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diff --git a/24188-8.txt b/24188-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6b2541d --- /dev/null +++ b/24188-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5994 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 30, +June 1893, 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: The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 30, June 1893 + An Illustrated Monthly + +Author: Various + +Editor: George Newnes + +Release Date: January 7, 2008 [EBook #24188] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK STRAND MAGAZINE *** + + + + +Produced by Victorian/Edwardian Pictorial Magazines, +Jonathan Ingram, Josephine Paolucci and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net. + + + + + + + +THE STRAND + +AN ILLUSTRATED MONTHLY + + +Vol. 5, Issue. 30. + +June 1893 + + + * * * * * + + + + +[Illustration: "THE HEAD BOOK-KEEPER STEPPED OUT OF THE SAFE." + +(_Pierre and Baptiste._)] + + + + +Pierre and Baptiste + +BY BECKLES WILLSON. + + +I once knew two industrious mechanics named Pierre and Baptiste. They +dwelt in a ramshackle tenement at Sault aux Beloeuil, where each had +half-a-dozen children to support, besides their wives; who, it is +grievous to relate, were drones. They were only nominally acquainted +with that godly art commonly associated with charwomen. + +Pierre and Baptiste were hard workers. They worked far into the night +and, occasionally, the thin mists of dawn had begun to break on the +narrow city pavements before their labours would cease. No one could +truthfully say that theirs was not a hard-earned pillow. Sometimes they +did not toil in vain. It depended largely upon the police. + +It was early one November that this horny-handed pair planned the +burglary of a certain safe located in a wholesale establishment in St. +Mark Street. On the particular evening that Pierre and Baptiste hit upon +for the deed, the head book-keeper had been having a wrangle with his +accounts. + +"I can't make head or tail of this!" he declared to his employer, the +senior member of the firm, "yet I am convinced everything must be right. +An error of several hundred dollars has been carried over from each +daily footing, but where the error begins or ends, I'm blessed if I can +find out." + +[Illustration: "THE HEAD BOOK-KEEPER HAD BEEN HAVING A WRANGLE WITH HIS +ACCOUNTS."] + +The fact was that the monthly sales had been unusually heavy, and a page +of the balance had been mislaid. The head book-keeper spent upwards of +an hour in casting up both the entries of himself and his subordinates +after the establishment had closed its doors for the day. + +Then he went home to supper, determined to return and locate the +deficit, if he didn't get a wink of sleep until morning. + +Book-keepers, it must be borne in mind, have highly sensitive organisms, +which are susceptible to the smallest atom reflecting upon their probity +or skill. At half-past eight the book-keeper returned and commenced anew +his critical calculations. He worked precisely three hours and a half; +at the end of which period he suddenly clapped his hand to his forehead +and exclaimed:-- + +"Idiot! Why haven't you looked in the safe for a missing sheet? Ten +chances to one they have been improperly numbered!" + +He turned over the pages of the balance on his desk, and, sure enough, +the usual numerical mark or designation in the upper left-hand corner +which should follow eleven was missing. Page twelve, in all likelihood, +had slipped into some remote corner of the safe. + +The safe was a large one, partially receding into the wall and +containing all the papers, documents, and several day receipts in cash +and drafts of the firm. + +The head book-keeper, in his efforts at unearthing the lost page of the +cash balance, was obliged to intrude his entire person into the safe. +Fearful lest the candle he held should attract attention from the +street, showing out as it did against the black recesses of the safe, +upon entering he drew the door slightly ajar. + +As he stepped in the tail of his coat caught on an angle of the huge +riveted lock; the massive gate swung to as if it weighed no more than a +pound, and the book-keeper was a prisoner. + +He heard a resonant click--that was all. His candle went out. + +The book-keeper at the outset lost his presence of mind. He fought like +a caged animal. He first exerted almost superhuman strength against the +four sides of the iron tomb. Then his body collapsed and, not for an +instant losing consciousness, he found himself sitting in a partially +upright posture, unable to so much as stir a muscle. + +It was almost at the same moment, although hours seemed to have passed, +that the drum of his ear, now abnormally sensitive, was almost split +into fragments. A frightful monotonous clangour rent the interior of the +safe. + +[Illustration: "HE STEPPED IN."] + +The book-keeper used to observe afterwards that a single second's +deviation of characteristic thought and he would have gone mad. Stronger +minds in a parallel situation would have indeed collapsed. But a weaker +man can never confront the inevitable, but clings more stubbornly to +hope. They are only weak individualities who, in the act of drowning, +catch at straws. + +As the book-keeper felt himself gradually growing faint for want of air +to breathe, his revivified hope led him to deliberately crash his fist +into the woodwork with which the interior of the safe was fitted, in +secretaire fashion, one drawer being built above another. This gave him +a few additional cubic feet of air. + +As may have been conjectured, the noise which smote the book-keeper's +ear was that of a drill. Although acutely discerned within, the sound +was practically smothered on the outside of the vault. + +At one end of the drill was a cavity, rapidly growing larger, in one of +the steel panels. At its other end was a heavy, warty fist, part of the +anatomy of Baptiste, the industrious mechanic. Baptiste held the drill +while his comrade, Pierre, pounded it in. + +Soon the two burglars became aware that some sort of animal commotion +was going on within the safe. It nearly drove them into convulsions of +astonishment. Baptiste was so startled that he dropped the drill. + +"It is a ghost," he said. + +Baptiste was for throwing up the job uncompromisingly on the spot, but +this proposal met with obstacles. His fellow workman, who was of stiffer +courage, rejected it with scorn, as savouring too much of the +superstitious. Pierre had a large family to support, he argued. He spoke +frankly. They could not afford to throw away the opportunities of +Providence. To his friend and co-labourer, the burden of his remarks +was:-- + +"_Lâche!_ Go hon! You make me tired wiz yer ghosts an' tings. Let's not +have no beast foolin'--see? De job is commence: _Allons!_" + +The upshot of this was that Pierre and Baptiste went back to work. At +the third crack of the drill, Pierre crossed himself, and said:-- + +"Baptiste, dere's a man in dat safe!" + +Both men grew pale as death at the very suggestion. Baptiste, for +instance, was so frightened he couldn't utter a syllable. His tongue +clove to the roof of his mouth. However, Pierre, as usual, was the first +to recover. He applied his ear, first to the lock and then to the +drill-hole. + +"Hey, in dere!" he cried, yet not so loud as to be heard on the +side-walk. To this there came a faint response--a very faint shout +indeed; it sounded as if it were a mile away:-- + +"For God's sake, give me air! I am locked in here. Try and burst open +the safe!" + +The two burglars did not stop to talk, but went at once to work as if +their own lives depended on the result, instead of the life of the +mysterious occupant of the vault. In less than four minutes they had a +hole, somewhat smaller than the business end of a collar-button, knocked +into the panel of the vault. + +Then Pierre and Baptiste paused to wipe the sweat from their brows. The +man inside breathed. + +It was now that the pair began to muse on the dénouement. Could this be +a member of the firm or an employé? This hypothesis jeopardized the +success of the night's adventure, unless, when they had permitted the +prisoner to emerge, they bound and gagged him into silence. + +On the other hand, this course would have an ugly look. If he resisted +it might mean murder in the end; whereas, if they did not let him out at +all, they would stand no chance of profiting by the pecuniary contents +of the safe. Besides, as the man could scarcely live thus until morning, +they would be responsible for his taking off. Thus reasoned Pierre and +Baptiste. + +[Illustration: "BOTH MEN GREW PALE AS DEATH."] + +These were not highly comforting reflections, but there was still +another and a better in reserve. What if, after all, the man were +himself a felon? Might he not be a companion crib-cracker? In that case +they would merely have to divide the spoils. + +"Hey, in dere," cried Pierre, suddenly struck with an idea. "What is de +combination hof de safe?" + +"Fifteen--three--seventy-three!" came back in sepulchral tones. + +It was evidently growing harder and harder to draw breath through the +tiny aperture. + +Thus it transpired that at the expiration of fifteen seconds the lock of +the vault gave back the same resonant click it had rendered eight +minutes previously. Thanks to the timely advent of Pierre and Baptiste +it opened as lightly, as airily, and as decisively as it had closed 480 +seconds before on the unhappy accountant. + +The head book-keeper gasped once or twice, but without any assistance +stepped out into the free air. He was very pale and his dress was much +rent and disordered when his feet touched the floor. But this pallor +quickly made way for a red flush at perceiving the two burglars, with +the implements of their profession strewn around them. + +Meanwhile Pierre and Baptiste themselves stood transfixed by the sheer +novelty of the situation. + +Without any kind of speech or warning, or without making any attempt at +bravado, the book-keeper walked deliberately to his desk and rang an +electric call for the police. Simultaneously it seemed, for so rapid and +quiet was the action, he opened a drawer, took out a small revolver, and +covered both burglars with a fatal precision. As he did so he uttered +these remarkable words:-- + +"Gentlemen, I would, indeed, be the basest of men if I did not feel +profoundly grateful for the service you have just rendered me. I shall +always regard you as any right-minded man should regard those who have +saved his life with imminent peril to themselves or, which is just the +same, to their liberty. Any demand in reason you make of me I shall make +an effort to perform--but my duty to my employers I regard as +_paramount_. I have accumulated a little money, and with it I propose to +engage the best counsel in your defence, which is certainly marked by +mitigating circumstances. If, on the other hand, you are convicted----" + +Here the officers of justice entered, having broken open the door with a +crash. + +[Illustration] + + + + +Future Dictates of Fashion + +BY W. CADE GALL. + + +An elderly gentleman of our acquaintance, whose reading has been rather +desultory than profound, and tending rather to the quaint and +speculative, was astonished recently at coming across a volume in his +library of whose very existence he had been completely unaware. This +volume was oblong in shape, was bound in mauve morocco, and was called +"Past Dictates of Fashion; by Cromwell Q. Snyder, Vestamentorum Doctor." + +Glancing his eye downwards past a somewhat flippant sub-title, the +elderly gentleman came, with intense amazement, to understand that the +date of this singular performance was 1993. Other persons at a similar +juncture would have pinched themselves to see if they were awake, or +have tossed the book into the street as an uncanny thing. But our +elderly gentleman being of an inquisitive and acquisitive turn of mind, +despite his quaintness, recognised the fact that if he was not of the +twentieth century the volume obviously was; seized pen and paper, and +began to make notes with the speed of lightning. Being also something of +a draughtsman he was able to embellish his notes with sketches from the +engravings with which "Past Dictates of Fashion" was copiously +furnished. These sketches appear with the present article. + +Fashion in dress, according to the twentieth century author, +notwithstanding its apparent caprice, has always been governed by +immutable laws. But these laws were not recognised in the benighted +epoch in which we happen to live at present. On the contrary, Fashion is +thought a whim, a sort of shuttlecock for the weak-minded of both sexes +to make rise and fall, bound and rebound with the battledore +called--social influence. But it will interest a great many people to +learn that Fashion assumed the dignity of a science in 1940. Ten years +later it was taken up by the University of Dublin. By the science as +taught by the various Universities later on were explained those points +in the history, manners, and literature of our own ancestors which were +formerly obscure and, in fact, unknown. They were also, by certain +strict rules, enabled to foretell the attire of posterity. Here is a +curious passage from the introductory chapter to the book:-- + +"Cigars went out of fashion twenty years ago. Men and women consumed so +much tobacco that their healths were endangered. The laws of Nature were +powerless to cope with the evil. Not so the laws of Fashion, which at +once abated it. It will, however, return in thirty-one years. In 1790 +Nature commanded men to bathe. They laughed at Nature. In 1810 Fashion +did the same thing. Men complied, and daily cold baths became +established. In 1900 it was pushed to extremes. The ultra-sect cut holes +in the ice and plunged into the water. The fashion changed. For forty +years only cads bathed." + +The following table is also interesting, and should be borne in mind in +considering the accompanying cuts. It professes to exhibit the +sartorial characteristics of an epoch:-- + + TABLE OF WAVES. + + Type. Tendency. +1790 to 1815 Angustorial Wobbling +1815 " 1840 Severe Recuperative +1840 " 1875 Latorial Decided +1875 " 1890 Tailor-made Opaque +1890 " 1915 Ebullient Bizarre +1915 " 1940 Hysterical Angustorial + +[Illustration: 1893] + +[Illustration: 1905] + +The first plate in the book is dated 1893, and serves as a frontispiece. +The costumes of the lady and gentleman are familiar enough, although we +note with surprise that the gentleman's coat-talks seem to have a +crinoline cast, and if the turned-up bottoms of his trousers are a +little mortifying, it is atoned for by a triumphant attitude which +disarms hypercriticism. Also the lady's posture makes it difficult for +us to tell whether it is a stick or an umbrella she is carrying. + +[Illustration: 1908] + +There is a pictorial hiatus of some years, but the text notes that +crinoline for women enjoyed a sway of some years' duration. For, taking +the tracings from the plates in the order in which they are given in the +book, we find a subdued form of the article in the female costume for +1905. The ladies may well regard this plate as astounding. There is even +a suggestion of "bloomer" about its nether portion, and if the hat is +not without precedent in history, the waist is little short of +revolutionary. + +[Illustration: 1910] + +The next plate displays a gentleman's habit for the year 1908. The +tailors, fifteen years hence, seemed to have borrowed, in the +construction of the coat, very liberally from the lady's mantle of 1893. +Apropos of this and the ensuing three plates, it is pleasing to be told, +as we are by the author of this book, that the long reign of black is +doomed. Towards the close of April, 1898, Lord Arthur Lawtrey appeared +in the Park attired literally in purple and fine linen, _i.e._, in a +violet coat, with pale heliotrope trousers. + +[Illustration: 1902, 1911-12] + +Yet, in spite of the opposition to Lord Arthur, the wave was due, and +the affection for colour spread. The new century, at its birth, saw +black relegated to the past--also to the future. This was midway in the +Ebullient Age. Pent up for decades, mankind naturally began to slop over +with sartorial enthusiasm. In 1920 its _bizarrerie_ became offensive, +and an opposition crusade was directed against it. Something had to be +conceded. Trousers, which had been wavering between nautical buttons and +gallooned knees--or, in the vernacular of the period, a sail three +sheets in the wind and a flag at half-mast--were the items sacrificed. +Knee-breeches enjoyed vogue for a time, but only for a time; for they +vanished suddenly in 1930 and were replaced by tights or shapes. Boots +made way for Elizabethan slippers. Hats had long since gone the way of +the superannuated. Taught by the Darwinian theory, society discovered +whence its tendency to baldness originated. They had recourse by degrees +to flexible tiles of extraordinary cut. + +[Illustration: 1912] + +[Illustration: 1912] + +A further glance at the costume for the swells between 1902 and 1912 +reveals the existence of an entirely novel adjunct to male attire. Silk +bows have been worn about the neck for nearly, if not quite, a century, +but never in the body of the attire. It is true the gentleman as early +as 1910 adorns his nether garments with a plain silk band, but in the +elderly party of 1911 he has assumed gay ribbons for his shoes as well +as at his knees and throat. In this plate we greet the presence of an +unmistakable umbrella as a good omen. But it is only a short-lived +rapture, for the spruce young party in the next sketch is balancing +lightly between thumb and forefinger what we take to be nothing more or +less than a shepherd's crook. This is hardly an edifying prospect. Yet +if we do not altogether mistake the two wing-shaped objects projecting +from his person, it is not the only feature of gentlemen's fashions +twenty years hence which will occasion a shock. Nor must we overlook the +frivolity of the lady of the same period who is doing her utmost to look +pleasant under the most trying conditions. Yet it must be confessed that +in spite of its intricate novelty and perplexity, the costume must still +be called plain. One might be forgiven for surmising that the +kerchief-shaped article covering a portion of the lady's bust is formed +of riveted steel, for surely nothing else could support the intolerable +load she is so blandly carrying off. + +Female costume seems to have always been regulated by the same waves and +rules which governed male costume, but in a different degree. In the +Ebullient period it is chiefly distinguished by head-dress and the total +abolition of stays. Crinoline, in spite of certain opposition, enjoyed a +slight revival in the present day, and in 1897 the divided skirt +threatened to spread universally. But it passed off, and nothing of a +radical order was attempted in this direction until the revolution which +brought in trousers for women in 1942. + +Meantime, in the next plate of a lady's costume, which is dated 1922, we +have presented a very rational and beautiful style of dress. The skirt, +it is true, is short enough to alarm prim contemporary dames, and it is +scarcely less assuring to find in the whole of the remaining plates only +three periods when it seems to have got longer. But doubtless the very +ample cloak, which is so long that it even trails upon the ground, +extenuated and in some degree justified its shortness. + +[Illustration: 1922] + +[Illustration: 1920] + +[Illustration: 1926] + +The plate dated 1920 exhibits a very gorgeous and yet altogether simple +set of garments for the male of that period. We are told that the upper +portion was of crimson plush, and the lower part of a delicate pink, +with white stockings and orange boots. It were well had the leaders of +fashion stopped at this, but it would appear that either their thirst +for novelty was insatiable or the Hysterical Wave too strong for them, +for in the incredibly short space of six years fashion had reached the +stage depicted in the following plate. Yet, even then, the depth of +folly and ugliness does not appear to have been sounded, for three years +later, in 1929, we are favoured with a plate of what is presumably a +husband and wife on their way to church or perchance upon a shopping +excursion. The lady is evidently looking archly back to see if anybody +is observing what a consummate guy her spouse is making of himself, for +with all her sartorial short-comings she has certainly the best of the +bargain. The prudes, too, seemed to have gained their point, for the +skirt is considerably less scanty in the region of the ankles. + +[Illustration: 1929] + +This skirt seems to have been rather a weak point with our posterity of +the female persuasion, for in the next three or four plates we find it +rising and falling with the habitual incorrigibility of a shilling +barometer. The Oriental influence is easily traced in the fashions from +1938 to 1945, but it cannot but make the judicious grieve to note that +trousers seem to have been adopted by the women at the same time that +they were discarded by the men. + +[Illustration: 1935] + +[Illustration: 1938] + +A further detail which might interest the student concerns the revival +of lace, which transpired so early as 1905. Curiously enough, this +dainty adjunct to the attire had fallen into desuetude among women. More +curiously still, it remained for the sterner sex to revive it. For it +was in that year that the backbone of stiff white collars and cuffs was +broken. A material being sought which would weather the existing +atmospheric conditions, it was yielded in lace, which continued in vogue +for at least two generations. + +[Illustration: 1940] + +[Illustration: 1945] + +If we look for the greatest donkey in the entire collection, it is +obvious that we shall find him in the middle-aged party of 1936, who is +gadding about in inflated trunks and with a fan in his hand. If it were +not for the gloves and polka-dot neck-wear we should assume that this +costume was a particularly fantastic bathing-suit. The youth of the +ensuing year, in the next plate, is probably a son of the foregoing +personage, for it is not difficult to detect a strong family likeness. +As to the costume itself for 1937, barring the shaved head and +Caledonian cap, there is nothing particular to be urged against it. It +seems clearly a revival of the dress of the Middle Ages. + +[Illustration: 1936] + +[Illustration: 1937] + +[Illustration: 1945] + +It is at least consoling to feel that only a very small minority of +those who read this is destined to enliven our thoroughfares with such +grotesque images as is furnished by the plate for 1945. The confidently +asinine demeanour of this youth is hardly relieved by the absurdity of a +watch suspended by a chain from the crown of his hat. That society +protested against this aspect of idiocy is evinced by the harmonious +costume for 1950, in which a complete revolution is to be noted. We +hasten to observe that the latter plate--the one for 1948--is that of a +clergyman. + +[Illustration: 1950] + +[Illustration: 1946] + +[Illustration: 1948] + +There is very little beauty about the lady's costume for 1946, or in +that of the child in the plate. That for 1950 is a great improvement. +The exaggerated chignon has disappeared, and two seasons later we find +the costume fascinating to a degree, although certainly partaking more +of the male than of the female order of dress. Without the cape it is +not so captivating, as shown by the plate dated 1955-6, where both a +lady and gentleman are shown, although to accord praise to either's +hideous style of head-dress would be to abandon permanently all +reputation for taste. + +[Illustration: 1950] + +[Illustration: 1952] + +[Illustration: 1955-6] + +The policeman shown in the drawing for 1960 seems to have a very easy +time of it, for no man's person can be considered in danger from the mob +who habitually offers so many _points à saisir_ as this policeman's head +displays. We may likewise suspect the military gentleman depicted in the +plate for 1965. It is not customary in the present day for army officers +to affect umbrellas, but seventy years hence it may be found necessary +to protect one's head-dress. + +[Illustration: 1960] + +[Illustration: 1965] + +[Illustration: 1965] + +Mawkish describes the attire of the civilian of the same year, but in +1970 we notice a distinct change for the better, although personally +many of us would doubtless strenuously object to wearing neckties of the +magnitude here portrayed. In 1975 costume seems to have taken a step +backward, and the literary young gentleman, who is the hero of the +engraving, may well be carrying about his MSS. inside his umbrella. +Whatever may be the merits of the spring fashions for 1978, it would +appear to have been universal (to speak of the future in the past +tense), for both these young gallants are dressed precisely alike. Of +the three remaining designs, that of 1984 appears to us to exhibit the +contour of the lady's figure most generously, and to have certain +agreeable and distinctive traits of its own which are not only lacking +in the gentleman's apparel, but are absent from the inane conception +which appears to have obtained vogue five years later. + +[Illustration: 1970] + +[Illustration: 1975] + +[Illustration: 1978] + +[Illustration: 1984] + +As to the last plate in the series, we can only remark that if the +character of our male posterity after four or five generations is to be +as effeminate as its attire, the domination by the fair sex cannot be +many centuries distant. The gentleman appears to be lost in +contemplation of a lighted cigar. If he possessed the gift of seeing +himself as others now see him, he would probably transfer his attentions +to another and not less contiguous quarter. + +[Illustration: Spring and Summer Fashions, 1932.] + +In a general review of the costumes of the forthcoming century the +Doctor observes:-- + +"The seventeenth is famous as the brown; the eighteenth is with us the +yellow; and the nineteenth we term the black century. I am asked my +opinion of the twentieth. It is motley. It has seen the apotheosis of +colour. Yet in worshipping colour we do not confound the order of +things. As is the twentieth, so was the fifteenth." + +The author furthermore observes that "the single article of apparel +which stands out most silhouetted against the background of the 19th +century's dress is its hard, shiny, black head-gear. It is without a +parallel. It is impossible for us to conceive of a similar article +surviving for so long a period; and I venture to say, versed as I am in +the science, nothing more absurd and irredeemably inappropriate, or more +openly violating in texture and contour every rational idea on the +subject, was ever launched. In 1962 the neck was left bare, in the +négligé fashion, in imitation of Butts, the æsthete who the year +previously had discovered the North Pole. In 1970, however, ruffs were +resumed and are still worn, and I regret to say are growing in +magnitude, until they threaten to eclipse precedent." + +At this juncture the notes and nap together terminated, for our elderly +gentleman woke up. + +[Illustration: 1989] + +[Illustration: 1993] + + + + +_Shafts from an Eastern Quiver._ + +XII.--THE DAUGHTER OF LOVETSKI THE LOST. + +BY CHARLES J. MANSFORD, B.A. + + +I. + +"Our journey seems to have no end, Harold," remarked Denviers, as he +lashed the horses which drew our sledge over the dreary plain; "for a +week we have been pressing on, night and day almost, in the hope of +coming across the hut near the road over which the exiles pass. If that +mujik told us the truth, we certainly ought to have seen it by this +time." + +"We have had a long, desolate ride since we parted with him," I +assented; "yet the snow lies in such drifts at times that we can hardly +be surprised to find ourselves still driving onwards." + +"See, sahibs!" exclaimed Hassan, as he pointed to where the snow-clad +plain was at last broken by a distant forest of stunted pines. "There is +surely the landmark of which the mujik spoke, and the peasant woman's +dwelling cannot be far off." + +After wandering through the outlying provinces of China, we determined +to visit the vast plains beyond, being anxious to see a Russian mine. To +all our requests for such permission we met with refusals, until +Denviers pressed a number of roubles into the hand of an official, who +eventually helped us to effect our purpose, after evincing some +reluctance. Staying a few days after this at a peasant's hut, we had +been fortunate enough to win his goodwill, and it was in consequence of +what he told us that we promised to undertake our present expedition. + +[Illustration: "A DESOLATE RIDE."] + +No sooner did the keen eyes of Hassan discover the forest far ahead than +we dashed onwards quicker than ever, as our exhaled breath froze in icy +particles and the biting wind struck right through the heavy sheepskin +wraps which we had purchased on entering Russia. Away across the snow +our foam-flecked horses sped, until we saw the blue smoke curling upward +in the frosty air from a low log hut, situated so that the pine forest +sheltered it somewhat from the icy winds. + +"Someone evidently lives here," said Denviers, as he beat with the +handle of his whip against the low door. We heard a footstep cross the +floor, then the noise of a bar being removed as a woman opened the door +cautiously and peered into our faces. Bent as she was with age, with +hair that hung in white masses about her shoulders, there was an +unsubdued look which rested upon us from her dark eyes that contrasted +forcibly with the dull, patient glance of the average Russian peasant. + +"Who is it crossing the plains? Are you servants of the Czar?" she +asked, in a tone of hesitation at our unexpected appearance, and +glancing strangely at Hassan, who had secured our steeds and joined us. + +"We are travellers crossing the Siberian wastes with our guide, and +come to you for shelter," I answered, although we had a deeper purpose +in visiting her. + +"It is yours," the woman replied, and having shaken our sheepskin wraps, +we entered the hut and accepted the invitation to gather about the +pine-wood fire which burnt in one corner of the rude dwelling. + +"You are not a Russian peasant?" remarked Denviers, in a tone of +inquiry, for the woman spoke English with some fluency. + +"I am not, for my people are the Lost Ones, of whom you may have heard," +she answered, with a dreary smile. + +"We do not understand you," Denviers responded, as we waited for her +explanation. + +"If you were men of this country my words would be lucid enough. Among +all those who were overcome in the many Polish struggles for liberty, +none have ever returned who once trod the road by which the exiles +passed to join those whom we call Our Lost." + +"You have a motive for living here?" I remarked quietly, watching +attentively to see what effect my words would have upon her. + +"I am friendless and alone, choosing rather to dwell here within sight +of the way to Tomsk, than in the great city from which I came. The Czar +is merciful, and permits this." + +"Then the mujik who directed us here was mistaken," I persisted. "He +related strange stories to us of fugitives, whom the peasants +whisper----" + +"Hush!" she cried, looking nervously round. "What was the mujik's name?" +For reply I placed in her hand a scrap of paper, upon which the man had +scrawled a message. She glanced keenly at us after reading the missive, +then answered:-- + +"He may be mistaken in you, for you are Englishmen, and do not +understand these things. A piece of black bread--what is it that it +should be denied to an enemy, even of the Czar, who has escaped from the +mines and wanders for refuge over these frozen wastes?" + +"You may trust us fully in this matter," said Denviers. "We have given +our word to the mujik to render all the help we can." + +"It is a terrible day to traverse the plain," the woman replied, as she +rose and threw open the rough door to the icy blast, which was only +imperfectly kept out before. We followed to where she stood, then +watched as she raised her hand and pointed at a distant object. + +"See!" the woman cried, bitterly; "yonder pine cross marks the spot +where a brave man fell, he who was the lover of the daughter of +Lovetski, one of our Lost Ones. By it, before the day is ended, will +pass the long train of exiles guarded by the soldiery and headed by the +one who hates to see that monument of his own misdeeds, but fears to +remove it, for, persecuting the living, he dreads the dead." She closed +and barred the door again; then, after some hesitation, spoke of the one +to help whom we had gone so far. + +"It was the night of a masquerade at the Winter Palace, long to be +remembered by many, for on the following day another rising of the Poles +had been planned to take place. A number of the leading citizens of St. +Petersburg were involved in it, but so well apparently was their secret +kept, that they ventured to accept the invitations issued to them. Amid +the mad revel the plotters moved, making occasionally a furtive sign of +recognition to each other, or venturing at times to whisper as they +passed the single word which told of all their hopes and +fears--'To-morrow!' Chief among them was Count Lovetski, who murmured +the watch-word more hopefully than any of those concerned whenever his +keen eyes searched out those sworn to take part in the revolt so near at +hand. + +"For three hours the gay crowd moved through the salons, then Lovetski, +as he leant against a carved pillar, saw one of the revellers who was +clad in strange attire approach several of the masqueraders and +smilingly whisper something in their ears. At last the Count saw the +stranger move close to himself, and a moment after he heard a mocking +laugh from behind the black mask, as the unknown one stooped and uttered +the preconcerted word. Lovetski looked doubtfully at the man's sombre +garb, for the glance from his eyes was by no means reassuring. + +"'To-morrow!' repeated the masker. 'Count Lovetski, you do not respond. +Have you forgotten?' + +"'Lower your voice, or we shall be heard by others,' said the Count, +with a warning gesture. 'Who are you?' + +"'One of the three hundred citizens who are sworn to revolt to-morrow. +The appointed day is fast drawing near, for in ten minutes the +great clock will chime the midnight hour, and then, Count +Lovetski--_Siberia!_' + +"His listener stared in blank amazement, then, regaining his composure, +he replied:-- + +"'So the plot is discovered? I am no coward. When is it settled for me +to set out?' + +"'At the last stroke of the hour a drosky will await you at the main +entrance. The palace is guarded by the soldiery. The others do not start +immediately; you are the leader, and will be ready, doubtless.' + +"'Quite,' answered Lovetski, for he knew resistance would be useless. He +quietly passed his sword to the masker, who took it, smiled again, and +disappeared in the crowd. One by one the followers of the Count were +singled out by the strange messenger of the Czar, and when the +masquerade was over three hundred exiles followed the track of the +sledge in which their leader had been hurried away a couple of hours +before them on the long, dreary journey to Tomsk. + +[Illustration: "SIBERIA!"] + +"Lovetski was refused the privilege of communicating his whereabouts to +his wife, who shortly after this event died, leaving their daughter to +the care of strangers. Before long a rumour reached the capital that the +Count had been shot while attempting to escape in disguise, and this was +eventually found to be true. + +"Scarcely had Marie Lovetski reached womanhood when she joined a +political movement, fired with a mad resolve to avenge her father's +death, and within a year her name appeared among those on the list of +suspects, whose every action was closely observed. A Russian officer of +high rank, Paul Somaloff, who had more than once made her an offer of +marriage, begged her to remember the fate which overtook Count Lovetski, +but the bare mention of it only made the woman more inexorable. The end +which everyone foretold soon came, for, seated one day in the midst of +treasonable correspondence, Marie Lovetski was surprised by three +gendarmes, who burst into her apartment. She tore the letter into +fragments before they could stop her, then scattered the pieces over the +floor. One of the gendarmes, motioning to his companions to pick them +up, moved towards her and attempted her arrest. For one moment the woman +stood at bay, then thrust the cold barrel of a pistol into the +gendarme's ear. + +"'Raise but a hand or move an inch nearer and I will shoot you!' she +cried, warningly. Her would-be captor shrunk back, and before he had +recovered from his surprise Marie Lovetski darted past him towards the +door. She seized the handle to wrench it open, then saw that all was +lost. The door was locked and the gendarme had removed the key. There +was a fierce struggle, in which one of the officers was dangerously +wounded, but eventually they secured her, and within two months Marie +Lovetski set out to traverse the same dreary road over which the Count +had gone long before when she was a mere child. + +"Ivan Rachieff, the masquerader who had whispered into Count Lovetski's +ear the fate to which he was consigned, was at that time a young attaché +at the Court of the Czar. The zeal which he displayed in hunting down +the autocrat's enemies rapidly brought promotion, so that when Marie +Lovetski was exiled he had risen to be a general of the Russ army, and +specially chosen for the duty of heading the Cossacks who conducted the +exiles over the Siberian wastes, while among his subordinates was Paul +Somaloff, who held a position scarcely inferior to his own. + +"Convicted of a double offence, Marie Lovetski was condemned to walk the +whole of that wearisome distance among criminals bound for the mines, +while the political exiles were somewhat less harshly treated. General +Rachieff had been warned that a band of discontents had threatened to +attempt the rescue of the prisoners, and special powers of life and +death were granted to him. By long forced marches he hurried the exiles +on, scarcely giving them a few hours' rest each night when they arrived +at their halting-places on the route. + +[Illustration: "SHE THRUST THE COLD BARREL OF A PISTOL INTO THE +GENDARME'S EAR."] + +"It was with a deep feeling of sorrow at his inability to lessen her +sufferings that Paul Somaloff glanced many times on the way at Marie +Lovetski. In spite of the strange position in which he found himself, +his love for the woman was by no means lessened, but increased each day +as he saw to his dismay how plainly her strength was failing as he +looked upon the woman's haggard countenance, who was wearily dragging +her limbs forward over the frozen wastes. One day Marie Lovetski's +condition became so serious that Somaloff begged General Rachieff to +order the fetters which bound her wrists to be removed, receiving in +reply a refusal as contemptuous as it was decisive. All that day the +exile's secret lover walked moodily on, racking his brains for some +method by which to save the woman from dying before even the terrible +journey was ended. + +"Not far from the hut in which you are now resting, the weary exiles +were halted that night, and soon sank down in the log building into an +exhausted sleep. After a severe conflict between his love and his +allegiance to the Czar, Paul Somaloff rose, and, stealing carefully +among the unconscious ones, he bent at last over the form of Marie +Lovetski, stretched upon a straw pallet. + +"'Marie,' he whispered softly, as he cautiously awakened her. ''Tis I, +Paul Somaloff--I come to save you.' + +"He remained by the woman's side till he had deftly removed the manacles +from her wrists, then stole to the entrance as she silently followed +him. Once he was outside the log building, Somaloff made for where his +general's horse was stabled, and quickly untethering it led it forth. +For one brief moment he clasped the exile to his breast, then lifted her +into the saddle and placed the reins in her hand with a few hurried +words as to the best course to pursue to avoid pursuit. + +"Suddenly Paul Somaloff felt a heavy hand grip him by the shoulder, and +turning round he found himself face to face with Ivan Rachieff, his +general! At the same time the woman was dragged from the horse and held +by three of the Cossacks. + +"'Your traitorous plan was well thought out,' said Rachieff, as he +smiled in derision at its failure. 'Paul Somaloff, you have broken your +oath to the Czar, and I swear you shall die for this.' + +"'You may do your worst,' replied the young officer. 'You would not +listen to my repeated appeals for a slight act of clemency for Marie +Lovetski, and so have turned a loyal subject of the Czar into a +traitor.' + +"'Insolent!' cried General Rachieff. 'At sunrise you shall be knouted to +death.' + +"'Coward that you are,' retorted Somaloff, 'that is a punishment you +dare not inflict upon one who wears a decoration given to him by the +august Czar. I am a soldier, General, and, at the hands of my comrades, +will die a soldier's death.' + +"'So be it,' answered Rachieff, calmly; 'you shall be shot at sunrise,' +and he motioned to the soldiers who had gathered about him to take +Somaloff into their charge, then turned on his heel and strode away, +humming an idle air. + +"The grey morning had scarcely dawned when brave young Somaloff was +blindfolded and led forth to be shot in sight of the exiles, while the +woman whom he had failed to save looked helplessly on. + +"A few minutes afterwards, Paul Somaloff knelt on the snow-covered +plain, the report of a dozen rifles rang out on the morning air, and the +exiles saw his arms raised as he clutched convulsively at his breast, +then he fell forward, dead! + +[Illustration: "HE FELL FORWARD, DEAD."] + +"The wild, despairing cries of the exiles were quelled with threats of +the knout, and then the prisoners were hurried on, as they had been for +so many days and weeks past. Ten days later a large number of Polish +insurrectionists, ill-armed, and accompanied by a throng of even worse +accoutred peasants carrying a red banner, flung themselves upon the line +of march, and made a futile effort to break through the soldiers who +guarded the exiles. The trained troopers of the Czar thrust them back +and, as they broke and fled into the forest, chased and cut them down +like sheep, till the snow turned to a crimson hue with their hearts' +blood. + +"The exiles made desperate efforts to avail themselves of the +opportunity to escape which the confusion presented. Those who were +unbound fought with branches, which they tore from the stunted trees, +while the others madly thrust the shackles upon their wrists into the +faces of the brutal soldiery, who knouted or cut down men and women +indiscriminately. Long will that massacre be remembered, and the +dreadful sufferings which the survivors endured at the command of Ivan +Rachieff. When at last Tomsk was reached, only a handful of decrepit +exiles passed into the city out of all those who started on the long +journey." + +"And Marie Lovetski?" I interrupted, "did she live to complete the +distance, or what was her fate?" + +"It was reported that she was cut down during the massacre," the woman +replied, slowly; "for nothing has been heard of her since by General +Rachieff, although her body could not be found among the slain." + +I glanced at the woman thoughtfully as she concluded her story, and +Denviers, who had listened in silence throughout, asked:-- + +"Where is Marie Lovetski? You are aware that she is alive--nay, more, +you know her place of concealment." + +Surprised at the directness of the question, the woman involuntarily +rose, and then, seeing that we suspected the fugitive was hidden in the +log hut, she answered:-- + +"Marie Lovetski is not here, yet if the mujik has rightly judged your +courage, within a week he will see your sledge return with one more +occupant than when it started. Once she is carried there her escape is +assured, for----" She stopped suddenly and pointed to the door. We +listened attentively as the sound of footsteps drew near, then a heavy +blow smote the barred entrance and a voice exclaimed:-- + +"Open, in the Czar's name!" The woman's face turned ashy pale as she +muttered faintly:-- + +"That is the voice of Ivan Rachieff, who is again in command of the +exiles," and she drew away the heavy bar to admit him. We rose to our +feet in an instant as the door was flung open and General Rachieff +entered and stood before us. + + +II. + +For a moment the Russian officer stared at us without speaking, then +throwing back his heavy sealskin cloak and revealing the military garb +which he wore beneath, he asked the woman sternly:-- + +"What does the presence of these men in your hut mean?" + +"We are travellers, who have asked for shelter. Our guide is an Arab; we +are Englishmen," responded Denviers, quietly but decisively. + +"Spies, I do not doubt," said Rachieff, as he bit his heavy moustache. + +"My word is accustomed to be believed," replied my companion, sharply. +"If you doubt what I have said, read that," and he flung a package +containing our passports upon the table as he spoke. + +The officer took out our passports, which we had been careful to obtain. +He glanced through them, then tossed the papers on to the table again as +he remarked, in a morose tone:-- + +"You would not be the first Englishmen who have made their way into the +Czar's territory only to discredit it." + +"You have chosen a curious method of displaying your pleasantry," +retorted Denviers, glancing sternly at the heavy-bearded Russian who had +so wantonly insulted us. Rachieff drew a chair to the table, and, +sitting down, leant his head upon his hands, narrowly scrutinizing our +features. + +[Illustration: "NARROWLY SCRUTINIZING OUR FEATURES."] + +"I saw some horses and a sledge in the shed without," he continued; "are +they yours?" + +"They are," answered my companion, laconically. + +"Where was your last stopping-place before you reached here?" Rachieff +asked, as if he were examining some prisoners. + +"We are neither Russian subjects nor refugees," Denviers replied. "You +may save your inquiries for others, since we have no intention of +satisfying your ill-timed curiosity." My companion turned his back to +Rachieff, and raising a blazing piece of pine-wood which had fallen, +tossed it again among the glowing embers, taking no more notice of the +discomfited officer. Rachieff was nonplussed; he frowned heavily, then +rising, moved to the door. He turned as he held it partly open, +saying:-- + +"If you were a Russian gentleman instead of an English spy, I would call +you out for your insolence to an officer in the Czar's service." + +I saw the blood mount to Denviers's forehead as he snatched the driving +whip which Hassan held and, striding forward, struck the Russian a blow +across his face with it. + +"If I were an exile, no doubt you would knout me for that," he said, +quietly. "You can do nothing as it is, since our papers are in order, +except fight me." + +"I am in command of the exiles," answered Rachieff. "They are now +passing yonder; when the halting-place is reached to-night I will leave +my subordinate in charge of them and return here with an officer as my +second. If you are not a coward you will be here awaiting me at +mid-day." + +"I shall be here," replied Denviers. "Choose your own weapons; you have +brought this meeting about entirely unprovoked, and to-morrow you or I +will fall." + +"Adieu till then!" cried Rachieff, with a bitter smile of hatred, then +he turned his face away, upon which was a long livid mark where the whip +had fallen, and we saw him stride towards the exiles passing over the +plain before us. + +"Ivan Rachieff is one of the most skilful duellists with sword or pistol +in the Czar's army," said the woman, who had been an attentive observer +of all that passed between the two men. "He will kill you with as little +remorse as he ordered Paul Somaloff to be shot by the soldiers." + +"Paul Somaloff!" exclaimed Denviers. "Ah! I had forgotten his fate for a +moment; but to-morrow, when Rachieff and I stand face to face, I will +surely remember it." + +"Allah and Mahomet help the sahib," cried Hassan. "If the bearded Russ +should chance to win, he shall fight the Arab afterwards." + +"Never mind Rachieff, Hassan," said Denviers; "we must at once make our +plans for the purpose of helping Marie Lovetski to escape from Siberia. +Whatever happens to me, she must be saved at all hazards." + +"Where is the woman concealed?" I asked the one who was our hostess. + +She rose and questioned us:-- + +"Will you swear by the memorial which I have raised over Paul Somaloff's +resting-place never to speak of what you may see in the strange +hiding-place to which I may conduct you?" + +"We will," I answered briefly, as Denviers joined in assenting. + +We lost little time after Rachieff's departure, but drew together and +discussed the probabilities of various plans succeeding, and at last +decided on that which seemed to promise success. The dusk rapidly closed +in upon us as we sat in thoughtful conversation, after which the woman +rose, and, having scanned the plain near the hut as well as she could in +the gloom, motioned to us to follow her. + +Hassan remained in the hut while we set out, and making our way through +a part of the pines and firs close to the dwelling in which we had +sought shelter, we found ourselves groping blindly along, following each +other like phantoms in the darkness which enveloped us. So far there was +little need for the woman to have sworn us to secrecy, for neither going +nor returning did we get a glimpse of anything likely to indicate the +spot to us again at any future time. At last we felt what appeared to be +a rough flight of stone steps beneath our feet, then our guide lit a +pine-wood torch which she carried. + +Holding up the flickering light before us, the woman led us into what we +conjectured to be one of the catacombs of an ancient city. On both sides +of us as we moved along the red flare of the pine-wood revealed many +bodies of the dead, each stretched in a niche cut for it in the red +rock, while at intervals between these we saw the resting-places of +others distinguished by various strange emblems. One of these niches was +silently guarded by two carved figures of horsemen with their white +steeds caparisoned, and each of the riders held in his uplifted hand a +sword such as the Damascenes use. + +"A strange resting-place that," I remarked to Denviers, as it stood out +weird and ghastly in the light of the torch. "No Russian soldiery ever +wear such accoutrements as are depicted there, I am certain." + +"They wear the garb of boyars of the time of Ivan the Terrible," our +guide said, as she pointed to the mounted horsemen. "Where the pine +forest about us is now there stood more than four hundred years ago one +of the many cities built by that extraordinary monarch, but it has long +been blotted out, and the Russ have forgotten its very existence. None +now know of its catacombs save those of us who form a secret band, and +whose object is to help the exiles who may escape and seek shelter and a +safe hiding-place. Even now it would be impossible for you to find the +one you seek, and if you wish to go farther it must be done blindfolded, +or I will not lead you." + +We stood by the strangely carved horsemen, and having consented to the +woman's request, allowed her to fasten our sashes securely over our +eyes; then, led by her, we slowly advanced through what appeared to be a +labyrinth of ways until we were stopped by someone who spoke to the +woman in a calm, grave tone. There was a whispered conversation between +the two, directly following which our eyes were uncovered, and we found +ourselves facing a strangely-robed hermit. His long white beard fell +almost to his waist, contrasting forcibly with the black garment which +covered him, while his high forehead and the steadfast look directed +towards us seemed to be in keeping with the hermit's strange +surroundings. A heap of blazing pine-wood lit up his retreat and served +to lessen the intense coldness of the air. + +[Illustration: "WE FOUND OURSELVES FACING A STRANGELY-ROBED HERMIT."] + +"You are Englishmen, and have promised to help Marie Lovetski to escape +from here to our next station of refuge," he said. "Since the day when +she fled she has been hidden in various of our secret places. Six months +ago she was brought here, yet so dangerous is the risk that we have +waited for the mujik's messengers, telling us that all is safe for her +to be conveyed there. He says in his message that you can be trusted, +and doubtless your passports will help you to accomplish the task more +easily than Russ or Pole could do. We trust, then, in your honour, that +once Marie Lovetski is in your keeping, you will die in her defence +rather than surrender her to the horrors of a mine." + +We explained to the hermit the difficulty which the approaching duel +between Denviers and Rachieff might cause, and discussed with him the +possibility of overcoming it. Denviers was emphatic in his determination +to meet the Russian on the morrow, and so it was arranged that at a +certain hour Marie Lovetski should leave the catacombs and secretly +watch the result of the duel. If Denviers escaped uninjured we were to +mount our sledge and make for the spot where she would be stationed, and +hiding her beneath the wraps, to start on our long journey back to the +mujik who had intrusted us with the task of saving her. + +"You will, of course, allow us to see this exile?" Denviers remarked, as +soon as everything was arranged. "It was for that purpose that we were +brought here to-night." + +"Then your visit has been made in vain," was the unexpected reply. "It +will be time enough for you to do so if your duel with Rachieff is +successful." + +We endeavoured to overcome the hermit's objection, but, although the +woman who had guided us there spoke strenuously on our behalf, the +strange guardian of Marie Lovetski was not to be persuaded from +following his own cautious plan. Finding our protests useless, we +consented to be blindfolded once more, and were led back through the +catacombs into the forest, and before long we had entered the log hut +again. There we threw ourselves on our sheepskin wraps in front of the +pine-wood fire, and laid down upon them to sleep; then, when daylight +came, the woman awoke us and we passed the morning vaguely wondering +what the result of the duel would be. + +Denviers urged upon our guide, Hassan, and myself the necessity of +attempting to save the woman so long shut up in the dismal catacombs, +and at last I gave a reluctant consent to do so if he fell, instead of +making an attempt to avenge him. The Arab stolidly refused to do this, +and justified his position by numerous quotations from the Koran, while +declaring that Mahomet would certainly come to my companion's +assistance, which, in spite of the gravity of his position, provoked a +smiling retort from Denviers. Little did we know what the termination of +the fight would be, or the strange part in it which Marie Lovetski was +to have. + + +III. + +"Hark, sahibs!" exclaimed Hassan. "Although noon has not yet come, the +Russian is approaching to keep his promise to fight." + +We threw open the door of the hut and distinguished the ringing sound of +the bells of a distant sledge. A few minutes after this the cracking of +a whip and the neighing of horses were heard, and finally we saw the +sledge appear before us. There were three occupants, and as it drew near +we distinguished among them General Rachieff as the one who was urging +on the horses. The conveyance dashed up to the hut; then one of the +officers sprang out and restrained the animals, while a second, who +carried a couple of swords, followed close behind Rachieff, with whom +Denviers was soon to try conclusions. + +"The weapons are here," said General Rachieff, frigidly, as Denviers +approached and bowed slightly. "There is no time to lose: we fight with +swords as you see. Choose!" and he motioned to his second, who held them +out. Following out the plan which we had determined to adopt, Hassan +quickly placed our horses in our own sledge and drew them a little +ahead, so that the conveyance should be ready for us to enter when the +duel was ended, if my companion did not fall in the encounter. + +"We fight there," said Denviers calmly, as he motioned to the part of +the plain to the right of where Hassan had already stationed our sledge. + +"As you will," responded Rachieff indifferently, and, accompanied by his +second, he moved to the spot Denviers pointed out. There the usual +formalities were settled by the other officer and myself, whereupon the +two duellists made ready and waited for the signal to begin, which fell +to my lot to give. + +I fluttered a handkerchief in the biting air for a moment, dropped it, +and the swords were rapidly crossed. The reputation which Rachieff had +won as a duellist was certainly well deserved, since his feints and +thrusts were admirable, while Denviers, whose coolness in critical +circumstances never deserted him, acted mainly on the defensive, +parrying his enemy's lunges with remarkable skill. + +More than once the duellists stopped as if by mutual consent, to regain +breath, then quickly facing each other again, fought more determinedly +than ever. Rachieff saw that for once he had apparently met his match +with the sword, and grew by degrees more cautious than he had been when +the fight began; yet repeatedly he failed to completely ward off the +quick lunges from my companion's weapon, and I saw the crimson stains of +blood which marked where the sword point had touched him. Then he rained +in his blows with lightning speed, pressing hard upon Denviers several +times, and glaring furiously at him, while his distorted features showed +plainly enough the mark of the blow he had received from the whip the +day previous. + +"Rachieff wins!" cried the Russian's second, and I saw, to my dismay, +Denviers's weapon suddenly twisted from his hand and flung into the air, +while an exultant exclamation burst from Rachieff's lips as he rushed +upon his defenceless opponent! Before he could make use of the advantage +which he had unexpectedly gained, Marie Lovetski uttered a wild, +mournful cry, and started forward from the pine forest, standing pale +with momentary fear before him! + +The superstitious Russian stared incredulously, his sword-arm dropped to +his side, while he gasped out:-- + +"Lovetski's daughter, and yet she is surely dead!" + +Taking full advantage of the Russian's dismay, Denviers instantly flung +himself upon his foe, dashing him backwards to the ground. Kneeling upon +his enemy's chest and gripping him by the throat, as he held the sword +he had seized before the startled Russian, my companion hissed in his +ear:-- + +"Yield, or you are a dead man!" + +The Russian's face turned to a purple hue as he almost choked for +breath, then he muttered brokenly the exiled woman's name. + +"She is living!" cried Denviers, as he lowered the point of the sword +till it touched the Russian's breast. "Swear that you will not attempt +to hinder her flight, and I will release your throat." + +General Rachieff raised his hand in sign of assent, for his voice had +failed him. Denviers rose, whereupon the Russian staggered to his feet, +then, mad at his defeat, moved over to where his sledge was. + +[Illustration: "HE RUSHED UPON HIS DEFENCELESS OPPONENT."] + +"Get the woman into our sledge," cried Denviers to me. I started forward +to where Hassan was; we snatched up the exile and immediately drove off. + +"After them, men!" cried Rachieff, caring nothing for his promise. "We +will take Marie Lovetski, or shoot her down!" + +"Never trust a Russ, sahibs!" exclaimed Hassan, as he lashed our horses +on, while our enemies followed furiously behind. "The only way to secure +his silence would have been a sword thrust through the false one's +heart." + +Away our sledge was whirled across the plain, faster and faster still, +yet Rachieff, whose horses were more numerous than our own, drew +gradually nearer. Marie Lovetski, who had forgotten her alarm now that +Denviers was safe, turned her pale-set countenance towards our pursuers, +and, as she did so, the report of a pistol rang out, while a bullet +whizzed past her head! I saw Rachieff holding the smoking weapon in his +hand as Denviers cried to me:-- + +"If he fires again, I will shoot him like the dog that he is!" + +"No," cried Marie Lovetski, snatching a pistol from my sash before I +could prevent her. "Rachieff slew Somaloff, my lover, and I will avenge +him." She pointed the weapon full at the Russian, and I barely had time +to brush her arm aside before the frenzied exile fired. Fortunately, the +shot was deflected, and Rachieff was saved from the fate that he +certainly deserved. + +"Shoot their horses!" exclaimed Denviers, and as our own dashed along he +leant over towards the pursuing sledge and fired at the foremost of +them. The animal reared for a moment, then fell dead, throwing the rest +into confusion. Out the Russians sprang, and cut the traces through, and +having in this way speedily managed to disencumber their steeds of the +dead one, they immediately began the pursuit again. We waited for them +to get near again, then fired in quick succession and brought down their +other horses, in spite of the bullets which the Russians rained upon us, +and which, fortunately, struck none who were in the sledge. Baffled in +their pursuit, we saw our enemies standing knee-deep in the snow +watching us as we dashed along. + +"Well," remarked Denviers, as we slackened our speed at last, "we have +had a strange running fight, such as I least of all expected." + +"The sahibs have saved the woman," said our guide. "Their slave the Arab +believes that even the Great Prophet would approve of what they have +done. The promise to convey Marie Lovetski to the mujik's hut will now +surely be kept"; and so it came about, for the daughter of Lovetski the +Lost lived to find freedom hers on another soil and under another flag. + + + + +_Illustrated Interviews._ + + +No. XXIII.--MR. HARRY FURNISS. + +[Illustration: "INTERVIEWED!"] + +It is the proud boast of every married man, and more particularly so +when his quiver is fairly full, that he presides over the happiest home +in the land. But there is a corner of Regent's Park where stands a house +whose four walls contain an amount of fun and unadulterated merriment, +happiness, and downright pleasure that would want a lot of beating. The +fact is that Mr. Harry Furniss is not only a merry man with his pencil. +Humour with him may mean a very profitable thing--it unquestionably +does; fun and frolic as depicted on paper by "Lika Joko" brings in, as +Digby Grant would put it, many "a little cheque." But I venture to think +that the clever caricaturist would not have half as many merry ideas +running from the mind to the pencil if he sold all his humour outside +and forgot to scatter a goodly proportion of it amongst his quartette of +children. + +[Illustration: "MY LITTLE MODEL."] + +[Illustration: "LITTLE GUY--OR, A FIDGETY MODEL."] + +I had not been in the house five minutes before they made their presence +known. I had not been there a quarter of an hour before the discovery +was made that they were small but impressive editions of their father. +Have you heard of Harry Furniss's little model--"My Little Model"? She +is Dorothy, who sits for all the little girls in her father's pictures. +A clever, bright young woman of thirteen, with glorious auburn tresses. +For two or three years past she has not forgotten to write her father a +story, illustrated it herself, and duly presented it on his birthday. +"Buzzy," for that is her pet name, is retained as a model at a modest +honorarium per sitting. Should she be indisposed, she must find a +substitute! Then there is Frank, the eldest, home for his holidays just +now from Cheltenham; young Lawrence, who also draws capitally; and +little Guy, the youngest, who creeps into the pictures occasionally. Guy +is a very fidgety model. "I have drawn him in twenty different moves, +when trying to bribe him with a penny to sit!" said Mr. Furniss. And it +seemed to me--and one had an excellent opportunity of judging during a +too-quickly-passed day spent at Regent's Park--that not a small amount +of Mr. Furniss's humour was caught from the children. He has brought +them up to live a laughing life, he ignores the standing-in-the-corner +theory, and believes that a penny discreetly bestowed on a youngster +during a troubled moment will teach him a better lesson than a +shilling's-worth of stick. It is also evident that the brightness and +jollity of the children are inherited, not only from father, but mother +as well; and it was easy to discern, from the remarks that fell from the +subject of my interview, that the touches of artistic taste to be seen +about the place were due to the "best of wives and mothers"--immaculate +housewife and capital hostess--Mrs. Furniss. And, as Mr. Furniss himself +acknowledges, half the battle of life is overcome for a hard-worked +professional man by the possession of a sympathetic and careful wife. + +[Illustration] + +Just run through this budget of letters from father to children. When I +arrived at Regent's Park--ten minutes before my time, by-the-bye--Mr. +Furniss was out riding, a very favourite exercise with him. "Buzzy" and +Frank and Lawrence and Guy brought out their treasured missives. When +"Lika Joko" gets a pen or pencil in his hand he can't help caricaturing. +These juvenile missives were decorated with sketches in every corner. +Here is a particularly merry one. Frank writes from Cheltenham for some +fret-work patterns. Patterns are sent by return of post--the whole +family is sent in fret-work. Mr. Furniss goes away to Hastings, +suffering from overwork. He has to diet himself. Then comes a letter +illustrated at the top with a certain gentleman greatly reduced in face +and figure through following Dr. Robson Roose's admirable advice. There +are scores of them--all neatly and carefully kept with their envelopes +in scrap-books. + +Some few days afterwards I discovered that Mr. Furniss delights in +"illustrating" his letters to others besides his children. My photo was +needed by Mr. Furniss for the purpose of making a sketch. I sent him a +recent one. He wanted a "profile" too. The "profile" was taken when I +was sadly in need of the application of the scissors of the tonsorial +artist. I posted the "profile" with a request that perhaps Mr. Furniss +would kindly apply his artistic shears and cut off a little of the +surplus hair. By return comes an illustrated missive. I am sitting in a +barber's chair, cloth round neck; the artist is behind me with the +customary weapon, and laying low the locks. The whole thing probably +only took a minute or two to do, but it is a capital little bit of +drawing. It is reproduced at the end of this article. + +This quarter of an hour spent with the youngsters over their paternal +letters was not lost. It prepared me for the man himself, it gave me the +true clue to his character, and when he rushed into the house--riding +boots and whip included--it was just the one the children had +unanimously realized for me. A jolly, hearty, "give us your hand" sort +of individual, somewhat below the medium height, with a face as merry as +one of his own pages in _Punch_. He is restless--he must be always at +it. He thinks and talks rapidly: there is no hesitation about him. He +gets a happy thought. Out it comes--unique and original in its +unvarnished state. He is as good and thorough a specimen of an +Englishman as one would meet--frank and straight-spoken, says what he +thinks and thinks what he means. An Englishman, notwithstanding the fact +that he was born in Ireland, his mother was a Scotchwoman, and he +married a lady of Welsh descent! But, then, his father was a +Yorkshireman! So much for the man--and much more. Of his talents we will +speak later. + +We all sat down to lunch, and the children simply did for me what I +could not have done for myself. Frank ran his father on funny stories. +Then it all came out. Mr. Furniss is an excellent actor--had he not been +a caricaturist he must have been a comedian. His powers of imitation are +unlimited. He will give you an Irish jarvey one moment and Henry Irving +the next, and the children led him on. But it all at once dawned upon +Mr. Furniss that it was interfering with the proper play of knife and +fork, so we dispensed with the mimicry and went on with the mutton. + +[Illustration] + +"Lika Joko" is suggested at once on entering the hall. Here are a +quartette of quaint Japanese heads, which their owner calls his "Fore +Fathers!" His Fellowship of the Zoo is typified by pictures of various +animals. A fine etching of St. Mark's, at Venice, is also noticeable, +the only two portraits being a Rembrandt and Maroni's "Tailor." + +"I always hold that up as the best portrait ever painted," said Mr. +Furniss, as he glances at Maroni's masterpiece. + +[Illustration: THE DINING-ROOM. + +_From a Photo. by Elliott & Fry._] + +In the dining-room Landseer, Herkomer, Alma Tadema, and Burton Barber +are represented--little Lawrence was the original study for the child in +the latter artist's "Bethgelert." Fred Barnard's work is here, and some +quaint old original designs on wood by Boyd Haughton are pointed out as +curios. _Punch_ is to the front, notably in Du Maurier, by himself, +which cost its possessor thirty guineas; a portrait group of the staff +up the river, some delicate water-colours by C. H. Bennett, and a fine +bit of work by Mr. Furniss of the jubilee dinner of the threepenny comic +at the Ship Hotel, Greenwich. Upstairs the children's portraits, and +pictures likely to please the youngsters, reappear. The nursery is full +of them, though perhaps the most interesting apartment in this part of +the house is the principal bedroom. It is full of the original +caricatures of M.P.'s and other notabilities, and the occupant of the +bed has Bradlaugh and the Baron de Worms on either side of him, whilst +from a corner the piercing eye of Mr. George Lewis is constantly on the +watch. + +A striking portrait of Mr. F. C. Burnand recalls to Mr. Furniss the +first time he sketched him. + +"I was making a chalk drawing of him," said the caricaturist. "He sat +with his back to me for half-an-hour writing, and suddenly turned round +and wanted to know if I had finished! Perceiving a piece of bread for +rubbing-out purposes in my hand, he objected to my having lunch there! +And finally, when I induced him to turn his head my way and I finished +the sketch, he looked at it critically and cried out, 'Splendid +likeness, remarkable features, fine head, striking forehead, +characteristic eyebrow, splendid likeness; somebody I know, but I can't +remember who!' Encouraging, wasn't it? + +"But I remembered it. Some years after I gave a dinner at the Garrick +Club to the _Punch_ staff and some friends. Burnand sat at the head of a +long table. It was understood that there was to be no speaking. Suddenly +I saw the editorial eyebrows wriggling. I knew what it meant--Burnand +was going to make a speech. I hurriedly got about a dozen sheets of +note-paper, and tore them in bits. I jumped up very nervous, produced +'notes'; terrible anxiety on part of diners--suppressed groans. I spoke, +got fearfully muddled, constantly losing notes, etc. 'Art amongst the +Greeks,' I said--notes; 'yes, your sculptors of Athens were, +unquestionably'--notes again. 'And what of it? _Punch_ is a--_Punch_ is +a--well, you all know _what Punch_ is!' Then it began to dawn upon them +that this was a little lark. So I hurriedly threw notes under the table +and suggested that on an occasion like the present it was our duty to +first propose the health of the Queen! We did. Then the Prince of Wales, +the Army and Navy, the Reserve Forces, the Bishops and Magistrates. All +these were replied to, and Burnand didn't get a chance!" + +[Illustration: THE DRAWING-ROOM. + +_From a Photo. by Elliott & Fry._] + +There are many delightful water-colours in the drawing-room, bronzes and +quaint Japanese ivories. The first meet of the "Two Pins Club" at +Richmond, June 8th, 1890, gives excellent back views of Sir Charles +Russell, F. C. Burnand, Frank Lockwood, Q.C., Linley Sambourne, Chas. +Matthews, Q.C., and the caricaturist himself. The "Two Pins" is a riding +club named after Dick Turpin and Johnny Gilpin. Works by Goodall and +Rowlandson are here, a fine Albert Dürer, and a most ingenious bit of +painting by a man who never had a chance to get to the front--he has +used his brush with excellent effect on the back of an old band-box. +Mary Anderson has written on the back of a photo, "Better late than +never," for the picture was a long time coming; another excellent +example of photographic work being a large head of Mr. Irving as +"Becket," bearing his autograph. In a corner is a queer-looking wax +model of Daniel O'Connell addressing the crowd, and amongst a hundred +little odds and ends spring flowers are peeping out. Mr. Furniss finds +little time now to use his paint-box. The example--an early one, +by-the-bye--he has contributed to this apartment is by no means +prophetic. It is a trifle in water-colours--a graveyard of a church with +countless tombstones! Now, who would associate the caricaturist with +tombstones? + +[Illustration: THE STUDIO. + +_From a Photo. by Elliott & Fry._] + +Passing down a glass corridor--from the roof of which the grapes hang in +great and luscious clusters in the autumn--you reach the studio. It is +a big, square room. Run your eyes round the walls, try to take in its +thousand and one quaint treasures. You can see humour in every one of +them--merriment oozes out of every single item. Stand before this almost +colossal statue of Venus. She of the almost faultless waist and +fashion-plate divine rests on a coal-box. Sit down on the sofa. It is +the stuffed lid of another receptacle for fuel. Golf is one of the +artist's hobbies, and he invariably plays with clergymen--excellent +thing for the character. We light our cigars from a capital little +match-stand modelled out of a golf-ball, and the next instant "Lika +Joko" is juggling with three or four balls. A clever juggler, forsooth. +And the battledore and shuttlecock? Excellent exercise. After a long +spell of work, the battledore is seized and the shuttlecock bounces up +to the glass roof. It went through the other day, hence play has been +postponed owing to the numerous engagements of the local glazier. +Fencing foils are in a corner; a quaint arrangement of helmets, masks, +and huge weapons _à la_ Waterloo suggests "scalping trophies." The china +is curious--there is even an empty ginger jar--picked up in country +places, of a rare and valuable old-fashioned type. He has the finest +collection of old tinsel pictures of the Richard III. and Dick Turpin +order in the kingdom, and values an old book full of tinsel patterns of +the most exquisite design and workmanship. Old glass pictures are +scattered about, "Lord Nelson's Funeral Car," and Joey Grimaldi grins at +you from the far corner of the room. + +[Illustration: SCALPING TROPHIES. + +_From a Photo. by Elliott & Fry._] + +All this and much more is characteristic of the humour of the famous +caricaturist. We look at "Lika Joko's" skits and laugh; we take a +delight in picking out from his ingenious pictorial mazes our own +particular politician or favourite actor; we roar at "Lika Joko's" +comicality, and only know him as a caricaturist. But there is another +side to this studio picture--Mr. Harry Furniss's pencil is such that it +can make you weep; so realistic, indeed, that when in his early days he +was sent to sketch scenes of distress and misery, they were so terribly +real and dramatic that the paper in question dared not publish them. No +artist appreciates a "situation" better than he. I looked through +portfolio after portfolio, drawer after drawer--full of character +studies and work of a serious character done in all parts of the world. +These have never been given to the public. Should they ever be +published, Mr. Harry Furniss will at once be voted as serious and +dramatic an artist as he is an eminently refined yet outrageously +humorous caricaturist. He is a great reader--he once collected first +editions. We begin to talk seriously, when he suddenly closes the +portfolio with a bang, shuts up once more his hidden and unknown +talents, and hastens to inform you that he is a member of the Thirteen +Club--Irving and he were elected together--and believes in helping other +people to salt, dining thirteen on the thirteenth, with thirteen +courses, etc. Always passes under ladders, and swears by peacocks' +feathers. + +We stand before the great easel in the middle of the room--though not +much work is done there. He prefers to work standing at a desk. He draws +all his pictures very large; they are studies from life. It prevents the +work from getting cramped. The same model has stood for all his +principal people for the last ten years, and he has a wardrobe of +artistic "props" big enough to fit out every member of the House of +Commons. He is a perfect business man. His ledger is a model book. Every +one of his pictures is numbered. In this book spaces are ruled off +for--Subject, Publisher, When delivered, Published, Price, When paid, +When drawing returned, Price of original, and What came of it. Humour by +no means knocks system out of a man. Look at the score of pigeon-holes +round the studio. As we are talking together now his secretary is +"typing off" his illustrated weekly letter which finds a place in the +_St. James's Budget_, _New York World_, _Weekly Scotsman_, _Yorkshire +Weekly Post_, _Liverpool Weekly Post_, _Nottinghamshire Guardian_, +_South Wales Daily News_, _East Anglian Times_, and in Australia, India, +the Cape, etc. He writes children's books and illustrates them. His +impressions of America are in course of preparation. There is his weekly +_Punch_ work; he is dodging about all over the country giving his unique +"Humours of Parliament" entertainment, and he found time to make some +special sketches for this little article. + +[Illustration: _From a Drawing by Mr. Furniss._] + +We sat down. Tea was brought in--he believes in two big breakfast cups +every afternoon--and with "Bogie," the Irish deerhound--so called owing +to his very solemn-looking countenance--close by, Mr. Furniss went back +as far as he could possibly remember, to March 26th, 1854. That is the +date of his birthday. + +"I am always taken for an Irishman," said Mr. Furniss. "Nothing of the +kind. My father was a Yorkshireman. He was in Ireland with my mother, +and I believe I arrived at an unexpected moment. Possibly my artistic +inclinations came through my mother. Her father was Æneas Mackenzie, a +well-known literary man of Newcastle-on-Tyne, and proprietor of several +newspapers. He founded the Newcastle School of Politics, and Mr. Joseph +Cowen--as a boy--got his first tuition in politics from sitting at the +knee of my grandfather. A bust of him is in the Mechanics' +Institute--which he founded." + +[Illustration: "AT WORK." + +_From a Photo. by Elliott & Fry._] + +Little Harry was brought up in Wexford. He remembers being held up in +his nurse's arms to see the _Great Eastern_ pass on its first voyage, +whilst an incident associated with the marriage of the Prince of Wales +is vividly impressed upon his mind. He was struck on the top of his hat +by a "fizzing devil" made out of moist powder, which burnt a hole +through it. He says that he would rather have this recollection on his +mind now, than the "fizzer" on his head at the time. The young artist in +embryo was a rare young pugilist at school. He was forced to use his +fists, as friction was strong between the Irish and English lads at the +school he went to. But he did well in athletic sports, and was never +beaten in a hundred yards race. He firmly believes that this early +athletic training is responsible for the rapid way in which he does +everything to-day--be it walking or talking, eating or working, all is +done on the hundred yards principle--to get there first. + +He was a spoilt boy--first of all because he was sent to a girls' +school, but mainly from a very significant incident which happened at +the Wesleyan College School in Dublin--a collegiate establishment from +which pupils (not necessarily Wesleyans, for Mr. Furniss is not of that +sect) passed to Trinity College--where he obtained all his education. He +was not a studious lad. He found the editing, writing, illustrating, +publishing, and entire bringing-out of a small journal he founded far +more agreeable to his taste than Latin verbs and algebraical problems. + +[Illustration: STUDY OF AN IRISHMAN.] + +"I was in knickerbockers at the time," he said, "and introduced to the +schoolboy public--_The Schoolboy's Punch_. It sounds strangely prophetic +as I think of it now. The entire make-up of it was _à la Punch_, and it +had its cartoon every week. At that time the Davenport Cabinet Trick was +all the rage, and the very first cartoon I drew was founded on that. +Here is the picture: myself--as a schoolboy--being tied up with ropes +depictive of Greek, Latin, Euclid, and other cutting and disagreeable +items. I am placed in the cabinet--the school. The head-master, whom I +flattered very much in the drawing, opens another cabinet and out steps +the young student covered with glory and scholastic honours thick upon +him! From that moment my school-master spoiled me. I left school and +started work. I got a pound for my first drawing. A. M. Sullivan started +a paper in Ireland on very similar lines to _Punch_. There was a wave in +Ireland of better class journalism at this time which had never existed +before or since. I slipped in. For some years I drew on wood and +engraved my own work. I was given to understand that all black and white +men engraved their own efforts, so I offered myself as an apprentice to +an engraver. + +"He said: 'Don't come as an apprentice. If you will undertake to look +after my office, I'll teach you the art of engraving.'" + +It meant a hard struggle for young Furniss. He was loaded down with +clerical work, but in his own little room, when the day's labours were +done, he would sit up till two and three in the morning. There was no +quenching his earnestness. Work then with him was a real desire. It is +so to-day. To rest is obnoxious to him. + +He worked away. The feeling in Ireland against Englishmen at that time +was very strong. Tom Taylor, then the editor of _Punch_, saw some of his +sketches in Dublin, and advised him to go to the West of Ireland to make +studies of character. He was in Galway, and he had persuaded a number of +Irishmen who were breaking stones to pause in their work and let him +sketch them. They consented. The overseer came up. + +"What d'yer mane," he cried, "allowing this hathen Saxon to draw yer?" + +"I've never been out of Ireland in my life," said the artist; but the +overseer had seized him, and but for the intervention of the men, whom +he had paid liberally for the "sitting," he would have thrown him into +the river. + +Then a great trouble came. His father was stricken with blindness. The +young man came to London, and with something more than the proverbial +half-crown in his pocket. He was nineteen years of age when he hurried +out of Euston Station one morning and stood for a moment thinking--for +he did not know a soul in the Metropolis. But he soon found an +opportunity. + +"My first work was on _London Society_, for Florence Marryat," he said; +"then for the _Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News_. The _Illustrated +London News_ employed me. I did such things as the Boat Race, Eton and +Harrow cricket match, and similar subjects--all from a humorous point of +view. I have had as many as three full pages in one number. Then came +that terrible distress in the mining districts. I was married that year. +I was sent away to "do" the Black Country, and well remember eating the +first Christmas dinner of my married life alone in a Sheffield hotel. + +[Illustration: MR. FURNISS ON "RHODA." + +_From a Photo. by Elliott & Fry._] + +"Those sketches were never published. They were too terribly real. The +people dying in rooms with scarcely a stick of furniture, the children +opening the cupboards and showing them bare, appealed to me, and my +pencil refused to depict anything else. It was the same kind of thing +that was afterwards made notorious by Sims and Barnard in "How the Poor +Live." I came back and was selected to do some electioneering work for +the same paper. This necessitated the putting off of a little dinner +party to some friends, and I wired one of the invited to that effect. +When I was starting, imagine my surprise to meet a _Graphic_ artist on +the platform, and to hear that my friend had unwisely given away the +contents of my telegram! However, we chummed up. He stayed with +friends--I at an hotel. I sat up all that night working after attending +the meetings. At four o'clock I heard a knock at the door. A journalist. +I was just about to put into my picture the large figures. I made him +very much at home, and told him I would give him any information I knew +as to the previous night's proceedings if he would act as my model. He +did. We worked on till breakfast time, and we sat down together. I sent +off my page--it was in a week before the _Graphic_! It was a good +return. I had started on the Tuesday, got home on the Thursday, and +never had my boots off the whole time! I'd rather keep my boots on for a +week than disappoint an editor." + +_Punch!_ + +I asked Mr. Furniss if Tom Taylor helped him to any considerable extent. +Oh! dear, no. Tom Taylor wrote a terrible fist, spattered the page all +over with ink, and invariably replied on the back of the letter sent +him. At least, it was so in Mr. Furniss's case. He would send sketches +to _Punch_; they were acknowledged as "unsuitable." They invariably +turned up a week or so later--the idea re-drawn by a member of the +staff! He began to despair. But that first cartoon in the schoolboy's +periodical was always before him. + +"When Mr. Burnand became editor," continued Mr. Furniss, "I was working +on the _Illustrated London News_. He saw one of the sketches and asked +me to call--the result was that I have worked for them ever since. I +started at very small things; my first was a small drawing of Temple +Bar. Then, when Parliament opened, Mr. H. W. Lucy commenced +_Toby_--by-the-bye, Lucy and I both joined the _Punch_ table, the weekly +dinner, together--and I worked with him. I have special permission at +the House; as a matter of fact, I have the sanction of the Lord Great +Chamberlain to sketch anywhere in the precincts of Westminster. My right +there is an individual one." + +"But supposing, Mr. Furniss," I said, "they put a stop to you and your +pencil entering?" + +"I'd go into Parliament!" came the ready reply. And, indeed, he has been +approached on this subject by constituencies two or three times. + +We spoke of some of the eminent statesmen and others Mr. Furniss has +caricatured. Mr. John Morley is the most difficult. He is not what an +artist would call a black and white man. You must suggest the familiar +red tie in your picture and then you have "caught" him. + +[Illustration: THE FURNISS FAMILY. _From a Photo. by Elliott & Fry._] + +"I have seen Mr. Morley look a boy, a young man, and an old man--and all +in an hour," said Mr. Furniss. "Mr. Asquith is difficult, too. But I +don't think I have ever missed him, as there's a Penley look about his +face and a decided low comedian's mouth that help you immensely. Sir +Richard Temple is the easiest. Many members have some characteristic +action which assists you materially. For instance, Mr. Joseph Arch +always wipes his hands down his coat before shaking hands with you, +whilst Mr. Goschen delights to play with his eye-glass when speaking. +Lord Randolph Churchill likes to indulge in a little acrobatic exercise +and balance himself on one foot, whilst Mr. Balfour hangs on +persistently to the lapel of his coat when talking. All these little +things help to 'mark' the man for the caricaturist. I invented +Gladstone's collar and made Churchill small. Not because he is small, +but because I think it is the caricaturist's art not so much to give an +absolutely correct likeness, but rather to convey the character and +value of the man through the lines you draw. Gladstone! A wonderful man +for the caricaturist, and one of the finest. I have sat and watched the +rose in his coat droop and fade, his hair become dishevelled with +excitement, and his tie get round to the back of his neck." + +"And what do the wives of our estimable M.P.'s think of all this?" I +hinted. + +"Oh! I get most abusive letters from both sides. Wives of members write +and ask me not to caricature their husbands. One lady wrote to me the +other day, and said if I would persist in caricaturing her husband, +would I put him in a more fashionable coat? Now, this particular member +is noted for the old-fashioned cut of the coats he wears. Another asked +me to make the sharer of her joys and sorrows better looking; whilst +only last week a lady--the wife of a particularly well-known +M.P.--addressed a most plaintive letter to me, saying that since some of +the younger members of her family had contrived to see my pictures they +had become quite rude to their papa! + +"Why, members often _ask_ me to caricature them. One member was very +kindly disposed to me, and suggested that I should keep my eye on him. I +did. Yet he cut me dead when he saw his picture! It's so discouraging, +don't you know, when you are so anxious to oblige." + +I asked Mr. Furniss if he thought there was anything suggestive of +cruelty in caricature. + +"Not in this country," he replied; "in Spain, Italy, and France--yes. +Caricaturists there score off their cruelty. Listen to this. One night I +was in the House. Mr. Gladstone rose to speak. He held his left hand up +and referred to it as 'This old Parliamentary hand.' I noticed a +fact--which men who had sat in that House for years had never seen. On +that left hand Mr. Gladstone has only three fingers! Think of it--think +of what your caricaturist with an inclination towards cruelty might have +made of that fact, coupled with those significant words! I ask you +again--think of it!" + +He spoke in thorough earnestness. He told me that he looked forward to +the time when he should consign to the rag-basket the famous Gladstone +collar and cease to play with Goschen's eye-glass. He is striving to +accomplish something more--he would do it now, but it isn't marketable. +Mr. Furniss is a sensible man. He caricatures to live; and, if the +laughs follow, well, so much the better. + +The afternoon passed rapidly, and the studio became darker and darker. +Venus on the coal-box looked quite ghostly, and a lay figure in the far +corner was not calculated to comfort the nervously-inclined when amongst +the "props" of an artist's studio. "Buzzy" merrily rushed in and +announced dinner, and "Bogie" jumped up and barked his raptures at the +word. "Bogie" knew it meant scraps. Mrs. Furniss and the children met us +at the dining-room door. The youngsters' faces were as solemn as the +Court of Queen's Bench. Little Lawrence looked up at me very demurely, +the others waiting anxiously. + +"Please could you tell us what a spiral staircase is?" he asked. + +A dead silence. + +"Oh!" I answered, anxious to show a superior knowledge of these +peculiarly constructed "ups and downs," "It's--it's--it's one of those +twirley-whirley"--here I illustrated my meaning by twirling my finger +round and round. + +A shout of laughter went up. + +If the reader will try this little joke on a score of people, by the +time the twentieth is arrived at he will then discover why the happiest +quartette of youngsters in the immediate vicinity of Primrose Hill +laughed so gaily. + +Then we all went in to dinner. How well the shirt-cuff story went down +with the soup. + +"Pellegrini," said the artist, "used to remark somewhat sarcastically to +his brother artists: 'Ah, you fellows are always making sketches. I +carry all mine here--here in my brain!' Pellegrini wore very big cuffs. +He made his sketches on them. Until this came out we thought his linen +always dirty!" + +[Illustration: BALLYHOOLY, M.P., GETS EXCITED.] + +Then Burnand came on with the beef. The two fellow-workers on +_Punch_--Mr. Burnand and Mr. Furniss--run pretty level in their ideas. A +happy thought is often suggested to both of them through reading the +same paragraph in a newspaper, and they cross in the post. We spoke of +_Punch's_ Grand Old Man--John Tenniel--of clever E. J. Milliken, whose +really wonderful work is yet but little known. Mr. Milliken wrote +"Childe Chappie"--and is "'Arry." Of Linley Sambourne, whom Mr. Furniss +once saw walking down Bond Street, and had the strange intuition that he +was the artist, connecting his work, and walk, and bearing together. He +had never seen or spoken to him before. Charles Keene's name was +mentioned. It was always the hardest matter to get Keene to make a +speech. He far preferred the famous stump of a pipe to spouting. Mr. +Furniss hurt Keene's feelings once with the happiest and kindest of +compliments. It was at a little dinner party, and Mr. Furniss linked +Keene's name with that of Robert Hunter--who did so much to provide open +spaces for the people. He referred to Keene as "the greatest provider of +open spaces!" Keene said he was never so grossly insulted--he never +forgave Mr. Furniss. He failed to see the truly charming inference to be +drawn from this remark. + +[Illustration: "THE ASSASSINATED SCARECROW, SOR!"] + +We went into the drawing-room, and together ran through the pages of a +huge volume. It contained the facsimiles of the pictures which comprised +one of Mr. Furniss's biggest hits--what was in reality an attack on the +Royal Academy. His "Artistic Joke"--a sub-title given to this exhibition +by the _Times_ in a long preliminary notice--created a sensation six +years ago. He attacked the Royal Academy in a good-natured way, because +he was not himself a member of that influential body. But there was a +more solid and serious reason. "I saw how cruel they were to younger +men," he said; "the long odds against a painter getting his work +exhibited, the indiscriminate selection of canvases." + +This really great effort on the part of Mr. Furniss--this idea to +caricature the style of the eminent artists of the day--kept him at work +for more than two years. There were eighty-seven canvases in all. His +friends came and went, but they saw nothing of the huge canvases hidden +away in his studio. He worked at such a rate that he became nervous of +himself. He would go to bed at night. He would wake to find himself +cutting the style of an R.A. to pieces in his studio at early morn--in a +state of semi-somnambulism. He fired his "Artistic Joke" off, the shot +went home, and the effect was a startler for many people and in many +places. It advanced Mr. Furniss in the world of art in a way he never +expected, and did not a little for those he sought to benefit. One of +these "jokes"--and a very dramatic one--is reproduced in these pages. + +The hour or two passed in the little drawing-room after dinner was +delightful. We had his unique platform entertainment. Mr. Furniss was +induced by the Birmingham and Midland Institute to appear on the +platform as a lecturer. This was followed by his lecturing for two +seasons all over the country, but finding that the Institutes made huge +profits out of his efforts, and that his anecdotes and mimicry were the +parts most relished, he abandoned the role of lecturer for that of +entertainer with "The Humours of Parliament." As soon as he had crushed +the idea that it was a lecture, people flocked to hear his anecdotes and +to watch his acting, the result of his first short tour resulting in a +clear profit of over £2,000. + +[Illustration: DRAWING FROM "AN ARTISTIC JOKE."] + +So it came about that young Frank closed his foreign stamp book, and +"Buzzy" settled down in a corner by her mother's side and looked the +little model she is. "Bogie" lay on the hearth-rug. Suddenly--we were +all in "The House." We heard the young member make his maiden speech; we +watched the mournful procession of the Speaker. Mr. Gladstone appeared +upon the scene--he walked the room, and in a merry sort of way played +with "Buzzy's" long curls--and took an intense interest in Frank's +collection of foreign stamps. "Bogie" was evidently inclined to break +out in a loud bark of presumable applause when the Irish member rose to +his legs--the member for Ballyhooly--who had a question to ask the Chief +Secretary for Ireland regarding an assassinated scarecrow! The reply did +not satisfy him, and the Ballyhooly M.P. poured forth such a torrent of +abuse upon the Chief Secretary's head that "Bogie's" bark came forth in +boisterous tones just as the Speaker called the Irish representative to +order! + +"What a hissing there was at one of my entertainments at Leicester," +said the humorist-caricaturist looking across at me with twinkling eyes. +"A terrible hissing! I showed Mr. Gladstone on the sheet. Immediately it +burst forth like a suddenly alarmed steam-engine. The audience rose in +indignation--they tried to outdo it with frantic applause, but in spite +of their lusty efforts it continued for several minutes. + +"'Turn him out--turn him out!' they cried. But we couldn't find the +party who was acting so rudely. + +"Imagine my feelings next morning when I saw in the papers leading +articles speaking in strong terms of this occurrence, which, one of +them stated in bold type--'was a disgrace to the people of Leicester.'" + +"Bogie" rose from the hearth-rug, wagged his tail, and made his exit. + +"Good night, Buz." + +"Good night, Frank." + +"And did they ever discover this very unseemly person?" I asked Mr. +Furniss when we were alone. + +"Oh! I forgot to tell you," he said, "that it was the hissing of the +lime in my magic lantern!" + +HARRY HOW. + +[Illustration: Telegraphic Address, Likajoko, London] + + + + +_Portraits of Celebrities at Different Times of their Lives._ + + +[Illustration: AGE 10. + +_From a Photo. by W. Andrews, Dublin._] + +[Illustration: Age 20. + +_From a Photo. by W. & D. Downey._] + + +HARRY FURNISS. + +BORN 1854. + +At ten years old Mr. Furniss was a pupil at the Wesleyan College School +at Dublin, where he started and edited _The Schoolboy's Punch_, in the +manner described in the extremely interesting interview which appears in +the present number. At twenty he had just come up to London, and was +working for the illustrated papers. At twenty-six he joined the staff of +_Punch_, with which his name has ever since been intimately connected. + +[Illustration: AGE 26. + +_From a Photo. by C. Watkins, Camden Road, N.W._] + +[Illustration: PRESENT DAY. + +_From a Photo by Debenham & Gould._] + +[Illustration: AGE 17. + +_From a Photo, by A. Adams, Aberdeen._] + +[Illustration: AGE 24. + +_From a Photo. by John Lamb, Aberdeen._] + + +SIR GEORGE REID, P.R.S.A. + +BORN 1842. + +Sir George Reid, P.R.S.A., was born in Aberdeen, N.B., in the year 1842, +and when nineteen years of age commenced his artistic studies at the +"Trustees' Academy," in the City of Edinburgh, and shortly afterwards in +Utrecht, under Mollinger. In 1870 he quitted the latter place for Paris, +where he continued his studies; and for several months in 1871 completed +his student life with Israels, at The Hague. He has proved himself a +true artist, and proficient in all departments--both figure and +landscape. Latterly he has applied himself to portrait painting, in +which he finds few competitors. He has done much in the way of book +illustrating. He was elected an Associate of the Royal Scottish Academy +in 1870, and a full member seven years afterwards, receiving on the +death of Sir W. Fettes Douglas the unanimous call of his brethren to +occupy the chair as President. + +[Illustration: AGE 36. + +_From a Photo. by John Lamb, Aberdeen._] + +[Illustration: PRESENT DAY. + +_From a Photo. by A. Inglis, Edinburgh._] + + +COLIN HUNTER, A.R.A. + +BORN 1841. + +[Illustration: AGE 15. + +_From a Daguerreotype._] + +Colin Hunter, A.R.A., was born in Glasgow, July 16, 1841, and is the son +of John Hunter, bookseller and postmaster, of Helensburgh. He was +educated in that town, and began painting at twenty years of age, after +four years' clerkship. His education as a painter was derived from +Nature. Mr. Hunter was elected an Associate of the Royal Academy in +January, 1884, and is also a Member of the Royal Scottish Water Colour +Society. + +[Illustration: AGE 24. + +_From a Photo. by Ovinius-Davis, Glasgow._] + +[Illustration: AGE 32. + +_From a Photo. by Fradelle & Marshall, London._] + +[Illustration: PRESENT DAY. + +_From a Photograph._] + +[Illustration: AGE 20. + +_From a Drawing by Carl Hartmann._] + + +SIR FREDERICK AUGUSTUS ABEL, BART., K.C.B., D.C.L., F.R.S. + +BORN 1827. + +[Illustration: AGE 28. + +_From a Photo. by Maull & Co., London._] + +Sir Fredk. A. Abel, Bart., who has lately been prominent before the +public in connection with the recent opening of the Imperial Institute, +of which he has been Organizing Secretary from 1887, was born in London +in 1827, and is known principally in connection with chemistry and +explosives. His published works are: "The Modern History of Gunpowder," +1866; "Gun Cotton," 1866; "On Explosive Agents," 1872, "Researches in +Explosives," 1875; and "Electricity Applied to Explosive Purposes," +1884. He is also joint-author with Colonel Bloxam of a "Handbook of +Chemistry." Sir Frederick Abel has been President of the Institute of +Chemistry, the Society of Chemical Industry, and the Society of +Telegraph Engineers and Electricians. He was appointed Associate Member +of the Ordnance Committee in 1867; and is Chemist to the War Department +and likewise Chemical Referee to the Government. In 1883 he was one of +the Royal Commissioners on Accidents in Mines, and was President of the +British Association at the Leeds meeting, 1890. He was created C.B. in +1877, Hon. D.C.L., Oxford, in 1883, knighted in the same year, and +raised to the rank of Baronet at the opening of the Imperial Institute. + +[Illustration: AGE 50. + +_From a Photograph._] + +[Illustration: AGE 65. + +_From a Photo. by Barraud, London._] + + +LORD KELVIN. + +BORN 1824. + +[Illustration: AGE 28. + +_From a Photograph._] + +William Thomson, Lord Kelvin, was born at Belfast on the 26th of June, +1824. His father was a distinguished mathematician, and was Professor of +Mathematics, first in Belfast, and afterwards in Glasgow University. At +a very early age, Lord Kelvin showed extraordinary mathematical ability; +and he passed with great distinction, first through the University of +Glasgow, and then through Cambridge, where he gained the Second +Wranglership and the first Smith's Prize. He became Professor of Natural +Philosophy in the University of Glasgow in 1846, at the age of +twenty-two; and he still holds that office. He was one of the pioneer +band who laid the first successful Atlantic cable, in 1858. In 1866 Her +Majesty conferred the honour of knighthood on him for his distinguished +services to the science and practice of submarine telegraphy. Lord +Kelvin is the author of many inventions. His mariner's compass and +sounding machine have done good service to seamen. His electrical +instruments are the standards all over the world. He is President of the +Royal Society and member of every important scientific society at home +and abroad. In January, 1892, the Queen conferred upon him his peerage. +He held the Colquhoun Sculls, at Cambridge, for two years. He is a +sailor at heart and an enthusiastic yachtsman; and, among amateurs, a +more keen lover of music it would be difficult to find. + +[Illustration: AGE 45. + +_From a Photo. by John Fergus, Largs._] + +[Illustration: PRESENT DAY. + +_From a Photo. by W. & D. Downey._] + +[Illustration: AGE 2. + +_From a Painting._] + +[Illustration: AGE 8. + +_From a Photo. by R. Tudor Williams, Monmouth._] + +[Illustration: AGE 40. + +_From a Photo. by M. Guttenberg, Manchester._] + + +CARDINAL-ARCHBISHOP VAUGHAN. + +BORN 1832. + +His Eminence Herbert Vaughan, D.D., is the eldest son of the late +Lieut.-Colonel Vaughan, of Courtfield, Herefordshire, born at +Gloucester, April 15, 1832, and was educated at Stonyhurst College, +Lancashire, on the Continent, and in Rome. On the death of Bishop +Turner, he was elected Bishop of Salford, a post which he held until his +recent elevation to the rank of Cardinal-Archbishop. + +[Illustration: AGE 25. + +_From a Photo. by Jules Géruzet, Brussels._] + +[Illustration: PRESENT DAY. + +_From a Photo. by G. Felici, Rome._] + +[Illustration: COLONEL VAUGHAN. + +_From a Photo. by G. Borelli._] + +[Illustration: JOHN S. VAUGHAN. + +_From a Photo. by A. Sauvy._] + +[Illustration: KENELM VAUGHAN. + +_From a Photo. by Southwell Bros._] + +[Illustration: REGINALD VAUGHAN. + +_From a Photo. by Bradley & Rulofson._] + +[Illustration: THE LATE COLONEL VAUGHAN. + +_Father of Cardinal Vaughan, Archbishop of Westminster._ + +_From a Photograph._] + +[Illustration: JOSEPH JEROME VAUGHAN. + +_From a Photo. by Bara._] + +[Illustration: BERNARD VAUGHAN. + +_From a Photo. by G. Jerrard._] + +[Illustration: ROGER BEDE VAUGHAN. + +_From a Photo. by J. H. Newman._] + +THE FATHER AND BROTHERS OF CARDINAL-ARCHBISHOP VAUGHAN. + + + + +ZIG-ZAGS AT THE ZOO + +XII.--ZIG-ZAG ACCIPITRAL. + + +[Illustration] + +[Illustration] + +The accipitral birds are the eagles, the vultures, the falcons, the +owls--all those birds that bite and tear unhappy mammals as well as +birds of more peaceful habits than themselves. They have all, it will be +observed, Roman noses, which may be the reason why the Romans adopted +the eagle as a standard; as also it may not. They have striking +characteristics of their own, and have been found very useful by poets +and other people who have to wander off the main subject to make plain +what they mean. The owl is the wiseacre of Nature, the vulture is a vile +harpy, and the eagle is the embodiment of everything great and mighty, +and glorious and free, and swooping and catoptrical. There is very +little to say against the eagle, except that he looks a deal the better +a long way off, like an impressionist picture or a volcano. When the +eagle is flying and swooping, or soaring and staring impudently at the +sun, or reproaching an old feather of his own in the arrow that sticks +in his chest, or mewing his mighty youth (a process I never quite +understood)--when he is doing noble and poetical things of this class at +an elevation of a great many thousand feet above the sea level he is +sublime. When you meet him down below, on his feet, much of the +sublimity is rubbed off. + +[Illustration: CHARLEY.] + +[Illustration: CORNS,--] + +[Illustration: BUNIONS,--] + +[Illustration: CHILBLAINS, OR--] + +[Illustration: IKINESS?] + +There is only one eagle in the world with whom I can claim anything like +a confidential friendship, although I know many. His name is Charley. +If, after a chat with Bob the Bactrian, you will turn your back to the +camel-house and walk past the band-stand toward the eagles' aviaries, +you will observe that the first corner cage is occupied by wedge-tailed +eagles--a most disrespectful name, by-the-bye, I think. There are +various perches, including a large tree-trunk, for these birds; but one +bird, the oldest in the cage, doesn't use them. He keeps on the floor by +the bars facing the place where Suffa Culli and Jung Perchad stand to +take up passengers, and looks out keenly for cats. That is Charley. He +is all right when you know him, is Charley, and I have it on the best +authority that there are no flies on him. A rat on the straggle has been +known to turn up in this aviary and run the gauntlet of all the +cages--till he reached Charley; nothing alive and eatable ever got past +_him_. I have all the esteem and friendship for Charley that any eagle +has a right to expect; but I can't admit the least impressiveness in his +walk. An eagle's feet are not meant to walk with, but to grab things. An +eagle's walk betrays a lamentable bandy-leggedness, and his toe-nails +click awkwardly against the ground. This makes him plant his feet +gingerly and lift them quickly, so that worthy old ladies suppose him to +be afflicted with lameness or bunions, an opinion which disgusts the +bird, as you may observe for yourself; for you will never find an eagle +in these Gardens submitting himself to be fondled by an old lady +visitor. It is by way of repudiating any suggestion of bunions that the +eagle adopts a raffish, off-hand, chickaleary sort of roll in the gait, +so that altogether, especially as viewed from behind, a walking eagle +has an appearance of perpetually knocking 'em in the Old Kent Road. On +Charley's next birthday I shall present him, I think, with a proper +pearly suit, with kicksies cut saucy over the trotters, and an artful +fakement down the side, if the Society will allow me. + +[Illustration: A PASSING SNACK.] + +[Illustration: DINNER AHOY!] + +There is nothing in the world that pleases an eagle better at +dinner-time than a prime piece of cat. Charley tells me that, upon the +whole, he prefers a good, plump, mouse-fed tabby; he adds that he never +yet heard of a tame eagle being kept at a sausage shop, though he would +like a situation of that sort himself, very much. The stoop of a free +eagle as it takes a living victim is, no doubt, a fine thing, except for +the victim; but the grabbing of cut-up food here in captivity is merely +comic. The eagle, with his Whitechapel lurch, makes for the morsel and +takes it in his stride; then he stands on it in a manner somehow +suggesting pattens, and pecks away at the hair--if, luckily, he has +secured a furry piece. I am not intimate with any eagle but Charley, but +I am very friendly with all of them--golden, tawny, white-tailed, and +the rest, with their scowls and their odd winks--all but one other of +the wedge-tailers, who stays for ever at the top of the tree trunk and +looks out westward, trying to distinguish the cats in the gardens of St. +John's Wood; he is reserved as well as uppish, and I don't know him to +speak to. + +[Illustration: UNCIVIL BAWLINGS.] + +I am pretty intimate with many of the owls. The owl I know least is a +little Scops owl, kept alone in the insect-house. He has for next-door +neighbour a sad old reprobate--Cocky, the big Triton cockatoo--who +abuses him horribly. The fact is, they both occupy a recess which once +Cocky had all to himself, and now Cocky bullies the intruder up hill and +down dale; although little Scops would gladly go somewhere else if he +could, and takes no notice of Cocky's uncivil bawlings further than to +lift his near wing apprehensively at each outburst. He and I have not +been able to improve our acquaintance greatly, partly because he is out +of reach, and partly because Cocky's conversation occupies most of his +time. + +[Illustration: WHAT!] + +[Illustration: WELL--] + +[Illustration: DID YOU EVER!] + +[Illustration: OF ALL THE--!] + +The Zoo owls are a lamentably scattered family. Another Scops owl, with +one eye, lives in the eastern aviary, in Church's care. He is a +charming, furious little ruffian (I am speaking of the owl, and not of +Church), and perfectly ready to peck any living thing, quite +irrespective of size. Where he lost his eye is a story of his own, for +he was first met with but one. He sits on his perch with a furious cock +of the ears--which are not ears at all, but feathers--with the aspect of +being permanently prepared to repel boarders; and the only thing that +could possibly add to his fierceness of appearance would be a patch over +the sight of the demolished eye; a little present I would gladly make +myself, if he would let me. + +[Illustration: THE SCOWLING SCOPS.] + +He lives just underneath a much less savage little Naked-foot Owl, who +doesn't resent your existence with his beak, but gazes at you with a +most extreme air of shocked surprise. He doesn't attack you bodily for +standing on this earth on your own feet--he is too much grieved and +scandalized. He looks at you as a teetotal lady of the Anti-Gambling +League would look at her nephew if he offered to toss her for whiskies. +He follows you with his glare of outraged propriety till you shrink +behind Church and sneak away, with an indescribable feeling of personal +depravity previously unknown. Why should this pharisaical little bird +make one feel a criminal? As a matter of fact, he is nothing but a +raffish fly-by-night himself; and his pious horror is assumed, I +believe, as much to keep his eyes wide open and him awake as to impose +on one. + +The owls' cages proper are away behind the llamas' house, and here you +may study owl nature in plenty; and you may observe the owls, like +people sitting through a long sermon, affecting various concealments and +excuses for going to sleep in the daytime. The milky eagle-owl pretends +to be waiting for a friend who never keeps his appointment. You come +upon him as he is dozing away quietly; he sees you just between his +eyelids, and at once stares angrily down the path as if he were sick of +waiting, and the other owl already half an hour overdue. Of course there +is no owl coming, so he shakes his head testily and half shuts his eyes. +If you go away then, he goes to sleep again. If you stay, he presently +makes another pretence of pulling out his watch and wondering if that +owl is ever coming. He has practised the transparent deception so long +that he does it now mechanically, and sleeps, I believe, or nearly so, +through the whole process. The oriental owl does it rather differently. +He doesn't open his eyes when you first wake him--this in order to give +greater verisimilitude to his pretence of profound meditation; he wishes +you to understand that it is not your presence that causes him to open +his eyes, but the natural course of his philosophical speculations. As a +pundit, he disdains to appear to observe you; so he gazes solemnly at a +vast space with nothing whatever for its centre. He sees you, but he +knows you for a creature that never carries raw meat with it, like a +keeper; a creature beneath the notice of _Bubo orientalis_. + +[Illustration: MILKY REPOSE.] + +[Illustration: IS HE COMING?] + +[Illustration: WHAT A NUISANCE!] + +As a song-bird, the owl is not a conspicuous success. Perhaps he has +learned this in the Zoo, for he cannot be induced to perform during +visiting hours. He is a reserved person, and exclusive. If you, as a +stranger, attempt to scrape his acquaintance, he meets you with an +indignant stare--confound your impudence! Nothing in this world can +present such a picture of offended, astounded dignity as an owl. I often +wonder what he said when Noah ordered him peremptorily into the Ark. As +for myself, I should as soon think of ordering one of the beadles at the +Bank. + +[Illustration: NOT YET?] + +[Illustration: OH, HANG IT!] + +Many worthy owls, long since passed away as living things, now exist in +their astral forms as pepper-boxes and tobacco-jars. They probably +belonged, in life, to the same species as a friend of mine here, who +exhibits one of their chief physical features. He sits immovably still, +so far as his body--his jar or pepper-reservoir--is concerned; indeed, +if he is not disturbed, he sits immovably altogether, and sleeps. When +he is disturbed he wakes in instalments, opening one eye at a time. He +fixes you with his wild, fiery eye, his indignant stare. Start to walk +round him; the head turns, and the stare follows you, with no movement +whatever of the part containing the pepper. The head slowly turns and +turns, without the smallest indication of stopping anywhere. I never +tempted it farther than once round, but walked back the other way, for +fear of strangling a valuable bird. Besides, I remembered an owl +pepper-box once, which became loose in the screw through continual +turning, so that the head fell off into your plate, and all the pepper +after it. + +[Illustration] + +The biggest owls are the eagle-owls. The eagle-owls here occupy a +similar sort of situation to that of the hermit in an old tea-garden. In +a secluded nook behind the camel-house a brick-built cave is kept in a +wire cage, which not only hinders the owls from escaping, but prevents +them taking the cave with them if they do. The cave is fitted up with +the proper quantity of weird gloom and several convenient perches; the +perches, however, are indistinct, because the gloom is obvious. In the +midst of it you may see two fiery eyes, like the fire-balls from a Roman +candle, and nothing else. This is the most one often has a chance of +seeing here in bright day. Often the eagle-owls are asleep, and then you +do not even see the fireworks. I know the big eagle-owl fairly well; +that is to say, I am on snarling terms with him. But once he has settled +in his cave he won't come out, even when I call him Zadkiel. + +[Illustration: THE EAGLE-OWLS' RETREAT.] + +There is nothing much more grotesque than a row of small barn owls, just +awakened from sleep and curious about the disturber. There is something +about the odd gaze and twist of the neck that irresistibly reminds me of +an illustration in an Old Saxon or Early English manuscript. + +[Illustration: SLEEP.] + +[Illustration: WHO SAID RATS?] + +[Illustration: THE ANGOLA.] + +I am not particularly friendly with any of the vultures. Walk past their +cages with the determination to ingratiate yourself with them. You will +change your mind. There are very few birds that I should not like to +keep as pets if I had the room, but the vulture is the first of them. I +don't know any kind of vulture whose personal appearance wouldn't hang +him at a court of Judge Lynch. The least unpleasant-looking of the lot +is the little Angola vulture, who is put among the kites; and she is bad +enough: a horrible eighteenth-century painted and powdered old woman; a +Pompadour of ninety. The large bearded vulture is not only an +uncompanionable fellow to look at, but he doesn't behave respectably. It +is not respectable to hurl yourself bodily against anybody looking over +a precipice and unaware of your presence, so as to break him up on the +rocks below, and dine off his prime cuts. I have no doubt that +Self--(Self, by-the-bye, keeps eagles and vultures as well as +camels)--has any amount of sympathy for his charges, but who _could_ +make a pet of a turkey-vulture, with its nasty, raw-looking red head, or +of a cinereous vulture, with its unwholesome eyes and its +unclean-looking blue wattle? No, I am not over-fond of a vulture. He is +always a dissipated-looking ruffian, of boiled eye and blotchy +complexion, and you know as you look at him that he would prefer to see +you dead rather than alive, so that he might safely take your eyes by +way of an appetizer, and forthwith proceed to lift away your softer +pieces preparatory to strolling under your ribs like a jackdaw in a cage +much too small. He sits there placid, unwinsome, and patient; waiting +for you to die. But he has his little vanities. He is tremendously +proud of his wings--and they certainly are wings to astonish. On a warm +day he likes to open them for coolness, but often he makes this a mere +excuse for showing off. He waits till some easily-impressed visitor +comes along--not a regular frequenter. Then he stands up and spreads his +great pinions abroad, and perhaps turns about, and the visitor is duly +impressed. So the vulture stands and receives the admiration, hoping the +while that the visitor has heart disease, and will drop dead where he +stands. And when the visitor walks off without dying the old harpy lets +his wings fall open, ready for somebody else. + +[Illustration] + + + + +_The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes._ + +XIX.--THE ADVENTURE OF THE REIGATE SQUIRE. + +BY A. CONAN DOYLE. + + +It was some time before the health of my friend, Mr. Sherlock Holmes, +recovered from the strain caused by his immense exertions in the spring +of '87. The whole question of the Netherland-Sumatra Company and of the +colossal schemes of Baron Maupertins are too recent in the minds of the +public, and are too intimately concerned with politics and finance, to +be fitting subjects for this series of sketches. They led, however, in +an indirect fashion to a singular and complex problem, which gave my +friend an opportunity of demonstrating the value of a fresh weapon among +the many with which he waged his life-long battle against crime. + +On referring to my notes, I see that it was upon the 14th of April that +I received a telegram from Lyons, which informed me that Holmes was +lying ill in the Hotel Dulong. Within twenty-four hours I was in his +sick room, and was relieved to find that there was nothing formidable in +his symptoms. His iron constitution, however, had broken down under the +strain of an investigation which had extended over two months, during +which period he had never worked less than fifteen hours a day, and had +more than once, as he assured me, kept to his task for five days at a +stretch. The triumphant issue of his labours could not save him from +reaction after so terrible an exertion, and at a time when Europe was +ringing with his name, and when his room was literally ankle-deep with +congratulatory telegrams, I found him a prey to the blackest depression. +Even the knowledge that he had succeeded where the police of three +countries had failed, and that he had out-manoeuvred at every point +the most accomplished swindler in Europe, were insufficient to rouse him +from his nervous prostration. + +Three days later we were back in Baker Street together, but it was +evident that my friend would be much the better for a change, and the +thought of a week of spring-time in the country was full of attractions +to me also. My old friend Colonel Hayter, who had come under my +professional care in Afghanistan, had now taken a house near Reigate, in +Surrey, and had frequently asked me to come down to him upon a visit. On +the last occasion he had remarked that if my friend would only come with +me, he would be glad to extend his hospitality to him also. A little +diplomacy was needed, but when Holmes understood that the establishment +was a bachelor one, and that he would be allowed the fullest freedom, he +fell in with my plans, and a week after our return from Lyons we were +under the Colonel's roof. Hayter was a fine old soldier, who had seen +much of the world, and he soon found, as I had expected, that Holmes and +he had plenty in common. + +On the evening of our arrival we were sitting in the Colonel's gun-room +after dinner, Holmes stretched upon the sofa, while Hayter and I looked +over his little armoury of fire-arms. + +"By the way," said he, suddenly, "I think I'll take one of these pistols +upstairs with me in case we have an alarm." + +"An alarm!" said I. + +"Yes, we've had a scare in this part lately. Old Acton, who is one of +our county magnates, had his house broken into last Monday. No great +damage done, but the fellows are still at large." + +"No clue?" asked Holmes, cocking his eye at the Colonel. + +"None as yet. But the affair is a petty one, one of our little country +crimes, which must seem too small for your attention, Mr. Holmes, after +this great international affair." + +Holmes waved away the compliment, though his smile showed that it had +pleased him. + +"Was there any feature of interest?" + +"I fancy not. The thieves ransacked the library and got very little for +their pains. The whole place was turned upside down, drawers burst open +and presses ransacked, with the result that an odd volume of Pope's +'Homer,' two plated candlesticks, an ivory letter-weight, a small oak +barometer, and a ball of twine, are all that have vanished." + +"What an extraordinary assortment!" I exclaimed. + +"Oh, the fellows evidently grabbed hold of anything they could get." + +Holmes grunted from the sofa. + +"The county police ought to make something of that," said he. "Why, it +is surely obvious that----" + +But I held up a warning finger. + +[Illustration: "I HELD UP A WARNING FINGER."] + +"You are here for a rest, my dear fellow. For Heaven's sake, don't get +started on a new problem when your nerves are all in shreds." + +Holmes shrugged his shoulders with a glance of comic resignation towards +the Colonel, and the talk drifted away into less dangerous channels. + +It was destined, however, that all my professional caution should be +wasted, for next morning the problem obtruded itself upon us in such a +way that it was impossible to ignore it, and our country visit took a +turn which neither of us could have anticipated. We were at breakfast +when the Colonel's butler rushed in with all his propriety shaken out of +him. + +"Have you heard the news, sir?" he gasped. "At the Cunningham's, sir!" + +"Burglary!" cried the Colonel, with his coffee cup in mid air. + +"Murder!" + +The Colonel whistled. "By Jove!" said he, "who's killed, then? The J.P. +or his son?" + +"Neither, sir. It was William, the coachman. Shot through the heart, +sir, and never spoke again." + +"Who shot him, then?" + +"The burglar, sir. He was off like a shot and got clean away. He'd just +broke in at the pantry window when William came on him and met his end +in saving his master's property." + +"What time?" + +"It was last night, sir, somewhere about twelve." + +"Ah, then, we'll step over presently," said the Colonel, coolly settling +down to his breakfast again. "It's a baddish business," he added, when +the butler had gone. "He's our leading squire about here, is old +Cunningham, and a very decent fellow too. He'll be cut up over this, for +the man has been in his service for years, and was a good servant. It's +evidently the same villains who broke into Acton's." + +"And stole that very singular collection?" said Holmes, thoughtfully. + +"Precisely." + +"Hum! It may prove the simplest matter in the world; but, all the same, +at first glance this is just a little curious, is it not? A gang of +burglars acting in the country might be expected to vary the scene of +their operations, and not to crack two cribs in the same district within +a few days. When you spoke last night of taking precautions, I remember +that it passed through my mind that this was probably the last parish +in England to which the thief or thieves would be likely to turn their +attention; which shows that I have still much to learn." + +"I fancy it's some local practitioner," said the Colonel. "In that case, +of course, Acton's and Cunningham's are just the places he would go for, +since they are far the largest about here." + +"And richest?" + +"Well, they ought to be; but they've had a law-suit for some years which +has sucked the blood out of both of them, I fancy. Old Acton has some +claim on half Cunningham's estate, and the lawyers have been at it with +both hands." + +"If it's a local villain, there should not be much difficulty in running +him down," said Holmes, with a yawn. "All right, Watson, I don't intend +to meddle." + +"Inspector Forrester, sir," said the butler, throwing open the door. + +The official, a smart, keen-faced young fellow, stepped into the room. +"Good morning, Colonel," said he. "I hope I don't intrude, but we hear +that Mr. Holmes, of Baker Street, is here." + +The Colonel waved his hand towards my friend, and the Inspector bowed. + +"We thought that perhaps you would care to step across, Mr. Holmes." + +"The Fates are against you, Watson," said he, laughing. "We were +chatting about the matter when you came in, Inspector. Perhaps you can +let us have a few details." As he leaned back in his chair in the +familiar attitude, I knew that the case was hopeless. + +[Illustration: "INSPECTOR FORRESTER."] + +"We had no clue in the Acton affair. But here we have plenty to go on, +and there's no doubt it is the same party in each case. The man was +seen." + +"Ah!" + +"Yes, sir. But he was off like a deer after the shot that killed poor +William Kirwan was fired. Mr. Cunningham saw him from the bedroom +window, and Mr. Alec Cunningham saw him from the back passage. It was a +quarter to twelve when the alarm broke out. Mr. Cunningham had just got +into bed, and Mister Alec was smoking a pipe in his dressing-gown. They +both heard William, the coachman, calling for help, and Mister Alec he +ran down to see what was the matter. The back door was open, and as he +came to the foot of the stairs he saw two men wrestling together +outside. One of them fired a shot, the other dropped, and the murderer +rushed across the garden and over the hedge. Mr. Cunningham, looking out +of his bedroom window, saw the fellow as he gained the road, but lost +sight of him at once. Mister Alec stopped to see if he could help the +dying man, and so the villain got clean away. Beyond the fact that he +was a middle-sized man, and dressed in some dark stuff, we have no +personal clue, but we are making energetic inquiries, and if he is a +stranger we shall soon find him out." + +"What was this William doing there? Did he say anything before he died?" + +"Not a word. He lives at the lodge with his mother, and as he was a very +faithful fellow, we imagine that he walked up to the house with the +intention of seeing that all was right there. Of course, this Acton +business has put everyone on their guard. The robber must have just +burst open the door--the lock has been forced--when William came upon +him." + +"Did William say anything to his mother before going out?" + +"She is very old and deaf, and we can get no information from her. The +shock has made her half-witted, but I understand that she was never very +bright. There is one very important circumstance, however. Look at +this!" + +He took a small piece of torn paper from a note-book and spread it out +upon his knee. + +"This was found between the finger and thumb of the dead man. It appears +to be a fragment torn from a larger sheet. You will observe that the +hour mentioned upon it is the very time at which the poor fellow met his +fate. You see that his murderer might have torn the rest of the sheet +from him or he might have taken this fragment from the murderer. It +reads almost as though it was an appointment." + +Holmes took up the scrap of paper, a facsimile of which is here +reproduced:-- + +[Illustration: at quarterto twelve learn what maybe] + +"Presuming that it is an appointment," continued the Inspector, "it is, +of course, a conceivable theory that this William Kirwan, although he +had the reputation of being an honest man, may have been in league with +the thief. He may have met him there, may even have helped him to break +in the door, and then they may have fallen out between themselves." + +"This writing is of extraordinary interest," said Holmes, who had been +examining it with intense concentration. "These are much deeper waters +than I had thought." He sank his head upon his hands, while the +Inspector smiled at the effect which his case had had upon the famous +London specialist. + +"Your last remark," said Holmes, presently, "as to the possibility of +there being an understanding between the burglar and the servant, and +this being a note of appointment from one to the other, is an ingenious +and not entirely an impossible supposition. But this writing opens +up----" he sank his head into his hands again and remained for some +minutes in the deepest thought. When he raised his face again I was +surprised to see that his cheek was tinged with colour and his eyes as +bright as before his illness. He sprang to his feet with all his old +energy. + +"I'll tell you what!" said he. "I should like to have a quiet little +glance into the details of this case. There is something in it which +fascinates me extremely. If you will permit me, Colonel, I will leave my +friend, Watson, and you, and I will step round with the Inspector to +test the truth of one or two little fancies of mine. I will be with you +again in half an hour." + +An hour and a half had elapsed before the Inspector returned alone. + +"Mr. Holmes is walking up and down in the field outside," said he. "He +wants us all four to go up to the house together." + +"To Mr. Cunningham's?" + +"Yes, sir." + +"What for?" + +The Inspector shrugged his shoulders. "I don't quite know, sir. Between +ourselves, I think Mr. Holmes has not quite got over his illness yet. +He's been behaving very queerly, and he is very much excited." + +"I don't think you need alarm yourself," said I. "I have usually found +that there was method in his madness." + +"Some folk might say there was madness in his method," muttered the +Inspector. "But he's all on fire to start, Colonel, so we had best go +out, if you are ready." + +We found Holmes pacing up and down in the field, his chin sunk upon his +breast, and his hands thrust into his trouser pockets. + +"The matter grows in interest," said he. "Watson, your country trip has +been a distinct success. I have had a charming morning." + +"You have been up to the scene of the crime, I understand?" said the +Colonel. + +"Yes; the Inspector and I have made quite a little reconnaissance +together." + +"Any success?" + +"Well, we have seen some very interesting things. I'll tell you what we +did as we walk. First of all we saw the body of this unfortunate man. He +certainly died from a revolver wound, as reported." + +"Had you doubted it, then?" + +"Oh, it is as well to test everything. Our inspection was not wasted. We +then had an interview with Mr. Cunningham and his son, who were able to +point out the exact spot where the murderer had broken through the +garden hedge in his flight. That was of great interest." + +"Naturally." + +"Then we had a look at this poor fellow's mother. We could get no +information from her, however, as she is very old and feeble." + +"And what is the result of your investigations?" + +"The conviction that the crime is a very peculiar one. Perhaps our visit +now may do something to make it less obscure. I think that we are both +agreed, Inspector, that the fragment of paper in the dead man's hand, +bearing, as it does, the very hour of his death written upon it, is of +extreme importance." + +"It should give a clue, Mr. Holmes." + +"It _does_ give a clue. Whoever wrote that note was the man who brought +William Kirwan out of his bed at that hour. But where is the rest of +that sheet of paper?" + +"I examined the ground carefully in the hope of finding it," said the +Inspector. + +"It was torn out of the dead man's hand. Why was someone so anxious to +get possession of it? Because it incriminated him. And what would he do +with it? Thrust it into his pocket most likely, never noticing that a +corner of it had been left in the grip of the corpse. If we could get +the rest of that sheet, it is obvious that we should have gone a long +way towards solving the mystery." + +"Yes, but how can we get at the criminal's pocket before we catch the +criminal?" + +"Well, well, it was worth thinking over. Then there is another obvious +point. The note was sent to William. The man who wrote it could not have +taken it, otherwise of course he might have delivered his own message by +word of mouth. Who brought the note, then? Or did it come through the +post?" + +"I have made inquiries," said the Inspector. "William received a letter +by the afternoon post yesterday. The envelope was destroyed by him." + +"Excellent!" cried Holmes, clapping the Inspector on the back. "You've +seen the postman. It is a pleasure to work with you. Well, here is the +lodge, and if you will come up, Colonel, I will show you the scene of +the crime." + +We passed the pretty cottage where the murdered man had lived, and +walked up an oak-lined avenue to the fine old Queen Anne house, which +bears the date of Malplaquet upon the lintel of the door. Holmes and the +Inspector led us round it until we came to the side gate, which is +separated by a stretch of garden from the hedge which lines the road. A +constable was standing at the kitchen door. + +"Throw the door open, officer," said Holmes. "Now it was on those stairs +that young Mr. Cunningham stood and saw the two men struggling just +where we are. Old Mr. Cunningham was at that window--the second on the +left--and he saw the fellow get away just to the left of that bush. So +did the son. They are both sure of it, on account of the bush. Then +Mister Alec ran out and knelt beside the wounded man. The ground is very +hard, you see, and there are no marks to guide us." + +As he spoke two men came down the garden path, from round the angle of +the house. The one was an elderly man, with a strong, deep-lined, +heavy-eyed face; the other a dashing young fellow, whose bright, smiling +expression and showy dress were in strange contrast with the business +which had brought us there. + +"Still at it, then?" said he to Holmes. "I thought you Londoners were +never at fault. You don't seem to be so very quick, after all." + +"Ah! you must give us a little time," said Holmes, good-humouredly. + +"You'll want it," said young Alec Cunningham. "Why, I don't see that we +have any clue at all." + +"There's only one," answered the Inspector. "We thought that if we could +only find----Good heavens! Mr. Holmes, what is the matter?" + +My poor friend's face had suddenly assumed the most dreadful expression. +His eyes rolled upwards, his features writhed in agony, and with a +suppressed groan he dropped on his face upon the ground. Horrified at +the suddenness and severity of the attack, we carried him into the +kitchen, where he lay back in a large chair and breathed heavily for +some minutes. Finally, with a shame-faced apology for his weakness, he +rose once more. + +"Watson would tell you that I have only just recovered from a severe +illness," he explained. "I am liable to these sudden nervous attacks." + +"Shall I send you home in my trap?" asked old Cunningham. + +"Well, since I am here, there is one point on which I should like to +feel sure. We can very easily verify it." + +"What is it?" + +"Well, it seems to me that it is just possible that the arrival of this +poor fellow William was not before but after the entrance of the burglar +into the house. You appear to take it for granted that although the door +was forced the robber never got in." + +[Illustration: "GOOD HEAVENS! WHAT IS THE MATTER?"] + +"I fancy that is quite obvious," said Mr. Cunningham, gravely. "Why, my +son Alec had not yet gone to bed, and he would certainly have heard +anyone moving about." + +"Where was he sitting?" + +"I was sitting smoking in my dressing-room." + +"Which window is that?" + +"The last on the left, next my father's." + +"Both your lamps were lit, of course?" + +"Undoubtedly." + +"There are some very singular points here," said Holmes, smiling. "Is it +not extraordinary that a burglar--and a burglar who had had some +previous experience--should deliberately break into a house at a time +when he could see from the lights that two of the family were still +afoot?" + +"He must have been a cool hand." + +"Well, of course, if the case were not an odd one we should not have +been driven to ask you for an explanation," said Mister Alec. "But as to +your idea that the man had robbed the house before William tackled him, +I think it a most absurd notion. Shouldn't we have found the place +disarranged and missed the things which he had taken?" + +"It depends on what the things were," said Holmes. "You must remember +that we are dealing with a burglar who is a very peculiar fellow, and +who appears to work on lines of his own. Look, for example, at the queer +lot of things which he took from Acton's--what was it?--a ball of +string, a letter-weight, and I don't know what other odds and ends!" + +"Well, we are quite in your hands, Mr. Holmes," said old Cunningham. +"Anything which you or the Inspector may suggest will most certainly be +done." + +"In the first place," said Holmes, "I should like you to offer a +reward--coming from yourself, for the officials may take a little time +before they would agree upon the sum, and these things cannot be done +too promptly. I have jotted down the form here, if you would not mind +signing it. Fifty pounds was quite enough, I thought." + +"I would willingly give five hundred," said the J.P., taking the slip of +paper and the pencil which Holmes handed to him. "This is not quite +correct, however," he added, glancing over the document. + +"I wrote it rather hurriedly." + +"You see you begin: 'Whereas, at about a quarter to one on Tuesday +morning, an attempt was made'--and so on. It was at a quarter to twelve, +as a matter of fact." + +I was pained at the mistake, for I knew how keenly Holmes would feel any +slip of the kind. It was his speciality to be accurate as to fact, but +his recent illness had shaken him, and this one little incident was +enough to show me that he was still far from being himself. He was +obviously embarrassed for an instant, while the Inspector raised his +eyebrows and Alec Cunningham burst into a laugh. The old gentleman +corrected the mistake, however, and handed the paper back to Holmes. + +"Get it printed as soon as possible," he said. "I think your idea is an +excellent one." + +Holmes put the slip of paper carefully away in his pocket-book. + +"And now," said he, "it would really be a good thing that we should all +go over the house together and make certain that this rather erratic +burglar did not, after all, carry anything away with him." + +Before entering. Holmes made an examination of the door which had been +forced. It was evident that a chisel or strong knife had been thrust in, +and the lock forced back with it. We could see the marks in the wood +where it had been pushed in. + +"You don't use bars, then?" he asked. + +"We have never found it necessary." + +"You don't keep a dog?" + +"Yes; but he is chained on the other side of the house." + +"When do the servants go to bed?" + +"About ten." + +"I understand that William was usually in bed also at that hour?" + +"Yes." + +"It is singular that on this particular night he should have been up. +Now, I should be very glad if you would have the kindness to show us +over the house, Mr. Cunningham." + +A stone-flagged passage, with the kitchens branching away from it, led +by a wooden staircase directly to the first floor of the house. It came +out upon the landing opposite to a second more ornamental stair which +led up from the front hall. Out of this landing opened the drawing-room +and several bedrooms, including those of Mr. Cunningham and his son. +Holmes walked slowly, taking keen note of the architecture of the house. +I could tell from his expression that he was on a hot scent, and yet I +could not in the least imagine in what direction his inferences were +leading him. + +"My good sir," said Mr. Cunningham, with some impatience, "this is +surely very unnecessary. That is my room at the end of the stairs, and +my son's is the one beyond it. I leave it to your judgment whether it +was possible for the thief to have come up here without disturbing us." + +"You must try round and get on a fresh scent, I fancy," said the son, +with a rather malicious smile. + +"Still, I must ask you to humour me a little further. I should like, for +example, to see how far the windows of the bedrooms command the front. +This, I understand, is your son's room"--he pushed open the door--"and +that, I presume, is the dressing-room in which he sat smoking when the +alarm was given. Where does the window of that look out to?" He stepped +across the bedroom, pushed open the door, and glanced round the other +chamber. + +"I hope you are satisfied now?" said Mr. Cunningham, testily. + +"Thank you; I think I have seen all that I wished." + +"Then, if it is really necessary, we can go into my room." + +"If it is not too much trouble." + +The J.P. shrugged his shoulders, and led the way into his own chamber, +which was a plainly furnished and commonplace room. As we moved across +it in the direction of the window, Holmes fell back until he and I were +the last of the group. Near the foot of the bed was a small square +table, on which stood a dish of oranges and a carafe of water. As we +passed it, Holmes, to my unutterable astonishment, leaned over in front +of me and deliberately knocked the whole thing over. The glass smashed +into a thousand pieces, and the fruit rolled about into every corner of +the room. + +[Illustration: "HE DELIBERATELY KNOCKED THE WHOLE THING OVER."] + +"You've done it now, Watson," said he, coolly. "A pretty mess you've +made of the carpet." + +I stooped in some confusion and began to pick up the fruit, +understanding that for some reason my companion desired me to take the +blame upon myself. The others did the same, and set the table on its +legs again. + +"Halloa!" cried the Inspector, "where's he got to?" + +Holmes had disappeared. + +"Wait here an instant," said young Alec Cunningham. "The fellow is off +his head, in my opinion. Come with me, father, and see where he has got +to!" + +They rushed out of the room, leaving the Inspector, the Colonel, and me +staring at each other. + +"'Pon my word, I am inclined to agree with Mister Alec," said the +official. "It may be the effect of this illness, but it seems to me +that----" + +His words were cut short by a sudden scream of "Help! Help! Murder!" +With a thrill I recognised the voice as that of my friend. I rushed +madly from the room on to the landing. The cries, which had sunk down +into a hoarse, inarticulate shouting, came from the room which we had +first visited. I dashed in, and on into the dressing-room beyond. The +two Cunninghams were bending over the prostrate figure of Sherlock +Holmes, the younger clutching his throat with both hands, while the +elder seemed to be twisting one of his wrists. In an instant the three +of us had torn them away from him, and Holmes staggered to his feet, +very pale, and evidently greatly exhausted. + +"Arrest these men, Inspector," he gasped. + +"On what charge?" + +"That of murdering their coachman, William Kirwan!" + +The Inspector stared about him in bewilderment. "Oh, come now, Mr. +Holmes," said he at last; "I am sure you don't really mean to----" + +"Tut, man; look at their faces!" cried Holmes, curtly. + +Never, certainly, have I seen a plainer confession of guilt upon human +countenances. The older man seemed numbed and dazed, with a heavy, +sullen expression upon his strongly-marked face. The son, on the other +hand, had dropped all that jaunty, dashing style which had characterized +him, and the ferocity of a dangerous wild beast gleamed in his dark eyes +and distorted his handsome features. The Inspector said nothing, but, +stepping to the door, he blew his whistle. Two of his constables came at +the call. + +"I have no alternative, Mr. Cunningham," said he. "I trust that this may +all prove to be an absurd mistake; but you can see that----Ah, would +you? Drop it!" He struck out with his hand, and a revolver, which the +younger man was in the act of cocking, clattered down upon the floor. + +[Illustration: "BENDING OVER THE PROSTRATE FIGURE OF SHERLOCK HOLMES."] + +"Keep that," said Holmes, quickly putting his foot upon it. "You will +find it useful at the trial. But this is what we really wanted." He held +up a little crumpled piece of paper. + +"The remainder of the sheet!" cried the Inspector. + +"Precisely." + +"And where was it?" + +"Where I was sure it must be. I'll make the whole matter clear to you +presently. I think, Colonel, that you and Watson might return now, and I +will be with you again in an hour at the furthest. The Inspector and I +must have a word with the prisoners; but you will certainly see me back +at luncheon time." + +Sherlock Holmes was as good as his word, for about one o'clock he +rejoined us in the Colonel's smoking-room. He was accompanied by a +little, elderly gentleman, who was introduced to me as the Mr. Acton +whose house had been the scene of the original burglary. + +"I wished Mr. Acton to be present while I demonstrated this small matter +to you," said Holmes, "for it is natural that he should take a keen +interest in the details. I am afraid, my dear Colonel, that you must +regret the hour that you took in such a stormy petrel as I am." + +"On the contrary," answered the Colonel, warmly, "I consider it the +greatest privilege to have been permitted to study your methods of +working. I confess that they quite surpass my expectations, and that I +am utterly unable to account for your result. I have not yet seen the +vestige of a clue." + +"I am afraid that my explanation may disillusionize you, but it has +always been my habit to hide none of my methods, either from my friend +Watson or from anyone who might take an intelligent interest in them. +But first, as I am rather shaken by the knocking about which I had in +the dressing-room, I think that I shall help myself to a dash of your +brandy, Colonel. My strength has been rather tried of late." + +"I trust you had no more of those nervous attacks." + +Sherlock Holmes laughed heartily. "We will come to that in its turn," +said he. "I will lay an account of the case before you in its due order, +showing you the various points which guided me in my decision. Pray +interrupt me if there is any inference which is not perfectly clear to +you. + +"It is of the highest importance in the art of detection to be able to +recognise out of a number of facts which are incidental and which vital. +Otherwise your energy and attention must be dissipated instead of being +concentrated. Now, in this case there was not the slightest doubt in my +mind from the first that the key of the whole matter must be looked for +in the scrap of paper in the dead man's hand. + +"Before going into this I would draw your attention to the fact that if +Alec Cunningham's narrative was correct, and if the assailant after +shooting William Kirwan had _instantly_ fled, then it obviously could +not be he who tore the paper from the dead man's hand. But if it was not +he, it must have been Alec Cunningham himself, for by the time that the +old man had descended several servants were upon the scene. The point is +a simple one, but the Inspector had overlooked it because he had started +with the supposition that these county magnates had had nothing to do +with the matter. Now, I make a point of never having any prejudices and +of following docilely wherever fact may lead me, and so in the very +first stage of the investigation I found myself looking a little askance +at the part which had been played by Mr. Alec Cunningham. + +[Illustration: "THE POINT IS A SIMPLE ONE."] + +"And now I made a very careful examination of the corner of paper which +the Inspector had submitted to us. It was at once clear to me that it +formed part of a very remarkable document. Here it is. Do you not now +observe something very suggestive about it?" + +"It has a very irregular look," said the Colonel. + +"My dear sir," cried Holmes, "there cannot be the least doubt in the +world that it has been written by two persons doing alternate words. +When I draw your attention to the strong t's of 'at' and 'to' and ask +you to compare them with the weak ones of 'quarter' and 'twelve,' you +will instantly recognise the fact. A very brief analysis of those four +words would enable you to say with the utmost confidence that the +'learn' and the 'maybe' are written in the stronger hand, and the 'what' +in the weaker." + +"By Jove, it's as clear as day!" cried the Colonel. "Why on earth should +two men write a letter in such a fashion?" + +"Obviously the business was a bad one, and one of the men who distrusted +the other was determined that, whatever was done, each should have an +equal hand in it. Now, of the two men it is clear that the one who wrote +the 'at' and 'to' was the ring-leader." + +"How do you get at that?" + +"We might deduce it from the mere character of the one hand as compared +with the other. But we have more assured reasons than that for supposing +it. If you examine this scrap with attention you will come to the +conclusion that the man with the stronger hand wrote all his words +first, leaving blanks for the other to fill up. These blanks were not +always sufficient, and you can see that the second man had a squeeze to +fit his 'quarter' in between the 'at' and the 'to,' showing that the +latter were already written. The man who wrote all his words first is +undoubtedly the man who planned this affair." + +"Excellent!" cried Mr. Acton. + +"But very superficial," said Holmes. "We come now, however, to a point +which is of importance. You may not be aware that the deduction of a +man's age from his writing is one which has been brought to considerable +accuracy by experts. In normal cases one can place a man in his true +decade with tolerable confidence. I say normal cases, because ill-health +and physical weakness reproduce the signs of old age, even when the +invalid is a youth. In this case, looking at the bold, strong hand of +the one, and the rather broken-backed appearance of the other, which +still retains its legibility, although the t's have begun to lose their +crossings, we can say that the one was a young man, and the other was +advanced in years without being positively decrepit." + +"Excellent!" cried Mr. Acton again. + +"There is a further point, however, which is subtler and of greater +interest. There is something in common between these hands. They belong +to men who are blood-relatives. It may be most obvious to you in the +Greek e's, but to me there are many small points which indicate the same +thing. I have no doubt at all that a family mannerism can be traced in +these two specimens of writing. I am only, of course, giving you the +leading results now of my examination of the paper. There were +twenty-three other deductions which would be of more interest to experts +than to you. They all tended to deepen the impression upon my mind that +the Cunninghams, father and son, had written this letter. + +"Having got so far, my next step was, of course, to examine into the +details of the crime and to see how far they would help us. I went up to +the house with the Inspector, and saw all that was to be seen. The wound +upon the dead man was, as I was able to determine with absolute +confidence, fired from a revolver at the distance of something over four +yards. There was no powder-blackening on the clothes. Evidently, +therefore, Alec Cunningham had lied when he said that the two men were +struggling when the shot was fired. Again, both father and son agreed as +to the place where the man escaped into the road. At that point, +however, as it happens, there is a broadish ditch, moist at the bottom. +As there were no indications of boot-marks about this ditch, I was +absolutely sure not only that the Cunninghams had again lied, but that +there had never been any unknown man upon the scene at all. + +"And now I had to consider the motive of this singular crime. To get at +this I endeavoured first of all to solve the reason of the original +burglary at Mr. Acton's. I understood from something which the Colonel +told us that a law-suit, had been going on between you, Mr. Acton, and +the Cunninghams. Of course, it instantly occurred to me that they had +broken into your library with the intention of getting at some document +which might be of importance in the case." + +"Precisely so," said Mr. Acton; "there can be no possible doubt as to +their intentions. I have the clearest claim upon half their present +estate, and if they could have found a single paper--which, fortunately, +was in the strong box of my solicitors--they would undoubtedly have +crippled our case." + +[Illustration: "THERE WAS NO POWDER-BLACKENING ON THE CLOTHES."] + +"There you are!" said Holmes, smiling. "It was a dangerous, reckless +attempt in which I seem to trace the influence of young Alec. Having +found nothing, they tried to divert suspicion by making it appear to be +an ordinary burglary, to which end they carried off whatever they could +lay their hands upon. That is all clear enough, but there was much that +was still obscure. What I wanted above all was to get the missing part +of that note. I was certain that Alec had torn it out of the dead man's +hand, and almost certain that he must have thrust it into the pocket of +his dressing-gown. Where else could he have put it? The only question +was whether it was still there. It was worth an effort to find out, and +for that object we all went up to the house. + +"The Cunninghams joined us, as you doubtless remember, outside the +kitchen door. It was, of course, of the very first importance that they +should not be reminded of the existence of this paper, otherwise they +would naturally destroy it without delay. The Inspector was about to +tell them the importance which we attached to it when, by the luckiest +chance in the world, I tumbled down in a sort of fit and so changed the +conversation." + +"Good heavens!" cried the Colonel, laughing. "Do you mean to say all our +sympathy was wasted and your fit an imposture?" + +"Speaking professionally, it was admirably done," cried I, looking in +amazement at this man who was for ever confounding me with some new +phase of his astuteness. + +"It is an art which is often useful," said he. "When I recovered I +managed by a device, which had, perhaps, some little merit of ingenuity, +to get old Cunningham to write the word 'twelve,' so that I might +compare it with the 'twelve' upon the paper." + +"Oh, what an ass I have been!" I exclaimed. + +"I could see that you were commiserating with me over my weakness," said +Holmes, laughing. "I was sorry to cause you the sympathetic pain which I +know that you felt. We then went upstairs together, and having entered +the room and seen the dressing-gown hanging up behind the door, I +contrived by upsetting a table to engage their attention for the moment +and slipped back to examine the pockets. I had hardly got the paper, +however, which was, as I had expected, in one of them, when the two +Cunninghams were on me, and would, I verily believe, have murdered me +then and there but for your prompt and friendly aid. As it is, I feel +that young man's grip on my throat now, and the father has twisted my +wrist round in the effort to get the paper out of my hand. They saw that +I must know all about it, you see, and the sudden change from absolute +security to complete despair made them perfectly desperate. + +"I had a little talk with old Cunningham afterwards as to the motive of +the crime. He was tractable enough, though his son was a perfect demon, +ready to blow out his own or anybody else's brains if he could have got +to his revolver. When Cunningham saw that the case against him was so +strong he lost all heart, and made a clean breast of everything. It +seems that William had secretly followed his two masters on the night +when they made their raid upon Mr. Acton's, and, having thus got them +into his power, proceeded under threats of exposure to levy blackmail +upon them. Mister Alec, however, was a dangerous man to play games of +that sort with. It was a stroke of positive genius on his part to see in +the burglary scare, which was convulsing the country side, an +opportunity of plausibly getting rid of the man whom he feared. William +was decoyed up and shot; and, had they only got the whole of the note, +and paid a little more attention to detail in their accessories, it is +very possible that suspicion might never have been aroused." + +"And the note?" I asked. + +Sherlock Holmes placed the subjoined paper before us:-- + +[Illustration] + +"It is very much the sort of thing that I expected," said he. "Of +course, we do not yet know what the relations may have been between Alec +Cunningham, William Kirwan, and Annie Morrison. The result shows that +the trap was skilfully baited. I am sure that you cannot fail to be +delighted with the traces of heredity shown in the p's and in the tails +of the g's. The absence of the i-dots in the old man's writing is also +most characteristic. Watson, I think our quiet rest in the country has +been a distinct success, and I shall certainly return, much invigorated, +to Baker Street to-morrow." + + + + +_Beauties._ + + +[Illustration: _Miss Ella Banister._] + +[Illustration: _Miss A Hughes_] + +[Illustration: _Miss Alice Ravenscroft._] + +_From Photos. by Messrs. Bassano, Old Bond Street._ + +[Illustration: _Miss Friend._ + +_From a Photo. by W. & D. Downey._] + +[Illustration: _Miss C. L. Foote._ + +_From a Photo. by W. & D. Downey._] + +[Illustration: _Mrs. Marsh._ + +_From a Photo. by Messrs. Bassano, Old Bond Street._] + +[Illustration: _Miss Norah Williams._ + +_From Photos. by Messrs. Bassano, Old Bond Street._] + +[Illustration: _Miss L. Harold._] + +[Illustration: _Lady Aberdeen._ + +_Photo. by Barraud_] + + + + +LIEUTENANT GAUTHIER + +By José de Campos + +FROM THE FRENCH OF JOSÉ DE CAMPOS. AN EPISODE OF THE CRIMEAN WAR. +APPROVED AND AUTHORIZED BY GENERAL SAUSSIER, MILITARY COMMANDER OF +PARIS. + +[Illustration] + + +Nicolas Gauthier, Sergeant-Major in the Foreign Legion, was about +twenty-six years of age. He was strikingly handsome, with black hair and +moustache and a pale complexion. His dark eyes were perhaps somewhat +dreamy and intensely sad, but they had a certain expression of +gentleness and candour which won all hearts. + +He was above the medium height, upright and broad-shouldered, and was +altogether more fitted for a cuirassier than for a foot-soldier. As, +however, he had entered the army from choice, it was for him to select +the arms he preferred. + +He had undoubtedly military tastes, but he had evidently some family +trouble or some love affair which had made him anxious to leave Paris +and to go to Africa with the Foreign Legion (which, as everyone knows, +is always the first regiment to be called out in case of war). + +He had been in the garrison at Constantine, and while there had been a +great favourite with all the ladies, and the men had envied him. + +It could scarcely be wondered at, for he was so handsome, and then, too, +he had such a martial bearing and such pleasant, attractive manners. + +All the sensation he caused was lost upon him, for he did not even seem +to notice it himself. + +He was a good soldier: subordinate to his superiors, and always +indulgent to the men under his command, and, consequently, a great +favourite in the Legion. + +When Napoleon III. was reviewing the troops, he noticed Gauthier, who +was at that time only a sub-officer. He made inquiries about him, and a +fortnight later Gauthier was appointed sergeant-major. + +It was evident that some great sorrow was weighing on him, for when he +was free from his military duties, instead of going out with his +comrades to any places of amusement, he would go off by himself for +long, solitary walks. + +Several times, on seeing him strolling along far from the walls of the +city, the other officers had warned him of the risk he ran of being +surprised by one of those bands of Arabs who wander about outside the +Algerian cities, and who take their revenge on any European who falls +into their hands for the yoke that has been put on to them. + +Sergeant Gauthier took very little notice of these warnings. He loved +solitude and was perfectly fearless. No one knew why he was so sad. +Certainly he had lately lost his mother, and still wore a badge of crape +on his arm. Of course, this had increased his melancholy, but it was not +the original cause of it. + +The war with Russia had just been declared. Gauthier, like a great many +other officers and sub-officers, was tired of the monotony of garrison +life, and volunteered to join the regiments which were to be sent to the +Crimea. The Minister of War dispatched the Foreign Legion, to the great +joy of Gauthier. His brother officers noticed that he was almost gay, +not at all like his former self. + + * * * * * + +He soon distinguished himself; was always foremost in the fight. His +courage and _sang-froid_ won the admiration of all. He was wounded, but +he cared little for that; and shortly after he was promoted to the rank +of sub-lieutenant. + +Gauthier was very intimate with Lieutenant Saussier, another hero who +had gone through the "baptism of fire" in Africa, and whose great valour +and integrity have won for him the high office he now holds. + +These two soldiers were of the same metal: they were able to understand +and appreciate each other, and were almost inseparable. + +One day during the siege of Sebastopol, Lieutenant Saussier said to his +friend:-- + +"Gauthier, may I ask you a question?" + +"Two questions, if you like." + +"You won't think it mere curiosity?" + +"Are we not friends, Saussier?" + +"Yes, but perhaps this is a secret----" + +"I have only one secret in the world, and as you do not know _that_ and +could not even have an idea of it, there is no fear, so you can speak +out." + +"Well, will you tell me what is the cause of your sadness, I might +almost say bitterness? When we left Africa I thought you had left it +behind you; but now in Russia it is worse than ever." + +At this unexpected question Gauthier started, then trying to smile he +answered:-- + +"It must be a kind of complaint born in me, and perhaps the change of +climate aggravates it." + +"Perhaps so," said Lieutenant Saussier, slowly, and watching the +expression of his friend's face. + +"This cold goes right through me to my very bones," said Gauthier, +shivering. + +Saussier quite understood that his friend meant, "Let us change the +subject," but he continued:-- + +"May I ask you another question?" + +"You seem to have a few to ask to-day," said Gauthier, looking rather +annoyed. + +"I have often wanted to speak to you, but have never dared before." + +"Well, to-day you don't seem afraid of running the risk." + +"If it vexes you, don't answer me." + +"Oh, I don't mind. I have had one; I may as well have the next." + +"Well, will you tell me why, every time there is an engagement, you take +such pains to find out the name of the chief who commands the enemy?" + +This time Gauthier was visibly annoyed. He answered, after a few +minutes' hesitation, "Because some day I intend writing the history of +the Crimean War. It is only natural I should want to know the names of +the commanders on the other side." + +"Oh! of course," said Saussier, feeling rather disconcerted. + +For some minutes the two friends continued their walk in silence. There +was no sound but the crunching of the snow under their heavy boots, for +it had been snowing hard in the district of Simferopol, and a thick +white mantle covered the ground. + +Lieutenant Saussier looked at Gauthier, and in spite of his friend's +attempt to turn away his head, Saussier saw that there were tears in his +eyes. + +"Forgive me for asking you!" he exclaimed. "I had no idea of causing you +pain." + +"How do you know you have?" asked Gauthier, passing his arm through that +of his friend. + +"Don't try and hide it. I can see that, quite unintentional as it was, I +have pained you with my questions." + +"It is nothing, nothing at all; or rather your questions brought to mind +something in my past life. It is only natural that you should have asked +me, and as a proof of my friendship I will tell you all." + +"No, no! Indeed I do not want you to. We will not talk about it. I am +awfully sorry to have spoken of it." + +"After all, you are my greatest friend. Why should I not tell you about +it? Perhaps, too, it might relieve me to speak of my trouble." + +"If it will be any relief to you, tell me; but if not, why, do not let +us say any more about it." + +[Illustration: YOU ARE MY GREATEST FRIEND.] + +"I would rather tell you. Life is very uncertain on the battlefield, and +I would rather not die with this secret untold. Perhaps, too, if you +knew it you might be able to help me." + +"If I could help you in any way, you know you have only to tell me how." + +"Well, you shall hear all. You know that, before leaving Algeria, I went +to Paris with a three months' leave." + +"Which you never stayed out, for you were back again in six weeks." + +"What could I do with myself in that Babylon, where everyone was gay +while I was so wretched? How could I stand the sardonic laughter and +gaiety around me when my heart was aching bitterly? As soon as my poor +mother was buried I was only too anxious to get from that city of +luxury, where the artificial lights only blinded and dazzled me. + +"I wanted to get away from the noise and the vice and the hypocrisy, and +go to the desert and be alone with Nature and with reality, where I +could breathe pure, wholesome air, and not that atmosphere which +bewilders and poisons you. I left what we _call_ the civilized world to +go to the savages whom I prefer. + +"I gave up society for solitude, peace for war. I despise my life and +long for death, but death does not come at my call." + +Gauthier stopped for a minute, overcome with emotion. + +"You are too sensitive," said Saussier. + +"Perhaps so, but I have had something to bear." + +"Is it a love affair, Gauthier?" + +"No, no! I have never loved anyone, and besides, I am one of those who +must not, who dare not love----" + +"I do not understand." + +"No, I will explain. My mother, who was dying of consumption, brought on +by some great grief that she had always suffered alone, sent for me to +bid me farewell. Three days before her death I was at her bedside. + +"'My son,' she said, 'I have sent for you to tell you something which I +feel you ought to know before my death. I have always led you to believe +that your father was dead.' + +"'And he is not dead. I have felt sure of that for a long time.' + +"'How could you nave guessed it?' exclaimed my mother. + +"'By your sadness, and, too, because you have never taken me to his +grave, nor even spoken of it. My poor mother, did he leave you?' + +"'No, no! Do not blame him; it was not his fault that he had to leave +us.' + +"'He is in prison, then; but surely he is innocent?' + +"'No, he is quite free.' + +"'How is it, then----" + +"'Listen, but do not interrupt me, for I have not strength for much. The +name you have, Gauthier, was my father's and mine, but not your +father's, Nicolas. My father was a wealthy shipbuilder at Havre. He +died in 1825. My mother sold everything, and then she and I went to +Paris to live. + +"'She was ambitious for me and wished me to marry well. We had plenty of +money, and as that opens most doors she managed to get introductions and +invitations to her heart's content. + +"'I was nineteen, and people said I was beautiful. My mother paid great +attention to my toilette, and by mixing in society I soon lost all +traces of having been brought up in the provinces. There was a young +Russian captain, Prince Nicolaï Porthikopoff, whom I used to meet at +different houses. He belonged to the Czar's Imperial Guard, and was an +_attaché_ of the Russian Embassy in Paris. + +"'He was very handsome, and was as noble at heart as he was by birth. + +"He loved me, and I returned his affection. At the end of six months he +came to my mother and asked for my hand. Our engagement caused a great +stir in Paris, it scandalized the aristocracy and caused jealousy in our +own circle. Prince Nicolaï cared nothing for the storm that he had +roused. + +[Illustration: "HE CAME TO MY MOTHER AND ASKED FOR MY HAND."] + +"'There was so much gossip, and there was so much scheming to break off +our engagement, that the Ambassador himself felt it his duty to inform +the Czar. It appears the Czar only laughed at it all until the Princess +Porthikopoff, your father's mother, wrote herself asking for his +intervention, and declaring that she would never give her consent to our +union. The Czar wrote a letter of advice to the Prince, but as it took +no effect, and the Princess still insisted, the Czar objected formally +to the marriage. Your father saw that it was hopeless, that there was no +chance whatever of winning the consent of his mother or of his +Sovereign. He proposed to me a desperate expedient, and I, young and +inexperienced as I was, and believing that it would be for our mutual +happiness, consented. + +"'We were to be married privately, but, as your father told me, the +marriage would not be legal, as we could not have the necessary papers, +and should even have to be married under assumed names, and in another +country. He believed that then, when his mother saw that the honour of a +Porthikopoff was at stake, she would take steps to have the ceremony +performed again with the necessary formalities. He thought that she +would do for the honour and pride of her family what she would not do +for love of her son. + +"'I consented to everything; but, alas! a month later, seeing that your +father continued to brave all authority, the Czar recalled him to St. +Petersburg. + +"'Your father pleaded our cause but in vain! Nicholas I., proud autocrat +as he was, and the Princess were both inexorable. Your father was +exasperated, and he gave vent to his indignation. The result was that he +was ordered to start the next day for Irkoutsk, in Siberia He was to be +exiled! Exiled because he had loved me, because he wished to do his duty +and make me his lawful wife! My mother and I went away to Lille, where +you were born. + +"'The Prince, your father, was not allowed to write or receive letters +without sending them first to the Governor to be read and approved. I +happened to meet with someone who was going to Irkoutsk, and begged him +to take a message to your father and to tell him of your birth. When +this man returned he brought me a letter from your father, in which he +said he was going to try and make his escape, and that he would never +again set foot in Russia. + +"'Just at this time my mother died. Your father was not able to put his +plan into execution, and a year later he was allowed to write to me, but +merely to tell me the conditions on which Nicholas I. offered to allow +his return from exile. The Czar had chosen a wife for him, and he was to +renounce me for ever. Your father added that he was refusing such terms; +that he would never break his vow to me, and preferred exile to what was +offered him. + +"'He was right!' I exclaimed, proudly, for I was glad to find that I had +no cause to blush for my father. + +"'It was noble of him!' said my mother, and her eyes filled with tears. +'It was noble, but how could I accept such a sacrifice? I could not; it +would have been too selfish. There was only one thing to do, and +although in doing it I had to sacrifice all my womanly pride, my courage +held out. I wrote to your father, telling him to accept the Czar's +offer, as I myself was about to marry.' + +"'It was not true?' + +"'No! No! It was to save him. I wanted him to be free, to be happy if +possible. As for me, all was over. He wrote to me, reproaching me, and +it broke my heart. I did not reply to his letter. I went back to Paris, +where I lived quietly and unknown, devoting myself entirely to you.... +Six months later I heard that he had married a Princess according to the +will of the Czar, and that he was appointed captain.' + +"'Is he happy?' + +"'I have never heard another word about him, and as he has no idea of my +whereabouts, he could never have made inquiries about me. Now you know +all, you know the cause of my sadness and the secret of your birth. You +must now judge between your father and your mother, and either pardon or +condemn us, for, alas! my poor boy, you have no name and no future.' + +"My poor mother hid her face in her hands and sobbed in an agony of +grief. + +"'I have nothing to forgive, mother; but if you wish me to judge my +father and you, I can only say that you both did your duty and that your +sacrifice was sublime. Society makes laws at its own pleasure, but in +the sight of God, who surely is over all, your marriage was valid, and I +have nothing to be ashamed of. On the contrary, you were both victims, +and you suffered through your loyalty to each other--and your love was +surely truer and more ideal than many which society recognises.' + +"My poor mother could not speak for some time, her emotion was so great. +Later on she told me where I should find some papers, which I was to +read after her death, and she added:-- + +"'You will also find in the same drawer two things by which your father +would always recognise you, if you should ever meet him and if you +wished to make yourself known. I leave it entirely to you to act as you +think best; but if you ever should see him, tell him that I was true to +him, explain all, and tell him that I loved him to the last.' + +"Two days later my poor mother passed away. I was thus left an orphan +and nameless. I was utterly alone in the world. I had not a creature to +love me, and I knew that I must never dare to love anyone. Left to +myself, I cursed the whole world and its prejudices and baseness." + +Gauthier covered his face with his hand, and Saussier, respecting his +friend's grief, did not speak for some time. The two officers walked on +through the snow without noticing where they were going. + +Suddenly Gauthier said, bitterly: "You understand now the cause of the +melancholy that is always weighing on me?" + +"I do, indeed," replied Saussier. + +"The tortures of the Inquisition are nothing to what I endure, when I +think of my poor mother suffering through all those years without a word +of consolation from any living soul." + +"It must have been terrible!" + +"Then, too, you know now why I always find out the name of the Russian +commander before every attack; for by now he must be at least a +General." + +"Yes, it is indeed fearful!" + + * * * * * + +Sebastopol had been besieged ever since October 9th, 1854. Marshal +Canrobert commanded the troops with Lord Raglan. + +[Illustration: "TELL HIM THAT I LOVED HIM TO THE LAST."] + +Prince Mentschiskoff and Prince Todleben resisted the attack bravely. + +The sight of the city, which was all in ruins, exasperated the Russian +Commander-in-Chief, and he ordered a sally, but the French and the +English were well on guard and repulsed this desperate attempt. + +The attack was terrible, and the heroism on every side sublime. + +The most warlike of the besieged troops rushed against the French, +preferring to have to do with the _furia francesca_ rather than with the +British deliberation and _sang-froid_. The combat was sustained and +desperate. + +Profiting by the confusion amongst the French troops, caused by the +death of their Commander-in-Chief, the Russians succeeded in obtaining +the first trench. The besiegers, however, got reinforcements and the +struggle was continued. + +Two young officers, who were fighting side by side, attracted everyone's +notice. They were in the first rank, and they led their soldiers into +the thickest of the fray and cut down the enemy right and left. + +One of them was rather in advance of the other, and was encouraging his +soldiers to follow him. Suddenly with his pistol he took aim at a +Russian commander, who, on seeing that the enemy was gaining ground, had +spurred his horse forward and was calling to his soldiers to advance. +Another horseman, seeing the danger his chief was in, rushed before him, +exclaiming:-- + +"Take care, General Porthikopoff!" + +On hearing this the French officer dropped his murderous weapon and +stood as if paralyzed, looking at his enemy. + +On receiving the warning the Prince had drawn out his pistol and fired +at the French officer. The ball struck him, and he fell. His friend, who +had just reached him, and who had also heard the Russian General's name, +drew his men to the right where the enemy was strongest, exclaiming, in +desperation: "Follow me! Follow me!" + +The Russian soldiers rushed at the young officer, who had fallen, and +would have killed him, but, waving them off, he said he must speak with +their General before he died. + +The Prince, astonished at the request at such a moment, consented. + +"What is it you have to say, and why did you not attempt to shoot me?" + +"I could not." + +"But what prevented you?" + +"Duty." + +"I do not understand." + +The young officer drew from his tunic a letter, a locket, and a small +box, and handed them to the General. + +"What is the meaning of this?" exclaimed the Prince. + +"Look inside the locket." + +The Prince opened it and started. "My portrait and Madeline's!" Then, +opening the box: "And her engagement ring! Where did you get these +from?" + +"The letter will explain all." + +The Prince opened it, and, after glancing at it quickly, said: "And you +are----" + +"Nicolas Gauthier." + +"And your mother?" + +"She is dead. Her love for you killed her." + +"That is not true, for she married another." + +"Never! She loved you to the last, and died with your name on her lips. +Read the letter to the end." + +Mechanically the General read the letter, and then kissing the locket +passionately: "I knew, I felt that Madeline was true!" he said, and then +bending over Gauthier, he continued: "How did you recognise me, though?" + +"I heard them call you by your name." + +"That was why you would not fire?" + +"Yes. A son could not kill his father, even though he be his enemy." + +"But you allowed a father to kill his son?" + +"I could not help it. It was fate." + +"No, no, my son! You shall not die! You _must_ live!" + +"God wills otherwise, father. Farewell! I have only seen you for a +minute, but I am satisfied." + +Gauthier made a great effort to get up, smiled at the Prince, and then +fell back dead. + +"My boy, my boy!" exclaimed the Prince, in desperation, stooping over +the dead body of his son. "Dead, dead, and killed by me, his father! And +this is the work of our Czar! Oh, cruel fate!" + +[Illustration: "THE GENERAL REMAINED KNEELING BY THE SIDE OF HIS SON."] + +The General remained some minutes kneeling by the side of his son in +mute despair, and then for the last time he sprang on to his horse and +rushed into the thickest of the fray. + +"Prince! Prince! what are you doing there?" exclaimed a French officer +at his side. + +"I am seeking death! I have killed my son, and I will not survive +him----" + +He had scarcely finished when a ball struck him and he fell down dead. + +"Who can say there is no Providence! The father has not waited long to +join his son," exclaimed the French officer, as he rushed on at the head +of his men. + +For some time the result of the combat seemed uncertain, but at last the +French won the day, and the Russians had to take refuge in Sebastopol. + + * * * * * + +When Marshal Canrobert went over the battlefield, he asked where the +young officer was who belonged to the Foreign Legion, and who had fought +so bravely. + +"He fell by the retrenchments," was the reply. + +The Commander-in-Chief rode over to the spot named and ordered the +surgeon to examine the young officer who was lying on the ground. It +was, however, too late. + +"There was another officer of the same Legion whom I saw fall there, to +the left," said the Marshal. + +The young officer was brought and was told that his friend was dead. + +"It is a pity," he said to the Marshal, "for you have lost a true +soldier." + +"What was his name?" + +"Nicolas Gauthier." + +"And yours?" + +"Félix Saussier." + +The Commander-in-Chief ordered the army to fall into rank, and then as +they presented arms he took the Cross of the Legion of Honour which he +was wearing himself and placed it on Lieutenant Saussier's breast. + +"Wear it proudly," he said; "it is the recompense that France accords to +her bravest sons, and you well deserve it." + +Then taking another Cross from one of the officers who belonged to the +État Major, he placed it on the body of Gauthier. "You, too, have well +earned it," he said, "and shall take it with you to your grave." + +The troops filed off, after passing in front of the two officers, the +one wounded and the other dead. Marshal Canrobert himself raised his +sword and saluted the two heroes (the one, alas! had died too soon, and +the other was destined to become one of the bravest Generals of France), +and then passed on deeply moved, but satisfied with the victory, and +ignorant of the drama which had taken place so near to him. + +[Illustration] + + + + +_From Behind the Speaker's Chair._ + +VI. + +(VIEWED BY HENRY W. LUCY.) + + +[Sidenote: SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT.] + +Sir William Harcourt has been so long a familiar figure in the House of +Commons, and has established so high a reputation, that it seems odd to +speak of him as one of the successes of the new Session. But the phrase +accurately describes his position. Circumstances connected with the +personality of the Premier have given him opportunity to show what +potentialities as Leader of the House modestly lurk behind his massive +figure, and the result has been eminently satisfactory to his party and +his friends. Sir William's early reputation was made as a brilliant +swordsman of debate, most effective in attack. The very qualities that +go to make success in that direction might lead to utter failure on the +part of a Leader of the House. + +[Illustration: "MODESTLY LURKING."] + +If one sought for a word that would describe the leading characteristics +of Sir William Harcourt in Parliament it would be found in the style +aggressive. Perhaps the most fatal thing a Leader of the House of +Commons could do would be to develop aggressiveness. The Leader must be +a strong man--should be the strongest man on his side of the House. But +his strength must be kept in reserve, and if he err on either side of +this particular line, submissiveness should be his characteristic. The +possession of this quality was the foundation of Mr. W. H. Smith's +remarkable success as Leader. It is true he could not, had he tried, +have varied his deferential attitude towards the House by one of sterner +mould, and the House enjoys the situation more keenly if that +alternative be existent. It took Mr. Smith as he was, and the two got on +marvellously well together. + +Nothing known of Sir William Harcourt's Parliamentary manner forbade the +apprehension that, occupying the box-seat, there would be incessant +cracking of the whip. It was difficult in advance to imagine how he +would be able to resist the opportunity of letting the lash fall on the +back of a restive or a stubborn horse. The opportunity of saying a smart +thing, at whatever cost, seemed with him irresistible. If only he had +his jest they might have his estate; in this case the estate of his +party. + +[Illustration: "AGGRESSIVE."] + +Reflection on an earlier experience of Sir William in the seat of the +Leader might have caused these forebodings to cease. Four years ago, +towards the close of the Session of 1889, the temporary withdrawal of +Mr. Gladstone from the scene gave him his chance. It happened that the +Government under the leadership of Mr. Smith, and, it was understood, +on the personal instruction of Lord Salisbury, were pressing forward +the Tithes Bill. They had an overwhelming, well-disciplined majority, and +being pledged up to the hilt to carry the Bill, the issue seemed certain. +Through a whole week Sir William led the numerically-overpowered +Opposition, fighting the Bill at every step. The hampered Government +were determined to get some sort of Bill passed, and, hopeless of +achieving their earliest intention, foreshadowed another measure in a +series of amendments laid on the table by the Attorney-General. The +Opposition were not disposed to accept this with greater fervour than +the other, and finally Mr. Smith announced a total withdrawal from the +position. + +Nothing was finer throughout the brilliant campaign than Sir William +Harcourt's lamentations over this conclusion. Having inflicted on a +strong Government the humiliation of defeat upon a cherished measure, +he, in a voice broken with emotion, held poor W. H. Smith up to the +scorn of all good men as a heartless, depraved parent, who had abandoned +by the wayside a promising infant. + +In the present Session Sir William, as Deputy Leader, finds himself in a +position different from, and more difficult than, the one filled in +August, 1889. He was then in the place of the Leader of the Opposition, +and had a natural affinity for the duty of opposing. In the present +Session he has been frequently and continuously called upon to perform +the duties of Leader of the House, and his success, though not so +brilliantly striking as in the short, sharp campaign against the Tithes +Bill, has stood upon a broader and more permanent basis. The House of +Commons, as Mr. Goschen learned during the experiments in Leadership +which preceded his disappearance from the front rank, may be led, but +cannot be driven. + +It is curious that two of the most aggressive controversialists in the +House, being temporarily called to the Leadership, have shown themselves +profoundly impressed with this truth. Like Lord Randolph Churchill, when +he led the House, Sir William Harcourt appears on the Treasury Bench +divested even of his side-arms. Like the Happy Warrior, his helmet is a +hive for bees. His patience in time of trial has been pathetic, and, +whatever may be his own feelings on the subject, the House has been +amazed at his moderation. He has sat silent on the Treasury Bench by the +hour, with Mr. Arthur Balfour, Mr. Chamberlain, Lord Randolph Churchill, +and other old familiar adversaries, trailing tempting coat-tails before +him. + +[Illustration: "THE HAPPY WARRIOR."] + +One night this Session, in debate on Uganda, Mr. Chamberlain interposed +and delivered a brilliant, bitter speech, which deeply stirred a crowded +House. It was drawing to the close of an important debate, and Mr. +Chamberlain sat down at half-past eleven, leaving plenty of time for the +Leader of the House to reply. To an old Parliamentary war-house the +situation must have been sorely tempting. A party like to be sent off +into the division lobby with a rattling speech from the Front Bench. +There was ample time for a brisk twenty minutes' canter, and the crowded +and excited sport. But there was nothing at stake on the division. +Though Mr. Chamberlain could not withstand the opportunity of +belabouring his old friends and colleagues, he did not intend to oppose +the vote for Uganda, which would receive the hearty support of the +Conservatives. Half an hour saved from speech-making would mean thirty +minutes appropriated to getting forward with other votes in Committee of +Supply. Sir William followed Mr. Chamberlain, and was welcomed with a +ringing cheer; members settling themselves down in anticipated enjoyment +of a rattling speech. When the applause subsided the Chancellor of the +Exchequer contented himself with the observation that there had been a +useful debate, the Committee had heard some excellent speeches, "and now +let us get the vote." + +There was something touching in the depressed attitude of the right hon. +gentleman as he performed this act of renunciation. What it cost him +will, probably, never be known. But before progress was reported at +midnight half-a-dozen votes had been taken. + +[Sidenote: THE WHIPS.] + +Of the various forms ambition takes in political life the most +inscrutable is that which leads a man to the Whip's room. In +Parliamentary affairs the Whip fills a place analogous to that of a +sub-editor on a newspaper. He has (using the phrase in a Parliamentary +sense) all the kicks and few of the half-pence. With the sub-editor, if +anything goes wrong in the arrangement of the paper he is held +responsible, whilst if any triumph is achieved, no halo of the resultant +glory for a moment lights up the habitual obscurity of his head. It is +the same, in its way, with the Whip. His work is incessant, and for the +most part is drudgery. His reward is a possible Peerage, a Colonial +Governorship, a First Commissionership of Works, a Postmaster-Generalship, +or, as Sir William Dyke found at the close of a tremendous spell of +work, a Privy Councillorship. + +[Illustration: SIR WILLIAM DYKE.] + +Yet it often comes to pass that the fate of a Ministry and the destiny +of the Empire depend upon the Whip. A bad division, even though it be +plainly due to accidental circumstances, habitually influences the +course of a Ministry, sometimes giving their policy a crucial turn, and +at least exercising an important influence on the course of business in +the current Session. + +An example of this was furnished early in the present Session by a +division taken on proposals for a Saturday sitting made necessary by +obstruction. Up to the announcement of the figures it had been +obstinately settled that the Second Reading of the Home Rule Bill should +be moved before Easter. The Opposition had pleaded and threatened. Mr. +Gladstone stood firm, and only three days before this momentous Friday +had almost impatiently reiterated his determination to move the Second +Reading of the Bill on the day appointed when leave was given to +introduce it. The normal majority of forty reduced to twenty-one worked +instant and magic charm. The falling-off had no political significance. +Everyone knew it arose from the accidental absence of a number of the +Irish members called home on local business. But there it was, and on +the following Monday Sir William Harcourt, on behalf of the Premier, +announced that the Home Rule Bill would not be taken till after Easter. + +For other members of the Ministry there is occasional surcease from +work, and some opportunity for recreation. For the Whip there is none. +He begins his labour with the arrival of the morning post, and keeps at +it till the Speaker has left the chair, and the principal door-keeper +standing out on the matting before the doorway cries aloud: "The usual +time!" + +That ceremony is a quaint relic of far-off days before penny papers +were, and the means of communicating with members were circumscribed. It +is the elliptical form of making known to members that at the next +sitting the Speaker will take the chair at the usual time. For ordinary +members, even for Ministers, unless they must be in their place to +answer a question, "the usual time" means whatever hour best suits their +convenience. The Whip is in his room even before the Speaker takes the +chair, and it is merely a change of the scene of labour from his office +at the Treasury. He remains till the House is up, whether the business +be brisk or lifeless. + +In truth, at times when the House is reduced almost to a state of coma, +the duties of the Whip become more arduous and exacting. These are the +occasions when gentle malice loves to bring about a count-out. If it is +a private members' night the Whips have no responsibility in the matter +of keeping a House, and have even been suspected of occasionally +conniving in the beneficent plot of dispersing it. But just now private +members' nights stand in the same relation to the Session as the +sententious traveller found to be the case with snakes in Iceland. There +are none. Every night is a Government night, and weariness of flesh and +spirit naturally suggests a count-out. The regular business of the Whip +is to see that there are within call sufficient members to frustrate the +designs of the casual counter-out. + +[Illustration: MR. JARRETT, DOOR-KEEPER.] + +[Sidenote: "BOBBY" SPENCER.] + +Mr. Gladstone and other members of the Cabinet, on many dull nights of +this Session, have been cheered on crossing the lobby by the sight of +Mr. "Bobby" Spencer gracefully tripping about, note-book in hand, +holding an interminable succession of members in brief but animated +conversation. He is not making a book for the Derby or Goodwood, as one +might suspect. "Do you dine here to-night?" is his insinuating inquiry, +and till he has listed more than enough men to "make a House" in case of +need, he does not feel assured of the safety of the British +Constitution, and therefore does not rest. + +[Illustration: "BOBBY" SPENCER.] + +This is part of the ordinary work of the average night. When an +important division is impending, the labour imposed upon the Whip is +Titanic. He, of course, knows every individual member of his flock. With +a critical division pending he must know more, ascertaining where he is +and, above all, where he will be on the night of the division. It is at +these crises that the personal characteristics of the Whip are tested. A +successful Whip should be almost loved, and not a little feared. He +should ever wear the silken glove, but there should be borne in upon the +consciousness of those with whom he has to deal that it covers an iron +hand. + +It happens just now that both political parties in the House of Commons +are happy in the possession of almost model Whips. As was said by a +shrewd observer, no one looking at Mr. Marjoribanks or Mr. Akers-Douglas +as they lounge about the Lobby "would suppose they could say 'Bo!' to a +goose." The goose, however, would do well not to push the experiment of +forbearance too far. All through the last Parliament Mr. Akers-Douglas +held his men together with a light, firm hand, that was the admiration +and despair of the other side. Mr. Marjoribanks has, up to this present +time of writing, maintained the highest standard of success in Whipping. + +[Sidenote: MR. MARJORIBANKS.] + +With a Ministerial majority standing at a maximum of forty, it is of the +utmost importance to the Government that there shall be no sign of +falling off. If the forty were diminished even by a unit, a storm of +cheering would rise from the Opposition Benches, and Ministerialists +would be correspondingly depressed. With the exception named, due to +circumstances entirely beyond the Whip's control, Mr. Marjoribanks has +in all divisions, big or small, mustered his maximum majority of forty, +and has usually exceeded it. + +That means not only unfailing assiduity and admirable business +management, but personal popularity on the part of the Whip. Aside from +party considerations, no Liberal would like to "disoblige Marjoribanks," +who is as popular with the Irish contingent as he is with the main body +of the British members. He is fortunate in his colleagues-- + +Mr. Ellis, Mr. Spencer, Mr. Causton, and Mr. McArthur. The Whip's +department has not always been a strong feature in a Liberal +Administration. In the present Government it is one of the strongest. + +[Illustration: MR. MARJORIBANKS.] + +Why Mr. Marjoribanks should be content to serve as Whip is one of the +mysteries that surround the situation. He does not want a peerage, since +that will come to him in the ordinary course of nature. He is one of the +personages in political life who excite the sympathy of Lord Rosebery, +inasmuch as he must be a peer _malgré lui_. He served a long +apprenticeship when the office of Whip was more than usually thankless, +his party being in opposition. When Mr. Gladstone's Ministry was formed, +it was assumed, as a matter of course, that Mr. Marjoribanks would have +found for him office in other department than that of the Whip. But Mr. +Gladstone, very shrewdly from the Leader's point of view, felt that no +one would be more useful to the party in the office vacated by Mr. +Arnold Morley than Mr. Marjoribanks. Mr. Marjoribanks, naturally +disposed to think last of his own interests and inclinations, did not +openly demur. + +[Sidenote: ALL-NIGHT SITTINGS.] + +The Whip's post, though hard enough, is much lightened by adoption of +the twelve o'clock rule. Time was, at no distant date, when for some +months in the Session Whips were accustomed to go home in broad +daylight. It is true the House at that time met an hour later in the +afternoon, but the earlier buckling to is a light price to pay for the +certainty that shortly after midnight all will be over. Even now the +twelve o'clock rule may be suspended, and this first Session of the new +Parliament has shown that all-night sittings are not yet impossible. But +so unaccustomed is the present House to them, that when one became +necessary on the Mutiny Bill everyone and everything was found +unprepared. In the old days, when Mr. Biggar was in his prime, the +commissariat were always prepared for an all-night sitting. When, this +Session, the House sat up all night on the Mutiny Bill, the larder was +cleared out in the first hour after midnight. + +It is not generally known how nearly the valuable life of the Chairman +of Ways and Means was on that occasion sacrificed at the post of duty. +Having lost earlier chances by remaining in the chair, it was only at +four o'clock in the morning he was rescued from famine by the daring +foraging of Mr. Herbert Gladstone, who, the House being cleared for one +of the divisions, brought in a cup of tea and a poached egg on toast, +which the Chairman disposed of at the table. + +[Illustration: MR. MELLOR.] + +Mr. Mellor is an old Parliamentary campaigner, and remembers several +occasions when, living injudiciously near the House, he was brought out +of bed to assist in withstanding obstruction. Being called up one +morning by an imperative request to repair to the House, he observed a +man violently ringing at the bell of the house of a neighbour, also a +member of the House of Commons. On returning two hours later, he found +the man still there, diligently ringing at the bell. + +"What's the matter?" he asked; "anyone ill?" + +"No, sir," said the man. "Lord Richard Grosvenor sent me to bring Mr. +---- down to the House, and said I was not to come away without him." + +"Ah, well, you can go off now; the House is up." + +Mr. ----, it turned out on subsequent inquiry, had gone down to Brighton +with his family, and the servants left at home did not think it +necessary to answer a bell rung at this untimely hour. + +[Sidenote: "PAIRED FOR THE NIGHT."] + +It was about the same time, in the Parliament of 1880, that another +messenger from the Government Whip went forth in the early morning in +search of a member. He lived in Queen Anne's Mansions, and the messenger +explaining the urgency of his errand, the night porter conducted him to +the bedroom door of the sleeping senator. Succeeding in awakening him, +he delivered his message. + +"Give my compliments to Lord Richard Grosvenor," said the wife of the +still somnolent M.P.; "tell him my husband has gone to bed, and is +paired for the night." + +[Sidenote: BARE-HEADED.] + +It is an old tradition, observed to this day, though the origin of it is +lost in the obscurity of the Middle Ages, that a Whip shall not appear +in the Lobby with his head covered. It is true Mr. Marjoribanks does not +observe this rule, but he is alone in the exception. All his +predecessors, as far as I can remember, conformed to the regulation. In +the last Parliament the earliest intimation of the formation of a new +Radical party was the appearance in the Lobby of Mr. Jacoby without his +hat. Inquiry excited by this phenomenon led to the disclosure that the +Liberal opposition had broken off into a new section. There was some +doubt as to who was the leader, but none as to the fact that Mr. Jacoby +and Mr. Philip Stanhope were the Whips. Mr. Stanhope was not much in +evidence. But on the day Mr. Jacoby accepted the appointment he locked +up his hat and patrolled the Lobby with an air of sagacity and an +appearance of brooding over State secrets, which at once raised the new +party into a position of importance. + +[Illustration: MR. JACOBY.] + +Dick Power, most delightful of Irishmen, most popular of Whips, made +through the Session regular play with his hat. Anyone familiar with his +habits would know how the land lay from the Irish quarter. If Mr. Power +appeared hatless in the Lobby, a storm was brewing, and before the +Speaker left the chair there would, so to speak, be wigs on the green. +If his genial face beamed from under his hat as he walked about the +Lobby the weather was set fair, at least for the sitting. + +[Sidenote: THE WINSOME WIGGIN.] + +One of the duties of the junior Whips is to keep sentry-go at the door +leading from the Lobby to the cloak-room, and so out into Palace Yard. +When a division is expected, no member may pass out unless he is paired. +That is not the only way by which escape from the House may be made. A +member desirous of evading the scrutiny of the Whips might find at least +two other ways of quitting the House. It is, however, a point of honour +to use only this means of exit, and no member under whatsoever pressure +would think of skulking out. + +For many nights through long Sessions, Lord Kensington sat on the bench +to the left of the doorway, a terror to members who had pressing private +engagements elsewhere, when a division was even possible. There is only +one well-authenticated occasion when a member, being unpaired, succeeded +in getting past Lord Kensington, and the result was not encouraging. + +[Illustration: "SKULKING OUT."] + +One night, Mr. Wiggin (now Sir Henry), the withdrawal of whose genial +presence from the Parliamentary scene is regretted on both sides of the +House, felt wearied with long attendance on his Parliamentary duties. +There came upon him a weird longing to stroll out and spend an hour in a +neighbouring educational establishment much frequented by members. He +looked towards the doorway, but there was Lord Kensington steadfast at +his post. Glancing again, Mr. Wiggin thought the Whip was asleep. +Casually strolling by him he found that this was the case, and with +something more than his usual agility, he passed through the doorway. + +Returning at the end of an hour he found Lord Kensington still at his +post, and more than usually wide awake. + +"You owe me £25," said Mr. Wiggin. + +"How?" cried the astonished Whip. + +"If," said Mr. Wiggin, producing his unencumbered watch-chain and +dangling it, "you hadn't been asleep just now, I wouldn't have got past +you; if I hadn't got past you, I wouldn't have dropped in at the +Aquarium; and if I hadn't looked in at the Aquarium, I shouldn't have +had my watch stolen." + +_Quod erat demonstrandum._ + +[Illustration: "ABSORBED."] + +[Sidenote: REMARKABLE FEAT OF A COUNTRY PAPER.] + +It was stated at the time, to the credit of the provincial Press, that +at the very moment Mr. St. John Brodrick was delivering in the House of +Commons his luminous speech on the Second Reading of the Home Rule Bill, +his constituents at Guildford, thanks to the enterprise of the local +weekly paper, were studying its convincing argument, lingering over the +rhythm of its sentences, echoing the laughter and applause with which a +crowded House punctuated it. I enjoyed the higher privilege of hearing +the speech delivered, and was probably so absorbed that I was not +conscious of the crowd on the benches, and do not recollect the laughter +and applause. Indeed, my memory enshrines rather a feeling of regret +that so painstaking and able an effort should have met with so chilling +a reception, and that an heir-apparent to a peerage, who has had the +courage to propose a scheme for the reform of the House of Lords, should +receive such scant attention in the Commons. + +[Sidenote: _Il y a_ POWER _et_ POWER.] + +Mr. Brodrick, however, got off his speech, and the local paper came out +with its verbatim report, a concatenation of circumstances not always +achieved. In the high tide of the Parnell invasion of the House of +Commons, there happened an accident that excited much merriment. Mr. +O'Connor Power--one of the ablest debaters the early Irish party brought +into the House, a gentleman who has with equal success given up to +journalism what was meant for the House of Commons--had prepared a +speech for a current debate. Desirous that his constituents should be at +least on a footing of equality with an alien House of Commons, he sent a +verbatim copy in advance to the editor of the local paper, an +understanding being arrived at that it was not to be published till +signal was received from Westminster that the hon. member was on his +feet. It happened that Mr. O'Connor Power failed on that night to catch +the Speaker's eye. Mr. Richard Power was more successful, and the local +editor receiving through the ordinary Press agency intimation that "Mr. +Power opposed the Bill," at once jumped to the conclusion that this was +the cue for the verbatim speech. Mr. Power was speaking; there was not +the slightest doubt that Mr. O'Connor Power, when he did speak, would +oppose the Bill. So the formes were locked, the paper went to press, and +the next morning County Mayo rang with the unuttered eloquence of its +popular member, and Irishmen observed with satisfaction how, for once, +the sullen Saxon had had his torpid humour stirred, being frequently +incited to "loud cheers" and "much laughter." + +[Sidenote: SIR ELLIS ASHMEAD-BARTLETT'S DILEMMA.] + +In this same debate on the Second Reading of the Home Rule Bill, where +the energy and enterprise of the provincial weekly Press was +incidentally illustrated in connection with Mr. Brodrick's speech, there +happened another episode which did not work out so well. Sir Ellis +Ashmead-Bartlett broke the long silence of years by delivering a speech +in the House of Commons. It was a great occasion, and naturally evoked +supreme effort. It was, in its way, akin to the wooing of Jacob. For +seven years that eminent diplomatist had worked and waited for Rachel, +and might well rejoice, even in the possession of Leah, when the term of +probation was over. For nearly seven years Mr. Ashmead-Bartlett had sat +on the Treasury Bench wrapped in the silence of a Civil Lord of the +Admiralty. Now his time was come, and he threw himself into the +enjoyment of opportunity with almost pathetic vigour. It was eleven +o'clock when he rose, and the debate must needs stand adjourned at +midnight. When twelve o'clock struck, Sir Ellis was still in the full +flow of his turgid eloquence. His speech was constructed on the +principle of, and (except, perhaps, in the matter of necessity) +resembled, the long bridge in Cowper's "Task"-- + + That with its wearisome but needful length + Bestrides the wintry flood. + +The scene and the atmosphere were sufficiently Arctic to bear out the +comparison. The audience had long since fallen away, like leaves in +wintry weather. In ordinary circumstances Sir Ellis, an old +Parliamentary Hand, would have wound up his speech, and so made an end +of it, just before the stroke of midnight gave the signal for the +Speaker's leaving the chair. + +There were, however, two reasons, the agony of whose weight must have +pressed sorely on the orator. One was the recollection of an incident in +his career still talked of in the busy circles round Sheffield. One +night in yesteryear he was announced to deliver a speech at a meeting +held in Nottingham. "For greater accuracy"--as the Speaker says, when, +coming back from the House of Lords on the opening day of a Session, he +reads the Queen's Speech to hon. members who have two hours earlier +studied it in the evening papers--Mr. Ashmead-Bartlett had written out +his oration and supplied it to the Sheffield paper whose recognition of +his status as a statesman merits reward. Proceedings at the Nottingham +meeting were so protracted, and took such different lines from those +projected, that the orator of the evening, when his turn came, found the +night too far advanced for his ordered speech, which would in other +respects have been beside the mark. He accordingly, impromptu, delivered +quite another speech, probably better than the one laboriously prepared +in the seclusion of the closet. In the hurry and excitement of the +moment he forgot to warn the Sheffield editor, with the consequence that +the other speech was printed in full and formed the groundwork of a +laudatory leading article. + +[Illustration: SIR ELLIS ASHMEAD-BARTLETT.] + +That was one thing that agitated the mind of Sir Ellis, and probably +gave a profounder thrill to his denunciation of Mr. Gladstone's iniquity +in the matter of the Home Rule Bill. Another was that this later speech, +with all its graceful air of ready wit, fervid fancy, and momentarily +inspired argument, was also in print, and, according to current report, +was in advance widely circulated among a friendly Press. It turned out +to be impossible to recite it all before the adjournment; equally +impossible to cut it down. That mighty engine, the Press, was already, +in remote centres of civilization, throbbing with the inspiration of his +energy, printing off the speech at so many hundreds an hour. It was +impossible to communicate with the unconscious editors and mark the +exact point at which the night's actual contribution to debate was +arrested. There was only one thing to be done: that was boldly to take +the fence. So Sir Ellis went on till twelve o'clock as if nothing were +happening elsewhere, was pulled up by the adjournment, and, turning up +bright and early with the meeting of the House next day, reeled off the +rest regardless of the gibes of the enemy, who said some of the faithful +papers had muddled the matter, reporting on Tuesday morning passages +that were not delivered in the House of Commons till Tuesday night. + +[Sidenote: THE PITY OF IT.] + +These accidents have their comical aspect. When it comes to +appropriating two hours of the time of a busy Legislature, they also +have their serious side. The House of Commons is a debating assembly, +not a lecture hall, where prosy papers may be read to sparse audiences. +The House is seen at its best when masters of fence follow each other +in swift succession, striking and parrying, the centre of an excited +ring. A prevalence of the growing custom of reading laboriously-prepared +papers will speedily bring it down to the level of the Congress meeting +at Washington. There the practice has reached its natural and happy +conclusion, inasmuch as members having prepared their papers are not +obliged to read them. They hand them in to the printer, and, at a cost +to the nation willingly borne in view of compensating circumstances, +they are printed at length in the _Congressional Globe_. + +[Illustration: "REELING IT OFF."] + +Perhaps when we have our official report of debates in the House of +Commons this also will follow. It is easy to imagine with what eagerness +the House would welcome any alternative that should deliver it from the +necessity, not of listening to these musty harangues--that, to do it +justice, it never suffers--but of giving up an appreciable portion of +its precious time to the gratification of ponderous, implacable, +personal vanity. + +[Sidenote: THACKERAY ON THE SUBJECT.] + +There is one gleam of light flickering about this intrinsically +melancholy topic in connection with the name of Thackeray. I have read +somewhere that it was a kindred calamity of a public speaker which led +to Thackeray's first appearance in print. At a time when the century was +young, and the author of "Vanity Fair" was a lad at Charterhouse, +Richard Lalor Sheil, the Irish lawyer and orator, had promised to +deliver a speech to a public meeting assembled on Penenden Heath. In +those days there were no staffs of special reporters, no telegraphs, nor +anything less costly than post-chaises wherewith to establish rapid +communication between country platforms and London newspaper offices. +Sheil, rising to the height of the occasion, wrote out his speech, and, +before leaving town, sent copies to the leading journals, in which it, +on the following morning, duly appeared. + +Alack! when the orator reached the Heath he found the platform in +possession of the police, who prohibited the meeting and would have none +of the speech. The incident was much talked of, and the boy Thackeray +set to and wrote in verse a parody on the printed but unspoken oration: +Here is the last verse, as I remember it:-- + + "What though these heretics heard me not?" + Quoth he to his friend Canonical; + "My speech is safe in the _Times_, I wot, + And eke in the _Morning Chronicle_." + + * * * * * + +[_The original drawings of the illustrations in this Magazine are always +on view, and on sale, in the Art Gallery at these offices, which is open +to the public without charge._] + + + + +_A Work of Accusation._ + +BY HARRY HOW. + + +"Suicide whilst in a state of temporary insanity." + +Such was the verdict of the coroner's jury, and they could scarcely have +declared anything else--there was not a tittle of evidence implicating +another as the perpetrator of the deed. The deceased was found lying in +his studio at the foot of his easel, shot through the heart. The +revolver--a six-chambered one--was tightly gripped in his hand. Four out +of the six chambers remained undischarged. It must have been suicide, +simple and premeditated! The inquiry into the death of the deceased +revealed only one spark of anything approaching sensationalism. It was +the evidence of the housekeeper--an old lady of distinctly nervous +temperament--who wept bitterly. Previous to the sad occurrence she had +heard the firing of a pistol some five or six times during a period of +two days. On the first occasion she had hurried to the studio, and the +alarmed state of her feelings was sufficient to cause her to overlook +the formality of giving the customary tap at the door previous to +entering. She entered the room, only to find the deceased artist holding +a pistol--the one produced--and looking at its barrel, still smoking, +earnestly. He burst into a hearty laugh when he saw her, and told her +not to be frightened. + +"It is nothing, Mrs. Thompson," he said, "and should you hear the firing +again, do not be alarmed. Don't be frightened." + +[Illustration: "DON'T BE FRIGHTENED."] + +So the firing was frequent, and though it played pitifully with the old +housekeeper's nerves and shook her seventy-year-old bones considerably, +she quietly submitted to it and "hoped it was all right." + +I knew Godfrey Huntingdon well. He often chatted over his pictures with +me. As a medical man and a student somewhat beyond the range of physic +and prescriptions, the pros and cons of an idea to be eventually carried +to the canvas gave rise to many interesting and discussable points. I +liked the man--he was so frank and true and positively simple in his +unassuming manner. Poor fellow! He never dreamt for a moment that he was +a genius, but what he did not know the public were quick to recognise. +Every picture from his brush was watched and waited for--a canvas from +him meant a vivid, striking, often sensational episode, which seemed to +live. I have some of his work in my dining-room now. I often look at his +figures. They are more human than anything I have seen by any other +modern painter. They seem possessed of breath and beating hearts of +their own, with tongues that want to speak, and eyes that reveal a +thinking brain. The trees in his landscapes appear to be gently shaken +by the breeze from across the moorland, the clouds only need touching by +the breath of the firmament to lazily move across the face of the blue +sky. He was indeed a genius. + +It was always an open question in the minds of the public and the +judgment of the critics as to who excelled the other--Godfrey Huntingdon +or Wilfred Colensoe. They both belonged to the same school of ideas. +Their works were equally impressive, their figure and portrait painting +particularly so, and the judges said it would be a life-long race +between them for supremacy with the brush. Huntingdon's sad death was a +terrible blow to the artistic world. I went to his funeral. + +He had not forgotten me. He left me all his studies. There were several +hundreds of them. Many were familiar to me, for he had made them whilst +we were smoking a pipe together, as I pointed out to him the necessary +laws of science he must needs regard in order to insure accuracy in his +work. The studies made quite a number of huge bundles, and in the +evening I would delight in sorting them through. It was a long task, for +I found something to admire and think over in every single one of them. + +A fortnight had passed away since they first came into my possession. I +had only another parcel to go through, and I should be finished. I was +quietly sitting in my chair with my legs stretched out on another chair, +as is my custom--I find it remarkably restful--and lighting up my brier +I cut the string of the last bundle. Slowly, one by one, I lifted up +those pieces of brown paper. They were still objects of reverence to me. +Here was the head of a child, a sweetly pretty child, and next to it a +study of a dissipated character, the face of a man fast losing every +working power of his brain and body by liquor. I realized the genius of +my dead friend more and more. + +[Illustration: "SLOWLY I LIFTED UP THOSE PIECES OF BROWN PAPER."] + +I had gone through quite a score of these play studies, when my hand +stretched out for another from the pile by my side. I turned the piece +of paper round and round, and it was some time before I grasped what the +subject was intended for. It appeared to be a piece of round tubing from +which smoke was protruding. The next half-dozen studies were of a +similar character. In one the smoke was very small, just a thin streak; +in another it was a full volume, as though to represent the after effect +of the discharge of a bullet from a revolver. I looked again. The chalk +drawing of the tubing was evidently intended for the barrel of a pistol! +Huntingdon always put the date on every study he made, and I found my +hand trembling as I turned the paper over. Great heavens--10th October, +1872--the day before his death! Another paper bore the same date, and +the others had the date of the previous day--the 9th. Was his death, +then, the result of an accident and not a suicide after all? Here was +the simple explanation of it so far--here was the reason for the several +shots which the old housekeeper had heard fired. He had discharged the +revolver at these times in order to watch the effect and immediately +place his impressions on the pieces of paper I now held in my hand. My +knowledge of Godfrey Huntingdon--both medically and fraternally--told me +that, at the time of his death, there was positively nothing on his mind +to cause such an act, and I now began reasoning the whole within myself +once again, as I had done many times since the occurrence. + +"It's a mystery--a terrible mystery!" I exclaimed, jumping up and +commencing to pace the room. I walked that room for over an hour, and +was only aroused from my reverie by the announcement of a servant that +supper was served. I ate my meal in silence, and the deliberate +mouthfuls I took, and my more than ordinarily methodical manner of +eating, must have told my wife that to disturb my present inward +argument would have been disastrous to the immediate prospects of +domestic harmony. I had come to a conclusion. There is nothing like +science and its accompanying occupations for balancing a man's brain. A +game of chess is recreative concentration. So the study of science was +with me, whilst physic was my profession. Scientific research and the +weighing of Nature's problems had steadied my thoughts and cooled my +actions. It was a settled thing with me that poor Huntingdon had been +murdered. By whom? Scientific investigation had transformed me into a +calculating individual. Every action, to me, could be proved as a +proposition in Euclid or an algebraical problem. I therefore said +nothing about my startling discovery, and decided to wait the +possibility of a further suggestion coming in my way, and "proving it." + +I suppose it was the deep interest I took in all matters concerning art +which brought so many artist-patients to my consulting room. Six months +had passed since the fatal 11th October, and the public were loudly +expressing their approval of a marvellously impressive bit of painting +by Wilfred Colensoe, which was the feature--and very justly so--of one +of the early spring exhibitions. It was the picture of a duel--a very +realistic canvas indeed. The young man--lying bleeding on the +ground--almost told the story of the attempted avenge of an action +towards someone dear to him on the part of an elderly _roué_, whose +still-smoking revolver was in his hand. Colensoe came to see me one +morning. He was a remarkably handsome man, classically featured, with +hair picturesquely scattered with streaks of silver. + +"Done up, eh?" I said to him. + +"Done up is the word," he answered. + +"You've been doing too much," I said, looking into his grey eyes as I +held his hand a moment. "You must cease work for a time. Get away from +your easel, go abroad, and forget to take your brushes with you. Go +anywhere, a hundred miles from a retail colourman's." + +[Illustration: "'YOU'VE BEEN DOING TOO MUCH,' I SAID."] + +"My dear doctor," he answered, "your prescription is too strong. You +forget I am an artist. It is like taking a man with a dying thirst to a +fountain of water and telling him he mustn't drink. I can't leave my +work." + +"When I tell you that it is either a case of your leaving your work or +your work leaving you, my remark may not be very original, but it is +undeniably true. Do you sleep well?" + +"I can't say," was his reply. "When I fall asleep at night I never wake +until my hour for rising. But I am more tired in the morning than when I +turned in over-night." + +"Quite so. Do you dream at all?" + +"Yes, I dream." + +"Feel sleepy now--eh?" + +"Doctor, I could go to bed for a week," he replied. + +"Again, I tell you--overwork," I said, with strong deliberation. "Now +I'll make you a proposal, which I can couple most heartily with the name +of Mrs. Gratton. Come away with us. We are going to Herne Bay for a few +weeks. I have taken a house there. Most invigorating place. You want no +medicine, you won't leave your work alone, I won't be hard in my +treatment of your case. Bring your tools with you. I will prescribe so +much colour for you during the day--your paints and brushes may become +converted into agreeable physic, but--they must be taken at periodical +times. What do you say?" + +Colensoe consented--gratefully accepted my offer, stayed to lunch, and +my wife took care to let him feel that the invitation was one of +combined cordiality from both of us. I was a great admirer of Colensoe's +work, and therefore took a deep interest in the worker. In a week's time +we were at Herne Bay. A room--with a good light--was apportioned off as +a small studio for Colensoe. A week passed by. Colensoe obeyed my +instructions to the letter. I limited his working hours, and he began +himself to be thankful when the periodical times for laying aside his +brush came round. I noticed this, and lessened the hours of painting +more, thinking that by degrees he would soon put his palette away +completely and take the undisturbed rest he needed for a time to restore +him thoroughly. + +About a fortnight after our arrival I was sitting alone in the +dining-room. My wife and visitor had retired an hour ago. It was a +glorious night. I turned out the gas, walked to the window, and drew up +the blinds. The sea was sparkling with gems thrown out by the +moon-beams. The beauty of the night seemed to heighten the stillness of +the surroundings. Although it wanted but a few minutes to midnight I +determined to walk out to the cliffs--a couple of hundred yards from the +house--and view the moonlit scenery to greater advantage. I turned from +the window, opened the door, and, just as I was turning into the +passage, I heard a footstep. It was a steady, deliberate step; there was +nothing uncertain or hesitating about it. I waited a moment; it came +nearer. I drew back into the shadow. Now it was on the top stair. A form +appeared in sight. It was Wilfred Colensoe. + +"Colensoe," I cried, softly; "why, what's the matter?" + +[Illustration: "HE STOOD BEFORE HIS EASEL."] + +He made no answer. With monotonous step he descended the stairs and was +now at the bottom. His blank, staring eyes at once told me that he was +in a state of somnambulism. He was fully dressed. His face was deadly +pale, his features stolidly set, and his lips were gently moving as +though impressively muttering. When he reached the bottom stair, he +turned and walked in the direction of the room we had converted into a +studio for him. I followed on quietly. With all the method and +mysterious discretionary power of the sleep-walker he turned the handle +of the door and entered. The room was flooded with light, for the roof +was a glass one. I watched him take his palette in hand and play with +the brushes on the colours. He stood before his easel, on which rested a +half-finished canvas. And he painted--painted as true and as sure as if +awake, blending the colours, picking out his work, working with all his +old artistic touch and finish. All this time his lips were moving, +muttering incoherent words I could not hear. At last he laid aside his +tools with a sigh that almost raised compassion in my heart. Then +walking towards the window at the far end of the room, he appeared to +look out upon the sea. He was now talking louder. I crept up to him and +tried to catch a word. It was a terrible brain-ringing word I heard--and +uttered in a way I shall never forget. + +"Murder!" + +That was the word. "Murder, murder, murder!" he muttered, with agonized +face. Yet another word came to his lips. + +"Huntingdon!" + +"Murder--Huntingdon!" I said within myself as I linked the two words +together. + +The sleeping man passed his hand across his forehead. It was evident +that he was in the midst of an agonizing dream--a vision of conviction. +Here stood the guilty man before me now, pale and motionless, the rays +from the moon lighting up his face and revealing the word "guilt" +written on every feature. I watched him and waited for something else to +come from his lips. I stood by his side for nearly an hour, but he did +nothing more than repeat these same two words. With measured tread he +turned to go. I followed him to his bedroom and heard him turn the key. +I sat up the whole night--thinking. None knew of the remarkable +discovery which I had made amongst poor Huntingdon's sketches; none +should know of what I had learnt to-night. By the morning I had fully +determined upon my course of action. The ramblings of a sleep-walking +man would not prove a conviction to those who would judge his deed. He +should convict himself. He should witness against himself. He was a +sleep-worker. I had met with many similar cases before, all of which +tended to prove that sleep by no means deadens the faculties of labour. +It is indisputable that the hands will follow the inclinations of the +brains of somnambulists. They will act as they think--perform what they +dream. If Colensoe would only work out his terrible night dreams! + +My conduct towards him at the breakfast table and throughout the day was +just the same as ever. It was far from a comfortable feeling, however, +to pass the wine to one who had taken another's life, and to offer an +after-dinner cigar to a murderer. The day passed. I slept during the +afternoon, for I was tired with my over-night watching, and could I but +put my inward plans into execution, it was more than probable that I +should be awake for many nights to come. I told my wife that Colensoe +was a somnambulist, and that he worked at the canvas equally as well +whilst sleeping as waking. I impressed upon her the absolute necessity +of silence on the subject, as I firmly believed that I was on the brink +of a great discovery. Seeing that I was a medical man, her curiosity was +in no way aroused. Indeed, she thought me foolish to give up my night's +rest. + +That night, after Colensoe had gone to bed, I went into his studio. My +hand trembled somewhat as I placed on his easel a square piece of new +canvas. This done, I waited patiently. A step on the stairs rewarded me. +It was Colensoe walking again. His speech was louder this time, and more +impressively distinct; his dream was evidently more agonizing than the +night before. If he would only follow out the promptings of that +dream--if he would but work to-night--to-night! I watched him +breathlessly. He wandered about the room for some time, then suddenly, +as though impelled by some mysterious force within, crossed to the +cupboard where he kept his tools, took out his materials and walked to +the canvas. + +"Huntingdon--Huntingdon!" he cried, and the first lines of his +everlasting vision were written on the hitherto untouched canvas. It was +the outline of a man's face! For two hours he worked, and then, +replacing his brushes and palette, went to bed. I took the canvas away. +Night after night for ten days I placed the canvas in position. Night +after night the artist got nearer to accomplishing his own condemnation. +And as the picture grew more like the man he had murdered, so his dream +became more intense. His features showed that. The rapidity of his brush +revealed the rush of thoughts within, of an anxiety to complete his +task. Never was such a true portrait painted, and when on the last night +he put the finishing touches to it, the face of Huntingdon seemed to +live on the canvas. It was the face which existed in the brain of the +painter. The last night's work was done. The sleeping man turned from +his easel and went to his bedroom once more. + +The morrow would tell me if Colensoe was guilty. I had little doubt of +it in my own mind--but he should say so himself when waking as he had +condemned himself whilst sleeping. I would take him to the studio and +confront him with his own testimony. He should see the face of the man +whose life he had taken, painted with his own hands. He was later than +usual in coming down that morning. I left the breakfast-room with the +intention of calling him, when, just as I got into the passage, I saw +him at the top of the stairs. His hat was on. His face was ghastly pale, +every feature was working. His eyes betokened some mad intention--their +gaze appeared to kill. He almost flew down the stairs. + +"Don't stop me," he cried. "I must go into the open. I want God's air. +Let me go now--let me go, only for a little while!" + +"Colensoe," I said, catching him by the arm, "what mad act do you +contemplate?" + +"Nothing--nothing. Believe me, nothing. I only want the refreshing +breeze, that's all. I'm tired--worn out." + +"Yes, you are truly tired," I said. + +"What do you mean?" he cried. + +"Your work." + +"Work--what work?--who works?" + +"Come with me," I said. + +[Illustration: "HE SHRIEKED THE MURDERED MAN'S NAME."] + +Like a child he followed me to his studio. I opened the door. The +portrait of Huntingdon rested on the easel. He saw it. The eyes he had +painted pierced him to the heart, and the lips almost moved in +accusation. He shrieked the murdered man's name and fell to the ground. +He was dead! + + * * * * * + +The following letter was found on Wilfred Colensoe's dressing-table:-- + +"What good is life to me?--what good am I for life? Then why live? A +guilty conscience only means a living death. You have been very good to +me--both you and your wife. But I am going to end it all. Let me +confess. It will bring me some small comfort even now in the dying hour +I have given to myself. You remember poor Huntingdon? I shot that +man--murdered him. Listen and then 'Good-bye.' Huntingdon and I were +friendly rivals. You remember my picture of 'The Duel'? Yes. One day I +visited Huntingdon. That same morning I had been making some studies of +a revolver in the act of being discharged. I had it in my pocket when I +went to see Huntingdon, and one chamber remained loaded. I walked +straight into his studio. As I entered Huntingdon had a pistol in his +hand pointed immediately towards me and--fired. In an instant my +revolver was in my grasp and a bullet had entered his heart. That is the +simple history of the crime. I fled from the place and none knew. Thank +God this is written. A life for a life. I am passing through death all +the day, and at night I do not cease to die. You do not know what that +means. The guilty do. Angels of darkness play with you all day long and +at night watch over you--watch over you that you do not escape, that +they may gambol with you on the morrow. They are making merry now. They +have got what they want--_Me_. Yes, a life for a life. I will deliver my +own up. Good-bye." + + + + +_The Queer Side of Things._ + +[Illustration: A USE FOR GENIUS] + + +Young Bansted Downs had finally arrived home from school; the cabman had +placed his box in the front hall, and young D. was in the act of hanging +up his hat on the stand, when the elder Bansted Downs, his father, put +his head out of the library, and said:-- + +"And now, young Bansted Downs, what sphere in life do you propose to +fill?" + +"I have been thinking, old Bansted Downs," replied the youth, +respectfully, "since I left school seventy-five minutes ago, that I +should prefer to be something prosperous." + +The father nodded his head approvingly at this evidence of foresight in +his child, and said:-- + +"I think you have come to a very wise decision, young Bansted Downs. No +doubt you have, while at school, selected such studies as were best +fitted to prepare you for the struggle of life?" + +"I think so, old Bansted Downs," replied the son. "The head-master took +in regularly for our use all the best prize-competition periodicals; in +fact, he was of opinion that a complete selection of these rendered all +other educational books superfluous. I myself have attained to such +dexterity in guessing the right word, deciding on the best eight +pictures and the two best stories, divining the correct number of pairs +of boots made in London on a given day, and so forth, that Dr. +Practiccle pronounced my education singularly complete." + +"Good--very good! young Bansted Downs," said the father, thoughtfully; +"and now as to a more specific choice of profession?" + +"Well, old Bansted Downs," said the son, "I have been thinking that I +should like to be apprenticed to a Genius, with a view to adopting his +calling." + +"Very well thought out," said the parent. "I must consider whether the +necessary premium----" + +"Pray do not trouble about that," said the son, "as my success at the +word competitions has more than provided for the contingency." And young +Bansted Downs drew from his pocket a large bag filled with a mixture of +sovereigns, marbles, and peppermint-drops. + +"Very good! Then the matter's settled; and perhaps you would like +something to eat." + +All the friends by whose opinion old Bansted Downs set any store +heartily approved of young Bansted Downs's choice of a calling; and the +matter was fully discussed that evening. The advertisement columns of +the newspapers were consulted as to the most suitable genius to +undertake the charge of the youth; and the following seemed promising:-- + +"_To Parents and Guardians._--_Young men of promise wishing to adopt the +profession of genius will do well to apply to Brayne Power and Sons, of +3019A, George Street, Hanover Square, who have a vacancy for one +apprentice. Telephone No. 7142863._" + +The very next day young Bansted Downs called at the address given, and +was shown into the presence of Power senior, a man of venerable +appearance, whose high broad forehead, far-away gaze, long hair, and +abstraction sufficiently revealed his calling. + +"It will be fifty pounds--twenty-five down, and the rest in monthly +instalments of one pound after you have got your H.A.W.," said the +Master Genius. + +"If you please, what is my H.A.W.?" asked young Bansted Downs. + +"Your final degree--your Head Above Water." + +"That will not be just yet?" asked the youth. + +"Oh, dear, no! Not for a very long while, if ever. There are two +preliminary degrees to get before that. There are the F.I. and the +E.P.--your Foot In and your Ear of the Public; and before you can obtain +either of these you will have to Make your Mark." + +"I can sign my name--will not that do as well?" asked the youth. + +[Illustration: "THE MASTER GENIUS."] + +"That entirely depends upon the sort of name. If it's just a surname +with a coronet over it, it entitles you to your F.I. and your E.P. +without any examination. You have the same advantage if you can append +to your signature either of the following affixes: P.P. (Pertinacious +Pusher) or C.I. (Chum of the Influential). + +"But if you can't sign these kinds of names, you will have to Make your +Mark. It's a difficult mark, and requires a lot of learning. + +"As the first instalment of twenty-five pounds down is all I am ever +likely to get, I will take it now--no, that one won't do; it's a +peppermint-drop, not a sovereign. _That's_ not the way to get on, young +man!" + +"Isn't it?" asked young Bansted Downs thoughtfully. "I'm glad you told +me. I thought perhaps it might be; but, of course, I've got to learn." + +That very week young Bansted Downs commenced his studies under the +Master Genius. He found he had a very great deal to learn. + +"The difference between talent and genius is that talent does what it +can and genius does what it must--you will find that in the poets," said +the Master Genius. "Consequently, to be a genius, you need not feel that +you have the _ability_ to do a thing, but only that it is _necessary_ to +do it. A house-painter is a specimen of genius: he has not the ability +to do his work; but he is compelled to do it in order to obtain the +means for his Saturday drinks. But, of course, that's only one kind of +genius. What we have to teach you first is to feel that you _must_ do +something transcendent--and then all you've got to do is to do it--see?" + +So, acting on his instructions, young Bansted Downs went to the office +and sat quite still day after day for a month or two, with his eyes +fixed on space; and one afternoon at the end of that time he got up and +rushed at Power junior (who took charge of him in these preliminary +studies), and announced that he felt the irresistible impulse to do +something great and wonderful. + +"What sort of thing?" asked the Junior Genius. + +"I don't know--anything--something stupendous and transcendent--a +master-piece!" said young Bansted Downs. + +"Knock it off, then. Don't make a labour of it, mind; that would spoil +all the genius of it. Just knock it off--shed it--see?" + +The apprentice went back to his stool in the corner and knocked off that +scintillation of genius. + +"Very good for a beginner," said the Junior Genius; "you show much +promise. I shall soon be able to hand you over to my father for the +Higher Grades." + +And some time after that young Bansted Downs moved into the room of the +Master Genius to learn the higher attributes of genius--eccentricity and +obscureness. These were the most important parts of the qualifications, +and he worked hard at acquiring them. The eccentricity had infinite +ramifications extending into language, manner, dress, habits, +appearance, and opinions. The teacher communicated a thousand little +touches of eccentricity invaluable to a genius--such as the bringing out +of a book of poems with the title printed upside down and the capitals +at the end of the lines instead of the beginning; the wearing of the +back hair tied in a bow under the tip of the nose, and so forth. The +pupil learned to hop backwards on to a public platform, wearing his +dress-coat upside down, to paint his figures with their bones outside +their skin, to sob audibly when performing on the piano; and many other +things necessary to the obtaining of his degrees. + +[Illustration: "A HOUSE-PAINTER IS A SPECIMEN OF GENIUS."] + +Having completed these studies, he was ready for the uphill work of +trying to Make his Mark; and he found it a complicated bit of drawing +too, far worse than the signature of a Chinese emperor--everything lay +in the flourish. + +The Master Genius said that no one could Make his Mark without a great +flourish; and the best way to make the flourish was to blow it on his +own trumpet; so there was the expense of a trumpet. + +But he didn't seem able to get on; and after he had worn out a gross of +pens in the attempt to Make his Mark he felt that he would never obtain +his degrees, and took a back cistern-cupboard under the roof in a poor +street, and fell into a low state. + +One day, as he was eating his weekly sausage at the Three Melancholy +Geniuses, off Fleet Street, there entered a party whom he knew slightly +and who had Made his Mark and passed all his degrees some time before. + +[Illustration: "TO SOB AUDIBLY WHEN PERFORMING ON THE PIANO."] + +"Haven't Made your Mark yet?" said this party. "Tell you what--why don't +you get Boomed?" + +"Does it hurt?" asked young Bansted Downs. + +"Hurts your self-respect just a little and your respect for your +fellow-creatures a little more--but it's nothing," replied the party. + +"Where do you go?" + +"To the Press Booming Department, of course. Just put your name down for +Booming, and fill up a form, stating what you require said about you. +You began all wrong: I never studied--I only went and put my name down +the moment it occurred to me that I would be a genius. I called at the +office every day, and shouted my name, and created disturbances, and got +turned out; until at last they couldn't stand it any longer, and my turn +came. + +[Illustration: "I CALLED AT THE OFFICE EVERY DAY AND SHOUTED MY NAME."] + +"They put a long article about me in every newspaper, all the same +day--mostly interviews--and quoted me as a classic. Some of 'em +described me as a painter, and others as a novelist: I never was either; +but it answered all right." + +So young Bansted Downs went to the Booming office, and put his name +down, and shouted; and the end of it was he got his Boom, and several +editors wrote to him; and he began to be a little successful. + +He hired halls, and went before the public in person; and painted on the +platform; and sang and played his own compositions to them; and recited +his own poems, and acted his own plays; and told them about his own +scientific researches, and his military, exploratory, judicial, +political, and athletic achievements. + +But the thing dulled off, for one day a deputation of the public called +at the Booming office to ask something about him; and the office had +forgotten his name, and said that he wasn't being Boomed now, as Smith +was up; and so the public got on an omnibus and went to Smith's hall, +and Bansted Downs faded out. + +After that he was to be found all day at the Three Melancholy Geniuses, +drooping over fours of Irish; and one day his late instructor happened +to come in and find him thus, with his melancholy nose over the edge of +his glass. + +"Haven't got your Head Above Water, I see?" said the Master Genius. +"Sorry you haven't Made your Mark." + +"I've made a good many," said Downs, pointing to the wet rings on the +counter. + +"Ah, that sort of mark's no use--unless you make it in Company," said +the Genius. + +[Illustration: "HAVEN'T GOT YOUR HEAD ABOVE WATER, I SEE?"] + +One day, as young Bansted Downs sat in his cistern-cupboard biting his +nails, a step was heard on the stair, and his late instructor entered. + +"I've been all wrong," he said, sitting down on the cistern. "I put you +all wrong--I've put all my pupils all wrong. I fell down stairs lately +and knocked my head, and when I got up I saw everything--the light broke +in upon me!" + +"Why, you've cut your hair, and you're dressed quite neatly--I should +hardly have known you for a Master Genius at all!" exclaimed young +Bansted Downs. + +"I am no longer a Genius--I am now the M.W.K.A.A.I.--the Man Who Knows +All About It. I now know why genius fails to get the Ear of the Public, +and is not appreciated----" + +"Fault of the public--everybody knew that before," growled young Bansted +Downs. + +"Pardon me, it is not the fault of the poor public, but the fault of the +system. We--the entertainers--have made the mistake of being geniuses; +whereas we had no business to meddle with genius at all. + +"It is the public who ought to have the genius; _they_ should have the +lively appreciation, the keen sense of humour, the afflatus, and all +that; and then those who cater for them would not need to trouble about +those things--they would only have to cater, and leave the public to +perceive, by means of their genius, the excellences of the fare +provided. If a plain person does something, and geniuses perceive +greatness in it, that's a right state of affairs; but if a genius does +something great, and plain persons fail to appreciate it, that's a wrong +state of things, and a waste of material---see?" + +"And what do you propose to do?" asked young Bansted Downs. + +"That's very simple--just make geniuses of the public. Of course the +public, having their own affairs to attend to, will not wish to turn +caterers and originate--their province is to appreciate, perceive, +applaud, and pay at the doors--see? By this system any dullard is +enabled, without effort, fatigue, or preliminary study, to Make his Mark +and get his F.I., his E.P., and his H.A.W. A child could use it." + +"But," objected young Bansted Downs, "under your system, dullardism +paying so well, everybody would want to cater for the public, and there +wouldn't be any audience--any public." + +"Pooh! The system at present in vogue is all I require--compulsory +education. Everybody will have to be educated as a genius, except a few +who will be specially exempted from attendance at the Board schools to +enable them to lie fallow and fit themselves for originators. + +"Of course, you may say that it would not be _necessary_ for the +entertainer to be dull. Of course it would not; but, as it is not +necessary for him to be a genius either, there would be a waste of +public money in educating him as one. In fact, it might be a +disadvantage for both originator and appreciator to be geniuses, and +their conceptions might clash and create confusion. It's better for a +conception to be lighted from one side only, as you get more contrast." + +"But would not the genius of the spectator simply perceive the dulness +of the originator?" + +"Not in the least. It's just the sphere of genius to perceive, in a +given production, excellences which the ordinary observer fails to +detect; and it's only a question of degree of genius. I take it that +perfect genius can detect perfect excellence in everything submitted to +its discrimination. And now, will you be kind enough to come and vote +for me, as for the furtherance of my scheme I am offering myself as +Chairman of the School Board?" + +In due course, the Man Who Knew All About It was elected to the School +Board. He secured this by publishing handbills declaring his intention +to squander the rate-payers' money like water, and provide free food, +clothing, lodging, sweets, tobacco, drinks, theatres, and pianos to all +the Board school children and their parents, relatives, and friends. The +public judged by the proceedings of past candidates, all of whom had +deliberately broken their promises on coming into office; and they +concluded that this one would do so as well, and refuse to spend a +penny. The Board were compelled to choose him as Chairman; and he at +once commenced his work of reform. + +Genius took the place of all the former studies at the Board schools: no +pupil was permitted to leave until he had passed the fifth standard, +which turned him out a full-fledged genius; and he had to attend until +he _could_ pass it, even if he became old and decrepit. This was a wise +step; for, had this rule been relaxed, those unable to pass the standard +would have joined the ranks of the originators, and thus flooded the +market. + +[Illustration: "THE GENIUS CLASS AT THE BOARD SCHOOL."] + +Young Bansted Downs now set himself to steadily forgetting all the +genius he had learned, feeling that it would be nothing but an +incumbrance in his new career; and he succeeded so well that in the +course of a few years he had become as dull as ditch-water. + +Meanwhile a new public were growing up, a public of such brilliant +perceptions--so great a faculty of appreciation--that they were quite +bewildered with the excellences they perceived in everything around +them. + +To take the sense of humour alone: they possessed it to so marvellous an +extent that they could perceive a joke in the passing cloud, +facetiousness in the growth of flowers, a choice witticism in the rates +and taxes, an incentive to mirth in strikes. Not that they were +incessantly giggling--that would have argued a something wanting; no, +they drank in and appreciated and enjoyed the universal humour, and +their eyes were bright. + +So, when young Bansted Downs was middle-aged Bansted Downs he started +all over again in quite a different way: he just wrote twaddle, and +painted twaddle, and composed twaddle; and went on to a platform and +twaddled about twaddle: and the public genius detected the brilliancy +lurking in it all, and they were in ecstacies. + +A terrible thing happened to the Boom Department of the Press. One day +the public arose as one man and remarked that they were capable of +finding out merit for themselves and no longer required the Department; +and they took large stones, and bad eggs, and dead cats, and fagots of +wood, and proceeded to the Boom Department; and it was in vain that the +head of the Department came out on the balcony and pleaded that the +Booming System, as practised by the Press, had nothing to do with the +finding-out of merit; for the public smashed the windows and burned the +offices, and abolished the Boom Department. + +[Illustration: "A CHOICE WITTICISM IN THE RATES AND TAXES."] + +However, nobody required Booming now, as absence of ability was no +longer a bar to fame; and things worked far more happily than they ever +had under the old system. Authors and others no longer pined under want +of appreciation; on the contrary, they were always wildly surprised at +the wonderful things the public discovered in their work; and as for the +public, they were vastly contented. + +It's the true system--there's not a question about that. + +J. F. SULLIVAN. + +[Illustration: TABLES OF ALL AGES] + +[Illustration: COMPLIMENTARY (A FACT). + + GLADYS: "GRANDPA, WHAT ARE THOSE STRINGS MADE OF?" + + GRANDPA: "CAT-GUT, MY DEAR." + + GLADYS: "WHAT'S THAT?" + + GRANDPA (JOKINGLY): "OH, THE INSIDES OF PUSSIES DEAR." + + GLADYS (AFTER A PAUSE): "I SUPPOSE THEY FOUND OUT THEY WERE + GOOD FOR THAT ON ACCOUNT OF THE NOISE CATS MAKE!"] + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: TURN THESE UPSIDE DOWN.] + + + + +INDEX. + + + PAGE +ADJUTANT'S LOVE STORY, THE. From the French of LE COMTE ALFRED +DE VIGNY + (_Illustrations_ by H. R. MILLAR.) 528 + +ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES. By A. CONAN DOYLE. + (_Illustrations_ by SIDNEY PAGET.) + + XIV.--THE ADVENTURE OF THE CARDBOARD BOX 61 + + XV.--THE ADVENTURE OF THE YELLOW FACE 162 + + XVI.--THE ADVENTURE OF THE STOCKBROKER'S CLERK 281 + + XVII.--THE ADVENTURE OF THE "GLORIA SCOTT" 395 + + XVIII.--THE ADVENTURE OF THE MUSGRAVE RITUAL 479 + + XIX.--THE ADVENTURE OF THE REIGATE SQUIRE 601 + +"AUTHOR! AUTHOR!" By E. W. HORNUNG 241 + (_Illustrations_ by W. S. STACEY.) + + +BARNARDO, DR. (_See_ "ILLUSTRATED INTERVIEWS.") 173 + +BEAUTIES:-- + + I.--LADIES: THE COUNTESS OF ANNESLEY, THE MISSES HATHAWAY + (TWINS), MISS HAYTER, MISS LEE, MISS MENCE 74 + + II.--CHILDREN: MISS BEAUMONT, MISS CROSS, MISS DUNLOP, MISS + MARGUERITE FOSTER, MISS SERJEANT, MISS WATERLOW, MISS WHITE, + MISSES WHITE, MISS WINSTEAD 186 + + III.--LADIES: PRINCESS AHMADEE, MADAME ARNOLDSON, MISS DOROTHY + DORR, MISS FLO HENDERSON, MISS KINGSLEY, MISS ALICE + LETHBRIDGE, MADAME SCHIRMER-MAPLESON, MLLE. DEL TORRE, + MISS WEBSTER 292 + + IV.--LADIES: MISS ARCHER, LADY CHARLES BERESFORD, MISS FLO + BERESFORD, MISS BRANSON, MRS. BRATE, MISS LLOYD, MISS + DECIMA MOORE, MISS RIPLEY, MISS NELLIE SIMMONS 415 + + V.--CHILDREN: MISS KATE BIRCH, MISS DORIS COLLINS, MISS ERNA + COLLINS, MISS GASCOYNE DALZIEL, MISS ELSIE DIEDRICHS, MISS + GLADYS HERBERT, MISS DOROTHY NORCUTT, MISS MAUDE WALLIS, + MISS KATHLEEN WHITE 525 + + VI.--LADIES: LADY ABERDEEN, MISS ELLA BANISTER, MISS C. L. FOOTE, + MISS FRIEND, MISS L. HAROLD, MISS A. HUGHES, MRS. MARSH, MISS + ALICE RAVENSCROFT, MISS NORAH WILLIAMS 613 + + +CARDS, PECULIAR PLAYING 77, 148 + +CHILD'S TEAR, A. From the French of EDOUARD LEMOINE 95 +(_Illustrations_ by PAUL HARDY.) + +COURTSHIP OF HALIL, THE. By A. F. BURN 84 +(_Illustrations_ by H. R. MILLAR.) + + +DARK TRANSACTION, A. By MARIANNE KENT 362 +(_Illustrations_ by PAUL HARDY.) + +DEAD OF NIGHT, AT. By MRS. NEWMAN 498 +(_Illustrations_ by W. B. WOLLEN.) + +DICTATES OF FASHION, FUTURE 551 +(_Written_ and _Illustrated_ by W. CADE GALL.) + +FASHION, FUTURE DICTATES OF 551 + +FURNISS, MR. HARRY. (_See_ "ILLUSTRATED INTERVIEWS.") 571 + + +GAME OF CHESS, A. Translated from the French 219 + (_Illustrations_ by PAUL HARDY.) + + +HANDS. By BECKLES WILLSON 119, 295 + (_Illustrations_ from Photographs of Casts.) + +HUMANE SOCIETY, ROYAL. With Portraits of Winners of the Medals 370, 446 + (_Illustrations_ from Photographs.) + + +ILLUSTRATED INTERVIEWS. By HARRY HOW. + + XIX.--THE LORD BISHOP OF RIPON 12 + (_Illustrations_ from Photographs by Messrs. ELLIOTT & FRY.) + + XX.--DR. BARNARDO 173 + (_Illustrations_ from Photographs by Messrs. ELLIOTT & FRY.) + + XXI.--MR. AND MRS. KENDAL 228 + (_Illustrations_ by MR. KENDAL; and from Photographs by Messrs. + ELLIOTT & FRY.) + + XXII.--SIR ROBERT RAWLINSON 513 + (_Illustrations_ from Drawings and Paintings; and from Photographs + by Messrs. ELLIOTT & FRY.) + + XXIII.--MR. HARRY FURNISS 571 + (_Illustrations_ by HARRY FURNISS; and from Photographs by + Messrs. ELLIOTT & FRY.) + + +KENDAL, MR. AND MRS. (_See_ "ILLUSTRATED INTERVIEWS.") 228 + + +LIEUTENANT GAUTHIER. From the French of JOSÉ DE CAMPOS 616 + (_Illustrations_ by H. R. MILLAR.) + +LITTLE SURPRISE, A. Adapted from the French of A. DREYFUS by +CONSTANCE BEERBOHM 25 + (_Illustrations_ by W. S. STACEY.) + + +MAJOR'S COMMISSION, THE. By W. CLARK RUSSELL 138 + (_Illustrations_by W. CHRISTIAN SYMONS.) + + +NANKEEN JACKET, THE. From the French of GUSTAVE GUESVILLER 418 + (_Illustrations_ by H. R. MILLAR.) + + +ONE AND TWO. By WALTER BESANT 44 + (_Illustrations_ by JOHN GÜLICH.) + + +PIERRE AND BAPTISTE. By BECKLES WILLSON 547 + (_Illustrations_ by PAUL HARDY.) + +PLAYING CARDS, PECULIAR. By GEORGE CLULOW 77, 148 + (_Illustrations_ from facsimiles of Curious Playing Cards.) + +PORTRAITS OF CELEBRITIES AT DIFFERENT TIMES OF THEIR LIVES:-- + + ABEL, SIR FREDERICK, BART. 589 + + ADLER, DR. HERMANN 278 + + ALISON, SIR ARCHIBALD 279 + + BATTERSEA, LORD 274 + + BERESFORD, LORD CHARLES 393 + + COWEN, FREDERIC H. 161 + + FURNISS, HARRY 586 + + GIRARD, MISS DOROTHEA 59 + + GOULD, REV. S. BARING 392 + + HADING, MADAME JANE 280 + + HALLÉ, SIR CHARLES 277 + + HALLÉ, LADY 276 + + HARDY, MISS IZA DUFFUS 473 + + HAWEIS, REV. H. R. 160 + + HERKOMER, MR. HUBERT, R.A. 474 + + HOUGHTON, LORD 156 + + HUNTER, COLIN, A.R.A. 588 + + KELVIN, LORD 590 + + KNILL, MR. STUART (LORD MAYOR) 60 + + LESLIE, THE LATE FRED 58 + + LLOYD, EDWARD 478 + + MACWHIRTER, JOHN, R.A. 476 + + NICOL, ERSKINE, A.R.A. 475 + + ORCHARDSON, W. Q., R.A. 275 + + PETTIE, JOHN, R.A. 157 + + POTTER, MRS. BROWN 389 + + PRINCESS MARIE OF EDINBURGH 56 + + PRINCE FERDINAND OF ROUMANIA 57 + + PRINCE OF WALES 390 + + PRINCESS OF WALES 391 + + REID, SIR GEORGE, P.R.S.A. 587 + + ROBERTS, JOHN 394 + + ROBERTSON, J. FORBES 477 + + RUSSELL, W. CLARK 55 + + TECK, DUCHESS OF 158 + + TECK, DUKE OF 159 + + VAUGHAN, CARDINAL 591 + + VAUGHAN, CARDINAL, FATHER AND BROTHERS OF 592 + +PRINCE OF WALES AT SANDRINGHAM, THE 327 + (_Illustrations_ from Photographs by BEDFORD LEMERE and W. & D. + DOWNEY.) + + +QUASTANA THE BRIGAND. From the French of ALPHONSE DAUDET 124 + (_Illustrations_ by JEAN DE PALÉOLOGUE.) + +QUEER SIDE OF THINGS, THE:-- + + BOTTLE FROM THE DEEP SEA, A 214 + + CHILDREN OF A THOUSAND YEARS 542 + + CLOAKS AND MANTLES 106 + + CROCODILE STORY, A 324 + + DRINKING VESSELS OF ALL AGES 322 + + DWINDLING HOUR, THE 98 + + EXPLOSION OF A LOCOMOTIVE 214 + + HORSE AND ITS OCCUPATIONS, THE 430 + + HUNTER AND THE BIRD, THE 108 + + JUDGE'S PENANCE, THE 535 + + MANDRAKE ROOTS 105 + + MISCELLANEOUS 648 + + N.P.M.C., THE 315 + + OLD JOE'S PICNIC 423 + + PAL'S PUZZLES 104, 215 + + ROOM PAPERED WITH STAMPS 321 + + SAGACITY OF A DOG 216 + + STORY OF THE KING'S IDEA 209 + + TABLES OF A CENTURY 646 + + TURNIP RESEMBLING A HUMAN HAND 321 + + USE FOR GENIUS 639 + + VEGETABLE ODDITIES 214, 432 + + WHO ARE THESE? 544 + + +RAWLINSON, SIR ROBERT. (_See_ "ILLUSTRATED INTERVIEWS.") 513 + +RIPON, THE LORD BISHOP OF. (_See_ "ILLUSTRATED INTERVIEWS.") 12 + +ROSITA. From the French of PITRE CHEVALIER 302 + (_Illustrations_ by H. R. MILLAR.) + + +SANDRINGHAM, THE PRINCE OF WALES AT 327 + (_Illustrations_ from Photographs.) + +SHADOW OF THE SIERRAS, IN THE. By IZA DUFFUS HARDY 433 + (_Illustrations_ by PAUL HARDY.) + +SHAFTS FROM AN EASTERN QUIVER. By CHARLES J. MANSFORD, B.A. + + VII.--MARGARITA, THE BOND QUEEN OF THE WANDERING DHAHS 3 + VIII.--THE MASKED RULER OF THE BLACK WRECKERS 189 + IX.--MAW SAYAH, THE KEEPER OF THE GREAT BURMAN NAT 258 + X.--THE HUNTED TRIBE OF THREE HUNDRED PEAKS 340 + XI.--IN QUEST OF THE LOST GALLEON 453 + XII.--THE DAUGHTER OF LOVETSKI THE LOST 561 + (_Illustrations_ by A. PEARSE.) + +SLAVE, A. By LEILA HANOUM. Translated from a Turkish Story 203 + (_Illustrations_ by H. R. MILLAR.) + +SPEAKER'S CHAIR, FROM BEHIND THE. Viewed by H. W. LUCY 89, 198, 267, + 381, 490, 624 + (_Illustrations_ by F. C. GOULD.) + +STRANGE REUNION, A. By T. G. ATKINSON 376 + (_Illustrations_ by A. J. JOHNSON.) + + +TYPES OF ENGLISH BEAUTY. (_See_ "BEAUTIES.") + + +WEATHERCOCKS AND VANES 351 + (_Written_ and _Illustrated_ by WARRINGTON HOGG.) + +WEDDING GIFT, A. By LEONARD OUTRAM 111 + (_Illustrations_ by PAUL HARDY.) + +WORK OF ACCUSATION, A. By HARRY HOW 633 + (_Illustrations_ by JOHN GÜLICH.) + + +ZIG-ZAGS AT THE ZOO. By ARTHUR MORRISON. + + VII.--ZIG-ZAG CURSOREAN 35 + VIII.--ZIG-ZAG PHOCINE 129 + IX.--ZIG-ZAG CONKAVIAN 248 + X.--ZIG-ZAG OPHIDIAN 407 + XI.--ZIG-ZAG MARSUPIAL 464 + XII.--ZIG-ZAG ACCIPITRAL 593 + + (_Illustrations_ by J. A. SHEPHERD.) + +GEORGE NEWNES, LIMITED. 8, 9, 10 AND 11, SOUTHAMPTON STREET, AND EXETER +STREET, STRAND. W.C. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue +30, June 1893, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK STRAND MAGAZINE *** + +***** This file should be named 24188-8.txt or 24188-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/4/1/8/24188/ + +Produced by Victorian/Edwardian Pictorial Magazines, +Jonathan Ingram, Josephine Paolucci 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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