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diff --git a/18885.txt b/18885.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8ae14b2 --- /dev/null +++ b/18885.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8867 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, August, 1878, by Various + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, August, 1878 + +Author: Various + +Release Date: July 22, 2006 [EBook #18885] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LIPPINCOTT'S MAGAZINE *** + + + + +Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Lesley Halamek and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + +=LIPPINCOTT'S MAGAZINE= + +OF + +_POPULAR LITERATURE AND SCIENCE_. + +AUGUST, 1878. + + * * * * * + +Footnote: Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1878, by +J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO., in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at +Washington. + + * * * * * + + + + +ALONG THE DANUBE. + +[Illustration: SOMENDRIA.] + + +Ada-Kale is a Turkish fortress which seems to spring directly from the +bosom of the Danube at a point where three curious and quarrelsome +races come into contact, and where the Ottoman thought it necessary to +have a foothold even in times of profound peace. To the traveller +from Western Europe no spectacle on the way to Constantinople was so +impressive as this ancient and picturesque fortification, suddenly +affronting the vision with its odd walls, its minarets, its red-capped +sentries, and the yellow sinister faces peering from balconies +suspended above the current. It was the first glimpse of the Orient +which one obtained; it appropriately introduced one to a domain which +is governed by sword and gun; and it was a pretty spot of color in the +midst of the severe and rather solemn scenery of the Danubian stream. +Ada-Kale is to be razed to the water's edge--so, at least, the treaty +between Russia and Turkey has ordained--and the Servian mountaineers +will no longer see the Crescent flag flying within rifle-shot of the +crags from which, by their heroic devotion in unequal battle, they +long ago banished it. + +The Turks occupying this fortress during the recent war evidently +relied upon Fate for their protection, for the walls of Ada-Kale are +within a stone's throw of the Roumanian shore, and every Mussulman +in the place could have been captured in twenty minutes. I passed by +there one morning on the road from Orsova, on the frontier of Hungary, +to Bucharest, and was somewhat amused to see an elderly Turk seated +in a small boat near the Roumanian bank fishing. Behind him were two +soldiers, who served as oarsmen, and rowed him gently from point to +point when he gave the signal. Scarcely six hundred feet from him +stood a Wallachian sentry, watching his movements in lazy, indifferent +fashion. And this was at the moment that the Turks were bombarding +Kalafat in Roumania from Widdin on the Bulgarian side of the Danube! +Such a spectacle could be witnessed nowhere save in this land, "where +it is always afternoon," where people at times seem to suspend +respiration because they are too idle to breathe, and where even a dog +will protest if you ask him to move quickly out of your path. The old +Turk doubtless fished in silence and calm until the end of the war, +for I never heard of the removal of either himself or his companions. + +The journeys by river and by rail from Lower Roumania to the romantic +and broken country surrounding Orsova are extremely interesting. The +Danube-stretches of shimmering water among the reedy lowlands--where +the only sign of life is a quaint craft painted with gaudy colors +becalmed in some nook, or a guardhouse built on piles driven into the +mud--are perhaps a trifle monotonous, but one has only to turn from +them to the people who come on board the steamer to have a rich fund +of enjoyment. Nowhere are types so abundant and various as on the +routes of travel between Bucharest and Rustchuk, or Pesth and +Belgrade. Every complexion, an extraordinary piquancy and variety of +costume, and a bewildering array of languages and dialects, are +set before the careful observer. As for myself, I found a special +enchantment in the scenery of the lower Danube--in the lonely inlets, +the wildernesses of young shoots in the marshes, the flights of +aquatic birds as the sound of the steamer was heard, the long tongues +of land on which the water-buffaloes lay huddled in stupid content, +the tiny hummocks where villages of wattled hovels were assembled. The +Bulgarian shore stands out in bold relief: Sistova, from the river, +is positively beautiful, but the now historical Simnitza seems only +a mud-flat. At night the boats touch upon the Roumanian side for +fuel--the Turks have always been too lazy and vicious to develop the +splendid mineral resources of Bulgaria--and the stout peasants and +their wives trundle thousands of barrows of coal along the swinging +planks. Here is raw life, lusty, full of rude beauty, but utterly +incult. The men and women appear to be merely animals gifted with +speech. The women wear almost no clothing: their matted hair drops +about their shapely shoulders as they toil at their burden, singing +meanwhile some merry chorus. Little tenderness is bestowed on these +creatures, and it was not without a slight twinge of the nerves that +I saw the huge, burly master of the boat's crew now and then bestow a +ringing slap with his open hand upon the neck or cheek of one of the +poor women who stumbled with her load or who hesitated for a moment to +indulge in abuse of a comrade. As the boat moved away these people, +dancing about the heaps of coal in the torchlight, looked not unlike +demons disporting in some gruesome nook of Enchanted Land. When they +were gypsies they did not need the aid of the torches: they were +sufficiently demoniacal without artificial aid. + +Kalafat and Turnu-Severinu are small towns which would never have been +much heard of had they not been in the region visited by the war. +Turnu-Severinu is noted, however, as the point where Severinus once +built a mighty tower; and not far from the little hamlet may still +be seen the ruins of Trajan's immemorial bridge. Where the Danube is +twelve hundred yards wide and nearly twenty feet deep, Apollodorus +of Damascus did not hesitate, at Trajan's command, to undertake the +construction of a bridge with twenty stone and wooden arches. He +builded well, for one or two of the stone piers still remain perfect +after a lapse of sixteen centuries, and eleven of them, more or less +ruined, are yet visible at low water. Apollodorus was a man of genius, +as his other work, the Trajan Column, proudly standing in Rome, amply +testifies. No doubt he was richly rewarded by Trajan for constructing +a work which, flanked as it was by noble fortifications, bound the +newly-captured Dacian colony to the Roman empire. What mighty men were +these Romans, who carved their way along the Danube banks, hewing +roads and levelling mountains at the same time that they engaged the +savages of the locality in daily battle! There were indeed giants in +those days. + +[Illustration: RUSTCHUK.] + +When Ada-Kale is passed, and pretty Orsova, lying in slumbrous quiet +at the foot of noble mountains, is reached, the last trace of Turkish +domination is left behind. In future years, if the treaty of San +Stefano holds, there will be little evidence of Ottoman lack of +civilization anywhere on the Danube, for the forts of the Turks will +gradually disappear, and the Mussulman cannot for an instant hold +his own among Christians where he has no military advantage. But at +Orsova, although the red fez and voluminous trousers are rarely seen, +the influence of Turkey is keenly felt. It is in these remote +regions of Hungary that the real rage against Russia and the burning +enthusiasm and sympathy for the Turks is most openly expressed. Every +cottage in the neighborhood is filled with crude pictures representing +events of the Hungarian revolution; and the peasants, as they look +upon those reminders of perturbed times, reflect that the Russians +were instrumental in preventing the accomplishment of their dearest +wishes. Here the Hungarian is eminently patriotic: he endeavors as +much as possible to forget that he and his are bound to the empire +of Austria, and he speaks of the German and the Slav who are his +fellow-subjects with a sneer. The people whom one encounters in that +corner of Hungary profess a dense ignorance of the German language, +but if pressed can speak it glibly enough. I won an angry frown and +an unpleasant remark from an innkeeper because I did not know that +Austrian postage-stamps are not good in Hungary. Such melancholy +ignorance of the simplest details of existence seemed to my host meet +subject for reproach. + +Orsova became an important point as soon as the Turks and Russians +were at war. The peasants of the Banat stared as they saw long lines +of travellers leaving the steamers which had come from Pesth and +Bazros, and invading the two small inns, which are usually more than +half empty. Englishmen, Russians, Austrian officers sent down to keep +careful watch upon the land, French and Prussian, Swiss and Belgian +military attaches and couriers, journalists, artists, amateur +army-followers, crowded the two long streets and exhausted the market. +Next came a hungry and thirsty mob of refugees from Widdin--Jews, +Greeks and gypsies--and these promenaded their variegated misery on +the river-banks from sunrise until sunset. Then out from Roumanian +land poured thousands of wretched peasants, bare-footed, bareheaded, +dying of starvation, fleeing from Turkish invasion, which, happily, +never assumed large proportions. These poor people slept on the +ground, content with the shelter of house-walls: they subsisted on +unripe fruits and that unfailing fund of mild tobacco which every male +being in all those countries invariably manages to secure. Walking +abroad in Orsova was no easy task, for one was constantly compelled to +step over these poor fugitives, who packed themselves into the sand at +noonday, and managed for a few hours before the cool evening breezes +came to forget their miseries. The vast fleet of river-steamers +belonging to the Austrian company was laid up at Orsova, and dozens +of captains, conversing in the liquid Slav or the graceful Italian or +guttural German, were for ever seated about the doors of the little +cafes smoking long cigars and quaffing beakers of the potent white +wine produced in Austrian vineyards. + +Opposite Orsova lie the Servian Mountains, bold, majestic, inspiring. +Their noble forests and the deep ravines between them are exquisite in +color when the sun flashes along their sides. A few miles below +the point where the Hungarian and Roumanian territories meet +the mountainous region declines into foot-hills, and then to an +uninteresting plain. The Orsovan dell is the culminating point of +all the beauty and grandeur of the Danubian hills. From one eminence +richly laden with vineyards I looked out on a fresh April morning +across a delicious valley filled with pretty farms and white cottages +and ornamented by long rows of shapely poplars. Turning to the right, +I saw Servia's barriers, shutting in from the cold winds the fat +lands of the interior; vast hillsides dotted from point to point with +peaceful villages, in the midst of which white churches with slender +spires arose; and to the left the irregular line of the Roumanian +peaks stood up, jagged and broken, against the horizon. Out from +Orsova runs a rude highway into the rocky and savage back-country. The +celebrated baths of Mehadia, the "hot springs" of the Austro-Hungarian +empire, are yearly frequented by three or four thousand sufferers, who +come from the European capitals to Temesvar, and are thence trundled +in diligences to the water-cure. But the railway is penetrating even +this far-off land, where once brigands delighted to wander, and +Temesvar and Bucharest will be bound together by a daily +"through-service" as regular as that between Pesth and Vienna. + +[Illustration: SISTOVA.] + +I sat one evening on the balcony of the diminutive inn known as "The +Hungarian Crown," watching the sunbeams on the broad current of the +Danube and listening to the ripple, the plash and the gurgle of the +swollen stream as it rushed impetuously against the banks. A group +of Servians, in canoes light and swift as those of Indians, had made +their way across the river, and were struggling vigorously to prevent +the current from carrying them below a favorable landing-place. These +tall, slender men, with bronzed faces and gleaming eyes, with their +round skull-caps, their gaudy jackets and ornamental leggings, bore +no small resemblance at a distance to certain of our North American +red-skins. Each man had a long knife in his belt, and from experience +I can say that a Servian knife is in itself a complete tool-chest. +With its one tough and keen blade one may skin a sheep, file a saw, +split wood, mend a wagon, defend one's self vigorously if need be, +make a buttonhole and eat one's breakfast. No Servian who adheres to +the ancient costume would consider himself dressed unless the crooked +knife hung from his girdle. Although the country-side along the Danube +is rough, and travellers are said to need protection among the Servian +hills, I could not discover that the inhabitants wore other weapons +than these useful articles of cutlery. Yet they are daring smugglers, +and sometimes openly defy the Hungarian authorities when discovered. +"Ah!" said Master Josef, the head-servant of the Hungarian Crown, +"many a good fight have I seen in mid-stream, the boats grappled +together, knives flashing, and our fellows drawing their pistols. All +that, too, for a few flasks of Negotin, which is a musty red, thick +wine that Heaven would forbid me to recommend to your honorable self +and companions so long as I put in the cellar the pearl dew of yonder +vineyards!" pointing to the vines of Orsova. + +While the Servians were anxiously endeavoring to land, and seemed to +be in imminent danger of upsetting, the roll of thunder was heard and +a few drops of rain fell with heavy plash. Master Josef forthwith +began making shutters fast and tying the curtains; "For now we _shall_ +have a wind!" quoth he. And it came. As by magic the Servian shore was +blotted out, and before me I could see little save the river, which +seemed transformed into a roaring and foaming ocean. The refugees, +the gypsies, the Jews, the Greeks, scampered in all directions. Then +tremendous echoes awoke among the hills. Peal after peal echoed and +re-echoed, until it seemed as if the cliffs must crack and crumble. +Sheets of rain were blown by the mischievous winds now full upon the +unhappy fugitives, or now descended with seemingly crushing force +on the Servians in their dancing canoes. Then came vivid lightning, +brilliant and instant glances of electricity, disclosing the forests +and hills for a moment, then seeming by their quick departure to +render the obscurity more painful than before. The fiery darts were +hurled by dozens upon the devoted trees, and the tall and graceful +stems were bent like reeds before the rushing of the blast. Cold swept +through the vale, and shadows seemed to follow it. Such contrast +with the luminous, lovely semi-tropical afternoon, in the dreamy +restfulness of which man and beast seemed settling into lethargy, was +crushing. It pained and disturbed the spirit. Master Josef, who never +lost an occasion to cross himself and to do a few turns on a little +rosary of amber beads, came and went in a kind of dazed mood while the +storm was at its height. Just as a blow was struck among the hills +which seemed to make the earth quiver to its centre, the varlet +approached and modestly inquired if the "honorable society"--myself +and chance companions--would visit that very afternoon the famous +chapel in which the crown of Hungary lies buried. I glanced curiously +at him, thinking that possibly the thunder had addled his brain. "Oh, +the honorable society may walk in sunshine all the way to the chapel +at five o'clock," he said with an encouraging grin. "These Danube +storms come and go as quickly as a Tsigane from a hen-roost. See! the +thunder has stopped its howling, and there is not a wink of lightning. +Even the raindrops are so few that one may almost walk between them." + +[Illustration: NICOPOLIS.] + +I returned to the balcony from which the storm had driven me, and was +gratified by the sight of the mountain-side studded with pearls, which +a faint glow in the sky was gently touching. The Danube roared and +foamed with malicious glee as the poor Servians were still whirled +about on the water. But presently, through the deep gorges and along +the sombre stream and over the vineyards, the rocks and the roofs of +humble cottages, stole a warm breeze, followed by dazzling sunlight, +which returned in mad haste to atone for the displeasure of the wind +and rain. In a few moments the refugees were again afield, spreading +their drenched garments on the wooden railings, and stalking about in +a condition narrowly approaching nakedness. A gypsy four feet high, +clad in a linen shirt and trousers so wide as to resemble petticoats, +strolled thoughtlessly on the bank singing a plaintive melody, and now +and then turning his brown face skyward as if to salute the sun. This +child of mysterious ancestry, this wanderer from the East, this robber +of roosts and cunning worker in metals, possessed nor hat nor shoes: +his naked breast and his unprotected arms must suffer cold at night, +yet he seemed wonderfully happy. The Jews and Greeks gave him scornful +glances, which he returned with quizzical, provoking smiles. At last +he threw himself down on a plank from which the generous sun was +rapidly drying the rain, and, coiling up as a dog might have done, he +was soon asleep. + +With a marine glass I could see distinctly every movement on the +Servian shore. Close to the water's edge nestled a small village of +neat white cottages. Around a little wharf hovered fifty or sixty +stout farmers, mounted on sturdy ponies, watching the arrival of the +Mercur, the Servian steamer from Belgrade and the Sava River. The +Mercur came puffing valiantly forward, as unconcerned as if no +whirlwind had swept across her path, although she must have been in +the narrow and dangerous canon of the "Iron Gates" when the blast +and the shower were most furious. On the roads leading down the +mountain-sides I saw long processions of squealing and grunting swine, +black, white and gray, all active and self-willed, fighting each other +for the right of way. Before each procession marched a swineherd +playing on a rustic pipe, the sounds from which primitive instrument +seemed to exercise Circean enchantment upon the rude flocks. It was +inexpressibly comical to watch the masses of swine after they had +been enclosed in the "folds"--huge tracts fenced in and provided with +shelters at the corners. Each herd knew its master, and as he passed +to and fro would salute him with a delighted squeal, which died away +into a series of disappointed and cynical groans as soon as the +porkers had discovered that no evening repast was to be offered them. +Good fare do these Servian swine find in the abundant provision +of acorns in the vast forests. The men who spend their lives in +restraining the vagabond instincts of these vulgar animals may perhaps +be thought a collection of brutal hinds; but, on the contrary, they +are fellows of shrewd common sense and much dignity of feeling. +Kara-George, the terror of the Turk at the beginning of this century, +the majestic character who won the admiration of Europe, whose genius +as a soldier was praised by Napoleon the Great, and who freed his +countrymen from bondage,--Kara-George was a swineherd in the woods of +the Schaumadia until the wind of the spirit fanned his brow and called +him from his simple toil to immortalize his homely name. + +Master Josef and his fellows in Orsova did not hate the Servians with +the bitterness manifested toward the Roumanians, yet they considered +them as aliens and as dangerous conspirators against the public weal. +"Who knows at what moment they may go over to the Russians?" was the +constant cry. And in process of time they went, but although Master +Josef had professed the utmost willingness to take up arms on such an +occasion, it does not appear that he did it, doubtless preferring, on +reflection, the quiet of his inn and his flask of white wine in the +courtyard rather than an excursion among the trans-Danubian hills and +the chances of an untoward fate at the point of a Servian knife. It +is not astonishing that the two peoples do not understand each other, +although only a strip of water separates their frontiers for a long +stretch; for the difference in language and in its written form is a +most effectual barrier to intercourse. The Servians learn something of +the Hungarian dialects, since they come to till the rich lands of the +Banat in the summer season. Bulgarians and Servians by thousands find +employment in Hungary in summer, and return home when autumn sets +in. But the dreams and ambitions of the two peoples have nothing in +common. Servia looks longingly to Slavic unification, and is anxious +to secure for herself a predominance in the new nation to be moulded +out of the old scattered elements: Hungary believes that the +consolidation of the Slavs would place her in a dangerous and +humiliating position, and conspires day and night to compass +exactly the reverse of Servian wishes. Thus the two countries are +theoretically at peace and practically at war. While the conflict of +1877 was in progress collisions between Servian and Hungarian were of +almost daily occurrence. + +The Hungarian's intolerance of the Slav does not proceed from unworthy +jealousy, but rather from an exaggerated idea of the importance of his +own country, and of the evils which might befall it if the old Serb +stock began to renew its ancient glory. In corners of Hungary, such as +Orsova, the peasant imagines that his native land is the main world, +and that the rest of Europe is an unnecessary and troublesome fringe +around the edges of it. There is a story of a gentleman in Pesth who +went to a dealer in maps and inquired for a _globus_ of Hungary, +showing that he imagined it to be the whole round earth. + +[Illustration: THE DANUBE AT TRAJAN'S BRIDGE.] + +So fair were the land and the stream after the storm that I lingered +until sunset gazing out over river and on Servian hills, and did not +accept Josef's invitation to visit the chapel of the Hungarian crown +that evening. But next morning, before the sun was high, I wandered +alone in the direction of the Roumanian frontier, and by accident came +upon the chapel. It is a modest structure in a nook surrounded by tall +poplars, and within is a simple chapel with Latin inscriptions. Here +the historic crown reposes, now that there is no longer any use for it +at Presburg, the ancient capital. Here it was brought by pious hands +after the troubles between Austria and Hungary were settled. During +the revolution the sacred bauble was hidden by the command of noblemen +to whom it had been confided, and the servitors who concealed it at +the behest of their masters were slain, lest in an indiscreet moment +they might betray the secret. For thousands of enthusiasts this tiny +chapel is the holiest of shrines, and should trouble come anew upon +Hungary in the present perturbed times, the crown would perhaps +journey once more. + +It seems pitiful that the railway should ever invade this +out-of-the-way corner of Europe. But it is already crawling through +the mountains: hundreds of Italian laborers are putting down the +shining rails in woods and glens where no sounds save the song of +birds or the carol of the infrequent passer-by have heretofore been +heard. For the present, however, the old-fashioned, comfortless +diligence keeps the roads: the beribboned postilion winds his merry +horn, and as the afternoon sun is getting low the dusty, antique +vehicle rattles up to the court of the inn, the guard gets down, dusts +the leather casing of the gun which now-a-days he is never compelled +to use: then he touches his square hat, ornamented with a feather, to +the maids and men of the hostelry. When the mails are claimed, the +horses refreshed and the stage is covered with its leathern hood, +postilion and guard sit down together in a cool corner under the +gallery in the courtyard and crack various small flasks of wine. They +smoke their porcelain pipes imported from Vienna with the air of men +of the world who have travelled and who could tell you a thing or two +if they liked. They are never tired of talking of Mehadia, which is +one of their principal stations. The sad-faced nobleman, followed by +the decorous old man-servant in fantastic Magyar livery, who arrived +in the diligence, has been to the baths. The master is vainly seeking +cure, comes every year, and always supplies postilion and guard with +the money to buy flasks of wine. This the postilion tells me and my +fellows, and suggests that the "honorable society" should follow the +worthy nobleman's example. No sooner is it done than postilion and +guard kiss our hands; which is likewise an evidence that they have +travelled, are well met with every stranger and all customs, and know +more than they say. + +The Romans had extensive establishments at Mehadia, which they called +the "Baths of Hercules," and it is in memory of this that a statue +of the good giant stands in the square of the little town. Scattered +through the hills, many inscriptions to Hercules, to Mercury and +to Venus have been found during the ages. The villages on the road +thither are few and far between, and are inhabited by peasants +decidedly Dacian in type. It is estimated that a million and a half +of Roumanians are settled in Hungary, and in this section they are +exceedingly numerous. Men and women wear showy costumes, quite +barbaric and uncomfortable. The women seem determined to wear as +few garments as possible, and to compensate for lack of number by +brightness of coloring. In many a pretty face traces of gypsy blood +may be seen. This vagabond taint gives an inexpressible charm to +a face for which the Hungarian strain has already done much. The +coal-black hair and wild, mutinous eyes set off to perfection the pale +face and exquisitely thin lips, the delicate nostrils and beautifully +moulded chin. Angel or devil? queries the beholder. Sometimes he is +constrained to think that the possessor of such a face has the mingled +souls of saint and siren. The light undertone of melancholy which +pervades gypsy beauty, gypsy music, gypsy manners, has an extremely +remarkable fascination for all who perceive it. Even when it is almost +buried beneath ignorance and animal craft, it is still to be found +in the gypsy nature after diligent search. This strange race seems +overshadowed by the sorrow of some haunting memory. Each individual +belonging to the Tsiganes whom I saw impressed me as a fugitive from +Fate. To look back was impossible; of the present he was careless; the +future tempted him on. In their music one now and then hears hints of +a desire to return to some far-off and half-forgotten land. But this +is rare. + +There are a large number of "civilized gypsies," so called, in the +neighborhood of Orsova. I never saw one of them without a profound +compassion for him, so utterly unhappy did he look in ordinary attire. +The musicians who came nightly to play on the lawn in front of the +Hungarian Crown inn belonged to these civilized Tsiganes. They had +lost all the freedom of gesture, the proud, half-savage stateliness of +those who remained nomadic and untrammelled by local law and custom. +The old instinct was in their music, but sometimes there drifted +into it the same mixture of saint and devil which I had seen in the +"composite" faces. + +[Illustration: BOATS ON THE DANUBE.] + +As soon as supper was set forth, piping hot and flanked by flagons of +beer and wine, on the lawn, and the guests had assembled to partake +of the good cheer, while yet the afterglow lingered along the Danube, +these dusky musicians appeared and installed themselves in a corner. +The old stream's murmur could not drown the piercing and pathetic +notes of the violin, the gentle wail of the guzla or the soft +thrumming of the rude tambourine. Little poetry as a spectacled and +frosty Austrian officer might have in his soul, that little must have +been awakened by the songs and the orchestral performances of the +Tsiganes as the sun sank low. The dusk began to creep athwart the +lawn, and a cool breeze fanned the foreheads of the listeners. When +the light was all gone, these men, as if inspired by the darkness, +sometimes improvised most angelic melody. There was never any loud +or boisterous note, never any direct appeal to the attention. I +invariably forgot the singers and players, and the music seemed a +part of the harmony of Nature. While the pleasant notes echoed in the +twilight, troops of jaunty young Hungarian soldiers, dressed in red +hose, dark-green doublets and small caps sometimes adorned with +feathers, sauntered up and down the principal street; the refugees +huddled in corners and listened with delight; the Austrian officials +lumbered by, pouring clouds of smoke from their long, strong and +inevitable cigars; and the dogs forgot their perennial quarrel for a +few instants at a time. + +The dogs of Orsova and of all the neighboring country have many of the +characteristics of their fellow-creatures in Turkey. Orsova is divided +into "beats," which are thoroughly and carefully patrolled night and +day by bands of dogs who recognize the limits of their domain and +severely resent intrusion. In front of the Hungarian Crown a large +dog, aided by a small yellow cur and a black spaniel mainly made up +of ears and tail, maintained order. The afternoon quiet was generally +disturbed about four o'clock by the advent of a strange canine, who, +with that expression of extreme innocence which always characterizes +the animal that knows he is doing wrong, would venture on to the +forbidden ground. A low growl in chorus from the three guardians was +the inevitable preliminary warning. The new-comer usually seemed much +surprised at this, and gave an astonished glance: then, wagging +his tail merrily, as much as to say, "Nonsense! I must have been +mistaken," he approached anew. One of the trio of guardians thereupon +sallied forth to meet him, followed by the others a little distance +behind. If the strange dog showed his teeth, assumed a defiant +attitude and seemed inclined to make his way through any number of +enemies, the trio held a consultation, which, I am bound to say, +almost invariably resulted in a fight. The intruder would either fly +yelping, or would work his way across the interdicted territory by +means of a series of encounters, accompanied by the most terrific +barking, snapping and shrieking, and by a very considerable effusion +of blood. The person who should interfere to prevent a dog-fight in +Orsova would be regarded as a lunatic. Sometimes a large white dog, +accompanied by two shaggy animals resembling wolves so closely that it +was almost impossible to believe them guardians of flocks of sheep, +passed by the Hungarian Crown unchallenged, but these were probably +tried warriors whose valor was so well known that they were no longer +questioned anywhere. + +The gypsies have in their wagons or following in their train small +black dogs of temper unparalleled for ugliness. It is impossible to +approach a Tsigane tent or wagon without encountering a swarm of these +diminutive creatures, whose rage is not only amusing, but sometimes +rather appalling to contemplate. Driving rapidly by a camp one morning +in a farmer's cart drawn by two stout horses adorned with jingling +bells, I was followed by a pack of these dark-skinned animals. The +bells awoke such rage within them that they seemed insane under its +influence. As they leaped and snapped around me, I felt like some +traveller in a Russian forest pursued by hungry wolves. A dog scarcely +six inches high, and but twice as long, would spring from the ground +as if a pound of dynamite had exploded beneath him, and would make a +desperate effort to throw himself into the wagon. Another, howling +in impotent anger, would jump full at a horse's throat, would roll +beneath the feet of the team, but in some miraculous fashion would +escape unhurt, and would scramble upon a bank to try again. It was a +real relief when the discouraged pack fell away. Had I shot one of the +animals, the gypsies would have found a way to avenge the death of +their enterprising though somewhat too zealous camp-follower. Animals +everywhere on these border-lines of the Orient are treated with much +more tenderness than men and women are. The grandee who would scowl +furiously in this wild region of the Banat if the peasants did not +stand by the roadside and doff their hats in token of respect and +submission as he whirled by in his carriage, would not kick a dog out +of his way, and would manifest the utmost tenderness for his horses. + +[Illustration: Orsova.] + +Much as the Hungarian inhabitants of the Banat hate the Roumanians, +they do not fail to appreciate the commercial advantages which will +follow on the union of the two countries by rail. Pretty Orsova may in +due time become a bustling town filled with grain- and coal-depots and +with small manufactories. The railway from Verciorova on the frontier +runs through the large towns Pitesti and Craiova on its way to +Bucharest. It is a marvellous railroad: it climbs hills, descends into +deep gullies, and has as little of the air-line about it as a great +river has, for the contractors built it on the principle of "keeping +near the surface," and they much preferred climbing ten high mountains +to cutting one tunnel. Craiova takes its name, according to a somewhat +misty legend, from John Assan, who was one of the Romano-Bulgarian +kings, Craiova being a corruption of _Crai Ivan_ ("King John"). This +John was the same who drank his wine from a cup made out of the skull +of the unlucky emperor Baldwin I. The old bans of Craiova gave their +title to the Roumanian silver pieces now known as _bani_. Slatina, +farther down the line, on the river Altu (the _Aluta_ of the +ancients), is a pretty town, where a proud and brave community love to +recite to the stranger the valorous deeds of their ancestors. It is +the centre from which have spread out most of the modern revolutionary +movements in Roumania. "Little Wallachia," in which Slatina stands, is +rich in well-tilled fields and uplands covered with fat cattle: it is +as fertile as Kansas, and its people seemed to me more agreeable and +energetic than those in and around Bucharest. + +He who clings to the steamers plying up and down the Danube sees much +romantic scenery and many curious types, but he loses all the real +charm of travel in these regions. The future tourist on his way to or +from Bulgaria and the battle-fields of the "new crusade" will be wise +if he journeys leisurely by farm-wagon--he will not be likely to find +a carriage--along the Hungarian bank of the stream. I made the journey +in April, when in that gentle southward climate the wayside was +already radiant with flowers and the mellow sunshine was unbroken by +cloud or rain. There were discomfort and dust, but there was a rare +pleasure in the arrival at a quaint inn whose exterior front, boldly +asserting itself in the bolder row of house-fronts in a long village +street, was uninviting enough, but the interior of which was charming. +In such a hostelry I always found the wharfmaster, in green coat and +cap, asleep in an arm-chair, with the burgomaster and one or two idle +landed proprietors sitting near him at a card-table, enveloped in such +a cloud of smoke that one could scarcely see the long-necked flasks of +white wine which they were rapidly emptying. The host was a massive +man with bulbous nose and sleepy eyes: he responded to all questions +with a stare and the statement that he did not know, and seemed +anxious to leave everything in doubt until the latest moment possible. +His daughter, who was brighter and less dubious in her responses than +her father, was a slight girl with lustrous black eyes, wistful lips, +a perfect form, and black hair covered with a linen cloth that the +dust might not come near its glossy threads. When she made her +appearance, flashing out of a huge dark room which was stone paved and +arched overhead, and in which peasants sat drinking sour beer, she +seemed like a ray of sunshine in the middle of night. But there was +more dignity about her than is to be found in most sunbeams: she was +modest and civil in answer, but understood no compliments. There was +something of the princess-reduced-in-circumstances in her demeanor. A +royal supper could she serve, and the linen which she spread on the +small wooden table in the back courtyard smelled of lavender. I took +my dinners, after the long days' rides, in inns which commanded +delicious views of the Danube--points where willows overhung the +rushing stream, or where crags towered above it, or where it flowed +in smooth yet resistless might through plains in which hundreds of +peasants were toiling, their red-and-white costumes contrasting +sharply with the brilliant blue of the sky and the tender green of the +foliage. + +[Illustration: BELGRADE, FROM SEMLIN.] + +If the inns were uniformly cleanly and agreeable, as much could not +be said for the villages, which were sometimes decidedly dirty. The +cottages of the peasants--that is, of the agricultural laborers--were +windowless to a degree which led me to look for a small- and dull-eyed +race, but the eloquent orbs of youths and maidens in all this Banat +land are rarely equalled in beauty. I found it in my heart to object +to the omnipresent swine. These cheerful animals were sometimes so +domesticated that they followed their masters and mistresses afield in +the morning. In this section of Hungary, as indeed in most parts of +Europe, the farm-houses are all huddled together in compact villages, +and the lands tilled by the dwellers in these communities extend for +miles around them. At dawn the procession of laborers goes forth, +and at sunset it returns. Nothing can give a better idea of rural +simplicity and peace than the return of the peasants of a hamlet +at eventide from their vineyards and meadows. Just as the sun was +deluging the broad Danube with glory before relinquishing the current +to the twilight's shades I came, in the soft April evening, into the +neighborhood of Drenkova. A tranquil afterglow was here and there +visible near the hills, which warded off the sun's passionate farewell +glances at the vines and flowers. Beside the way, on the green banks, +sat groups of children, clad with paradisiacal simplicity, awaiting +their fathers and mothers. At a vineyard's hedge a sweet girl, tall, +stately and melancholy, was twining a garland in the cap of a stout +young fellow who rested one broad hand lightly upon her shoulder. Old +women, bent and wrinkled, hobbled out from the fields, getting help +from their sons or grandsons. Sometimes I met a shaggy white horse +drawing a cart in which a dozen sonsie lasses, their faces browned by +wind and their tresses blown back from their brows in most bewitching +manner by the libertine breeze, were jolting homeward, singing as +they went. The young men in their loose linen garments, with their +primitive hoes and spades on their shoulders, were as goodly specimens +of manly strength and beauty as one could wish to look upon. It hurt +me to see them stand humbly ranged in rows as I passed. But it was +pleasant to note the fervor with which they knelt around the cross +rearing its sainted form amid the waving grasses. They knew nothing +of the outer world, save that from time to time the emperor claimed +certain of their number for his service, and that perhaps their lot +might lead them to the great city of Buda-Pesth. Everywhere as far as +the eye could reach the land was cultivated with greatest care, +and plenty seemed the lot of all. The peasant lived in an ugly and +windowless house because his father and grandfather had done so before +him, not because it was necessary. It was odd to see girls tall as +Dian, and as fair, bending their pretty bodies to come out of the +contemptible little apertures in the peasant-houses called "doors." + +Drenkova is a long street of low cottages, with here and there a +two-story mansion to denote that the proprietors of the land reside +there. As I approached the entrance to this street I saw a most +remarkable train coming to meet me. One glance told me that it was a +large company of gypsies who had come up from Roumania, and were going +northward in search of work or plunder. My driver drew rein, and +we allowed the swart Bohemians to pass on--a courtesy which was +gracefully acknowledged with a singularly sweet smile from the driver +of the first cart. There were about two hundred men and women in +this wagon-train, and I verily believe that there were twice as many +children. Each cart, drawn by a small Roumanian pony, contained two or +three families huddled together, and seemingly lost in contemplation +of the beautiful sunset, for your real gypsy is a keen admirer of +Nature and her charms. Some of the women were intensely hideous: age +had made them as unattractive as in youth they had been pretty; others +were graceful and well-formed. Many wore but a single garment. The men +were wilder than any that I had ever before seen: their matted hair, +their thick lips and their dark eyes gave them almost the appearance +of negroes. One or two of them had been foraging, and bore sheeps' +heads and hares which they had purchased or "taken" in the village. +They halted as soon as they had passed me, and prepared to go into +camp; so I waited a little to observe them. During the process of +arranging the carts for the night one of the women became enraged +at the father of her brood because he would not aid her in the +preparation of the simple tent under which the family was to repose. +The woman ran to him, clenching her fist and screaming forth invective +which, I am convinced, had I understood it and had it been directed at +me, I should have found extremely disagreeable. After thus lashing the +culprit with language for some time, she broke forth into screams and +danced frantically around him. He arose, visibly disturbed, and I +fancied that his savage nature would come uppermost, and that he might +be impelled to give her a brutal beating. But he, on the contrary, +advanced leisurely toward her and spat upon the ground with an +expression of extreme contempt. She seemed to feel this much more than +she would have felt a blow, and her fury redoubled. She likewise spat; +he again repeated the contemptuous act; and after both had gratified +the anger which was consuming them, they walked off in different +directions. The battle was over, and I was not sorry to notice a few +minutes later that _paterfamilias_ had thought better of his conduct, +and was himself spreading the tent and setting forth his wandering +Lares and Penates. + +A few hundred yards from the point where these wanderers had settled +for the night I found some rude huts in which other gypsies were +residing permanently. These huts were mere shelters placed against +steep banks or hedges, and within there was no furniture save one +or two blankets, a camp-kettle and some wicker baskets. Young girls +twelve or thirteen years of age crouched naked about a smouldering +fire. They did not seem unhappy or hungry; and none of these strange +people paid any attention to me as I drove on to the inn, which, oddly +enough, was at some distance from the main village, hard by the Danube +side, in a gully between the mountains, where coal-barges lay moored. +The Servian Mountains, covered from base to summit with dense forests, +cast a deep gloom over the vale. In a garden on a terrace behind the +inn, by the light of a flickering candle, I ate a frugal dinner, and +went to bed much impressed by the darkness, in such striking contrast +to the delightful and picturesque scenes through which I had wandered +all day. + +[Illustration: THE IRON GATES] + +But I speedily forgot this next morning, when the landlord informed +me that, instead of toiling over the road along the crags to Orsova, +whither I was returning, I could embark on a tug-boat bound for that +cheerful spot, and could thus inspect the grand scenery of the Iron +Gates from the river. The swift express-boats which in time of peace +run from Vienna to Rustchuk whisk the traveller so rapidly through +these famous defiles that he sees little else than a panorama of high +rocky walls. But the slow-moving and clumsy tug, with its train of +barges attached, offers better facilities to the lover of natural +beauty. We had dropped down only a short distance below Drenkova +before we found the river-path filled with eddies, miniature +whirlpools, denoting the vicinity of the gorges into which the great +current is compressed. These whirlpools all have names: one is called +the "Buffalo;" a second, Kerdaps; a third is known as the "Devourer." +The Turks have a healthy awe of this passage, which in old times was a +terrible trial to these stupid and always inefficient navigators. For +three or four hours we ran in the shade of mighty walls of porphyry +and granite, on whose tops were forests of oaks and elms. High up on +cliffs around which the eagles circle, and low in glens where one +sometimes sees a bear swimming, the sun threw a flood of mellow glory. +I could fancy that the veins of red porphyry running along the face +of the granite were blood-stains, the tragic memorials of ancient +battles. For, wild and inaccessible as this region seems, it has been +fought over and through in sternest fashion. Perched on a little +promontory on the Servian side is the tiny town of Poretch, where +the brave shepherds and swineherds fought the Turk, against whose +oppression they had risen, until they were overwhelmed by numbers, and +their leader, Hadji Nikolos, lost his head. The Austrians point out +with pride the cave on the tremendous flank of Mount Choukourou where, +two centuries ago, an Austrian general at the head of seven hundred +men, all that was left to him of a goodly army, sustained a three +months' siege against large Turkish forces. This cave is perched high +above the road at a point where it absolutely commands it, and the +government of to-day, realizing its importance, has had it fortified +and furnished with walls pierced by loopholes. Trajan fought his way +through these defiles in the very infancy of the Christian era; and in +memory of his first splendid campaign against the Dacians he carved +in the solid rock the letters, some of which are still visible, and +which, by their very grandiloquence, offer a mournful commentary on +the fleeting nature of human greatness. Little did he think when his +eyes rested lovingly on this inscription, beginning-- + + IMP. CAES. D. NERVAE FILIUS NERVA. TRAJANUS. GERM. PONT. MAXIMUS. + +--that Time with profane hand would wipe out the memory of many of his +glories and would undo all the work that he had done. + +On we drifted, through huge landlocked lakes, out of which there +seemed no issue until we chanced upon a miraculous corner where there +was an outlet frowned upon by angry rocks; on to the "Caldron," as the +Turks called the most imposing portion of the gorge; on through an +amphitheatre where densely-wooded mountains on either side were +reflected in smooth water; on beneath masses that appeared about to +topple, and over shallows where it looked as if we must be grounded; +on round a bluff which had hidden the sudden opening of the valley +into a broad sweep, and which had hindered us from seeing Orsova the +Fair nestling closely to her beloved mountains. + +EDWARD KING. + + + + +THE PARIS EXPOSITION OF 1878. + + +I.--BUILDINGS AND GROUNDS. + +[Illustration: THE TROCADERO AND GROUNDS.] + + +It is customary to speak of things by comparison, and the question is +constantly propounded here, as it will be to returned Americans: "How +does the Exposition compare with the Centennial of 1876?" This is not +to be answered by vague generalities nor by sweeping statements. + +It must of course be true that a great nation could not fail to make +interesting an object upon which it has lavished money and which has +obtained the co-operation of the principal foreign nations. So much +is true equally of Philadelphia and Paris, and the merits of each are +such that comparisons may be instituted which shall be derogatory to +neither. + +The scale of each is immense, and the buildings of both well filled +and overflowing into numerous annexes. Fairmount had the advantage of +breadth of ground for all comers. The Champ de Mars is but little +over one hundred acres in area, while the portion of Fairmount Park +conceded to the Exposition was two hundred and sixty acres. + +The Champ de Mars is simply crowded with buildings, and is hemmed in +by houses except at the end where it abuts upon the Seine. The space +between the river and the main building is the only breathing-ground +on that side of the river, the only place large enough for a band to +play in the open air with allowance for a moderate crowd of listeners; +and even this portion has a far larger number of detached houses than +elegance or convenience of view would dictate. It was otherwise in +Philadelphia, where the ample room gave a sensation of freedom, and +the wide lawns, and even rustic hollows, permitted rambles, picnic +lunches and parties. Herein consists one of the most striking features +of dissimilarity between the Philadelphia and Paris expositions. The +former had plenty of room--the latter has insufficient. The former, +with the exception of the Main and Machinery Buildings, with a +few adjuncts, and the Art-Gallery, a little retired from the Main +Building, had its structures dotted over a wide expanse bordering its +lakes or along an encircling drive. For want of any other sufficient +opportunity to display the architecture of the countries assembled, +one of the interior facades of the Paris building has a series of +characteristic house-fronts looking upon an allee of but fifty feet in +width, which is dignified by the title of "The Street of Nations." + +This tight packing has, however, one compensation: it has permitted a +degree of finish to the grounds far superior to what was possible at +Philadelphia. All the space inside the enclosure is admirably laid out +in walks and parterres, and the two open places between the principal +buildings and the Seine display a truly beautiful and picturesque +garden, with winding walks, ponds, fountains, artificial mounds with +clumps of trees and evergreens, grottos, statues, trickling rivulets +with ferns and mosses, cozy dells with little cascades, and the walks +in the more open spots bordered with charming flowers and plants of +rich leafage. The lawns are something marvellous in the speed with +which they have been created. Thousands of tons, as it seems, of rich +mould have been deposited and levelled or laid upon the swelling +tumuli which border the more open space, and the grass grows with +denseness and vigor under the stimulating treatment of phosphates, its +greenness mocking the emerald, and forming a most vivid setting for +the darker leaves of the tree-rhododendrons, whose globular masses of +bloom look like balls of fire. + +After all, it is only justice to mention two things at Philadelphia +which render it memorable among exhibitions, and which, I observe in +conversation with foreigners who visited it and are here now, made a +great and lasting impression. I do not mean that it had but two, but +these are so frequently referred to that it is fair to cite them +specially, even at the risk of a little repetition as to the +first--namely, the wide area and beautiful situation, with the views +of hill and river; the means of approach by carriage-drives through +the lovely Park, those so disposed being able to drive for miles along +the water-side, in the groves and to various commanding points of view +on their way to such of the remoter entrances as they might elect; +the railway, which enabled one not only to see the grounds without +fatigue, but while resting from the pedestrian work of the interiors +of the buildings; the sense of comfort in being able to retire for a +while to sylvan or floral retreats to digest the thoughts and rest +from seeing. Secondly, the various and ample accommodations offered +to the public--the postal and telegraph facilities; the Department +of Public Comfort; the lavatories and retiring-rooms so abundantly +furnished. A Moresque gentleman in turban who was in Philadelphia +fairly rubbed his hands as he referred to the lavish opportunities for +washing which were freely given in Philadelphia, and contrasted them +with the state of things here, where it costs ten cents to wash your +hands, and the supply of water is but meagre at that. But he is an +African, you know, and had learned to appreciate water, and plenty of +it, in a land where the washing of the face, hands and feet is among +the first civilities offered to a stranger. + +A few figures, dry enough in themselves if there were nothing more, +will serve as a means of comparison of the relative spaces under +cover. The building on the Champ de Mars is stated officially to +be 650 metres long by 350 metres broad, which, reduced to our +measurement, will give 2,447,536 square feet. Deducting 150,000 feet +for two enclosed alleys, the area under roof will be 2,297,536 feet. +The area of the five principal buildings at the Centennial Exhibition +was: + + Square feet. + +Main Building.................... 872,320 + +Machinery Hall.................. 504,720 + +Art-Gallery..................... 76,650 + +Agricultural Hall................ 442,800 + +Horticultural Hall............... 73,919 + _________ + 1,970,409 + +So that the difference in favor of Paris is 327,127 feet. In round +numbers, the Paris Exposition building is one-fifth larger than the +united areas of the five principal buildings at the Centennial. +Without making a close calculation of the areas of the annexes and +detached buildings either of Philadelphia or Paris, I am disposed to +think that the 1876 Exhibition was not in excess of the present one in +this respect. Either exceeds, both in the main buildings and the swarm +of detached structures, any preceding exhibitions. The difference +between the Paris exhibitions of 1867 and 1878 is as 153 is to 240: +the London building of 1862 would bear to both the proportion of 92, +without any important annexes. + +The high ground on the right bank of the Seine is occupied by the +Trocadero Palace, which faces that on the Champ de Mars, each building +being about five hundred yards from the bank of the river, which flows +in so deep a depression that it is visible from neither building, and +the grounds between the two appear to be continuous, though the bridge +suggests the contrary. + +The cascade in front of the Trocadero occupies the site of the old +steps by which the steep hill was ascended, but the ground nearer to +the Seine has been so raised that the river-roads on each side run +in subways spanned by bridges, thus permitting free use of the great +thoroughfares without impeding communication between the two portions +of the Exposition. Indeed, they appear as one viewed in either +direction, notwithstanding the intervening streets and wide and rapid +river. + +The change in the shape of the Trocadero hill to bring it into a +symmetrical position in front of the Champ de Mars has required the +quarrying of twenty-four thousand cubic metres of rock, leaving a +rough scarp on the northern edge quarried into steps, walks and +grottos, with flowers, ferns and mosses cunningly planted on the ledge +and creepers on the walls. + +The Trocadero Palace is the most striking architectural feature of the +Exposition. Standing on a level one hundred and six feet above +the Quai de Billy and overlooking the city of Paris, the dome and +glittering minarets of the building are visible from many miles' +distance. It is not easy to describe its architecture, though it is +called "half Moorish, half Renaissance;" which is not very definite. +It has a large rotunda capable of accommodating seven thousand +persons, and the river-front has two spacious corridors on as +many stories. The central building is flanked by two tall square +campaniles, and from its sides extend long wings which curve toward +the river: these have colonnades and terraces in front overlooking +the garden, its picturesque and grotesque cottages and pavilions, its +fountains and its parterres of gay flowers. + +The Trocadero has been purchased by the town council of Paris, and is +to be a permanent structure, its flanking salons, forty-two feet wide, +being known as "Galeries de l'Art Retrospective." Its collection is +to form a history of civilization, and will probably include the +Egyptian, Assyrian and similar collections from the Louvre, as well as +the Ethnological, which is at St. Germain. It is designed to represent +in chronological order ancient and historic art, both liberal and +mechanical, with the furniture, arms and tools of the Middle Ages and +Renaissance, arms, implements and fabrics from the East, Africa and +Oceanica, and a collection of musical instruments of all ages and +countries. This is an ambitious programme, but will no doubt be well +accomplished. Its general color is that of the beautiful stone of this +region, a delicate cream. The uniformity is broken by great boldness +and variety in the structural form of the building, and by its +pillars, deep colonnades and heavy cornices, giving shadows which +prevent monotony of tint. + +While artists and architects disagree like the proverbial doctors, and +purists shudder at the jumble of orders, periods and nationalities, a +tyro may well hesitate. An opinion of the building will no more suit +everybody than does the building itself; but one cannot entirely +forfeit one's reputation for taste, for each will find some agreeing +judgments. All must acknowledge that it has a gala air. Its central +dome, tall minarets and wings widespread toward the river crown the +height and seem to foster the beauties they partly enclose. + +The circular corridor of the rotunda is surmounted by the Muses and +other figures typical of the future purposes of the building. The +rotunda-walls are themselves castellated, the towers being interplaced +with windows of Saracenic arched form. The beton pavement of the +corridors and balcony is made of annular fragments, facets upward, +of black, red, white and slate-colored marbles, feldspar and other +stones. It is as hard as natural rock and as smooth as half-polished +marble. A tessellated fret pattern is made along the borders of the +corridor floor, consisting of triple rows of smooth cubes of marble +inserted in the cement. The square balusters are of red-mottled +marble, with base and entablature of dull rose. The square corner +pillars support figures allegorizing the six divisions of the earth. + +The vestibules at the sides of the tower are open east and west for +the passage to and from the garden, and at the sides have doors which +admit to the Grande Salle and the flanking galleries respectively. The +interior red scagliola columns of the vestibule are in pairs, with +white bases and capitals, the latter combining the lotus-leaf with the +volute. The soffits of the ceiling have panels of yellow with orange +border, contrasting with iron beams painted a chocolate brown. + +The uniformity of the long and curved colonnades which form the wings +of the building is broken by square porticoes, which have entrances to +the galleries and small terraces in front, with steps leading to the +garden. The wall back of the white pillars of this long promenade +is painted of a warm but not glaring red. The roof is of tile and +skylight. The base of the colonnade beneath the balustrade and pillars +is a rough concrete wall hidden by a sloping bank of evergreens, +upon which the eye rests pleasantly amid so much wall-space and +architectural decoration. + +In front of the corridor of the rotunda is a projecting balcony, +with six gigantic female figures on the corners of its balustrade +representing Europe, Asia, North and South America, Africa and +Australia. These statues are of metal gilt, and typify by countenance +and accompanying emblems the portions of the globe they represent. +Europe is an armed figure with sword: at her side are the caduceus, +olive-branch, books and easel. Asia has a spear and a couch with +elephant heads. Africa is a negress, with the characteristic +grass-rope basket containing dates. North America is an Indian, but +the civilization of the land is indicated by an anchor, beehive and +cog-wheel. Australia is a gin, with a waddy, boomerang and kangaroo. +South America sits on a cotton-bale, has a condor by her side, and at +her feet are tropical fruits--pineapples, bananas and brazil-nuts. + +The balustrade of the balcony is of a light marble with faint red +mottling, and in front of it is a boiling pool of water at the level +of the hand-rail. A large volume of water overflows the curved edge of +this pool and falls twenty feet into a basin beneath, the first of a +series of nine whose overflows in successive steps form the cascade +technically known as a "chateau d'eau," the finest of which +description of ornamental waterworks is at the Chateau St. Cloud, one +of the mementos of the fatal luxury which precipitated the Revolution +of 1789. The cascade of St. Cloud plays once a month for half an +hour--that at the Exposition during the whole day. From one jet at +St. Cloud issue five thousand gallons per minute: the supply at the +Exposition is twenty-four thousand cubic feet per hour. Most of +this water runs over the edge of the balcony-pool, and the fall of +fifty-six cubic feet per second a distance of twenty feet creates no +mean roar and mist in the archway beneath the balcony, where visitors +walk behind the falls and look through the sheet of water. It is not +fair to compare at all points the cascades of the Exposition and St. +Cloud. The amount of water may probably not be greatly different, but +the fantastic profusion of spiratory objects and long succession of +overflow basins and urns in the works at the chateau has no +parallel in those of the Trocadero. The cascades of St. Cloud are +disappointing: the object should be to add to landscape effect by +water in motion, and the principle is entirely missed when the +water is made a mere accessory to a series of stone steps, jars +and monsters. Steps are made to walk upon, jars to hold water. An +interminable series of either with water poured over them is not the +work of a genius. If the first suggestion to the mind be that a thing +is a stairway, the fact that it is made too wet to walk upon does not +constitute it a beautiful cascade. A row of jars on pedestals around a +grass-plat has a pretty effect, because they do or may hold flowers, +but to set several rows of them on a hillside and turn on the water is +not art. As an admirable illustration of fantasy well wrought out the +Fountain of Latona at Versailles may be cited. There Latona, having +appealed to Jupiter against the inhabitants of Argos, who had deprived +her of water, is deluged by jets from the unfortunates, who appear in +various degrees of transformation into frogs. + +[Illustration: THE ENGLISH QUARTER, ON INTERNATIONAL AVENUE.] + +The cascade of the Trocadero has nothing meretricious about it. It is, +like the building of which it is the finest ornament, of Jura marble, +while much of the adjacent work is of artificial stone so admirably +made that one cannot tell the difference, and is disposed to give the +preference to the latter as evincing greater ingenuity than the mere +patient chiselling of the quarry-stone. The pools are symmetrical, in +conformity to the style of their surroundings, their overflows curved, +the successive falls being about two feet after the first dash nine +hundred and twenty feet from the balcony level. Each side of the +cascade is flanked by six small pools in which are spouting and spray +jets. The course ends in a pool which may be described as square, with +circular bays on three of its sides. In this are one large jet and two +smaller ones, which are themselves beautiful and keep the surface in +a pleasant ripple. The corner pillars are crowned by colossal gilt +figures of animals, supposed to represent what we were used to call +the "four quarters of the earth"--Europe, Asia, Africa and America, as +the books had it before America had attained any prominence in public +estimation. These are typified by a horse, an elephant, a rhinoceros +and a bull, the latter probably a tribute to our bison, but not much +like him. These face the four winds, so to speak, and do indeed more +nearly, as they are set obliquely, than do the grounds and buildings, +the length of which runs north-west and south-east. Each animal has +his back to the pool, and with one exception is in a rampant attitude. + +Many thousands of cubic metres of stone were quarried away to afford a +site for the cascade, for the system of water-pipes which supply the +various pools and jets and conduct off the surplus. The size of the +site occupied by these hydraulic works is 360 by 75 feet. + +The balcony of the Trocadero facing toward the river and the Champ +de Mars affords the most extensive view obtainable in the grounds. +Beneath is the cascade with its basins and fountains, and spreading +away on each side is the garden with its various national buildings, +neat, gaudy or grotesque. Spanning the invisible roads and river is +the broad Pont d'Iena, and then comes a repetition of the garden, the +sward dotted with parterres and buildings. A broad terrace, crowned +with the splendid facade of the main building, does not quite +terminate the view, for from the height of the lower corridor of +the rotunda the buildings of Paris are seen to stretch away in the +distance. The hill of Montmartre on the north and the heights of +Chatillon and Clamart on the south terminate the view in those +directions. + +The cascade immediately beneath us has been already described, but +how shall we give an impression of the appearance of the buildings +collected in groups on each side of the main avenue? So great is +the variety of objects to be presented that any very large unbroken +surface of sward is impossible. The general plan is geometrical, and +the absence of large trees on the newly-made ground has prevented any +attempt at woodland scenery. + +The French make great use of common flowers in obtaining effects of +color. Some square beds of large size have centres of purple and white +stocks, giving a mottled appearance, with a border of the tender blue +forget-me-nots and a fringe of double daisies. Other beds are full +of purple, red and white anemones, multicolored poppies or yellow +marigolds. The sober mignonette is too great a favorite to be +excluded, though it lends little to the effect. The gorgeous +rhododendron is here massed in large beds, and there forms a standard +tree with a formal clump of foliage and gay flowers, contrasting with +the bright green of the succulent grass. The roses are by thousands +in beds and lining the walks, and here are especially to be seen the +standard roses for which Europe is so famous, but which do not seem to +prosper with us. + +Besides the flowers and flowering shrubs, a most profuse use is made +of evergreens, which are removed of surprising size and forwardness of +spring growth. We can form little conception from our gardens at home +of the wealth, variety and exuberance of the evergreen foliage in +Southern England and Northern France--the Spanish and Portuguese +laurel, laurustinus, arbutus, occuba, bay, hollies in variety, +tree-box, with scores of species of pines, firs, arborvitae and yews, +relieved by the contorted foliage of the auraucarias, the sombre cedar +of Lebanon and the graceful deodar cedar of the Himalayas. As already +remarked, the tree-growth is small, as the ground was a blank and +rocky hillside two years ago, and was quarried to make a site for the +garden. The tree which seems best to bear moving, and is consequently +used in the emergency, is the horse-chestnut, the red and white +flowering varieties being intermingled. This is perhaps the most +common tree in the streets of Paris, though the plane and maple are +also favorites. + +[Illustration: BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF THE MAIN BUILDING AND ITS +SURROUNDINGS.] + +Against the rocky scarp on the south of the garden a plantation of +aloes, yuccas and cactus has been made. These are in great variety, +and some of them in flower. It was especially pleasant to see the +independence which the gardener has shown in placing a fine clump of +rhubarb in one place where he wanted a green bunch. Some persons would +have been afraid of injurious criticism in the use of so common a +plant, but we all know what a vigorous, healthy green it is, and +as such not to be despised by the artist in color. There are a few +specialties in the way of gardening which are worth notice: one is the +array of tulips planted by the city of Haarlem, and representing the +municipal coat-of-arms in tulips of every imaginable color of which +the plant is capable, and around the figures the words "Haarlem, +Holland," in scarlet tulips on a ground of white ones. + +Another novelty is the Japanese garden with its bamboo fence, the +posts and door of entrance being carved with remarkable taste and +boldness. The double gates are surmounted by a cock and hen in natural +attitudes, which is a relief from the absurdities of their impossible +storks and hideous griffins. Perhaps it shows that modern and European +ideas are at work there. The flag of Japan, by the way--a red circle +on a white ground--is a sensible design, and can be seen at a +distance: it contrasts favorably with the dragon on a yellow ground of +the Chinese pavilion. The Japanese garden has several large standard +umbrellas for permanent shade, and little bamboo-fenced yards for the +game chickens and the ducks. Two shrines are in the garden, and a +fountain with a feeble jet issuing from a stump and falling into +a little fanciful pond with small bays and promontories. On the +miniature deep a walnut-shell ship might ride, and on the shoals near +the bank aquatic plants are beginning to sprout, and their leaves will +soon touch the opposite shore if they are not attended to. + +Rather a disparagement, as a matter of taste, to the somewhat formal +grace but undoubted beauty of this floral scene are the buildings +which are placed here and there over the surface. However, it is these +that we have come to see, for if we were in search of landscape or +Dutch gardening we should find it better elsewhere. This gardening +is only a setting, a frame, in which the various nations have set up +their cottages and villas. The ground surface between the houses has +been laid off ornamentally to please the eye and satisfy the sense +of order and beauty, but is not itself the object of which we are in +search. It is impossible perhaps to harmonize such an incongruous +set of buildings, adapted for different climates, habits, tastes and +needs. Here on the left is a large white castellated house of Algiers. +It has blank walls and loopholed towers, and no suggestion of a tree +or flower, but gives an idea of the land where the sand of the desert +comes up to the doorstep and beggars and thieves go on horseback. On +the opposite extremity, at the right, is a Chinese house with its +peculiar curved roof, suggested originally, doubtless, by the Tartar +tent, but having more curves and points than were ever shown by canvas +or felt. In a district by themselves the readers of the Koran--or a +set of people passing for such--have their Persian, Tunisian, Morocco +and Turkish kiosques, and the inhabitants seem perhaps one shade +cleaner than they did in Philadelphia. They are supposed, at least, +to be the same, and have an exactly similar lot of rubbish and brass +jewelry for sale, and oil of cassia, which they sell for the attar of +the "gardens of Gul in their bloom." Next is a campanile of Sweden, +and near it are the Swedish and Norwegian houses, armed against +winter. Then the Japanese cottage with sides all open, mats on the +floors and no furniture to speak of. Then comes a Moorish pavilion +of Spain with nondescript ornaments, the bulbous domes and pinnacles +supporting the flags of yellow and red--of barbaric taste, color and +significance. + +We have yet to notice the Italian villa, the Oriental mosque, the +Swiss chalet and the log hut; also the modern pavilion with zinc +roof, the thatched houses of Britain and of Normandy, the Elizabethan +cottage and the English farm-house. What they lack in size they make +up in variety, may be said of the greenhouses and conservatories +dotted about the place. In and outside of them the marvellous +skill and patience of the gardener is seen in the rigidly-formal or +abnormally-directed limbs of the fruit trees. The fish-ponds and +fountains are neither numerous nor large, but the aquarium may merit +more extended description when completed. + +Standing, sensible-looking and tasteful, in the midst of much that is +trumpery, but good enough for a summer fete, and placed here not as +exhibits of good taste, but of what their owners think good, rises the +wooden building with skylight roof of "The Administration of Forests +and Waters." It is on a beautiful knoll, and has a wooden frame with +tongued and grooved panels, the whole varnished to show the natural +grain of the timber. On the panels outside are arranged the tools and +implements of arboriculture and forestry. + +The flags of the different nations displayed upon these buildings give +animation to the scene, and the glance might pass at once from this +panorama to the other side of the Seine, where the scene is repeated, +but for the intervention of long barnlike sheds with tile roofs which +intrude themselves along the banks of the river, and quench the poetry +of the fanciful and picturesque as the eye passes from the immediate +foreground and seeks the magnificent facade of the Salle d'Iena, the +river front of the main building occupying the Champ de Mars. The +flags of all nations are flying from the numerous minor pinnacles, +while the six domes on the ends and centres of the east and west +facades display the tricolor of France. + +The best view of the exterior is obtained from the Trocadero. The +building itself is so large that some distance is necessary to take in +the whole at a glance. The approach to it by way of the Pont d'Iena +has been marred by raising the bridge to too great a height, so that +the impression in crossing the Seine is that the building stands upon +low ground. Standing upon the east end of the bridge, one cannot see +the base on the other side of the river, which suggests descent and +dwarfs the building. The bridge retains its colossal statuary, each +of the four groups consisting of an unmounted man and a horse. They +respectively represent a Greek, Roman, Gaul and Arab. The bridge was +erected to commemorate the victory over the Prussians in 1806, and +Bluecher, who had his head-quarters at St. Cloud in 1815, threatened to +blow it up. After crossing the bridge we find ourselves reaching +the work-a-day world. On the left are represented the foundries and +workshops of Creuzot, Chaumont and Serrenorri. Near by is a model +of the observatory of Mount Jouvis and an annex of the state +tobacco-factory of France. + +The building on the Champ de Mars is 2132 feet by 1148. A wide and +lofty vestibule runs across the full extent of each end, and these +afford the most imposing interior views of the building. They are +known respectively as the Galerie d'Iena and Galerie de l'Ecole +Militaire, from their vicinity to the bridge and school respectively. +Being lofty themselves, and having central and flanking domed towers +which break the uniformity, their fronts form the principal facades +of the building, of which, architecturally speaking, they are the +principal entrances; but in fact, as happens with buildings of such +acreage, the actual inlets depend upon the predominance in numbers +of the people on one or another side of the building, the means of +approach by land and water, and the contiguous streets of favorite and +convenient travel. In the present case the bulk of the people reach +the grounds either by water at the south-east corner or by land at the +intersection of Avenue Rapp with the Avenue Bourdonnaye, which latter +bounds the Champ de Mars on its southern side. + +The end-vestibules are connected by five longitudinal galleries on +each side of the open area in the middle of the building. The five +galleries on the southern side belong to France, and the five on the +northern side are divided by transverse partitions among the foreign +nations present, in very greatly differing quantities. England, for +instance, occupies nearly two-sevenths of the whole space devoted to +foreign exhibitors, being more than the sum of the amounts allotted to +Spain, China, Japan, Italy, Sweden, Norway and the United States. The +end-vestibules have curved roofs with highly ornamented ceilings of a +succession of flat domes along the centres, with three rows of deep +soffits on each side, gayly painted. The walls are nearly all glass +in iron frames, and the panes of white glass alternate in checkerwork +with those having blue tracery upon them. The whole building is +principally of iron and glass, the roof of wood, with zinc plates +and numerous skylights over the interior galleries. The machinery +galleries of each side are much the largest of the longitudinal ones, +and have high roofs with side windows above the levels of the roofs on +each side of them; but the four other galleries on each side of the +building have quite low ceilings, which make one fear for the quality +of the ventilation when the heat is at its greatest. + +In the interior of the quadrangular building is an open space about +two hundred feet broad and nearly two thousand feet long, reaching +from one vestibule to the other; and in this space are two rows of +fine-art pavilions and a building for the exhibition of the municipal +works of the city. This isolated building is in the central portion +of the whole structure, the fine-art pavilions being arranged in line +with it, four in a group, the salons of a group connected by lobbies +and also with the large end-vestibules at the end upon which they +abut. + +The French and foreign sides of the Exposition building on the Champ +de Mars have frontages upon the interior court, and the facades of +the foreign sections are made ornamental and are intended to be +characteristic of the countries. There is a great discrepancy in +the space assigned to each: that of Great Britain is the longest, +amounting to five hundred and forty feet in length, while the little +territories of Luxembourg, Andorra, Monaco and San Marino, which are +clubbed together, have unitedly about twenty-five feet of frontage. In +some cases the space assigned to a nation does not run back the full +four hundred feet to the outside of the building, but it is intended +that each shall have some part of the facade in this allee. Much +taste and more expense have been lavished upon the architectural +construction and embellishment of the facades, and the row reminds one +of the scenes in a theatre, where palace, cottage, mosque and jail +stand side by side, giving a particolored effect as various as the +different emotions which the respective buildings might be supposed +to elicit. The English space being so large, no single design was +adopted, as it could have but a monotonous effect, but the frontage +was divided into five portions, each of which illustrates some style +of villa or cottage architecture, and is separated from the adjoining +one by garden-beds. The first, counting from the Salle de la Seine, +is of the style of Queen Anne's reign. It is built of a patented +imitation of red brickwork. Thin slabs of Portland cement concrete are +faced with smaller slabs of red concrete of the size of bricks and +screwed to the wooden frame of the building. The house has tall +casements in a bay with a balcony, and an entablature on top of the +wall. The second house is the pavilion of the prince of Wales, and +is of the Elizabethan style. It is built of rubble-work faced +with colored plaster in imitation of red brickwork and Bath-stone +dressings. The front has niches for statuary, and above the windows +are shield-shaped panels for armorial bearings. The windows are in +square clusters, with small lights in hexagonal leaden cames. The +union jack flies from the staff. The third house is constructed of +red brick and terra-cotta, and is not specially characteristic of any +period. It is, in fact, a jumble of the early Gothic with a Moorish +entablature and a balustrade parapet. The stained-glass casement +windows are surmounted with circular lights in the arches. The fourth +house is built of pitch-pine framework, enriched with carving and +filled in with plaster panels--a style of construction known as +"half-timbered work," much employed in England from the fifteenth to +the seventeenth century. This house is placed at the disposal of the +Canadian commissioners. It has a large square two-story bay-window, +with the customary small glass panes in cames of lozenge and other +patterns, and is perhaps the neatest and most cozy house in the row. +The fifth is of the construction of an English country-house in the +reign of William III. It is of timber, with stucco and rough-cast +panels, and has a large bay-window in the second story, surmounted by +a gable to the street and covering an old-fashioned stoop with seats +on each side. The five houses have a pretty effect, and each has a +home look. The facades only are on exhibition, the interiors being +private. They contrast with others in the "street" in the same way as +the habits of the different peoples. Some build their houses to retire +into, and others to exhibit themselves. Each nation being asked for +the facade of a house, the Italian has built a portico where he +can lounge, see and be seen; the Englishman has in all serenity +represented what he deems comfort, and shuts the front door. + +[Illustration: VIEW IN THE PARK OF THE TROCADERO, SHOWING THE +PAVILIONS OF PERSIA AND SIAM.] + +The next in order is the United States house, which is plain and +commodious; the latch-string would be out, but that the front door is +everlastingly open. The style is perhaps to advertise to the world +that we have not yet had time to invent an order of architecture or +devise anything adapted to our climate, which has extremes utterly +unknown to our ancestors in Britain. The building is light and airy, +has office-rooms on each floor, and is described by one English +paper as "a sort of school-building which combines elegance with +usefulness." Another paper states that "it exemplifies the utilitarian +notions of our Transatlantic cousins rather than any artistic intent." +These comments are as favorable as anything we ourselves can say: we +accept the verdict with thanks and think we have got off pretty well. +In the squareness of its general lines, with arched windows on the +second floor and square tower over the centre, perhaps the architect +thought it was Italian. Sixteen coats-of-arms on the outside excite +admiration. + +The building of Norway and Sweden is a charming cottage of handsome +and ample proportions. It has three sections: one of two stories with +low-pitched roof, and gable to the street, a middle structure with +colonnade, and one of three stories with high-pitched roof. The +windows are round-topped, made in an ingenious way, the upper member +being an arched piece with sloping ends, to match the springing on +the tops of the posts which divide the openings. The horizontal and +vertical bands are enriched by carving. + +The facade of Italy may be pronounced pretentious and disappointing. +It is constructed of various kinds of unpolished marble and +terra-cotta panels. A tall archway is flanked by two wings having each +two smaller arches, the entablatures of which are enriched, if we +must so term it, with gaudy mosaic figures, portraits and heraldic +bearings, while the spans of the arches surmount pyramidal groups of +emblems, scientific, medical, lyrical and so forth. Red curtains with +heavy gilt cords and tassels behind the arches throw the columns with +composition (not Composite) capitals and the emblems into high relief. +Beneath the centre arch is the armorial bearing of the country. The +vestibules display statuary. + +Japan has a quaint little house with a very massive gateway of solid +timber, flanked by two characteristic fountains of terra-cotta. +These represent stumps of trees, with gigantic lily-cups, leaves of +water-lilies, and frogs in grotesque attitudes in and around the +water. + +China has a grotesque house, painted in imitation of octagonal +slate-colored bricks, covered with a pagoda-roof full of curves and +points. The red door has rows of large knobs and is surmounted by +colored and gilded carvings, representing genii probably. The pointed +flag has in a yellow field a blue dragon in the later stages of +consumption. + +Spain has a Moorish building rich in gold and color--a central +portion with Italian roof, and two colonnade side-sections flanked by +castellated towers. Five forms of arches span the doors and windows, +and the artist has contrived to associate all forms of ornament, +running from an approach to the Greek fret down through the Arabesque +to the Brussels carpet. + +Austro-Hungary has a long colonnade of white stone ornamented with +black filigree-work and supported by columns in pairs. The entablature +is surmounted by a row of statues, and the end-towers have parapets +with balustrade. The colonnade, with a chocolate-brown back wall, +affords shelter and relief for bronze and marble statuary. At each end +of this facade is a tall flagstaff striped like a barber's pole, and +so familiar to all who have visited the Austrian stations, at Trieste, +for example. From it flies the flag of horizontal stripes of red, +white and green, with the shield of many quarterings and two angelic +supporters. + +Russia has a log-and-frame house of somewhat more than average +picturesque character. The projecting centres and wing-towers, the +outside staircase, and roofs conical, flat, pyramidal, bulbous and +Oriental, give it a miscellaneous toyshop appearance, characteristic +perhaps of the mosaic character of the nation. Barge-boards and +brackets of various cheap patterns are plentifully strewed over the +building. + +Passing from the Russian to the Swiss building suggests inevitably +Mr. Mantalini's description of his former _cheres amies_: "The two +countesses had no outline at all, and the dowager's was a demmed +outline." A semicircular archway, over which is a high-flying arch +with a roof of six slopes surmounted by a bell-tower and pinnacle +roof; on the pillars two lions supporting a red shield with white +Greek cross in the field; two wings with flat arches containing +gorgeous stained-glass windows. But what avails description? There are +twenty-two armorial bearings on the spandrils of the arches, beating +the United States by six; but we had only room for the original +thirteen, the United States and two more. Oh that they had granted us +more space! High up aloft is the motto _Un pour tous, tons pour un_, +which was adopted by the French Commune. + +Belgium is pre-eminent in the whole row, if expense determines. This +country has about three times as much space in the building as the +United States, and has worthily filled it. The Belgian facade on the +"Street of Nations" is reputed to have cost nearly as much as the +whole appropriation made by Congress for the United States exhibit. It +is of dark red brick with gray stone quoins and corners and blue and +gray marble pillars. The centre building is joined by two colonnades +to a flanking tower at one end and an ornate gable at the other. The +style is one familiar in the times when the great William of Orange +was alive, and was to some extent introduced into England soon after +another William took the place of his bigoted father-in-law. It +cannot be denied that the general effect is gray, sombre and +uncomfortable--that it is too much crowded with objects, and, though +of admirable and enduring materials, suggests a spasmodic attempt to +assimilate itself to the gala character of the occasion which called +it forth. It is the saturnine one of the row. It is said that the +pieces are numbered for re-erection in some other place. + +Greece has an Athenian house painfully crude in color, white picked +out with all the hues of the rainbow and some others, suggesting muddy +coffee and chibouques. + +Denmark has about twenty feet of front, utilized by a gable-end of +brick with facings of imitation stone. + +The Central American States have about sixty feet of yellow front, +with three arched openings into the vestibule, which is flanked by a +tower and a gable. + +Anam, Persia, Siam, Morocco and Tunis have unitedly a gingerbread +affair of four distinct patterns--we cannot call them styles. Siam in +the centre has a chocolate-colored tower picked out with silver, and +surmounted by a triple pagoda roof, whence floats the flag, a white +elephant in a red field. The six feet of homeliness belonging to Tunis +has a balcony of wood which neither reveals nor hides the almond-eyed +whose supposed relatives are selling trumpery in booths on the other +side of the Seine. + +Luxembourg, Andorra, Monaco and San Marino unite in a facade +representing the different styles of architecture which prevail in the +several states: 1. A portion faintly suggesting the ancient palace +of Luxembourg, to-day the residence of Prince Henry of Holland; 2. An +entrance erected by the principality of Monaco as the model of that of +the royal palace; 3. A window contributed by San Marino, and showing +that the prevalent type in the little republic is more useful than +ornamental; 4. A balustrade surmounting the facade, supplied by the +republic of Andorra. + +Portugal has an imitation in cream-colored plaster of a Gothic +church-entrance, and a highly-enriched arch with flanking towers, +whose canopied niches have figures of warriors and wise men. + +Holland shows an architecture of two hundred years ago, the +counterpart of the houses we see in the old Dutch pictures. It is of +dark red brick with stone courses, and a tall slate roof behind its +balustered parapet. + +We are at the end of the Street of Nations, somewhat under a third of +a mile in length. + +It is evening, and the sun in this latitude--for we are farther north +than Quebec--seems in no hurry to reach the horizon. Two hours ago the +whistle sounded "No more steam," and the life of the building went +out. The attendants, tired of the show and _blases_ or "used up," +according to their nationality, with exhibitions, have shrouded their +cases in sack-cloth and gone to sip ordinaire, absinthe or bitter ale. +I sit on a terrace of the Champ de Mars, the gorgeous building at my +back, and look riverward. Before me stretches away the green carpet of +sward one hundred feet wide and six hundred long, a broad level band +of emerald reaching to the gravel approach to the Pont d'Iena, each +side of which is guarded by a colossal figure of a man leading a +horse. The gravel around the _tapis vert_ is black with the figures of +those whom the fineness of the evening has induced to take a parting +stroll in the ground before retiring. + +Flanking the gravel-walks the ground is more uneven, and Art, in +imitation of the wilder aspects of Nature, has done what the limited +space permitted to enhance the allied beauties of land and water, +where + + Each gives each a double charm, + Like pearls upon an Ethiop's arm. + +On the left is a rockery and waterfall on no mean scale, with a +romantic little lake in front. On the right a rocky island in a +corresponding lake is crowned with a thatched pavilion, the reflection +of which shines broken in the water ruffled by the evening breeze. +Groups of detached buildings hem in the view on each side, and their +flags wave with the sky for a background. Paris is invisible: at this +point the grounds are isolated from outside view. + +Rising clear beyond the bridge, the approach to it on the other side +hidden by the lowness of the point of view, stands the palace of the +Trocadero, a broad sweep of green covering the hill, along whose +summit are the widespread wings of the colonnade, uniting at the +central rotunda, of which the domed roof and square campaniles rise +one hundred feet above all and dominate the middle of the picture. The +traces of the indefatigable swarms of workmen are obliterated, except +in the magical and finished work. The spray of the fountains of the +chateau d'eau drifts to leeward and hides at times patches of the +velvety grass on the hill. The central jet plays sturdily, and from +where I sit appears to reach the level of the second corridor of the +rotunda. + +The eye fails to detect a single object, excepting the four statues on +the bridge, which is not the creation of a few months. The hill beyond +has been torn to pieces and sloped, and the palace built upon it. +Every house in sight is new. The very ground in front on which I look +down has been raised, and the terrace on which I sit has been built. +The ponds have been excavated, the mimic rocky hills have been piled +up, and the water led to the brink of the tiny precipice from the +artesian wells which supply this part of Paris. + +The hum of many voices and the dash of waters make a deep undertone, +and one comes away with the feeling--not exactly that the scene is +too good to last, but--of regret that the result of such lavish care +should be ephemeral. In a few months all on the left side of the river +may again be parade-ground, and the thirty thousand troops which can +be readily man[oe]uvred upon it be getting ready for another conflict, +while the palace which the Genius of the Lamp had builded, as in +a night, shall be a thing of the past, as if whirled away by the +malevolent magician. + +EDWARD H. KNIGHT. + + + + + SENIORITY. + + + Child! Such thou seemest to me that am more old + In sorrow than in years, + With that long pain that turns us bitter cold, + Far worse than these hot tears + + Of thine, that fall so fast upon my breast. + I know they ease thy grief: + I know they comfort, and will bring thee rest, + Thou poor wind-shaken leaf! + + Ah yes, thy storm will pass, thy skies will clear. + Thou smilest beneath my kiss: + Lift up the blue eyes cleansed by weeping, dear, + Of every thought amiss. + + What seest thou, child, in these dry eyes of mine? + Grief that hath spent its tears-- + Grief that its right to weeping must resign, + Not told by days, but years. + + The bitterest is that weeping of the heart + That mounts not to the eyes: + In its lone chamber we sit down apart, + And no one hears our cries. + + It comes to this with every deep, true soul: + 'Tis neither kill nor cure, + But a strong sorrow held in strong control, + A girding to endure. + + For no such soul lives in this tangled world + But, like Achilles' heel, + Hath in the quick a shaft too truly hurled-- + Flesh growing round the steel. + + And with its outcome would come all Life's flood: + Joy is so twined with pain, + Sweetness and tears so blended in our blood, + They will not part again. + + For at the last the heart grows round its grief, + And holds it without strife: + So used we are, we cry not for relief, + For we know all of life. + + And this is why I kiss thy tear-wet eyes, + Nor think thy grief so great. + Thou untried child! at every fresh surprise + Thy heart springs to the gate. + + HOWARD GLYNDON. + + + + +"FOR PERCIVAL." + + +CHAPTER XXXV. + +OF THE LANDLADY'S DAUGHTER. + +[Illustration] + + +Early in that December the landlady's daughter came home. Percival +could not fix the precise date, but he knew it was early in the month, +because about the eighth or ninth he was suddenly aware that he +had more than once encountered a smile, a long curl and a pair of +turquoise earrings on the stairs. He had noticed the earrings: he +could speak positively as to them. He had seen turquoises before, and +taken little heed of them, but possibly his friends had happened to +buy rather small ones. He felt pretty certain about the long curl. And +he thought there was a smile, but he was not so absolutely sure of the +smile. + +By the twelfth he was quite sure of it. It seemed to him that it was +cold work for any one to be so continually on the stairs in December. +The owner of the smile had said, "Good-morning, Mr. Thorne." + +On the thirteenth a question suggested itself to him: "Was she--could +she be--always running up and down stairs? Or did it happen that just +when he went out and came back--?" He balanced his pen in his fingers +for a minute, and sat pondering. "Oh, confound it!" he said to +himself, and went on writing. + +That evening he left the office to the minute, and hurried to Bellevue +street. He got halfway up the stairs and met no one, but he heard a +voice on the landing exclaim, "Go to old Fordham's caddy, then, for +you sha'n't--Oh, good gracious!" and there was a hurried rustle. He +went more slowly the rest of the way, reflecting. Fordham was another +lodger--elderly, as the voice had said. Percival went to his +sitting-room and looked thoughtfully into his tea-caddy. It was nearly +half full, and he calculated that, according to the ordinary rate of +consumption, it should have been empty, and yet he had not been more +sparing than usual. His landlady had told him where to get his tea: +she said she found it cheap--it was a fine-flavored tea, and she +always drank it. Percival supposed so, and wondered where old Fordham +got his tea, and whether that was fine-flavored too. + +There was a giggle outside the door, a knock, and in answer to +Percival's "Come in," the landlady's daughter appeared. She explained +that Emma had gone out shopping--Emma was the grimy girl who +ordinarily waited on him--so, with a nervous little laugh, with a toss +of the long curl, which was supposed to have got in the way somehow, +and with the turquoise earrings quivering in the candlelight, she +brought in the tray. She conveyed by her manner that it was a new and +amusing experience in her life, but that the burden was almost more +than her strength could support, and that she required assistance. +Percival, who had stood up when she came in and thanked her gravely +from his position on the hearthrug, came forward and swept some books +and papers out of the way to make room for her load. In so doing their +hands touched--his white and beautifully shaped, hers clumsy and +coarsely colored. (It was not poor Lydia's fault. She had written to +more than one of those amiable editors who devote a column or two in +family magazines to settling questions of etiquette, giving recipes +for pomades and puddings, and telling you how you may take stains +out of silk, get rid of freckles or know whether a young man means +anything by his attentions. There had been a little paragraph +beginning, "L.'s hands are not as white as she could wish, and she +asks us what she is to do. We can only recommend," etc. Poor L. had +tried every recommendation in faith and in vain, and was in a fair way +to learn the hopelessness of her quest.) + +The touch thrilled her with pleasure and Thorne with repugnance. He +drew back, while she busied herself in arranging his cup, saucer and +plate. She dropped the spoon on the tray, scolded herself for her own +stupidity, looked up at him with a hurried apology, and laughed. +If she did not blush, she conveyed by her manner a sort of idea of +blushing, and went out of the room with a final giggle, being confused +by his opening the door for her. + +Percival breathed again, relieved from an oppression, and wondered +what on earth had made her take an interest in his tea and him. Yet +the reason was not far to seek. It was that tragic, melancholy, hero's +face of his--he felt so little like a hero that it was hard for him +to realize that he looked like one--his sombre eyes, which might have +been those of an exile thinking of his home, the air of proud and +rather old-fashioned courtesy which he had inherited from his +grandfather the rector and developed for himself. Every girl is ready +to find something of the prince in one who treats her with deference +as if she were a princess. Percival had an unconscious grace of +bearing and attitude, and the considerable advantage of well-made +clothes. Poverty had not yet reduced him to cheap coats and advertised +trousers. And perhaps the crowning fascination in poor Lydia's eyes +was the slight, dark, silky moustache which emphasized without hiding +his lips. + +Another rustling outside, a giggle and a whisper--Percival would have +sworn that the whisper was Emma's if it had been possible that +she could have left it behind her when she went out shopping--an +ejaculation, "Gracious! I've blacked my hand!" a pause, presumably +for the purpose of removing the stain, and Lydia reappeared with the +kettle. She poured a portion of its contents over the fender in her +anxiety to plant it firmly on the fire. "Oh dear!" she exclaimed, +"how stupid of me! Oh, Mr. Thorne"--this half archly, half pensively, +fingering the curl and surveying the steaming pool--"I'm afraid you'll +wish Emma hadn't gone out: such a mess as I've made of it! What will +you think of me?" + +"Pray, don't trouble yourself," said Percival. "The fender can't +signify, except perhaps from Emma's point of view. It doesn't +interfere with my comfort, I assure you." + +She departed, only half convinced. Percival, with another sigh of +relief, proceeded to make the tea. The water was boiling and the fire +good. Emma was apt to set a chilly kettle on a glimmering spark, but +Lydia treated him better. The bit of cold meat on the table looked +bigger than he expected, the butter wore a cheerful sprig of green. +Percival saw his advantages, but he thought them dearly bought, +especially as he had to take a turn up and down Bellevue street while +the table was cleared. + +After that day it was astonishing how often Emma went out shopping or +was busy, or had a bad finger or a bad foot, or was helping ma with +something or other, or hadn't made herself tidy, so that Lydia had to +wait on Mr. Thorne. But it was always with the same air of its being +something very droll and amusing to do, and there were always some +artless mistakes which required giggling apologies. Nor could he doubt +that he was in her thoughts during his absence. She had a piano down +stairs on which she accompanied herself as she sang, but she found +time for domestic cares. His buttons were carefully sewn on and his +fire was always bright. One evening his table was adorned with a +bright blue vase--as blue as Lydia's earrings--filled with dried +grasses and paper flowers. He gazed blankly at it in unspeakable +horror, and then paced up and down the room, wondering how he should +endure life with it continually before his eyes. Some books lay on a +side-table, and as he passed he looked absently at them and halted. On +his Shelley, slightly askew, as if to preclude all thought of care and +design, lay a little volume bound in dingy white and gold. Percival +did not touch it, but he stooped and read the title, _The Language +of Flowers_, and saw that--purely by accident of course--a leaf was +doubled down as if to mark a place. He straightened himself again, and +his proud lip curled in disgust as he glanced from the tawdry flowers +to the tawdry book. And from below came suddenly the jingling notes +of Lydia's piano and Lydia's voice--not exactly harsh and only +occasionally out of tune, but with something hopelessly vulgar in its +intonation--singing her favorite song-- + + Oh, if I had some one to love me, + My troubles and trials to share! + +Percival turned his back on the blue vase and the little book, and +flinging himself into a chair before the fire sickened at the thought +of the life he was doomed to lead. Lydia, who was just mounting with +a little uncertainty to a high note, was a good girl in her way, +and good-looking, and had a kind sympathy for him in his evident +loneliness. But was she to be the highest type of womanhood that he +would meet henceforth? And was Bellevue street to be his world? He +glided into a mournful dream of Brackenhill, which would never be +his, and of Sissy, who had loved him so well, yet failed to love him +altogether--Sissy, who had begged for her freedom with such tender +pain in her voice while she pierced him so cruelly with her frightened +eyes. Percival looked very stern in his sadness as he sat brooding +over his fire, while from the room below came a triumphant burst of +song-- + + But I will marry my own love, + For true of heart am I. + +Sometimes he would picture to himself the future which lay before +Horace's three-months-old child, whose little life already played so +all--important a part in his own destiny. He had questioned Hammond +about him, and Hammond had replied that he heard that Lottie and the +boy were both doing well. "They say that the child is a regular Blake, +just like Lottie herself," said Godfrey, "and doesn't look like a +Thorne at all." Percival thought, not unkindly, of Lottie's boy, of +Lottie's great clear eyes in an innocent baby face, and imagined him +growing up slim and tall, to range the woods of Brackenhill in future +years as Lottie herself had wandered in the copses about Fordborough. +And yet sometimes he could not but think of the change that it might +make if little James William Thorne were to die. Horace was very ill, +they said: Brackenhill was shut up, and they had all gone to winter +abroad. The doctors had declared that there was not a chance for him +in England. + +At this time Percival kept a sort of rough diary. Here is a leaf from +it: "I am much troubled by a certain little devil who comes as soon as +I am safely in bed and sits on my pillow. He flattens it abominably, +or else I do it myself tossing about in my impatience. He is quite +still for a minute or two, and I try my best to think he isn't there +at all. Then he stoops down and whispers in my ear 'Convulsions!' and +starts up again like india-rubber. I won't listen. I recall some tune +or other: it won't come, and there is a hitch, a horrible blank, in +the midst of which he is down again--I knew he would be--suggesting +'Croup.' I repeat some bit of a poem, but it won't do: what is the +next line? I think of old days with my father, when I knew nothing of +Brackenhill: I try to remember my mother's face. I am getting on very +well, but all at once I become conscious that he has been for +some time murmuring, as to himself, 'Whooping-cough and scarlet +fever--scarlet fever.' I grow fierce, and say, 'I pray God he may +escape them all!' To which he softly replies, 'His grandfather +died--his father is dying--of decline.' + +"I roll over to the other side, and encounter him or his twin brother +there. A perfectly silent little devil this time, with a faculty for +calling up pictures. He shows me the office: I see it, I smell it, +with its flaring gaslights and sickly atmosphere. Then he shows me +the long drawing-room at Brackenhill, the quaint old furniture, the +pictures on the walls, the terrace with its balustrade and balls of +mossy stone, and through the windows come odors of jasmine and roses +and far-off fields, while inside there is the sweetness of dried +blossoms and spices in the great china jars. A moment more and it is +Bellevue street, with its rows of hideous whited houses. And then +again it is a river, curving swiftly and grandly between its castled +rocks, or a bridge of many arches in the twilight, and the lights +coming out one by one in the old walled town, and the road and river +travelling one knows not where, into regions just falling asleep in +the quiet dusk. Or there is a holiday crowd, a moonlit ferry, steep +wooded hills, and songs and laughter which echo in the streets and +float across the tide. Or the Alps, keenly cut against the infinite +depth of blue, with a whiteness and a far-off glory no tongue can +utter. Or a solemn cathedral, or a busy town piled up, with church and +castle high aloft and a still, transparent lake below. But through it +all, and underlying it all, is Bellevue street, with the dirty men and +women, who scream and shout at each other and wrangle in its filthy +courts and alleys. Still, God knows that I don't repent, and that I +wish my little cousin well." + + +CHAPTER XXXVI. + +WANTED--AN ORGANIST. + + +In later days Percival looked back to that Christmas as his worst and +darkest time. His pride had grown morbid, and he swore to himself that +he would never give in--that Horace should never know him otherwise +than self-sufficient, should never think that but for Mrs. Middleton's +or Godfrey Hammond's charity he might have had his cousin as a +pensioner. Brooding on thoughts such as these, he sauntered moodily +beneath the lamps when the new year was but two days old. + +His progress was stopped by a little crowd collected on the pavement. +There was a concert, and a string of carriages stretched halfway down +the street. Just as Percival came up, a girl in white and amber, with +flowers in her hair, flitted hurriedly across the path and up +the steps, and stood glancing back while a fair-haired, +faultlessly-dressed young man helped her mother to alight. The father +came last, sleek, stout and important. The old people went on in +front, and the girl followed with her cavalier, looking up at him and +making some bright little speech as they vanished into the building. +Percival stood and gazed for a moment, then turned round and hurried +out of the crowd. The grace and freshness and happy beauty of the girl +had roused a fierce longing in his heart. He wanted to touch a lady's +hand again, to hear the delicate accents of a lady's voice. He +remembered how he used to dress himself as that fair-haired young +man was dressed, and escort Aunt Harriet and Sissy to Fordborough +entertainments, where the best places were always kept for the +Brackenhill party. It was dull enough sometimes, yet how he longed for +one such evening now--to hand the cups once again at afternoon tea, to +talk just a little with some girl on the old terms of equality! The +longing was not the less real, and even passionate, that it seemed to +Thorne himself to be utterly absurd. He mocked at himself as he walked +the streets for a couple of hours, and then went back when the concert +was just over and the people coming away. He watched till the girl +appeared. She looked a little tired, he fancied. As she came out into +the chill night air she drew a soft white cloak round her, and went +by, quite unconscious of the dark young man who stood near the door +and followed her with his eyes. The sombre apparition might have +startled her had she noticed it, though Percival was only gazing at +the ghost of his dead life, and, having seen it, disappeared into the +shadows once more. + +"The night is darkest before the morn." In Percival's case this was +true, for the next day brought a new interest and hope. A letter came +from Godfrey Hammond, through which he glanced wearily till he came +to a paragraph about the Lisles: Hammond had seen a good deal of them +lately. "Their father treated you shamefully," he wrote, "but, after +all, it is harder still on his children." ("Good Heavens! Does he +suppose I have a grudge against them?" said Percival to himself, and +laughed with mingled irritation and amazement.) "Young Lisle wants a +situation as organist somewhere where he might give lessons and make +an income so, but we can't hear of anything suitable. People say the +boy is a musical genius, and will do wonders, but, for my part, I +doubt it. He may, however, and in that case there will be a line in +his biography to the effect that I 'was one of the first to discern,' +etc., which may be gratifying to me in my second childhood." + +Percival laid the letter on the table and looked up with kindling +eyes. + +Only a few minutes' walk from Bellevue street was St. Sylvester's, a +large district church. The building was a distinguished example of +cheap ecclesiastical work, with stripes and other pretty patterns +in different colored bricks, and varnished deal fittings and patent +corrugated roofing. All that could be done to stimulate devotion +by means of texts painted in red and blue had been done, and St. +Sylvester's, within and without, was one of those nineteenth-century +churches which will doubtless be studied with interest and wonder by +the architect of a future age if they can only contrive to stand up +till he comes. The incumbent was High Church, as a matter of course, +and musical, more than as a matter of course. Percival looked up from +his letter with a sudden remembrance that Mr. Clifton was advertising +for an organist, and on his way to the office he stopped to make +inquiries at the High Church bookseller's and to post a line to +Hammond. How if this should suit Bertie Lisle? He tried hard not to +think too much about it, but the mere possibility that the bright +young fellow, with his day-dreams, his unfinished opera, his pleasant +voice and happily thoughtless talk, might come into his life gave +Percival a new interest in it. Bertie had been a favorite of his years +before, when he used to go sometimes to Mr. Lisle's. He still thought +of him as little more than a boy--the boy who used to play to him in +the twilight--and he had some trouble to realize that Bertie must be +nearly two and twenty. If he should come--But most likely he would not +come. It seemed a shame even to wish to shut up the young musician, +with his love for all that was beautiful and bright, in that grimy +town. Thorne resolved that he would not wish it, but he opened +Hammond's next letter with unusual eagerness. Godfrey said they +thought it sounded well, especially as when he named Brenthill it +appeared that the Lisles had some sort of acquaintance living there, +an old friend of their mother's, he believed, which naturally gave +them an interest in the place. Bertie had written to Mr. Clifton, who +would very shortly be in town, and had made an appointment to meet +him. + +The next news came in a note from Lisle himself. On the first page +there was a pen-and-ink portrait of the incumbent of St. Sylvester's +with a nimbus, and it was elaborately dated "Festival of St. Hilary." + +"It is all as good as settled," was his triumphant announcement, "and +we are in luck's way, for Judith thinks she has heard of something for +herself too. You will see from my sketch that I have had my interview +with Mr. Clifton. He is quite delighted with me. A great judge of +character, that man! He is to write to one or two references I gave +him, but they are sure to be all right, for my friends have been so +bored with me and my prospects for the last few weeks that they would +swear to my fitness for heaven if it would only send me there. I +rather think, however, that St. Sylvester's will suit me better for a +little while. His Reverence is going to look me up some pupils, and I +have bought a Churchman's almanac, and am thinking about starting an +oratorio instead of my opera. Wasn't it strange that when your letter +came from Brenthill we should remember that an old friend of my +mother's lived there? Judith and she have been writing to each other +ever since. Clifton is evidently undergoing tortures with the man he +has got now, so I should not wonder if we are at Brenthill in a few +days. It will be better for my chance of pupils too. I shall look you +up without fail, and expect you to know everything about lodgings. How +about Bellevue street? Are you far from St. Sylvester's?" + +Thorne read the letter carefully, and drew from it two conclusions and +a perplexity. He concluded that Bertie Lisle's elastic spirits had +quickly recovered the shock of his father's failure and flight, +and that he had not the faintest idea that any property of +his--Percival's--had gone down in the wreck. So much the better. + +His perplexity was, What was Miss Lisle going to do? Could the "we" +who were to arrive imply that she meant to accompany her brother? And +what was the something she had heard of for herself? The words haunted +him. Was the ruin so complete that she too must face the world and +earn her own living? A sense of cruel wrong stirred in his inmost +soul. + +He made up his mind at last that she was coming to establish Bertie in +his lodgings before she went on her own way. He offered any help in +his power when he answered the letter, but he added a postscript: +"Don't think of Bellevue street: you wouldn't like it." He heard no +more till one day he came back to his early dinner and found a sealed +envelope on his table. It contained a half sheet of paper, on which +Bertie had scrawled in pencil, "Why did you abuse Bellevue street? We +think it will do. And why didn't you say there were rooms in this +very house? We have taken them, so there is an end of your peaceful +solitude. I'm going to practise for ever and ever. If you don't like +it there's no reason why you shouldn't leave: it's a free country, +they say." + +Percival looked round his room. She had been there, then?--perhaps had +stood where he was standing. His glance fell on the turquoise-blue +vase and the artificial flowers, and he colored as if he were Lydia's +accomplice. Had she seen those and the _Language of Flowers_? + +As if his thought had summoned her, Lydia herself appeared to lay the +cloth for his dinner. She looked quickly round: "Did you see your +note, Mr. Thorne?" + +"Thank you, yes," said Percival. + +"I supposed it was right to show them in here to write it--wasn't it?" +she asked after a pause. "He said he knew you very well." + +"Quite right, certainly." + +"A very pleasant-spoken young gentleman, ain't he?" said Miss Bryant, +setting down a salt-cellar. + +"Very," said Percival. + +"Coming to play the High Church organ, he tells me," Lydia continued, +as if the instrument in question were somehow saturated with +ritualism. + +"Yes--at St. Sylvester's." + +Lydia looked at him, but he was gazing into the fire. She went out, +came back with a dish, shook her curl out of the way, and tried again: +"I suppose we're to thank you for recommending the lodgings--ain't we, +Mr. Thorne? I'm sure ma's much obliged to you. And I'm glad"--this +with a bashful glance--"that you felt you could. It seems as if we'd +given satisfaction." + +"Certainly," said Percival. "But you mustn't thank me in this case, +Miss Bryant. I really didn't know what sort of lodgings my friend +wanted. But of course I'm glad Mr. Lisle is coming here." + +"And ain't you glad _Miss_ Lisle is coming too, Mr. Thorne?" said +Lydia very archly. But she watched him, lynx-eyed. + +He uttered no word of surprise, but he could not quite control the +muscles of his face, and a momentary light leapt into his eyes. "I +wasn't aware Miss Lisle _was_ coming," he said. + +Lydia believed him. "That's true," she thought, "but you're precious +glad." And she added aloud, "Then the pleasure comes all the more +unexpected, don't it?" She looked sideways at Percival and lowered her +voice: "P'r'aps Miss Lisle meant a little surprise." + +Percival returned her glance with a grave scorn which she hardly +understood. "My dinner is ready?" he said. "Thank you, Miss Bryant." +And Lydia flounced out of the room, half indignant, half sorrowful: +"_He_ didn't know--that's true. But _she_ knows what she's after, very +well. Don't tell me!" To Lydia, at this moment, it seemed as if every +girl must be seeking what she sought. "And I call it very bold of her +to come poking herself where she isn't wanted--running after a young +man. I'd be ashamed." A longing to scratch Miss Lisle's face was mixed +with a longing to have a good cry, for she was honestly suffering the +pangs of unrequited love. It is true that it was not for the first +time. The curl, the earrings, the songs, the _Language of Flowers_, +had done duty more than once before. But wounds may be painful without +being deep, although the fact of these former healings might prevent +all fear of any fatal ending to this later love. Lydia was very +unhappy as she went down stairs, though if another hero could be found +she was perhaps half conscious that the melancholy part of her present +love-story might be somewhat abridged. + +The streets seemed changed to Percival as he went back to his work. +Their ugliness was as bare and as repulsive as ever, but he understood +now that the houses might hold human beings, his brothers and his +sisters, since some one roof among them sheltered Judith Lisle. Thus +he emerged from the alien swarm amid which he had walked in solitude +so many days. Above the dull and miry ways were the beauty of her +gray-blue eyes and the glory of her golden hair. He felt as if a white +dove had lighted on the town, yet he laughed at his own feelings; for +what did he know of her? He had seen her twice, and her father had +swindled him out of his money. + +Never had his work seemed so tedious, and never had he hurried so +quickly to Bellevue street as he did when it was over. The door of No. +13 stood open, and young Lisle stood on the threshold. There was no +mistaking him. His face had changed from the beautiful chorister type +of two or three years earlier, but Percival thought him handsomer than +ever. He ceased his soft whistling and held out his hand: "Thorne! At +last! I was looking out for you the other way." + +Thorne could hardly find time to greet him before he questioned +eagerly, "You have really taken the rooms here?" + +"Really and truly. What's wrong? Anything against the landlady?" + +"No," said Percival. "She's honest enough, and fairly obliging, and +all the rest of it. But then your sister is not coming here to live +with you, as they told me? That was a mistake?" + +"Not a bit of it. She's coming: in fact, she's here." + +"In Bellevue street?" Percival looked up and down the dreary +thoroughfare. "But, Lisle, what a place to bring her to!" + +"Beggars mustn't be choosers," said Bertie. "We are not exactly what +you would call rolling in riches just now. And Bellevue street happens +to be about midway between St. Sylvester's and Standon Square, so it +will suit us both." + +"Standon Square?" Percival repeated. + +"Yes. Oh, didn't I tell you? My mother came to school at Brenthill. It +was her old schoolmistress we remembered lived here when we had your +letter. So we wrote to her, and the old dear not only promised me some +pupils, but it is settled that Judith is to go and teach there every +day. Judith thinks we ought to stick to one another, we two." + +"You're a lucky fellow," said Percival. "You don't know, and won't +know, what loneliness is here." + +"But how do _you_ come to know anything about it? That's what I can't +understand. I thought your grandfather died last summer?" + +"So he did." + +"But I thought you were to come in for no end of money?" + +[Illustration: "SHE DREW A SOFT WHITE CLOAK ROUND HER, AND WENT +BY."--Page 173.] + +"I didn't, you see." + +"But surely he always allowed you a lot," said Lisle, still +unsatisfied. "You never used to talk of doing anything." + +"No, but I found I must. The fact is, I'm not on the best terms with +my cousin at Brackenhill, and I made up my mind to be independent. +Consequently, I'm a clerk--a copying-clerk, you understand--in a +lawyer's office here--Ferguson's in Fisher street--and I lodge +accordingly." + +"I'm very sorry," said Bertie. + +"Hammond knows all about it," the other went on, "but nobody else +does." + +"I was afraid there was something wrong," said Bertie--"wrong for you, +I mean. From our point of view it is very lucky that circumstances +have sent you here. But I hope your prospects may brighten; not +directly--I can't manage to hope that--but soon." + +Percival smiled. "Meanwhile," he said with a quiet earnestness of +tone, "if there is anything I can do to help you or Miss Lisle, you +will let me do it." + +"Certainly," said Bertie. "We are going out now to look for a grocer. +Suppose you come and show us one." + +"I'm very much at your service. What are you looking at?" + +"Why--you'll pardon my mentioning it--you have got the biggest smut +on your left cheek that I've seen since I came here. They attain to +a remarkable size in Brenthill, have you noticed?" Bertie spoke with +eager interest, as if he had become quite a connoisseur in smuts. +"Yes, that's it. I'll look Judith up, and tell her you are going with +us." + +Percival fled up stairs, more discomposed by that unlucky black than +he would have thought possible. When he had made sure that he +was tolerably presentable he waited by his open door till his +fellow-lodgers appeared, and then stepped out on the landing to meet +them. Miss Lisle, dressed very simply in black, stood drawing on her +glove. A smile dawned on her face when her eyes met Percival's, and, +greeting him in her low distinct tones, she held out her white right +hand, still ungloved. He took it with grave reverence, for Judith +Lisle had once touched his faint dream of a woman who should be brave +with sweet heroism, tender and true. They had scarcely exchanged a +dozen words in their lives, but he had said to himself, "If I were an +artist I would paint my ideal with a face like that;" and the memory, +with its underlying poetry, sprang to life again as his glance +encountered hers. Percival felt the vague poem, though Bertie was at +his elbow chattering about shops, and though he himself had hardly got +over the intolerable remembrance of that smut. + +When they were in the street Miss Lisle looked eagerly about her, +and asked as they turned a corner, "Will this be our way to St. +Sylvester's?" + +"Yes. I suppose Bertie will make his debut next Sunday? I must come +and hear him." + +"Of course you must," said Lisle. "Where do you generally go?" + +"Well, for a walk generally. Sometimes it ends in some outlying +church, sometimes not." + +"Oh, but it's your duty to attend your parish church when I play +there. I suppose St. Sylvester's _is_ your parish church?" + +"Not a bit of it. St. Andrew's occupies that proud position. I've been +there three times, I think." + +"And what sort of a place is that?" said Miss Lisle. + +"The dreariest, dustiest, emptiest place imaginable," Percival +answered, turning quickly toward her. "There's an old clergyman, +without a tooth in his head, who mumbles something which the +congregation seem to take for granted is the service. Perhaps he means +it for that: I don't know. He's the curate, I think, come to help the +rector, who is getting just a little past his work. I don't remember +that I ever saw the rector." + +"But does any one go?" + +"Well, there's the clerk," said Percival thoughtfully; "and there's a +weekly dole of bread left to fourteen poor men and fourteen poor women +of the parish. They must be of good character and above the age of +sixty-five. It is given away after the afternoon service. When I have +been there, there has always been a congregation of thirty, without +reckoning the clergyman." He paused in his walk. "Didn't you want a +grocer, Miss Lisle? I don't do much of my shopping, but I believe this +place is as good as any." + +Judith went in, and the two young men waited outside. In something +less than half a minute Lisle showed signs of impatience. He inspected +the grocer's stock of goods through the window, and extended his +examination to a toyshop beyond, where he seemed particularly +interested in a small and curly lamb which stood in a pasture of green +paint and possessed an underground squeak or baa. Finally, he returned +to Thorne. "You like waiting, don't you?" he said. + +"I don't mind it." + +"And I do: that's just the difference. Is there a stationer's handy?" + +"At the end of the street, the first turning to the left." + +"I want some music-paper: I can get it before Judith has done ordering +in her supplies if I go at once." + +"Go, then: you can't miss it. I'll wait here for Miss Lisle, and we'll +come and meet you if you are not back." + +When Judith came out she looked round in some surprise: "What has +become of Bertie, Mr. Thorne?" + +"Gone to the bookseller's," said Percival: "shall we walk on and meet +him?" + +They went together down the gray, slushy street. The wayfarers seemed +unusually coarse and jostling that evening, Percival thought, the +pavement peculiarly miry, the flaring gaslights very cruel to the +unloveliness of the scene. + +"Mr. Thorne," Judith began, "I am glad of this opportunity. We haven't +met many times before to-day." + +"Twice," said Percival. + +She looked at him, a faint light of surprise in her eyes. "Ah! twice," +she repeated. "But you know Bertie well. You used often to come at one +time, when I was away?" + +"Oh yes, I saw a good deal of Bertie," he replied, remembering how he +had taken a fancy to the boy. + +"And he used to talk to me about you. I don't feel as if we were quite +strangers, Mr. Thorne." + +"Indeed, I hope not," said Percival, eluding a baker's boy and +reappearing at her side. + +"I've another reason for the feeling, too, besides Bertie's talk," she +went on. "Once, six or seven years ago, I saw your father. He came in +one evening, about some business I think, and I still remember the +very tone in which he talked of you. I was only a school-girl then, +but I could not help understanding something of what you were to him." + +"He was too good to me," said Percival, and his heart was very full. +Those bygone days with his father, which had drifted so far into the +past, seemed suddenly brought near by Judith's words, and he felt the +warmth of the old tenderness once more. + +"So I was very glad to find you here," she said. "For Bertie's +sake, not for yours. I am so grieved that you should have been so +unfortunate!" She looked up at him with eyes which questioned and +wondered and doubted all at once. + +But a small girl, staring at the shop-windows, drove a perambulator +straight at Percival's legs. With a laugh he stepped into the roadway +to escape the peril, and came back: "Don't grieve about me, Miss +Lisle. It couldn't be helped, and I have no right to complain." These +were his spoken words: his unspoken thought was that it served him +right for being such a fool as to trust her father. "It's worse for +you, I think, and harder," he went on; "and if you are so brave--" + +"It's for Bertie if I am," she said quickly: "it is very hard on him. +We have spoilt him, I'm afraid, and now he will feel it so terribly. +For people cannot be the same to us: how should they, Mr. Thorne? Some +of our friends have been very good--no one could be kinder than Miss +Crawford--but it is a dreadful change for Bertie. And I have been +afraid of what he would do if he went where he had no companions. A +sister is so helpless! So I was very thankful when your letter came. +But I am sorry for you, Mr. Thorne. He told me just now--" + +"But, as that can't be helped," said Percival, "be glad for my sake +too. I have been very lonely." + +She looked up at him and smiled. "He insisted on going to Bellevue +street the first thing this morning," she said. "I don't think any +other lodgings would have suited him." + +"But they are not good enough for you." + +"Oh yes, they are, and near Standon Square, too: I shall only have +seven or eight minutes' walk to my work. I should not have liked--Oh, +here he is!--Bertie, this is cool of you, deserting me in this +fashion!" + +"Why, of course you were all right with Thorne, and he asked me to let +him help me in any way he could. I like to take a man at his word." + +"By all means take me at mine," said Percival. + +"Help you?" said Judith to her brother. "Am I such a terrible burden, +then?" + +"No," Thorne exclaimed. "Bertie is a clever fellow: he lets me share +his privileges first, that I mayn't back out of sharing any troubles +later." + +"Are you going to save him trouble by making his pretty speeches for +him, too?" Judith inquired with a smile. "You are indeed a friend in +need." + +They had turned back, and were walking toward Bellevue street. As they +went into No. 13 they encountered Miss Bryant in the passage. She +glanced loftily at Miss Lisle as she swept by, but she turned and +fixed a look of reproachful tenderness on Percival Thorne. He knew +that he was guiltless in the matter, and yet in Judith's presence he +felt guilty and humiliated beneath Lydia's ostentatiously mournful +gaze. The idea that she would probably be jealous of Miss Lisle +flashed into his mind, to his utter disgust and dismay. He turned +into his own room and flung himself into a chair, only to find, a few +minutes later, that he was staring blankly at Lydia's blue vase. But +for the Lisles, he might almost have been driven from Bellevue street +by its mere presence on the table. It was beginning to haunt him: it +mingled in his dreams, and he had drawn its hideous shape absently on +the edge of his blotting-paper. Let him be where he might, it lay, a +light-blue burden, on his mind. It was not the vase only, but he felt +that it implied Lydia herself, curl, turquoise earrings, smile and +all, and on the evening of his meeting with Judith Lisle the thought +was doubly hateful. + + +CHAPTER XXXVII. + +LYDIA REARRANGES HER CAP. + + +Thus, as the days lengthened, and the winter, bitter though it was, +began to give faint promise of sunlight to come, Percival entered +on his new life and felt the gladness of returning spring. At the +beginning of winter our glances are backward: we are like spendthrifts +who have wasted all in days of bygone splendor. We sit, pinched and +poverty-stricken, by our little light of fire and candle, remembering +how the whole land was full of warmth and golden gladness in our +lavish prime. But our feelings change as the days grow clear and keen +and long. This very year has yet to wear its crown of blossom. Its +inheritance is to come, and all is fresh and wonderful. We would not +ask the bygone summer for one day more, for we have the beauty of +promise, instead of that beauty of long triumph which is heavy and +over-ripe, and with March at hand we cannot desire September. + +Percival's new life was cold and stern as the February weather, but it +had its flitting gleams of grace and beauty in brief words or passing +looks exchanged with Judith Lisle. He was no lover, to pine for more +than Fate vouchsafed. It seemed to him that the knowledge that he +might see her was almost enough; and it was well it should be so, for +he met her very seldom. She went regularly to Standon Square, and came +home late and tired. She had one half-holiday in the week, but Miss +Crawford had recommended her to a lady whose eldest girl was dull and +backward at her music, and she spent a great part of that afternoon in +teaching Janie Barton. Bertie was indignant: "Why should you, who have +an ear and a soul for music, be tortured by such an incapable as that? +Let them find some one else to teach her." + +"And some one else to take the money! Besides, Mrs. Barton is so +kind--" + +Bertie, who was lying on three chairs in front of the fire, sat up +directly and looked resigned: "That's it! now for it! No one is so +good as Mrs. Barton, except Miss Crawford; and no one is anything like +Miss Crawford, except Mrs. Barton. Oh, I know! And old Clifton is +the first and best of men. And so you lavish your gratitude on +them--Judith, _why_ are all our benefactors such awful guys?--while +they ought to be thanking their stars they've got us!" + +"Nonsense, Bertie!" + +"'Tisn't nonsense. Aren't you better than I am? And old Clifton is +very lucky to get such an organist. I think he is thankful, but I wish +he wouldn't show it by asking me to tea again." + +"Don't complain of Mr. Clifton," said Judith. "You are very fortunate, +if you only knew it." + +"Am I? Then suppose you go to tea with him if you are so fond of him. +I rather think I shall have a severe cold coming on next Tuesday." + +Judith said no more, being tolerably sure that when Tuesday came +Bertie would go. But she was not quite happy about him. She lived as +if she idolized the spoilt boy, but the blindness which makes idolatry +joyful was denied to her. So that, though he was her first thought +every day of her life, the thought was an anxious one. She was very +grateful to Miss Crawford for having given him a chance, so young and +untried as he was, but she could only hope that Bertie would not repay +her kindness by some thoughtless neglect. At present all had gone +well: there could be no question about his abilities, Miss Crawford +was satisfied, and the young master got on capitally with his pupils. +Neither was Judith happy when he was with Mr. Clifton. Bertie came +home to mimic the clergyman with boyish recklessness, and she feared +that the same kind of thing went on with some of the choir behind Mr. +Clifton's back. ("Behind his back?" Bertie said one day. "Under his +nose, if you like: it would be all one to Clifton.") He frightened +her with his carelessness in money-matters and his scarcely concealed +contempt for the means by which he lived. "Thank Heaven! this hasn't +got to last for ever," he said once when she remonstrated. + +"Don't reckon on anything else," she pleaded. "I know what you are +thinking of. Oh, Bertie, I don't like you to count on that." + +He threw back his head, and laughed: "Well, if that fails, wait and +see what I can do for myself." + +He looked so bright and daring as he spoke that she could hardly help +sharing his confidence. "Ah! the opera!" she said. "But, Bertie, you +must work." + +"The opera--Yes, of course I will work," Bertie answered. "Now you +mention it, it strikes me I may as well have a pipe and think about it +a bit. No time like the present, is there?" So Bertie had his pipe and +a little quiet meditation. There was a lingering smile on his face as +if something had amused him. He always felt particularly virtuous when +he smoked his pipe, because it was so much more economical than the +cigars of his prosperous days. "A penny saved is a penny gained." +Bertie felt as if he must be gradually making his fortune as he leant +back and watched the smoke curl upward. + +And yet, with it all, how could Judith complain? He was the very life +of the house as he ran up and down stairs, filling the dingy passages +with melodious singing. He had a bright word for every one. The grimy +little maid-servant would have died for him at a moment's notice. +Bertie was always sweet-tempered: in very truth, there was not a touch +of bitterness in his nature. And he was so fond of Judith, so proud of +her, so thoroughly convinced of her goodness, so sure that he should +do great things for her some day! What could she say against him? + +Percival, too, was fascinated. His room smelt of Bertie's tobacco and +was littered with blotted manuscripts. He went so regularly to +hear Bertie play that Mr. Clifton noticed the olive-skinned, +foreign-looking young man, and thought of asking him to join the Guild +of St. Sylvester and take a class in the Sunday-school. Yet Percival +also had doubts about the young organist's future. He knew that +letters came now and then from New York which saddened Judith and +brightened Bertie. If Mr. Lisle prospered in America and summoned his +son to share his success, would he have strength to cling to poverty +and honor in England? There were times when Percival doubted it. There +were times, too, when he doubted whether the boy's musical promise +would ever ripen to worthy fruit, though he was angry with himself +for his doubts. "If he triumphs, it will be _her_ doing," he thought. +Little as he saw of Judith, they were yet becoming friends. You may +meet a man every day, and if you only talk to him about the weather +and the leading articles in the _Times_, you may die of old age before +you reach friendship. But these two talked of more than the weather. +Once, emboldened by her remembrance of old days, he spoke of his +father. He hardly noticed at the time that Judith took keen note of +something he said of the old squire's utter separation from his son. +"I was more Percival than Thorne till I was twenty," said he. + +"And are you not more Percival than Thorne still?" + +He liked to hear her say "Percival" even thus. "Perhaps," he said. +"But it is strange how I've learned to care about Brackenhill--or, +rather, it wasn't learning, it came by instinct--and now no place on +earth seems like home to me except that old house." + +Judith, fair and clear-eyed, leaned against the window and looked out +into the twilight. After a pause she spoke: "You are fortunate, Mr. +Thorne. You can look back happily to your life with your father." + +The intention of her speech was evident: so was a weariness which +he had sometimes suspected in her voice. He answered her: "And you +cannot?" + +"No," she said. "I was wondering just now how many people had reason +to hate the name of Lisle." + +Percival was not unconscious of the humorous side of such a remark +when addressed to himself. But Judith looked at him almost as if she +would surprise his thought. + +"Don't dwell on such things," he said. "Men in your father's position +speculate, and perhaps hardly know how deeply they are involved, till +nothing but a lucky chance will save them, and it seems impossible to +do anything but go on. At last the end comes, and it is very terrible. +But you can't mend it." + +"No," said Judith, "I can't." + +"Then don't take up a useless burden when you need all your strength. +You were not to blame in any way." + +"No," she said again, "I hope not. But it is hard to be so helpless. I +do not even know their names. I can only feel as if I ought to be more +gentle and more patient with every one, since any one may be--" + +"Ah, Miss Lisle," said Percival, "you will pay some of the debts +unawares in something better than coin." + +She shook her head, but when she looked up at him there was a half +smile on her lips. As she moved away Percival thought of Sissy's old +talk about heroic women--"Jael, and Judith, and Charlotte Corday." He +felt that this girl would have gone to her death with quiet dignity +had there been need. Godfrey Hammond had called her a plain likeness +of her brother, but Percival had seen at the first glance that her +face was worth infinitely more than Bertie's, even in his boyish +promise; and an artist would have turned from the brother to the +sister, justifying Percival. + +It was well for Percival that Judith's friendly smile and occasional +greeting made bright moments in his life, since he had no more of +Lydia's attentions. Poor grimy little Emma waited on him wearily, and +always neglected him if the Lisles wanted her. She had apparently laid +in an immense stock of goods, for she never went shopping now, but +stayed at home and let his fire go out, and was late and slovenly with +his meals. There was no great dishonesty, but his tea-caddy was no +longer guarded and provisions ceased to be mysteriously preserved. +Miss Bryant seldom met him on the stairs, and when she did she +flounced past him in lofty scorn. Her slighted love had turned to +gall. She was bitter in her very desire to convince herself that she +had never thought of Mr. Thorne. She neglected to send up his letters; +she would not lift a finger to help in getting his dinner ready; and +if Emma happened to be out of the way she would let his bell ring and +take no notice. Yet she would have been very true to him, in her own +fashion, if he would have had it so: she would have taken him for +better, for worse--would have slaved for him and fought for him, +and never suffered any one else to find fault with him in any way +whatever. But he had not chosen that it should be so, and Lydia +had reclaimed her heart and her pocket edition of the _Language of +Flowers_, and now watched Percival and Miss Lisle with spiteful +curiosity. + +"I shall be late at Standon Square this evening: Miss Crawford wants +me," said Judith one morning to her brother. + +"I'll come and meet you," was his prompt reply. "What time? Don't let +that old woman work you into an early grave." + +"There's no fear of that. I'm strong, and it won't hurt me. Suppose +you come at half-past nine: you must have your tea by yourself, I'm +afraid." + +"That's all right," he answered cheerfully. + +"'That's all right?' What do you mean by that, sir?" + +"I mean that I don't at all mind when you don't come back to tea. I +think I rather prefer it. There, Miss Lisle!" + +"You rude boy!" She felt herself quite justified in boxing his ears. + +"Oh, I say, hold hard! Mind my violets!" he exclaimed. + +"Your violets? Oh, how sweet they are!" And bending forward, Judith +smelt them daintily. "Where did you get them, Bertie?" + +"Ah! where?" And Bertie stood before the glass and surveyed himself. +The cheap lodging-house mirror cast a greenish shade over his +features, but the little bouquet in his buttonhole came out very well. +"Where did I get them? I didn't buy them, if you mean that. They were +given to me." + +"Who gave them to you?" + +"And then women say it isn't fair to call them curious!" Bertie put +his head on one side, dropped his eyelids, looked out of the corners +of his eyes, and smiled, fingering an imaginary curl. + +"Not that nasty Miss Bryant? She didn't!" + +"She did, though." + +"The wretch! Then you sha'n't wear them one moment more." Bertie +eluded her attack, and stood laughing on the other side of the table. +"Oh, Bertie!" suddenly growing very plaintive, "why did you let me +smell the nasty things?" + +"They are very nice," said Lisle, looking down at the poor little +violets. "Oh, we are great friends, Lydia and I. I shall have buttered +toast for tea to-night." + +"Buttered toast? What do you mean?" + +"Why, it's a curious thing, but Emma--isn't her name Emma?--always has +to work like a slave when you go out. I don't know why there should +be so much more to do: you don't help her to clean the kettles or the +steps in the general way, do you? It's a mystery. Anyhow, Lydia has +to see after my tea, and then I have buttered toast or muffins and +rashers of bacon. Lydia's attentions are just a trifle greasy perhaps, +now I come to think of it. But she toasts muffins very well, does that +young woman, and makes very good tea too." + +"Bertie! I thought you made tea for yourself when I was away." + +"Oh! did you? Not I: why should I? I had some of Mrs. Bryant's +raspberry jam one night: that wasn't bad for a change. And once I had +some prawns." + +"Oh, Bertie! How _could_ you?" + +"Bless you, my child!" said Bertie, "how serious you look! Where's the +harm? Do you think I shall make myself ill? By the way, I wonder if +Lydia ever made buttered toast for Thorne? I suspect she did, and that +he turned up his nose at it: she always holds her head so uncommonly +high if his name is mentioned." + +"Do throw those violets on the fire," said Judith. + +"Indeed, I shall do nothing of the kind. I'm coming to Standon Square +to give my lessons this morning, with my violets. See if I don't." + +The name of Standon Square startled Judith into looking at the time. +"I must be off," she said. "Don't be late for the lessons, and oh, +Bertie, don't be foolish!" + +"All right," he answered gayly. Judith ran down stairs. At the door +she encountered Lydia and eyed her with lofty disapproval. It did not +seem to trouble Miss Bryant much. She knew Miss Lisle disliked her, +and took it as an inevitable fact, if not an indirect compliment to +her conquering charms. So she smiled and wished Judith good-morning. +But she had a sweeter smile for Bertie when, a little later, carefully +dressed, radiant, handsome, with her violets in his coat, he too went +on his way to Standon Square. + +If Judith had been in Bellevue street when he came back, she might +have noticed that the little bouquet was gone. Had it dropped out +by accident? Or had Bertie merely defended his violets for fun, and +thrown them away as soon as her back was turned? Or what had happened +to them? There was no one to inquire. + +Young Lisle strolled into Percival's room, and found him just come in +and waiting for his dinner. "I'm going to practise at St. Sylvester's +this afternoon," said the young fellow. "What do you say to a walk as +soon as you get away?" + +Percival assented, and began to move some of the books and papers +which were strewn on the table. Lisle sat on the end of the horsehair +sofa and watched him. "I can't think how you can endure that blue +thing and those awful flowers continually before your eyes," he said +at last. + +Percival shrugged his shoulders. He could not explain to Lisle that to +request that Lydia's love-token might be removed would have seemed to +him to be like going down to her level and rejecting what he preferred +to ignore. "What am I to do?" he said. "I believe they think it +very beautiful, and I fancy the flowers are home-made. People have +different ideas of art, but shall I therefore wound Miss Bryant's +feelings?" + +"Heaven forbid!" said Bertie. "Did Lydia Bryant make those flowers? +How interesting!" He pulled the vase toward him for a closer +inspection. There was a crash, and light-blue fragments strewed the +floor, Percival, piling his books on the side-table, looked round with +an exclamation. + +"Hullo!" said Lisle, "I've done it! Here's a pretty piece of work! +And you so fond of it, too!" He was picking up the flowers as he +spoke.--"Here, Emma," as the girl opened the door, "I've upset Mr. +Thorne's flower-vase. Tell Miss Bryant it was my doing, and I'm afraid +it won't mend. Better take up the pieces carefully, though, on the +chance." This was thoughtful of Bertie, as the bits were remarkably +small. "And here are the flowers--all right, I think. Have you got +everything?" He held the door open while she went out with her load, +and then he came back rubbing his hands: "Well, are you grateful? +You'll never see that again." + +Percival surveyed him with a grave smile. "I'm grateful," he said. +"But I'd rather you didn't treat all the things which offend my eye in +the same way." + +Bertie glanced round at the furniture, cheap, mean and shabby: "You +think I should have too much smashing to do?" + +"I fear it might end in my sitting cross-legged on the floor," said +Thorne. "And my successor might cavil at Mrs. Bryant's idea of +furnished lodgings." + +"Well, I know I've done you a good turn to-day," Bertie rejoined: "my +conscience approves of my conduct." And he went off whistling. + +Percival, on his way out, met Lydia on the landing. "Miss Bryant, have +you a moment to spare?" he said as she went rustling past. + +She stopped ungraciously. + +"The flower-vase on my table is broken. If you can tell me what it +cost I will pay for it." + +"Mr. Lisle broke it, didn't he? Emma said--" + +"No matter," said Thorne: "it was done in my room. It is no concern of +Mr. Lisle's. Can you tell me?" + +Lydia hesitated. Should she let him pay for it? Some faint touch of +refinement told her that she should not take money for what she had +meant as a love-gift. She looked up and met the utter indifference of +his eyes as he stood, purse in hand, before her. She was ashamed of +the remembrance that she had tried to attract his attention, and +burned to deny it. "Well, then, it was three-and-six," she said. + +Percival put the money in her hand. She eyed it discontentedly. + +"That's right, isn't it?" he asked in some surprise. + +The touch of the coins recalled to her the pleasure with which she had +spent her own three-and-sixpence to brighten his room, and she half +repented. "Oh, it's right enough," she said. "But I don't know why you +should pay for it. Things will get knocked over--" + +"I beg your pardon: of course I ought to pay for it," he replied, +drawing himself up. He spoke the more decidedly that he knew how it +was broken. "But, Miss Bryant, it will not be necessary to replace it. +I don't think anything of the kind would be very safe in the middle of +my table." And with a bow he went on his way. + +Lydia stood where he had left her, fingering his half-crown and +shilling with an uneasy sense that there was something very mean about +the transaction. Now that she had taken his money she disliked him +much more, but, as she _had_ taken it, she went away and bought +herself a pair of grass-green gloves. From that time forward she +always openly declared that she despised Mr. Thorne. + +That evening, when they came back from their walk, Lisle asked his +companion to lend him a couple of sovereigns. "You shall have them +back to-morrow," he said airily. Percival assented as a matter of +course. He hardly thought about it at all, and if he had he would have +supposed that there was something to be paid in Miss Lisle's absence. +He had still something left of the small fortune with which he +had started. It was very little, but he could manage Bertie's two +sovereigns with that and the money he had laid aside for Mrs. Bryant's +weekly bill. + +Percival Thorne, always exact in his accounts, supposed that a time +was fixed for the repayment of the loan. He did not understand that +his debtor was one of those people who when they say "I will pay you +to-morrow," merely mean "I will not pay you to-day." + + +CHAPTER XXXVIII. + +CONCERNING SISSY. + + +Percival had announced the fact of the Lisles' presence in Bellevue +street to Sissy in a carefully careless sentence. Sissy read it, and +shivered sadly. Then she answered in a peculiarly bright and cheerful +letter. "I'm not fit for him," she thought as she wrote it. "I don't +understand him, and I'm always afraid. Even when he loved me best I +felt as if he loved some dream-girl and took me for her in his dream, +and would be angry with me when he woke. Miss Lisle would not be +afraid. It is the least I can do for Percival, not to stand in the way +of his happiness--the least I can do, and oh, how much the hardest!" +So she gave Thorne to understand that she was getting on remarkably +well. + +It was not altogether false. She had fallen from a dizzy height, but +she had found something of rest and security in the valley below. And +as prisoners cut off from all the larger interests of their lives pet +the plants and creatures which chance to lighten their captivity, so +did Sissy begin to take pleasure in little gayeties for which she +had not cared in old days. She could sleep now at night without +apprehension, and she woke refreshed. There was a great blank in her +existence where the thunderbolt fell, but the cloud which hung so +blackly overhead was gone. The lonely life was sad, but it held +nothing quite so dreadful as the fear that a day might come when +Percival and his wife would know that they stood on different +levels--that she could not see with his eyes nor understand his +thoughts--when he would look at her with sorrowful patience, and she +would die slowly of his terrible kindness. The lonely life was sad, +but, after all, Sissy Langton would not be twenty-one till April. + +Percival read her letter, and asked Godfrey Hammond how she really +was. "Tell me the truth," he said: "you know all is over between us. +She writes cheerfully. Is she better than she was last year?" + +Hammond replied that Sissy was certainly better. "She has begun to go +out again, and Fordborough gossip says that there is something between +her and young Hardwicke. He is a good fellow, and I fancy the old man +will leave him very well off. But she might do better, and there +are two people, at any rate, who do not think anything will come of +it--myself and young Hardwicke." + +Percival hoped not, indeed. + +A month later Hammond wrote that there was no need for Percival to +excite himself about Henry Hardwicke. Mrs. Falconer had taken Sissy +and Laura to a dance at Latimer's Court, and Sissy's conquests were +innumerable. Young Walter Latimer and a Captain Fothergill were the +most conspicuous victims. "I believe Latimer rides into Fordborough +every day, and the captain, being stationed there, is on the spot. Our +St. Cecilia looks more charming than ever, but what she thinks of all +this no one knows. Of course Latimer would be the better match, as +far as money goes--he is decidedly better-looking, and, I should say, +better-tempered--but Fothergill has an air about him which makes his +rival look countrified, so I suppose they are tolerably even. Neither +is overweighted with brains. What do you think? Young Garnett cannot +say a civil word to either of them, and wants to give Sissy a dog. He +is not heart-whole either, I take it." + +Hammond was trying to probe his correspondent's heart. He flattered +himself that he should learn something from Percival, let him answer +how he would. But Percival did not answer at all. The fact was, he did +not know what to say. It seemed to him that he would give anything to +hear that Sissy was happy, and yet-- + +Nor did Sissy understand herself very well. Her grace and sweetness +attracted Latimer and Fothergill, and a certain gentle indifference +piqued them. She was not sad, lest sadness should be a reproach to +Percival. In truth, she hardly knew what she wished. One day she came +into the room and overheard the fag-end of a conversation between Mrs. +Middleton and a maiden aunt of Godfrey Hammond's who had come to +spend the day. "You know," said the visitor, "I never could like Mr. +Percival Thorne as much as--" + +Sissy paused on the threshold, and Miss Hammond stopped short. The +color mounted to her wintry cheek, and she contrived to find an +opportunity to apologize a little later: "I beg your pardon, my dear, +for my thoughtless remark just as you came in. I know so little that +my opinion was worthless. I really beg your pardon." + +"What for?" said Sissy. "For what you said about Percival Thorne? My +dear Miss Hammond, people can't be expected to remember _that_. Why, +we agreed that it should be all over and done with at least a hundred +years ago." She spoke with hurried bravery. + +The old lady looked at her and held out her hands: "My dear, is the +time always so long since you parted?" + +Sissy put the proffered hands airily aside and scoffed at the idea. +They had a crowd of callers that afternoon, but the girl lingered +more than once by Miss Hammond's side and paid her delicate little +attentions. This perplexed young Garnett very much when he had +ascertained from one of the company that the old woman had nothing but +an annuity of three hundred a year. He hoped that Sissy Langton wasn't +a little queer, but, upon his word, it looked like it. + +[TO BE CONTINUED.] + + + + +A WELSH WATERING-PLACE. + + +On the eastern shore of that stretch of land which forms the extreme +south-western point of Wales stands the stony little seaport town +of Tenby. It is an old, old town, rich in historical legends, an +important place in the twelfth century and down to Queen Elizabeth's +reign. Soon after her time it fell into woeful decay, and for years +of whose number there is no record Tenby existed as a poor +fishing-village and mourned its departed glories. That it would ever +again be a place of interest to anybody but people of fishy pursuits +was an idea Tenby did not entertain concerning itself; but, lo! in the +present century there arose a custom among genteel folk of going down +to the sea in bathing-machines. It was discovered that Tenby was a +spot favored of Neptune (or whatever god or goddess regulates the +matter of surf-bathing), and Tenby was taken down from the shelf, as +it were, dusted, mended and set on its legs again. The fashionables +smiled on it. Away off in the depths of wild Wales the knowing few set +up their select and choice summer abode, and vaunted its being so +far away from home; for Tenby was farther from London in those old +coaching days than New York is in these days of steamships. Even years +after railroads found their way into Wales, Tenby remained remote +and was approachable only by coach; but now you can step into your +railway-carriage in London and trundle to Tenby without change between +your late breakfast and your late dinner. + +Probably no seaside watering-place known to the polite world contrasts +so strongly with the typical American watering-place as does this +Welsh resort. Not at Brighton, not at Biarritz, not at any German spa, +will the tourist find so complete a contrast in every respect to Long +Branch or Newport. Tenby is almost _sui generis_. A watering-place +without a wooden building in it would of itself be a novelty to an +American. Our summer cities consist wholly of wooden buildings, but +Tenby, from the point of its ponderous pier, where the waves break as +on a rock, to the tip of its church-spire, which the clouds kiss, is +every inch of stone. Welshmen will not build even so insignificant a +structure as a pig-sty out of boards if there are stones to be had. I +have seen stone pig-sties in Glamorganshire with walls a foot thick +and six hundred years old. There is not a wooden building in Tenby. +The station-buildings are "green" (as the Welsh say of a new house), +but they are solid stone. + +Alighting from the railway-carriage in which you have come down from +London, you are greeted with no clamor of bawling hack-drivers and +hotel-omnibus men roaring in stentorian tones the names of their +various houses. Three or four quiet serving-men in corduroy +small-clothes and natty coats touch their hats to you and look in your +face inquiringly. They represent the various hotels in Tenby, and at +a gesture of assent from you one of them takes your bags, your wraps, +whatever you are burdened with, and conducts you to a somewhat +antiquated vehicle which bears you to your chosen inn through some +gray stony streets, under an ivy-green archway of the ancient +town-wall; and as the vehicle draws up at the inn-door the beauty of +Tenby lies spread suddenly before you--the lovely bay, the cliffs, +the sands, the ruined castle on the hill, the restless sea beyond. A +handsome young person in an elaborate toilet as regards her back hair, +but not otherwise impressive in attire, comes to the door of the hotel +to meet you, and gently inquires concerning your wishes: that you +have come to stay in the house is a presumption which no properly +constituted young person in Tenby would venture upon without express +warrant in words. Receiving information on this point from you, the +probability is that she imparts to you in return the information that +the house is full. Such, indeed, is the chronic condition of the +hotels at Tenby in the season; and unless you have written beforehand +and secured accommodations, you are not likely to find them. In the +life of a Welsh watering-place hotels do not fill the important place +they do in American summer resorts. Nobody lives at an hotel in Tenby. +If their stay be longer than a day or two (and very few indeed are +they who come to-day and are off to-morrow), visitors inevitably go +into lodgings. Such is the custom of the country, and there is no +provision for any other, no encouragement to a prolonged stay at an +hotel. The result is, that the hotels are in an incessant state of +bustle and change: there is a never-intermitting stream of arrivals, +who only ask to be made comfortable for a night or two while they are +looking for lodgings, and then make way for the next squad. Tenby +abounds in lodging-houses, the expenses of which are smaller than +hotel expenses, while their comforts are greater, their cares actually +less and their good tone unquestionable. The various lodging-house +quarters vie with each other in genteel cognomens and aristocratic +flavor. The Esplanade is but a row of lodging-houses. The various +Terraces, each with a prenomen more graceful than the other, are the +same. The windows of Tudor Square and Victoria street, Paragon Place +and Glendower Crescent, bloom with invitations to "inquire within." A +handsome parlor and bedroom may be had for two pounds a week, and the +cost of food and sundries need not exceed two pounds more for two +persons moderately fond of good living; which means, at Tenby, the +fattest and whitest of fowls, the freshest and daintiest salmon and +john dories, the reddest and sweetest of lobsters and prawns. Those +who prefer to take a house have every encouragement to do so. A bijou +of a furnished cottage, all overrun with vines and flowers, may be had +for three pounds a month, the use of plate and linen included. These +things are fatal to hotel ambition, for although the hotels are not +expensive, from an American point of view, they cannot compete with +such figures as these. Hence there is nothing to induce a change in +the customs of Tenby, which have prevailed ever since it became a +watering-place. Britons do not change their habits without good and +valid cause therefor, and no Americans ever come to Tenby, so far as I +can learn. + +We are Americans ourselves, of course, and we are going to do as +Americans do--viz. make a very brief stay, and that in an hotel. We +obtain accommodations at last through a happy fortune, and presently +find ourselves installed in the grandest suite of hotel-apartments +at Tenby--a large parlor, handsomely furnished, with a piano, books, +_objets d'art_, etc., and a bedroom off it. At Long Branch, were there +such an apartment there--which there is not--twenty dollars a day +would be charged for it, without board and without compunction. Here +we pay nineteen shillings. There is a magnificent view from our front +windows. The hotel stands close to the cliff, with only a narrow +street between its doorstep and the edge of the precipice. The night +is falling, and the scene is like Fairy Land. We look from our windows +straight down upon the sands, a dizzy distance below (but to which it +were easy to toss a pebble), and out over the glassy waters, where +small craft float silently, with the gray old stone pier and the dark +ivy-hung ruin on Castle Hill, the one reflected in the waves, the +other outlined against the sky--a lovely picture. Tenby covers the +ridge of a long and narrow promontory rising abruptly out of the sea, +its stone streets running along the dizzy limestone cliffs. From the +highest point eastward--where is presented toward the sea a front +of rugged precipices which would not shame a mountain-range--the +promontory slopes gradually lower and lower till the streets of the +town run stonily down sidewise through an ancient gate and debouch +upon the south beach. Then, as if repenting its condescension, the +promontory takes a fresh start, and for a brief spurt climbs again, +but quickly plunges into the sea. This spurt, however, creates the +picturesque hill on which of old stood a powerful Norman fortress, +whose ruins we see. Local enterprise has now laid out the hill as a +public pleasure-ground, with gravelled paths and rustic seats, and +glorified it with a really superb statue of the late Prince Albert, +who, the Welsh inscription asserts, was _Albert Dda, Priod Ein +Gorhoffus Frenhines Victoria_. + +We find upon inquiry that our hotel so far infringes upon primitive +Welsh manners as to provide a _table-d'hote_ dinner at six. This is +most welcome news, and we become at once part of the company which +sits down to the table d'hote. There are ten people besides ourselves, +and not a commonplace or colorless character among them. My left-hand +neighbor is a somewhat slangy young gentleman in a suit of chequered +clothes, who carves the meats, being at the head of the table; and +my happy propinquity secures me the honor of selection by the young +gentleman as the recipient of his observations: a toughish round of +beef which he is called upon to carve evokes from him an aside to the +effect that it is "rather a dose." The foot of the table is held by an +old gentleman in a black stock, with a tuft of wiry hair on the front +part of his head, and none whatever on any other part, who carves +a fowl, and in asking the diners which part they severally prefer +accompanies the question with a brisk sharpening of his knife on his +fork, but without making the least noise in doing it. My chequered +neighbor having advertised the toughness of the beef, everybody +murmurs a purpose of indulging in fowl, at which my neighbor observes +aside to me that he is "rather jolly glad," and the butler takes the +beef away. The dish next set before him proving a matter of spoons +merely, his relief at not being obliged to carve finds vent in a +whispered "Hooray!" for my exclusive amusement. One unfortunate +individual has accepted a helping of beef, however--a bald-headed man +in spectacles, not hitherto unaccustomed to good living, if one +might judge by his rounded proportions. It is painful to witness his +struggles with the beef, which he maintains with the earnestness of a +man who means to conquer or perish in the endeavor. Opposite sits as +fair a type of a ripe British beauty of the middle class as I have +anywhere seen--with a complexion of snow, a mouth like a red bud and +eyes as beautiful and expressive as those of a splendid large wax +doll, her hair drawn tensely back and rolled into billowy puffs, with +a rose atop. It is sad, in looking on a picture like this--superb in +its suggestions of pure rich blood and abounding health--to reflect +that such a rose will develop into a red peony in ten years. I do not +say the peony will not have her own strong recommendings to the eye: +we may not despise a peony, but it is impossible not to regret that a +rose should turn into one. There is a very good example of the peony +sort near the foot of the table--quite a magnificent creature in her +way. Her husband, who sits next her, is a fiercely-bearded man, but +has a strange air of being in his wife's custody nevertheless. The +lady is apparently forty-five, red to a fault, full in the neck, and +with a figure which necessitates a somewhat haughty pose of the head +unless one would appear gross and piggish. There is much to admire +in this lady, peony though she be. The fiercely-bearded husband is +smaller than his wife, and, in spite of her commanding air and his +subdued aspect, I have not a doubt he rules her with a rod of iron. +Appearances are very deceptive in this direction. I have known so many +large ladies married to little men who (the ladies) carried themselves +in public like grenadiers or drum-majors, and in private doted on +their little lords' shoe-strings! Next the fiercely-bearded husband +sits a very pretty girl, whom he finds his entertainment in constantly +observing with the air of a connoisseur. She is modesty itself; her +eyes are never off her plate; and from the at-ease manner in which he +contemplates her it is clear he no more expects her to return his gaze +than he expects a torpedo to go off under his chair. + +The dinner proceeds most decorously. If it were a funeral, indeed, it +could hardly be less given to anything approaching hilarity. There +is now and then a little conversation, but the gaps are +frightful--yawning chasms of silence of the sort in which you are +moved to wild thoughts of running away, for fear you may suddenly +commit some act of horrible impropriety, like whistling in church. In +one of these gaps--during which the whole company, having finished the +course, is waiting gloomily for the victim of tough beef (who is still +struggling) to have done--my chequered neighbor remarks, in an aside +which makes every one start as if a pistol had been fired off, +"Goodish-sized pause, eh?" + +But with the dessert we begin to unbend. We are still exceedingly +decorous, but our tongues are loosened a little, and we exchange +amiable remarks, under whose genial influence we begin to feel that +the worst is over. Unfortunately, however, with the spread of sunshine +among us there is the muttering of a storm at our backs: the butler +pushes his female assistant aside with deep rumbling growls, and +presently explodes with open rage at her stupidity. The diners turn +and stare incredulous and amazed. The butler rushes madly from the +room. The female assistant, agitated but obstinate, seizes the +blanc-mange and the cream and proceeds to serve them. I shall not be +believed, I fear, but I am relating simple truth: in her agitation +this incredible female spills the cream in a copious shower-bath over +me and my chequered neighbor, and excitedly falls to mopping it off us +with her napkin, like a pantomime clown. Fortunately, we are in our +travelling suits, and come out of this baptism unharmed. The incident +nearly suffocates the company, for there is not a soul among them who +would not sooner suffer the pangs of dissolution than laugh outright. +As for me, I am nearly expiring with the merriment that consumes me +and my efforts to prevent indecorous explosion. The young woman, after +having wiped me dry, once more presents the cream-jug, this time with +both hands, but I can only murmur faintly in my trouble, "Thanks, +no--no _more_ cream." This appears to be quite too much for the young +person, who throws up her arms in despair and rushes after the butler. +What tragic encounter there may have been in the servants' hall I know +not. Another servant comes and carries the dinner through. + +It is entertainment enough for the first morning of your stay at Tenby +just to sit at the windows and observe what is there before you--the +street with its passers, the beach with its strange rock-formations, +the ocean thickly dotted with fishing-craft. The tide is out, and the +huge black block of compact limestone called God's Rock, with its +almost perpendicular strata, lies all uncovered in the morning sun--a +vast curiosity-shop where children clamber about and search for +strange creatures of the sea. In the pools left here and there by +the receding tide are found not only crabs and periwinkles in great +number, but polyps, sea-anemones, star-fishes, medusae and the like in +almost endless variety. Naturalists--who are but children older grown, +with all a child's capacity for being amused by Nature--get rages of +enthusiasm on them as they search the crevices of this and other like +rocks at Tenby. A floor of hard yellow sand stretches away into the +distance, visible for miles, owing to the circular sweep of the beach +and the height from which we are looking out, and it is dotted with +strollers appearing like black mice moving slowly about. The +long stretch of the cliff, from its crescent shape, is clearly +seen--sometimes a sheer, bare stone precipice, sometimes a steep slope +covered with woods and hanging gardens and zigzag, descending walled +paths. + +Among those who make up the human panorama of the street under your +window are types of character peculiar to Wales. One such is the +peddling fisher-woman who strolls by with a basketful of bright +pink prawns, which she holds out to you temptingly, looking up. The +fisher-women of Tenby wear a costume differing in some respects from +that of all other Welsh peasants. Instead of the glossy and expensive +"beaver" worn in other parts, the Tenby women sport a tall hat of +straw or badly-battered felt. Another favorite with them is a soft +black slouch hat like a man's, but with a knot of ribbon in front. One +of the neatest of the fisher-women is an old girl of fifty or so, who +haunts your windows incessantly, and greets you with a quick-dropped +courtesy whenever you walk out. She is never seen to stand still, +except for the purpose of talking to a customer, but trots incessantly +about; and either for this reason, or from her constant journeys to +and fro between her home and the town, is given the nickname of Dame +Trudge. She usually has on her back a coarse oyster-basket called a +"creel," and in her hands another basket containing cooked prawns, +lobsters or other temptation to the gourmand. Her dress, though it is +midsummer, is warm and snug, particularly about the head and neck, +as a protection against the winds of ocean; and her stout legs are +encased in jet-black woollen stockings (visible below her short check +petticoat), while her feet are shod with huge brogans whose inch-thick +soles are heavily plated with iron. She lives ten miles from Tenby, +walks to and fro always, and sleeps under her own roof every night, +yet you never fail to see her there in the street when you get up in +the morning. There are many other oyster-women to be seen at Tenby, +but none so trim as good Dame Trudge. Here and hereabout grow the +largest, if not the sweetest, oysters in Great Britain, and their +cultivation is chiefly the work of the gentler sex. They do not look +very gentle--or at least very frail--as you come upon a group of +oyster-women in their masculine hats and boots munching their bread +and cheese under a wall, but they are a good-natured race, and most +respectful to their betters. Anything less suggestive of Billingsgate +than the language of these Welsh fisher-women could hardly be, +considering their trade. + +The tide of passers is setting toward the south sands. Foreigners are +almost unrepresented in this throng. There is one Frenchman, who would +be recognizable as far off as he could be seen by his contrast to the +prevailing British tone. It is a mystery why he should be here instead +of at Trouville, Boulogne, Dieppe or Etretat, where the habits of the +gay world are all his own. Nobody seems to know him at Tenby. Behind +him walks quite as pronounced a type of the Welsh country gentleman--a +character not to be mistaken for an Englishman, in spite of the family +resemblance. A shrewd simplicity characterizes this face--an open, +guileless sharpness, so to speak, peculiarly Welsh. An indifferent +judge of human nature might venture to attempt heathen games with this +old gentleman, but no astute rogue would think of such a thing. A man +of this stamp, however green and rural, is not gullible. This Welsh +simplicity of character is very deceptive to the unwary, and many +besides Ancient Pistol have eaten leeks against their will because of +their ignorance concerning it. + +We join the throng in the street and stroll leisurely down the long +incline. The whole town tips that way. A variety of more or less +quaint vehicles move about--cabriolets drawn by donkeys and ponies; +sedan chairs; a species of easy-chair on wheels, with a wooden apron, +and propelled by a boy or a decayed footman in seedy livery with +bibulous habits written on his face. Something of a similar sort was +seen at the Centennial, yet utterly unlike this, notwithstanding a +resemblance in principle. These invalid go-carts are very convenient +at Tenby, as they may be trundled everywhere, even on the sands, which +are hard and flat. A peculiarity of all the vehicles, even those drawn +by two animals, is that they go slower, as a rule, than on-foot people +do. Briskly-walking couples and groups of English and Welsh ladies +pass us, carrying over their arms bathing-dresses or towels, with the +business-like alacrity of movement characteristic of most Britons on +their feet. No one saunters except ourselves. All are hastening to the +south sands, looking neither to the right nor the left; but for +us there are eye-lures in every direction. The town abounds with +antiquities calculated to awaken the liveliest interest in a stranger: +every street is rich with romantic story; every hill and rock for +miles around has its legend, its ruin of castle, abbey or palace, or +its mysterious cromlech,--all that can most charm the soul of the +antiquary; and Shakespeare has honored this corner of Wales beyond +others by putting it in one of his tragedies. Considerable portions +of the ancient town-wall are standing, with the mural towers and +gateways. In the parish church, which we pass, are some most +interesting monuments of the early half of the fourteenth century, but +the Tenbyites look upon their church as rather a modern structure, +as churches go in Wales. They point out the place where John Wesley +preached in the street in 1763, when the mayor threatened to read the +riot act. There is still a law in Wales against street-preaching, but +it is not often enforced, unless the preacher happens to be drunk--an +incident not altogether unknown. + +The old stone pier abounds with seafaring characters in holiday rig, +very picturesque to American eyes. They knuckle their foreheads and +remove their pipes as we pass, and by attitudes and gestures which +would inform a deaf-mute invite us to take a sail on the bay. They do +not audibly offer their services, for the municipal laws forbid them +to, but their figureheads are mutely eloquent. Here is one who might +be put right on the stage as he stands as the typical jolly Jack Tar +of the nautical drama. He wears a red liberty-cap, and a nose which +matches it to a shade. His jersey is blue and low in the neck, and his +trousers are of that roominess supposed to be necessary for nautical +purposes. Other mariners about him are quite as interesting. +Occasionally one is seen whose rig is so neat he might have stepped +out of a bandbox, but, though he is an ornamental mariner, he is not a +Brummagem one. These fellows all know storm and danger and severe toil +as common acquaintances. The neatest of them are understood to be +residents here, with wives or mothers who strive hard to keep them +looking nice in the fashionable season; and in blue flannel shirt with +immense broad collar, another broad collar of white turned over that, +hat of neat straw or tarpaulin with upturned rim and bright blue +ribbon, they form a feature of attractiveness which has no counterpart +at American seaside resorts. The rougher mariners, if not so handsome, +are still most picturesque: they are chiefly fishermen from the +Devonshire coast, who sail over here to take the salmon, mackerel, +herrings, turbots, soles, etc. which so abound at Tenby. The spot +still bears out, in spite of its modern glories as a watering-place, +its ancient renown as a fishing-point, which was so great that the +old-time Britons called it _Denbych y Piscoed_ ("the hill by the place +of fishes"). + +On the Castle Hill we find a great company gathered, looking down +on the still greater company which is gathered on the yellow sands. +Children are climbing and rolling on the soft greensward of the +terraces, and adults are sprawling at full length, completely at their +ease. Men and women lounge to and fro on the sea-wall promenade, a +miniature of the Hyde Park throng at mid-season. Others sit reading or +chatting or looking out over the sparkling sea. The grass and crags +are dotted with azure and purple flowers, and cushions of pink and +white stone-crop abound. Higher up the hill stand the ivied ruins of +the Norman castle, and the white memorial monument to Prince Albert, +with its sculptured panels bearing the arms of Llewellyn the Great, +the red dragon of Cadwalader, the symbolical leek and the motto, +_Anorchfygol Ddraig Cymru_ ("The dragon of Wales is invincible"). The +air is very cool and bracing on this hill. But the greatest crowd is +on the sands and on the rocks of the cliff immediately backing the +beach. It is difficult for one who is familiar only with the beach at +Long Branch or Cape May to comprehend such a scene as this which I +am trying to picture. In the first place, the field is so entirely +different from that at home; and in the second place, the bathing +population of the town is not broken up into a number of hotel +communities and cottage communities, but is all gathered at one spot. +It is true some residents on the north cliff bathe on the north sands, +but they come to the south sands after they have had their dip, to +meet _le monde_. There is room here for _le monde_ too; and the groups +not only sprinkle the wide yellow plain, but they are perched about +on the face of the cliff in grottos and on jutting crags; they are +grouped in the cool shade of rocky caverns at the precipice's base; +they are leaning on the battlemented walls that crown its summit. The +water is a considerable distance from where the people sit, and minute +by minute, as the time passes, it recedes farther and farther, until +at last it is a long walk away. The gay hues of red-coated soldiers +assist feminine attire in enlivening the scene with color. Children in +great numbers are scampering about, and busying themselves, much as +they do at home, with toy pails and spades; but if you take notice +you will find that their sand-structures differ widely from those of +children in America: you may even see a perfect model of a feudal +castle grow into shape, with barbacan, gate, moat, drawbridge, towers, +bastions, donjon-keep and banqueting-hall complete. A brass band--the +members in full uniform of bright colors, with little rimless +red-and-gold caps--is playing under the battlemented garden-wall which +backs the sands in one place. Listen to the tunes! Heard you ever +these peculiar airs before? The "Bells of Aberdovey" jangle their +sweet chime over the wind-blown scene. The "March of the Men of +Harlech" fills all the air with its stirring scarlet strain. The +quaint melody of "Hob y deri dando" moves the feet of youth to +restlessness: not that it is a jig, in spite of the jiggy look of +the words to English eyes, but because it has been twisted into the +service of Terpsichore by a famous band-master in his "Welsh Lancers." +"Hob y deri dando" is a love-song: + + All the day I sigh and cry, love, + Hob y deri dando! + All the night I say and pray, love, + Hob y deri dando![A] + +[Footnote A: This phrase is sometimes supposed to be the original +of the English "Hey down, derry, derry down!" but the old Druidic +song-burden, "Come, let us hasten to the oaken grove," is in Welsh +"Hai down ir deri dando," which is nearer the English phrase.] + + +A hand-organ with monkey attachment is delighting a group of children +on another part of the sands. Yonder, too, is a balladist with a +guitar, bawling at the top of his lungs, + + The dream 'as parst, the spell his broken, + 'Opes 'ave faded one by one: + Th' w'isper'd words, so sweetly spoken, + Hall like faded flow'rs har gone. + Still that woice hin music lingers, + Loike er 'arp 'oose silver strings, + Softly swep' by fairy fingers, + Tell of hunforgotten things. + +Nobody pays much attention to this wandering minstrel: he is happy if +at the close of his song a penny finds its way into the battered hat +he extends for largess. He is clearly a stranger to this part of the +world, and has probably tramped down here from London by easy stages, +and will have to tramp back again as he came, without much profit from +his provincial tour. + +The fashionable world which is sunning itself on the sands is made up, +for the most part, of the usual types of a British watering-place--the +pea-jacketed swell with blase manner and one-eyed quizzing-glass; the +occasional London cad in clothes of painful newness and exaggeration +of style, such as no gentleman by any chance ever wears in Britain; +the young sprig of nobility with effeminate face and "fast" +inclinations, who smokes a cigarette and ogles the girls, and utters +sentiments of profound ennui in a light boyish tenor voice. He is +the son of an English nobleman who has a Welsh estate, upon which he +passes a portion of his time, and can trace his lineage back to one of +the Norman adventurers who came over with William the Conqueror. For +an example of an older aristocracy than this, however, observe the +ancient couple sitting near us in the shadow of a cliff-rock, the wife +with a high-bridged nose and puffs of gray hair on her temples, the +husband with an easy-fitting hat and a coat-collar which rolls so high +as to give the impression he has no neck. These are aristocrats who, +although untitled and owners only of a few modest acres back in +Carmarthenshire, descend from ancestors that looked down on William +the Conqueror as a plebeian upstart. + +There are bathers in the surf, but they are so far away from the +throngs on this vast plain of beach that they are as unindividual +as if they were puppets. One's most intimate friend could not be +recognized without the aid of a glass. The bathing-machines, which +serve in lieu of the huts common at American seaside resorts, are +merely huts on wheels instead of huts in stationary rows. They are +cared for by women, who escort you to the door of an untenanted hut, +collect sixpence and retire. You enter, and disrobe at your leisure. +The machine proves to be a snug box lighted by one little unglazed +window not large enough for you to put your head through, and having a +solid shutter. If you close this shutter the box is as dark as night, +for it is well built, with hardly a crevice in wall or roof or floor. +A small and very bad looking-glass hangs on the wall, and there is a +bench to sit on: that is the extent of the furniture. You have been +provided with towels and with the regulation bathing-dress for +men--linen breeches, to wit. While you are contemplating this garment +and questioning of your modesty as to the propriety of donning it, +there is a sound of rattling iron outside, and a tap on your door as a +warning that your machine is about to start. The machine is dragged +in lumbering fashion out into the sea by an antediluvian horse with +a small boy astride, and there the boy unhitches the traces from the +machine and goes ashore, leaving you with the waves breaking on +the steps before your door. You peep out dubiously. A shoal of +naked-shouldered men are swimming and splashing in the surf. Some +fifty yards away is another school of bathers, whose back hair betrays +their sex, and who are clad in garments made like those worn by +feminine bathers at Long Branch, etc. There is no commingling of the +sexes in the water, as our American custom is, but on the score of +modesty I must confess to a prejudice in favor of the American plan, +nevertheless. The British theory evidently presumes that men have no +modesty among themselves. Custom regulates these matters, I suppose. +I have never felt disposed to blush for my naked feet and arms while +conversing with a lady on the beach at Long Branch, being snugly clad +from head to foot in a flannel costume. But I confess to a shrinking +sense of the incompleteness of the prescribed fig-leaves as I stand +in the door of the bathing-machine at Tenby. To cover myself with the +water as quickly as possible appears to be the only remedy, however, +and I take a header from the doorsill. Ugh! The water is like ice! To +one accustomed to the warm American bathing-suit the linen substitute +of Tenby is a most insufficient protection. At home I have on occasion +extended the revels of the surf for a full hour, being a pretty strong +swimmer and exceedingly fond of the exercise. I get enough at Tenby +in precisely two minutes, and hasten to don my customary clothing. +Nevertheless, it is contended that the surf at Tenby is pleasant for +bathers as late as Christmas, and I am told there really are Britons +who bathe daily in the sea here quite up to the first snow. It is +certain that the fashionable season does not end till November, and +some stay straight on through the winter. + +Among the lions of Tenby none is more interesting than St. Catharine's +Island, a great rugged hill of solid limestone almost devoid of +verdure and rent into innumerable fissures, with a succession of dark +romantic coves and caverns and jagged projecting crags fringing its +sides completely round. At high tide this islet is separated from the +mainland by a deep rolling sea. At low tide its shores are left dry by +the receding waters. It is a curious sight to watch this daily advance +and retreat of the sea. To see the tides of ocean come and go is no +novelty, but it becomes a novelty under circumstances like these, +where every day a dry bridge of yellow sand is stretched forth from +the islet to the mainland, across which a stream of humanity pours the +moment the path is clear. At first only one person at a time can pass. +Ten minutes later the sand-bridge is a broad road. Ten later, and all +Tenby might cross in a crowd. There is an iron staircase built up the +rocky face of the islet, winding about among its crags and fissures, +and the isle is overrun with people during the time the tide is out. +It has many attractions. The view is grand from those heights. Yawning +gulfs fascinate you to look dizzily down into the secret heart of the +isle. On the highest point of rock stood, a few years ago, an ancient +chapel which had in Roman Catholic days been dedicated to St. +Catharine. Within the past six years this chapel has given way to a +fortress, its walls partly embedded in the solid rock. The people who +throng to the islet between tides roam about, loiter with breeze-blown +garments on the stairs and landings, peer into the fortress, or, +perching themselves in the sheltered nooks which are innumerable among +the crags, sit and sew, read, chat, make love and watch the pygmy +bathers in the sea far down below. As long as the tide is low the +tenants of the islet are safe to remain, but as soon as it turns those +who are wise begin to gather up their things and clear out. Now +and then incautious ones get caught; and then there are screaming, +hurrying and a terrible fright, especially if the trapped ones are of +the gentler sex, and still more especially if their proportions are +ample. Such women are, as a rule, the cowardliest. Probably, they feel +their amplitude a disadvantage in moments of peril, and know emotions +which their scrawnier sisters escape. A case in point greets us this +morning as we stand watching the rising of the tide. A roly-poly woman +of forty or so is caught on the islet by the closing of old Ocean's +drawbridge. She is a fair being with dark hair and eyes, a sweet +smile, a clear complexion, and some two hundred and fifty pounds +avoirdupois, richly dressed, pleasant-mannered, and in all respects +no doubt a lady to be admired and loved, as well as respected, in the +social circle. But at present she is at a sad disadvantage. I noticed +her a few minutes ago at the top of the iron staircase, and said to +myself that she would have just time enough to come down, for there +was an isthmus of sand some twenty feet wide as yet to be obliterated +by the crawling tide. A quickly-tripping foot would have accomplished +it, but the fair-fat-and-forty lady occupied one whole minute in +coming down. Now that she has reached the bottom step there is a wide +wash of sea between her and the mainland, and she raises her hands in +horror. How is she to get over? There is no boat in sight. Shall +she wade? There is a nervous motion of her fat white hands in the +direction of her gaiters, but she hesitates. The woman who hesitates +is lost: the water grows deeper and deeper every instant; in ten +minutes it will be over her head. A bathing-machine boy comes trotting +his horse through the water, and, backing up by the rock on which the +distressed lady stands, bids her get on. Get on the back of a horrid +bathing-horse! behind the back of a horrid boy! Had she been a +sylph the prospect would have been most untempting, but a +two-hundred-and-fifty-pounder! Nevertheless, the unhappy fair one +begins to prepare for the sacrifice with grief and consternation in +her face. "How can I do it?" her trembling lips whisper, and she looks +about her on the rocks as if to say, "Oh, is there _no_ other way out +of this wretched predicament?" The boy, as he sits astride, is +getting his feet wet by this time: the horse will have to swim for it +presently. Still she hesitates, and throws a shrinking glance over the +vast audience gathered on the sands silently attentive--the band, the +organ-grinder and the balladist all breathlessly awaiting the issue, +no doubt feeling that it would be mockery to indulge in music at such +a moment. Suddenly a bare-headed and shirt-sleeved man is seen to dash +through the water, regardless of danger and of wet trousers, who, +seizing the fat lady round the knees in spite of her screams, dumps +her on the horse's back all in a heap. Saved! saved! Such a giggling +(for joy) has seldom been seen to shake a large assemblage. The +emotion caused by the spectacle of beauty in distress is no doubt a +pain to every masculine mind not hopelessly vitiated by the cynical +tendencies of the age; but the pain produced by the emotion of mirth +at seeing a fellow-creature at a ridiculous disadvantage is greater +when you feel bound not to laugh. + +There are four strange caves piercing St. Catharine's Island +completely through from side to side. In rough weather the storming +of the sea through these extraordinary tunnels creates a prodigious +uproar. When the weather is still it is possible to take boat and sail +quite through one of them: at low tide you may walk through. Marine +zoological riches abound in these caverns, which have been for many +years a real treasure-house for naturalists. The walls are studded +with innumerable barnacles, dogwinkles and other shells--not dead and +empty, but full of living creatures, requiring only the return of the +tide to awaken them to an active existence. There are simply myriads +of them: a random stone thrown against a wall will smash a whole +colony; and there are besides polyps and sea-anemones and other +strange animals of eccentric habits in unusual abundance. The visitors +to Tenby find great diversion in these and the other caves on the +coast: in fact, the whole coast as far as Milford Haven is one +succession of natural curiosities and antiquities. One cavern bears +the name of Merlin's Cave, and is hallowed by a legend of the +enchanter, who was born at Carmarthen in the next county. + +WIRT SIKES. + + + + +NOCTURNE. + + + There'll come a day when the supremest splendor + Of earth or sky or sea, + Whate'er their miracles, sublime or tender, + Will wake no joy in me. + + There'll come a day when all the aspiration, + Now with such fervor fraught, + As lifts to heights of breathless exaltation, + Will seem a thing of naught. + + There'll come a day when riches, honor, glory, + Music and song and art, + Will look like puppets in a wornout story, + Where each has played his part. + + There'll come a day when human love, the sweetest + Gift that includes the whole + Of God's grand giving--sovereignest, completest-- + Shall fail to fill my soul. + + There'll come a day--I will not care how passes + The cloud across my sight, + If only, lark-like, from earth's nested grasses, + I spring to meet its light. + + MARGARET J. PRESTON. + + + + +THROUGH WINDING WAYS. + +CHAPTER IV. + + +It was soon decided that I was to set out for The Headlands the first +week in October. I had studied too hard, and was growing so tall and +slight that Harry Dart used to draw caricatures of me, taking me in +sections, he declared, since no ordinary piece of paper would suffice +for a full-length. I was glad of a change, yet felt some sorrow about +it too. I knew nothing of what it was to miss the warm home-life and +the constant companionship which had filled every idle hour with +ever-recurring pleasures. I hated to part from my mother, who had +grown of late so inestimably dear to me; I should miss the boys; what +could make up to me for Georgy? I did not know that I was never again +to enjoy the old Belfield routine, with all my untamed impulses +making the wild, free physical life full of deep and passionate +delight--never again to stand the peer of all my mates, running the +familiar races, playing the familiar games. I did not know what a +changed life awaited me, and I looked forward to my opening vistas of +a bright future with longings inconceivably sweet. + +I reached The Headlands one fine day in October a little past noon. +Mr. Raymond's carriage met me at the station, and a grave elderly +servant, who told me his name was Mills, put me inside and assumed +all responsibilities concerning my luggage. I had plenty of time to +remember with regret our homely, pleasant life at Belfield, and recall +Thorpe's words when he heard that I had been invited to The Headlands. +"It will be a glimpse of another life," he had remarked with his usual +air of consummate knowledge of the world. "Even I, who am used to +living on terms of intimacy with men of all ranks and positions, find +it difficult to adjust the balance in that quiet, stately house, where +everything goes on oiled wheels." + +"But what makes it hard to get along?" I had inquired with a sort of +awe. + +"Oh, I can't describe it," he had returned with a wave of his white +hand, "but you'll soon experience it for yourself." + +But as I went on and the great sea opened before my eyes, I quite +forgot my fears in the pleasure of such wide horizons, such +magnificent scenery. The ocean was here in all its grandeur, yet there +was no bleakness or bareness in these rock-bound shores, softly veiled +in the haze of the October afternoon. The voices of the breakers +greeted me as something vaguely familiar: I seemed to have been +listening for them all my life. In such joys as I felt that day eyes +and ears do but little--imagination works most wonders. + +I had not noticed, so raptly was I watching the fleeting tints of +opal, steel and blue which chased each other along the smooth slow +waves, that we had entered enclosed grounds, and when the carriage +stopped suddenly before a wide, pillared portico I was wholly taken by +surprise. Mills opened the carriage-door, and I got down with a blank, +dreamy feeling, and followed him up the steps through the wide portal +and along the hall. He ushered me into the library, and left me while +he went to announce my arrival. + +I sat perfectly still in the lofty Gothic room. It was lined with +books except on the west side, where were long oriel windows of +stained glass, with figures of saints glorious in blue and gold and +crimson and purple, with aureoles of wonderful splendor above their +beautiful heads. The floor was of inlaid woods polished until it +shone, and over it was laid a Persian carpet thick and soft as moss. +The chimney-piece was of wonderful beauty, and extended into the room, +leaving a sort of alcove on each side, and a low fire was burning in a +quaintly-designed grate. Over the mantel hung a large picture which I +did not know, but which made my heart beat as I looked: it was a copy +of the Sistine Madonna. In front of the fire was an easy-chair piled +with cushions, and beside it a low stool, while on either hand were +painted screens: on one the field of brilliant azure was strewn with +flowers of dazzling hues; the other was crossed by a flight of birds +of gorgeous plumage. + +I had looked at everything, had taken in every surprise of beautiful +form and color: then my eyes were lifted again to the windows, and I +was gazing at the meek saints with their shining raiment and radiant +hair when I was suddenly recalled to a recollection of where I was and +why I was there. A hand pushed aside the velvet curtain which hung +across the doorway--a child's hand--and then a little girl entered, +followed by a greyhound as tall as herself. I rose and stood waiting +while she advanced, the same sunshine which transfigured the saints in +the windows playing over her white dress in brilliant rainbow tints. + +She was a very little girl, yet her large, serious dark eyes and her +lithe way of carrying her slim height impressed me with a sort of awe +which I might not have felt for a grown woman. When she neared me she +stood perfectly still, regarding me silently with a deliberate glance. +She was very pale, with a complexion like the inner leaves of a white +rose, but her eyes lent fire to a face otherwise proud and cold. Her +hair had evidently been cut short, and curled close to her head in +loose brown curls. When she had fairly taken me in she held out her +hand. "How do you do?" she asked in a clear, deliberate voice. "I am +very glad to see you." + +"Did you expect me?" I inquired shyly. + +"Of course we did," she answered with some imperiousness, "or we +should not have sent the carriage and servants to meet you." + +Then we were both silent again, and went on mentally making up our +minds concerning each other. + +"Yes," she said presently, putting her hand into mine again, "you look +just as I thought you did. I asked papa: he said you had brown hair +and gray eyes, and that you were good-looking when you smiled. And am +I like what you expected to see?" + +I did not know, I told her. In fact, although I had heard much and +thought some about Helen, she had hitherto possessed no personality +for me except as Mr. Floyd's little girl. And now she impressed me +differently from any person I had ever seen before, and if I had +formed any previous conceptions, they all fled. She seemed, I will +confess, a haughty, aristocratic little creature, with her slight form +and somewhat imperious look, her deliberate, commanding voice and +intense eyes: still, I liked her at once. Mr. Floyd had begged me to +be kind to her, and it seemed easy for me to cherish and protect +her: she appeared to need being taken care of with both strength and +tenderness, for it was such a fragile little hand I held, and, with +all its beauty, such a wan little face I looked upon. + +"I hope you will like me, Helen," said I bluntly, "for your father +wants you to enjoy my visit." + +She smiled for the first time. "I like you very much already," she +said in the same distinct, melancholy voice; and without more words +she put up her little face to mine and kissed me softly on my lips. I +was unused to caresses, and my cheeks burned; but I followed her, at +her request, to the back lawn, where Mr. Raymond was waiting to see +me. + +"Grandfather is not strong," she explained, "and we save him all the +steps we can. It is so sad to be old! Have you a grandfather?" + +"No," I returned: "there is nobody in our family but mother and me." + +"And I have got grandpa and papa too," said she thoughtfully. "Only +papa is so busy: he is never here but a week at a time." + +We had passed through the hall, crossed the rear piazza and +descended the steps, and were advancing along the grassplat toward a +summer-house which faced the sea. I could now for the first time gain +an idea of the extent and grandeur of the place. The house towered +above us solemnly with its towers, pillared arches, cornices and +pediments, while, beyond, the glass roofs of numberless greenhouses +lifted their domes to the warm afternoon sun. All around the lawn +stood lofty trees, their foliage glorious with crimson, russet and +gold, and their shadows crept stealthily toward us as if they were +alive. And beyond house, lawns, gardens and tree-lined avenues was +a pine wood which extended its solemn verdure all round the place, +enclosing it almost to the edge of the bluff. All this on the right +hand: on the left the mysterious sea, whose music filled the fair +sunshiny world we two children were traversing hand in hand. + +"There is grandpa," exclaimed Helen as we neared the summer-house; +and I saw an old man sitting in an arm-chair in the sunshine, looking +eagerly toward us as if in anxious expectation. + +"You were gone a long time, Helen," he called out peevishly. + +"Oh no, dear," she replied soothingly. "Here is Floyd, grandpa." + +He had looked, when I first saw him from a distance, like a very old +man, but when I was shaking hands with him I was surprised to discover +that his face had little appearance of age. Even his thin dark hair +was but sprinkled with gray at the curly ends on the temples: his +eyebrows were a black silky thread, his eyes dark and full of a +peculiar glitter. His features were finely formed and feminine in +their delicacy, but the expression of his face was marred by the +restlessness of his eyes, and made almost pathetic by the dejected, +melancholy lines about his thin scarlet lips. + +He shook hands with me gracefully, and made inquiries about my +journey, then sank back into his chair listlessly, and allowed Helen +to pull the tiger-skin which formed his lap-robe over his knees. +There was a peculiar feebleness about his whole attitude as he +sat--something almost abased in the sinking of his chin upon his +breast. It was hard for me to realize that he was the owner of all +this magnificence, and, dressed although he was with faultless +elegance, and although luxurious appurtenances filled the +summer-house, waiting for his momentary convenience, I was certain +that his great wealth brought him no pleasure, and that, except for +his little grandchild, he was comfortless in the world. He was full of +complaints toward her. He was sure, he said, that now when I had come +she would have no thought of him; that taking care of an old man was a +dreary and thankless task; that only the young could be beloved by the +young. And her way of listening and answering made me suspect that she +was but too used to such querulousness. I was perhaps too young to +understand mainsprings of action, yet nevertheless I seemed to know at +once that her calm, mature manner and precocious imperiousness were +the result of his weakness and wavering, of his selfish and morbid +doubts. + +"You are older than I thought," Mr. Raymond said to me, regarding +me for the first time with languid curiosity. "I expected to see a +velvet-coated little fellow of Helen's size. What is your age, my +boy?" + +I told him I should be fifteen the next spring, counting, as most +young people do, by the milestone ahead of me, instead of the one I +had passed. + +"Oh, that is quite an age," said he with an air of relief. "Do not +expect to make a playmate of Mr. Floyd Randolph, Helen: he is quite +too old to care for a mere child like yourself." + +"He is not nearly as old as papa." returned Helen quickly, "and papa +will play with me all day long." + +"Yes, yes," said Mr. Raymond, sinking back among his cushions and +tiger-skins, "all the world can play but me. I must be content to sit +outside the joy and the sunshine. I have lived too long. Only the +young, bright people of the world are welcome even to my own little +grandchild." + +Helen threw her arm about his neck and stroked his cheek with her slim +hand. "You know, grandpa," she said simply, "that I do not care for +play, and I love our quiet times together; but you forget what Dr. +Sharpe says--that I must run about out of doors and be as merry as I +can, or else--" + +He stopped her with a quick, shuddering gesture. "Oh no," said he, "I +do not forget. Do not make me out worse than I am to Floyd, Helen." He +rang a hand-bell on the table by his side, and began feebly to adjust +the wrappings about his shoulders.--"I will go in, Frederick," he +murmured to the servant, who advanced at once as if he had been +waiting close by--"I will go in and sit by the fire.--Helen, you must +show Floyd the place.--There are greenhouses, and the stables are +worth seeing too," he added to me apologetically. "I hear that +Robinson has some rare fowls, and Helen has dogs of all kinds, and a +few deer. It will do her good to go about, you know." He broke off +suddenly, a spasm crossing his face, and without more words he turned +abruptly to his valet, took his arm and walked feebly toward the +house. + +We stood together looking after him--I a little shy and perplexed in +my new position, Helen thoughtful and melancholy. + +"Poor grandpa!" she said presently with a sigh: "he has only me, you +know, Floyd. He has nothing else in the whole wide world, and it +worries him to think that he cannot be with me always, that he +cannot--" + +She broke off, and the small face twitched as if she were about to +cry, but she controlled herself. + +The splendid house, with its gleaming windows and stately pillars, the +wide grounds, the air of quiet magnificence which reigned over the +whole place, had so much impressed me that I could not resist uttering +an exclamation at her words. She spoke of Mr. Raymond as having +nothing in the wide world but herself, yet he was rich enough to be +master of what appeared to me the pomp of kings; and I told her so. + +She regarded me curiously. "Is grandpa rich?" she asked. "He says +sometimes that the greenhouses cost so much money that they will send +him to the poorhouse. I do not think grandpa can be rich. But if he +were rich," she cried out indignantly, "that makes no difference: he +has nothing but me--nothing to care about. There was poor grandmamma: +she died--oh so long ago!--and my uncles died when they were little +boys not so old as I. And mamma--she stayed the longest: then she +died. No, grandpa has nothing left but me." + +"Your father too: he has only you. I wonder you do not live with your +father, Helen." + +She shook her head. "Oh, you don't know," she returned. "I couldn't +leave grandpa. Oh, Floyd, if you knew how it hurts me to tell papa +that I must stay here! He does not understand. He will say, 'I want my +little girl: you can't guess how badly I want my little girl.'" She +finished with a great sob which shook her from head to foot. I pitied +her very much, and I could easily comprehend that she was too delicate +still to be allowed to have any sort of trouble. So I asked her to go +down to the shore with me, and while we went I told her all the funny +things I could remember until I made her laugh. She was quick and +sympathetic; and her spirit was so strong, yet so repressed, that +the moment she was really glad it seemed to have the exuberance of a +bird's joy at freedom after imprisonment. + +I have reason, beyond that of mere admiration for its admirable +picturesqueness, to remember and note down the form of the shore at +The Headlands. The house stood on the highest part of the promontory, +and there was a gradual descent to the end of the bluff, which +terminated in a line of black rocks, some of which were firmly +embedded in the soil, while others lay piled above each other as they +had been tossed by some horrible convulsion of the sea. In one place +there was a perpendicular precipice of eighty feet, washed by the +waves at its base; but the beach was easily accessible from every +other point, although in some places the descent needed sure feet and +agile limbs. But I had always been the best climber in Belfield, and I +ran up and down the rocks now with the ease of a monkey, until Helen +begged me not to terrify her by any new exploits. Under the frowning +citadel of rocks the beach was particularly fine, well pebbled below +watermark and above a strip of shining sand. The tide was coming +in with a strong dull roar, and every wave broke on the shore with +curling cataracts of foam and a voice like thunder. It was hard for me +to realize that above us on the headland the mild October sunshine was +gilding and reddening the trees, for here we were in shadow, and the +cry of storm and the din of tempest were in our ears. Yet beyond the +bar opaline tints were playing along the sunlit sea, and the luminous, +shifting-hued swell of crested waves merged into the iridescent sky. +There was a secret and a mystery about the scene to me. I could not +understand its influence upon me, and felt under a spell as I gazed at +the distant white sails and listened to the roar of the waves as if I +could never hear it enough. + +After Helen had shown me all the strange, beautiful places of the +beach, I helped her up the precipitous bank, where steps had been +carefully cut in the rock or laid upon the crumbling sods. She took me +to the stables, and I saw the horses, her pony and the blooded colt in +training for her: her dogs had followed us about, leaping and fawning +upon her and smelling suspiciously at me. Mr. Raymond disliked +animals, and it was to the stables or the gardener's cottage that the +child came to pet her hounds, her sheep-dog and her snowy Pomeranian: +not even Beppo, the Italian greyhound, was domesticated at the house. +Some shy deer peered out at us from their paddock, and a doe, less +timid than the rest, approached us and gave me a good look out of +her meek, beautiful eyes. Gold and silver pheasants lurked in the +shrubberies, and peacocks spread their tails and paraded before us on +the greensward. Everything seemed to be Helen's, and not a flower that +bloomed or a bird that flew but she gave it an ample tenderness. + +We did not talk much, but stood together hand in hand, I gazing with +ardent delight and curiosity at all these beautiful expressions of +life which filled the place. + +"Do you like it?" she inquired anxiously from time to time, and when +I answered her gravely that I liked it, she would smile a contented +little smile. She asked me if I rode, and carefully selected the +horse she considered suitable for me, and gave the groom orders +about exercising him regularly. The man took her instructions with +a respectful air: she was evidently mistress of the place, and the +centurion in the Gospel had not his servants better under his command +than had she. It was a quaint sight to see the child knitting her +brows over some complaint of Robinson's against McGill the gardener: +she settled it promptly with but half a dozen words. She had energy +enough and to spare for her duties, but she had nothing of that eager +bubbling up of light thoughts and bright hopes which other children +know and use in endless chatter and playful gambollings, like puppies +and kittens and other happy young things. There was always shrewd +purpose behind her few words, and she seemed always on her guard, +always ready to act promptly and with decision. + +"Why don't you send those men to Mr. Raymond?" I burst out finally. +"You ought not to be bothered. What do you know about such things?" + +"I know all about them," she returned gravely. "I never let anybody +trouble poor grandpapa." + +"My mother would not let anything trouble me if she could help it, yet +I am a boy and almost fifteen years old." + +She looked at me wistfully and smiled her peculiar indefinable smile, +then put her hand in mine, and we went toward the house together. Just +as night fell dinner-time came. I had gone to my room to dress at five +o'clock, but finding that all my windows looked out upon the water, +I had forgotten everything else in watching the sea, which took hue +after hue as the sun sank, growing black and turbid as it settled into +a bank of gray cloud, then, when the last beams reddened every rift, +lighting up into a brief splendor of crimson and gold, absorbing all +the glory of the firmament. I felt rather homesick and dreary. I knew +that in the dusky streets of Belfield the boys were walking up and +down beneath the russet elms, wondering about me while they talked. I +knew that my mother was sitting in the bay-window with the light of +the sunset in her face, and that she was longing to have me with her +again. When, finally, I roused myself to dress, and went along the dim +halls and down the great staircase lined with niches where calm-faced +statues stood regarding me with a fixed and solemn air, I was quite +dull and dreary, and needed all the cheerful influences of the warmed +and lighted rooms to brighten me up. + +At dinner Mr. Raymond seemed more what I had expected him to be than +I had found him at first sight. He was dressed with scrupulous +propriety, and wore a ceremonious and precise air which better +accorded with his position as master of the house. He talked well, and +asked me many questions about our life in Belfield, made inquiries +about George Lenox, and was interested when I told him about Georgina. +And about Georgina I found myself presently talking with a freedom +which amazed myself, for my habits were reserved, and of all that I +felt and thought about Georgy I had never yet said anything except +to my mother. But in this beautiful house, which seemed so fitting a +place for my lovely princess, and which was of late the object of her +dreams, I felt moved to be her ambassador and to plead her cause as +well as I might. I spoke not only of her beauty and her cleverness, +but of the drawbacks to her success in life. I anticipated criticism, +and disarmed it. "Oh, Helen!" I burst out at length, "you would love +her so dearly--I am sure you would!" + +Helen's eyes were shining, and her color came and went. "Oh, grandpa," +said she softly, "why may I not ask her to come here? Floyd will like +it, and I--" + +She could not finish, she was so glad and excited, and she ran around +the table and laid her cheek against Mr. Raymond's shoulder in mute +entreaty. + +"Oh, do whatever you please," rejoined the old gentleman impatiently: +"you know very well that you must have your own way in everything." + +The glad little face fell at once, and she went back to her chair +slowly and climbed into it. It was a high-backed, crimson velvet +chair, with a footstool for the child's feet to rest upon. She looked +very slight and young as she sat there, her baby face thrown into +clear outline and startling pallor by the ruby-colored cushions. She +filled the place well, however, helping to the soup and fish, and even +the meats after Mills had carved them at the sideboard. I noticed too, +with some surprise, that the decanter of sherry stood at her elbow, +and was not passed, but that she herself poured out Mr. Raymond's +glass of wine, and once replenished it. He sent it to her to be filled +for the third time, but she shook her head. + +"No, no, grandpa," she said with a queer little smile: "you have had +two already." + +He looked angry, and affirmed that she had given him but one glass, +appealing to Mills, who corroborated the words of his young mistress. +Helen said no more, but gave the decanter to the butler, who took it +away, and I heard him lock the door of the wine-closet and saw him +drop the key in his pocket. Then, presently, when coffee came on, +Helen and I went into the library, and left Mr. Raymond alone, with +his easy-chair turned toward the fire. I knew that something in the +house was wrong, and experienced a vague humiliation out of sympathy +for Helen, but what my fears were I did not name to myself. + +"Promise me," said she, clasping my hand suddenly--"promise me to say +nothing to papa. Remember that grandpa is very old, and that he has +nothing in the world but me." + +I gave the promise eagerly, more to avoid the subject than because I +understood as to what I was to be silent and why the subject should be +interdicted. + +"You see," said she, her clear eyes meeting mine with their peculiarly +wistful, melancholy gaze, "this is why I cannot go away. Papa thinks I +do not love him: he does not know that it would not be safe for me to +leave grandpa all alone. If papa did know--" + +"You ought to tell your papa everything," I said gravely. + +"I wish I could," she cried in a trembling voice. "But I can't. He +would not let me stay here, and I could not go away. You must never +tell papa, Floyd--never!" + +I said I would not tell with the air of one who never discloses a +secret; and she believed in me, and we were soon bright and happy +again, and wrote a letter to Georgy Lenox inviting her to The +Headlands on a visit. + +With all his faults and weaknesses, I soon found there were good and +lovable traits in Mr. Raymond. He had been in early life a successful +merchant, and the habit of controlling widespread interests had given +him a broad and sympathetic insight into men and their ideas. He +possessed a graceful and comprehensive culture, and had embodied his +conceptions of the fitness of things in the arrangement of his home, +making it beautiful in all ways. He was an old man now, yet had not +lost the thirst for knowledge, and could talk, when inspiration was +upon him, generously and eloquently. He had been a part of the busy +great world; he understood society and social ways: all these talents +and acquirements made him a pleasant old gentleman when at his best, +but it needed only a touch of suspicion or jealousy to put him at his +worst. It was easy enough to see that Helen did not exaggerate when +she told me he had nothing to care for but herself; and his care for +her was so mixed with morbid fears that he was not first in her heart, +so embittered by a distrust of her love for her father, that she could +gain small comfort from all his overweening devotion and pride. + +The child and I were constantly together in those October days. I do +not think it would have been so but for the fact that Mr. Floyd wrote +daily concise and peremptory orders that Helen was to be out of doors +from morning till night, and that Dr. Sharpe, a brisk, keen-eyed old +gentleman, came every morning at breakfast-time to feel the little +girl's pulse, order her meals and command Mr. Raymond to let her have +all the play she could get before the cold weather came. + +"You see," Helen would explain to me as we tramped the meadows and the +uplands gorgeous with every mellow hue of autumn's glorious time--"you +see, Floyd, I was going to die in September when papa came. Oh, I felt +so tired I wanted just to go to sleep. But papa came, took me in his +arms and held me there. Whenever I woke up, there he was, his strong +arms holding me tight. He wouldn't let me go, you know, so I couldn't +die. I couldn't have lived for grandpa: I knew that he would die too, +and that perhaps it would all be best." + +"But now you are getting strong," I said: "your cheeks are quite rosy +now." + +"Oh yes," she answered. "I like to live now. I love you so dearly, +Floyd, and I have such good times." + +I loved her dearly too, after a boy's fashion. It was easy for me to +talk to her, and I told her many things that lay near my heart and far +from my tongue--much about my mother and my worship of her--about our +home and its surroundings--about my father and my brother Frank, and +my grief when they died. I had never expected to tell any one these +memories, but I told them all to Helen. + +One day we came in a little later than usual. We had carried our +luncheon down to the beach, and had eaten it there: we had never been +quite so happy together before, for everything had conspired to make +our enjoyment perfect. We had made up stories about the people on +board the ships that went up and down in the offing; strange and +beautiful things had looked at us from out the sea; a fisherman had +offered us some oysters as he coasted about the bar in his boat, and I +had bought some and opened them for Helen with my knife, every blade +of which I broke in the effort. Altogether, we had had a blissful +experience. + +But as, upon returning, we neared the house, Mills met us on the +terrace with a grave face. "You'd better go to your grandfather, Miss +Floyd," said he--"you had, indeed, or it will be all over with him. +You must not blame me, miss--it was none of my fault--but some +gentlemen came here for lunch, and he's been a-drinking and a-drinking +ever since they went away, and will not let either decanter go out of +his hand." + +Helen's little face had been warm with color, but it froze into pallor +while I looked at her. We entered the door, and she took off her +things slowly and gave them to Mills, smoothing her hair mechanically +with her little trembling hands. + +"What shall I do?" I whispered, quaking as much as she. "Let me help +you somehow, Helen." + +"You can't," she returned quietly: "nobody can help me." + +She bade Mills go about his work: then went into the dining-room and +shut the door. + +The man had tears in his eyes as he turned to me as soon as we were +alone. "I declare, Mr. Randolph," said he, "it's enough to break +anybody's heart to see that child a-bowed down at her age with the +care of an old man who can't be kept from drunkenness unless her eye +is on him every minute." + +"Is he violent when he's--" I tried to ask the question, but could not +form the horrible word upon my tongue. + +Mills did not flinch from facts. "When he's drunk?" he said. "He is +ready to break my head, but he's never anything but tender with her. +She's naught but a baby, but I have seen him, in a regular fury, +just fall a-whimpering when she came in and said, 'Oh, grandpa! oh, +grandpa! I'm so sorry!' Oh, it is a burning shame! And to think that +that splendid gentleman, her father, does not know it!" + +"He ought to know it," I cried. + +"And if he did, sir," said Mills solemnly, "he would take Miss Floyd +away, and the old gentleman would drink himself to death, and that +would kill the little girl too. It's hard to see the right of it, Mr. +Randolph. But," he added with a complete change of manner, "she would +be vexed to see me stand gossiping here." + +He went up stairs with the cloak and hat, smoothing them with his big +hand as if to comfort somebody in need of comfort. I stole across the +hall and stood at the dining-room door, wishing to go in, yet fearing +to vex Helen by my intrusiveness. She opened the door presently, as if +she knew I was there, and beckoned me, and I entered. The old man +sat at the table in his usual place, looking half defiant and half +ashamed. She had removed both decanters and glasses to the sideboard, +and stood by him with her arm about his neck, urging him to go into +the library, kissing him now and then softly on the forehead. + +"What do you think, Floyd," he said to me in a thick, unnatural +voice--"what do you think of the way my only grandchild treats me? She +despises me." + +"No, no, grandpa! I love you dearly." + +He went on with vehemence: "A few years ago I was living among the +finest ladies and gentlemen in the world: I was admired and sought. I +have been called the most accomplished of hosts, the most perfect of +gentlemen. Look about this house. Where in this entire country will +you find a more liberal patron of the arts than I? Yet this little +girl treats me like a servant. For a year she has not permitted me to +have even a few friends to dine with me. Because to-day I extended +hospitality to half a dozen gentlemen who drove over from the Point, +she fumes at me: she treats me as if I had committed a deadly sin.--By +and by, Miss Floyd, you can have it all your own way here: I shall be +dead." + +She never flinched, nor did her face change as he glared at her, but +she went on smoothing his hair and softly putting her lips to his +temples. "Dear grandpa," said she, "come into the library now. It is +getting late, and Mills wants to set the table for dinner." + +"Very well," he exclaimed with a sort of petulant dignity, and, +pushing back his chair, half rose. Helen gave me a swift glance, and +with our united strength we barely kept him from falling on his face. +He staggered to his feet, looking at us angrily, and not releasing +our hold we steadied him into the library and seated him in the great +chair before the fire. He sank down with some inaudible exclamation +not unlike a groan, and in five minutes he had fallen asleep with loud +breathings. Helen rang the bell and told Mills to send for Dr. Sharpe, +then came back and drew two low seats opposite the sleeper, and we sat +down together hand in hand. She was as pale as death, and her great +eyes dilated as she gazed steadily at her grandfather. From time +to time she felt his pulse and looked with painful scrutiny at the +temples and forehead, which grew every moment more and more crimson. +The half hour before the doctor came appeared to me endless. Inside it +was almost dark but for the firelight, and outside the twilight glooms +slowly gathered: a storm was coming on, and the waves bellowed against +the rocks. Mills lit the candles and drew the curtains, but could +not shut out the roar of the angry sea. I could see that Helen was +miserably anxious, but she said nothing, only sighed and set her lips +tight against each other, and seemed to listen. Presently we could +hear the gravel crunched under a horse's hoofs outside, then the sound +of wheels, and in another moment Dr. Sharpe came in. + +"How is this?" said he without any salutation. "Somebody to lunch, eh? +---- luncheons! Where were you, Miss Chicken?" + +"I am so sorry!" she faltered painfully. "But I was playing down on +the beach, and I did not know. You told me to play about out of doors, +doctor--you know you did," she added deprecatingly. + +"Of course I told you to play about out of doors. You need it bad +enough, God knows! Now run away, both of you." + +"Is there any danger?" she whispered. + +"Not a bit," said Dr. Sharpe, adding, under his breath, "A good thing +for her if there were.--Run away, I say," he said, hustling us both +out of the door, "and send Mills and Frederick here." + +We were shut away from the dim luxurious library with its blazing +fire, and the old man asleep before it, but we did not feel free to +move, and stood awed and speechless outside, listening and waiting. +Helen, who had been so brave, gave way now: her face was piteously +convulsed and the tears streamed down her cheeks. I made clumsy +attempts to soothe her, and finally took her in my arms and carried +her into the great lighted drawing-room and laid her on the sofa. She +uttered nothing of her impotent childish despair, but I could read +well enough her humiliation and her shame. Mills came in presently and +whispered to me that dinner was ready. She heard him and sprang up +with the air of a baby princess. "I will come to dinner in five +minutes, Mills," said she imperiously: then, when she met the honest +sympathy of his glance, she ran up to him and thrust her little slim +hand into his. "I trust you, Mills," she murmured, her lips quivering +again, "but you must never let papa know and never let the servants +suspect." And presently, with the outward indifference of a woman +of the world, the child took her place at table and entertained me +through dinner with an account of what we should do for Georgy Lenox. + + +CHAPTER V. + + +For Georgy was coming next day, and in spite of my unhappiness on +Helen's account I woke up the following morning with my pulses all +astir with joy. It would be something for me to have her here, away +from her mother, who always frowned upon me--away from Jack, whose +claim upon her time and attention made mine appear presumptuous and +intrusive--away from Harry Dart, with his teasing jokes, his wholesale +contempt for any weakness or romantic feeling. I had never declared to +myself that I was in love with Georgina, nor had I formed my wishes +to my own heart in distinct thoughts. Still, young although I was, I +should hardly dare to write down here how far above every other idea +and object on earth Georgina appeared to me. I never thought of her +then, I never looked upon her, without the blood thickening around my +heart as if I stood face to face with Fate: my every impulse toward +the future was blended with my desire to be something to her. I had +not dared to dream then that she could be anything to me. + +Before I was out of bed that morning, Frederick, Mr. Raymond's valet, +came to me with the request that I should go to his master's room +before I went down stairs. It was in the wing, and the third chamber +of a handsome suite comprising study, dressing-room and bedroom. +It was hung and curtained with red; a wood-fire was burning on the +hearth; the chairs were covered with red; even the silken coverlet of +the bed was red, and the only place where living, brilliant color was +not seemed to be the pale shrunken face on the pillow, a little paler +and more delicate than usual: the hands, too, clutching each other on +the red blanket, had a look of languor and waste. + +"Good-morning, Floyd," Mr. Raymond said, and then dismissed Frederick. + +"But you ought not to talk, sir," expostulated the valet, "until you +have had your breakfast." + +The sick man made a gesture for him to leave the room, watched him go +out, and then fastened his piercing black eyes on me and looked at me +long and fixedly. "You saw me yesterday?" said he at last, breaking +the silence. + +I nodded, finding it a difficult task to speak. + +"Are you a babbling child?" said he with considerable force and +earnestness, "or have you enough of a man's knowledge to have learned +to respect the infirmities of other men?" + +"I tell no one's secrets, sir: they are not mine to tell." + +He quite broke down, and lay there before me strangling with sobs and +cries. "Should Mr. Floyd know," he murmured, "should Mr. Floyd even +guess, that I am the wretched wreck of a man that I am, he would not +let Helen stay with me another moment. He would extenuate, he would +pity, nothing: he does not know what it is for a man like me, once +proud, witty, gay, to bear seclusion and depression and decay. I long +at times for some of the inspiration of my youth: it comes with a +terrible penalty." + +I could believe it, for his face expressed such abasement and despair +as I had never dreamed of. + +"I know," he continued, his voice broken and husky, "that I shadow +Helen's life. I know that if I had died last night she would be a +luckier girl to-day than she is now. But I sha'n't last long, Floyd. +Put your finger on my pulse." + +I did so, and was obliged to grope for the uncertain, slow beating at +his wrist. It seemed as if so little life was there it might easily +flicker and go out at any moment. + +"I may die at any time," said he, putting my unspoken thought into +words. "Dr. Sharpe tells me not to count on the morrow. What cruelty +it would be, then, to deprive me of my grandchild! What could I do +without her? What would become of me, living alone, with no company +but the gibbering shapes mocking at me out of the corners?" He cowered +all in a heap and looked up at me with clasped hands. "Let her stay," +he went on imploringly. "It is only for a little while, and then +everything will be hers--this house and these grounds, my house in New +York and blocks of stores, all my pictures, my statues, my books. +Why, I tell you, Floyd, I am worth more than a million of dollars in +invested property that brings me in a return of ten per cent. It is +all for her. I save half my income every year to buy new mortgages +and stocks, that she may be the richer. I think," he exclaimed with a +sudden burst of feeling, "that such wealth as I shall give her might +atone for a great deal. Remember, Floyd, it is only a little while +that I shall burden her: let her stay." + +He was pleading with me as if I were the arbiter of his fate. He had +grasped my arm, and his glittering eyes were fastened on me with the +intensity of despair in their expression. + +"Why, Mr. Raymond," said I gently, "I have nothing to do with Helen's +going or staying. If you fear that I shall inform Mr. Floyd about +what--what happened yesterday, you do me injustice. I shall tell him +nothing. I have no right to say a word about anything that takes place +in your house." + +"You are a good boy," said Mr. Raymond, with an expression of relief +relaxing his convulsed features. "I do not wonder that James loves you +as his own son--that it is the wish of his heart that you should grow +up with Helen, learn to love her, and marry her at last." + +I listened doubtfully: it did not occur to me that his words had +any foundation in fact; yet, all the same, the newly-suggested idea +burdened me. "I think you are mistaken," said I gently. "Nothing of +that kind could ever possibly happen." + +"Not for years--not until I am dead," returned Mr. Raymond peevishly. +"It was nothing--nothing at all. All that occurred I will tell you, +since I was foolish enough to speak of it in the first instance. James +said he wanted Helen to be much with you. 'You know how those childish +intimacies end,' I replied to him--'in deep attachment and desire for +marriage.'--'I ask nothing better for Helen,' James exclaimed. 'She +will grow up like other girls, and love, and finally become a wife; +and if she became Floyd's wife I should have no fears for her.'" Mr. +Raymond's eyes met mine. "You will never tell Mr. Floyd I spoke of +this to you," he said under his breath. "I am not quite myself this +morning, or I should not have suggested a thought of it to you." + +I was very sure that I should never mention it, for I found the idea +of my marrying Helen so painfully irksome that it went with me all the +day, casting a shadow across our intercourse. I told myself over and +over that the idea was absurd--that such a thing could never, never +come to pass. She was so mere a child. I studied her face with its +baby contours, where nothing showed the dawn of womanhood yet except +the great melancholy eyes; I took her hand in mine, where it lay like +a snowflake on my brown palm; and I laughed aloud at the grotesqueness +of the fancy that I should ever put a ring on that childish finger. + +"Why do you laugh?" she asked me wonderingly. + +"To think," I rejoined, "how funny it is to remember one day you will +be grown up and have rings upon your fingers." + +"Is that funny?" she asked. "Of course, if I live I shall grow up and +be a woman. My mamma was married when she was only seventeen, and in +seven years I shall be seventeen." I dropped her hand as if it had +stung me. "I have all mamma's rings," she went on: "I have a drawerful +of trinkets that mamma used to wear. When Georgy Lenox comes I shall +give her a locket and a chain that are so very, very pretty they will +be just right for her. Tell me more about her, Floyd." + +It was easy enough for me to grow eloquent in talking of Georgina, and +Helen was as anxious to hear as I to tell. The little girl had had few +friends of her own sex and age: every summer had brought the New +York and Boston Raymonds to The Headlands, and when the neighboring +watering-place was in its season numerous flounced and gloved little +misses had been introduced to the shy, quaint child, who felt strange +and dreary among them all. In fact, the little heiress's position, so +unique in every respect, had isolated her from the joys of commonplace +childhood, and she found more companionship in her dumb pets, in the +sumptuous silence of the blossoming gardens, in the voices of the +shore, than among girls of her own age with their chatter about +their teachers or governesses, their dancing-steps and their games. +Nevertheless, she was both ardent and affectionate, and ready to love +all the world; and no sooner had Georgy appeared than she lavished +upon her all the passion of girlish fondness for her own sex which +had hitherto lain dormant within her. Georgy had always been used to +adulation and to lead others by her capricious will and her radiant +smile, and within a day after her coming had established almost a +dangerous supremacy over the child. It was at once fascinating and +disappointing to be under the same roof with Georgy: every morning +when I awoke it seemed a miracle of happiness that I had but to dress +and go out of my room to have a chance of meeting her, of perpetually +recurring smiles and conversation such as I had never enjoyed before +at Belfield. But the reality never bore out the promise of my vague +but delicious reveries. Mr. Raymond at once took an active, almost +virulent, dislike to his young guest, and pointed out her faults to +me with clear and concise words, each one of which pierced me like a +rapier; and the certainty of his condemnation gave me a keen, and at +times almost inspired, vision for her weaknesses. + +Nothing could exceed her rapture at being in the beautiful house +which she had so long wished to see, and which she loudly asserted +a thousand times surpassed all her expectations. And she fitted +admirably into her costly surroundings: the sheen of her golden +hair made the dark velvet cushionings and hangings a more beautiful +background than before; she gave expression to the stately, silent +rooms; and what had at first been almost, despite its luxury, a +desert to me, became a fairy land. Little Helen was so burdened with +possessions that it was a pleasure for her to give them away. Still, +I wished that Georgy had not been so willing to accept all that the +lavish generosity of the child prompted her to offer. But Georgy was +no Spartan: she wanted everything that could minister to her comfort. +She was a natural gourmand, hungry for sweets and fruits all day long: +she coveted ornaments, and found Helen's drawer of trinkets almost too +small for her; she liked velvets and furs, silks and plushes, and wore +the child's clothes until Mr. Raymond sent his housekeeper to Boston +to purchase her a complete outfit of her own. But all these faults +I could have pardoned in Georgy, and ascribed them to her faulty +education and false influences at home, had she been grateful to +little Helen. + +"She hates Helen for being luckier than herself," Mr. Raymond +affirmed: "she would do her a mischief if she could." + +I could not believe that, yet I could see that she loved to torture +the child, whose acute sensibilities made her suffer from the +slightest coldness or suspicion. + +"If you really loved me, Helen," Georgy would say, "you would do this +for me;" and sometimes the task would be to slight or openly disobey +Mr. Raymond, to outrage me or to make one of the dumb, loving pets +which filled the place suffer. And if at sight of the child's tears I +remonstrated, I was punished as it was easy enough for Georgy Lenox to +punish me. + +She would melt Helen too by drawing a picture of her own poverty and +state of dreary unhappiness beside the good fortune of the heiress, +until the little girl would search through the house to find another +present for her, which she besought her beautiful goddess almost on +her knees to accept. All these traits, which showed that Georgina was +far from perfect, caused me a misery proportionate to my longing to +have her all that was lovely and excellent. It is indeed unfair to +write of faults which are so easy to portray, and to say nothing of +the beauty of feature and charm of manner, which might have been +enough to persuade any one who looked into her face that she was one +of God's own angels. What does beauty mean if it be not the blossoming +of inner perfection into outward loveliness? And Georgina Lenox was +beautiful to every eye. Let every one who reads my story know and feel +that she had the beauty which can stir the coldest blood--the eyes +whose look of entreaty could melt the most implacable resolution--the +smile which could lure, the voice which could make every man follow. + + +CHAPTER VI. + + +Mr. Floyd had again entered upon active life in Washington, and his +duties were so absorbing that it was almost impossible for him to find +any opportunity of joining me at The Headlands, as he had promised. +But just as my visit was drawing to an end he came, and kept me on for +the week of his stay. I had become used to the routine of life at Mr. +Raymond's, and had again and again wondered if Mr. Floyd's presence +there would make any difference; but the change in the entire aspect +of the household after the advent of my guardian absolutely startled +me. Mr. Raymond was again master of the house, and little Helen +was left free of all care and responsibility. There seemed a tacit +understanding between Mills and the child and her grandfather that Mr. +Floyd was to gain not the faintest idea of the usual state of things. +Mr. Raymond wore a dignity which was not without its pathetic side: he +no longer touched wine, although a different vintage was offered with +every course, and his selfish, peevish ways seemed entirely forgotten. +Helen had grown steadily stronger every week of my stay, and now that +her father was with her she rallied at once into a happy, careless +state of mind which made her almost as light-hearted a child as one +could wish. She had none of Georgy's gay boisterousness, but her +blitheness of heart seemed like a lambent fire playing over profound +depths of gladness and security. + +Mr. Floyd was scarcely well pleased to find Georgy at The Headlands, +and at once observed with solicitude the influence she had gained over +his little girl. Georgy's idea of power was to put her foot on the +neck of her subjects and hold them at her mercy; and Mr. Floyd showed +his displeasure at her course by at once withdrawing Helen almost +entirely from her society. Georgy rebelled defiantly at this; and I +too felt keenly the injustice of leaving her so utterly alone as we +did day after day when Mr. Floyd, Helen and I went riding through the +woods together. Directly after breakfast my guardian and I mounted our +horses, and Helen her pony, and off we started for the hills, where +the keen autumn winds would put color into the little girl's pale +cheeks. Far below us we could see the curving reaches of beach and +promontory, the sparkling fall of the low surf, and in the offing +the white-winged ships bringing all the wonders of the East and the +richness of the tropics to our barren New England shores. What wonder +if I have never forgotten a single incident of those too swiftly +succeeding days? The glow, the enthusiasm, the wild gush of free, +untrammelled enjoyment, were to go from me presently, and to return no +more. + +When Mr. Floyd first came he had shaken me roughly by the shoulder, +laughing in my face as he told me he had just come from Belfield, +where he had spent six hours with my mother. I felt ashamed to look +him in the eyes when I remembered my interference, and I began to +debate the question in my own mind whether I had not better yield my +boyish whim of pride and exclusive, domineering affection to this +noble, splendid gentleman, whom I loved better and better every day. + +The week appointed for his visit at The Headlands had almost passed. +It was a Thursday morning, and we were to set out early the ensuing +day, when he asked me to walk with him an hour on the bluff, as he had +something to speak to me about. It was a lovely day: the fogs were +rolling off the water, and disclosed a sea of chrysoprase beneath. + +"In my old courting-days," began Mr. Floyd at once, "I used to walk +here with Alice. We were engaged six weeks, and looking back +now eleven years the days seem all like this. It was the Indian +summer-time." + +I was dumb, but stared into his face, which showed emotion, and +pressed his arm bashfully. + +"I was thirty-four when I first met her," he went on, "and she was +just half my age. She was an heiress and I was poor, yet the world +called me no bad match for her. Still, I felt as if I could not marry +a rich woman: I went away, and tried to forget her, but stole back to +the Point, hoping to get one glimpse of her sweet face by stealth. +Then when I saw her I could not go away again, nor did she want me to +go. Mr. Raymond hated me in those days, yet we were so strong against +him that he gave his consent, and we were married on just such a +November day as this. It seems like a dream, Floyd, that I, so long a +lonely man, without a private joy, could ever have been so happy as I +was then. I loved her--the light of her eyes and the white lids that +covered them when I looked at her; the smile on her parted lips; the +way her hair curled away from her temples; the little dimples all over +her hands; her voice, her little ways. And while I loved her like +that, before the first year of my happiness had passed she was dead. I +hope you will never know what that means. That she had left me a child +was nothing to me: I was only a rapturous lover, and had not begun to +long for baby voices and upturned children's faces. When, finally, +I did turn to Helen, it was as you see now: to part her from her +grandfather would be to wrench body from soul." + +"Mr. Raymond is a very old man," I suggested. + +"He has a surer life than mine: I doubt if anybody would insure mine +at any price." + +We were silent. I felt awkward and ashamed: I knew what was in his +thoughts. + +"You wise young people!" said he presently, throwing his arm over my +shoulder--"oh, you wise young people!" Then turning me square about, +he looked into my face: "Oh, you foolish, foolish young people!" + +I felt foolish indeed--so foolish I could not meet his eyes. + +"Why begrudge us a few years of happiness together?" he asked in his +deliberate gentle voice. "Your mother is still young, and so beautiful +that she deserves to shine in a sphere worthy of her. I will say +nothing of my profound and respectful love for her. My love for Alice +was my passionate worship of a singularly charming child: your mother +commands a different feeling. But of that I will say nothing. Think, +Floyd, what a life I can offer her! It seems to me that in marrying me +she will gain much: what can she lose?" + +What, indeed, could she lose? My doubt and dread shrank into +insignificant and petty proportions: it seemed to me the noblest fate +for any woman alive to gain the love of this man into whose face I was +looking earnestly. Yet I could find no words to utter, and he went on +as if trying to convince me against my will. + +"You do not appear to entertain any aversion for me," he pursued, +smiling, "and in our new relation I will take care that you do not +like me less. You are dear to me now, yet when your mother is my wife +you will be much dearer." + +My self-control vanished: my lip trembled. "What does mother say?" I +asked almost in a whisper. + +He put his hands on my shoulders, laughing softly: "She says she has a +son whose love and respect she so highly prizes she will do nothing to +forfeit them." + +"Does she love you, Mr. Floyd?" I questioned bluntly. + +"I think she does--a little," he answered, dropping his eyes. "But," +he went on more hurriedly, "in such a marriage love is not everything, +Floyd, although it is much. There is sympathy, constant close +companionship: of these both your mother and I have bitterly felt the +need." + +"Don't say any more, sir," I cried, humbled to the dust. "When I first +saw what was coming I suppose I thought only of myself: now--" + +"Now you think of two other people, and withdraw your opposition. I +confess I can't see how you will be worse off. Come now, give me your +hand, you young rascal! I shall go home with you to-morrow, and--" + +"Will it take place at once?" I asked with a pang at my heart. + +"What? our marriage? You are hurrying matters charmingly. Mrs. +Randolph has not yet accepted me. But I will confess to you, my boy, +that I shall be more than happy, more than proud, if I can persuade +her to allow me to introduce her to my friends in Washington in +December." + +We walked about for more than an hour after, but said no more about +the matter, although it was stirring below every thought and word of +each of us. I felt the weariness of soul which succeeds a struggle, +and my guardian tried, but unsuccessfully, to conceal the elation +which follows victory. Yet subdued and unhappy though I was, haunted +by a sense of terrible loss, I was proud and glad to have contented +him. He talked to me intimately, and discussed my plans for the +future. I was to enter college the next year, and he pointed out +the fact, to which I was not insensible, that our old life at home +would necessarily have been broken up when I left Belfield. He spoke +of my pecuniary means, and frankly informed me that his property +amounted to three hundred thousand dollars, and that this amount he +had divided into thirds--one for my mother, one for Helen and one +for me. + +"Oh, sir," I burst out, "you must not be so generous to me." + +"And why not? My little girl has too much already: it has always been +one of the discomforts of my life that she is so rich, so raised above +all human wants, that I have had it in my power to do nothing for +her. I have seen poor men buying clothes and shoes for their little +sunburned children, and envied them." + +We had been lounging toward the house, and now had reached the +terrace, where we found Mr. Raymond pacing feebly up and down in the +mild sunshine leaning on Frederick's arm. Mr. Floyd stepped forward +and took the valet's place, investing the slight courtesy with the +charm of his grand manner. + +"Where is Helen?" asked Mr. Raymond. "I supposed that she was with +you, James." + +"I have not seen her since breakfast.--Suppose you look her up, Floyd? +I am afraid she is with Miss Georgy, and in mischief, no doubt.--I +object, sir," Mr. Floyd added to his father-in-law, "to Helen's having +too much of the society of Miss Lenox. She is a pretty little devil +enough, but then I don't like pretty little devils." + +"I have written to Mrs. Lenox to recall her," returned Mr. Raymond +stiffly. "She is no favorite of mine. There is a look in her eyes at +times that makes me shudder at the thought of the harm she is pretty +sure to do. Floyd here is her only partisan." + +I had already sprung along the terrace, and quickly crossed the lawn +and garden to the rocks. I remembered having seen a blue and a scarlet +jacket going toward the shore during my talk with Mr. Floyd; and, sure +enough, on the rocks I found traces of the girls--a ribbon, the rind +of Georgy's oranges which she was always nibbling, and Helen's book. +Supposing they were on the beach, I descended the stone steps leading +to the sands. There was a faint plashing and lisping of the waves, but +otherwise no sound and no sight but the great rocks and the smooth sea +lustrous and glittering like steel. I had no doubt but that Helen and +Georgy were somewhere near me, and sat down to wait. My mind was full +of thoughts that came and went, bringing clear but swiftly-shifting +pictures of our old life and the new, which rose suddenly fresh and +vivid before me. I could see my mother's face, the color coming and +going like a young girl's, and the movement of her little hands +clasping and unclasping in her lap. I could see her, too, by the side +of Mr. Floyd in a bright, wonderful world of which I knew nothing. For +a moment I felt already parted from her, and the pang of separation +wrenched body from soul. I threw myself face downward on the sand and +declared myself profoundly miserable. + +Suddenly I started to my feet. I was vaguely terrified, yet could not +tell what had aroused me from my brooding thoughts. I seemed conscious +of having heard a cry, but so faint and inarticulate as hardly to +differ from the distant note of a sea-bird. But as I ran frantically +along the sands I distinctly heard my name, and knew that the entreaty +was for help. + +"I am coming!" I screamed at the top of my voice--"I am coming as fast +as I can." The rocks gave back so many deceitful echoes that I was not +certain from what point the imploring cry came; but I knew every inch +of the beach for a mile up and down, and knew, too, that there was but +one place in which with ordinary prudence there could be the slightest +danger. So with unerring instinct I flew along the wet shingle to +"Raymond's Cliff." At this point the beetling line of rocks which +coiled and frowned along the coast terminated abruptly in precipitous +crags. On one side it was sheer precipice, but on the other the cliff, +exposed both to wind and wave, washed by the rains and gnawed at its +base by ever-advancing and receding tides, had gradually been worn +away in the centre by the constant crumbling of the sandy soil, so as +to form a sort of ravine. It was a dangerous and gloomy place, and +I had received many a warning from Mr. Raymond never to take Helen +there. + +"Helen!" I cried--"Helen! if you are here, answer me. I cannot see +you." A gull flew away from the cliff with a scream, and I could hear +no other sound. "Tell me, Helen, if you are here." + +I heard a cry from above--almost inaudible it was so spiritless and +faint--yet, gaze as I might toward the top, I could see nothing. I +skirted the main rock and climbed as far as I easily could up the +ravine. Here my attention was arrested by a dot of scarlet against the +grim, bare face of the basalt. Yes, there she was, about forty feet +above me, hanging on to a shelving rock with her little Italian +greyhound in her arms. She was peering down, disclosing a pallid face. +I saw at once that she had hung there until her strength was almost +gone. + +"Listen to me, Helen," said I, calmly and very gently, for I had a +ghastly dread that she would fall before my very eyes. "Don't look +down: just keep your eyes fixed on the rock, and hold on tight until I +reach you." She obeyed me. "Now," I went on authoritatively, "drop the +dog--drop him, I say!--Here, Beppo! here!" + +She again obeyed me, and the dog scrambled down and fell--scratched +and bruised, no doubt, yet otherwise unhurt--at my feet. "Helen, +answer me one question," said I. "Can you wait until I go round up to +the top and get a rope?" + +She gave a little scream of pitiful anguish: I saw her slight figure +sway, and some loose stones came rattling down. "I feel so sick, so +dizzy!" she cried. + +"I will climb up, then. Hold on tight for a few minutes more. Keep +perfectly still, and don't look down: you know how well I can climb." + +I was a capital climber, and could hold on like a cat where there was +a crevice to fasten my feet or my hands. Still, I was anything but +certain about these hollow, worn sides, which in places were as smooth +as glass. But it had to be done, and done quickly. If the child +fell she was dead or maimed to a certainty. She had crawled in some +unheard-of way down from the top, and must go back the way she had +come; and since I had no time to help her from above, I must go up +to her. A spar had been washed up among the debris upon which I had +mounted, and this helped me up a little way. Then I managed to creep a +trifle farther, hand over hand: whenever I could take breath I called +out to her that it was all right and I should be up in another minute. +The necessity of keeping up her courage endowed me with miraculous +strength, and in a little while I stood beside Helen on the narrow +shelf, and waited for a moment to breathe freely and see what was yet +beyond me. I smiled at her, and she looked steadily into my face, but +said not a word. + +"How in the world did you get here, Helen?" I asked. + +"I came after Beppo," she returned, her lip trembling. + +"How did Beppo get here?" + +"Georgy flung him down," cried the child, bursting into tears. +"Perhaps she did not mean to, but she was angry that he would not go +by himself after the stone she flung." + +I had looked to the top by this time, and saw at once that the worst +part of the ascent was before me. It had been sheer rock beneath: here +the strata were crumbled, and the interstices filled with earth and +dried vegetation. The angle was much greater than it had been below, +and it was easy to see that even Helen's light footstep had loosened +every fragment it had touched. I gained a foothold above her; +stretched out my hand and drew her up; then another and another. Once +she lost her footing, but I caught the slim figure in my arms and went +on, with her half fainting against my shoulder, her puny strength +quite worn out. + +When we were within a few feet of the top I told her to look up. "You +see that we are almost there," I said gently. "Can you do what I tell +you to do? When I raise you place one foot on my shoulder: ... now, +then, take hold of something firmly and clamber up." + +My footing was precarious, and in order to lift her up I was obliged +to unfasten my hold of the few scant wisps of withered grass. If she +could but reach the top, I believed I could make a supreme effort to +save myself; and I risked everything. + +In an instant she was on the brow of the cliff. She gave a convulsive +cry of joy and relief, and reached out her little hand to me. I almost +stretched out to grasp it; then, remembering that with her slight +weight I might easily drag her back into danger, I took hold of a +little bush: it was dried to the roots, and came out in my hand. My +footing gave way: I slipped down, with nothing to break my fall--not a +shrub, not a fissure in the rocks. The blue sky had been above me, but +that blessed glimpse of azure vanished, and I could see nothing +but the frowning sides of the precipice as I went down, my pace +accelerating every moment. I believed I could gain a hold or footing +on the shelving rock where I had found Helen, but it gave way as I +touched it and slid suddenly down the ravine. I was dizzy and bruised, +but was wondering if Helen would give the alarm--if Georgy would be +sorry. I thought with pity of my mother, who would surely weep for +me. Then I heard Beppo barking joyfully, and I knew that I was at the +bottom of the abyss. I suffered a few seconds of such terrible pain +that I was glad when a sickening sort of quietude settled over me, and +I felt that I must be dying. + +ELLEN W. OLNEY. + +[TO BE CONTINUED.] + + + + +A SEA-SOUND. + + + Hush! hush! + 'Tis the voice of the sea to the land, + As it breaks on the desolate strand, + With a chime to the strenuous wave of life + That throbs in the quivering sand. + + Hush! hush! + Each requiem tone as it dies, + With a soul that is parting, sighs; + For the tide rolls back from the pulseless clay + As the foam in the tempest flies. + + Hush! hush! + O throb of the restless sea! + All hearts are attuned to thee-- + All pulses beat with thine ebb and flow + To the rhyme of Eternity! + +JOHN B. TABB. + + + + +THE BRITISH SOLDIER. + + +I allude to the British soldier, more especially, as I lately +observed and admired him at Aldershot, where, just now, he appears +to particular advantage; but at any time during the past +twelvemonth--since England and Russia have stood glaring at each other +across the prostrate body of the expiring yet reviving Turk--this +actually ornamental and potentially useful personage has been +picturesquely, agreeably conspicuous. I say "agreeably," speaking from +my own humble point of view, because I confess to a lively admiration +of the military class. I exclaim, cordially, with Offenbach's Grand +Duchess, "Ah, oui, j'aime les militaires!" Mr. Ruskin has said +somewhere, very naturally, that he could never resign himself to +living in a country in which, as in the United States, there should be +no old castles. Putting aside the old castles, I should say, like Mr. +Ruskin, that life loses a certain indispensable charm in a country +destitute of an apparent standing army. Certainly, the army may be too +apparent, too importunate, too terrible a burden to the state and to +the conscience of the philosophic observer. This is the case, without +a doubt, just now in the bristling empires of the Continent. In +Germany and France, in Russia and Italy, there are many more soldiers +than are needed to make the taxpayer thrifty or the lover of the +picturesque happy. The huge armaments of continental Europe are an +oppressive and sinister spectacle, and I have rarely derived a high +order of entertainment from the sight of even the largest masses of +homesick conscripts. The _chair a canon_--the cannon-meat--as they +aptly term it in French, has always seemed to me dumbly, +appealingly conscious of its destiny. I have seen it in course of +preparation--seen it salted and dressed and packed and labelled, as it +were, for consumption. In that marvellous France, indeed, which bears +all burdens lightly, and whose good spirits and absence of the tragic +_pose_ alone prevent us from calling her constantly heroic, the army +scarcely seems to be the heavy charge that it must be in fact. The +little red-legged soldiers, always present and always moving, are +as thick as the field-flowers in an abundant harvest, and amid the +general brightness and mobility of French life they strike one at +times simply as cheerful tokens of the national exuberance and +fecundity. But in Germany and Italy the national levies impart a +lopsided aspect to society: they seem to drag it under water. They +hang like a millstone round its neck, so that it can't move: it has +to sit still, looking wistfully at the long, forward road which it is +unable to measure. + +England, which is fortunate in so many things, is fortunate in her +well-fed mercenaries, who suggest none of the dismal reflections +provoked by the great foreign armies. It is true, of course, that they +fail to suggest some of the inspiring ones. If Germany and France are +burdened, at least they are defended--at least they are armed for +conflict and victory. There seems to be a good deal of doubt as to how +far this is true of the nation which has hitherto been known as the +pre-eminently pugnacious one. Where France and Germany and Russia +count by hundreds, England counts by tens; and it is only, strictly +speaking, on the good old principle that one Englishman can buffet +a dozen foreigners that a very hopeful view of an Anglo-continental +collision can be maintained. This good old principle is far from +having gone out of fashion: you may hear it proclaimed to an inspiring +tune any night in the week in the London music-halls. One summer +evening, in the country, an English gentleman was telling me about his +little boy, a rosy, sturdy, manly child whom I had already admired, +and whom he depicted as an infant Hercules. The surrounding influences +at the moment were picturesque. An ancient lamp was suspended from the +ceiling of the hall; the large door stood open upon a terrace; +and outside the big, dense treetops were faintly stirring in the +starlight. My companion dilated upon the pluck and muscle, the latent +pugnacity, of his dear little son, and told me how bravely already he +doubled his infant fist. There was a kind of Homeric simplicity about +it. From this he proceeded to wider considerations, and observed that +the English child was of necessity the bravest and sturdiest in the +world, for the plain reason that he was the germ of the English man. +What the English man was we of course both knew, but, as I was a +stranger, my friend explained the matter in detail. He was a person +whom, in the ordinary course of human irritation, every one else was +afraid of. Nowhere but in England were such men made--men who could +hit out as soon as think, and knock over persons of inferior race as +you would brush away flies. They were afraid of nothing: the sentiment +of hesitation to inflict a blow under rigidly proper circumstances +was unknown to them. English soldiers and sailors in a row carried +everything before them: foreigners didn't know what to make of such +fellows, and were afraid to touch them. A couple of Englishmen were +a match for a foreign mob. My friend's little boy was made like a +statue: his little arms and legs were quite of the right sort. This +was the greatness of England, and of this there was an infinite +supply. The light, as I say, was dim in the great hall, and the rustle +of the oaks in the park was almost audible. Their murmur seemed +to offer a sympathetic undertone to the honest conversation of my +companion, and I sat there as humble a ministrant to the simple and +beautiful idea of British valor as the occasion could require. I made +the reflection--by which I must justify my anecdote--that the ancient +tradition as to the personal fighting-value of the individual +Englishman flourishes in high as well as in low life, and forms a +common ground of contact between them; with the simple difference +that at the music-halls it is more poetically expressed than in the +country-houses. + +I am grossly ignorant of military matters, and hardly know the names +of regiments or the designations of their officers; yet, as I said at +the beginning of these remarks, I am always very much struck by the +sight of a uniform. War is a detestable thing, and I would willingly +see the sword dropped into its scabbard for ever. Only I should plead +that in its sheathed condition the sword should still be allowed to +play a certain part. Actual war is detestable, but there is something +agreeable in possible war; and I have been thankful that I should have +found myself on British soil at a moment when it was resounding to the +tread of regiments. If the British army is small, it has during the +last six months been making the most of itself. The rather dusky +spectacle of British life has been lighted up by the presence in the +foreground of considerable masses of that vivid color which is more +particularly associated with the protection of British interests. The +sunshine has appeared to rest upon scattered clusters of red-coats, +while the background has been enveloped in a sort of chaotic and +fuliginous dimness. The red-coats, according to their number, have +been palpable and definite, though a great many other things have been +inconveniently vague. At the beginning of the year, when Parliament +was opened in the queen's name, the royal speech contained a phrase +which that boisterous organ of the war-party, the _Pall Mall Gazette_, +pronounced "sickening" in its pusillanimity. Her Majesty alluded to +the necessity, in view of the complications in the East, of the +government taking into consideration the making of "preparations for +precaution." This was certainly an ineffective way of expressing a +thirst for Russian blood, but the royal phraseology is never very +felicitous; and the "preparations for precaution" have been extremely +interesting. Indeed, for a person conscious of a desire to look into +what may be called the psychology of politics, I can imagine nothing +more interesting than the general spectacle of the public conduct of +England during the last two years. I have watched it with a good deal +of the same sort of entertainment with which one watches a five-act +drama from a comfortable place in the stalls. There are moments of +discomfort in the course of such a performance: the theatre is hot and +crowded, the situations are too prolonged, the play seems to drag, +some of the actors have no great talent. But the piece, as a whole, is +intensely dramatic, the argument is striking, and you would not for +the world leave your place before the denouement is reached. My own +pleasure all winter, I confess, has been partly marred by a bad +conscience: I have felt a kind of shame at my inability to profit by a +brilliant opportunity to make up my mind. This inability, however, was +extreme, and my regret was not lightened by seeing every one about me +set an admirable example of decision, and even of precision. Every one +about me was either a Russian or a Turk, the Turks, however, being +greatly the more numerous. It appeared necessary to one's self-respect +to assume some foreign personality, and I felt keenly, for a while, +the embarrassment of choice. At last it occurred to me simply that as +an American I might be an Englishman; and the reflection became +afterward very profitable. + +When once I had undertaken the part, I played it with what the French +call _conviction_. There are many obvious reasons why the role, +at such a time as this, should accommodate itself to the American +capacity. The feeling of race is strong, and a good American could not +but desire that, with the eyes of Europe fixed upon it, the English +race should make a passable figure. There would be much fatuity in his +saying that at such a moment he deemed it of importance to give it the +support of his own striking attitude, but there is at least a kind of +filial piety in this feeling moved to draw closer to it. To see how +the English race would behave, and to hope devoutly it would behave +well,--this was the occupation of my thoughts. Old England was in a +difficult pass, and all the world was watching her. The good American +feels in all sorts of ways about Old England: the better American he +is, the more acute are his moods, the more lively his variations. He +can be, I think, everything but indifferent; and, for myself, I never +hesitated to let my emotions play all along the scale. In the morning, +over the _Times_, it was extremely difficult to make up one's mind. +The _Times_ seemed very mealy-mouthed--that impression, indeed, it +took no great cleverness to gather--but the dilemma lay between one's +sense of the brutality and cynicism of the usual utterances of the +Turkish party and one's perception of the direful ills which Russian +conquest was so liberally scattering abroad. The brutality of the +Turkish tone, as I sometimes caught an echo of it in the talk of +chance interlocutors, was not such as to quicken that race-feeling +to which I just now alluded. English society is a tremendously +comfortable affair, and the crudity of the sarcasm that I frequently +heard levelled by its fortunate members at the victims of the +fashionable Turk was such as to produce a good deal of resentful +meditation. It was provoking to hear a rosy English gentleman, who +had just been into Leicestershire for a week's hunting, deliver the +opinion that the vulgar Bulgarians had really not been massacred half +enough; and this in spite of the fact that one had long since made the +observation that for a good plain absence of mawkish sentimentality a +certain type of rosy English gentleman is nowhere to be matched. +On the other hand, it was not very comfortable to think of the +measureless misery in which these interesting populations were +actually steeped, and one had to admit that the deliberate invasion of +a country which professed the strongest desire to live in peace with +its invaders was at least a rather striking anomaly. Such a course +could only be justified by the most gratifying results, and brilliant +consequences as yet had not begun to bloom upon the blood-drenched +fields of Bulgaria. + +To see this heavy-burdened, slow-moving Old England making up her mind +was an edifying spectacle. It was not over-fanciful to say to one's +self, in spite of the difficulties of the problem and the (in a +certain sense) evenly-balanced scales, that this was a great crisis +in her history, that she stood at the crossing of the ways, and that +according as she put forth her right hand or her left would her +greatness stand or wane. It was possible to imagine that in her huge, +dim, collective consciousness she felt an oppressive sense of moral +responsibility, that she too murmured to herself that she was on +trial, and that, through the mists of bewilderment and the tumult of +party cries, she begged to be enlightened. The sympathetic American +to whom I have alluded may be represented at such an hour as making +a hundred irresponsible reflections and indulging in all sorts of +fantastic visions. If I had not already wandered so far from my theme, +I should like to offer a few instances here. Very often it seemed +natural to care very little whether England went to war with Russia or +not: the interest lay in the moral struggle that was going on within +her own limits. Awkward as this moral struggle made her appear, +perilously as it seemed to have exposed her to the sarcasm of some of +her neighbors--of that compact, cohesive France, for instance, which +even yet cannot easily imagine a great country sacrificing the +substance of "glory" to the shadow of wisdom--this was the most +striking element in the drama into which, as I said just now, the +situation had resolved itself. The Liberal party at the present hour +is broken, disfigured, demoralized, the mere ghost of its former self. +The opposition to the government has been, in many ways, factious and +hypercritical: it has been opposition for opposition's sake, and it +has met, in part, the fate of such immoralities. But a good part of +the cause that it represented appeared at times to be the highest +conscience of a civilized country. The aversion to war, the absence +of defiance, the disposition to treat the emperor of Russia like a +gentleman and a man of his word, the readiness to make concessions, to +be conciliatory, even credulous, to try a great many expedients +before resorting to the showy argument of the sword,--these various +attributes of the peace party offered, of course, ample opportunity to +those scoffers at home and abroad who are always prepared to cry out +that England has sold herself, body and soul, to "Manchester." It was +interesting to attempt to feel what there might be of justice in such +cries, and at the same time feel that this looking at war in the face +and pronouncing it very vile was the mark of a high civilization. It +is but fair to add, though it takes some courage, that I found myself +very frequently of the opinion of the last speaker. If British +interests were in fact endangered by Russian aggression--though, on +the whole, I did not at all believe it--it would be a fine thing to +see the ancient might of this great country reaffirm itself. I did +not at all believe it, as I say; yet at times, I confess, I tried to +believe it, pretended I believed it, for the sake of this inspiring +idea of England's making, like the lady in _Dombey & Son_, "an +effort." There were those who, if one would listen to them, would +persuade one that that sort of thing was quite out of the question; +that England was no longer a fighting power; that her day was over; +and that she was quite incapable of striking a blow for the great +empire she had built up--with a good deal less fighting, really, than +had been given out--by taking happy advantage of weaker states. (These +hollow reasoners were of course invidious foreigners.) To such talk as +this I paid little attention--only just enough to feel it quicken my +desire that this fine nation, so full of private pugnacity and of +public deliberation, might find in circumstances a sudden pretext for +doing something gallant and striking. + +Meanwhile I watched the soldiers whenever an opportunity offered. +My opportunities, I confess, were moderate, for it was not often my +fortune to encounter an imposing military array. In London there are a +great many red-coats, but they rarely march about the streets in large +masses. The most impressive military body that engages the attention +of the contemplative pedestrian is the troop of Life Guards or of +Blues which every morning, about eleven o'clock, makes its way down to +Whitehall from the Regent's Park barracks. (Shortly afterward another +troop passes up from Whitehall, where, at the Horse Guards, the guard +has been changed.) The Life Guards are one of the most brilliant +ornaments of the metropolis, and I never see two or three of them +pass without feeling shorter by several inches. When, of a summer +afternoon, they scatter themselves abroad in undress uniform--with +their tight red jackets and tight blue trousers following the swelling +lines of their manly shapes, and their little visorless caps perched +neatly askew on the summit of their six feet two of stature--it is +impossible not to be impressed, and almost abashed, by the sight of +such a consciousness of neatly-displayed physical advantages and by +such an air of superior valor. It is true that I found the other +day in an amusing French book (a little book entitled _Londres +pittoresque_, by M. Henri Bellenger) a description of these majestic +warriors which took a humorous view of their grandeur. A Frenchman +arriving in London, says M. Bellenger, stops short in the middle of +the pavement and stares aghast at this strange apparition--"this +tall lean fellow, with his wide, short torso perched upon a pair of +grasshopper's legs and squeezed into an adhesive jacket of scarlet +cloth, who dawdles himself along with a little cane in his hand, +swinging forward his enormous feet, curving his arms, throwing back +his shoulders, arching his chest, with a mixture of awkwardness, +fatuity and stiffness the most curious and the most exhilarating.... +In his general aspect," adds this merciless critic, "he recalls the +circus-rider, minus the latter's flexibility: skin-tight garments, +simpering mouth, smile of a dancing-girl, attempt to be impertinent +and irresistible which culminates only in being ridiculous." + +This is a very heavy-handed picture of those exaggerated proportions +and that conquering gait which, as I say, render the tall Life +Guardsman one of the most familiar ornaments of the London +streets. But it is when he is armed and mounted that he is most +picturesque--when he sits, monumentally, astride of his black charger +in one of the big niches on either side of the gate of the Horse +Guards, cuirassed and helmeted, booted and spurred. I never fail to +admire him as I pass through the adjacent archway, as well as his +companions, equally helmeted and booted, who march up and down beside +him, and, as Taine says, alluding in his _Notes sur l'Angleterre_ to +the scene, "posent avec majeste devant les gamins." If I chance to be +in St. James's street when a semi-squadron of these elegant warriors +are returning from attendance upon royalty after a Drawing-Room or +a Levee, I am sure to make one of the gamins who stand upon the +curbstone to see them pass. If the day be a fine one at the height of +the season, and London happen to be wearing otherwise the brilliancy +of supreme fashion--with beautiful dandies at the club-windows, and +chariots ascending the sunny slope freighted with wigged and flowered +coachmen, great armorial hammercloths, powdered, appended footmen, +dowagers and debutantes--then the rattling, flashing, prancing +cavalcade of the long detachment of the Household troops strikes one +as the official expression of a thoroughly well-equipped society. It +must be added, however, that it is many a year since the Life Guards +or the Blues have had harder work than this. To escort their sovereign +to the railway-stations at London and Windsor has long been their most +arduous duty. They were present to very good purpose at Waterloo, but +since their return from that immortal field they have not been out of +England. Heavy cavalry, in modern warfare, has gone out of fashion, +and in case of a conflict in the East those nimble, pretty fellows the +Hussars, with their tight, dark-blue tunics so brilliantly embroidered +with yellow braid, would take precedence of their majestic comrades. +The Hussars are indeed the prettiest fellows of all, and if I were +fired with a martial ambition I should certainly enlist in their +ranks. I know of no military personage more agreeable to the civil eye +than a blue-and-yellow hussar, unless indeed it be a young officer in +the Rifle Brigade. The latter is perhaps, to a refined and chastened +taste, the most graceful, the most truly elegant, of all military +types. The little riflemen, the common soldiers, have an extremely +useful and durable aspect: with their plain black uniforms, little +black Scotch bonnets, black gloves, total absence of color, they +suggest the rigidly practical and business-like phase of their +profession--the restriction of the attention to the simple specialty +of "picking off" one's enemy. The officers are of course more elegant, +but their elegance is sober and subdued. They are dressed all in +black, save for a broad, dark crimson sash which they wear across the +shoulder and chest, and for a very slight hint of gold lace upon their +small, round, short-visored caps. They are furthermore adorned with a +small quantity of broad black braid discreetly applied to their tight, +long-skirted surtouts. There is a kind of severe gentlemanliness about +this costume which, when it is worn by a tall, slim, neat-waisted +young Englishman with a fresh complexion, a candid eye and a yellow +moustache, is of quite irresistible effect. There is no such triumph +of taste as to look rich without high colors and picturesque without +accessories. The imagination is always struck by the figure of a +soberly-dressed gentleman with a sword. + +The little riflemen, the Hussars, the Life Guards, the Foot Guards, +the artillerymen (whose garments always look stiffer and more +awkwardly fitted than those of their _confreres_) have all, however, +one quality in common--the appearance of extreme, of even excessive, +youth. It is hardly too much to say that the British army, as a +stranger observes it now-a-days, is an army of boys. All the regiments +are boyish: they are made up of lads who range from seventeen to +five-and-twenty. You look almost in vain for the old-fashioned +specimen of the British soldier--the large, well-seasoned man of +thirty, bronzed and whiskered beneath his terrible bearskin and with +shoulders fashioned for the heaviest knapsack. This was the ancient +English grenadier. But the modern grenadier, as he perambulates the +London pavement, is for the most part a fresh-colored lad of moderate +stature, who hardly strikes one as offering the elements of a very +solid national defence. He enlists, as a general thing, for six years, +and if he leave the army at the end of this term his service in the +ranks will have been hardly more than a juvenile escapade. I often +wonder, however, that the unemployed Englishman of humble origin +should not be more often disposed to take up his residence in Her +Majesty's barracks. There is a certain street-corner at Westminster +where the recruiting-sergeants stand all day at the receipt of custom. +The place is well chosen, and I suppose they drive a tolerably lively +business: all London sooner or later passes that way, and whenever +I have passed I have always observed one of these smart apostles of +military glory trying to catch the ear of one of the dingy London +_lazzaroni_. Occasionally, if the hook has been skilfully baited, +they appear to be conscious of a bite, but as a general thing the +unfashionable object of their blandishments turns away, after an +unillumined stare at the brilliant fancy dress of his interlocutor, +with a more or less concise declaration of incredulity. In front +of him stretches, across the misty Thames, the large commotion of +Westminster Bridge, crowned by the huge, towered mass of the Houses of +Parliament. To the right of this, a little _effaced_, as the French +say, is the vague black mass of the Abbey; close at hand are half +a dozen public-houses, convenient for drinking a glass to the +encouragement of military aspiration; in the background are the +squalid and populous slums of Westminster. It is a characteristic +congregation of objects, and I have often wondered that among so many +eloquent mementos of the life of the English people the possible +recruit should not be prompted by the sentiment of social solidarity +to throw himself into the arms of the agent of patriotism. Speaking +less vaguely, one would suppose that to the great majority of the +unwashed and unfed the condition of a private in one of the queen's +regiments would offer much that might be supremely enviable. It is +a chance to become, relatively speaking, a gentleman--more than a +gentleman, a "swell"--to have the grim problem of existence settled +at a stroke. The British soldier always presents the appearance of +scrupulous cleanliness: he is scoured, scrubbed, brushed beyond +reproach. His hair is enriched with pomatum and his shoes are +radiantly polished. His little cap is worn in a manner determined by +considerations purely aesthetic. He carries a little cane in one hand, +and, like a gentleman at a party, a pair of white gloves in the +other. He holds up his head and expands his chest, and bears himself +generally like a person who has reason to invite rather than to evade +the fierce light of modern criticism. He enjoys, moreover, an abundant +leisure, and appears to have ample time and means for participating in +the advantages of a residence in London--for frequenting gin-palaces +and music-halls, for observing the beauties of the West End and +cultivating the society of appreciative housemaids. To a ragged and +simple-minded rustic or to a young Cockney of vague resources all +this ought to be a brilliant picture. That the picture should seem to +contain any shadows is a proof of the deep-seated relish in the human +mind for our personal independence. The fear of "too many masters" +weighs heavily against the assured comforts and the opportunity of +cutting a figure. On the other hand, I remember once being told by a +communicative young trooper with whom I had some conversation that +the desire to "see life" had been his own motive for enlisting. He +appeared to be seeing it with some indistinctness: he was a little +tipsy at the time. + +I spoke at the beginning of these remarks of the brilliant impressions +to be gathered during a couple of days' stay at Aldershot, and I have +delayed much too long to attempt a rapid and grateful report of them. +But I reflect that such a report, however friendly, coming from a +visitor profoundly uninitiated into the military mystery, can have but +a relative value. I may lay myself open to contempt, for instance, +in making the simple remark that the big parade held in honor of the +queen's birthday, and which I went down more particularly to see, +struck me, as the young ladies say, as perfectly lovely. I will +nevertheless hazard this confession, for I should otherwise seem +to myself to be grossly irresponsive to a delightful hospitality. +Aldershot is a very charming place--an example the more, to my sense, +if examples were needed, of the happy variety of this wonderful little +island, its adaptability to every form of human convenience. Some +twenty years ago it occurred to the late prince consort, to whom so +many things occurred, that it would be a good thing to establish a +great camp. He cast his eyes about him, and instantly they rested upon +a spot as perfectly adapted to his purpose as if Nature from the first +had had an eye to pleasing him. It was a matter of course that the +prince should find exactly what he looked for. Aldershot is at but +little more than an hour from London--a high, sunny, breezy expanse +surrounded by heathery hills. It offers all the required conditions +of liberal space, of quick accessibility, of extreme salubrity, of +contiguity to a charming little tumbled country in which the troops +may indulge in ingenious imitations of difficult man[oe]uvres; to +which it behooves me to add the advantage of enchanting drives and +walks for the entertainment of the impressible visitor. In winter, +possibly, the great circle of the camp is rather a prey to the +elements, but nothing can be more agreeable than I found it toward +the end of May, with the light fresh breezes hanging about, and the +sun-rifts from a magnificently cloudy sky lighting up all around the +big yellow patches of gorse. + +At Aldershot the military class lives in huts, a generic name given to +certain low wooden structures of small dimensions and a single story, +covering, however, a good many specific variations. The oblong shanty +in which thirty or forty common soldiers are stowed away is naturally +a very different affair from the neat little bungalow of an officer. +The buildings are distributed in chessboard fashion over a very large +area, and form two distinct camps. There is also a substantial little +town, chiefly composed of barracks and public-houses; in addition to +which, at crowded seasons, far and near over the plain there is the +glitter of white tents. "The neat little bungalow of an officer," as I +said just now: I learned, among other things, what a charming form of +habitation this may be. The ceilings are very low, the partitions are +thin, the rooms are all next door to each other; the place is a good +deal like an American "cottage" by the seaside. But even in these +narrow conditions that homogeneous English luxury which is the +admiration of the stranger blooms with its usual amplitude. The +specimen which suggests these observations was cushioned and curtained +like a pretty house in Mayfair, and yet its pretensions were tempered +by a kind of rustic humility. I entered it first in the dark, but the +next morning, when I stepped outside to have a look at it by daylight, +I burst into pardonable laughter. The walls were of plain planks +painted a dark red: the roof, on which I could almost rest my elbow, +was neatly endued with a coating of tar. But, after all, the thing was +very pretty. There was a matting of ivy all over the front of the hut, +thriving as I had never known ivy to thrive upon a wooden surface: +there was a tangle of creepers about all the windows. The place looked +like a "side-scene" in a comic opera. But there was a serious little +English lawn in front of it, over which a couple of industrious +red-coats were pulling up and down a garden-roller; and in the centre +of the drive before the door was a tremendous clump of rhododendrons +of more than operatic brilliancy. I leaned on the garden-gate and +looked out at the camp: it was twinkling and bustling in the morning +light, which drizzled down upon it in patches from a somewhat agitated +sky. An hour later the camp got itself together and spread itself, in +close battalions and glittering cohorts, over a big green level, where +it marched and cantered about most effectively in honor of a lady +living at a quiet Scotch country-house. One of this lady's generals +stood in a corner, and the regiments marched past and saluted. This +simple spectacle was in reality very brilliant. I know nothing about +soldiers, as the reader must long since have discovered, but I had, +nevertheless, no hesitation in saying to myself that these were the +handsomest troops in the world. Everything in such a spectacle is +highly picturesque, and if the observer is one of the profane he +has no perception of weakness of detail. He sees the long squadrons +shining and shifting, uncurling themselves over the undulations of +the ground like great serpents with metallic scales, and he remembers +Milton's description of the celestial hosts. The British soldier +is doubtless not celestial, but the extreme perfection of his +appointments makes him look very well on parade. On this occasion at +Aldershot I felt as if I were at the Hippodrome. There was a great +deal of cavalry and artillery, and the dragoons, hussars and lancers, +the beautiful horses, the capital riders, the wonderful wagons and +guns, seemed even more theatrical than military. This came, in a great +measure, from the freshness and tidiness of their accessories--the +brightness and tightness of uniforms, the polish of boots and buckles, +the newness of leather and paint. None of these things were the worse +for wear: they had the bloom of peace still upon them. As I looked at +the show, and then afterward, in charming company, went winding back +to camp, passing detachments of the great cavalcade, returning also in +narrow file, balancing on their handsome horses along the paths in +the gorse-brightened heather, I allowed myself to wish that since, as +matters stood, the British soldier was clearly such a fine fellow and +a review at Aldershot was such a delightful entertainment, the bloom of +peace might long remain. + +H. JAMES, JR. + + + + +A SAXON GOD. + + +In the year of grace 1854, Ernest Philip King, a young attache of the +English embassy at Athens, married Haidee Amic, the most beautiful +woman in that city. Neither of the pair possessed a fortune, and their +united means afforded a not abundantly luxurious style of living; but +they loved each other, and the fact that he was the portionless son +of a Church of England divine, and she the daughter of an impecunious +Greek of noble family and royal lineage, was no drawback to the early +happiness of their wooing and wedding. They had two children, a boy +and a girl, born within two years of each other in Athens: the girl, +the elder of the two, they named Hyacinthe; the boy was called +Tancredi. + +Five years after this marriage had taken place King lost his position +at the embassy, and only received in exchange for it a mean government +clerkship in Rome at a meagre salary. Thither he removed, and after +dragging out a miserable and disappointed existence five years longer, +he died in the arms of his beautiful and still young wife. Thereafter +the youthful widow managed to keep life in herself and her two little +ones by dint of pinching, management and contrivance on the pittance +that had come to her from the estate of her impecunious father. They +lived in a palace, it is true--but who does not live in a palace in +Rome?--high up, where the cooing doves built their nests under the +leaden eaves, and where the cold winds whistled shrilly in their +season. + +Such accomplishments as the mother was mistress of she imparted to +her children. What other education they received was derived from +intercourse with many foreigners, English, French, Russians, and from +familiarity with the sights and wonders of Rome, its galleries, ruins, +palaces, studios. + +At eighteen Tancredi had obtained a situation as amanuensis to an +English historian resident in Italy; and Hyacinthe already brooded +over some active and unusual future that spread itself as yet but +dimly before her. She inherited from her mother her unparalleled +beauty--the clear, colorless, flawless skin, the straight features, +the lustrous eyes with their luxuriant lashes and long level brows, +her lithe and gracious figure and slender feet and hands: of the +English father her only physical trace was the large, full, mobile +mouth with its firm white teeth. She had from him the modern spirit +of unrest and the modern impetus and energy: from the Greek mother, a +counteracting languor of temperament and an antique cast of mind. + +Such, in a measure, was Hyacinthe King at twenty--a curious compound +of beauty, unspent _verve_, irritated longings, half-superstitious +imaginings, and half-developed impulses, ideas and mental powers; +practically, an assistant to the worn mother in her household duties, +a haunter of the beautiful places in the city of her adoption, an +occasional mingler in the scant festivities of artists, a good +linguist, knowing English thoroughly and speaking French and German +with fluent accuracy. Watch her, with me, as she walks one spring day +along the narrow Via Robbia, down which a slip of sunlight glints +scantily on her young head, and, emerging into a wider thoroughfare, +ascends at last the Scala Regia of the Vatican. The girl is known +there, and the usually not over-courteous officials allow her to pass +on at her will through hall after hall of splendor and priceless +treasure. She is neither an English tourist with Baedeker, Murray and +a note-book, nor an American traveller with pencil, loose leaves and +a possible photographic apparatus in her pocket: therefore to the +vigilant eye of the guardian of the pope's palace she is an innocuous +being. Hyacinthe glides quietly through the Clementino Museum, with +never a glance for the lovely, blooming Mercury of the Belvedere, or +even one peep in at the cabinet where the sad Laocooen for ever writhes +in impotent struggles, or a look of love for rare and radiant Apollo, +or one of surprise for Hercules with the Nemean lion. She has reached +the Hall of Statues--that superb gallery with its subtly-tesselated +pavement, its grand marble columns with their Ionic capitals, its +arches and walls of wondrous marbles--and here she stops with a little +sigh before the Cupid of Praxiteles, shorn of his wings by ruthless +Time or some still more ruthless human destroyer. But oh the +lovesomeness of that wingless Love, the sensuous psalmody that seems +about to part the young lips, and the glad eyes one may fancy glancing +under that careless infant brow! Hyacinthe stands before it a long, +long time while many parties come in and go out, and only moves on a +little when an insolent young Frenchman offers a surmise as to her +being a statue herself. She moves only as far as Ariadne: the _jeune +Francais_ has made a progressive movement also, and notes behind his +Paris hat to his companion that the girl looks something like the +marble. She does. Though the grief of the face of the daughter of +Minos as she lies deserted by her lover on the rocky shore of Naxos be +a poignant and a present woe, there is the shadow of its mate on +the brow and lips of the girl who gazes at its pure and pallid and +all-unavailing loveliness. + +The Frenchmen have gone with their guide, and there is a great +stillness falling on the place, and no more tourists come that way. +The light is fading, but Hyacinthe turns back to the mutilated Cupid, +and ere long sits down at the base of the statue, and her head rests +well on the cold marble while the darkness grows, and the guardians of +the Vatican either forget or do not distinguish the white of her gown +from the blurred blanchedness of the Greek Love. + +So, while the mother waits at home, and wails and prays and wonders +and seeks comfort among her neighbors, the daughter sleeps and dreams; +and her dream is this: The wingless Love looks up and laughs as in +welcome, and Hyacinthe looks up too, and they both see a new marble +standing there in front of them: nay, not a marble, though white as +Parian, for the eyes that laugh back at Love's and hers are blue as +the blue Italian summer skies, and the curling locks of hair on the +brow are of shining gold, and the palms of the beautiful hands are +rosy with the bright blood of life. + +And Love asks, "What would you?" + +And the strange comer answers, "They say I need nothing." + +And Hyacinthe in her dream says, "Is what they say the truth?" But +even while she speaks the stranger sinks farther and farther from her +sight, his glad blue eyes still laughing back at Love and her as he +fades into one with the darkness afar off where Ariadne slumbers in +sorrow. And the wingless Love smiles sadly as he speaks: "Seek your +art, O daughter of a Greek mother! and you will find in it the answer +to your question." And Hyacinthe, sighing, wakes in the dreary dusk of +the first dawn. + +She was affrighted at first, and then slowly there came upon her, with +the fast-increasing daylight, a great peace. + +"'Seek your art!'" the girl murmured to herself, pushing back her dark +locks and gazing away toward the spot where the hero of her dream had +vanished. "So will I, Cupid, and there I shall find the answer to my +question, to all questions; for I shall find him whom my soul loveth. +Who was he, what was he, so resplendent and shining among all these +old Greeks? Where shall I seek? Say, Cupid? But you are a silent god, +and will not answer me. I know, I know," she cried, clasping her +slender hands together. "I will go to my father's country, where, he +used to tell me, all the men are fair and all the women good. There I +shall find my art and you, my Saxon god." + +When the mother heard of the dream and the resolution she was sad +at first, but decided finally to write to the two maiden sisters of +Ernest King, who had idolized their young, handsome brother, and who +answered promptly that they would gladly receive his only daughter. +Hyacinthe took a brave and smiling leave of the _madre_ and Tancredi, +after having gone to look her farewell at the wingless Love and the +sleeping stricken Ariadne. "Ah, dear Cupid," she whispered, "I am +going to-day to find my art and the Saxon whom my soul loveth. +_Addio_, you and Ariadne!" + +From the old into the new, from the tried to the untried, from +inertness to action, from the Greek marbles to Saxon men and women, +from Rome to Britain, from breathing to living. Down the Strand, past +Villiers, Essex, Salisbury, Northumberland and many more streets +whose names tell of vanished splendors, whose dingy lengths are +smoke-blackened, and far enough off from the whole aroma of Belgravia, +is Craven street. The houses are all of a pattern--prim, dingy, +small-windowed habitations, but within this one there must be comfort, +for the fire-flames dance on the meek minute panes and a heavy curl +of smoke is cutting the air above its square, business-like little +chimney-pot. Drawing-room there is none to this mansion, but there is +a pleasant square substitute that the Misses King call "the library" +in the mornings, and "the parlor" after their early, unfashionable +dinner. It is full of old-time furniture, such as connoisseurs are +searching after now--dark polished tables with great claws and little +claws; high presses and cupboards brass bound and with numberless +narrow drawers; spindle-legged chairs, with their worn embroidered +backs and seats; a tall thin bookcase; a haircloth sofa with a griffin +at either end mounting savage guard over an erect pillow; a thick +hearth-rug; and two easy-chairs with cushioned arms and two little old +ladies, the one quaint and frigid--she had once loved and had had a +successful rival; the other quaint and sweet--she had loved too, and +had lost her lover in the depths of the sea. + +The rattle of a cab down the still street, a pull-up, a short, sharp +knock, and in two minutes more Hyacinthe King had been welcomed kindly +by one aunt and tenderly pressed to the heart of the other. A sober +housemaid had taken her wraps, and was even now unpacking her boxes in +the chamber above. She was sitting in Miss Juliet's own armchair, and +had greatly surprised Ponto, the ancient cat, by taking him into her +lap. + +"Will you ring for tea and candles, sister?" asked Miss King +primly.--"We have had tea of course, Hyacinthe, but we will have some +infused for you at once." + +"Perhaps Hyacinthe doesn't like tea," suggested Miss Juliet with her +thin, once-pretty hand on the rope. + +"Not like tea? Absurd! Was not her father an Englishman, I should like +to know? Our niece is not a heathen, Juliet." + +"But, aunt," smiled Hyacinthe, "I do not like tea, after all. You are +both so kind to me," sighed she: "I hope you will not ever regret my +coming to England and to you." + +"It is not likely that our niece--" + +"That Ernest's daughter--" said Miss Juliet softly. + +"Should ever do aught to give us cause to blush--" + +"Save with pride and pleasure," added the younger old lady, laying her +fingers on the girl's soft, dark, abundant hair. + +"I hope not, aunts." Hyacinthe looked at Miss King a bit wistfully as +she spoke. "You know I am not come to be a burden to you--the madre +wrote: I am come to England to pursue my art." + +"My sister-in-law did--" + +"Your dear mother did--" Miss Juliet chimed in gently. + +"Write something of the kind, but, Hyacinthe, ladies do not go out +into the world seeking their fortunes. I believe I have heard"--Miss +King speaks austerely and as from some pinnacle of pride--"that +there are _women_ who write and lecture and paint, and, in short, +do anything that is disgraceful; but you, my dear, are not of that +blood." + +"Yes, aunt, I am. I would do any of those things--must do one of them +or something--to help me find my Saxon god." + +"Your what?" cries Miss King, staring over her spectacles at the +serene, heroic young face. + +"Your what, dear child?" murmurs Miss Juliet protectively, looking +down into her niece's dark, fathomless eyes. + +"Saxon god," says she quite low, for the first time in all her life +experiencing a conscious shyness. + +"Are you a pagan, Hyacinthe King?" shrieks the elder aunt. + +"Tell us all about it, my dear," says Miss Juliet soothingly. + +And Hyacinthe tells them her dream and her resolve. + +"So much for an honest English gentleman wedding with a--" + +"Lovely Greek girl," finishes Miss Juliet quietly, glancing for the +first time at her sister. "They say your mother was very beautiful, +Hyacinthe." + +"Yes the madre is beautiful: she is like the Venus of the Capitol." + +Miss King utters a woeful "Ah!" which her sister endeavors to smother +in some kind inquiry. + +When Hyacinthe has been shown to her room by the sober housemaid, +the two old ladies discuss the situation in full, and Miss Juliet's +gentleness so far prevails over Miss King's frigid despair as to wring +from the latter a tardy promise to let the young niece pursue the +frightful tenor of her way, at least for a time. + +A week after her arrival in London, the girl, having informed herself +with a marvellous quickness of intelligence on various practical +points, calmly laid her plans before her aunts, the elder of whom +listened in frigid silence, the younger with assurances of assistance +and counsel. She then proceeded to put her projects into action with a +curious matter-of-factness that, considering the purely ideal nature +of her aim, is to be accounted for in no other way than by the +recollection of her parentage--the Greek soul and the British brain. + +On a Wednesday morning Hyacinthe and Miss Juliet repaired to the +studio of a great sculptor: the niece had previously written to him +stating her desire, and the aunt, nervous and excited, clung to the +girl's firm arm in a kind of terror. + +"You wish to know if you have a talent for my art?" he asked kindly, +looking into the pallid young face with its earnest uplifted look. "I +think that had you the least gift that way, having lived in Rome, you +would know it without my assistance. However, here is a bit of clay: +we shall soon see. Try what your fingers can make of it--if a cup like +this one." He turned off, but watched her, nevertheless, with fixed +curiosity as she handled the lump of damp earth. + +Hyacinthe could make nothing of it save twist it from one shapeless +mass into another. + +"I had hoped it would be sculpture," she said a bit regretfully as she +left the great man's workroom. "In my dream _he_ was a statue." + +On Thursday the two went to the atelier of a renowned painter. He too +bent curious interested eyes upon the absorbed and searching face of +his strange applicant as he placed pencils, canvas and brushes before +her, and directed her to look for a model to the simple vase that +stood opposite or to the bust of Clyte that was beside her. But +Hyacinthe had no power over these things, and the two turned their +faces back toward the small house in Craven street. + +On Friday they sought out a celebrated musician, but the long, supple +hands--veritable "piano-hands" he noted from the first--availed the +girl in no way here. The maestro said she "might spend years in study, +but the soul was not attuned to it." + +When Saturday came they went to a famous teacher for the voice. But, +alas! Hyacinthe, he said frankly, had "no divine possibilities shrined +in her mellow tones." Perhaps she was a little, just a little, +disheartened on Saturday night. If so, none knew it. + +On Sunday the old ladies took her to St. Martin-le-Grand's church, but +all she said over the early cold dinner was, "Women cannot preach in +the churches. I could not find him there." + +And Miss King said grace after that meat in a loud and aggressive +voice, but Miss Juliet whispered a soft and sweet "Amen." + +On Monday morning Hyacinthe slipped from the house unseen. There was +a vein of subtlety and finesse in her that came to the surface on +occasion: it had been in Haidee Amic and in her ancestors. She +repaired to a _maitre de ballet_, an old man who lived in an old house +in the East End. + +"Can you learn to dance, mademoiselle--learn to dance 'superbly'?" +repeated the danseur after his applicant. "Well, I should say no, most +decidedly--never. You have not a particle of _chic_, coquetry: you +were made for tragedy, mademoiselle, and not for the airy, indefinable +graces of my art. You should devote yourself to the drama." + +Hyacinthe looked up, and the old Italian repeated his assertion, +adding a recommendation to seek an interview with Mr. Arbuthnot, +the proprietor and manager of one of the principal theatres. Before +Hyacinthe returned to the little domicile in Craven street she had +been enrolled as a member of the company of this temple of the +dramatic art. + +Arbuthnot was speculative, and withal lucky: he had never brought out +even a "successful failure," and a something in this odd young woman's +beauty, earnestness, frankness, pleased him. He gave her the "balcony +scene," of course, to read to him; noted her poses, which were +singularly felicitous; knew at once that she was not cast for the +lovesick Veronese maiden; was surprised to discover that she was quite +willing to follow his advice--to begin in small parts and work her way +up if possible. The shrewd London manager foresaw triumphs ahead +when the insignificant "Miss H. Leroy" should pass into the actress +Hyacinthe King. + +"Aunts, I went out by myself," the girl says as she dawdles shyly over +her newly-acquired habit of tea-drinking that evening, "because I +knew--I fancied--that you, Aunt Juliet, would not care to go with me +where I was going." + +"Yes, dear," says Miss Juliet, glad to have the curious child of her +favorite brother back with her in safety. + +"A foolish and an unwarrantable step, Hyacinthe, which I trust--I +trust--you will never repeat." Thus Miss King, adding with severity, +"May I inquire, Hyacinthe, where you went?" + +"To Bozati the ballet-master first." + +"To whom?" Miss King draws forth an old-fashioned salts-bottle, and +Miss Juliet glances nervously at the tea-tray. "To whom? Can it be +possible that my niece, your father's daughter--No, no! my ears +deceive me." + +"He said I never could learn to be anything more than a coryphee, +aunt, and I knew that that would not be accounted an art," she says +quite low. "But I then went to Mr. Arbuthnot. You know him, aunt?" + +"I have heard of such a person," answers Miss King, peering austerely +over her spectacles at Hyacinthe. + +"He has engaged me at a salary of two pounds a week, and he says that +some day I shall be great." Her eyes dilate and look out afar, through +the tiny window-panes, into a limitless and superb future. "I have +found my art; and I am so happy!" + +Miss Juliet's glance intercepts her sister's speech. There is silence +in the quaint, small parlor that night; and for the first time in many +a year the memory of her lost lover's first kiss rests softly on Miss +King's wan, wrinkled cheek: for the first time in many a year she has +remembered the perfection of him and forgotten the perfidy. + +That was October. + +This is June. + +"For thirty-seven consecutive nights the girl has held the public of +this great capital spellbound by the magical power of her art. She +has great beauty--Greek features lighted up by Northern vividness and +intellectuality; but transcendent beauty falls to the lot of very many +actresses, yet it is not to be said of any one of them that they have +what this unheralded, unknown girl possesses--tragic genius such as +thrilled through the Hebrew veins of dead Rachel, and flew from her, a +magnetic current, straight to the hearts and brains of her auditors. +Of such metal is made this new star. She has as yet appeared but in +one _role_, that of Adrienne in Scribe's play, but within the compass +of its five acts she runs the wild and weary gamut from crowned love +to crowned despair. It is a new interpretation, and a remarkable +one--an interpretation that is tinged with the blight of our +inquisitive and mournful age: self-consciousness, that terrible +tormentor in her soul, sits for ever in judgment upon every impulse +of the heart of Adrienne, and makes of pain a stinging poison, and +of pleasure but a poor potentiality. Her death-scene is singular and +awful--awful in its physical adherence to realism, and singular in +that it does not disgust, or even horrify, but leaves a memory of +peace with the listener, who has not failed to catch the last strain +for sight of the divine and dying eyes." So the critic of the London +oracle wrote of Hyacinthe King. + +That night the people had crowned her with a wreath of gold +laurel-leaves, and she was walking to her dressing-room, when, as she +passed the green-room door, a merry laugh made her glance in. There +were fifty people there--actors, journalists, swells and hangers-on +of the playhouse. A little to the right of the group, and talking +and laughing with two or three others, stood a man both young and +handsome. + +Hyacinthe went toward him, and the people, unused to seeing her there +for a long time past, hushed their talk, and one of them marked the +newness of the light that shone in her eyes and the happiness that +smiled on her lips as she came. He was a poet, and he went home and +made verses on her: he had never thought of such a thing before. She +raised the wreath of laurel from her brows and lifted it up to the +golden head of the man whose laugh she had caught. "My Saxon god!" she +murmured, so low that none heard her save him, and then, leaving the +crown on his head, she turned and walked away. She went home to the +shabby house in Craven street, which was still her home, and before +she slept she whispered to Miss Juliet, "I have found him." + +In less than twenty-four hours the scene enacted in the green-room of +the theatre had been reported everywhere--first in the clubs, then +in all the salons--not last in the pretty boudoir of Lady Florence +Ffolliott. + +Every night thereafter Hyacinthe saw her hero sitting in his stall: he +never missed once, but generally came in well on toward the end of the +performance. At the close of a fortnight, as she was making her way to +her room after the curtain had come down for the last time, she met +him face to face: he had planned it so. + +"What would you?" she asked in the odd foreign fashion that clung to +her still, and showed itself when she was taken unawares. + +"They say I need nothing;" and the blue eyes laugh down into hers. +"They say I need nothing now that I have been crowned by a King with +laurel-leaves." But even as he speaks the smile fades from his lips: +he sees no answering flash on hers. + +"That is what you said in the Vatican that night," she says. "Is it +true?" + +He begins to fear that she is losing her mind, but he speaks gently to +her: "Have we met before, then?" + +Hyacinthe, standing between two dusty flies while the mirth of the +farce rings out from the stage, tells her dream, for the third time, +to-night to him. "Is it true that you need nothing?" she asks again, +raising anxious eyes to his. + +For a moment the man wavers. Last night he would have laughed to scorn +the idea of _his_ not being ready with a pretty speech for a beautiful +actress: just now he is puzzled for a reply, and he knows full well +that some strange new jarring hand is sweeping the strings of his +life. "It is true," he sighs, remembering a true heart that loves +him. "I have wealth, position--these things first, for they breed the +rest," he says with a small sneer--"troops of friends and the promised +hand of a woman whom I have asked to marry me." + +"I am sorry," she says at last with a child's sad, unconscious +inflection, "but all the same, I have found you. Cupid said I should." + +He surveys her calculatingly: he is a very keen man of the world, and +he has recovered sufficiently from the peculiarity of the situation to +speculate upon it with true British acumen. Shall he, or shall he not, +put a certain question to her, or leave the matter at rest for ever? +Being a person well used to gratifying himself, he asks his question: +"Supposing that it had not been true, what would you have had to say +to me then?" And, strange to say, his face flushes as he finishes--not +hers. + +"Nothing." The word comes coldly forth without a fellow. He knows then +that she has only looked at Love, and that the thoughtless harmony of +his life is done for him. + +"May I see you sometimes?" he cries as she makes a step onward. + +"When you will," she replies, going farther along the narrow passage, +and then looking back at him clearly. "I have found you: I am very +content. And if you thought I loved you--Well, Love, you know, was a +blind god, and so must ever be content to look at happiness through +another's eyes." + +He went away, and he said to himself, "She does not know what love +means." + +Night after night found him at the theatre, and night after night saw +him seek at least a few moments' talk with her; and always he came +away thinking her a colder woman than any of the statues she was so +fond of speaking about. In her conversation there was no personality; +and although her intellect pleased him, the lack of anything else +annoyed him in equal proportion. And yet he loved the woman whom he +was going to marry. She was a sweet woman--"God never made a sweeter," +he told himself a hundred times a day. He had wooed her and won her, +and wished to make her his wife. + +She _was_ a sweet woman. For weeks now she had heard harsh rumors and +evil things of him that made her heart ache, but she had given no +sign, nor would she have ever done so had not her friends goaded her +to the point. She hears the light footstep coming along the corridor +toward her, and she knows that it comes this morning at her especial +call. She sees the bonny face and feels the light kiss on her cheek. +Heaven forgive her if she inwardly wonder if these lips she loves have +last rested on another woman's face! + +"Roy," she says, stealing up to him and laying one of her lovely round +arms about his neck, "tell me, dear, if you have ceased to love me--if +you would rather--rather break our engagement? Because, dear, better a +parting now, before it is too late, than a lifelong misery afterward." +There are tears in the blue bewitching eyes, and tears in the gentle +voice that he is not slow to feel. + +"Florence"--the young man catches her in his arms--"who has--What do +you mean? I have not ceased to love you." All the fair fascination +that has made her so dear to him in the past rushes over him now to +her rescue. + +"Then, Roy, why, why--Oh, I cannot say it!" Her pretty head, gold like +his own, falls on his shoulder. + +"Look up, love." He is not a coward, whatever else. "You mean to say, +'Why do I, a man professing to love one woman, constantly seek the +society of another?' Do not you?" + +She bows her head, her white lids droop. There is a pause so long that +the ticking of the little clock on the mantel seems a noise in the +stillness. He puts her out of his arms, rises, picks up a newspaper, +throws it down, and says, "God help me! I don't know." Then another +pause; and now the ticking of the little clock is fairly riotous. +"Florence, love," kneeling by her, "bear with me. It's a fascination, +an infatuation--an intellectual disloyalty to you, if you will--but it +is nothing more, and it must die out soon." + +Lady Dering was a charming woman: all her friends agreed upon that +point, and also upon another--that an invitation to visit Stokeham +Park was equivalent to a guarantee for so many days of unalloyed +pleasure. It was a grand old place, not quite three hours from town, +with winding broad avenues and glimpses of sweeping smooth lawns +between the oaks and beeches. And the company which the mistress of +Stokeham had gathered about her this autumn was, if possible, a more +congenial and yet varied one than usual. Having no children of her +own, Lady Dering enjoyed especially the society of young people, and +generally contrived to have a goodly number of them about her--Mildred +and Mabel Masham, Lady Isobel French, Lady Florence Ffolliott, her +cousin the little Viscount Harleigh--who was very far gone in love +with his uncle's daughter, by the by--the Hon. Hugh Leroy Chandoce and +a host of others. + +Her ladyship, telegram in hand, has just knocked at Florence +Ffolliott's door. Florence is a special favorite with the old lady: +she approves thoroughly of her engagement, which was formally +announced at Stokeham last year, and of the man of her choice, who at +the present moment is lighting a cigar and cogitating in a somewhat +ruffled frame of mind over the piece of news he has just been made +acquainted with by his hostess. + +"Florence, my dear," says her ladyship, "I am the most fortunate +woman in the world. I have been longing for a new star in my domestic +firmament, and, behold! it dawns. I expected to have her here some +time, but not so early as this; and the charming creature sends me a +telegram that she arrives by the eleven-o'clock express this morning: +I have just sent to the station for her. I met Roy on my way to you, +and conveyed the intelligence to him, but of course he only looked +immensely bored: these absurd men! they never can take an interest in +but one woman at a time." Lady Florence's quick color came naturally +enough. "Now, my child, guess the name of the new luminary." + +"I'm quite sure I can't," says the girl, her roses paling to their +usual pink. "Tell me, dear Lady Dering: suspense is terrible;" and she +laughs merrily. + +"Hyacinthe King, the great actress, my dear: could anything be more +delicious?" Lady Dering has been absent on the Continent during the +season, and is utterly ignorant of all the _on dits_ of the day. + +"Charming!" murmurs Florence Ffolliott with the interested inflection +of thorough good breeding; but her hands, lying clasped together on +her lap, clasp each other cruelly. + +"Yes," continues her ladyship. "I knew her father in my young +days--Ernest King--the Kings of Essex, you know?" Florence nods +assent. "He was the handsomest fellow imaginable, married a lovely +Greek girl; and here comes his daughter startling the world with her +genius twenty odd years after my little flirtation with him. It makes +one feel old, child--old. I called on her the last day I was in +London, but she was out; so then I wrote and begged her to come to +Stokeham when she could. Now I must leave you, dear. What are you +reading? Poetry, of course. I never read anything else either when I +was your age and was engaged to Sir Harry." The bright, stately lady +laughs gayly as she goes, and Florence Ffolliott sits before her +fire until luncheon-time, turning over a dozen wild fancies in her +brain--fancies that do no honor either to the man she loves or the +woman whom she cannot help disliking heartily. But her just, and +withal generous, soul dismisses them at last, and she bows her head to +the blow and acknowledges it to be what it is--an accident. + +That the advent of Hyacinthe King in their midst should have created +no sensation among the party assembled at Stokeham would scarcely be a +reasonable proposition: it did, and not only the excitement that the +coming of a renowned meteor of the theatrical firmament might be +expected to occasion in a house full of British subjects, but +an undertone of surmise, and some sarcasms, between those--the +majority--who were well enough aware of Roy Chandoce's peculiar +infatuation for the beautiful young player. The pair were watched +keenly, it must be confessed, but with a courtesy and _savoir faire_ +that admitted no betrayal of this absolutely human curiosity--by +none more keenly and more guardedly than by Lady Florence Ffolliott. +Neither she nor they discovered aught in the conduct of either the man +or the woman to find fault with or cavil at. + +Hyacinthe was quickly voted a "man's woman" by the women, and as +quickly pronounced a "thorough enigma" by the men, not one of whom had +succeeded, even after the lapse of fourteen days, in arousing in her +that which is most dear to the masculine soul, a preference--although +it be a mild, a shamming or an evanescent preference--for one of them +above another. Sir Vane Masham set her down over his third dinner's +sherry as "an iceberg," in which kind opinion the little viscount +joined, with the amendment of "polar refrigerator." Young Arthur +French, who was very hard hit indeed, said she was like a "beautiful, +heartless marble statue," but the poet, who had made verses on her, +called her a "white lily with a heart of flame." + +Not one of them all, however, could dispute the perfect quality of her +beauty to-night. In a robe of violet satin, with pale jealous topazes +shining on her neck and arms and in the sleek braids of her dark hair, +Hyacinthe was fit for the regards of emperors had they been there to +see. They were not. In the conservatory at Stokeham, where she stood +amid the tropical trees and flowers and breathing the warm close scent +of rich blossoms foreign to English soil, there was only one man to +look at her, and he was no potentate, but a blond young fellow, with +blue blood in his veins and a sad riot in his heart. + +For the first time since they have been in the house together he has +left his betrothed wife's side and sought hers: in the face of this +little watching world about him he has, at last, quietly risen from +the seat at Florence Ffolliott's side and followed that trail of +sheeny satin into the conservatory. "Not one word for me?" he says in +a low voice that has in it a sort of desperation. + +She turns startled and looks at him: "Who wants me? Who sent you to +fetch me?" + +"No one 'sent' me," he replies bitterly: "I 'want' you. Hyacinthe! +Hyacinthe!" He stretches two arms out toward her, and when he dies +Roy Chandoce remembers the look that leaps then into the eyes of this +girl. + +"Do not touch me!" She shrinks away with the expression of awakened +womanhood on her fair face. "If you do, you will make me mad." For he +has followed and is close to her. + +"No, no, no! Not 'mad'--happy! Ah, Hyacinthe!" His arms are no more +outstretched or empty: they enfold all the beauty and all the +bliss that now and then give mortality fresh faith in heaven. "Ah, +Hyacinthe!" That is all that he says, and she is silent while his +kisses fall upon her mouth and cheeks and brow and hands. + +And when, ten minutes later, he goes back where he came from, he knows +that it is no "intellectual disloyalty" that lured him from his seat: +he knows that the poet was right, and Vane and the viscount and Arthur +all wrong. + +There is to be a meet at Stokeham Park the next morning, and +Hyacinthe, for the first time in her life, witnesses the pretty sight. +Two or three only of the ladies are going to ride to cover, among them +Lady Florence Ffolliott, who looks superbly on her horse and in her +habit, and feels superbly too--in a transient physical fashion--as she +glances down at Hyacinthe, who in her clinging creamy gown, with a +furred cloak thrown about her, stands in the porch to see them off. +She knows nothing of horses or riding, and is therefore debarred from +the exhilarating pleasure, and has also declined Lady Dering's offer +to drive with her to the first cover that is to be drawn. But the +pretty and, to her, novel picture of the various vehicles with their +freight of merry matrons, girls and children, the scarlet coats of the +sportsmen and the servants, the hounds drawn up a good piece off, the +four ladies who are going to ride, and stately, cheery Lady Dering +exchanging cordial and courteous greetings with her friends and +neighbors, while good-hearted Sir Harry gives some last instructions +to his whip, is sufficiently charming. + +"You have eaten no breakfast, Mr. Chandoce," cries the hostess, "and +you are quite as white as Lady Florence's glove there. I insist upon +your taking a glass of something before you are off.--Patrick!" But +before Patrick has even started on my lady's errand Hyacinthe has +fetched from the hall a glass of claret-cup, and holds it up to him +where he sits on his lithe and mettlesome hunter. + +He takes it, drains it to the last drop and hands it back to her. +Their eyes meet, and his lips murmur very softly a Saxon's sweetest +word of endearment--"My darling!" + +"Quarter-past eleven!" calls Sir Harry; and the gay cavalcade moves +off, and Hyacinthe, waving adieu to Lady Dering, watches it fade away +among the windings of the avenue. + +"Mr. Chandoce has a green mount," mutters one of the footmen to +another. + +"Yes, he have, but he's not a green horseman." + +"No," admits the other. + +Hyacinthe remembers their talk later in the day--that day that she +passes in such a restless wandering from one room to another--from the +conservatory to the library, and from music-room to hall. Finally, at +four o'clock she has composed herself with a book in the library, and +before the fire sits half lost in reading, half in wondering. Without, +the early gloom of the short day is gathering, and the bare trees cast +murk shadows all across the frostbitten lawns, and late birds twitter +their good-night notes, and a few sleepy rooks caw coldly to each +other. + +She hears none of this, is as self-absorbed a being as ever lived--one +whose whole solitude is full to overflowing with the thought of +another. But at last there breaks in upon Hyacinthe's still dream a +shriek, and then wild tumult, noises and excited speech, and the girl +springs to her feet, and in a flash is out in the wide hall in the +very midst of it all. + +He lies there quite, quite dead. For ever flown the breath that made +of this beautiful clay a living man. Lady Florence has him halfway in +her arms as she kneels on the floor beside the body of her lover, and +between her sobs cries out to them to "Go for the surgeons!" for whom +long since Sir Harry sent. Hyacinthe put her hands behind her and +leaned heavily against the column that by good chance she found there. +When the crowd parted from him a little she leaned over a bit and +stared: that was all. + +"Do not _you_ touch him!" cried the English maiden, maddened by her +grief, as she glanced up at the fair face. + +"No, I will not: I do not wish to," returns the other softly, +straightening herself; and leaning there in her close gown, she is as +tearless as some caryatid. + +When the surgeons have come on their useless mission, and gone, when +Florence Ffolliott stands weeping and wringing her hands, Hyacinthe +ventures over a pace nearer to the two. + +"You see, Lady Florence," she says very gently, and with that curious +sorrowful look on her face that made it so like to the Ariadne's--"you +see, he was not meant for any woman: he was a Saxon god." + +A year later Lady Florence Ffolliott's engagement to her cousin, the +little lovelorn viscount, was announced. + +Sir Henry Leighton told me last week that he had been called in +consultation with regard to Hyacinthe King, and that there were not +three months of life in her. "She cannot act," said the great medical +man: "she plays her parts, it is true, but the power to portray has +gone out of her. She is going back to Rome for a while, and, I can +assure you, she will never return." + +MARGUERITE F. AYMAR. + + + + +MUSICAL NOTATION. + + +Why is it that the knowledge of music is not more common?--that is, +why is it that there are so few people in this and every other country +who are able to read and write music as they read and write their +mother-tongue? Is it that the musical ear is a rare gift? Evidently +not, for music is composed of a small number of elements, which are +found for the most part in any popular air, and almost every person +can sing one or more of these airs correctly. It is not, then, the +musical ear nor the sense of time which is wanting. Neither is the +cause to be attributed to the fact that few study music; for, although +the teaching of music is by no means so general as it should be, still +it is taught in our schools, public and private, singing-schools are +common even in our small villages, and there is no lack of teachers +both of vocal and instrumental music. And yet out of every hundred +who take up the study of music, it is safe to say that about +ninety abandon it after a short time, discouraged by the almost +insurmountable difficulties presented at every turn. Only those +succeed who are endowed with rare natural aptitude, an indomitable +will, and time--four or five years at least--to devote to an art which +is as yet a luxury to the masses of the people. + +M. Galin, his pupil M. Cheve and other advocates of reform in musical +notation declare that the people are deprived of this grand source of +culture because of the blind, inconsistent and wholly unscientific +nature of the ordinary musical notation. At first this seems +incredible, but one has only to compare this notation with that +elaborated by Emile Cheve after Galin's theory to become convinced +that the statement is true. People are apt to say, "Why, it cannot +be that our system of writing music is so defective: in this age of +improvements and scientific precision gross inconsistencies would have +been eliminated long ago." And so, indeed, they would have been but +for the fact that the very basis of the system is altogether at +fault. How are the Chinese, for example, to "improve" their system of +writing? It is simply impossible. They have some thousands of abstract +characters, hieroglyphs standing for things or thoughts. All these +must be swept away, and in their place must come an alphabet where +each letter stands for an elementary sound. These elementary sounds +are few in number in any language. So of our musical notation. It is +doubtful if it can be materially improved; it must be discarded for a +system of fewer elements and a more clear and precise combination of +them. + +No, it is not strange that we have not adopted a better method of +musical notation before this. Think how long a struggle it required to +abandon the cumbersome Roman notation for the short, clear and +precise Arabic--how many centuries of feeble infancy the science of +mathematics passed before the invention of logarithms rendered the +most tedious calculations rapid and easy. Most people take things as +they seem, giving but little thought to their meanings and relations +to each other; and so an awkward method may be followed a long time +without protest. People are blamed for their devotion to routine, but +devotion to routine is perfectly natural. It is mental inertia, and +corresponds to that property in physics--the inability of a body of +itself to start when at rest, or stop or change its course when in +motion. And then the general distrust of new things--"new-fangled +notions," as contempt terms them--retards the examination and adoption +of improved and labor-saving methods. + +It is more than fifty years since Pierre Galin, professor of +mathematics in the institute for deaf mutes at Bordeaux, published his +_Exposition d'une nouvelle Methode pour l'Enseignement de la Musique_, +and more than thirty since his distinguished disciple, Emile Cheve, +demonstrated practically, in the military gymnasium at Lyons, +the immeasurable superiority of that method; and yet such is the +repugnance of teachers of music to any change in their routine that +they have paid little or no attention to the work of Galin and his +followers. The _Methode elementaire de la Musique vocale_, by M. and +Mme. Emile Cheve, has never been translated into English. It was +published in Paris by the authors in 1851--a work of over five hundred +pages in royal octavo, and a most clear and exhaustive exposition of +the method which they followed with such success. + +In proof of the superiority of that method, an account of M. Cheve's +test-experiment at the military gymnasium at Lyons in 1843 will be +interesting. The gymnasium was at that time under the direction of two +officers of the French army, Captain d'Argy and Lieutenant Grenier. +The facts are taken from their official report of the experiment. + +By order of Lieutenant-General Lascours the soldiers of the gymnasium +were placed at the disposition of M. Cheve, that he might make a trial +of his method. General Lascours further ordered that the officers in +charge of the gymnasium should be present at every lesson, and report +carefully the progress of the pupils and the final results of the +course. + +The members of the class were taken at large from the twelfth, +sixteenth and twenty-ninth regiments of the line, fifty from each. +M. Cheve accepted all as they came, and agreed formally to bring +eight-tenths of the class of one hundred and fifty in one year to the +following results: (1) To understand the theory of music analytically; +(2) To sing alone and without any instrument any piece of music within +the compass of ordinary voices; (3) To write improvised airs from +dictation. + +"Candor compels us to admit," says the report, "that nearly all of the +soldiers showed the greatest repugnance to attending the course, and +did so only because they were ordered to do so. Several months elapsed +before this bad spirit could be conquered, and before the majority +of them could be brought to practise the vocal exercises. Some even +refused to try to sing, on the ground that they were old, that they +had no voice, that they could not read, etc." + +The first lesson took place October 1, 1842. There were five a week, +of an hour and a half each. At the end of the month the professor +wished to classify the voices, and required each pupil to sing alone. +The experiment was rather discouraging. _More than two-thirds were +unable to sing the scale_: twelve refused to utter a sound, and +declared that nothing would induce them to try. These twelve were +immediately dismissed. The rest remained, though some confessed that +they had not sung a note since the beginning of the course. These, +however, now promised to practise all the exercises in future. Under +these unfavorable circumstances the professor engaged anew to fulfil +his contract, on condition that the pupils would submit to practise +the exercises conscientiously and attend regularly. From this time, +with the exception of three or four rebellious spirits, none were +rejected. + +The month of October was not very profitable to the pupils, on account +of continual absences necessitated by military reviews. April and May +of the following year (1843) also brought many interruptions through +the various demands of the service. Sickness, promotions, punishments, +mutations, and the disbanding of the class of 1836, which took away +several under-officers, gradually reduced the class, so that in July +only a little over fifty were left. This falling off greatly troubled +Professor Cheve, especially when the army at Lyons went into camp and +left him with only twenty-eight pupils. This reduction of the class +could not have been foreseen or prevented. M. Cheve could not be held +responsible for the fulfilment of his promise, except to eight-tenths +of those that remained. + +Two months after the opening of the course M. Cheve printed at his own +expense a collection of one hundred and forty pieces of music from the +best composers, and gave a copy to each of his pupils, that they might +read from the printed page instead of the blackboard. Three months +after the opening of the course General Lascours visited the gymnasium +and was present during one of the lessons. He was struck, as were all +the visitors on that occasion, by the progress obtained. The pupils +were already far advanced in intonation and in time: they read easily +in all the keys, and sung pieces together with great spirit and +correctness. + +On April 25, 1843, the general returned, accompanied by Madame +Lascours and all the officers of his staff. The following was the +programme of the occasion: (1) A quartette from Webbe; (2) A Languedoc +air in three parts, from Desrues; (3) A trio from the opera of +_[OE]dipus in Colonna_, by Sacchini; (4) Singing at sight intervals of +all kinds, major and minor; (5) Singing at sight in eight different +keys; (6) Two rounds in three voices from Siller; (7) A quartette from +the _Clemenza di Tito_ of Mozart; (8) A quartette from the _Iphigenia_ +of Gluck; (9) A trio from the _Corysander_, or the _Magic Rose_ of +Berton; (10) Exercise upon the tonic in all the keys, major and minor; +(11) Exercise in naming notes vocalized; (12) Singing at sight a trio +from the _Magic Flute_ of Mozart; (13) _Ave Regina_, by Choron--three +voices; (14) The _Gondolier_, a round in three parts, by Desrues; (15) +A quartette from the _Magic Flute_; (16) Chorus from the _Tancredi_ of +Rossini; (17) The "Prayer" from _Joseph_, by Mehul. + +This is certainly a remarkable programme to be filled by illiterate +soldiers with only six months' training. "It would be difficult," says +the official report, "to paint the astonishment of the spectators +upon this occasion. The confidence and readiness with which +these soldier-students of music sang at sight the most difficult +intonations, major and minor, the facility with which they read in all +the keys, and, finally, the certainty and spontaneity with which +they _all, without exception_, recognized and named various sounds +vocalized, showed clearly that they possessed a very superior +knowledge of intonation. All the pieces which they sung were rendered +with irreproachable correctness, though the professor did not beat the +time, except through the first bar to indicate the movement. + +"With the consent of General Lascours, all the teachers and professors +in the city, including the members of the Royal College, were on one +occasion admitted to a private rehearsal of M. Cheve's class. The +result was the same--admiration and astonishment. The professor +received on all sides well-merited praise for a success gained in so +short a time and with such unfavorable conditions. + +"These soldiers have at this moment (September 1, 1843) reached a +degree of power in intonation and in reading music at sight which is +fairly wonderful. They can sing together at sight any new piece in +three or four parts, the music being written, after the new method, in +figures. If the piece be written in the ordinary musical character, +no matter what the key, they can also sing it at sight together after +they have together sung each part by itself. All the members of the +class understand thoroughly the theory of music, and are able to write +from dictation a vocalized air never heard before, no matter what the +modulations may be. + +"Such are the results obtained by Professor Cheve from a mass of men +taken at hazard and against their will. The experiment to-day has had +eleven months of duration, seventeen or eighteen lessons being given +every month. The pupils have never studied at all between the lessons, +and those who remain at the present time have lost many lessons from +punishments, illness, leave of absence, etc. + +"As to the method pursued by M. Cheve, it is as follows: In theory he +demonstrates _de facto_ the inequality of major and minor seconds, and +from this he deduces the theory of the gamut. Here he follows in the +footsteps of his master, Galin. The theory of time he takes from +the same source. In practice, he employs the Arabic figures for the +musical notes, as proposed by J. J. Rousseau and modified by Galin, +using a series of exercises created by Madame Cheve. To these +exercises especially does M. Cheve owe his ability to make his pupils +masters of intonation in an incredibly short time. He teaches time by +itself, using a language of durations invented by the father of Madame +Cheve, M. Aime Paris, and tables of exercises in time made by Madame +Cheve. Transposition is also taught separately, and never does M. +Cheve require his pupils to execute two things simultaneously until +they understand perfectly how to do them separately. + +"In this way M. Cheve leads his pupils through every step of the +theory of music until they are able to read _in the ordinary notation_ +every kind of music, and to execute during any piece all the possible +changes of mode or key." + +The report--which is duly signed by the officers having charge of the +gymnasium--ends with the expression of their "profound conviction that +the method of teaching music employed by Professor Cheve is faultless, +if it may be judged by its practical results." + +There is a very common impression, in this country at least, that the +best new method of writing music has been tried and abandoned, weighed +in the balance and found wanting. This is far from the fact. It is +doubtful if there is one person in a hundred in this country who ever +heard even the name of Galin or Cheve. Some twenty years ago there was +a little interest excited in a new method of musical notation. A class +was formed in Lowell, Massachusetts, and a "singing-book" was used +there with the notes written with numerals on the staff instead of the +usual characters. But it could not have been the Cheve method that +the Lowell professor used, for he employed no new system of teaching +time--a prime characteristic of that method. + +Those who examine the subject fairly will be compelled to take the +position held by Galin, Cheve and their school, that a new method of +writing music is imperatively needed, because that now in use lacks +the essential elements of a scientific system: it is neither simple, +clear nor concise. There are certain elementary principles which must +be observed in the exposition of any science, and especially in that +of music, which is addressed to all classes of intelligence. Among +these principles are the following, as stated by M. Cheve: _1st_. +Every idea should be presented to the mind by a clear and precise +symbol. _2d_. The same idea should always be presented by the same +sign: the same sign should always represent the same idea. _3d_. +Elementary textbooks or methods should never present two difficulties +to the mind at the same time; and such textbooks or methods should be +an assemblage of means adapted to aid ordinary intelligences to gain +the object proposed. _4th_. The memory should never be drawn upon +except where reasoning is impossible. + +Let us test the exposition of the ordinary musical notation, and also +that of the school of Galin, by these principles and compare the +results. + +_First_. Is every idea presented by a clear and precise symbol? + +In the ordinary method, certainly not. The musical sounds or notes are +represented by elliptical curves with or without stems; by spots +or dots with plain stems, or with stems having from one to four +appendages, or with these appendages united, forming bars across the +stems. These curves and dots are placed on the five parallel lines of +a staff, as it is called, or between the lines of this staff, or on or +between added or "ledger" lines above and below the staff. Certainly, +these cannot be called precise symbols, especially when we reflect +that _any one of them placed upon any given line or space may +represent successively do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, si_, or the flats or +sharps of these notes. The notes, indeed, have no names, being all +alike for the various notes; but names are given to the lines and +spaces of the staff; and, alas! the names of these lines and spaces +change continually with the change of key or pitch. For example: if +we commence a scale with C, our _do_ will be on the first added line +below the staff, and its octave, _do_, on the third space counting +from the lowest. If we commence a scale with G, our _do_ will be on +the second line from the bottom, and the octave on the first space +above the staff; and so on for all the other scales except those which +commence a semitone below or above. For example: the scales of the key +of G and of G flat would be placed exactly the same upon the staff, +though the signature of G would be one sharp upon the staff at the +beginning, and that of G flat would be six flats. The same may be said +of the keys of D and D flat, F and F sharp, etc. + +Again: the scales of the keys of G flat and of F sharp are the +same--are played on precisely the same keys of the organ or piano--yet +they are placed on different lines and spaces of the staff, and the +signature of the first is six flats, and of the second six sharps. + +Think of the disheartened state of the victim of this notation when +he has learned to read comfortably in one key, and then, taking up a +piece of music written in another key, finds that he has all the lines +and spaces to relearn! The wonder is that he does not lose his wits +altogether. + +Compare this maze of notes and lines and spaces, for ever changing +like a will-o'-the wisp, with the following: + + Low Octave. Middle Octave. High Octave. + + =.......= + =1234567= =1234567= =1234567= + =.......= + +Here everything is as clear as day. Take any note--as =5=, for +example. This is _sol_--always _sol_, and never by any chance anything +else. If it has a dot under, it is _sol_ of the octave below the +middle; if it has no dot, it belongs to the middle octave; and if it +has a dot above, it belongs to the octave above the middle. These +three octaves are amply sufficient for all the purposes of vocal +music, which alone is considered here. For instrumental music, where +many octaves are used, the system is modified without losing its +simplicity and conciseness. To represent the flats, Galin crosses the +numerals with a line like the grave accent, and marks the sharps by a +line like the acute accent. For example, =\1\2\3\4\5\6\7=[*] represent +_do_ flat, _re_ flat, _mi_ flat, etc.: =/1 /2 /3 /4 /5 /6 /7=[*] +represent _do_ sharp, _re_ sharp, _mi_ sharp, etc. + +[*: the slash goes _through_ the number (transcriber)] + +A score of music in the new style of notation has no signature--that +is, no flats or sharps at the beginning. Above the line of numerals is +written simply "Key of G," "Key of A flat," etc. The pitch, of course, +must be taken from the tuning-fork or a musical instrument, as it is +in all cases. + +_Second_. The same idea should always be presented by the same sign: +the same sign should always represent the same idea. + +It has already been shown how this principle is disregarded; but take, +for further illustration, the symbols indicating silence. There are +seven different kinds of rests, and there is no need of more than one. +These signs are: + +[Illustration of music rest symbols] + +Again: these rests may be followed by one or two dots, which increase +their duration. For example: an eighth-note rest dotted equals an +eighth note and a sixteenth; and followed by two dots it equals an +eighth, a sixteenth and a thirty-second note in time. That is, the +first dot prolongs the rest one-half or a sixteenth, and the second +dot prolongs the value of the first dot one-half or a thirty-second. + +To a disciple of Galin it is really amazing that such a bungling, +unscientific way of expressing silence should have been tolerated +so long. Compare these "pot-hooks and trammels," dotted and +double-dotted, with Galin's symbol of silence, the cipher (0)! This +is all, and yet it expresses every length of rest, as will be shown +presently. + +Let us now examine the symbols representing the prolongation of a +sound. There are three ways by the common notation, where there should +be but one. First, by the form of the note itself, as-- + +[Illustration of musical note symbols] + +Second, by one or more dots after a note, the first dot prolonging the +note one-half, and the second dot prolonging the first in the same +ratio. Third, by the repetition of the note with a vinculum or tie, +the second note not being sung or played. Galin uses simply a dot. It +may be repeated, as a rest or a note may, but then _its value is not +changed_, any more than in the case of notes or rests repeated. For +example: + + KEY OF E. + + 1|3556|5.31|[7.]143|3.21| + +Here are the first measures of a well-known hymn in common time, +four beats to the measure. As all isolated signs, whether notes, +prolongations or rests, fill a unit of time, or beat, it follows that +the dots following _sol_ and _mi_ prolong these through an entire +beat, for the dots are isolated signs. Whatever the time, _each unit +of it appears separate and distinct to the eye at a glance_; and all +the notes, rests or prolongations that fill a beat are always united +in a special way. This will be more fully shown hereafter. + +_Third_. Elementary textbooks or methods should never present two +difficulties to the mind at the same time; and such textbooks or +methods should be an assemblage of means adapted to aid ordinary +intelligences to gain the object proposed. + +The first thing that the student of music encounters is a staff of +five lines, armed with flats or sharps, the signature of the key, or +with no signature, which shows that the music upon it is in the key +of C. On this staff he sees notes which are of different pitch, and +probably of different length. In any case, there are at least three +difficulties presented in a breath--to find the name of the note, +give it its proper sound, and then its proper length; and these +difficulties are still greater because the ideas, as we have seen, are +hidden under defective symbols. + +Take all the teachers of vocal music, says M. Cheve, place them upon +their honor, and let them answer the following question: "How many +readers of music can you guarantee by your method, out of a hundred +pupils taken at random and entirely ignorant of music, by one hour +of study a day during one year?" The reply, he thinks, will be: "Not +many." And if you tell them that by another method you will agree in +the same time to teach eighty in a hundred to read music currently, +and also to write music, new to them, dictated by an instrument placed +out of sight or from the voice "vocalizing," they will all declare +that the thing is impossible. + +The great composers and renowned performers are cited as examples of +what the ordinary methods have accomplished. No, replies Cheve: they +are exceptional organizations. The methods have not produced them. +They have, on the contrary, arrived at their proficiency despite +the methods, while thousands fail who might reach a high degree of +excellence but for the obstacles presented by a false system to a +clear understanding of the theory of music, which in itself is so +simple and precise. In the study of harmony especially, says the same +authority, does the want of a clear presentation of the theory produce +the most deplorable results. It has made the science of harmony +wellnigh unintelligible even to those called musicians. Ask them why +flats and sharps are introduced into the scales; why there is one +sharp in the key of G major and five in B major; why you spoil the +minor scale by making it one thing in ascending and another in +descending--that is, by robbing it of its modal superior in ascending +and of its sensible in descending. They will in most cases be unable +to answer, for neither teachers nor textbooks explain. The catechisms +found in most of the elementary works upon music are replete with +stumbling-blocks to the young musician. Mr. R. H. Palmer, author of +_Elements of Musical Composition, Rudimental Class-Teaching_ and +several other works, says in one of his catechisms that "there are +two ways of representing each intermediate tone. If its tendency is +upward, it is represented upon the lower of two degrees, and is called +sharp; if its tendency is downward, it is represented upon the higher +of two degrees, and is called flat. There are exceptions to this, as +to all rules." This is deplorable. Music is a mathematical science, +and in mathematics there is no such thing as an exception to a rule. +But to quote further from the same catechism: "A natural is used to +cancel the effect of a previous sharp or flat. If the tendency from +the restored tone is upward, the natural has the capacity of a sharp; +if downward, the capacity of a flat. A tone is said to resolve when +it is followed by a tone to which it naturally tends." How long would +novices in the science of music rack their brains before they would +comprehend what the teacher meant by a tone tending somewhere +"naturally," or by the tendency of a restored tone being destroyed by +the "capacity of a flat"? The same writer, speaking of the scale of +G flat, says it is a "remarkable feature of this scale that it is +produced upon the organ and piano by pressing the same keys which +are required to produce the scale of F sharp." This is precisely +equivalent to saying that it is a remarkable feature that the notes C, +D, E, F are produced by pressing the same keys which are required to +produce _do_, _re_, _mi_, _fa_. + +One more citation from the same author. Speaking of the formation of +scales, he says: "Thus we have another perfectly natural scale by +making use of two sharps." This vicious use of the term "natural" is +deplorable, because it is apt to give the pupil the notion that some +scales are more natural than others. A certain note is called "C +natural," and it is not uncommon for learners to suppose that it is +easier or more natural to sing in that key, as it is easier on the +piano to play anything in it because only the white keys are used, +while in any other at least one black key is required. Indeed, a pupil +may study music a long time before he finds out that there is no +difference between flats and sharps, as such, and other notes--that +all notes are flats and sharps of the notes a semitone above and +below. Seeing the staff of a piece of music armed with half a dozen +sharps or flats, the first thought of the pupil is that it will be +rather hard to sing. And many really suppose that flats and sharps +in themselves are different from other notes--a little "flatter" or +"sharper" in sound perhaps--and secretly wonder why their ear cannot +detect it. Of course it may be said that there is no necessity for +pupils to have such absurd notions, but it is inevitable where the +theory of music is made so difficult for the beginner. No doubt the +ambitious and naturally studious will delve and dig among the rubbish +of imperfect textbooks, analyzing and comparing the explanations +of different teachers, until order takes the place of chaos; but +textbooks should be adapted to ordinary capacities, and thereby they +will better serve the needs of the most brilliant. + +_Fourth._ The memory should never be drawn upon except where reasoning +is impossible. + +In science you have general laws, and from these deduce particular +facts depending upon them, but collections of facts and phenomena +without connection you must learn by heart. The extensive and involved +nomenclature of music, added to the complicated and inconsistent +system of notation, is a continual and exhausting strain upon the +memory. Teachers commence their drill in vocalization, as a rule, with +the scale of the key of C, and the pupils, fired with a noble ambition +to become musicians, make a strenuous effort to remember where _do_, +_re_, _mi_ and the other notes are placed on the lines and spaces of +the staff. Presently the "key is changed," and with that change comes +chaos. All the notes are now on a different series of lines and +spaces. The confusion continues until the series of seven notes is +exhausted. Then come scales with new names, commencing upon different +notes (flats and sharps), but with places on the staff identically the +same as others having different names! + +Long before this point is reached by the pupil his courage flags, +his ambition cools, and in the greater number of cases dies out +altogether. To be sure, if he has the rare courage to persist he will +come to recognize the notes of any key, not by the number of lines +or spaces intervening between them and some landmark, but by their +relative distances from each other measured by the eye. But this +requires long practice. At first he must remember if he can, and when +he cannot he must count up to his unknown note from some remembered +one. It is, at best, a labor of Sisyphus. With many people--bright and +intelligent people, too--it requires years of practice to read new +music at sight even tolerably readily; for it is not simply a question +of learning the notes, difficult as that may be: there is a further +difficulty, and to many even a greater difficulty--that of the +measure. Not the number of beats in a measure or bar and their proper +accentuation--this is but the alphabet of time--but to group correctly +and rapidly the fractional notes, rests and prolongations in their +proper place in time. In very rapid music this becomes an herculean +task, requiring long-continued and arduous practice. It is not simply +a question of nice appreciation of rhythm, but of mathematical +calculation, to know instantly and unhesitatingly, for example, that +one-sixteenth, one half of one-sixteenth and one thirty-second added +together equal one-eighth--that is, one-third of the unit of time or +beat in six-eighths time. + +Any one can see that such mental feats, ever varying as they are in +music, and demanding instant solution at the same time the attention +is given to the intonation, style, etc., must require an exceptional +temperament and natural capacity. The fact is, it is beyond the power +of most musicians. They must practise their instrumental and vocal +music, and learn it nearly "by heart," before they attempt to perform +it for others. + +The writer of this has attended a class taught by one of Cheve's +pupils, and can testify to the efficiency of the method, though the +lessons were a very modest attempt to exemplify the perfection of +the system. The lessons of M. and Mme. Cheve were divided into three +parts: first, a drill in the principles of the theory of music; +second, singing scales and exercises; third, drills in "reading time," +beating time, analyzing time, etc., ending with some diverting "round" +or "catch" or some exercise in vocal harmonies. On their method of +teaching time, more than on any other part of their system perhaps, +did the grand success of the Cheves depend. Rhythm was always taught +separately from intonation, it being contrary to their principle to +present two difficulties together before each had been mastered alone. + +The first grand law of Galin's system is that _every isolated symbol +represents a unit of time_ or beat, whatever the measure. For example: + + 5, unit of sound articulated. + ., unit of sound prolonged. + 0, unit of silence. + +The second law is that _the various divisions of the unit of time are +always united in a group under a principal bar, and such a bar always +contains the unit of time--never more, never less_. To illustrate: + + H | __ T | ___ + A | 55 H | 555 + L | __ I | ___ + V | .. R | ... + E | __ D | ___ + S | 00 S | 000 + . | . | + +Here the units of time--the numeral, the dot and the cipher--are +divided first into two equal parts, and then into three. In both cases +the groups represent units of time--one beat of a measure--according +to the rule. It will be noticed that the form of the notes is the +same whether whole or divided into fractions; that is, there are no +different forms for "crotchets," "quavers," "semiquavers," etc., the +expression of time being better provided for. Thus, halves or thirds +are indicated to the eye by a single bar surmounting two signs for +halves, three for thirds. If the halves or thirds have in their turn +been divided by _two_, then the principal bar covers two little groups +of _two_ signs each; if the halves or thirds have been divided by +_three_, then each principal bar covers two or three little groups of +_three_ signs each. + +Nothing could be more simple than this. The eye has always before +it, separate and distinct, the unit of time or beat; and the mind +apprehends instantly the number of articulated sounds, prolongations +or silences (rests) that must be sung or played during that beat. +The eye has no hesitation, the mind no calculation, as to what note +commences or ends a beat. Even the most modest student of music will +see the immense advantage of this. Nor is there any need for the +multiplicity of fractions to express different kinds of time. The +moment the eye rests upon the score the student knows the measure as +definitely and certainly as he knows the letters of the alphabet. + +"And is this all there is in this system of notation?" some one will +ask. Practically, Yes. There are the symbols of intonation, the +numerals and the dot--the dot below or above the notes showing the +octave ([5.] [.5]); the two diagonal lines indicating flats or sharps +(\3 /3); the horizontal bar indicating the time (123 123[*]); and the +vertical line or bar dividing the measures (123 | 432 |). + + ___ ___ +[*: 123 123] + +The following is the air "God Save the Queen!" or, as we call it, +"America," written in this method. The lower line, of course, is the +alto: + + KEY OF G. + + _____ ____ + 1 1 2 | 7 . 1 2 | 3 3 4 | 3 . 2 1 | 2 1 7 | + [5.] [5.] [6.] | [5.] . [6.] [7.] | 1 1 1 | 1 [7.] 1 | [6.] [5.] [5.] | + + ___ ___ + 1 . 0 | 5 5 5 | 5 . 4 3 | 4 4 4 | 4 . 3 2 | + 5 . 0 | 3 3 3 | 3 . 2 1 |[7.] [7.] [7.] | 2 . 1 [7.] | + + ______ ______ ___ ___ + 3 4 3 2 1 | 3 . 4 5 | 6 4 3 2 | 1 . . || + 1 [6.] [5.] [4.] [3.] | 1 . 1 1 | 1 1 [7.] | 5 . . || + +It will be noticed that the dot in the second measure which prolongs +the note _si_ (7) is not placed against it, as we are accustomed to +see it. It is carried forward into the second beat, where it belongs. +There it is grouped with the note _do_ (1), and occupies one half of +that unit of time; for all the signs grouped under a line or under the +same number of lines are equal in time to each other, the same as +all isolated signs are. In the sixth measure the dot is isolated; +therefore it fills the whole beat, while the following beat is +represented by a rest (0). In two of the measures there are groups of +two notes. Each of the notes in these groups of course equals in time +half of an isolated note, for each occupies half the time of one beat. + +The French say _dechiffrer la musique_--to puzzle it out, to decipher +it, as one would say of hieroglyphs on an Egyptian sarcophagus. The +term is well chosen. The causes of the obscurity of musical notation +are numerous, but the most prolific is undoubtedly expressing time by +the form of the symbols of sound. In slow movements, and where only +few modulations occur, this does not seem to be a serious +objection; but in the rapid movements of compound time it becomes +insupportable--at least after one has learned that there is a better +way. An example in 6/8 time--six eighth-notes to the measure--will +illustrate this: + +[Illustration of 6/8 notes score] + +Here each triplet fills the time of one-third of a beat; that is, +three-sixteenths equal one-eighth, according to the sublime precision +of the old notation! But then no such thing as a twenty-fourth note +is in use: three twenty-fourths would just do it! This is a part of a +vocal exercise. The learner would have to divide each beat into three +parts each, unless very familiar with such exercises; and one of these +divisions would fall on a rest, another in a prolongation, another in +the middle of an eighth note. In the new method see how the crooked +places are straightened: + + --------------- --------------- + ----- ----- ----- ----- + 1 0 2 3 4 3 2 1 . 2 3 . 4 5 + +It "sings itself" the moment you look at it, after a little study +of this rational notation. Note also that there is no mathematical +absurdity here: the division is logical, and yet the air is perfectly +expressed in every particular. + +The mastery of time in music is at best an arduous task, yet teachers +of music, as a rule, expect their pupils to learn it incidentally +while studying intonation. They give no special drill in pure time at +every lesson; and the result is that army of mediocre singers and +players who never become able to execute any but the very simplest +music at sight. They may know the theory of time, may be able to +explain to you clearly the divisions of every measure, but this is not +sufficient for the musician: he must decipher his measures with great +readiness, precision and rapidity, or he never rises above the +mediocre. The ambition to excel without hard labor is the bane of +students of the piano especially. It leads them to muddle over music +too difficult for them; finally, to learn it after a fashion, so that +they may be able to "rattle and bang" through it to the delight of +fond relatives and the amazement and pity of severe culture. Not that +we should have consideration for all that passes for severe culture +and exquisite sensitiveness among musical dilettanti. In no field of +art is there so much affectation, assumption and charlatanry as in +music. Some years ago a musician in New York of considerable +reputation refused to play on a friend's piano because, as he said, it +was a little out of tune and his ear was excruciated by the slightest +discord. The lady wondered that the instrument should be out of tune, +as it was new and of a celebrated manufacturer. She sent to the +establishment where it was made, however, and a tuner promptly +appeared. He tried the A string with his tuning-fork, ran his fingers +over the keyboard, declared the piano in perfect tune, and left. That +evening the musician called, and was informed that a tuner had "been +exercising his skill" upon the instrument. Thereupon he graciously +condescended to play for his hostess, and the sensitiveness of his ear +was no longer shocked. She never dared to undeceive him, but mentioned +the fact to another musician, a violinist, who exclaimed, greatly +amused, "The idea of a pianist pretending to be fastidious about +concord in music! Why, the instrument at its best is a bundle of +discords." Both of these musicians were guilty of affectation; for, +although the piano's chords are slightly dissonant, the intervals of +the chromatic scale are made the same by the violin-player as by the +pianist. What right, then, has the former to complain? To be sure, the +violinist _can_ make his intervals absolutely correct: he _can_ play +the enharmonic scale, which one using any of the instruments with +fixed notes cannot do. But does he, practically? Does he not also make +the same note for C sharp and D flat? The violinist mentioned of +course alluded to the process called _equal temperament_, by which +piano-makers, to avoid an impracticable extent of keyboard, divide the +scale into eleven notes at equal intervals, each one being the twelfth +root of 2, or 1.05946. This destroys the distinction between the +semitones, and C sharp and D flat become the same note. Scientists +show us that they are different notes, easily distinguished by the +ear. Representing the vibrations for C as 1, we shall have-- + + C C# Db D D# Eb E, etc. + 1 25/24 27/24 8/9 75/64 6/5 5/4, etc. + +each note being increased by one twenty-fourth of itself, or in +absolute vibrations-- + + C C# Db D D# Eb E, etc. + 261 271 271 293 305 303 326, etc. + +This is the enharmonic scale, having twenty-one notes. The chromatic +has eleven, and the name--it may be remarked in passing--is from the +Greek word for "color" ([Greek: chroma]) because the old composers +wrote these notes in colors, and had them so printed. Not a bad idea, +surely: many a learner on the piano would be overjoyed to see all the +ugly flats and sharps on the staff in brilliant holiday dress. + +There is no reason at this day, when science in all fields is making +such progress, why the ordinary music-teacher should have so limited a +knowledge of his subject. He should be able to explain the fundamental +principles of the different scales upon the theory of vibration, and +to so educate the apprehension of his pupils that they will not be +content with the imperfect catechisms of the music-books in vogue. And +with the adoption of a rational system of writing music, which will +reduce the time and labor of learning it to one half, there will be +time for the niceties of a science of such vast importance to the +culture--and, indirectly, to the moral progress--of the world. + +MARIE HOWLAND. + + + + +SAMBO: A MAN AND A BROTHER. + + +"But," I said eagerly, "you do not deny that slavery was a curse to +the country--to Southerners most of all?" + +"My dear fellow," said Captain S----, knocking off the ashes from his +cigar, "don't go into that! We were talking about negroes, not about +slavery. I suppose," he added meditatively, "there are not many men in +the country who have faced more of the negro race than those of us +who spent some part of our term of service in the Freedmen's Bureau. +Imagine settling disputes from morning till night between negroes +and between negroes and whites! If you abolitionists--as you called +yourselves before the emancipation--want to have some of the romance +and sentiment of negroism dissolved, live amongst them for a time." + +"You were in Virginia?" I said. + +"Yes, but the negroes there are a better class than in the States +farther South and more remote from cities." + +"How better?" + +"Well, more intelligent. To see the deepest ignorance you have to +go to the cotton-plantations, miles in extent, where men, women and +children have been born and have died as cotton-pickers. Of course I +am not now speaking of the freedmen as they are, for it is ten years +since I was on duty in G----, Mississippi, where all the horrors of +freedom were first revealed to the poor creatures." + +"'_Horrors_ of freedom!'" I repeated. + +"It meant starvation to many, and intense suffering to others. Turn +out a nursery of children of five years old to care for themselves, +and they will fare better than many of the grown men and women of whom +I knew in my Southern experiences." + +"You relieved G---- of the --th regiment?" I said. + +"Yes, and I often think of our meeting at the depot. He had about two +minutes before taking the train to Vicksburg. 'Cap,' he said, 'go to +Sim's to board. Real Southern hospitality, and his wife's a mother if +you are sick--bound to have bilious fever, you know. And, Cap, those +confounded niggers think the Bureau is bound to back them up, right or +wrong, and in about ninety-nine cases out of a hundred they're wrong. +Clerk's got the reports and papers.'" + +"Well?" I said. + +"He was right. The way those planters allowed the negroes to impose +upon their good-nature and true generosity confounded me. I went to +relieve an oppressed race, and, by Jove! I was inclined to consider +the planters in that light." + +"But I don't understand." + +"I'll show you. When the planters found they could still have the +practised slave-labor in the cotton-fields by paying fair wages, they +made contracts with the negroes by the year. It was my fortune to be +the referee on all disputes on the accounts of the first year of such +contracts, and I solemnly declare the liberality and consideration of +the planters would astonish the hard-fisted business-men of some of +our factories. They knew the improvidence of the race, and out of +regard for them, instead of paying them in money, they allowed them to +obtain goods in their names at the leading stores. Almost invariably +these bills exceeded the amount stipulated for in the contract, but I +never knew one case where the employer made the negroes work out their +debt. When I would tell them how the accounts came out, they said: +'Well, captain, let it go: I'll pay the bills. These poor fellows do +not understand the use of money yet.' + +"But the negroes had the laws of possession, the rights of freedom and +privileges of slavery in such a hopeless muddle that no Gordian knot +ever required more patience than an effort to enlighten them as to +their rights and wrongs. The only limit set to their credit at +the stores was that the purchases were to be confined to food and +clothing. Without any idea of money or economy, they were wasteful, +and heard with long faces that the pile of money they confidently +expected was awaiting them had already been spent. Conversations like +the following occurred many times a day: + +"'No money, Mars' Cap'n? Why, ole mars' he done 'greed to gib me fou' +hund'ed dollars dis year, an' I done worked faithful, Mars' Cap'n; an' +now I ain't to have nuffin'!' + +"'But you have had nearly five hundred dollars.' + +"'Clare to Goodness, Mars' Cap'n, I ain't had one cent--not one cent.' + +"'But you have had it in meal, bacon, calico and other goods at the +store.' + +"'But dey allers gives a nigga his food and clothes, Mars' +Cap'n--_allers_. We ain't got to pay for dat ar, for sure?' + +"'Yes. Now you can earn your own money you must pay for your own +food.' + +"'But dey nebber does--nebber! And dar's only de ole 'ooman an' two +picaninnies. Dey's nebber ate fou' hund'ed dollars up in a year.' + +"'But you have had a suit of clothes, and there is calico charged to +you.' + +"'But we ain't got to pay for clothes? Dey allers 'lows a nigga two +suits a year--_allers_? + +"And much argument failed to convince the poor fellows that food and +clothing were no longer to be had for nothing, the usual end of the +discussion being, often with great tears rolling down the black faces, +'An' I was promised fou' hund'ed dollars! Ole mars' done promised dat +ar, an' I've jes' worked dis whole year for nuffin'.' + +"Their perfectly childlike faith in the promise of their old masters +made their disappointment more acute than can be imagined by those +who are used to the close bargains driven with the working community +farther North. 'Ole mars'' represented to them their sole idea of vast +wealth and power, and was usually almost worshipped. + +"I do not deny the many horrible exceptions, the shocking cruelties, +that blot the records of slave-life; but I do maintain that they +were exceptions, and that nine cases out of ten--nay, more than that +proportion--that came under my personal observation proved that a +sincere love existed between masters and slaves. In many instances I +saw planters impoverished by the war supporting old slaves or whole +families in absolute idleness, simply because the poor creatures, +after a short trial of freedom's vicissitudes, had come back to 'home +an' ole mars',' and he had not the heart to turn them away. + +"One woman, whose circumstances I knew, came to me for a pass to go +North. + +"'But, Kate,' I said to her, 'you are much better off here than you +can be at the North.' + +"'Done got _nuffin_' here,' she asserted positively. + +"'You have that little cabin Mrs. H---- allows you to live in.' + +"'Sho' now, Mars' Cap'n, 'course I has.' + +"'But at the North you will have no house unless you can pay for it.' + +"'Pay for it! Why, don't they gib deir niggas a cabin?' + +"'No. You may get a room, but you will have to pay so much a week to +be allowed to live in it. And Mrs. H---- lets you have your food too.' + +"'But dey'll gib a nigga her food, cap'n--nebber make her pay for a +han'fu' of meal an' a lash o' bacon?' + +"'You will have to pay for every mouthful. And it is cold there too, +Kate--very cold at this time of the year. You will have to buy clothes +or freeze to death.' + +"'But dey'll 'low me two suits?' + +"'Not unless you pay for them. And work is not plenty, Kate, for the +cities are crowded with negroes who were discontented here. Suppose +you cannot get work, you will have no cabin, no food, no clothes.'" + +"Did you convince her?" I asked. + +"No. She said to me, 'Guess you's mistaken 'bout dat ar, Mars' Cap'n. +Dey _mus_' gib deir niggas a cabin an' a bite, you know; and dey makes +piles o' money. And sho' now, Mars' Cap'n, all de _free_ folks is +rich--dey mus' be. Nobody's po' dat's _free_.' + +"You see," he added earnestly, "they did not know what freedom meant. +It was a gorgeous vision of doing as they pleased, unlimited riches +and idleness. They could work or not: whether they starved or not, +they had not taken into consideration. Freedom came upon them too +suddenly, and they had no idea of personal responsibility." + +"But," I said, "they could form families, be free to keep their +children." + +To my surprise, Captain S---- began to laugh. "Of all the ludicrous +scenes I remember," he said, "none were funnier than those occasioned +by the new ideas of matrimony. I remember one pretty pouting mulatto +about eighteen who came with a tall, powerful negro to the office for +a marriage license. They were married in the church, and some few +words were spoken of the solemnity of the bond between them. In about +two weeks the bride burst into my office one morning, followed by her +husband. 'Mars' Cap'n,' she said, 'can't I go home ef I choose?' + +"'Certainly,' I said. + +"'Dar, you nigga!' she said. 'I's gwine home dis bery day.' + +"'But, Mars' Cap'n,' said the man, 'the minister said she was to lib +'long o' me fur allers.' + +"'Oh,' I said, 'she wants to leave you?' + +"'Jes' fo' sure I does! I'se gwine home: I done tired o' bein' +married, I is. I'se gwine back to ole missus.' + +"'Does your husband treat you badly?' I asked. + +"'Nebber, Mars' Cap'n,' said the man earnestly. 'I done make the fire +ebery mornin', an' cook her a hoecake 'long o' my own, so dat gal +sleep half de day. An' I done give her two pair earrings.' + +"'What do you complain of?' I asked the bride. + +"'Sho' now, Mars' Cap'n, I ain't a-complainin'; only I done tired o' +dat nigga, an' I'se gwine home.' + +"It was wasted talk, I found afterward, that I spent in trying +to convince her of her duty to her husband. They left the office +together, but the bride disappeared, and the disconsolate husband +never found her, to my knowledge. One of the neighbors told me, 'He +jes' spiled dat gal, Mars' Cap'n, a-lettin' her have her own way all +de time. My ole woman ain't wuff shucks if I don't ware her out 'bout +onct a week.' + +"'How do you wear her out?' I asked. + +"'Jes' wif a stick, Mars' Cap'n. Women ain't good for nuffin' 'less +you give 'em a good warin' out when they gits sarsy.' + +"And I found afterward that this man beat his wife till she fainted +about once a week. The best of the joke was, that when I remonstrated +with him the woman told me she 'didn't want no Bureau 'terference with +her ole man!'" + +"But, Cap," I said, "you cannot defend the custom of tearing children +from their mothers?" + +"No," he said gravely: "it hardened them. I have been as soft-hearted +as any man over the supposed maternal anguish of negro women, but I +assure you, old fellow, my own observation quite cured me. It may be +there are cases, such as we weep over in _Uncle Tom's Cabin_, but my +own experience shows not one. I think the custom of taking children +in infancy to put them in dozens under the care of old negresses past +work may be answerable for the indifference I have seen manifested by +negro mothers. I have known more than one case where the love of +a colored nurse for her white charge was strong as mother-love. I +remember one woman who came to me in a violent rage to ask if I could +not punish her mistress for striking her own child. The little fellow +had been naughty, and had been corrected by his mother. 'What fo' she +done slap Mars' Tom?' she asked: 'he ain't done nuffin', po' chile!' + +"'Nonsense!' I said. 'The boy was naughty, and his mother boxed his +ears. Why, Chloe,' I added, 'what do _you_ mean by complaining? I +have seen you take your own baby by one leg and throw him across the +kitchen, without any regard to the stoves or kettles he might hit.' + +"''Course you has,' she said coolly: 'he's allers under my feet.' + +"'But you might strike his head and kill him.' + +"'Well,' was the startling answer, 'he's nuffin' but a nigga.' + +"And that was her own child, habitually treated with neglect and blows +by his mother, while she cried over the cruelty of slapping the white +child she had nursed. And it was not to curry favor, but from a +sincere belief that the one child should be caressed and loved, while +the other must expect knocks and blows, being 'nuffin' but a nigga.' + +"One old crone told me, 'I've done had sixteen picaninnies, Mars' +Cap'n, but I nebber seed none o' dem after dey was 'bout six weeks +old. Dey was in de nussery, an' I was a rale smart cotton-picker, and +couldn't be spar'd to nuss chillen, nohow.' + +"'But were you not allowed to see your own children?' I asked, as much +shocked as you would be. + +"''Lowed! 'Course I was 'lowed ef I wanted to bother 'bout 'em. But +Law's sakes! dey was all mixed up 'long o' de others, an' I wa'n't +goin' fussin' 'bout some oder woman's baby, likely 'nuff.' + +"Many such instances convinced me speedily that--whether from want of +natural affection or from their having been educated to indifference I +do not pretend to say--negro mothers in Mississippi had certainly no +violent affection for their own offspring. + +"But the most shocking case that came under my immediate notice was +that of a woman seeking employment. She came to my office with two +handsome boys, all three being bright mulattoes. The little fellows +were about three and five years of age, with large brown eyes and +pretty faces, full of fun and vivacity. The mother was a tall, +fine-looking woman of twenty-two or -three, and claimed to be a good +cook. I had one place in my mind, and sent her there, as a friend had +mentioned to me that he wanted a cook, and if one came for employment +would like to have her sent to him. + +"Unfortunately, he objected to the children, but, thinking the mother +could board them out, told her to 'get rid of the children' and he +would employ her. + +"The next day he came to me with a face of horror. 'Captain,' he said, +'the cook you sent me has murdered both her children!' + +"'Murdered them?' I cried. + +"'Yes. She is in the office, and you will have to see her, I suppose. +It is awful!' + +"I found the woman waiting my coming with a face of perfect composure. + +"'Hannah,' I said, after I had heard the accusation of the people in +the house where the crime was committed, 'what have you to say?' + +"'Nuffin', Mars' Cap'n. Mars' T---- done sed I mus' git rid o' de +picaninnies; and dey was bothersome, anyway--allers eatin', 'deed dey +was, Mars' Cap'n'--this very earnestly, as if to defend herself--' +allers a-hollerin' for suffin' to eat.' + +"'But, Hannah, Mr. T---- wanted you to leave them with some of the +women to board.' + +"'Nebber sed so. Jes' sed--'deed he did--"You get rid o' dem chillens +an' come here to cook." So I jes' waited till dey was asleep, an' cut +deir throats. Dey nebber screeched.' + +"I was sick with horror, but through the whole of the examination the +woman showed no sign of emotion, though we all went to the house where +the two pretty babies lay, stone dead." + +"What became of her?" I asked. + +"I have forgotten. I sent her to Vicksburg, as the case was too grave +for my decision. I should not have held her accountable, as she was +evidently under the impression that absolute obedience was the law for +her race. + +"It was odd," he continued, "but after that tragedy there came a farce +in true dramatic order. My office was hardly cleared of the parties +concerned in this dreadful murder when I was attracted to the window +by the most horrible yelping and squealing, and saw two negroes, black +as coals, barefooted, bareheaded and ragged, one leading a dog, one +trying to drag two pigs into the yard attached to my quarters. Seeing +me, one of them made a bow. 'Sarvent, Mars' Cap'n,' he said. + +"'What do you want?' I asked. 'Tie those pigs up before you come in,' +for he was dragging them up the steps. + +"'Likely shoats, ain't dey?' said the other eagerly. 'We jes' come +down 'bout dem ar shoats, Mars' Cap'n.' + +"'An' dat ar dog,' broke in the other. + +"Here the dog made a dash at the pigs, and in trying to escape the +latter ran between the legs of the men, upsetting one. Such a hubbub +of squealing pigs, barking dog, laughing and swearing men as ensued +beggars description. When there was some order restored, the pigs and +dog tied up in the yard, the biggest of the darkeys, scraping his best +bow, said, 'We jes' come, Mars' Cap'n, 'bout a little complexity 'long +o' dat ar dog and dem two shoats.' + +"'No 'plexity it all, cap'n,' said the other.--'Jes' you keep to +facks, you Hannibal.--You see, Mars' Cap'n, dat ar nigga he had de +dog: jes' a good-for-nuffin' mongrel, _he_ is, fo' sure now.' + +"'Rale likely dog, Mars' Cap'n,' broke in the other. 'Dat ar dog'll +twist a pig off'n his legs onto his back quicker'n winkin'--'deed will +he.' + +"I had been long enough in G---- to appreciate this speech, having +seen droves of pigs in gardens or vegetable-patches routed by dogs. +A monstrous pig would roll over perfectly helpless after a dexterous +twist of a small dog holding the hind leg of the heavy animal between +his teeth. I do not know how they are trained, but it is far more +mirth-provoking than any circus to see two or three little yelping +dogs rout some fifty great pigs in this way. + +'"Ain't wuff two shoats,' growled the other darkey. + +"'Wuff twenty-'leven racks o' bones like dem ar.' + +"'Stop!' I said.--'You speak, Hannibal, and you wait till your turn,' +I added to the other man. + +"'You see, Mars' Cap'n,' said Hannibal, 'Bill he wanted dat ar dog o' +mine powerful bad--'deed you did, you nigga!--an' he done swopped off +two missable weak ole shoats on me for dat dog. Well, Mars' Cap'n, I +done fed up dem shoats fo' free or fou' months; an', now dey's likely +pigs an' a-makin' bacon, Bill he wants to swop back, he does.' + +"'You see, Mars' Cap'n,' broke in the other, 'dat ar dog was to be +a huntin'-dog, he was. Wish ter gracious you'd jes' see him _hunt_! +Stan' an' bark an' yelp till dar ain't a quail in ten miles, he will, +an' splash inter de ribber till he'll scare ebery duck fo' seven +miles.' + +"And then they went at it, abusing and defending the dog, till we +heard a great scuffling, and saw the pigs had broken loose and were +tearing down the street, followed by the dog, every nigger in sight, +and, bringing up the rear, Hannibal and Bill, who never returned. How +they settled their dispute I never heard." + +"One! two!" chimed the mantel-clock, and we parted for the night, +while I lay awake a long time musing upon the "Sambo" of my +imagination and the "Sambo" of the experiences of Captain S----. + +S. A. SHEILDS. + + + + +THE EMPRESS EUGENIE. + + +When the bloody business of the _coup d'etat_ was definitely finished, +the murder-stains washed from the streets, the victims interred, and +a few thousand of the best and boldest hearts of France had taken the +sorrowful road of exile, the new emperor bethought him of how best to +gild his freshly-gained throne. + +A court was to be constructed, and that right speedily. After the +gloomy tragedy of the overthrow of the Republic, France was to be +treated to the grand spectacular piece of the Second Empire. And for +that a _corps de ballet_ and trained supernumeraries were needed. The +role of leading lady, too, was vacant. An empress was to be sought for +without delay. Negotiations were opened with several princely houses +for the hands of damsels of royal birth, but speedily came to +naught. As yet, the new-made emperor was a parvenu amid his royal +contemporaries. The negotiations for the hand of the Swedish princess +Vasa did indeed promise at one time to be crowned with success. But +the emperor sent his physician to take a look at the lady, and to +judge if her physique promised healthful and numerous offspring; and +this fact, coming to the ears of her family, caused a sudden stop to +be put to the whole affair. Meantime, at the reunions of Compiegne, +the personality of a young and lovely foreign countess was coming +prominently into notice, owing to the evident impression that her +charms had made upon the susceptible heart of Napoleon III. This lady, +Eugenie Montijo, countess de Teba, was no longer in the first bloom of +girlhood, having been born in 1826. But she was in the full meridian +of a beauty which, had the crown matrimonial of France, like the apple +of Ate, been dedicated to the fairest, would have ensured her the +throne by sheer right divine. It is indeed said that as a young girl +her charms were in no wise remarkable: on her first appearance in +society at the court of Madrid she created no sensation whatever. She +was too pale and quiet-looking to attract attention. But one day, the +court being at Aranjuez, during a _fete champetre_, Mademoiselle de +Montijo had the good or ill fortune to fall into one of the ornamental +fishponds in the garden. She was taken out insensible, and her wet and +clinging garments revealed a form of such statuesque perfection that +all Madrid went raving about her beauty. She plunged a commonplace +girl--she rose a Venus. And when she first attracted the notice of +Napoleon she was indisputably one of the loveliest women in Europe. +She was tall, slender, exquisitely proportioned, and her walk was that +of a goddess. Her features were delicate and regular; her eyes long, +almond-shaped, and full of a tender and dreamy sweetness: her small +and faultlessly-shaped head was set upon a long, slender neck with the +swaying grace of a lily upon its stalk; her shoulders were sloping and +beautifully moulded, notwithstanding her lack of embonpoint, for +in those days she was as slight as a reed. A profusion of fair +hair--which she wore turned back from the face in the graceful +style known as "a la Pompadour," but speedily to be rechristened "a +l'Imperatrice"--and a hand and foot of truly royal beauty completed an +ensemble of charms that were well calculated to drive poor masculine +humanity out of its seven senses. + +Cold and calculating as was Napoleon III., it drove him out of _his_, +for in every respect such a marriage was an unwise and an impolitic +one. It lent to his new-founded throne neither the lustre of an +alliance with royalty nor the popularity that might have been gained +by the selection of a Frenchwoman as the partner of his fortunes. The +Spanish blood of the countess de Teba made her obnoxious in the eyes +of many of her future subjects. Moreover, the antecedents of the lady +were not altogether without reproach. Not that any actual stigma had +ever clung to her character, but she had always been looked upon in +European circles as that anomalous character in such society, a fast +girl. Stories, some true and some false, were circulated respecting +her follies and her escapades. Evidently, if Caesar's wife should be +above suspicion, she was not the person who should have been selected +to become the wife of Caesar. + +The fact of the emperor's interest in the fair foreigner was revealed +by an incident, slight in itself and only important by the emotions +which it called forth. At one of the small intimate reunions at +Compiegne, Mademoiselle de Montijo happened, while dancing, to +entangle her feet in the long folds of her train, and she fell +with some violence to the floor. The extreme anxiety and distress +manifested by the emperor acted as a revelation to all present. A +stormy opposition to the projected alliance was at once organized +among the familiars of the emperor--the men who had aided in his +elevation, and to whom it was too recent for them to stand in awe of +him. MM. de Morny and de Persigny in particular were violent in their +opposition. In fact, the latter went so far as to tell the emperor at +the close of a long and stormy interview on the subject that it was +hardly worth while to have made a _coup d'etat_ to end it in such a +manner. M. de Morny argued and reasoned with his imperial brother, but +neither the violence of Persigny nor the arguments of De Morny made +any impression on the cold and inflexible will of Napoleon III., and +a few days later the countess made her appearance at one of the +court-balls in a dress looped and wreathed with the imperial +emblem-flower, the violet. The emperor, advancing toward her, +presented her with a superb bouquet of the same significant blossoms. +The meaning of that little scene was fully understood by the +spectators. The marriage was irrevocably decided upon, and all that +they had to do was to submit to the imperial will and make ready to +offer their homage to the new empress. With the solitary exception of +Prince Napoleon, the imperial family submitted with a good grace to +the matrimonial projects of their chief. The Princess Mathilde in +particular, although the marriage would depose her from the place +that she then occupied as the first lady of the court, declared her +willingness to bear the train of the new empress in public if such a +duty should be required of her, as it had been of the sisters of the +First Napoleon. + +There remained, however, an arrangement to be completed which, though +awkward and painful, was yet positively necessary. No one better than +Napoleon III. was aware of the truth of the old adage which declares +that a man must be off with the old love before he is on with the new. +In an hotel on the Rue du Cirque dwelt a lady who had been the partner +of his days of exile and ill-fortune, who had impoverished herself in +his service, and who had devoted herself to furthering his aims with a +persistency worthy of a better cause. This lady, the well-known Mrs. +Howard, was now to be got rid of. A frank and open rupture was not in +the style or the ideas of her royal and sphinx-like lover. A pretended +secret mission to England lured her from Paris. She learned the truth +at Boulogne, and hastened back to her home. There she found that her +hotel had been visited by the police, and that a cabinet wherein she +kept the letters of Louis Napoleon had been broken open and rifled of +its contents. Deeply wounded by the treatment she had received, she +withdrew, not without dignity, from all attempt at contesting the +position with her rival. "I go," she wrote to Napoleon, "a second +Josephine, bearing with me your star." To do justice to the emperor, +it must be confessed that he treated her in other respects with royal +liberality. The title of countess of Beauregard and a fortune of a +million of dollars were allotted to her. She withdrew to England, +where she afterward married. In 1865 a great longing to behold +Paris once more came upon her. Her youth and beauty gone, a worn, +disappointed and unhappy woman (for her marriage had turned out +most wretchedly), she returned to Paris only to die. Her eldest son +succeeded to the title of count de Beauregard, and was made consul +at Zanzibar. Since the downfall of the Empire he has lived a sort of +Bohemian existence in Paris, where his striking resemblance to Louis +Napoleon has won for him the nickname of "the ghost" (_le revenant_). + +Meanwhile, the preparations for the marriage were proceeding +vigorously. The future empress and her mother had been installed in +apartments at the Elysee. The household of the royal bride was already +formed, including the princess of Essling as chief lady-in-waiting, +and the Count (afterward Duke) Tascher de la Pagerie as +head-chamberlain. The nuptial ceremony took place on the 30th of +January. The bride's dress was composed of white velvet, with a veil +of point d'Angleterre, the time being too short to have one of point +d'Alencon manufactured. The details of the ceremony were closely +copied from those of the wedding of Napoleon I. and Marie Louise, and +the state-coach was the same that had been used at the coronation of +the great emperor. It was a magnificent vehicle, covered with gilding +and ornaments, and so heavy that the eight fine horses that drew it +were less for show than for actual service. The ceremony took place in +the cathedral of Notre Dame, which was illuminated for the occasion +with fifteen thousand wax-lights. The bride was visibly agitated. +She was as pale as death, and her voice in making the responses was +scarcely audible. No wonder if in that hour a premonition of +evil weighed upon her soul. The civil register of the imperial +family--which, preserved by the devotion of some of the adherents +of the Bonapartes, had been brought forth to be used at the civil +ceremony which had taken place the day before--might well have +thrilled her with forebodings. The last record inscribed on those +pages had been the birth of the king of Rome. How had it fared with +that scion of a mighty father? how might it fare with her own possible +offspring? + +It speedily became evident that the marriage, unpopular as it had been +among the counsellors of the emperor, was still more so among the +people at large. No cries of "Long live the empress!" save from the +throats of paid agents of the government, rose to greet the beautiful +Eugenie when she appeared in public. People stared sullenly at her as +at a passing pageant, but were moved neither by her charms nor her +gentle and gracious courtesy to any outburst of enthusiasm. To the +masses she was "L'Espagnole," the heiress to the bitter hate inspired +by the Austrian, Marie Antoinette. Epigrams on the marriage, seasoned +with the cruel and ferocious wit for which the Parisians are so +famous, circulated on all sides. Some bold hand affixed to the walls +of the Tuileries a series of doggerel verses wherein the empress was +first called by the nickname of "Badinguette," which was universally +applied to her after the fall of the Empire. The author of these lines +was discovered and banished to Cayenne, but his verses, set to a +popular tune, were long sung in secret in the taverns and workshops of +the suburbs. + +To a certain extent, popular opinion respecting the young and lovely +Eugenie was correct. She was indeed emphatically not the wife that +Louis Napoleon should have chosen. A woman of intelligence and force +of character might have done much to aid in founding his throne on +a more stable basis. The downfall of the Empire, though probably +inevitable, might have been delayed for at least a generation. But his +choice had fallen upon a lady who had but one qualification for the +position in which he had placed her--namely, extreme personal beauty. +She was indeed kind-hearted and amiable, and among the temptations +of a court as dissolute as was that of Louis XV. she preserved her +reputation unspotted. But she was narrow-minded and unintellectual, a +bigoted Catholic, and so blinded by national and religious prejudices +that many of the most fatal mistakes of the Empire are directly +traceable to her influence. An alliance with a royal princess would +have strengthened the throne of Louis Napoleon: an alliance with a +French lady would have drawn toward him the hearts of the nation. But +Eugenie was neither a princess nor a Frenchwoman, nor yet a woman +of vigorous and commanding intellect; and his union with her was +undoubtedly a serious political error. + +But for some time all went well. She ruled gracefully over her +allotted realm, which was that of Fashion. The influence of a crowned +Parisian beauty over the social doings of the world can hardly be +over-estimated. Eugenie invented toilettes that were copied by all the +women in the civilized world: she invented crinoline, and added a new +product to the manufactures of the earth. No woman better understood +the art of dress than she. Certain of her toilettes have retained +their celebrity to this day. Never did the art of costly dress reach +so high a pinnacle. She fringed her ball-dresses with diamonds, and +covered them with lace worth two thousand dollars a yard. Then, like +many wise and economical ladies, she undertook to have her dresses +made at home, and installed a dressmaker's establishment in the +Tuileries, where these splendid garments were prepared under her +immediate supervision. The workroom was directly over her private +apartments. By means of a trapdoor, whose mechanism was skilfully +dissimulated among the ornaments of the cornice and ceiling, a +mannikin, arrayed in the garb that was in progress, could be lowered +for the empress's inspection. This singular branch of the royal +household was under the charge of a functionary whose business it +was to purchase silks, velvets and laces at wholesale prices and to +superintend the workwomen. The knowledge of its existence was soon +spread abroad, and did the empress infinite harm. The petty economy of +the proceeding horrified and disgusted the Parisians, who, economical +themselves, have ever scorned that virtue in their sovereigns. Many +of the partisans of the court denied the existence of such an +establishment, but during the period that elapsed between the downfall +of the Empire and the outbreak of the Commune the curious throngs that +visited the Tuileries might trace amid the mouldings of the ceiling in +the empress's boudoir the outline of the famous trapdoor. + +It would have been well had she never turned her attention to any less +feminine or more dangerous pursuits. But in an evil hour for France +and for the nation she undertook to dabble in politics. Left regent +during the Austro-Italian campaign, she acquired a taste for reigning, +which was increased by the flatteries of her husband's ministers and +the counsels of her confessor. It was currently said at court that the +Mexican expedition "came ready-made from her boudoir." She hated the +United States, as a true daughter of Spain could not fail to detest +the coveters of Cuba and the friends of progress and of enlightenment. +Consequently, she did not fail to further a project whose real aim was +to deal the great republic, then struggling in the throes of civil +war, a decisive stab in the back. She approved of the war with China, +and condescended to enrich her private apartments with the spoils of +the Summer Palace. But her pet project, the one that she had most at +heart, was the war with Prussia. The now historical phrase, "This is +_my_ war," was uttered by her to General Turr soon after the outbreak +of hostilities. And when, an exile and discrowned, she first sought +the presence of Queen Victoria, she sobbed out with tears of vain +remorse, "It was all my fault. Louis did not want to go to war: 'twas +I that forced him to it." Poor lady! bitterly indeed has she atoned +for that unwise exercise of undue influence. The holy crusade of which +she dreamed against the enemies of her Church and of her husband's +throne ended in giving her son's inheritance to the winds. + +Nor was her domestic life a happy one. She loved her husband; +and indeed Napoleon III. seems to have possessed a rare power of +attracting and securing the affections of those about him. Few that +came within the influence of his kindly courtesy, his grave and gentle +voice, but fell captive to the spell thus subtly exercised. He made +many and warm personal friends, even among those who were hostile to +his politics and his dynasty. And by three women at least he was loved +with a fervor and a constancy that no trial could shake. One of these +was the Princess Mathilde, his cousin and once his intended wife; +another was Mrs. Howard; the third was his wife. But, like many men +who are much loved, Louis Napoleon was incapable of anything like +genuine and constant love for any woman. His passion for his lovely +empress was as brief as it had been violent. He vexed her soul and +tortured her heart by countless conjugal infidelities. She resented +this state of affairs with all the vehemence of an outraged wife and a +jealous Spaniard. It is said that she once soundly boxed the ears of +the distinguished functionary who filled in her husband's household +the post that the infamous Lebel held during the latter days of the +life of Louis XV. Twice she fled abruptly from the court, unable to +bear the presence of insolent and triumphant rivals, and the ingenuity +of the fashionable chroniclers of the day was taxed to invent +plausible pretexts for her sudden journeys to the Scottish or the +Italian lakes. No wonder that the soft eyes grew sadder and the +smiles more forced as the years passed on and brought only weariness, +disenchantment and the shadow of the coming end. + +Alphonse Daudet has said in _Le Nabab_ that there exists in the life +of every human being a golden moment, a luminous peak, where all of +glory or success that destiny reserves is granted; after which comes +the decadence and the descent. This golden moment in the life of the +empress Eugenie was the occasion of the first French international +exhibition in 1855. She was then in the full pride of her womanhood +and her loveliness. The greatest lady in Europe, Queen Victoria, had +been her guest, had embraced her as an equal and had given her proofs +of real and sincere friendship. Enveloped in clouds of priceless +lace and blazing with diamonds of more than regal splendor, she had +presided, _la belle des belles_, over the opening of the exhibition in +the Champs Elysees. And, above all, the event so anxiously desired by +her husband and by the supporters of his cause was near at hand. She +was soon to become the mother of the heir to the imperial throne. With +every aspiration gratified, every wish accomplished, she did indeed +seem in that year of grace the most enviable of human beings. The +later splendors of the exhibition of 1867 were more apparent than +real, and the gorgeous assemblage of reigning sovereigns brought +with it for Eugenie a subtle and premeditated insult. The kings and +emperors who responded to the imperial invitation and came to visit +the court of Napoleon III., with one exception, that of the king +of the Belgians, left their wives at home. They acted as men do in +private life when they receive invitations to a ball given by a family +of doubtful standing with whom they are unwilling to quarrel. + +I have spoken of the birth of the prince imperial. It may perhaps +interest the reader to know how much this auspicious event cost the +French nation. Not less than nine hundred thousand francs (one hundred +and eighty thousand dollars), of which twenty thousand dollars were +paid for the young gentleman's first wardrobe. The whole amount +expended at the birth of the Comte de Paris did not exceed this latter +sum. + +The details of the scenes at the Tuileries after the downfall of the +Empire, and those of the flight of the empress, are well known. It +is now generally conceded that after Sedan the fate of the imperial +dynasty was in the hands of Eugenie. Had she withdrawn to Tours or to +Bourges, summoned the Assembly to meet there, and called around her +the partisans of the Empire, she might have saved the heritage of her +son. But her essentially feminine and frivolous nature was not fitted +for deeds of high resolve or for heroic determinations. A morbid dread +of following in the footsteps of Marie Antoinette had pursued her in +the later years of her prosperity. She knew that she was unpopular, +and visions of the fate of the Austrian queen or of the still more +horrible one of the Princesse de Lamballe must have risen before her +as the shouts of the Parisian mob, exulting in the downfall of +her husband, met her ear. In that hour of disaster and of woe no +Frenchman, for all the boasted chivalry of the race, was at hand +to aid or protect the fair lady who had so long queened it at the +Tuileries. The Austrian ambassador, the Italian minister, the Corsican +Pietrio planned and managed her escape from the palace. She took +refuge in the house of an American, her dentist, Dr. Thomas W. +Evans. He it was who got her out of Paris and accompanied her to the +seacoast, placing his own carriage at her disposal. She crossed the +Channel in the yacht of an English gentleman. Thus guarded by aliens, +she passed from the land of her queenship to that of exile. + +To-day, in her abode at Chiselhurst, the widow of Napoleon III. +attracts scarcely less of the world's interest and attention than +she did as throned empress and queen of Fashion. Unfortunately, the +supreme tact that once was her distinguishing quality seems to have +deserted her in the days of her decadence. She, the most graceful of +women, has not learned the art of growing old gracefully. She had +played the part of a beauty and the leader of fashion for years. Now +that she is past fifty that character is no longer possible to her. +But she might have assumed another--less showy, perhaps, but surely +far more touching. With her whitening hairs she might have worthily +worn the triple dignity of her widowhood, her maternity and her +misfortune. She has chosen instead, with a weakness unworthy of the +part that she has played on the wide stage of contemporary history, to +clutch vainly after the fleeting shadow of her vanished charms. A head +loaded with false yellow hair, a face covered with paint and powder, a +mincing gait and the airs and graces of an antiquated coquette,--such +to-day is she who was once the world's wonder for her loveliness and +grace, a bewigged Mrs. Skewton succeeding to the dazzling vision that +swerved the calculating policy of Napoleon III. and won his callous +heart, and that still smiles upon us from the canvas of Winterhalter. + +LUCY H. HOOPER. + + * * * * * + + + + +OUR MONTHLY GOSSIP. + + + +A LOST COLONY. + + +Why does nobody--antiquarian, historian, or even novelist--open again +that forgotten page of history, the story of the lost colony of +Norwegians who disappeared in the fourteenth century from the shores +of Greenland? Doctor Hayes, after he came back, had a good deal to say +of them, but he did not gather all the facts, and his book, I believe, +is now out of print. + +I know no mystery made of such nightmare stuff as this in history; +and mysteries are growing scarce now-a-days as eggs of the terrible +Dinornis: we cannot afford to lose one of them. + +The foremost figure in the story is of course Leif _hin-hepna_ ("the +happy"). There is much to be unearthed concerning that famous pioneer +in discovery and religion, and we Americans surely ought to have +enough interest in him to do it, as Leif unearthed this continent for +us out of the hold of the sea and Demigorgon ages ago, while the dust +of which Columbus was to be made centuries later was yet blowing loose +about the streets of Genoa. Leif, besides discovering new worlds, +turned the souls of all his father's subjects from paganism to such +Christianity as the times afforded. I protest, this vigorous young +Greenlander heads the roll of unrecognized heroes in the world: +heathen and Christians have made demigods and saints out of much +flimsier stuff than he. + +The colony, too, out of which he came, what a spectral shadow it is +beside the live flesh-and-blood figures of other nations! At the +banquet of the boar-eating Scottish thanes there was one empty chair, +and that was filled by a ghost. We hear of the East and West Bygds, +settlements with hundreds of farms, churches, cathedrals, monasteries, +set on the narrow rim of green coast which edges Greenland, lying +between the impenetrable wall of ice inland and the Arctic Sea +without. They had their religion, which Leif brought to them; they +were busy and prosperous; they married, traded, fought, loved and +died; and with a breath they all vanished from off the face of the +earth. There is no ghost-story like this in literature. + +Where will you find, too, such a delightful flavor of ancient mystery +as in the old chronicles which tell of these people? Besides the +Sagas there are the voyages of long-ago-forgotten navigators--Arthur +himself, the Venetian brothers Nicolo and Antonio Zeni, King Zichmni, +divers Frisian fishermen. These old records, coffee-colored with +age and frail as skeleton leaves, are yet to be found in certain +libraries, and surely would tempt any one with a soul above +newspapers. In them you shall hear how these voyagers, in their poor +barkentines of from ten to two hundred tons, entered into this region +of enormous tides, of floating hordes of mountainous icebergs, of +flaming signs in the sky--into all the horrors, in fact, of an +Arctic winter and night, darkened still deeper for them by nameless +superstitious terrors. They went down to these deeps in very much the +temper with which a living man now-a-days would adventure into hell. +The icy peaks of the far-off land they knew were glittering silver, +and the sea was full of malignant spirits which guarded it. A +mountain-magnet lay hid under the sea, dragging the ships down to it +(as late, indeed, as 1830 skilled Danish navigators declared that they +felt the stress from it, and fled in terror): the unnatural tides were +the breathing of angry Demigorgon. There were, however, other sights +and sounds not to be explained in even this reasonable fashion. On a +fair day and a calm sea panic would seize the soul of every man on +board, and the ship would turn and beat homeward, "as one who knows a +frightful fiend doth follow him behind." + +It is the mystery of the lost colony, however, which ought to be +opened by some competent hand. In 1406, Queen Margaret, it will be +remembered, laid an interdict upon trade with them: for two centuries +afterward not even a passing barkentine touched upon the Greenland +shore. At the end of that time, when explorers were sent from the +civilized world in search of the long-forgotten colonists, they +had utterly vanished. There, to this day, are their dwellings and +churches, solidly built of stone in an architectural style which Graah +fifty years ago described as simple and elegant: there are even the +ruins of the monastery which the Zeni brothers declare was heated by +a magical hot sulphurous spring, the waters of which were conveyed +through the building by pipes. But the people had absolutely +disappeared. Not even a bit of pottery, a grave or a bone was left; +which last is a noteworthy circumstance, as portions of the human body +are almost indestructible in that climate. Seventeen expeditions have +been sent out by the Danish and Norwegian governments in search of +this lost colony, the last of which was within the present half +century. One of these was headed by Egedi, a poor Norwegian clergyman +to whom is owing the civilization of Greenland, and of whose strange +heroic life we know too little. + +There are two or three conjectures to account for the disappearance of +this colony. One is that they were all murdered by the Skroeellings. +But where are their bones? Besides, the colonists numbered from +fifteen to twenty thousand, and were much superior to the natives in +size, strength, intelligence and knowledge of war. + +Graah, a Danish navigator who came in search of them in 1828, believes +that they were carried off bodily by the English after the ravages +of the "black death" in England, to repair the waste of human life, +citing a treaty of 1433 in which England was charged with abducting +Danish subjects for that end. Another theory is that the Frisian king +Zichmni carried them off captive. Pope Nicholas asserts this outrage +as a fact in a bull in 1448. But Zichmni is as uncertain a personage +in history as Demigorgon; and the good popes were not so infallible as +to matters of general news before the establishment of telegraph and +postal service as they are now. + +Mr. Dalton Dorr, who accompanied Hayes, tells me that among the +Esquimaux there is a tradition that a colony of foreigners once owned +the land, and about five centuries ago emigrated in a body northward, +crossing the Mer de Glace--that they found an open sea, and somewhere +within the eternal rampart of snow and ice now dwell securely by its +shores. As early as 1500 the migratory Skroeellings told of this colony +far to the north-east. These rumors possessed substance enough to +warrant the expeditions from Denmark, which have all been directed to +the eastern coast. Graah heard from his guides of a strange people +with high features, hoarse voices and large stature living beyond the +limits passed by Europeans. + +Here is a mystery surely worth finding out--a people exiled from their +kind for centuries living at the Pole--something better worth search +than even Franklin's bones. To give it reality, too, we must remember +how many Arctic explorers have caught sight, as they thought, of an +open sea near the Pole--a sea with strong, iceless swells, and on +whose shores warm rains fell. Nobody need suggest that these people +would probably, after our search, not be worth looking for. What shall +we do with the North-west Passage when we have found it? + +R. H. D. + + + +THE DIFFICULTIES OF BEING AGREEABLE. + + +"A man will please more by never offending than by giving a great deal +of delight." In this remark of Doctor Johnson's lies the art of being +agreeable. But nothing is more difficult than to avoid offending. Most +people are offended by trifles. For instance, persons generally take +umbrage at superior brilliance of conversation. "The man who talks for +fame will never please." Even he who talks to unburden his mind will +please only some old and solitary friend. Large experience and great +learning, however quietly carried, are very offensive to those who +have them not. Clever things cannot be said unobtrusively enough. A +person so brilliant as to make others feel that his efforts are above +theirs will be detested. Moreover, one of the difficulties of being +agreeable is that the apprehension of offending and the small hope of +pleasing destroy all captivation of manner. The confident expectation +of pleasing is an infallible means of pleasing. Characters pleased +with themselves please others, for they are joyous and natural in +mien, and are at liberty from thinking of themselves to pay successful +attention to others. Still, the self-conceited and the bragging are +never attractive, self being the topic on which all are fluent and +none interesting. They who dwell on self in any way--the self-deniers, +the self-improvers--are hateful to the heart of civilized man. +The Chinese, who knew everything beforehand, are perfect in +self-abnegation of manner. "How are your noble and princely son and +your beautiful and angelic daughter?" says Mandarin Number One.--"Dog +of a son have I none, but my cat of a daughter is well," says Mandarin +Number Two. + +To set up for an invariably agreeable person you must adjust yourself +to the peculiarities of others. You must talk of books to bookworms: +you must be musical with musicians, scientific with savants. +Furthermore, you have to make believe all the time that you are +enjoying yourself. The belle is a lady who has an air of enjoying +herself with whomsoever she talks. We like those who seem to delight +in our company. You must not overdo it, and thus make yourself +suspected of acting; but do not imagine that you will please without +trying. Those who are careless of pleasing are never popular. Those +who do not care how they look invariably look ugly. You will never +please without doing all these things and more. + +What a Pecksniffian business it is to go into! Who wants to refrain +from smart, spiteful sayings when he happens to think of them, to +abjure laughing at friends and ridiculing enemies, to renounce the +tart rebuff, the keen _riposte_? Amazing that any succeed! and many +do. There are some gentlemen who are entirely agreeable--"gentlemen +all through," like Robert Moore in _Shirley_. They have order, +neatness, delicacy of movement, reticence, incuriosity: their +unaffected English has almost the charm of a musical composition. They +are generally men whose mothers well nagged them when they were small +with perpetual adjurations: "Do not bang the door," "Stop kicking your +feet," "Stop clinking your plate with your fork," and so on. + +In some inscrutable way, young girls often attain thorough +agreeableness. Look at lazy little Jane: she has acquired the highest +charm of repose. Look at Sally, who used to be such an angular and +hurried little girl: she is all quips and cranks and wreathed smiles +now. And meek, humble-minded Martha, in former days so diffident, +blushing and taciturn, has found out the value of a deferential +demeanor and the knack of being a good listener, and can sing a ballad +with a pathos and dramatic effect that eclipse the highly-embellished +performances of other girls. + +Ladies who make a profession of pleasing become irresistibly alluring. +Actresses have abundant hair, fine teeth, all physical beauty, because +they train themselves to beauty, though not originally better endowed +than most others. Actresses' voices are set habitually, not in +complaining, whining, creaking or vociferating keys, but in +chest-tones clear and calm in quality. Actresses do not grow old, +partly in consequence of their constant attention to the toilette, +partly in consequence of the fact that they have hope and ambition, +and enough occupation and enough rest, and do not worry over trifles. + +To remain young is one of the difficulties of being agreeable. Whoever +does so is obliged to adopt the Aristotelian maxim of moderation, +Placidity of temper is necessary to the clear-pencilled eyebrow and +the magnolia complexion. Frowns, weeping, excitement, despair and +laughter wrinkle the face. Nature keeps women's forms well rounded to +extreme old age, and their faces remain agreeable when they take the +trouble to keep them so. The brow, the fair front, need never be +furrowed. Of all we meet in the street, very few have tranquil, +undistorted faces: the old are screwed out of shape, the young are +going to be so. A well-preserved beauty is one who neither puckers her +face into wrinkles nor mauls it with her hands: she never buries her +knuckles in her cheeks, nor rests cheek on palm or chin on hand, nor +folds her fingers around her forehead while reading, nor rubs her +"argent-lidded eyes." She veils her face from the wind; she does not +work with uncovered neck and arms: therefore they do not become tawny. +She avoids immoderate toil, which makes the hair to fall, the features +sharp, the skin clammy and yellow. She avoids immoderate laziness, as +causing obesity and a greasy complexion or pallor, lassitude and loss +of vitality. Such are; the difficulties of being agreeable. + +M. D. + + + +OUR SUB-GARDENER. + + +He who doubts that civilized progress and industry is beneficial to +birds, and promotes their comfort and multiplication, never saw +the robin and the purple grakle following the plough on a summer's +morning. The ploughman is not more punctually afield than his unbidden +but welcome feathered attendants. They are ahead of him, perched +patiently in the trees that dot fence or hedgerow. They see the team +afar off, and as the gate rattles in opening for its admission the +glad tidings is sent down the line in whistle or chirrup, the most +musical of breakfast-bells. The worm that but for the intrusive +ploughshare would blush unseen beneath the soil, and but for +the feathered detective on the lookout for him would regain his +subterranean retreat, might take a less cheery view of the philosophy +of the matter; but he too is, taken collectively, favored by tillage +and fattens on high-farming like an English squire. But we are not +at present occupied with his feelings. Somebody must suffer in the +battledore game of eat and be eaten, and we shall let the chain of +continuous destruction rest here with the grub that reaps where he +hath not sown. Horse, man and bird are honestly and harmoniously +picking up a living at the expense of a fourth party that also thrives +in the long run. + +Not many of us get out with the plough at the orthodox hour of +sunrise. It is a privilege few, comparatively, possess, and fewer +still enjoy. The doctors recommend it warmly, on the ground that, +though perhaps productive of rheumatism, it is death to dyspepsia. The +faculty have, however, on this point piped to us in vain, and it is +not at all in consequence of their advice that those who luxuriate +in early agriculture adopt that system of hygiene, any more than the +birds, who, as we have remarked, are first up and out, and who, at +this season, in flat defiance of all medical rules, adopt a purely +animal diet. Later, long after Lent, their food is varied with fruits +and seeds, but never to such an extent as to amount to vegetarianism. +This carnivorous taste ranks high in the "charm of earliest birds" so +interesting to the cultivator. He, as a rule, is not wrapped up in +the strawberry or the cherry that in the fulness of time comes to +be levied on, in very moderate percentage, by a few of his musical +associates. We do not forget that the blackbird has a weakness for +planted maize, and that the quota of the cornhill is very truly and +safely stated in the doggerel-- + + One for de blackbird, one for de crow, + Two for de cut-worm, and two for to grow. + +The cut-worm is here correctly defined as the enemy, while the excise +claimed by the birds is head-money for his extirpation. An adaptation +of this instructive couplet to gardening for the guidance of those of +us who do not farm, but garden in a small way, would naturally enlarge +the allowance of the cut-worm. From the more limited demesne the crow +and the grakle are generally excluded. What is their loss is +the cut-worm's gain. Nowhere does he run (or burrow) riot more +successfully than in old gardens. Living in darkness, from an apparent +consciousness that his deeds are evil, he seems to be fully advised of +all that goes on above ground. One would fancy that he has a complete +system of subterranean telegraphs, like those coming into vogue in +Europe. He learns within a few hours or minutes of every new lot of +plants sprouting from the seed or set out from the hotbed. Upon both +he sets systematically to work, following his row with a precision and +thoroughness at once admirable and exasperating. You go out of a May +afternoon, and with the tenderest care establish in their summer homes +your very choicest plants. Reverse "One counted them at break of day, +and when the sun set where were they?" and the tale that greets you +the next morning is told. Did the spoiler need them for food, you +would be partly reconciled to his proceedings, or at least would know +how to frame some sort of an excuse for them. But he merely divides +the succulent stem close to the surface of the ground, above or below, +and leaves the wreck unutilized even by him. A comfort is that flight +is not his forte. He is generally to be found by the exploring +penknife or trowel close by the scene of his crime, and is thus easily +subjected to condign punishment. But his wife, family and friends +survive in different spots of the adjacent underworld, to give +evidence of their existence only in subsequent havoc. The titillative +rake or the peremptory hoe does not help you much in their discovery; +for their color is that of the soil, their size as various as that +of bits of gravel, and they are not easily perceptible to a cursory +glance from the ordinary height of the eye. Here is where keener +optics than yours, sharpened perhaps by a keener impulse--that of the +stomach--come to the rescue. The catbird, whose imploring mew you +listened to from your bed some time before thinking proper to respond +to it, is intently watching operations from the other end of the +border or the square. His lusty youngsters have been trained, after +the good old fashion, to early hours, and they are impatient for +breakfast. Their parent sees what you do not, and astonishes you by +suddenly pouncing upon a bit of earth you have just broken and seizing +a stout worm. This stranger, if presentable to the family circle, he +is at once off with, his spouse taking his place in the field. Or the +youngsters may still be _in futuro_. All the same: whatever turns up +is welcome to him. His appetite seems as insatiable as that of half a +dozen nestlings: they, you know, will eat three or four times their +own weight in twelve hours. He is thus immensely useful to you, but +your appreciation of that fact is as nothing to his estimate of your +value to him. He accepts you as a being sent for his benefit. You are +a part of his scheme of providence. True, he pities while he rejoices +over you. Your blindness and stupidity in not seeing the fat and +luscious tidbits he snaps up from almost beneath your feet is of +course a subject of wonder and disdain. But he learns to make +allowances for you, and comes to view your failings charitably, +especially as they enure to his benefit, and so lean to Virtue's side. +Fear of you he has none. Indeed, you inspire in him a certain sense of +protection, for in your presence his habitual vigilance is lulled, and +his apprehensive glances over his right and left shoulders fall to a +lower figure per minute. He has learned there to feel safe from hawk +and cat, and knows enough of other birds to be sure that none of them +will "jump" his little claim of fifty feet square whereof you are the +moving centre. His individual audacity gives him the sway of that +small empire, and he doubts not that you will support him in acting up +to the motto of the Iron Crown of the Lombards. His cousin the robin +may, and very probably does, hover on the outskirts, but an exact +distance measures the comparative boldness and familiarity of the two +species. The catbird is, say, ten yards more companionable than his +red-vested relative in the latter's most genial and trustful mood; and +his faith is of a more robust type and less easily and permanently +weakened by rebuffs. The robin rarely hovers round you, but likes to +have the whole premises quietly to himself. His attachment does not +take a personal hue, but is rather to locality. His acquaintanceship +with you is never so intimate as that of the catbird, who soon +recognizes your step, your dress and the peculiar touch and cadence of +your hoe, even as a college oarsman will identify the stroke of a +chum or a rival a quarter of a mile off. If the robin does fix your +individuality in his mind, he deigns to make no sign thereof. At most +he accepts you as part of the mechanism of creation. You make no draft +upon his bump of reverence. He does not set you on his Olympus. This +mark of the spirit which makes him, on the whole, a more respectable +and dignified character than his less gayly-dressed cousin tends in +some sense to commend him the less to you, since we all like the +homage of the "inferior animals," birds or voters. You half dislike +the independence of the robin, who is equally at home in the parterre +or the forest, on the gravel-walk or in the upper air. On the other +you have more hold. He is rarely seen higher than twenty feet above +ground, and is strictly an appendage of the shrubbery and the orchard. +Even in his unhappy voice there is a domestic tone, closely imitated +as it is from Grimalkin. Imitated, we say, for we have never been able +fully to believe that this mew is the bird's original note. We shall +ever incline to the impression that it is an acquired dialect, picked +up in the mere wantonness born of a conscious and exceptional power of +mimicry. + +E. C. B. + + + +A NEW AND INDIGNANT ITALIAN POET. + + +Mrs. Leo Hunter's selection of an "Expiring Frog" as a subject for +poetical composition has lately been surpassed by a new Italian poet. +The latter, Signer Giovanni Rizzi, has just published at Milan a small +volume of sonnets, chiefly ironical in character, in which he gives +vent to his disgust at the positive and materialistic tendencies of +the present day. The theme of the three most remarkable among these +productions is that useful but not very aesthetic animal, the hog. + +Signer Rizzi is the professor of literature at the military school and +the high school for girls in Milan. Not long ago his three sonnets +to the hog--or, more literally, the boar (_maiale_)--appeared in an +Italian journal called _Illustrazione Italiana_, prefaced by a letter +to the editor, in which the author stated that as apes, toads and +caterpillars have now been triumphantly introduced into literature, he +no longer felt any hesitation about bringing forward in the same way +his esteemed friend the boar. These three pieces, together with others +of the same form and character, have now been published as a book +under the title of _Un Grido_. This work begins with an address to the +reader, in which the poet laments the prevailing tendency of public +opinion, and protests against what he considers a determined war on +all old and honored beliefs and feelings, and a substitution therefor +of a vague and revolting materialism. Then come five sonnets to Pietro +Aretino, the witty poet and scoffer of the Renaissance era. Aretino is +invited to reappear among men, for the world, says Rizzi, has again +become worthy of such a man's presence. Leaving Dante to Jesuits, and +Beatrice to priests, it has made Aretino its favorite model, and has, +consequently, said farewell to everything resembling shame. In the +last of these five sonnets the poet addresses his beloved thus: "And +we too, O Love! do we still keep holy honor, home, faith, prayer, +truth and noble sorrow?" + +After the five sonnets to Aretino come the three to the boar (_Al +Maiale_) which have already been mentioned. Here the author enters +into a mock glorification of that animal, and declares himself ready +to give up all pretensions to any superiority over it. He proceeds +to "swear eternal friendship" with it, and offers it his hand +to solemnize the compact; but, suddenly remembering that such +old-fashioned practices must be very distasteful to his new friend, he +immediately apologizes for having conformed to such a ridiculous old +prejudice. He does not expect his "long-lost brother" to make any +effort to elevate himself or to change his swinish nature in any +particular, but thinks we should all bring ourselves down to the +boar's mental and physical level as soon as we can. The closing verses +of the third sonnet may be freely rendered as follows: + + And when, at last, the grave shall close above us, + No solemn prayer our resting-place should hallow, + No flowers be strewn by hands of those that love us. + + But if, at times, you'll come where we are lying, + O worthy friend! upon our graves to wallow, + That thought should give us joy when we are dying. + +The last piece in this little collection is addressed to "The Birds of +my Garden" _(Agli Uccelletti del mio Giardino)_. Though inferior to +the others in boldness and originality of conception, it is much more +graceful and attractive, and shows that the writer is by no means +deficient in elegance of style and delicacy of treatment. + +Signor Rizzi may, it is probable, be taken as a type of a large class +among his countrymen, to which the iconoclastic tendencies of our time +seem strange and horrible. Indeed, it is possible that he is one of +the earliest heralds of a widespread reaction in opinion and feeling +throughout his native land. At any rate, his poems can hardly fail +to become popular, and to produce some effect among a people so +susceptible to the influences of witty and sarcastic poetry as are the +Italians even at this day. + +W. W. C. + + + +A NEZ PERCE FUNERAL. + + +"Call me, Washington, when they are going to bury him," said the +doctor. + +George Washington, evidently not quite sure that he understood the +doctor, said with an interrogative glance, "You like--see him--dead +man--put in ground?" And, pointing downward and alternately bending +and extending one knee, he made a semblance of delving. + +The doctor nodded. + +"Good! Me tell you." + +"I want to go, Washington," said the lieutenant. + +"And I too," said the lieutenant's guest, myself. + +George Washington was one of the Nez Perce prisoners surrendered by +Joseph to General Miles after the battle of Bear-Paw Mountain. The +dead man was one of the wounded in that action who died from his +wounds, aggravated, no doubt, by fatigue and exposure while the +prisoners were marching to the east in the winter of 1877 under orders +from the War Department. George spoke a few words of English, and was +quite an intelligent Indian. He was very clean--for an Indian--and was +comfortably clad. + +"How soon?" asked the doctor. + +"He--call me--when he ready: me call you." + +"Good! Then I shall go to dinner." + +"We had better eat our dinner," said the lieutenant: "it is growing +late.--Come and have some dinner, Washington." + +Washington seemed not quite sure that he understood correctly. He had +a modest distrust of his English. In the matter of an invitation to +dinner doubt is admissible. "You--want _me_--" here George Washington +tapped himself on the savage breast--"eat--with _you_?" And here, +gracefully reversing his hand, with the index extended, he touched the +lieutenant on the civilized bosom. + +"Yes: come in." + +We three entered the tent. As it was an ordinary "A" tent, with a +sheet-iron stove in it, it was pretty full with the addition of two +good-sized white men and an Indian of no contemptible proportions. The +lieutenant and I sat on the blankets, camp-fashion: Washington sat on +my heavy riding-boots, with the stove perforce between his legs. + +"Good wahrrm!" ejaculated George Washington, hugging the stove. + +"Hustleburger!" shouted the lieutenant. + +"Yes, sir." + +"George Washington will take dinner with us. Set the table for three." + +"All right, sir, lieutenant!" + +"Good man--docther," Washington remarked, nodding several times to +emphasize his observation: "ver'--good man--docther." + +We eagerly assented, pleased to see that the Indian appreciated the +doctor's kindness to his people. + +Rabelais's quarter of an hour began to hang heavily on us. Washington +was equal to the occasion: taking a survey of the tent, he nodded +approvingly and remarked, "Good tepee." + +"Not bad this weather." + +"Good eyes!" said Washington in a burst of enthusiasm. + +These two simple words in their Homeric immensity of expression meant +all this: "The fire made on the ground in our Indian lodges fills them +with continual smoke, and consequently we Indians suffer very much +from sore eyes. Now, your little stove, while it warms the tent much +better than a fire, does not smoke, and your eyes are not injured." + +Our habitual table, a small box, was not constructed on the extension +plan. It would not accommodate three. So Hustleburger handed directly +to each guest a tin cup of macaroni soup. Washington disposed of the +liquid in a very short time, but the elusive nature of the macaroni +rather troubled him. We showed him how to overcome its slippery +tendency. Smacking his lips, he said, with a broad smile, "Good! What +you call him?" + +"Macaroni." + +"Maclony? Good! Maclony--maclony." he continued, repeating the word to +fix it in his memory. + +Our only vegetable was some canned asparagus. Washington was +delighted with it after he had been initiated into the mystery of its +consumption. He did not stop at the white. "What you call--_him_?" + +"Asparagus." + +"Spalagus--spalagus? Goo-oo-d!" + +"Did you never eat asparagus before, Washington?" + +"Never eat him--nev' see him. Spalagus--spalagus! Goo-oo-d!" + +Hustleburger now brought in the dessert, which consisted of canned +currant-jelly, served in the can. Each guest helped himself from the +original package, using a "hard tack" for a dessert-plate, _more +antiquo_. Washington was bidden to help himself. Before doing so, +however, he wished to test the substance placed before him, and, +taking a little on the end of his spoon, he carried it to his lips. +Then an expression of intense enjoyment overspread his dusky face; his +black eyes sparkled like diamonds; his full lips were wreathed in a +smile. "Ah! goo-oo-oo-d!" he cried, with a mouthful of _o_'s. "What +you call HIM?" + +"Jelly." + +"Yelly? Ah! yelly goo-oo-ood! Me--like--yelly--much." And he helped +himself plentifully. + +A smell of burning woollen became unpleasantly noticeable. Washington +still had the stove between his legs: it was red-hot. He never moved, +but ate "yelly." + +"Washington, you're burning!" cried the lieutenant. + +Washington smiled. "Much wah-r-rum!" he remarked in the coolest manner +possible. + +"Throw open the front, then." + +A long, shrill cry now rang through the silence and the darkness. +Washington jumped up suddenly, ran out of the tent, and uttered a cry +in response so similar that it might pass for an echo of the first. +Then, returning, he said, "He call. He--ready--put--dead man--down. +Come! Me--come back--eat--yelly." + +Fortunately, the Indian camp was not far off. The night was +pitch-dark. Led by Washington, we got through the thick underbrush +without much trouble. The grave was dug near the water's edge, where +the Missouri and the Yellowstone, meeting, form an angle. A large fire +of dry cottonwood at the head of the grave fitfully lit up the dismal +scene. A bundle of blankets and buffalo-robes lay by the open grave. +Some Indians of both sexes with bowed and blanketed heads stood near +it. Washington was evidently awaited. As soon as he appeared a little +hand-bell was rung, and a number of dark, shrouded figures with +covered faces crept forth like shadows from the lodges throughout the +camp and crowded around the grave, a mute and gloomy throng. + +The bell was rung again, and the dark crowd became motionless as +statues. Then Washington in a mournful monotone repeated what I +supposed to be prayers for the dead. At the end of each prayer the +little bell was rung and responses came out of the depths of the +surrounding darkness. Then the squaws chanted a wild funeral song in +tones of surpassing plaintiveness. At its close the bell tinkled once +more, and the figures that surrounded the grave vanished as darkly +as they came. Washington, one or two warriors and ourselves alone +remained. + +"You like--see--him--dead man?" asked Washington. + +The question was addressed to me. + +I never want to look on a dead face if I can avoid it; so with +thanks I declined. Washington seemed a little disappointed, as if he +considered we showed a somewhat uncourteous want of interest in the +deceased. Noticing this, the lieutenant said he would like to see the +dead man's face, and, preceded by Washington, we moved toward the +bundle of blankets and buffalo-robes that lay by the side of the +grave. Washington threw back the buffalo-robes, and a bright gleam of +the cottonwood fire disclosed the upturned face of the dead Nez Perce +and lightened up the long, thick locks of glossy blue-black hair. It +was the face of a man about thirty--bold, clear-cut features and long, +aquiline nose: a good face and a strong face it seemed in death. + +When we had looked upon the rigid features a few moments, Washington +covered the face of his dead brother. The body, coffined in blankets +and skins, was placed in the grave, and the men began to throw the +earth upon it. + +"That's--all," said Washington. "Come!" + +And he moved away toward our tent. + +He seemed to think some apology necessary for the simplicity of the +ceremonial. "If," said he, "Chapman [the interpreter]--he tell--we +sleep here to-morrow--we put dead man--in ground--when sun he ver' +litt'; an' Yoseph he come--an' you come--an' I come--all come--white +man an' Injun." + +"He was a fine-looking young man," I remarked, alluding to the dead +Indian. + +Washington was pleased by the compliment to his departed brother. +He stopped short, and, turning toward me, said, "Yes, he fine young +man--good man--good young man." + +"I thought he was rather an oldish man," remarked the lieutenant. + +"No, no," replied Washington, touching his head--"all black hairs--no +white hairs. Good young man." + +And Washington led the way back toward the lieutenant's tent, saying, +"Let us go--eat up--yelly." + +J. T. + + + +REFORM IN VERSE. + + +A want of the day is some good fugitive poetry: bad is superabundant. +The demand is for short and telling effusions in plain, direct and +intelligible English, speaking to feelings possessed by everybody, and +placing incidents, scenes and creatures, familiar or exceptional, in +a poetic light, bright and warm rather than fierce or dazzling. The +millions are waiting to be stirred and charmed, and will be very +thankful to the singer who shall do it for them. Studied obscurity +of thought and language, verbal finicalities and conceits, and mere +ingenuities of any kind, rhythmic, mental or sentimental, will not +meet the occasion: that sort of thing is overdone already. It is the +"swollen imposthume" of refinement, an excrescence on culture, a +penalty of which we have suffered enough. The Heliconian streams which +are not deep, but only dark, must run dry if they cannot run clear. +Sparkling and pellucid rills, wherein we can all see our own-selves +and trace our own dreams, irradiated with light like the flickering +of gems, and set off with rich foil, are those to attract the popular +eye. Genuine humor, pathos, elevation and delicacy of fancy seek no +disguise, but aim at the utmost simplicity of expression. Inversions, +like affectation in every shape, are foreign to them. True songsters, +like the birds, warble to be heard, understood and loved, and not to +astonish or puzzle. + +We read the other day, duly headed "For the ---- ----," and signed +with the contributor's name and place of residence, Wolfe's well-known +lines to his wife, the one good thing preserved of him, and better, in +our humble judgment, than those on the burial of Moore. The wearer of +borrowed plumes was obviously confident that his theft would not be +detected, readers of to-day having been so long unfamiliar with poetry +of that character as to be sure to set it down as original and hail +the reviver of it as a new light. Perhaps he may turn out to have been +right in that impression, and figure as the herald, if not an active +inaugurator, of a new era of taste in verse. He cannot remain the +only practical asserter of the theory that it is better to steal good +poetry than to write bad. Should his followers, however, shrink from +downright theft, they might consent to shine as adapters. Some who are +masters of English undefiled might help the cause by translating some +of the best bits of Browning, Swinburne and Rossetti, to say nothing +of Tennyson, who has gradually constructed a dialect of his own and +trained us to understand it. + +By fugitive poetry we mean the work of those usually classed as +song-writers and lyrists, leaving out the big guns, if we have had any +of the latter tribe since Milton, who was himself strongest in short +poems. Most modern poets have made their debut in the periodical +press, and those who did not have shown a painful tendency to run to +epic. The age respectfully declines epics. + +We should not despair of the suggested revival. Ours is not the first +period that has suffered under the dealers in _concetti_. They have +had things somewhat their own way before--in the century which +included Spenser and Donne, for instance. Our euphuists may pass away +like those of the Elizabethan era, or, like the best of them, live in +spite of faults with which they were gratuitously trammelled. + +E. B. + + * * * * * + + + + +LITERATURE OF THE DAY. + + +Bits of Travel at Home. By H. H. Boston: Roberts Brothers. + +The author's present home we should incline to fix in Colorado, but +she includes New England and California in her travels, and finds +something beautiful to describe wherever she goes within those broad +limits. The Yosemite, the Big Trees, the Mormons, the Chinese, the +snow-sheds, drawing-room cars, agates, prairie-and mountain-flowers, +New Hampshire life and scenery, and an infinity of like material, +are readably, and not incongruously, presented in her little book. +Population is so sparse and Nature so redundant in the scene of most +of her descriptions as to render them sometimes a little lifeless, and +oblige her to depend too solely upon her powers of landscape painting +with the pen. We miss the human element, as we do in the vast, however +luxuriant, pictures of Bierstadt and Moran--artists who preceded her +on the same sketching-ground. Not that she fails to make the most of +what Nature places before her. Rather, she makes too much of it, and +lavishes whole pages on truthful, minute and vivid, but bewildering, +detail of mountain, river, rock, plain, plants and sea. She is +enraptured, for example, with Lake Tahoe and with the wild flowers of +California and Colorado, and enables us to understand why she is so; +but the raptures are not shared by the reader, partly for the very +reason that they are so elaborately explained. Printer's ink, when +used as a pigment or pencil, should be used sparingly, with a few, +sharp, clear, bold touches, and without painful finish or niggling. +What amplification would not weaken instead of heightening the effect +of "the copse-wood gray that waved and wept on Loch Achray"? Breadth, +distance and atmosphere are obscured by H. H.'s carefully itemized +foregrounds. But the itemizing is done admirably and con amore by one +who is a botanist, a poet and an observer. The Great Desert is no +desert to her: no square foot of it is barren. Even the sage-brush has +a charm, if only from its dim likeness to a miniature olive tree, both +being glaucous and hoary. An oasis of irrigated clover on Humboldt +River is made a theme for an idyl. The vast rocks, when bare even of +moss, are at least rich and various in tint and form, and have plenty +of meaning to her. + +A traveller between Omaha and San Francisco might well carry this +pocket volume as a lorgnette. It will show him what he might otherwise +miss, and make more visible to him what he sees. It belongs to a high +class of railroad literature, and is in style and matter so full of +movement as to suggest the railway to readers by the fireside. + + +Putnam's Art Handbooks. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. + +This series of manuals for beginners with pencil and palette will +include five small books. The two before us treat of "Landscape +Painting" and "Sketching from Nature." Both are old acquaintances, +reprinted respectively from the thirty-fourth and thirty-eighth London +editions. When they first came under our eye, more years ago than we +need state, they bore the imprint of a London firm of color-dealers, +and were loaded down with advertisements and less direct +recommendations of their wares to an extent that rather obscured the +valuable and interesting part of the publications. This rubbish has +been swept away in the American edition, so that the tyro can get at +what he needs to know more readily, and use it with more confidence, +than when he was puzzled to distinguish between solid instruction and +hollow puffery. The notes added by the American editor are very scant, +and yet so sensible as to enhance one's regret at their paucity and +meagreness. Directions for the use of pigments and vehicles well +enough adapted for the English climate may require modification for +ours. Moreover, British artists have not unfrequently, in their +methods, shown themselves too prone to sacrifice durability to +immediate effect. The list of colors has, too, been enriched by some +accessions within the past third of a century which demand mention. +Such points should be considered in a new edition of the brochure on +landscape painting. Generally speaking, it is a good guide, and may +safely be placed in the hands of the young colorist. + +The sketcher from Nature will find in the other a succinct set of +rules clearly stated. He will not need much else if he has a good hand +and eye, and the industry and perseverance to use them. He has first +to render objects and scenes by simple lines; and to assist him in +that the elementary laws of perspective are here laid before him. Some +mechanical appliances, such as a small frame that may be carried in +the pocket, divided by equidistant wires, vertical and horizontal, and +serving, when held before the eye, to fix the relative situation of +points in the view, we do not find alluded to. Perhaps they are as +well let alone, as corks have been abandoned in the swimming-school. + +When the series is completed the whole may well be bound together. +Smaller type, thinner paper and less margin would make a book readily +portable, containing all that is indispensable to the student, and a +good deal besides that the maturer artist will be none the worse for +being reminded of. One who has attained some little facility with the +pencil might adopt it as a sufficient mentor in the field or in the +studio, and accept its guidance in a path to be perfected by his own +powers, according to their measure, toward such pleasure, elevation of +taste or fortune as art offers. Studies abound everywhere. The ruins, +arched bridges and picturesque dwellings and other erections of Europe +are but slenderly to be regretted by the American beginner. He has no +lack of clouds, rocks, trees, houses, etc., embracing within their +contours every possible line and shade. He may even learn precision of +line and tint better than his Transatlantic brother, who is apt to be +tempted into carelessness by the ragged variety and indecision of +the objects offered by his surroundings and nearly unknown here. +The broken and wandering touch suggested by the jagged stones of a +crumbling castle is not that which one should begin by cultivating. +Breadth and firmness in form, color and chiaroscuro are attainments to +be first held in view, and never to be lost sight of. + +We have often wondered that the _technique_ of art should have so +meagre a literature. Its philosophy and poetry have employed many +pens, and been exhaustively analyzed, but this has been mostly the +work of outsiders--of critics devoid even of the qualification laid +down by Disraeli of having failed in the practical exploitation of the +field they discuss, but for all that often powerful critics. Artists +have rarely been able to paint their pictures in black and white +and run them through the press. They cannot so display the infinite +gradations that grow upon their canvas, nor trace in words the subtle +principles which have presided at the birth of their works and of +every part of them. General rules they can lay down, as poets can the +elements of their own trade; but these rules are at the command of the +veriest daub or rhymester; the manifold development of them to results +almost divine remaining, even to those who achieve it in either walk, +evasive and untraceable. The masters of verse and art have mapped +out for us none of their secrets. The deductions we make from their +practice are our deductions, not theirs. Raffaelle, if questioned, +could only point to his palette spread with the common colors, and +Homer had not even pen and ink. Our versifiers are provided with +admirable paper and gold pens, and our artists, young and old, with +the colors Elliott once told an inquirer he made his marvellous +flesh-tints with--red, blue and yellow. + + +Adventures of a Consul Abroad. By Luigi Monti. Boston: Lee & Shepard. + +This is a didactic or illustrative story, with a moral we find thus +laid down on the last page: "Our government sends men abroad who, +after hard labor and long experience, learn a complicated, delicate +and responsible profession; and no sooner have they learned it, and +are able to perform creditably to themselves and the government +they represent all its intricate duties, than they are recalled and +replaced by inexperienced men, who have to go through the same ordeal, +and never stay long enough to be of real service to their country." + +The gentleman upon whose shadowy shoulders is placed the heavy task of +pointing this dictum is Samuel Sampleton, Esq., teacher of a private +seminary on Cape Cod, who gets tired of the young idea and seeks more +profitable and expanded fields of labor. He has not, at the outset, +the slightest preparation for the duties of the position--that of +United States consul at Verdecuerno (a translation of Palermo into +"Greenhorn")--or even knowledge of what they are. His utter lack of +information in the premises is indeed quite exceptional, especially +in a New England teacher. We should have expected an average lad of +fourteen in any part of the Union to have suspected that a consul +would need some acquaintance with the language of the people among +whom he was stationed, if not some slight notion of the general +routine and purposes of the office. Mr. Sampleton, however, is not +lacking in shrewdness and energy, and sets to work manfully, despite +the difficulties of his situation, general and special. After several +trying years, the comical tribulations of which are graphically +set forth, he is just beginning to feel himself at home when he is +summarily placed there in another sense by recall. He comes back as +poor as he went, save in experience and the languages, and resumes the +ferule with the determination not again to abandon it for the pen of +the public employe. + +It is chiefly to the social side of consular life that Mr. Monti +introduces us, and most of the scenes belong to that aspect. The +salary, no longer eked out by fees and other perquisites, is much +inferior to the emoluments of other consuls at the same port, and +the American representative is consequently entirely outshone by his +colleagues of other nationalities. A considerable degree of diplomatic +style is expected from the corps, and kept up by all but himself. In +dinners, equipages, buttons and gold lace, and display of every kind, +not merely France, England and Russia, but Denmark and Turkey, leave +him deep in the shade. They have consular residences, large offices +and reading-rooms, with secretaries, interpreters and the other +paraphernalia of a small embassy, while Jonathan nests, with his +wife, on the third or fourth flat of a suburban rookery, and uses his +dining-room for an office. The sea-captains grumble at having to seek +him in such a burrow, and being accorded nothing when they get there +beyond the barest official action. He cannot interchange courtesies +with the magnates of the city, and thus places himself and the +interests of his country, so far as that often potent means of +influence goes, at a great disadvantage. A pompous commodore brings an +American squadron into port, and is ineffably disgusted at finding +his consul utterly unable to do the honors or in any way assist the +cruise. + +Our author holds that the compensation of these mercantile and +quasi-diplomatic agents ought to be largely increased, it being now +inadequate as measured either by their labor and responsibility or +by the allowances made by other nations, our commercial rivals. +Certainly, additional pay in any reasonable proportion would be but a +trifle in comparison with the result should it promote the rise of our +marine from its present unprecedented state of depression. If consuls +will create, or recreate, shipping, and reintroduce the American flag +to the numerous foreign ports to which it is becoming each year more +and more a stranger, let us by all means have them everywhere and at +liberal salaries, with quant. suff. of clerks, assistants, flunkeys, +dress-suits for dinner-parties and court-suits for state receptions, +and all the other necessaries of an efficient consulate, the want +whereof so vexed the soul of Mr. Sampleton. And then let us make +fixtures of these gentlemen, with good behavior for their tenure of +office, and in the selection of them endeavor to apply abroad the test +it seems next to impossible to adhere to at home--honesty, capacity +and fidelity. + + +_Books Received_. + +The Bible for Learners. By Dr. H. Oort and Dr. I. Hooykaas. Volume II. +From David to Josiah, from Josiah to the supremacy of the Mosaic Law. +Authorized Translation. Boston: Roberts Brothers. + +A Vision of the Future: A Series of Papers on Canon Farrar's "Eternal +Hope." By Various Divines. (No. 3 of the International Religio-Science +Series.) Detroit: Rose-Belford Publishing Co. + +The Cincinnati Organ, with a Brief Description of the Cincinnati Music +Hall. Edited by George Ward Nichols. Cincinnati: Robert Clarke & Co. + +Protection and Revenue in 1877. By William G. Sumner. (Economic +Monographs, No. 8.) New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. + +Hallock's American Club List and Sportsman Glossary. By Charles +Hallock. New York: Forest and Stream Publishing Co. + +Shooting Stars, as observed from the "Sixth Column" of the _Times_. By +W. L. Alden. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. + +Christ, His Nature and Work: A Series of Discourses by Eminent +Divines. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. + +Poganuc People: Their Loves and Lives. By Harriet Beecher Stowe. New +York: Fords, Howard & Hurlbert. + +Children of Nature. By the Earl of Desart. Toronto: Rose-Belford +Publishing Co. + +Francisco: A Poem. By William Watrous. San Francisco: A. L. Bancroft & +Co. + +Aspirations of the World. By L. Maria Child. Boston: Roberts Brothers. + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, +August, 1878, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LIPPINCOTT'S MAGAZINE *** + +***** This file should be named 18885.txt or 18885.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/8/8/8/18885/ + +Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Lesley Halamek and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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