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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Belford's Magazine, Volume II, No. 8,
+January, 1889, 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: Belford's Magazine, Volume II, No. 8, January, 1889
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: March 18, 2010 [EBook #31684]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BELFORD'S ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Barbara Tozier, Bill Tozier, Dan Horwood, and
+the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
+http://www.pgdp.net
+
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+
+
+
+BELFORD'S MAGAZINE.
+
+
+  Vol. II.    No. 8.
+  January, 1889.
+
+
+
+
+WICKED LEGISLATION.
+
+
+The patience with which mankind submits to the demands of tyrants
+has been the wonder of each succeeding age, and heroes are made of
+those who break one yoke only to bow with servility to a greater. The
+Roman soldier, returning from wars in which his valor had won wealth
+and empire for his rulers, was easily content to become first a
+tenant, and then a serf, upon the very lands he had tilled as owner
+before his voluntary exile as his country's defender, kissing the hand
+that oppressed, so long as it dispensed, as charity, a portion of his
+tithes and rentals in sports and food. And now, after ages of
+wonder and criticism, the soldiers of our nineteenth-century
+civilization outvie their Roman prototypes in submitting to exactions
+and injustice of which Nero was incapable either of imagining or
+executing, bowing subserviently to the more ingenious tyrant of an
+advanced civilization, if but his hand drop farthings of pensions in
+return for talents of extortion. It may not be that the soldiers
+and citizens of America shall become so thoroughly debauched and
+degraded, nor that the consequences of their revolt shall be a
+burning capitol and a terrified monopolist; but if these evils are
+to be averted, it will be only because fearless hands tear the
+mask from our modern Neros, and tireless arms hold up to popular
+view the naked picture of national disgrace.
+
+Twenty-eight years ago the first step had been taken towards the final
+overthrow of the objective form of human slavery. There were, even in
+those days, cranks who were dreaming of new harmonies in the songs of
+liberty; and when tyranny opposed force to the righteous demands of
+constitutional government, ploughshares rusted in the neglected
+fields, workshops looked to alien lands for toilers, while patriots
+answered the bugle-call, and a nation was freed from an eating cancer.
+But what was the return for such sacrifices? Surely, if ever were
+soldiers entitled to fair and full reward, it was those who responded
+to the repeated call of Lincoln for aid in suppressing the most
+gigantic rebellion of history--not in the form of driblets of charity,
+doled with cunning arts to secure their submission to extortions, not
+offered as a bribe to unblushing perjury and denied to honest
+suffering, but simple and exact justice, involving a full performance
+of national obligation in return for the stipulated discharge of the
+duty of citizenship. The simple statement of facts of history will
+serve to expose the methods of those who pose as _par excellence_ the
+soldiers' friends and the defenders of national faith.
+
+The soldiers who enlisted in the war of the rebellion were promised by
+the government, in addition to varying bounties, a stipulated sum of
+money per month. It requires no argument to prove that the faith of
+the government was as much pledged to the citizen who risked his life,
+as to him who merely risked a portion of his wealth in a secured loan
+to the government. But the record shows that the pay of the former was
+reduced by nearly sixty per cent, while the returns of the latter were
+doubled, trebled, and quadrupled; that in many cases government
+obligations were closed by the erection of a cheap cast-iron tablet
+over a dead hero, while the descendants of bondholders were guarded in
+an undisturbed enjoyment of the fruits of their ancestors' greed. For,
+after the armies were in the field, the same legislative enactment
+that reduced the value of the soldier's pay increased that of the
+creditor's bond, by providing that the money of the soldier should be
+rapidly depreciated in value, while the interest upon bonds should be
+payable in coin; and then, after the war was over, another and more
+valuable bond was prepared, that should relieve the favored creditor
+of all fear of losing his hold upon the treasury by the payment of his
+debt. That the purpose of the lawmakers was deliberate, was exposed in
+a speech by Senator Sherman, who was Chairman of the Finance Committee
+of the Senate while the soldiers in the trenches were being robbed in
+the interest of the creditors at home. In reviewing the financial
+policy of his party during the war, Mr. Sherman said, in a speech in
+the Senate, July 14th, 1868 [Footnote: Congressional Record, page
+4044]:
+
+  "It was, then, our policy during the war, to depreciate the value
+  of United States notes, so that they would come into the Treasury
+  more freely for our bonds. Why, sir, we did a very natural thing
+  for us to do, we increased the amount to $300,000,000, then to
+  $450,000,000, and we took away the important privilege of
+  converting them into bonds on the ground that, while this
+  privilege remained, the people would not subscribe for the bonds,
+  and the notes would not be converted; that the right a man might
+  exercise at any time, he would not exercise at all."
+
+No page of our national history contains a more damning record of
+injustice than this. Mr. Sherman recognizes and admits that the notes,
+as issued and paid to the soldiers and producers of the country, were
+fundable at the holder's option in a government interest-bearing bond.
+He confesses to the foreknowledge that in nullifying this right the
+value of the notes would be decreased and to that extent the soldiers'
+pay be diminished. No organ of public opinion raised the cry of
+breaking the plighted faith of the nation. The soldier had no organ
+then; but years after the wrong had been perpetrated, there appeared
+in Spaulding's "History of the Currency" the naïve statement, "It
+never seemed quite right to take away this important privilege while
+the notes were outstanding with this endorsement upon them." By a law,
+passed against the protests of the wisest and most patriotic members
+of the popular branch of Congress, it had been provided that these
+government notes, so soon to be further depreciated in value, should
+be a full legal tender to the nation's defenders, but only rags in the
+hands of the fortunate holder of interest-bearing obligations of the
+government, upon which they were based, and into which they were
+fundable at the option of the holder. In one of his reports while
+Secretary of the Treasury, Hon. Hugh McCulloch showed that fully
+thirty per cent of the cost of supplies furnished the government was
+due to the depreciation of the currency, the initial step in such
+depreciation being the placing of the words "Except duties on imports
+and interest on the public debt" in the law and upon the back of the
+notes. But, having provided that one class of the government creditors
+should be secured against the evil effects of a depreciated currency,
+those friends of the soldiers and defenders of the nation's honor
+proceeded to a systematic course of depreciation of the currency,
+while the soldiers were too busy fighting, and the citizens too
+earnest in their support of the government, to criticize its acts.
+During the war the sentiment was carefully inculcated, that opposition
+to the Republican party or its acts was disloyalty to the government,
+copperheadism, treason; and protests against any of its legislation
+were answered with an epithet. It so happened that very little
+contemporary criticism was indulged in, from a wholesome fear of
+social or business ostracism, or the frowning portals of Fort
+Lafayette.
+
+But from the very commencement of the war there had been felt at
+Washington a strong controlling influence emanating from the money
+centres. The issue of the demand notes of the government during
+the first year had furnished a portion of the revenues required,
+and had served to recall the teachings of the earlier statesmen
+and the demonstrations of history--that paper money bottomed on
+taxes would prove a great blessing to the people, and a just
+exercise of governmental functions. This was only too evident to
+those controlling financial operations at the great money centres. The
+nation was alive to the necessities of the government; the people
+answered the calls for troops with such promptness as to block the
+channels of transportation, often drilling in camp, without arms,
+awaiting production from the constantly running armories. Those
+camps represented the people. From them all eyes were bound to the
+source of supply of the munitions of war; in them all hearts burned
+for the time for action, even though that meant danger and death.
+There were other camps from which gray-eyed greed looked with far
+different motives. The issue of their own promissory notes, based
+upon a possibility of substituting confidence for coin, had proven
+in the past of vast profit to the note-issuers of the great money
+centres. The exercise of that power by the government would
+inevitably destroy one great source of their profits, and transfer it
+to the people. Sixty millions of the people's own notes, circulating
+among them as money, withstanding the effect of the suspension of
+specie payments by both the banks and the national Treasury, was a
+forceful object-lesson to all classes. To the people, it brought a
+strong ray of hope to brighten the darkness of the war cloud. To some
+among the metropolitan bankers who in after years prated so loudly of
+their patriotism and financial sagacity, it brought to view only
+the danger of curtailed profits. The government Treasury was empty;
+troops in the field were unpaid and uncomplaining; merchants
+furnishing supplies, seriously embarrassed for the lack of money in
+the channels of trade. The sixty millions of demand notes were
+absorbed by the nation's commerce like a summer storm on parched
+soil. Under such circumstances, at the urgent request of the
+Secretary of the Treasury, the Ways and Means Committee of the House
+of Representatives framed a bill authorizing the issue of one
+hundred and fifty millions of bonds, and the same amount of Treasury
+notes, the latter to be a full legal tender, and fundable in an
+interest-bearing bond at the option of the holder. The contest between
+the popular branch of the government and the Senate, upon this
+measure, forms one of the most interesting and instructive lessons
+of the financial legislation of the nation. In the Senate, a
+bitter and determined opposition to the legal-tender clause was
+developed. The associated banks of New York had adopted a resolution
+that the Treasury notes of the government should only be received
+by the different banks from their customers as "a special deposit to
+be paid in kind;" and it was one of the lessons of the war, that
+notices containing the announcement above quoted remained posted in
+the New York banks until a high premium on those very notes, over
+the dishonored greenbacks, caused a shrewd depositor to demand of
+the bank his deposits in kind. The demand was settled by a delivery
+of greenbacks, which were a full legal tender for the purpose, and
+the notices suddenly disappeared. The compromise effected between
+the two Houses resulted in the issue of the emasculated greenback,
+and it also led the way to the establishment of the National Banking
+system, and the issue of the promissory notes of the banks to be
+used as money.
+
+Much of the force of all criticism of the system so devised has been
+weakened by the fact that the attack has been aimed at the banks
+themselves, and not against one special feature of the system. In
+explanation, though not in excuse for this, should be stated the fact
+that every issue of the annual finance report of the government
+contained the special pleadings of the comptrollers of the currency,
+concealing some facts, misstating others, and creating thereby the
+impression that they were endeavoring to win the favor of the banking
+institutions. Added to this were the efforts of those controlling the
+national bank in the great money centres to secure a permanency of the
+note-issuing feature of their system, after a very general public
+sentiment against it had been aroused, and even after its evil effects
+had been felt by smaller banks located among, and supported more
+directly by, the producing classes. But now, when the discussion is
+removed from the arena of politics, when the volume of the bank-note
+system is rapidly disappearing, and when many of the best and
+strongest banks are seeking to be relieved from the burden of
+note-issuance, it is opportune to discuss calmly and without prejudice
+the wisdom of the original acts and their effects upon the country.
+
+It has been claimed that by the organization of the national banks
+the government was enabled to dispose of its bonds and aided in
+carrying on the war. Do the facts warrant the claim? All national bank
+notes have been redeemable solely in Treasury notes. They do not
+possess the legal-tender qualification equal to the Treasury note, and
+cannot therefore be considered any better than the currency in which
+they are alone redeemable, and in comparison with which they have less
+uses. These are truths that were just as palpable twenty-five years
+ago as to-day. It follows that the issue of the bank notes did not
+furnish any better form of currency than that which came directly from
+the government to the people. Every dollar of such notes issued
+contributed just as much towards an inflation of the currency as the
+issue of an equal amount of Treasury notes. With these facts in mind,
+a review of the organization of the banks and their issue of notes
+will reveal the effect of such acts.
+
+In 1864 the notes of the government had been depreciated to such an
+extent that coin was quoted at a premium ranging from 80 per cent to
+150 per cent. The record of a single bank organized and issuing notes
+under such circumstances is illustrative of the whole system.
+
+Take a bank with one hundred thousand dollars to invest in government
+bonds as a basis for its issuance of currency. The bonds were bought
+with the depreciated Treasury notes. Deposited with the Comptroller of
+the Currency at Washington, the bank received ninety thousand dollars
+of notes to issue as money. It also received six thousand dollars in
+coin as one year's advance interest upon its deposited bonds, under
+the law of March 17, 1884. This coin, not being available for use as
+money, was sold or converted into Treasury notes at a ratio of from
+two to two and a half for one. The bank, therefore, had received, as a
+working cash capital, a sum in excess of the money invested in its
+bonds. The transaction stands as follows:
+
+  Invested in bonds                            $100,000
+  Received notes to issue              $90,000
+  Received coin equal to, say           12,000--102,000
+                                                 ------
+  Bank gains by transaction                      $2,000
+
+From this it will appear that the bank has the use, as currency, of
+more than the amount of its bonds, while the government is to pay, in
+addition, six per cent per annum on the full amount of bonds so long
+as the relations thus created continue. Surely no argument is needed
+to prove that, if the government had issued the $90,000 in the form
+of Treasury notes, and had paid out the interest money for its current
+obligations, there would have been no greater inflation of the
+currency, a more uniform currency would have been maintained, and a
+saving effected of the entire amount of interest paid on bonds held
+for security of national bank notes, which at this date would amount
+to a sum nearly representing the total bonded debt of the country.
+
+But there remains a still more serious charge to be made against this
+system. Defended as a war measure by which the banks were to aid the
+government in conquering the rebellion, the fact remains that at the
+date of Lee's surrender only about $100,000,000 of bonds had been
+accepted by the banks, even though they received a bonus for the act.
+But, after the war had closed, and the government was with one hand
+contracting the volume of its own circulating notes by funding them
+into interest-bearing bonds, the banks were allowed to inflate the
+currency by the further issue of over $200,000,000 of their notes.
+Time may produce a sophist cunning enough to devise an adequate
+defence or apology for such legislation. His work will only be saved
+from public indignation and rebuke when a continued series of outrages
+shall have dulled the national intelligence and destroyed the national
+honor.
+
+But there came a time when the policy of the government was radically
+changed. The soldiers had conquered a peace,--or thought they
+had,--and, as they marched in review before their commander-in-chief,
+had been paid off in crisp notes of the government--legal tender to
+the soldier, but not to the bondholder; the time for government to pay
+the soldiers had ceased; the national banks had been allowed to show
+their patriotism and their willingness to aid the government overthrow
+a rebellion already conquered, by the issuance of their notes to add
+to an inflated and depreciated currency; the soldiers had returned to
+the arts of peace, and had taken their places as producers of the
+nation's wealth and taxpayers to the national Treasury. Then Mr.
+Sherman, with his brother patriots and statesmen, discovered that the
+country (meaning, of course, the bondholders) was suffering under the
+evils of a depreciated currency. Their tender consciences had never
+suffered a twinge while the soldiers were receiving from the
+government a currency depreciated in value as the result of its own
+acts. But when the soldier became the taxpayer, and from his toil was
+to be obliged to pay the bondholder, then the patriotic hearts of Mr.
+Sherman and his co-conspirators in the dominant political party
+trembled at the thought of a soldier being allowed to discharge his
+obligations in the same kind of money he had received for his
+services. As a recipient of the government dole, paper money,
+purposely depreciated, was quite sufficient. From the citizen by the
+product of whose toil a bonded interest-bearing debt was to be paid,
+"honest money" was to be demanded. It required no argument to convince
+the government creditor that this was a step in his interest, and
+public clamor was hushed with the catchwords of "honest money" and
+"national honor," while driblets of pensions were allowed to trickle
+from rivers of revenue. The Nero of Rome had been excelled by his
+Christian successor, and the dumb submission of ancient slaves became
+manly independence in contrast with modern stupidity.
+
+By the passage of the so-called "Credit-strengthening Act," in March,
+1869, it was provided that all bonds of the government, except in
+cases where the law authorizing the issue of any such obligation has
+expressly provided that the same may be paid in lawful money, or other
+currency than gold and silver, should be payable in coin. This act was
+denounced by both Morton and Stevens, as a fraud upon the people, in
+that it made a new contract for the benefit of the bondholder. The
+injustice of the act could have been determined upon the plainest
+principles of equity: if the bonds were payable in coin, there was no
+need for its passage; if they were not so payable, there could be no
+excuse for it. If there existed a doubt sufficiently strong to require
+such an act, it was clearly an injustice to ignore the rights of the
+many in the interests of the few. But the men who had not scrupled to
+send rag-money to the soldiers in the trenches, and coin to the
+plotters in the rear, had no consciences to be troubled. They had
+dared to pay to the soldiers the money of the nation, and then rob
+them of two-thirds of it under color of law, and now needed only to
+search for methods, not for excuses. Political exigencies must be
+guarded against. The public must be hoodwinked, the soldier element
+placated with pension doles.
+
+The first essential was to stifle public discussion. Some fool-friends
+of the money power had introduced and pressed the bill early in 1868.
+There were still a few Representatives in Congress who had not bowed
+the knee to Baal, and they raised a vigorous protest against the
+iniquitous proposal. Discussion then might be fatal to both the scheme
+and the party, and Simon Cameron supplemented an already inodorous
+career by warning the Senate that this bill would seriously injure
+the Republican party, and that it should be laid aside until the
+excitement of a political campaign had subsided, and it could be
+discussed with the calmness with which we should view all great
+financial questions.
+
+Here was the art of the demagogue, blinding the eyes of the people with
+sophistry and false pretences in order to secure by indirection that
+which could not be obtained by fair discussion. A Presidential election
+was approaching. An honest Chief Executive had rebelled against the
+attempt to nullify the results of the war by converting the Southern
+States into conquered territories, in order that party supremacy should
+be secured, even at the expense of national unity and harmony. Any
+discussion of a proposition to burden the victorious soldier with
+greater debt, in the interest of a class of stay-at-homes, would have
+caused vigorous protests from the men whose aid was necessary for party
+success. Thaddeus Stevens had announced that if he thought "that the
+Republican party would vote to pay, in coin, bonds that were payable
+in greenbacks, thus making a new contract for the benefit of the
+bondholders, he would vote for Frank Blair, even if a worse man than
+Horatio Seymour was at the head of the ticket." Oliver P. Morton, the
+war-Governor of Indiana, had been equally vigorous in his language;
+and practical politicians foresaw that even Pennsylvania and Indiana
+might be lost to the Republican party with these men arrayed against
+it. Therefore the cunning proposal to postpone this discussion "until
+after the excitement of a Presidential election was over, and we could
+discuss this with the calmness with which we should view all great
+financial questions." The hint was taken, the contest of 1868 was fought
+under a seeming acquiescence in the views of Stevens and Morton; the
+dear people were hoodwinked with catch-phrases coined to deceive, and a
+new lease of power was secured by false pretence. But when the
+excitement of the election had passed, and there was no longer any
+danger of "injuring the Republican party," all discussion was stifled;
+and the first act signed by the newly elected President was that which
+had been laid aside for that season of "calmness with which we
+should view all great financial questions."
+
+The next step in the conspiracy was a logical sequence to all that had
+preceded. Having secured coin payment of interest and principal of all
+bonds, it was now in order to still further increase the value of the
+one and to perpetuate the payment of the other. To this end, silver
+was demonetized by a trick in the revision of the Statutes, reducing
+the volume of coin one-half, and decreasing the probability of rapid
+bond payments. Then the volume of the paper currency was contracted by
+a systematic course of substituting interest-bearing bonds for
+non-interest-bearing currency, and the first chapter of financial
+blunders and crimes of the Wall Street servants ended in a panic,
+revealing, in its first wild terror, the disgraceful connection of
+high public officials with the worst elements of stock-jobbery.
+
+It is possible that a direct proposition in 1865, to double the amount
+of the public debt as a free gift to the creditor-class, might have
+caused such a clamor as would have forever driven from power its
+authors, and have silenced the claims of modern Republicans that they
+were the sole friends of the soldier, and defenders of national honor.
+But the financial legislation of the Republican party has done more
+and worse than this. Its every act has been in the interest of a
+favored class, and a direct and flagrant robbery of the producing
+masses. It has won the support of corporate monopoly by blind
+submission to its demands, and, with brazen audacity, sought and
+obtained the co-operation of the survivors of the army by doling out
+pensions and promises. And yet, with a record that would have
+crimsoned the cheek of a Nero or Caligula, its leaders are posing as
+critics of honest statesmen, and the only friends and defenders of the
+soldier and laborer. The leaders of its earlier and better days have
+been ostracised and silenced in party councils, while audacious
+demagogues have used its places of trust as a means of casting anchors
+to windward for personal profit. Its party conventions are controlled
+by notorious lobbyists and railroad attorneys, and the agricultural
+population appealed to for support. Truly the world is governed more
+by prejudice than by reason, and American politics of the present day
+offer but slight rewards to manliness or patriotism.
+
+Clinton Furbish.
+
+
+
+
+THE HONOR OF AN ELECTION.
+
+(President Cleveland's Defeat, 1888.)
+
+
+                Whose is the honor? Once again
+                 The million-drifted shower is spent
+         Of votes that into power have whirled two men:--
+           One man, defeated; one, made President.
+
+                Whose is the honor? His who wins
+                 The people's wreath of favor, cast
+         At venture?--Lo, his thraldom just begins!--
+           Or is it his who, losing, yet stands fast?
+
+               The first takes power, in mockery grave
+                 Of freedom--made, by writ unsigned,
+         The people's servant, whom a few enslave.
+           The other is master of an honest mind.
+
+               From venomed spite that stung and ceased,
+                 From slander's petty craft set free,
+         This man--the bonds of formal power released--
+           Moves higher, dowered with large integrity.
+
+               Though stabs of cynic hypocrites
+                 And festering malice of false friends
+         Have won their noisome way, unmoved he fits
+           His patriot purpose still to lofty ends.
+
+               Whose is the honor? Freemen--yours,
+                 Who found him faithful to the right,
+         Clean-handed, true, yet turned him from your doors
+           And bartered daybreak for corruption's night?
+
+               Weak-shouldered nation, that endures
+                 So painfully an upright sway,
+         Four little years, then yields to lies and lures,
+           And slips back into greed's familiar way!
+
+               For now the light bank-note outweighs
+                 The ballot of the unbought mind;
+         And all the air is filled with falsehood's praise--
+           Shams, for sham victory artfully designed.
+
+               Is theirs the honor, then, who roared
+                 Against our leader's wise-laid plan,
+         Yet now have seized his plan, his flag, his sword,
+           And stolen all of him--except the man?
+
+               No! His the honor, for he keeps
+                 His manhood firm, intact, unsoiled
+         By base deceit.--Not dead, the nation sleeps:
+           Pray Heaven it waken ere it be despoiled!
+
+George Parsons Lathrop.
+
+November, 1888.
+
+
+
+
+ANDY'S GIFT.
+
+HOW HE GOT IN AND HOW HE WAS GOTTEN OUT.
+
+_An Episode of Any Day._
+
+
+I.
+
+"Well, Age _is_ beautiful!"
+
+"Then _she_ is a joy forever!"
+
+"Wonderful staying power for a filly of her age, anyhow!"
+
+From a typical, if not very remarkable, group of alleged men of the
+world, surrounding the quaint and capacious punch-bowl at a brilliant
+society event, came this small-shot of repartee. None of the speakers
+had been very long out of their teens; all of them were familiar
+ingredients of that cream-nougat compound, called society.
+
+Mr. de Silva Street was of the harmless blonde and immaculate
+linen type. He was invited everywhere for his present boots, and
+well-received for his expectant bonds; his sole and responsible
+ancestor having "fought in his corner" with success, in more than one
+of the market battles for the belt.
+
+Mr. Wetherly Gage had glory enough with very young belles and
+tenacious marriageable possibilities, in being society editor of _Our
+Planet_; while Mr. Trotter Upton had owned more horses and been more
+of a boon to sharp traders than any man of his years in the
+metropolis. A brief young man, with ruddy, if adolescent, moustache
+apparently essaying the ascent of a nose turned up in sympathetic hue,
+his red hair was cut in aggressive erectile fashion, which emphasized
+the _soubriquet_ of "Indian Summer," given him by the present
+unconscious subject of the critical trilogy.
+
+"But remember, Trotter, she is my pet partner," simpered Mr. Street at
+the shapely back disappearing down the hallway; and he caressed where
+his blond moustache was to be.
+
+"And might have been of your--mother's," added Mr. Gage, with the
+lonesome titter that illustrated all of his acidulous jokelets.
+
+"Remember she is a lady, and a guest of your host besides," chimed in
+a tall, dark man, as he joined the group. The voice was perfectly
+quiet; but there seemed discomforting magnetism in the glance he
+rested on one after the other, as he filled a glass and raised it to
+handsome, but firm-set lips.
+
+The three typical beaux of an abnormal civilization shifted position
+uneasily. Trotter Upton pulled down his cuffs, and laboriously admired
+the horse-shoe and snaffle ornamenting their buttons, as he answered:
+
+"Sorry we shocked you, Van. Forgot it was your lecture season! But
+I'll taut the curb on the boys, so socket your whip, old fel!"
+
+"If your tact kept pace with your slang, Upton, what a success you'd
+be!" Van Morris answered, carelessly. "'Tis a real pity you let the
+stable monopolize so much of the time that would make you an ornament
+to society." Then he set down his unfinished glass, sauntered into the
+hall, and approached the subject of discussion.
+
+Miss Rose Wood was scarcely a beauty; nor was she the youngest belle
+of that ball by perhaps fifteen seasons of German cotillion. But she
+had tact to her manicured finger-tips, delicate acid on her tongue's
+tip, and that dangerous erudition, a brief biography of every girl in
+the set, was handily stored in her capacious memory. She had,
+moreover, a staunch following of gilt-plated youths who, being really
+afraid of her, made her a belle as a sort of social Peter's pence.
+
+Miss Wood had just finished a rapid "glide," when she came under fire
+of the punch-room light-fighters; but, though Mr. Upton had once
+judged her "a trifle touched in the wind," her complexion and her
+tasteful drapery had come equally smooth out of that trying ordeal.
+Even that critic finished with a nod towards her as their mentor moved
+away:
+
+"She _does_ keep her pace well! Hasn't turned a hair." And he was
+right in the fact so peculiarly stated; for it was less the warmth of
+the dancing-room than of her partner's urgence, that brought Miss Rose
+Wood into the hall, for what Mr. Upton called "a breather."
+
+The visible members of the Wood family were two, Miss Rose and her
+father, Colonel Westchester Wood. "The Colonel" was an equally
+familiar figure at the clubs and on the quarter-stretch; nor was he
+chary of acceptance of the cards to dinners, balls, and opera-boxes,
+which his daughter's facile management brought to the twain in
+showers. He had a certain military air, and a nebulous military
+history; boasted of his Virginia-Kentucky origin, and more than hinted
+at his Blue Grass stock-farm. Late at night, he would mistily mention
+"My regiment at Shiloh, sah!" But, as he was reputed even more expert
+with the pistol than most knew him to be with cards, geography and
+chronology were never insisted on in detail. But the Colonel was
+undisputed possessor of a thirst, marvellous in its depth and
+continuity; and he had also a cast-iron head that turned the flanks of
+the most direct assaults of alcohol, and scattered them to flaunt the
+red flag on his pendulous nose, or to skirmish over his scrupulously
+shaven cheeks.
+
+Of the invisible members of "the Colonel's" household, fleecy rumors
+only pervaded society at intervals. The social Stanleys and
+Livingstons who had essayed the sources of the Wood family stream in
+its dark continent of brown-faced brick, on a quiet avenue, sent back
+vague stories of a lovely and patient invalid, and a more lovely and
+equally patient young girl, mother and sister to Miss Rose. There was
+a misty legend sometimes floating around the clubs, that "the
+Colonel," after the method of Cleopatra, had dissolved his wife's
+fortune in a posset, and swallowed it years before. But again the
+reputation of a dead shot cramped curiosity.
+
+And a similar mist sometimes pervaded five o'clock teas and reunions
+_chez la modiste_, to the effect that the younger sister was but as a
+Midianite to the elder, while the mother was dying of neglect. But as
+neither subject of this gossip was in society, the mist never
+condensed into direction.
+
+Society found Miss Rose Wood a peculiarly useful and pleasant person;
+and it took her--as "the Colonel" took many of his pleasures--on
+trust.
+
+
+II.
+
+The ball was a crowded one; but was, perhaps, the most brilliant and
+select of that season, combining a Christmas-eve festivity with the
+_début_ party of the acknowledged beauty and prize-heiress of the
+entire set.
+
+Blanche Allmand had been finally finishing abroad for some years,
+after having won her blue-ribboned diploma from Mde. de Cancanière, on
+Murray Hill. Rumors of her perfections of face and form and character
+had come across the seas, in those thousand-and-one letters, for which
+a fostering government makes postal unions. And ever mingled with
+these rumors, came praises of those thousand-and-one accomplishments,
+which society is equally apt to admire as to envy, even while it does
+not appreciate.
+
+But what most inspired with noble ambition the gilded youth of that
+particular _coterie_, was the universally accepted fact that old Jack
+Allmand was master of the warmest fortune that any papa thereabouts
+might add to the blessing he bestowed upon his son-in-law.
+
+And, like Jeptha of old, he "had one fair daughter and no more." A
+widower--not only "warm," but very safe--he had weathered all the
+shoals and quicksands of "the street," and had brought his golden
+argosy safe into the port of investment. Then he had retired from
+business, which theretofore had engrossed his whole heart and soul,
+and lavished both upon the fair young girl, to bring whom from final
+finishing at the _Sacre Coeur_, he had just made himself so hideously
+sea-sick.
+
+It was very late in the season when the delayed return of the pair was
+announced, with numerous adjectives, in the society columns; but Mr.
+Allmand's impatience to expose his golden fleece to the expectant
+Jasons would brook no delay. Blanche was allowed scarcely time to
+unpack her many trunks; to exhibit her goodly share of the _chefs
+d'oeuvres_ of Pengat and Worth to the admiring elect; and to receive
+gushing embraces, only measured by their envy, when the _début_ ball
+was announced for Christmas-eve.
+
+His best Christmas gift had come to the doting father; and what more
+fitting season to show his joy and pride in it, and to have their
+little world share both?
+
+When Blanche, backed by Miss Rose Wood, had hinted that it was rather
+an unusual occasion, he had promptly settled that by declaring that
+she was a peculiarly unusual sort of girl. So the invitations went
+forth; the Allmand mansion was first turned inside out, and then
+illuminated, and flower-hidden for the _début_ ball.
+
+That it would be _the_ affair of the season none doubted. Already,
+many a paternal pocket had twinged responsive to extra appeals from
+marketable daughters; and as to beaux, they had responded _nem. con._,
+when bidden to the event promising so much in present feast, and which
+might possibly so tend to prevent future famine. For already the clubs
+had discounted the chances of one favorite or another for winning the
+marital prize of the year.
+
+Foremost among those who had hastened to welcome Blanche back to her
+new home was Miss Rose Wood. She had the mysterious knack of "coming
+out" gracefully with every fresh set; of perfectly adapting herself to
+its fads, and especially to its beaux. Set might come and set might
+go, but she came out forever; and some nameless tact implied to every
+_débutante_, what Micawber forced upon Copperfield with the brutality
+of words, that she was the "friend of her youth."
+
+So, already, Miss Wood was prime favorite and prime minister at the
+home-court of the confiding Blanche, who, spite of brave heart and
+strong will of her own, fluttered not unnaturally in the unwonted buzz
+and glare of her new life. But most particularly had Rose Wood warned
+her against the flirts and "unsafe men" of their set; including, of
+course, Vanderbilt Morris and her present partner of the ball in the
+ranks of both.
+
+That partner, Andrew Browne, was avowedly the best _parti_ of the
+entire set. Handsome, fun-loving, and well-cultivated, he was that
+_rara avis_ among society beaux, a thorough gentlemen by instinct; but
+he was lazily given to self-indulgence, and had the prime weakness of
+being utterly incapable of saying "no," to man or woman. The intimate
+friend and room-mate of Van Morris for many years, Browne had never
+lost a sort of reverence for the superior force and decision of the
+other's character; and, though but a few years his junior, in all
+serious social matters he literally sat at his feet.
+
+And Morris had always grown restive when Miss Rose Wood made one of
+her "dead sets" at Andy's face and fortune; for a far-away experience
+of his own, in that quarter, had taught him how small an objection to
+that maiden would be a fortune with the man whom she blessed with her
+affection.
+
+"And _that_ brand of the wine of the heart," he had once cautioned
+Andy, "does not improve with age."
+
+Doubtful of that young gentleman's confident response, that
+"_he_ was not to be caught with chaff," Van still kept watch and
+ward. So, leaving the elegant book-room of the elegant avenue
+mansion--converted, for the nonce, into an elegant bar-room for Mr.
+Trotter Upton and his friends--Morris sauntered through knots of
+pretty women and of pretty vacuous-looking men, resting on seats
+half-hidden in potted plants, and approached the pair interesting
+him most.
+
+Neither glowed with delight at his advent, although Andy seemed only
+to be rattling off common-places, in peculiarly voluble style. Morris
+asked for the next waltz; Miss Wood glanced shyly up at her companion,
+dropped her eyes demurely, and believed she would rest until the
+_cotillon_. Then, after a few more small necessaries of social life
+about the beauty of the girls, the heat of the rooms, and the elegance
+of the flowers, she permitted Andy to drift easily towards the door
+that opened on the dim-lit coolness of the conservatory.
+
+As they turned away, Rose Wood sent one sharp glance of her gray eyes
+glinting into Morris's; then hers fell, and even he could find only
+bare common-place in her words:
+
+"So many little dangers, you know, Mr. Morris--at a ball. One cannot
+be _too_ prudent."
+
+He did not answer; but the look that followed her graceful figure had
+very little of flattery in it.
+
+"Curse that _Chambertin_!" he muttered in his moustache. "I warned him
+against the second pint at dinner. Andy _couldn't_ be fool enough,
+though," he added, with a shrug, and moved slowly towards the
+dancing-room.
+
+The critical group, still around the big punch-bowl, looked after him
+curiously.
+
+"_He's_ not soft on the old girl, is he?" queried Mr. de Silva
+Street.
+
+"Never!" chuckled Mr. Wetherly Gage. "Morris is too well up in Bible
+lore to marry his grandmother!"
+
+"And he don't have to," put in Mr. Trotter Upton, with a sage wink.
+"I'd back Van against the field to win the Allmand purse, hands down,
+if he'd only enter. But he _won't_; so you're safe, Silvey, if you've
+got the go in you. But Lord! Van's too smart to carry weight for age!
+Why, you may land me over the tail-board, if the woman that hitches
+_him_ double won't have to throw him down and sit on him, Rarey
+fashion!"
+
+And the speaker, remarking _sotto voce_, that here was luck to the
+winner, drained his glass with a smack, set it down, and lounged
+into the smoking-room. There he lazily lit one of Mr. Allmand's
+full-flavored Havanas, and thoughtfully stored his breast pocket
+with several more.
+
+
+III.
+
+Meanwhile, the horsey pundit's offered odds seemed not so wisely
+laid.
+
+In the great room a crowded waltz was in progress; and Morris saw
+Blanche Allmand standing on the opposite edge of the whirling circle.
+Her head and her dainty slipper were keeping time to the softly
+accented music; while a comical expression--half anger, half
+mischief--emphasized the nothing she was saying to her companion.
+
+Van caught her eye and, adept that he was in the social signal-service,
+took in the situation at a glance. He slightly raised his eyebrows and
+barely moved his lips; she assented with the smallest of nods and a
+happy flush; and, a moment later, he had edged around the masses of
+bumping humanity and offered his arm.
+
+"My waltz, I believe," he said, with the ease of the heir-apparent of
+Ananias. "I was unlucky enough, in losing the first turn, not to
+grudge Major Bouncey the rest."
+
+"You deserve to lose the whole for coming late," the girl answered,
+drawing her arm from her partner's with that pretty reluctance which
+makes society's stage-business seem born in woman. "It was just too
+good of Major Bouncey to take your place and save my being a
+wall-flower." And, not pausing for that gallant soldier's labored
+disclaimer, the graceful pair glided away to the graceful time of 'La
+Gitana' waltz.
+
+"Horrid bore, that Bouncey," Blanche panted in the first pause. "Don't
+stop near him! He does all his dancing on my insteps; and I dare not
+stop for fear of his still more dreadful spooning."
+
+"You would not have _me_ blame him? A better balanced brain might well
+lose its poise, with _such_ temptation!" And the man looked down on
+her with very eloquent eyes.
+
+There was a pause. Then Van Morris bent his head, and the eyes still
+more strongly emphasized the words:
+
+"Blanche, do you know how dangerously lovely you are?"
+
+The girl's frank eyes dropped beneath the strong light in his; but
+there was not a shade of consciousness in the soft laugh that prefaced
+her reply:
+
+"Ah! I've a cheval-glass and this is my first ball. So I suppose I
+know how 'dangerous' I am! Then, too, that awful Bouncey called me a
+lily of the valley!"
+
+"It is the purest flower made by God's hand," were Morris's simple
+words; but the vibrant tone came from deeper than the lips, now close
+pressed together.
+
+"But I _know_ I'm not," Blanche retorted, merrily, "for _they_ drink
+only dew, and I am quite wild for Regent's punch!"
+
+They were at the refreshment room, now nearly deserted. Once more the
+man's eyes grew darker and deeper, as they met the girl's frank blue
+ones.
+
+"And yet, not purer," he said, unheeding the interruption, "than the
+heart you, little girl, will soon give to some----"
+
+He stopped abruptly; but the eyes added more than the words left
+unsaid.
+
+Again Blanche dropped her eyes quickly; but her color never
+heightened, nor did the soft laces nestling over the graceful bust
+move at all quicker than the waltz might warrant. Van's face still
+bent over her with earnest expression, as she sipped the glass of
+punch he handed her; but neither spoke until they had crossed the
+corridor and passed another door into the conservatory.
+
+
+IV.
+
+The soft, warm air, heavy with the breath of the "Grand Duke" and of
+orange blossoms; the tremulous half-light from colored lamps hung amid
+the leaves; the dead stillness of the place, broken only by the plash
+of the fountain falling back into its moss-covered basin, all
+contrasted deliciously with the hot, dusty atmosphere and giddy
+buzzing under the flaring gas-jets left behind.
+
+They strolled slowly down the gravelled walk, between rows of huge
+tubs, moist and flower-laden with the products of almost every clime.
+Here gleamed the glossy leaves of the Southern _grandiflora_; the rare
+wax plant crept along the wall beyond, its pink, starry blooms
+gleaming delicately among the thick, artificial-seeming leaves; while,
+as though in honor of the happily-timed birthnight of the fair young
+mistress of all, a gorgeous century plant had opened its bud in a
+glory of form and color, magnificent as rare.
+
+"Blanche, do you remember how long I have known you?" Morris asked,
+suddenly breaking the silence. "Ever since you were like _this_; a
+close, callow bud, giving but vague promise of the glorious flowering
+of your womanhood! I watched the opening of every petal of your mind
+and tried to peer through them into the heart of the flower. But they
+sent you away; and now your return dazzles me with the brilliance and
+beauty of the full bloom. This was the past--_this_ is the present!"
+
+And reaching up, the man suddenly snapped off the glowing blossom from
+the cactus and held it before the girl, close to the pale camellia bud
+he had plucked before.
+
+She raised her beautiful face, crowned with its halo-like glory of
+hair, full to him; and the expression it took was graver and more
+womanly than before. But still no agitation reflected in the candid
+eyes that looked steadily into his, and the voice, more softly
+pitched, had no tremor in it, as she answered:
+
+"_Please_ think of me, then, as the child you used to know; never as
+the _débutante_ who must be fed, _à la_ Bouncey, on the sweets of
+sentiment."
+
+"Take sentiment--I mean the higher sentiment, that lifts us sometimes
+above our baser worldly nature--out of life, and it is not worth the
+living," Morris said earnestly. "That man could not understand it any
+more than he could understand you!"
+
+"Perhaps you are right," she answered, quietly. "_We_ are too old
+friends to talk society at each other; and you are _so_ different from
+him."
+
+Perhaps Morris was luckier for not replying.
+
+It may be that the Destiny, which, we are told, shapes our ends, did
+not leave his so rough-hewn as it might have.
+
+He himself could scarcely have told what thoughts were framing
+themselves in his mind; what words had almost formed themselves on his
+tongue. There are moments in life, when we live at the rate of hours;
+and Van Morris was certainly going the pace, mentally, for those ten
+seconds of silence, before the echo of the girl's voice ceased
+vibrating on his ear. He was vaguely conscious, some ten seconds later
+still, that rarely had a calm, well-posed man of the world found
+himself quite so dizzy, from combined effects of a quick waltz, a
+flower-laden atmosphere, and a rounded arm pressing only restfully
+upon his own.
+
+Suddenly that pressure grew sharp and decided. They stopped abruptly
+at a sharp turn of the walk.
+
+On a somewhat too small rustic seat, under the fruit-laden boughs of
+an orange tree, and comfortably screened thereby from the gleam of the
+tinted lantern, sat Miss Rose Wood and Mr. Andrew Browne.
+
+Their two heads were rather close together; their two hands were
+suspiciously distant, as though by sudden movement; and the lady's fan
+had fallen at her feet, most _à propos_ to the crunch of the gravel,
+under approaching feet.
+
+But only Blanche--less preoccupied with her thoughts than her
+companion--had caught the words, "Dismiss carriage--escort home,"
+before Miss Wood's fan had happened to drop at her feet.
+
+What there might be in those words to drop the color out of rosy
+cheeks, or to clench white little teeth hard together, it might well
+puzzle one to guess. But the face that had not changed under the
+strong music of Van Morris's voice, now grew deadly white an instant;
+then flooded again with surging rush of color.
+
+But very quickly, though with perfect self-possession, Miss Wood had
+risen and advanced one step, to arrange Blanche's lace, with the
+words:
+
+"Your _berthé_ is loose, darling!"
+
+Then, as she inserted the harmless, unnecessary pin, she whispered in
+the shell-like ear:
+
+"_Don't_ scold me, loved one! Indeed, I was _not_ flirting. I only
+came out here to keep him from the--_champagne punch!_"
+
+Blanche made no reply to this whispered confidence; nor did she seem
+especially grateful for the grace done to her toilette. She never so
+much as glanced at Andy Browne. He, also, had risen, after picking up
+the dropped fan, with not effortless grace; and now stood smiling,
+with rather meaningless, if measureless, good nature upon the
+invaders.
+
+And Van Morris was all pose and _savoir faire_ once more. He might
+have been examining Blanche on her progress in algebra, for all the
+consciousness in his manner as he complimented Miss Wood on her
+peculiarly deft management of that dangerous weapon, the pin. But
+there was no little annoyance in the whispered aside to his friend:
+
+"Don't drink any more to-night, Andy. _Don't!_"
+
+"All right, Van; I promise," responded the other, with the most
+beaming of smiles. "Tell you the truth, don't think I need it. Heat of
+the room, you know--"
+
+"And the second pint of _Chambertin_ at dinner," finished Morris, as
+Miss Wood--the toilette and _her_ confidence both completed--slipped
+her perfectly gloved hand into Andy's arm again.
+
+Precisely, then, three sharp notes of the cornet cut through the
+stillness under the flowers. It was followed by the indescribable
+sound, made only by the rush of many female trains towards one spot.
+Like the chronicled war-horse, Andy shook his mane at the first note;
+Miss Wood nodded beamingly over her shoulder at the second; and the
+pair were hastening off by the time the third died away.
+
+Blanche showed no disposition to take the vacated seat.
+
+"The German is forming," she said, "and I am engaged to that colt-like
+Mr. Upton."
+
+Only at the door of the conservatory she paused.
+
+"Does Mr. Browne ever drink too much wine?" she asked abruptly.
+
+Van never hesitated one second. He lied loyally. "Why, _never_, of
+course," he deprecated, in the most natural tone. "With rare
+exceptions. But what deucedly sharp eyes she has," he added, mentally,
+as Mr. Upton informed them that "the bell had tapped," and took
+Blanche off.
+
+Almost at the same moment, a waiter rushed by with a wine-cooler and
+glasses; and he heard the pompous butler direct:
+
+"Set it by Mr. Browne's chair. He leads in _ler curtillyun!_"
+
+Morris half started to countermand the order. Then he reconsidered and
+leaned against the doorway.
+
+"He can't mean to drink it, after his promise to me," he thought.
+"Anyway, he might get something worse. Besides, I am not his guardian;
+and," he added very slowly, a strange smile hovering about his lips,
+"I can scarcely keep my own head to-night."
+
+Somehow he, best dancer in town as he was, had no partner to-night.
+The sight before him had no novelty; and Mr. Trotter Upton's vivacious
+prancing somewhat irritated him, in spite of the amusement at himself
+he felt at the sensation.
+
+"Didn't think I was so far gone as to be jealous of Trotter," he
+muttered.
+
+Then he slipped into the hat-room and was quickly capped and cloaked
+for that precious boon to the bored, the exit _sans adieu_.
+
+
+V.
+
+It was a raw, searching Christmas morning into which Van Morris
+stepped, as he softly closed the door of the Allmand mansion and
+turned up his fur collar against "a nipping and an eager air."
+
+Even in that fashionable section the streets already showed somewhat
+of the bustle of the busy to-morrow. Belated caterers' carts spun by;
+early butchers' and milk-wagons rumbled along, making their best speed
+towards distant patrons. Here and there, gleams from gas-lit windows
+slanted athwart the frosty darkness, punctuated by ever-recurrent
+flaring of street lamps. Not infrequent groups of muffled men--some
+jovial with reminiscent scenes of pleasure left behind, and some
+hilarious from what they brought along with them--passed him, as he
+strode rapidly along the echoing flags, too intent on his own thoughts
+to notice any of them.
+
+Suddenly, from beneath one of the gloom punctuators opposite, a
+woman's voice cut the air sharply:
+
+"_Please_ let me pass!"
+
+Morris, alert in a second, had crossed the street and joined the group
+of four intuitively, before he knew it himself. Three young men, whose
+evening dress told that they were of society, and whose unsteady hold
+of their own legs, that they had had just a little too much of it,
+barred the way of a young girl. Tall, slight, and with a mass of
+blonde hair escaping from the rough shawl she drew closer about her
+head as she shrank back, there was something showing through her
+womanly terror that spoke convincingly the gentlewoman. The trio
+chuckled inanely, making elaborate bows; and the girl shivered as she
+shrank further into the shadow, and repeated piteously:
+
+"Do, _please_, let me pass! _won't_ you?"
+
+"Certainly they will," Van answered, stepping up on the pavement and
+taking her in at a glance. "Am I not right, gentlemen?" he added
+urbanely to the unsteady trio.
+
+"Not by a damned sight!"
+
+"Who the devil are you?" were the prompt and simultaneous rejoinders.
+
+"That doesn't matter," Van answered quietly; "but you are obstructing
+the public streets and frightening this evident stranger."
+
+"We don't know any stranger at two o'clock in the morning," was the
+illogical rejoinder of the third youth, who clung to the lamp-post.
+
+"What about it, anyway?" said the stoutest of the three, advancing
+towards Morris. "Do _you_ know her?"
+
+"_You_ evidently do not," Van replied; then he turned to the girl
+with the deference he would scarce have used to the leader of his
+set. "If you will take my arm, I will see you safely to the nearest
+policeman."
+
+The girl hesitated and shrunk back a second; then, with that
+instinctive trust which--fortunately, perhaps--is peculiarly feminine,
+slipped her red, ungloved little hand into his arm.
+
+The leader of the trio staggered a step nearer. "You're a nice
+masher," he said thickly; "but if it's a row you're looking for, you
+can find one pretty quick!"
+
+Morris glanced at the man with genuine pity.
+
+"You look as though you might be a gentlemen when you are sober," he
+said. "_I_ am not looking for a row; and if you boys make one, you'll
+only be more ashamed of yourselves on Christmas day than you should be
+already. And now I wish to pass."
+
+"I'll give you a pass," the other answered; and, with a lurch, he
+fronted Morris and put up his hands in most approved fighting form. At
+the same moment, the girl--with the inopportune logic of all girls in
+such cases--clung heavily to Morris's arm and cried piteously:
+
+"Oh, no! You mustn't! Not for me!" and, as she did so the man lunged
+a vicious blow with his right hand, full at Morris's face.
+
+But, though like J. Fitz-James, "taught abroad his arms to wield," Van
+Morris had likewise used his legs to wrestle in England, and had
+moreover seen _la savatte_ in France. With a quick turn of his head,
+the blow passed heavily, but harmlessly, by his cheek. At the same
+instant his foot shot swiftly out, close to the ground, and with a
+sharp sweep from right to left, cut his opponent's heels from under
+him, as a sickle cuts weeds, sprawling him backwards upon the
+pavement.
+
+Drawing the girl swiftly through the breach thus made, Morris placed
+her behind him and turned to face the men again. They made no rush, as
+he had expected; so he spoke quickly:
+
+"You'd better pick up your friend and be off. You don't look like boys
+who would care to sleep in the station," he said, "and here comes the
+patrol wagon."
+
+They needed no second warning, nor stood upon the order of their
+going. The downed man was on his feet; and it was devil take the
+hind-most to the first corner. For the rumbling of heavy wheels and
+the clang of heavy hoofs upon the Belgian blocks were drawing nearer.
+
+To Van's relief, for he hated a scene, it proved to be only a
+"night-liner" cab, though with rattle enough for a field battery; but
+to his tipsy antagonists it had more terror than a park of Parrot
+guns.
+
+"Can I do anything more for you?" he asked the girl; then suddenly:
+"You're not the sort to be out alone at this hour of the night. Are
+you in trouble?"
+
+"Oh, indeed I am!" she answered, with a sob; again illogical, and
+breaking down when the danger was over. "What _must_ you think of me?
+But mother was suddenly _so_ ill, and father and sister were at a
+ball, and the servants slipped away, too. I dared not wait, so I ran
+out alone to fetch Doctor Mordant. _Please_ believe me, for--"
+
+"Hello, Cab!" broke in Van. "Certainly I believe you," he answered the
+girl, as the cab pulled up with that eager jerk of the driver's
+elbows, eloquent of fare scented afar off. "I'll go with you for
+Doctor Mordant, and then see you home."
+
+"Why, is that _you_, Mr. Morris?" cried Cabby, with a salute of his
+whip _à la militaire;_ but he muttered to himself, "Well, I _never_!"
+as he jumped from the box and held the door wide.
+
+"That's enough, Murphy," Van said shortly. "Now, jump in, Miss, and
+I'll--" But the girl shrank back, and drew the shawl closer round her
+face. "No, I won't either. Pardon my thoughtlessness; for it isn't
+exactly the hour to be driving alone with a fellow, I know. But you
+can trust Murphy perfectly. Dennis, drive this lady to Dr. Mordant's
+and then home again, just as fast as your team can carry her!" And he
+half lifted the girl into the carriage.
+
+"That I will, Mr. Van," Murphy replied cheerily, as he clambered to
+his seat.
+
+The girl stretched out two cold, red little hands, and clasped his
+fur-gloved one frankly.
+
+"Oh! thank you a thousand times," she said. "I _knew_ you were a
+gentleman at the first word to those cowards; but I never dreamed you
+were Mr. Van Morris. I've heard sister speak of you _so_ often!"
+
+"_Your_ sister?" Van stared at the cheaply-clad night wanderer, as
+though _he_ had had too much Regent's punch.
+
+"Yes, sister Rose--Rose Wood," she said, with the confidence of
+acquaintance. "I'm her sister, you know--Blanche."
+
+"Blanche? Your name is Blanche? I cannot tell you how happy I am to
+have chanced along just now, Miss Wood;" and Van bared his head in the
+cutting night wind to the blanket-shawled girl in the night-liner, as
+he would not have done at high noon to a duchess in her chariot. "But
+I'm wasting your time from your mother; so good-morning; and may your
+Christmas be happier than its eve."
+
+"Good-by! And oh, _how_ I thank you!" the girl said, again extending
+her hand over the cab door. "I'll tell Rose, and _she_ shall thank
+you, better than I can!"
+
+"Good-night! But don't trouble _her_," Van said, releasing the girl's
+hand. "One minute, Murphy," he added aside to the driver; "here's your
+Christmas-gift!"
+
+A bright gold piece glinted in the dirty fur glove, in which Dennis
+Murphy looked to find a shilling under the next gas-lamp.
+
+"Blanche! and the same golden hair, too!" Van muttered to himself, as
+the cab rocked and ricketted down the street. "Well, I suppose that is
+what the poet means by 'the magic of a name'!" and he suddenly
+recalled that he was still standing bareheaded in the blast. "And Rose
+Wood's sister looks like that! Well, verily one half the world does
+_not_ know how the other half lives!"
+
+Then he turned and strode rapidly homeward; pulling hard, as he
+thought many strange thoughts, on the dead cigar between his lips.
+
+Once in his own parlor, Van Morris walked straight to the mirror over
+the mantel, and looked long and steadily at himself. Then he tossed
+Mr. Allmand's half-smoked cigar contemptuously into the grate, lit one
+he selected carefully from the carved stand near, and threw himself
+into a smoking-chair before the ruddy glow of coals.
+
+"I must be getting old," he soliloquized. "I didn't use to get bored
+so easily by these things. Either balls are not what they were, or _I_
+am not. Now, 'there's no place like home!' Not much of a box to call
+home, either!" And he glanced round the really elegant apartment in
+half-disgust. "There's _something_ lacking! Andy's the best fellow in
+the world, but he's so wanting in order. Poor old boy! Wonder if he
+_will_ drink anything more? I surely must blow him up to-morrow
+morning. How deucedly sharp _she_ is!" and he smiled to himself. "She
+saw through Rose Wood's game at a glance. Wonder if she saw through
+_me_?"
+
+He looked steadily into the glowing coals, as though castles were
+building there. Once or twice his lips moved soundlessly; and suddenly
+he reached over to the escritoire near by, and taking an oval case
+from it, opened it, and gazed long and earnestly at the picture in it.
+The face was the average one of a young girl, with stiff plaits of
+hair stiffly tossed over the shoulder, in futile chase after grace;
+but the wide blue eyes were a glory of purity and trust, and they were
+the eyes of Blanche Allmand.
+
+Then he rose abruptly, walked to the sideboard, and filled a glass
+with water. Then he placed carefully in it the cactus flower and
+camelia bud, which had never left his hand since he plucked them in
+the conservatory. As he did so, Morris' face grew serious, and looked
+down wistfully into the fire.
+
+When he raised his eyes they were full of hopeful light, and they
+rested long and steadily upon the flowers.
+
+"Yes! It _is_ better!" he exclaimed aloud, as though continuing a
+train of thought. "Some of _that_ family bloom only once in a
+century. I cannot look for miracles, and many a hand may reach for
+_my_ flower. Yes, to-morrow shall settle it! The Italian was even
+more philosopher than poet when he said, '_Amare e no essere amato
+e tiempo perduto_'!"
+
+
+VI.
+
+When Mr. Andrew Browne tumbled into the cosy parlor of that bachelor's
+box at 4 A.M. on Christmas morning, he was by all odds the happiest
+man of his acquaintance, even if he knew himself, which was more than
+doubtful.
+
+He slammed the door, slung his fur-lined overcoat across the sofa,
+turned up the gas until it whistled merrily, and poked the fire until
+it roared again. Then he hunted the boot-jack, and drew off one boot;
+changed his mind, and flung himself into the smoking-chair, and
+stretched booted and unbooted foot to the blaze. Thus posed, he
+trolled out, "_Il segreto per esser felice_," in a rich baritone; only
+interrupting his _tempo_ to spit out superfluous ends, bitten from his
+cigar, in the effort to phrase neatly and smoke at the same time.
+
+"Why the deuce don't you get to bed?" growled Van Morris from the next
+room. He was aroused from dreams of Blanche Allmand, music, diamond
+solitaires, and orange-blossoms, mixed into one sweet confusion. "Stop
+your row, can't you? and go to bed!"
+
+"You go to bed yo'sef!" responded the illogical Andy, rising, not too
+steadily, on his one boot, and throwing wide the folding-door. "Who
+wants to go to bed? _I_ sha'n't."
+
+"You're an idiot!" muttered Mr. Morris; and he turned his face to the
+wall.
+
+"Guess am an idiot," responded Andy, blandly. "But I ain't tight,--only
+happy! I'm the happiest idiot--_Il segreto per ess_--Say, Van! I'm so
+_devilish_ happy, ol' boy!"
+
+Morris turned over with a groan, and pulled the covering over his
+head. The strong, small word he uttered as he did so is not to be
+found in the church service. But Andy was not to be snubbed in that
+style. He stepped forward; attempted to sit on the bed's edge;
+miscalculated his momentum, and succeeded in landing plump on the
+centre of his friend's person.
+
+"Confound you!" gasped the latter, breathless. "You're as drunk as--as
+a fool!"
+
+"No, I ain't," chuckled Andy, imperturbably happy. Then he laughed
+till the bed shook; composing himself suddenly into gravity, with a
+fierce snort--"No, I ain't: you're sober!"
+
+"And when _she_ asked, I said you never drank," reproached the irate
+and still gasping Morris. "I _lied_ for you!"
+
+"Tha's nothing. I'll lie for you; lie for you to-morrow--see'f I
+don't! Say, Van, ol' boy, I ain't tight; only happy--_so_ happy! Van!
+_Van!_" and he shook the pretended sleeper heavily. "I'm goin' to
+reform! I'm goin' to be married!"
+
+"_What? Rose Wood?_"
+
+Van Morris sat bolt upright in bed now. The tone of voice in which he
+invoked Miss Wood might have brought response from that wise virgin,
+disrobing for triumphant rest full ten blocks away.
+
+But he found it vain to argue with Andy's mixed Burgundy and champagne
+punch. Contradiction but made him insist more strongly that he _was_
+engaged to the old campaigner, whom Morris had so manoeuvred to
+outflank. Finally, in a miscellaneous outfit of evening pants,
+night-gown, and smoking-cap, he succeeded in getting the jubilant
+groom _in futuro_ into bed, where he still hummed at the much-sought
+secret of happiness, until he collapsed with a sudden snore, and slept
+like the Swiss.
+
+Then Morris walked the floor rapidly, wrapped in thought and a cloud
+of fragrant cigar-smoke. Then he threw himself once more into the
+smoking-chair, and gazed long and earnestly into the coals, a heavy
+frown resting on his face. Suddenly it cleared off; the sunshine of a
+broad smile took its place; and Van tossed the end of his cigar
+exultingly into the fire. Then he rose and stretched himself like a
+veritable son of Anak, when
+
+           "Stalwart they court the rapture of the fight."
+
+"I have it, by George!" he cried. "I'll get the poor fellow out of
+this box, if the old girl did induce him to pop, and accepted him out
+of hand! Andy! I say, Andy, wake up!" and he ran into his chum's room,
+dragged him out of bed, and had him at the fire, before he was well
+awake.
+
+Mr. Andrew Browne was no longer in a mood even approaching the
+jubilant. He had utterly forgotten the secret _per esser felice_,
+during his two hours' nap. He confessed to a consuming desire for
+Congress-water, and made use of improper words upon finding only empty
+bottles, aggravating in reminiscence of it, in the carved ebony
+sideboard.
+
+Finally he sat down, with his head in his hands, and told his story
+dismally enough.
+
+Miss Rose Wood's carriage had been dismissed, as per programme. Andy
+had led the German with her, and a bottle of champagne at his side. He
+had walked home with her; had told her--in what wild words he knew
+not--that he loved her; and had been, as Van had surmised, "accepted
+out of hand."
+
+"And, Van, I'm bound, as a man of honor, to marry her!" finished the
+now thoroughly dejected _fiancé_. "Yes, I know what you'd say; it _is_
+a pretty rum thing to do; but then she mustn't suffer for my cursed
+folly!"
+
+"Suffer? Rose Wood _suffer_ for missing fire one time more?"
+
+Surprise struggled with contempt in the exclamation Morris shot out by
+impulse.
+
+"But, if she loves me well enough to engage--" Andy began, rather
+faintly; but his mentor cut him short.
+
+"Love the d--_deuce!_" he retorted. "Why, she's a beggar and a
+husband-trap!"
+
+"But her family? What will _they_ think?" pleaded Andy, but with very
+little soul in the plea.
+
+"Poor little Blanche!" muttered Morris, half to himself. "Bah! the
+girl _has_ no heart!"
+
+"Blanche?" echoed Van, in a dazed sort of way. "Why, you don't suppose
+Blanche will know it! I never thought of _her!_" and he rose feebly,
+and stood shivering in his ghostly attire.
+
+"Why, of course, Rose Wood couldn't keep such great news. Why, man,
+you're the capital prize in the matrimonial lottery; but hang me if
+Miss Wood shan't draw another blank this time!"
+
+There was a compound of deadly nausea and effortful dignity in the
+elbows Mr. Andrew Browne leaned upon the mantel, which hinted volumes
+for what his face might have said, had it been visible through the
+fingers latticed over it.
+
+"I am a gentleman," he half gasped. "It _may_ be a trap; but I'll keep
+my word, and--_marry_ her, unless--unless, Van, you get me out of
+it!"
+
+"Go to bed, you spoon!" laughed his friend. "I have the whole plan cut
+and dried. I'll teach you your lesson as soon as you sleep yourself
+sober."
+
+Morris stood many minutes by the bedside of his quickly-sleeping
+friend; but, when he turned into the parlor again, his face was pale
+and stern.
+
+"The way of the world, always," he said aloud. "One inanely eager,
+another stupidly backward. 'Fools rush in where angels fear to tread!'
+Poor boy! he'd give as much to-morrow to unsay his words as I would to
+have spoken those I nearly said last night!"
+
+The chill gray dawn outside was wrestling at the windows for entrance
+with the sickly glaring gas-light within. Morris drew aside the heavy
+curtains and pressed his forehead against the frost-laced pane. Long
+he looked out into the gray haze with eyes that saw nothing beyond his
+own thoughts. Then he turned to the fire again. The gray ash was
+hiding the glow of the spent coals. Then he took up the glass once
+more and looked earnestly at the contrasted flowers it held. He
+replaced it almost tenderly, and walked slowly to his own room.
+
+"Yes, I know _myself_," he said; "I think I know _her_. I'll hesitate
+no longer; some fool may 'rush in.' To-morrow shall settle it. The
+tough old Scotchman was right:
+
+                 'He either fears his fate too much,
+                    Or his deserts are small,
+                 That dares not put it to the touch
+                    To gain or lose it all!'"
+
+
+VII.
+
+That same afternoon, at two o'clock, Mr. Vanderbilt Morris's stylish
+dog-cart, drawn by his high-spirited bays, drew up at Miss Rose Wood's
+domicile. Holding the reins sat Mr. Andrew Browne, beaming as though
+_Chambertin_ had never been pressed from the grape; seemingly as fresh
+as though headache had never slipped with the rest out of Pandora's
+box.
+
+But it may have been only seemingly; for, faultlessly attired from
+scarf-pin to glove tips, Andy was still a trifle more uneasy than the
+dancing of his restless team might warrant in so noted a whip as he. A
+queer expression swept over his handsome face from time to time; and,
+as he came to a halt, he glanced furtively over his shoulder, as
+though fearing something in pursuit.
+
+"Ask Miss Rose if she will drive with me," he said hurriedly to the
+servant. "Say I can't get down to come in; the horses are too fresh."
+
+Then the off-horse danced a polka in space, responsive to deft
+tickling with the whip.
+
+Miss Wood did not stand upon ceremony, nor upon the order of her
+going, but went at once to get her wraps.
+
+"Better late than never," she said to herself, as she dived into a
+drawer and upset her mouchoir case in search for a particular
+handkerchief. "I really couldn't comprehend his absence and silence
+all day--but, poor boy! he's _so_ young!" And then Miss Rose, as she
+tied a becoming cardinal bow under her chin, hummed two bars of "The
+Wedding March" through the pins in her mouth.
+
+Two minutes later saw her seated on the high box beside her future
+lord _in posse_; the bays plunging like mad and Andy swinging to the
+reins as if for life. For, before she could speak one word--and for no
+reason to her apparent--he had let the limber lash drop stingingly
+across their backs.
+
+Very keen was the winter wind that swept by her tingling ears; and
+Miss Wood raised her seal-skin muff and hid her modest blushes from
+it. For that gentle virgin had ever a familiar demon at her elbow. His
+name was Experience; and now he whispered to her: "A red nose never
+reflects sentiment!"
+
+"And _he_ is so particular how one looks," Miss Rose whispered back to
+the familiar; and her tip-tilted feature sought deeper protection in
+the furs.
+
+At length, when well off the paved streets, the mad rush of the brutes
+cooled down to a swinging trot--ten miles an hour; Browne's tense arms
+relaxed a trifle; and he drew a long, deep breath--whether of relief,
+or anxiety, no listener could have guessed. But he kept his eyes still
+rooted to that off-horse's right ear as though destiny herself sat
+upon its tip.
+
+Then, for the first time, he spoke; and he spoke with unpunctuated
+rapidity, in a hard, mechanical tone, as though he were a bad model of
+Edison's latest triumph, and some tyro hand was grinding at the
+cylinder.
+
+"Miss Rose," he began, "we are old friends--never so old; but I can
+never sufficiently regret--last night!"
+
+He felt, rather than saw, the muff come sharply down and the face turn
+full to him; regardless now of the biting wind.
+
+"No! don't interrupt me," he went on, straight at the off-horse's
+right ear. "I _know_ your goodness of heart; _know_ how it pained you;
+but you could have done nothing else but--_refuse me!_"
+
+Miss Rose Wood's mouth opened quickly; but a providential gutter
+jolted her nearly from the seat; and the wind drove her first word
+back into her throat like a sob.
+
+The inexorable machine beside her ground on relentless.
+
+"Yes, I understand what you would say: that you refused me _firmly_
+and _finally_ because I--_deserved it!_" Had Andy Browne's soul really
+been the tin-foil of the phonograph, it could not have shown more
+utter disregard of moral responsibility. "You knew I was under the
+influence of wine; that I would never have dared to address you had I
+been myself! I repeat, I deserve my--_decisive rejection!_ It was
+proper and just in you to say '_No!_'"
+
+Woman's will conquered for one brief second. Spite of wind and spite
+of him, Miss Wood began:
+
+"'_No?_' I--"
+
+"Yes, '_no!_'" broke in the relentless machinery. It ground on
+implacable, though great beads stood on Andy's brow from sheer terror
+lest he run down before the end. "_No!_ as firmly, as emphatically as
+you said it to me last night. Indeed, I honor you the more for flatly
+refusing the man who, in forgetting his self-respect, forgot his
+respect--_for you!_ But, Miss Rose, while I pledge you my honor never,
+_never_ to speak to you again _of love_, I may still be--_your
+friend!_"
+
+The bays were bowling down the street again by this time; when another
+_kismet_, in small and ugly canine form, flew at their heads with yelp
+and snarl. Rearing with one impulse, the spirited pair lunged forward
+and flew past the now twinkling lamps in a wild gallop. Andy pulled
+them down at last; their swinging trot replacing the dangerous rush.
+The Wood mansion was almost in sight; but the Ancient Mariner was a
+tyro to Andy Browne in the way he fixed that off-horse's right ear
+with stony stare.
+
+He might have looked round in perfect safety. The lithe figure by him
+sat gracefully erect. The face a trifle pale; the lips set tight
+against each other, with the blood pressed out of them, were not
+unnatural in that cutting wind. The eyes, fixed straight ahead, as his
+own, gleamed gray and cold; only a half-closing of the lids, once or
+twice, hiding an ugly light reflecting through them from the busy
+brain behind. But Andy never turned once until he brought up the bays
+stock still and leaped down to offer his hand to the lady at her own
+door.
+
+She took it, naturally; springing to the ground as lightly as any
+_débutante_ of the season. Not one trace of annoyance, even, showed on
+that best educated face.
+
+"Andy, we _are_ old friends," she said, offering her hand frankly.
+
+He took it mechanically, with a dazed soft of feeling that he must be
+even a bigger fool than he felt himself.
+
+"Real friends," Miss Wood went on, pleasantly, "and I'll prove it to
+you now. _You_ have acted like a man of honor to me; _I_ will betray
+one little confidence, and make two people happy!"
+
+The man still stood dumb; and his eye furtively wandered to the pawing
+off-horse, as if to take _his_ confidence as to what it meant. The
+woman's next words came slowly, and she smiled; a strange smile the
+lips alone made, but in which the glinting gray eyes took no share.
+
+"For Van Morris is your best friend, after all. He will remember that
+I told him, last night, 'One cannot be too careful'!"
+
+She rose on tiptoe, whispered three words, and was gone before he
+could frame one in reply.
+
+Once more those ill-used bays got the whip fiercely; and they turned
+the corner so short that Mr. Trotter Upton looked over his shoulder
+with a grin, and remarked to the blaze-faced companion in his sulky
+shafts:
+
+"Nine hundred dollars' worth of horse risked with nine dollars' worth
+of man! Van Morris better drive his own stock. G'long!"
+
+
+VIII.
+
+It was two o'clock when Mr. Andrew Browne had ridden forth to
+recapture his plighted troth.
+
+The shades of Christmas evening had now wrapped the city completely,
+and the gilt clock upon his parlor mantel now pointed to six. Still he
+had not returned; and still Van Morris's eagerness to test the issue
+of his own tactics was too keen to let him leave their rooms. He had
+even resisted the temptations of a gossip at the club, and was smoking
+his fifth cigar--a thought-amused smile wreathing his lips--when the
+chime of six startled him suddenly to his feet.
+
+"How time flies!" he exclaimed. "And we are to dine at the Allmand's
+at seven."
+
+He tossed away his cigar, turned into his own apartment, and made an
+unusually careful toilet. Then he looked into Browne's still vacant
+room once more.
+
+"Where _can_ he be?" he muttered. "By George! he must have bungled
+fearfully if he did not pull through. He certainly had his lesson by
+heart! But _she_ must not be kept waiting," and his face softened
+greatly, and the deep, strong light came back into his eyes. "How
+ceaselessly that old verse comes back to me! And now 'to put it to the
+test' myself."
+
+He turned to his escritoire, and took a small Russia case from the
+drawer; then to the mantel, and carefully shook the dampness from the
+two flowers he had placed there that morning. Putting case and flowers
+carefully in his vest pocket, Van paused at the door, gave a long,
+sweeping glance--with a sort of farewell in it--to the rooms; then
+shut himself outside, still repeating _sotto voce_,
+
+                 "He either fears his fate too much,
+                   Or his deserts are small."
+
+Metropolitan Christmas was abroad in the streets. Young and old,
+grandsire and maiden, beggar and parvenu jostled one another on the
+pavements. Rough men, laden with loosely-wrapped, brown-papered
+packages, strode happily homeward; wan women skurried along leading
+eager children from unwonted shopping for dainties; carriages rolled
+by, with the gas-light glimpsing on occupants in evening dress, driven
+Christmas dinnerward.
+
+Van Morris recked little of all this, as he strode rapidly over the
+very spot where his coolness had saved an ugly misadventure twelve
+hours before. His brain was going faster than his body; one goal only
+had he in view; one refrain ever sounded in his memory: "To gain, or
+lose, it all!"
+
+A quick turn of the corner, and he stood at the door he had quietly
+escaped from during the ball. The servant replied to his inquiry that
+Miss Blanche was in the library; and thither he turned, with the
+freedom of long intimacy.
+
+Only the warm glow of fire-light filled the room; there was a rustle,
+as of a retreating silk dress. There was also a man's figure, backed
+by the fire, with that not infrequent expression all over it that
+tells he would really be at his ease if he only knew how.
+
+"Why, Andy! And in your driving suit!"
+
+"Van, dearest old boy," cried the other, irrelevantly, "congratulate
+me! I'm the luckiest dog alive!"
+
+"With all my heart," Van answered, shaking the proffered hand
+heartily. "I was sure it would come out all right."
+
+"You were?" Andy fairly beamed. "She said so!"
+
+"What? _she_ said so? Did Rose Wood expect you to break off, then?"
+
+"No, no! Not _that_. She said she knew you'd be glad of the match."
+
+"Glad of--the match!" Van stared at his friend, with growing suspicion
+in his mind.
+
+"Yes, you dear old Van! I'm engaged, and just the happiest of--"
+
+"_Engaged?_" and Van seized Andy by the shoulders with both hands.
+
+"Yes, all fixed! And Rose Wood is just the dearest, best girl after
+all! I'd never have known happiness but for her!"
+
+Van Morris turned the speaker full to the firelight, and stared hard
+in his face.
+
+"I wouldn't have believed it, Andy," he said, contemptuously. "You
+have come _here_ drunk again!"
+
+"No, indeed! I have pledged my word to _her_ never to touch a drop!"
+protested Andy, with imperturbable good nature. "And, Van, _she has
+accepted me_."
+
+"_She?_"
+
+"Yes. Rose said, 'Morris has his heart set on the match;' I went
+straight on that hint, and Blanche Allmand will be Mrs. Andrew Browne
+next Easter."
+
+Morris answered no word.
+
+With a deep, hard breath, he turned abruptly, strode to the alcove
+window, and peered through the curtains into the black night beyond. A
+great surge of regret swept over him that shook the strong man with
+pain pitiful to see. He pressed his forehead against the cold glass;
+and the contrast, so strong, to the hope with which he had looked out
+thus at the gray dawn, sickened him with its weight. There was a boom
+in his ears, as of the distant surf; and his brain mechanically groped
+after a lost refrain, finding only the fragment: "To lose it all!
+_lose it all!_"
+
+But heart-sickness, like sea-sickness, is never mortal, and it has the
+inestimable call over the latter of being far less tenacious. And Van
+Morris was mentally as healthy as he was physically sound. He made a
+strong effort of a strong will; and turned to face his friend and
+his--fate. In his hand he held a wilted camellia bud and a crushed
+cactus flower.
+
+Moving quickly to the fire, he tossed them on the glowing coals;
+watching as they curled, shrivelled, and disappeared in the heat's
+maw. Then he moved quietly to the window and looked into the night
+once more.
+
+Wholly wrapped up in his new-found joy, Andy Browne saw nothing odd in
+his friend's manner or actions. He moved softly about the room, and
+once more hummed, "_Il segreto per esser felice_;" very low and very
+tenderly this time.
+
+Suddenly the rustle of silk again sounded on Morris's ear.
+
+He turned quickly, and looked long, but steadily, into the beautiful
+face. It was very quiet and gentle; glorified by the deeper content in
+the eyes and the modest flush upon the cheek. His face, too, was very
+quiet; but it was pale and grave. His manner was gentle; but he
+retained the little hand Blanche held out to him, in fingers that were
+steadier than her own.
+
+"I reminded you last night," he said, very gravely, "how long we had
+been friends, Blanche. It is meet, then, that I should be the first to
+wish you that perfect happiness which only a pure girl's heart may
+know."
+
+Then, without a pause, he turned to Andy, and placed the little Russia
+case in his hand. As it opened, the eye of a dazzling solitaire
+flashed from its satin pillow.
+
+"Andy, old friend," he added, "Rose Wood told you only the truth. I
+_had_ set my heart on Blanche's happiness; and only this morning I got
+that for her engagement ring. Put it on her finger with the feeling
+that Van Morris loves you both--better than a nature like Rose Wood's
+can ever comprehend."
+
+T. C. De Leon.
+
+
+
+
+FROM THE WINDOWS OF A GREAT LIBRARY.
+
+        "The dead alive and busy."--Henry Vaughan.
+
+
+
+        Without, wind-lifted, lo! a little rose
+        (From the great Summer's heart its life-blood flows),
+        For some fond spirit to reach and kiss and bless,
+          Climbs to the casement, brings the joyous wraith
+        Of the sun's quick world, without, of joyousness
+          Into this still world of enchanted breath.
+        And, far away, behold the dust arise,
+        From streets white-hot, into the sunny skies!
+        The city murmurs: in the sunshine beats,
+        Through all its giant veins of throbbing streets,
+        The heart of Business, on whose sweltering brow
+        The dew shall sleep to-night (forgotten now).
+        There rush the many, toiling as but one;
+        There swarm the living myriads in the sun;
+        There all the mighty troubled day is loud
+        (Business, the god whose voice is of the crowd).
+        And, far above the sea-horizon blue,
+        Like sea-birds, sails are hovering into view.
+        There move the living; here the dead that move:
+          Within the book-world rests the noiseless lever
+          That moves the noisy, throngèd world forever.
+        Below the living move, the dead above.
+
+John James Piatt.
+
+
+
+
+"GOING, GOING, GONE."
+
+
+I.
+
+"Take it to Rumble. He will give you twice as much on it as any other
+pawnbroker."
+
+The speaker was a seedy actor, and the person he addressed was also a
+follower of the histrionic muses. The latter held before him an ulster
+which he surveyed with a rueful countenance.
+
+It was not the thought of having to go to the pawnbroker's that made
+him rueful, for he would have parted with a watch, if he had possessed
+one, with indifference; but the wind that whistled without and the
+snow that beat against the window-pane made him shiver at the thought
+of surrendering his ulster. However, he had to do it. Both he and his
+friend were without money, and it was New Year's eve, which they did
+not mean to let pass without a little jollification. Therefore they
+had drawn lots to determine which should hypothecate his overcoat in
+order to raise funds. The victim was preparing to go to the
+sacrifice.
+
+"Yes," continued his friend, "take it to Rumble. He is the Prince of
+Pawnbrokers. Last week I took a set of gold shirt studs to him. He
+asked me at what I valued them. I named a slightly larger sum than I
+paid for them, and the old man gave me fully what they cost me."
+
+"Let us go at once to Rumble's," said the other, seizing his hat, and
+the two sallied forth into the night and the storm.
+
+Down the street they went before the wind-driven snow. Fortunately
+they did not have far to go.
+
+When they opened the door of Rumble's shop, the old pawnbroker looked
+up in surprise. The tempest seemed to have blown his visitors in. The
+windows rattled; the lights flared; fantastic garments, made in the
+style of by-gone centuries, swayed to and fro where they hung, as
+though the shapes that might have worn them haunted the place; a set
+of armor, that stood in one corner, clanked as though the spirit of
+some dead paladin had entered it and was striving to stalk forth and
+do battle with the demons of the storm; while the gust that had
+occasioned all this commotion in the little shop went careering
+through the rooms at the rear, causing papers to fly, doors to slam,
+and a sweet voice to exclaim:
+
+"Why, father, what is the matter?"
+
+"Nothing, my dear, it is only the wind," answered the old man, as he
+advanced to receive his visitors.
+
+The one with whom he was acquainted nodded familiarly to the
+pawnbroker, while he of the rueful countenance pulled off his ulster
+and threw it on the counter, saying:
+
+"How much will you give me on that?"
+
+Rumble, who was a large man, rather fleshy and slow of movement,
+started toward the back of the shop with a lazy roll, like a ship
+under half sail. He made a tack around the end of the counter and hove
+to behind it, opposite the men who had just come in. He pulled his
+spectacles down from the top of his bald head, where they had been
+resting, drew the coat toward him, looked at it for an instant, then
+raised his eyes till they met those of his customer.
+
+"How much do you think it is worth?" he said, uttering the words
+slowly and casting a commiserating glance at the thinly-clad form of
+the man before him.
+
+"I paid twenty dollars for it," said the young man. "It is worth ten
+dollars, isn't it?"
+
+"Oh, yes!" returned the pawnbroker. "Shall I loan you ten dollars on
+it?"
+
+"If you please," answered his customer, whose face brightened when he
+heard the pawnbroker's words. He had thought he might get five dollars
+on the ulster. The prospect of getting ten made him feel like a man of
+affluence.
+
+The pawnbroker opened a book and began to fill the blanks in one of
+the many printed slips it contained. One of the blanks he filled with
+his customer's name, James Teague. That was his real name, not the one
+by which he was known to the stage and to fame. That was far more
+aristocratical.
+
+As Rumble handed Teague the ticket and the ten dollars, he took a
+stealthy survey of his slender and poorly-clad form, then glanced
+toward the window on which great flakes of snow were constantly
+beating, driven against it by the wind that howled fiendishly as it
+went through the street, playing havoc with shutters and making the
+swinging sign-boards creak uncannily.
+
+"Mr. Dixon," said the pawnbroker, turning to Teague's companion, "will
+not you and your friend wait awhile until the storm slackens? It is
+pleasanter here by the fire than it is outside."
+
+His visitors agreed with him and accepted his invitation. They seated
+themselves beside the stove which stood in the center of the room,
+and from which, through little plates of isinglass, shone cheerful
+light from a bed of fiery coals. Both leaned back in their chairs;
+both turned the palms of their hands toward the stove, to receive the
+grateful heat; and when the old pawnbroker joined them, smiling
+genially as he sank into his great arm-chair, which seemed to have
+been made expressly for his capacious form, the same thought came to
+both of his guests. To this thought Dixon gave expression.
+
+"Mr. Rumble," he asked, "how happened it that you became a pawnbroker?"
+
+"Well, I might say that it was by chance," replied Rumble. "I was not
+bred to the business."
+
+"I thought not," answered Dixon, as he and his friend exchanged
+knowing glances.
+
+"I was a weaver by trade," continued Rumble, "and until two years ago
+worked at that calling in England, where I was born. But I made little
+money at it, and when an aunt, at her death, left me five hundred
+pounds, I decided to come to this country and go into a new
+business."
+
+"But what put it into your head to choose that of a pawnbroker?" asked
+Dixon.
+
+"Because everybody told me that larger profits were made in it than in
+any other. You see I am getting on in years, and I have a daughter for
+whom I must provide. When I die I want to leave her enough to make her
+comfortable."
+
+The street door was opened and for a moment the room was made
+decidedly uncomfortable by a cold blast accompanied by driving snow.
+Again the windows rattled, the armor clanked, and the hanging suits
+swung and shook their armless sleeves in the air.
+
+A tall, slight young man, clad in well-worn black clothes, stood by
+the door. Although his beardless pale face was the face of youth, it
+was not free from the marks of care, and in his large lustrous dark
+eyes there was a yearning look that spoke, as plainly as words, of
+desires unfulfilled.
+
+Dixon and Teague exchanged glances which as much as said, "here's
+another customer for the pawnbroker."
+
+"Is Miss Rumble in?" said the newcomer in a hesitating manner, as he
+turned toward the old pawnbroker.
+
+"You wouldn't have her out on such a night, would you, Mr. Maxwell?"
+said Rumble, laughing. "She is in the sitting-room," he added,
+pointing to the rear; "go right in."
+
+But Maxwell did not go right in. He knocked lightly at the door, which
+in a moment was opened by a young woman, whose girlish face and
+willowy figure presented a vision of loveliness to those in the outer
+room.
+
+As Maxwell disappeared in the sitting-room, Dixon and his friend again
+exchanged glances which showed that they had changed their opinion in
+regard to the newcomer's relations with the pawnbroker.
+
+"Well," asked Teague, "have the profits in this business met your
+expectations?"
+
+"I have not been in it long enough to tell, for I have not had an
+auction," replied Rumble. "In one respect, however, I have been
+disappointed. Very few articles on which I have loaned money have been
+redeemed. I don't understand it."
+
+"Perhaps you are too liberal with your customers," said Dixon.
+
+"You would not have me be mean with them, would you?" answered Rumble.
+"Why, you know they must be in very straitened circumstances to come
+to me. If I took advantage of people's poverty, I would expect that
+after their death all the old women who have pawned their shawls with
+me would send their ghosts back to haunt me."
+
+"Well, I never thought of that," murmured Dixon. "If their ghosts do
+come back what very lively times some pawnbrokers must have!"
+
+"But if your customers do not redeem their goods, how do you expect to
+get your money back?" asked Teague.
+
+"From auctions," replied the pawnbroker.
+
+"Oh!" was Teague's response.
+
+"You should have a good auctioneer," said Dixon.
+
+"The goods will bring a fair return," replied Rumble quietly.
+
+Although it was apparent that the pawnbroker had begun to mistrust his
+methods of doing business, it was also evident that he had great faith
+in auctions. He had attended auctions in his time and had bid on
+articles, only to see them go beyond the length of his modest purse.
+Now, he said to himself, the auctioneer would be on his side. The
+bidding would go up and up and up, and every bid would bring just so
+much more money into his pocket. Altogether he was well satisfied.
+
+The faces of his guests showed that they at once admired and pitied
+the old man. They admired his generosity and his faith in human
+nature, and wished that other pawnbrokers with whom they had dealt had
+been like him; they pitied him, for they knew that he would have a
+rude awakening from his dream when the hammer of the auctioneer
+knocked down his goods and his hopes of getting back the money he had
+loaned on them.
+
+"It is time we were going," said Dixon, at last, as his eyes fell on a
+tall hall clock that stood in a corner, quietly marking the flight of
+time.
+
+"Well, then let us go," answered Teague, as he cast a dismal look at
+the windows, against which the snow was still driven in volleys by the
+wind that howled as loudly as ever.
+
+It was the pawnbroker's turn to pity his visitors.
+
+"I am afraid you will take cold going from this warm room out into the
+storm," he said to Teague. "Let me lend you an overcoat. You see I
+have more here than I have any use for," he added jocosely.
+
+"Oh, I could not think of letting you lend me one!" exclaimed Teague,
+blushing probably for the first time in his life.
+
+Dixon laughed quietly as he enjoyed his friend's confusion, while the
+pawnbroker looked among his stock for a coat that would fit Teague.
+Presently he advanced with one which he held out with both hands, as
+he said:
+
+"Let me help you put it on."
+
+Teague protested.
+
+"Why, you can bring it back to-morrow when you come this way," added
+Rumble.
+
+"But how do you know I will bring it back?" said Teague. "I am a
+stranger to you."
+
+"Oh, your friend is good surety for you," replied the pawnbroker. "He
+is one of my few customers who have redeemed their pledges."
+
+A thundering blast struck the house. The wind beat at the windows as
+though it meant to smash them.
+
+The sound of the tempest persuaded Teague to accept the pawnbroker's
+offer. Without another word he caught the edge of either sleeve with
+his fingers and put his arms out behind, while Rumble put the overcoat
+on him. His arms, however, never found the ends of its capacious
+sleeves. It was almost large enough for a man of twice Teague's size.
+Dixon had a fit of laughter at his friend's expense, and even the
+pawnbroker could not forbear a smile.
+
+"It is rather large for you, isn't it?" said Rumble. "Let us try
+another." And then he added: "Why, your own fits you best, of
+course."
+
+Then seizing Teague's ulster, which still lay on his counter, he threw
+it over its owner's shoulders, and bade the two men a hearty
+good-night as they went forth into the storm.
+
+When he had succeeded in closing the door in the face of the tempest,
+he turned the key in the lock, and then, with a shiver, returned to
+the fire. As he stood before the stove he smiled and seemed to be
+chuckling over the thought that he had made Teague wear his own coat.
+His face wore a happy look. He had a clear conscience. He knew that he
+was a philanthropist in a small way, and had helped many a poor soul
+when the light of hope was burning dimly. But he took no credit to
+himself for this. The opportunity of doing a little good had come in
+his way, and he had not let it pass; that was all. Besides, as he
+often said, he expected to make money in his business. He simply
+conducted it on more liberal principles than most pawnbrokers. When he
+went into it he was told that a large proportion of pawnbrokers'
+customers never redeemed their pledges, and that by advancing on goods
+pawned only a small percentage of their value, a great deal of money
+was made in the sale of unredeemed articles. He thought, therefore,
+that it was only just to loan on whatever was brought to him nearly as
+much money as he deemed it would bring at auction. To do anything less
+would, in his opinion, have been to cheat his customers. Besides, if
+he loaned more money on goods, in proportion to their value, than
+other pawnbrokers, his return in interest was also greater when the
+goods were redeemed. This was the peculiar principle on which he did
+business, and it is needless to say that he did a very large business,
+much to the disgust of all other pawnbrokers having shops in his
+neighborhood.
+
+It was not strange, therefore, that, as he stood before the fire on
+that New Year's eve, the face of old John Rumble wore a contented
+smile. The knowledge of having done good brings content, if it brings
+nothing else; and the pawnbroker knew that he had done well by his
+customers, and he thought, also, that his customers had done well by
+him, as he surveyed his full shelves.
+
+While he stood there musing, the door of the sitting-room was opened
+and his daughter appeared.
+
+"Come, father," said the girl. "If you don't hurry you will not have
+the punch ready by midnight."
+
+The old man's face assumed an anxious expression, and he started with
+a roll for the sitting-room.
+
+Not to have the punch ready to drink in the New Year at the stroke of
+midnight, would indeed be a calamity. He had never failed to welcome
+the New Year with a brimming cup. His father had done so before him,
+his daughter had done so with him, and he hoped his grandchildren
+would do so after him.
+
+"Bring the punch-bowl, Fanny," he said, as he went to a cupboard and
+took out a big black bottle.
+
+His daughter brought him an old-fashioned blue china bowl and hot
+water, and while he made the punch, Maxwell told him of his plans for
+the coming year, about which he had been talking with Fanny.
+
+Arthur Maxwell, who was a civil-engineer, had been followed by
+ill-fortune for some time. Indeed, he made Rumble's acquaintance in a
+purely business way; but he called it good fortune that had led him to
+the pawnbroker's door, for otherwise he would not have known Fanny.
+And now fortune seemed really to smile on him. He had secured a
+position with a railroad company, and was going to Colorado as an
+assistant of its chief engineer, who had charge of the construction of
+a railway there.
+
+And then, hesitating, he told the old man that Fanny had promised to
+be his wife as soon as he could provide a home for her.
+
+The pleasure which Rumble had expressed, as Maxwell told of his good
+fortune, was a little dashed by this last bit of information. Of
+course he had expected that his daughter would leave him sometime, and
+he had not been blind to the fact that Maxwell had gained a place in
+her affections; nevertheless, he was not quite prepared for this news,
+and it left a shadow on his kindly face.
+
+"But, father," said Fanny, advancing quickly, and placing her arm
+about his neck and her head on his shoulder, "Arthur and I hope that
+we shall all be together. He may return to New York; but if we have a
+home in the West you might live with us there."
+
+It was a loving, tender look which Rumble gave his daughter as she
+uttered these words.
+
+At that moment the clock began to strike, horns were heard in the
+street, bells were rung, and in a lull in the storm the musical notes
+of a chime fell on their ears.
+
+Rumble filled the cups, and then, raising his, he said:
+
+"Here's to the New Year, and here's to your success, Arthur, and to
+Fanny's happiness."
+
+And while the clock was still striking, the three drank in the New
+Year.
+
+
+II.
+
+That year, however, was not a fortunate one for Rumble. His little
+fund had dwindled. He had, as he thought, barely enough to conduct his
+business to the time when he could legally have an auction. But how
+was he to do this and pay his rent? That problem troubled him. It was
+finally solved by the consent of his landlord, in consideration of a
+high rate of interest, to wait for his rent until Rumble had his
+auction. When this arrangement was made, the pawnbroker, who had been
+gloomy for some time, again wore a cheerful look. His daughter had
+advised him to pay his rent and curtail his business for the time
+being; but that, he said, would never do; and when he had tided over
+the crisis in his affairs, he went on distributing his money among the
+people who brought him their old clothes and their all but worthless
+jewellery.
+
+From time to time pawnbrokers called on him and tried to persuade him
+that his method of doing business was a mistake; that it was not only
+hurting their business, but was ruining himself. Rumble was not
+convinced. If his way of doing business took from the profits of other
+pawnbrokers, they were only meeting with justice, he said; they had
+made money enough out of the poor; he meant to treat his customers
+better. He admitted that he might not get his money back from some of
+his investments, but then the auction would make it all right; what he
+lost in one way he would get back in another. He looked to the auction
+as to a sort of Day of Judgment, when there would be a grand evening
+of accounts.
+
+At last the great day came--the day of the auction. Rumble was full of
+the importance of the event, and had donned his best clothes in honor
+of the occasion. He had advertised the auction in several newspapers,
+and he expected a large attendance. He was somewhat disappointed when,
+a little while before the time set for the sale, it began to rain; but
+he hoped for the best.
+
+When the auctioneer rapped on his desk and announced that he was about
+to open the sale, there were not more than a dozen people in the room.
+Among them Rumble recognized several pawnbrokers, and the others
+looked as though they might belong to the same guild. He wondered why
+they were there. Had they come to bid--to bid at his auction, on goods
+on which he had loaned more money than they would have loaned? He did
+not understand it.
+
+When the sale began Rumble took a seat near the auctioneer and
+watched the proceedings. He soon understood why the pawnbrokers were
+there. The prices obtained were absurdly small. There was very little
+competition, and the sale had not gone far before it dawned on
+Rumble's mind that the pawnbrokers had a tacit understanding that they
+would not bid against one another, but would divide the stock among
+them.
+
+The poor old man's heart sank, and great beads of perspiration
+appeared on his brow, as lot after lot went for almost nothing. All
+his worldly possessions were melting away before his eyes, and he had
+not the power to put out his hand and save them. Was he dreaming? No,
+for he could hear the auctioneer's voice, loud and clear, crying:
+
+"Going--going--gone!"
+
+He turned his head and saw his daughter standing in the sitting-room,
+near the open doorway, with her eyes fixed upon him. Her face was
+white, white as the 'kerchief about her neck. She understood it all.
+Yes, it was all too real.
+
+"Going--going--gone!"
+
+Again those terrible words rang like a knell in his ears, and every
+time he heard them he knew that he was a poorer man; he knew that more
+of his little stock had gone at a sacrifice.
+
+At last he scarcely heeded the words of the auctioneer, but sat
+staring before him like one spell-bound. The buzz of conversation
+about him seemed like a sound coming from afar, like the roll of waves
+on the seashore; and through it all, at intervals, like the faint note
+of a bell warning seamen of danger, came those words telling of his
+own wreck:
+
+"Going--going--gone!"
+
+When the auction was over Fanny went to her father's side. He was
+apparently dazed. She helped him to rise. He leaned heavily upon her
+as she led him into the sitting-room, where he sank back into a chair,
+and did not utter a word for a long time. At last, when he found
+voice, he said:
+
+"Going--going--gone! It's all gone, Fanny, all gone! We are ruined!"
+
+The sale on which Rumble had built so many hopes, realized but little
+more than enough to pay the rent he owed. He did not have money enough
+to continue his business, and a few days after the auction his
+pawnshop was closed.
+
+In the meantime, to add to their distress, Fanny had received a letter
+from Arthur Maxwell, informing her that the railroad company with
+which he had found employment had failed, owing him several hundred
+dollars--all his savings. He wrote that there was a prospect that a
+labor-saving invention of his would be put in use in one of the mines.
+This was the only gleam of hope in the letter. Fanny answered it,
+giving Arthur an account of the misfortune which had befallen her
+father. Although she gave him the number of the new lodging into which
+they moved when her father's shop was closed, she received no reply.
+She had hoped soon to have some cheering word from him, but none came.
+She could not understand his silence. This, in addition to her other
+troubles, seemed more than she could bear.
+
+Since the auction Rumble had not been a well man. His nerves at that
+time had received a shock from which he had not recovered.
+
+Between nursing her father, and earning what little she could by
+sewing, Fanny had a hard time. The pittance she got for her work did
+not go far toward meeting their expenses. Rumble had given up his shop
+in the early autumn, and the little money he had saved from the wreck
+had disappeared when winter set in. At last it became necessary to
+pawn some of their household goods. Fanny would not let her father go
+the pawnbroker's, but went herself. When she returned, and showed him
+the little money she had obtained on the articles she had pledged, he
+said:
+
+"Why, I would have given twice as much."
+
+"Yes, father," answered Fanny, "but all pawnbrokers are not like
+you."
+
+"No, no," muttered the old man. "If they were they would be poor like
+me."
+
+Although Rumble was not able to work, he was always talking of what he
+would do when he felt a little stronger. He worried continually
+because he was dependent upon his daughter, and every time she went to
+the pawnbroker's he had a fit of melancholy.
+
+At last, just before Christmas, he became seriously ill. The doctor,
+whom Fanny called in, said he had brain fever, and gave her little
+hope of his recovery. His mind wandered, and seemed to go back to the
+auction, of which he spoke almost constantly. Many times he repeated
+the words of the auctioneer, that had made such a deep impression on
+him: "Going--going--gone!"
+
+It was a gloomy Christmas for Fanny, and when New Year's eve came she
+was still watching by the bedside of her father, whose fever had
+reached its crisis.
+
+Her thoughts went back to another New Year's eve, when Arthur Maxwell
+had told her of his plans for the future. And it had been so long
+since she had heard from him!
+
+She had to get some medicine which the doctor had ordered, and while
+her father slept, asking an acquaintance who lodged on the same floor
+to watch over him, she went out, taking with her a gold locket which
+she meant to pawn.
+
+Although she knew that a pawnbroker had opened a shop where her father
+had kept his, she had never gone to it. But something seemed to lead
+her there that evening. When she reached the place her heart almost
+failed her; but, summoning courage, she entered the shop, and
+presented the locket to the pawnbroker. While he was examining it two
+men entered. The pawnbroker's clerk waited on them. She seemed to feel
+their eyes on her.
+
+When she gave the pawnbroker her name, he said:
+
+"Rumble? Frances Rumble? Why, a young man was here to-day inquiring
+for Mr. Rumble, and some time ago the carrier brought two letters here
+for you. I could not tell him where you lived, and he took them
+away."
+
+Fanny's heart beat wildly. She was sure that the letters were from
+Arthur, and that it was he who had inquired for her father.
+
+"Is this Miss Rumble?" said one of the men who had followed her into
+the shop.
+
+She turned and recognized Dixon. The person with him was Teague. Dixon
+had just pawned a watch, and had remarked that he wished Rumble still
+kept the shop.
+
+When Fanny told them of her father's illness and of his misfortune,
+Dixon and Teague insisted on going home with her, meaning to lend
+assistance in some way.
+
+When they reached Fanny's humble lodging, and followed her into her
+father's room, they found Maxwell at Rumble's bedside.
+
+A cry of joy escaped Fanny as her lover folded her in his arms. She
+soon learned from him that he had never received the letter in which
+she wrote him about her father's trouble and their removal from the
+old shop. It had missed him while he was moving about in the West. And
+then he told her of the success of his invention.
+
+Rumble, whose mind was lucid for the moment, said:
+
+"You will be happy at last, Fanny. Arthur has come for you."
+
+"And you, too, will be happy with us, father," replied Fanny, taking
+his hands in hers.
+
+The old man smiled faintly, and rolled his head to and fro on his
+pillow, as if he thought differently.
+
+The clock began to strike; it was midnight, and the New Year was at
+hand. The sound of bells came to their ears, and a distant chime was
+heard.
+
+Rumble's mind once more began to wander; again he talked about the
+auction; again he muttered the words that had troubled him so much:
+
+"Going--going--gone!"
+
+They were his last words. The old man's life went out with the old
+year.
+
+Albert Roland Haven.
+
+
+
+
+THE ROOT OF THE SPOILS SYSTEM.
+
+
+What is known as the spoils system of politics, in a measure common to
+all times and all forms of government, seems to have reached its
+highest development in our Republic. This fact justifies the suspicion
+that something in our form of administration is favorable to such
+development; and whether we regard the spoils system as praiseworthy
+or reprehensible, it will be instructive to inquire why it has
+prevailed in this country as among no other free people.
+
+Most persons who deplore the spoils system urge as one of its greatest
+evils that it substitutes for the discussion of principles a mere
+scramble for office; that it teaches men to value the material prizes
+incident to government above political truth. Such reasoners have
+strangely mistaken cause for effect. The rarity of ideas in our
+political discussions is not an effect, but the immediate cause of the
+spoils system; and behind both, as the direct cause of the latter and
+the remote cause of the former, lies the difficulty of expressing the
+popular will in legislative enactment. In other words, we have
+substituted the pursuit of place for the discussion of principles,
+because the relations of the people to the law-making body are not
+sufficiently close.
+
+No reader of this periodical needs to be reminded that when our
+present constitution was written the mass of freemen had not, as now,
+come to believe that a constitutional government should include a
+legislature promptly obedient to the popular will; a ministry
+dependent upon the support of a majority in the popular branch of the
+law-making body; and an executive powerless to interfere in
+legislation. It was natural, then, that our forefathers, imperfectly
+acquainted with this modern device of free peoples, should have
+believed that they had secured the prompt and certain efficacy of the
+popular will in government by placing no restriction as to national
+elections upon the wide suffrage already prevailing in most of the
+States, and providing that the chief magistrate and both branches of
+the national legislature should be elective and chosen for short
+terms. They could not foresee that in course of time a constitutional
+monarch would come to have less power than the executive head of the
+Republic; that an hereditary House of Lords less often than an
+elective Senate would dare to cross the will of the popular
+legislative body; that the popular branch of the legislature in a
+constitutional monarchy would, in effect, change at will the
+administrative head of the government, while in the new Republic
+premiers would retain power despite the adverse verdict of the people
+as expressed in legislative majorities; and, finally, that the
+enfranchised portion of a people dwelling under a constitutional
+monarchy would determine at the ballot-box every great question
+arising in their politics, and drive from power all men who should
+dissent from the popular decision, while the whole people of the
+Republic might be balked not only of their will in matters upon which
+they had distinctly made up their minds, but even of bringing
+questions thus potentially decided to the practical test of the
+ballot-box, and of introducing other important issues into the realm
+of popular discussion.
+
+The difficulty of procuring from the people of the United States an
+unequivocal decision upon any political question, and of expressing
+that decision in legislative enactment, is familiar to every student
+of our history. The questions that occupy Congress now are in large
+part the same that were debated there forty years ago, save that the
+issue of slavery and the extreme States' rights theory have
+disappeared. But even in these cases the exceptions prove the rule;
+for it is grimly significant of our legislative immobility that the
+two great questions of a century should finally have been settled by
+the sword. If the people declared for anything at the general election
+of 1884, they may be supposed to have declared for a revision of the
+tariff, since the platform of principles adopted by each great party
+at its National Convention affirmed the necessity of such revision;
+yet Congress not only failed to legislate for that object, but
+actually at one time refused to discuss a measure designed to meet the
+issue in question, and at another stopped in the midst of such
+legislation to test the popular will upon the very same matter.
+Furthermore, while it will be assumed by most persons that whatever
+the significance of the election four years ago, the contest just
+ended sets the seal of disapproval upon the recent effort of the House
+of Representatives to revise the tariff; yet we hear already that the
+LI. Congress can hardly escape some such legislation as has just been
+attempted. The truth is, that the election of 1884, as all our
+elections, was in the main a struggle for spoils. The question at
+issue was not tariff revision or any other great economic idea, but
+which party should administer during the next four years the great
+patronage of the Federal Government. In the contest of November last
+the people for the first time in twenty years had a living issue
+presented, but so unused were they to the discussion of economic
+principles that it may be questioned whether the verdict just
+delivered with so much apparent emphasis was really the expression of
+a well-ascertained public opinion. It is worthy of note, too, that
+believers in the spoils system of politics are already taunting the
+vanquished with the folly of presenting a political idea to the
+American people, and prophesying a more rigid exclusion of principles
+from politics in all time to come.
+
+Such difficulties have beset us throughout all our history. Let men
+wince as they would under galling injustice and false economics, they
+could not work their will upon the body whose duty it is to express in
+legislation the political desires of the people. A mocking fate seemed
+to balk the accomplishment of our most earnest purposes, and men whose
+interests were adverse to the public good constantly took it upon
+themselves to declare that the people had not spoken upon whatever
+vital question was uppermost, or that their words had meant something
+other than they seemed to mean. The result of all this was what we
+see. A self-governing people must have some sort of political
+activity, and since it was early discovered that the discussion of
+principles was little better than a vain occupation, the pursuit of
+place soon became almost the sole object of political organization. If
+it was almost impossible to carry a question from the stage of popular
+discussion to that of legislative enactment, it was a very simple
+matter to elect presidents and congressmen who should see to a proper
+distribution of places. Since men could not accomplish the rational
+object of political endeavor, they strove for what was easily
+attainable. If they could not make the laws they could at least fill
+the offices. Then came the easy descent to Avernus. Politics having
+become a mere struggle for place, public affairs were left more and
+more in the hands of men who found such work congenial, and the mass
+of the people, to whom the hope of office is but a shadowy illusion,
+became less and less interested in a struggle that held for most
+voters neither the promise of gain nor the incentive of high purpose.
+The spoils system having thus been established, the causes that bred
+it were in their turn intensified by its reaction, and the evil round
+was complete. To make matters worse, the struggle for wealth,
+stimulated by the marvellous richness of a part of the country,
+claimed the attention of thousands to the exclusion of politics, and
+those who would naturally have led in affairs of State adopted the
+evil philosophy that it is cheaper to be robbed by professional
+politicians than to neglect private business for the sake of public
+duty.
+
+Having sought thus to trace the steps by which our form of administration
+has begotten the spoils system, let us endeavor to prove the conclusion
+by another process of reasoning. Were our government a parliamentary
+system, such as exists among the free peoples of the Old World, we
+should have a legislature promptly responsive to movements of the popular
+will, a ministry sitting in one or the other house of Congress, and
+dependent for continuance in power upon the support of a majority in the
+Lower House, and an executive disarmed in whole or in part of the power
+to negative legislative enactments. The result would be to concentrate
+interest not as now upon the election of a president whose chief
+function is to distribute places, and whose part in legislation is
+almost purely negative, but upon the choice of the legislative body whose
+majority should determine the political complexion of the president's
+advisers and the general policy of the administration. At each general
+election for members of the Lower House the issue would be some
+well-defined question then under hot discussion, and in most instances
+Congress would have been dissolved for the express purpose of taking the
+sense of the people upon the matter at issue. Public interest in
+political discussion would return, because great principles, such as
+have an important bearing upon the lives of all men, would be under
+debate, and the mass of voters would have such an incentive to activity
+as the shadowy hope of place could never furnish. The knowledge that
+the popular will would find prompt expression through the law-making
+power would render it impossible for the people to be turned from their
+purpose by the jugglery of place-hunters.
+
+With a whole people interested in political discussion no conceivable
+abuse of patronage could balk them of their will, and the spoils
+system would disappear because the factitious importance of
+office-holders and office-seekers, favored by the defects of our
+present form of administration, could no longer obscure the vastly
+greater question of the public weal. This change in the popular
+attitude toward politics would be sufficient of itself to seal the
+doom of the spoils system; but if other influences were needed they
+would be found in the new relations of the ministry to the legislature
+and the people, since a cabinet bound to take the initiative in great
+lines of policy and required to give an account of itself to a hostile
+minority in Congress would have little time and less stomach for the
+nice apportionment of political rewards to partizan deserts. Finally,
+should we adopt the principle of a ministry dependent upon the support
+of a majority in the Lower House, the possibility of two changes of
+administration within a single year would make the spoils system, as
+we now have it, unendurable and unworkable. Indeed, it may be
+questioned whether a rigid application of the spoils system by the
+administration coming into office in March 1889 would not place the
+evils of that system in a peculiarly glaring light, when it is
+remembered that a very large number of those who would be asked to
+make places for party workers unversed in the routine of public office
+have exercised their official functions for barely four years, and but
+recently acquired the skill so necessary to the efficient transaction
+of business.
+
+The attentive reader will have noted that it has been argued, first
+that the spoils system is the natural and inevitable outcome of the
+rigidity that seems unseparable from our form of administration; and
+second, that such a system, in its grossest development, is almost
+impossible under a parliamentary government. The latter line of
+argument has been taken less for its own sake than for the purpose of
+strengthening the conclusions reached by the former; and the writer
+would not be understood as insisting that to eliminate the spoils
+system we must adopt exactly such a parliamentary form as now exists
+among the free peoples of Europe. Any system that should make it easy
+to ascertain the popular will, and should insure the prompt and
+certain expression of that will in legislation, would accomplish the
+object of substituting principles for spoils in our politics. To
+suggest a plausible plan for grafting upon our system this far more
+democratic scheme of administration would be a stupendous work,
+calling for the highest exercise of trained political sagacity; but it
+is not difficult to indicate some of the things that need not be done.
+It is not necessary that the president should be reduced to any such
+mere figure-head as is the monarch in the half-dozen parliamentary
+governments of Europe. Perhaps the principle of a ministry sitting in
+the houses of Congress might be omitted; and it is not clear that the
+president's veto would have to be altogether sacrificed. It is not
+positive, indeed, that a formal amendment of the constitution would be
+necessary to obtain the essentials of the reform under consideration.
+We have amended the spirit of the constitution in one highly important
+feature without changing the letter of that instrument. Perhaps the
+nearest way to the object in view lies through a more intimate
+relation between the cabinet and the committees of the Lower House.
+
+Finally, the consideration presents itself that if the conclusions
+reached here are correct, those persons who have sought by statutory
+restriction and appeals to public conscience to abolish the spoils
+system have not employed the wholesome policy of attacking the evil at
+its source. They seem to be mowing rather than uprooting the weeds.
+Doubtless our political garden has been tidied, but the roots of the
+evil growth and the aptitudes of the soil remain. The reform system,
+as applied to the great body of minor clerical offices, will probably
+prevail from now on; but we can scarcely hope that the broad spirit of
+civil service reform can reign in this land until the people shall
+have made themselves immediate masters of the legislative power.
+
+Edward V. Vallandigham.
+
+
+
+
+UNCLE SCIPIO.
+
+
+Once more the wizard of the Christmas-time lifts his wand in our
+homes, brightening young eyes that look forward, dimming old ones that
+look backward. Thou hast prisms of hope for the young; prisms of tears
+for the old, but shining always in our souls with a light all thine
+own. We hail thee, lovely spirit of this matchless festival!
+
+Would that words could paint to you a picture which I carry in my
+heart! I see it through a light brilliant, yet tender, that Christmas
+morning long ago in the old Georgia home. Those were dark days of war
+which I remember, and the shadow of death had already fallen on our
+house: but there was one day in the year when we did not feel its
+chill. What shadows can withstand the light of the Christmas fire in
+the heart of a child?
+
+We had grown to be pretty thorough Bohemians, my little brother and
+I, in those war days, and were ready to take any stray bit of sport,
+asking no questions whatever for conscience' sake. But the outlook was
+rather bad for us, one dreary December. The holidays were very near,
+and we saw no preparations for rendering the big dining-room royal
+with holly and cedar, as usual, for King Cole's reception. We had
+already ceased to press our grievances in the "big house," for we
+felt, through a child's instinct, that we were standing in the
+presence of griefs greater than our own.
+
+We began to fear that Santa Claus had been killed in the war, or
+that maybe he would not care to come to us now since the fire had
+grown so small in the huge fire-place, where it used to roar and flash
+around the back-log, until the polished floor was flooded in light,
+and the candelabra's lights shone cold and pale as stars through a
+conflagration. Even the crimson rugs and hangings, that used to
+brighten up the dark old floor and furniture, had disappeared, one
+by one, to be transformed into haversacks and warm garments for our
+poor boys at the front, whose hearts were stouter and courage more
+lasting than their regimentals. And so, we thought, poor little
+infants! that perhaps our deity would desert the altars on which the
+fires burned so low, and would go, with all his wonderful store, to
+the happy children away in the North. There, we were told, the cities
+blazed with light and merriment for weeks before his coming; there the
+snow sometimes fell whole days at a time, until it lay like a white
+carpet along the streets, where children could walk without fear,
+and which never echoed to the tramp of foes; for there the heavy
+booming cannon never sounded to drown the chiming bells, and
+blanch the children's laughing lips with terror. Why, we argued,
+should he not go there instead of driving his reindeer across
+bloody fields and deserted highways, to bring gifts to two poor
+little children? Truly we would have been comfortless in that sad
+time but for one old standby, who had never yet failed us. Dear old
+Uncle Scipio--his ebony face shines in the light of memory as it
+used to shine in the light of the kitchen fire. To him we turned in
+our trouble. We did not know all his worth then, but we knew him for
+the sympathizer in all our childish griefs. Oh, those preposterous
+old stories he used to tell us! but they could raise the sheeted dead
+then in every corner of the old kitchen, as we sat in awed silence
+on his knee, and watched the supper fire die out.
+
+And not to us only, was Uncle Scipio the stay and comfort in those
+dark days, but to our mother also. He had been the guardian,
+playmate, and tyrant of two eager boys, my brothers, through infancy,
+and through the sunny college days, when, with the school boy's
+profanation of the classics, they had stumbled on the story of his
+great prototype, and laughingly called him "Scipio Africanus." Through
+tear-dimmed spectacles he watched them march away, two boy soldiers,
+with no premonition of misfortune on their faces, and minds full of
+great Shakespearian thoughts of "all the pomp and circumstance of
+glorious war." And last of all, he stood by my father's stirrup when
+he mounted to ride on his last journey, and took his final orders
+concerning us.
+
+About this time, I remember, there was quite a disturbance among the
+negroes; some were for following in the wake of the first Union troops
+that should pass, as the only sure means of gaining their promised
+freedom. These, we knew, had been trying to persuade Uncle Scipio to
+join them. To us this was a thing too preposterous to think of; but I
+think that mother and grandmother really had some doubts on the
+subject. So one day the latter asked him what he should do if the
+opportunity should be offered him to go. I was balancing on the
+rockers of her chair at the time, and I shall never forget the look he
+gave her in reply.
+
+"I can't go, ole missus," he said, shaking his gray head, as he rose
+from emptying an armful of lightwood knots into the wood box, and
+dusted the splinters from his sleeve. "I can't go, nohow, and leave
+young missus and de chillun in dese yere times. Mars Ben he done die,
+and lef' me to take care o' dese yere darlins o' hisen, and no kind o'
+proclamation, dis side de Jordan o' def, gwine to free ole Scipio from
+dat charge."
+
+"But don't you want to be free if the rest are?"
+
+"Yes, ole missus, but ef de Lord mean to bring freedom to dis ole
+nigger, he kin fin' him here. Ef He mean to fetch our people dry shod
+tru dis Red Sea o' blood, outen de house o' bondage, den when I hears
+de soun' o' dem timbrels, and de dancin', an' de shoutin', I praise
+Him too; but I don't tink He gwine to be angry kase one ole man love
+his home so much 'til he got to stay behind and weep wid dem in de
+house where de eldest born am slain."
+
+And faithfully he kept his promise to the slain. But see! I began to
+tell you the story of that memorable Christmas-time, and am letting
+the shadows of the intervening years crowd between me and the
+Yule-log. Avaunt! ye ghosts of bitter days of want, of hatred and
+contention; the spirit of peace and good-will exorcise ye from the
+hearth of Christmas memories!
+
+I was going to tell you how Uncle Scipio undertook to save us from
+despair in that terrible time.
+
+We, the much abused community of infants, had submitted with
+tolerable fortitude to taking our rye substitute for coffee,
+sweetened with sorghum, and similar hardships; but now, as the
+holidays approached, and we saw no signs of festivity, we began to
+feel great apprehensions.
+
+We resolved to confide our fears to Scipio.
+
+"Do you think," I asked him one evening, as we sat in our usual
+evening attitudes before the fire, "that old 'Santy' will forget us
+this year because it is so cold and dark, and because everybody is so
+sad, and?--"
+
+Here my griefs overcame utterance: I could say no more.
+
+"Now, Lawd o' messy!" cried the dear old creature, taking a closer
+look at my tearful face. "What dat yer sayin', chile? Ole Santy Claus
+forgit yer, honey? What make yer tink he gwine to forgit yer? Well,
+well! You's a funny little chile, sho'--yer makes me laugh 'til I
+cries; sho' yer do."
+
+I noticed that he did take off his "specs" and wipe them with his
+yellow bandana, but I didn't see anything to laugh at. He gazed sadly
+enough, I thought, into the embers for awhile, and smoothed my hair in
+a thoughtful way. Then an inspiration seized him; he saw his way
+through the dilemma. He straightened himself in his chair, and
+readjusted his glittering ornaments across his nose. He assumed the
+air which all the country 'round knew as the precursor of something
+oracular, for he was "not 'zactly a preacher, no sah! but sort of a
+'zorter 'mongst de breren."
+
+"Now, my dear little chillun," he began, "I dunno who tuk an' turned
+in an' put dat funny notion in yer heads 'bout ole Santa Claus
+forgitten yer, but pay 'tickler extension to what I'se gwine to say to
+yer. You mustn't go to kalklatin' on none o' dem high-falutin' tings
+what he used to fotch here fo' de wah sot in, fur de times is mighty
+hard, and de ole feller'll have to run de blockade to git yere
+t'all--sho' he will. But ef you sez you'll be powerful good til' dat
+time, an' don't go to pesterin' yer ma 'bout it, I'll promise yer dat
+he aint gwine to forgit yer altogedder."
+
+This was surely consolation; but it required all our faith in Uncle
+Scipio to keep our courage alive until the great day. It drew near and
+nearer, and still we saw no unusual stir in the house, and our hearts
+began to sink a little. At last it wanted but one day, and I shall
+never forget that Christmas eve.
+
+Uncle Scipio was very much preoccupied, and could not be disturbed by
+any means, that day; so we betook ourselves to the society of our
+elders. But there matters were worse. There was little of privation
+and bad news that we had not become pretty familiar with by this time,
+and war, I remember, seemed to me the normal condition of things. But
+it soon became clear to me that something a little worse than usual
+was apprehended that day.
+
+There were whispered conversations going on above our heads, but we
+caught enough of it to know that a piece of terrible news had arrived.
+A party of refugees had passed through our town in the early morning.
+They were a company of fragile women and children, with a few faithful
+negroes, fleeing from their homes as from a pestilence. They told us
+that a large company of Yankees had made their appearance a few miles
+above us, and if they followed the most direct route to the railroad,
+would, in all probability, reach us that night or the following day.
+Our little town being on the line of the railroad, rarely escaped the
+military visitations. Besides, it was at this time the depository of a
+great deal of cotton, which it was feared might be the occasion of its
+being burned.
+
+I have heard mother say that this day before Christmas there were just
+three able-bodied men in the town--the hospital doctor, the miller,
+and the conscript officer; not a very formidable defence against a
+hostile invasion. But I suppose those two lonely women, my mother and
+grandmother, must have looked for help in this extremity, towards the
+everlasting hills where the twelve legions of angels lay encamped, for
+they bore their anxiety like Spartans.
+
+The day dragged through, however, and the last sun rays showed us no
+blue coats on the western road towards which aching eyes had turned
+through the heavy hours. Things began to look a little more hopeful.
+We began to feel that reaction from anxiety which is almost sure to
+come when the candles are lighted.
+
+We sat close together in the sitting-room, and took our very frugal
+supper there in quite a hysterical sort of cheerfulness.
+
+The day had passed without disaster, and we had been told that in case
+the "Yankees" should make their appearance during the night, and our
+garrison of three be obliged to evacuate the town, the village
+church-bell would be rung to apprize the citizens of the situation.
+
+No, we felt sure the enemy _could_ not come on Christmas eve. We even
+ventured to hang up our stockings in the accustomed place.
+
+We knelt, my brother and I, by dear old grandmother's knee, and said
+our prayers to Him who, she told us, knew what it was to spend His
+first Christmas days here under the shadow of the sword, and would not
+that one of His little ones should perish. Then tossed by hope and
+fear, we slept.
+
+It was a notable fact, but one which escaped comment in the general
+anxiety of that night, that Uncle Scipio had not appeared as usual,
+after his out-of-door tasks were finished. It had gone pretty hard
+with us all not to be able to confide everything to this faithful old
+friend; but the strictest injunctions had been laid upon us to keep
+the whole matter a secret from the negroes, for many reasons. So he
+knew nothing, and went about his tasks all day, singing his most
+dirge-like tunes, which meant some pleasant preoccupation of mind. We
+had learned that. We knew soon after what it was that occupied his
+heart and head that day.
+
+I do not know how long we had slept in our trundle bed, but I know I
+had travelled in my dreams over many leagues of fairy land, walking
+under endless avenues of lighted Christmas trees, when suddenly, I
+thought, from some unseen source, the deep tones of a bell struck
+discord on the radiant air. It seemed so out of place in that
+enchanted region; and at the sound all the lights on the trees
+flickered and went out, and we were lost in the dark. Louder and
+nearer the bell still sounded; and then we awoke and our hearts stood
+still with terror.
+
+We knew it was the village church-bell, proclaiming its story to the
+sleeping town. The enemy were upon us, and our Christmas fires would
+be the light of blazing homes. Oh, such awakening after such dreams!
+So eloquent was every face, of horrible certainty, that scarcely a
+word was spoken. It was only about midnight, but I was dressed by
+trembling hands--mother had not been undressed at all. And then we
+waited--for what? We could not have told precisely. But after a little
+the bell ceased to ring, and then we listened for the tramp of horses
+and the quick Northern voices speaking words of command to the men. We
+had heard it before, and knew the sound well. Once before I had
+awakened from sleep and seen the distorted shadows of horsemen chase
+one another across the strip of moonlight just over my bed, and looked
+from my window to see the moonlight glittering on the sabres and gun
+barrels of an armed host surrounding our house. That is not a sight to
+be forgotten, let me tell you, children who are born and reared in the
+lap of peace and plenty.
+
+For quite a while--it seemed ages to me--we sat in silence looking at
+one another. But though the lights twinkled in all the neighboring
+windows, telling of other anxious watchers, no unusual sound disturbed
+the air.
+
+What could it mean? Surprise began to succeed to alarm. It occurred to
+some one to call up Uncle Scipio, and get him to investigate. But it
+was wonder on top of wonder--he was not to be found; neither had his
+bed been disturbed during the night. Had he deserted us and gone over
+to the enemy, then? No, we could not really doubt him, even yet; but
+his absence was too significant; there must be some plot hatching
+somewhere in the dark.
+
+There was nothing for us to do but wait. But we had not to wait much
+longer; for presently in walked the absentee, clothed in his most
+majestic air, but a little non-plussed to see us all up and dressed.
+
+"Oh, Scipio! where have you been?" we exclaimed indignantly. "How
+could you leave us at such a time and the town full of soldiers? Which
+way are they coming? What shall we do?"
+
+"Well, I clar," he answered, in a bewildered sort of way, "dis yere
+proceedin' clean tops my cotton! Is you all clar outen yer minds, or
+what's de matter wid yer? I aint seed nary a Yankee dis night, and I
+jes bin way up to de Mef'dis chache, ringing de Christmas chimes fur
+to cheer you up a little. Did'n ole Scip tell you, honeys, dat dis was
+gwine to be de boss Christmas? And he done kep his word. I met ole
+Santy out yonder, sittin' on de pump and he sez he's comin' here
+soon's iver he kin; so you better git to bed 'mejitly, ef not sooner;
+ef you don't he'll be here and ketch you 'Christmas gif' fust, sho' he
+will."
+
+And so this was the end of it all. The dear old soul had taken it into
+his funny old head to give us a surprise and ring the Christmas chimes
+as in the old times.
+
+Well, we tried to soften the blow, when we told him what a blunder he
+had made; but we knew it would be a long time ere he would recover
+from his chagrin. He had long been a terror to the idle young darkies
+about town, and they were only too glad to get something to use
+against him. Of course there was general indignation among the
+citizens when they learned that they had suffered a false alarm; but
+when they considered the beautiful motive that prompted the action,
+the tide of reproach was turned aside, and it all ended in a general
+laugh at Uncle Scipio's expense.
+
+It still wanted several hours till day, when our fears were relieved
+by his appearance, and we went to bed again.
+
+With the first streak of light, however, we were up with bare feet and
+frowzy heads to find Uncle Scipio's promise had not failed us. The
+Christmas saint had been upon our hearthstone and left his footprints
+there. The stockings were as fantastically distended as ever in the
+palmiest times.
+
+I suppose the children of the present day would not covet the
+wonderful objects that we hauled forth from heel and toe. Yet I have
+spent many Christmas holidays amid the gayeties of the metropolis
+since then, and its richest gifts wax poor when I remember that
+morning. What did it matter to us that both toys and confections bore
+the stamp of home manufacture--little wooden dolls, like Chinese
+deities, carved out of wood by Uncle Scipio's jack knife--strange
+people baked in sweet bread with coffee grains for eyes? What did it
+matter that the war cloud hovered around us; that to-morrow might
+renew the scenes of yesterday? We were happy in our treasures. We
+know, now, what the charm was that made them precious, for we know
+that
+
+             "The painted vellum hallows not the prayer,
+             Nor ivory and gold the crucifix."
+
+Ah! that will ever be the day of days to me. And with it are enshrined
+in fadeless green, the names of many whose eyes have long been closed
+upon the wars and joys of this earth. Not the least dear among these
+will ever be old Scipio, who loved us better than his own freedom; who
+stood by us in the day of trial, and was faithful till death to the
+charge of a master who could never return to take account of his
+stewardship.
+
+He was grandiloquent, insisted on spectacles, though he generally read
+the hymns upside down; wore a collar on Sundays that would put our
+modern dudes to naught; but he was a prophet, for all that, and saw
+farther than most men into the future.
+
+We trust he has honor now in his own country; while in our hearts his
+memory will yearly ring the chimes of Christmas bells.
+
+Celine McCay.
+
+
+
+
+THE RESULT.
+
+(November 6th, 1888.)
+
+
+                   We have no longer Uncle Sam,
+                     Nor yet our Yankee-doodle;
+                   The first is but an Uncle Sham,
+                     The last is Yankee-boodle.
+
+James McCarroll.
+
+
+
+
+SILK CULTURE.
+
+
+"There are so many persons thirsting for information," I says to Mrs.
+Wrigglesniff, "let's tell them all about it." It was always my way to
+stir in something useful with what was agreeable; and here was an
+opportunity, while pursuing an avocation that was at once pleasant and
+lucrative, to bring forward at the same time, an illustration of those
+great economic and philosophic principles, that lie at the foundation
+of all government and are the ground-work of the social fabric. The
+tariff, although an intricate subject, I felt was one that could be
+elucidated by simple exemplification in practical life; and so I
+opened up to her one day, by remarking upon the great importance of
+fostering our "infant industries." That most efficient mother was
+nursing the baby at the time. The baby was four weeks old, weighed
+sixteen pounds, and could partake of more nourishment at nature's
+fountain, than any two ordinary pair of twins.
+
+"Infant industry! here's one now," observed Mrs. W., gazing with
+maternal fondness upon the lusty native American in her lap, who was
+tugging away with a zeal quite amazing.
+
+You should first understand, however, that Mrs. W. is a superior woman
+"as has got intellect into her," as her uncle John Fetherly Brown was
+wont to say. Her father's second cousin was a half-brother to Noah
+Webster, and she has, therefore, inherited some of the qualities of
+that distinguished philosopher. I proposed the subject to her one day,
+in a genial sort of a way, and she said, "W.," says she, "You're a
+fool! Silk indeed!" She always calls me "W.," as the whole of it makes
+it too long, and being a practical woman, she is aware that life is
+short. I could not help admiring the promptness with which Mrs. W.
+arrived at her conclusions; and as she is a most excellent judge of
+human nature, I changed the subject, not wishing to exasperate her.
+
+The way it came about was this. I had read all about it in the papers
+and books and things, and was thinking over it one day and all of a
+sudden I spoke up, and says I:
+
+"Mrs. W., let's have worms."
+
+She looked at me just that way for a minute, I thought there was going
+to be a funeral. So I said, says I, "We can get the eggs from
+Washington for nothing; then we can have the stands in the attic, and
+there's the osage-orange hedge, that does nothing in the world but
+keep the boys from stealing apples, and we have no apples to steal;
+the children can feed them, so that the total cost will be nothing. We
+can sell the cocoons at $1.50 a pound; and suppose we raise five
+hundred pounds only the first season; there's $750, which is
+absolutely clear profit, the whole of it. We can then buy a carriage,
+and we will give a ball, and 'ye shall walk in silk attire.'"
+
+Mrs. W. turned up her nose. In using that expression, I do not mean
+that she actually inverted that feature of her countenance, but the
+expression of her face indicated the idea which usually finds
+utterance in the word 'Rats.' At this point I took occasion to explain
+to Mrs. W. the relations of this most beautiful and fascinating
+industry to the principles of political economy. My amiable lady had
+frequently said it was all "bosh;" that to try to raise silk in this
+country was mere gammon. I explained to her that her position, as a
+philosophical proposition, would be true, were it not for the
+fostering care of a paternal government, which had inaugurated the
+American system of protection. That this great principle of protection
+was the source of our national wealth, that the tariff on silk was
+sixty per cent, and----
+
+"Tariff!" inquired Mrs. W., "what is tariff?"
+
+"Tariff, my dear," said I, "I am surprised. I had supposed that such
+an intellect as yours would have familiarized itself with the great
+economic questions of the day." But I did not wish to be too severe
+with her, as I remembered that the sphere of woman did not bring her
+into contact with these rugged issues that are the theme of
+philosophers and statesmen; so I explained briefly, but still kindly:
+
+"My dear, a tariff is a tax paid by the importer."
+
+To this she made the very singular reply: "But how is taxing a people
+going to make them rich, and be the source of national wealth? I know
+when tax day comes around, you are always groaning and saying that it
+keeps your nose flat on the grindstone, to raise money enough to pay
+your taxes." I told her she still failed to see the point, as she was
+referring to mere state taxes, while I, upon a higher plane, was
+viewing the comprehensive bearings of national institutions.
+
+"W.," she said, "you don't know any more about it than Horace Greeley
+did." Such a reference to the great apostle of American protection, I
+confess, shocked me; but I suppressed my feelings in consideration of
+her sex.
+
+I have said that Mrs. W. is a woman of intellect; but she has no
+enthusiasm. With me it is different. I am all enthusiasm and no--I was
+about to say no intellect; but I mean no such intellect as has Mrs.
+W.
+
+So she says: "That's the way you're always doing, W.; going into
+something you don't know anything about, throwing away your money; and
+that's about all you're fit for."
+
+"But, my love!" I exclaimed, "there's no chance to lose money in silk
+worms. You get them for nothing, feed them for nothing; and how is it
+possible to lose money on them, with the tariff at sixty per cent ad
+valorem?"
+
+"W.," she interrupted, "when you talk Latin to me, please explain
+yourself."
+
+Some people have thought that there was an asperity in Mrs. W.'s
+nature, that occasionally found expression in words, but it is not so.
+She is of most amiable disposition, and I never knew her to--if I may
+coin a word--to asperse. I, therefore, said that in the tariff laws,
+duties were levied upon the value of articles, as stated in the
+importer's invoice.
+
+"But," said she, "won't the importers value too low?"
+
+"Oh, my dear," I said, "that would be dishonest, and importers are
+never dishonest; indeed it is upon the virtue and integrity of the
+people that the welfare of our institutions depends." As I was about
+to expand upon this theme, my wife checked me with the remark that we
+would take the American eagle and the rest of it, at another time, but
+just now we would hear about the silk worms. I told her I had made all
+necessary arrangements, and would that day write to the "Department"
+at Washington, and secure the necessary supply of eggs to commence a
+flourishing business. I did so and in due time I received from the
+capital of the nation, a nice little wooden box, and inside of that
+another little tin box, and inside of that were the eggs. They were
+about as big as pin's heads and it looked as though there were
+millions, but I don't suppose there were that many.
+
+I exhibited them with pride to the partner of my bosom, exclaiming,
+"Such is the fostering care of a paternal government, it raises these
+eggs at vast expense, and bestows them liberally upon those who ask."
+I then explained to Mrs. W. how it was that our glorious republic
+nursed those infant industries that were so delicate they could not
+stand alone; supporting them with great assiduity, inasmuch as they
+could not support themselves. I showed her how employment was thus
+furnished to thousands of persons, who would otherwise be idle, or
+engaged in some other occupation that was able to take care of itself;
+of course, therefore, making wages lower. I contrasted the condition
+of the American laborer, with that of the European serf, trodden under
+the iron heel of despotism, at ten cents a day, and satisfied her that
+the laboring man in the United States was the best paid, and therefore
+the happiest and most contented being on earth, owing to the fact of a
+protective tariff, ever since 1789.
+
+"W.," exclaimed that angelic creature, "why is it, then, that the
+workingmen are always striking and marching around town with brass
+bands? First shoemakers, then carpenters and railroad men, and
+stone-masons, and iron-molders, and hod-carriers--all wanting higher
+wages. Where does the happiness and content come in? I heard you say,
+yourself, the other day, that the disorganized system of labor was
+such in this country, that it was degenerating into socialism and
+anarchy and was ruining every branch of business."
+
+I hated to do it, but I crushed her with the reply: "Ah! my dear, that
+is begging the question."
+
+But that sweet creature, unruffled as a summer sea, preserved an
+equanimity that astounded me, as she said: "Why is it, W., that
+whenever a woman corners a man in argument, he simply ends the
+discussion by telling her she is 'begging the question?'" Seeing that
+she did not exactly catch the drift of my logic, I adroitly turned the
+subject to silk-worms again, and how we should proceed in our
+enterprise.
+
+"Now," said I to Mrs. W., "I will procure the necessary lumber, at
+usual market rates, and make a stand on which to lay the frames."
+
+She observed: "You know, W., you never made anything in your life and
+can't do it. Go up to the carpenter and he will do what you want for
+fifty cents, and you can't buy the lumber for that."
+
+"Mrs. W.," I replied, "I scorn your words. I propose that this
+undertaking shall be absolutely inexpensive, except, perhaps, the
+outlay for the raw material."
+
+"Very well," she observed, "try it." My! what a head that woman has. I
+took a book that had a picture of the stand I wanted, and took the
+dimensions carefully down; went to the lumber yard, selected the
+pieces, and they cost only $1.25; went home, measured, planned, and
+figured, and found that I had ordered the upright cut the length of
+the cross pieces, and _vice-versa_, so that the whole was useless. My
+disposition, however, is to take cheerful views of things, and I
+explained to Mrs. W. that I could still use the stuff for pickets on
+the front fence, some of which were missing. Mrs. W. quietly observed:
+"How are you going to use four-foot pickets on a six-foot fence?"
+
+When I purchased the second lot I was very careful to proceed
+deliberately. I am a good deal of a carpenter, if things would only
+come out square when finished: but they never will. When I saw a
+board, somehow the saw runs off to one side, and when I try to nail it
+to the other board, the two won't fit; and by the time I get around to
+the fourth side, one end of the concern is up in the air, and I have
+to sit on it to keep it down. I have often gazed with admiration on a
+real carpenter, to see him run his saw along, straight as a string and
+true as a die, and then put the pieces all together and have them fit,
+nice as a cotton hat. This is true genius.
+
+Sensible of the danger and liability to mistake in putting the pieces
+together, I told Mrs. W., who was superintending the operation, that
+we would not use nails, but screws, so that in case of error--and all
+human judgment is fallible--we could take the screws out and take the
+pieces apart, which could not be done with nails. Mrs. W. conceded the
+suggestion to be a valuable one. So we went to work, she kindly
+lending her assistance. I measured all the pieces, got them the exact
+length, and for the greater certainty, stood them up on the floor to
+see if they would all fit. They certainly seemed to do so, as far as
+mortal vision could determine. As all this required a great deal of
+deliberation, a great deal of measuring, a great deal of sawing, some
+chiselling, etc., the hour of sunset was approaching when I had put in
+the last screw, and triumphantly called Mrs. W. from her afternoon nap
+to witness the success of my mechanical endeavors. I stood the blamed
+thing up on its four legs, and three of 'em were on the floor, and the
+fourth wasn't. It was impossible for me to discover the defect in my
+workmanship. I could make any three of the legs stand on the floor,
+but the fourth could not be prevailed upon for any consideration. The
+cross-pieces, which should have been horizontal, and which, to that
+end, had been measured with mathematical precision, slanted up on one
+side and slanted down on the other. I was in despair, until Mrs. W.
+brought her intellect to bear upon my difficulties; when it appeared
+that three of the uprights were four feet six inches high, and the
+fourth was four feet seven inches. How it happened no one could
+explain.
+
+"Now, W.," says Mrs. W., "send for the carpenter." I did so. He
+came--a rough, totally uncultured man. He could barely write his name
+and his clothes were principally suspenders. But that uneducated man
+just took these pieces of wood, and knocked them here, and knocked
+them there, and, by aid of some disreputable shingle nails, in twenty
+minutes had as neat looking a stand made as ever you saw come out of a
+cabinet maker's shop. I was abashed and paid him twenty-five cents.
+Mrs. W. said nothing, but smiled.
+
+We had some frames, about two feet square, covered with brown paper.
+These we placed on the stand and spread out the eggs. I was a little
+uneasy about what kind of a hen to get to hatch them, as I could find
+nothing in the books on the subject; but Mrs. W. called me my usual
+pet name, and said that the first warm day was all the hen needed.
+Wonderful woman that! Just as she predicted! In a few days the brown
+paper was covered with little dark specks in a state of agitation.
+Mrs. W. spoke of them contemptuously as "nasty black worms."
+
+They grew at a prodigious rate. I explained to the children that all
+they had to do was to go down to the osage-orange hedge, cut off the
+twigs and branches, and feed them to the worms; that in a few weeks
+the product would be ready for market, and if the Mills bill didn't
+interfere with protection to American industry, the profits would be
+large, and should be equally divided between themselves and their
+mother. The children were highly elated and were soon discussing what
+should be the color of the carriage horses. One wanted black, the
+other blue; and the excitement ran so high that parental intervention
+became necessary and some spanking ensued. The next morning our early
+dreams were disturbed by fearful outcries from the direction of the
+front fence. The smallest of the children had tumbled head first into
+the osage-orange hedge, and could not get out. Anyone who knows the
+infernal, brutal intensity with which the thorns of the osage-orange
+sting, can understand the predicament of that child. We extracted her
+in a fearfully lacerated condition. She was punctured all over. Having
+read in a book entitled "Three Thousand Valuable Receipts, for
+Twenty-five Cents," that ammonia was good for stings, I applied
+ammonia liberally to that bleeding child, until she became absolutely
+frantic. Her screams attracted Mrs. W. to the scene, and she
+exclaimed:
+
+"Have you no more sense than to put ammonia on raw flesh like that?" I
+pointed to the "Three Thousand Valuable Receipts, for Twenty-five
+Cents," which she immediately picked up and threw out of the window.
+The child ultimately recovered, but from that day abhorred silk
+culture in all its branches. Still the industry went on. The children
+were so stung by the thorns that the work devolved on me, and it was a
+task most fearful. There is a poison in the thorn of the osage-orange
+that not only makes the pain exquisite, but swells one up as though he
+had been stung all over by bees, or had chronic dropsy. My hands and
+arms were puffed up, and my face looked as though I had been in a
+prize-fight. As I observed to Mrs. W., however, these were minor
+difficulties, and we could put up with them in consideration of the
+large profits which would ensue. One day one of the servants--they are
+always going around and turning things up side down--left one of the
+frames on the floor, and all the worms, to the number of several
+hundred, scattered themselves profusely about the house, and without
+any reference to the comfort or convenience of the family. If you
+opened the flour barrel, there was a silk worm. They pervaded the
+sugar and crawled into the cream. You found them in bed and the mash
+was awful. How many were trodden into the parlor carpet can never be
+known. This, too, was but an episode; and as the worms grew in size
+and began to spin their cocoons, the process was quite interesting,
+and even Mrs. W. overcame her repugnance to the crawling little
+wretches.
+
+I was startled one day, as I was feeding my silk-worms, who were
+consuming the osage-orange leaves at the rate of a bushel a day,
+making two bushels of litter, to hear Mrs. W. abruptly ask:
+
+"W., what is a consumer?" The unexpectedness of the interrogation
+found me at fault for a moment; but reflecting a little while and
+looking at the silk-worms, I concluded the best way to put it was: "A
+consumer, my dear, is--well, a consumer in this country is one who
+consumes." Thinking that no exception could be taken to such a
+definition, I was triumphant.
+
+"W.," said that pertinacious person, "you don't hang together well, if
+any. You said the other day that this tariff thing was for the benefit
+of the producer, etc."
+
+"My dear," I replied, "I seize the occasion. 'My foot is on my native
+heath, and my name is McGregor.' When our industries were in their
+infancy, it was found impossible to compete with foreign productions.
+Labor was so cheap abroad that they could undersell us in our own
+markets. We had laid the foundation of a broad, comprehensive
+manufacturing interest; we had taken men from agricultural and other
+pursuits, where they earned a livelihood, and put them in new and
+strange employments, about which they knew nothing, where they
+expected to earn more than a livelihood. But this could not be done on
+account of prices. So government imposed high duties, and the producer
+sold his articles for a higher price. In this way he was benefited and
+enabled to make money. The tariff added just so much to the price of
+the article sold, and the producer was happy."
+
+"But who paid this extra price?" queried Mrs. W.
+
+"Well," I replied, "it is a principle of political economy, I believe,
+that all taxes are paid ultimately by the consumer, so that in a case
+of this kind--"
+
+"The consumer is the American people," interrupted Mrs. W.
+
+"My dear," I cried, "once more I am compelled to observe, you are
+begging the question."
+
+"Mendicant again," was her arch reply, and a cry from the nursery
+ended the discussion.
+
+In about six weeks we had the cocoons. Of course, during that time the
+house was littered with dirt, dried leaves, and all sorts of unclean
+things; and if you ran about the premises in the dark, barefooted, you
+were sure to step on an osage-orange twig; and I am satisfied, from
+the amount of squalling done, that if the season had lasted six months
+most of the children would have been exterminated.
+
+I corresponded with some concern in one of the eastern cities, stating
+that I had a large amount of fine cocoons, and wanting to know what
+they would pay. I observed to Mrs. W. that I was confident of
+receiving a reply to the effect that I should ship the cocoons, draw
+at sight for five hundred dollars, leaving the balance to be paid as
+per account sales.
+
+The reply was, to send on half-a-pound as a sample, and they would see
+if they could take them. When we came to weigh out half-a-pound, both
+Mrs. W. and I were appalled. It took about two bushels--nearly, if not
+quite, half of the entire crop. However, they were sent, and Mrs. W.
+snickered as she did up the package.
+
+In the course of several weeks I received a specimen, say about a
+skein, of the most beautiful silk I had ever beheld, with an
+order to forward the balance of the cocoons per Adams Express, which
+I did at the expense of one dollar. Waited several months for
+acknowledgement of receipt, wrote various letters, the postage on
+which was two cents each. As considerable time elapsed while we were
+"waiting for the returns," and as I was determined that Mrs. W.
+should understand this great subject of the tariff, as I knew she
+could if she gave her mind to it, I proceeded to eviscerate the
+whole matter. Said I, "When a tariff is laid upon a manufactured
+article, it enables the manufacturer in this country to pay his
+workmen higher wages."
+
+"And does he always do it?" said Mrs. W.
+
+"Always," I replied. "Statistics show that when the tariff on iron was
+increased twenty per cent the manufacturers of iron immediately raised
+the wages of all their employés twenty per cent."
+
+"I see," said that clear-headed woman, "what excellent persons these
+iron men are. They do not hire their men for as little as they can,
+but pay them more than they want."
+
+"Exactly so," I replied; "the general rule I admit to be that a man
+pays as little as he can for labor; but under the protective system,
+the tariff increases the price of the manufactured article, so that
+the manufacturer is enabled to sell his goods for that higher price,
+and the workman thus gets the benefit of it."
+
+This argument seemed to have great weight with her, as it gave her new
+light on things, for she said it was contrary to experience; but I
+explained to her that unless some flaw could be found in the
+syllogism, the conclusion was irresistible, all experience to the
+contrary notwithstanding. I then showed her how entirely disinterested
+the manufacturers were; that all their efforts were solely for the
+benefit of the workmen; that, personally, the tariff made no
+difference to them; that they never besought Congress to lay high
+tariffs; that no one ever knew of the iron men, or the sugar men, or
+the copper men, besieging the legislators at Washington to impose
+duties upon articles they made; that it was the workmen who always did
+it.
+
+I do not know exactly how long it was that we waited to receive our
+fortune from those cocoons, but one day a postal card came to hand
+from the parties to whom I had sent my wealth, stating that they had
+received so many cocoons they could not tell which mine were. Inasmuch
+as mine were the only ones that had ever been shipped from the town
+wherein I reside, it occurred to me that this remark might be
+considered in the nature of a joke. Then there followed another
+voluminous correspondence. I appealed to Adams Express Company, who
+said they would send out a "tracer"; I did not like to betray my
+ignorance by showing that I did not know what a tracer was, but,
+frankly, I should not have known one had I met it on the street. But
+with the infinite knowledge of affairs that Mrs. W. has, that
+remarkable woman signified to me that a tracer was something that goes
+up and down and to and fro upon the face of the earth, like a roaring
+lion, seeking something, and not generally finding it. It is an
+immense consolation, however, to railroad men and others; for it
+appears that after a "tracer" has been "sent out," nothing more can,
+by any possibility, be done by anybody. Whether or not the tracer had
+anything to do with the final result I never knew. But about six
+months after I had transmitted my cocoons to that large silk
+manufacturing house that paid such large wages to American workmen for
+the purpose of fostering American industry, I received a note sending
+a balance-sheet, and enclosing a check for eighty-eight cents.
+
+When I received this portentous paper, I observed to Mrs. W.: "My
+dear, how much do you suppose we got for our cocoons?" "About
+seventy-five cents," was the reply. The mind that woman has for detail
+is simply wonderful.
+
+The check I have had framed, and hung up in the parlor, but when I
+balanced the books, I still found the profit large, thus:
+
+    Dr.                _W. in Acc't with Silk Worms._              Cr.
+  =======================================================================
+  1887.   |                   |       | 1888.|                   |
+          |                   |       |      |                   |
+  Jan. 1, | Cash p'd lumber   |  $2 00| Feb. | By acc't sales    |  $0 88
+   "   "  |  "    "  carpenter|     25|  "   | " amt. experience |
+          |                   |       |      |    gained         | 500 00
+  Sept. 1,|  "    "  express  |     50|      |                   |
+  Nov.    |  "    "     "     |   1 00|      |                   |
+  1888.   |                   |       |      |                   |
+  Feb.    |  "    "  postage  |     20|      |                   |
+          |      Profit       | 496 93|      |                   |
+          |                   |-------|      |                   |-------
+          |                   |$500 88|      |                   |$500 88
+
+D. Thew Wright.
+
+
+
+
+IS MARRIAGE A FAILURE?
+
+                  How like the ague is this boon
+                    Of matrimonial strife!
+                  The fever ends in one short moon,
+                    The chill runs on through life.
+
+
+
+
+EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT.
+
+
+THE COMMUNISM OF CAPITAL.
+
+The President in his late and last message to Congress calls
+attention, in his incisive and felicitous style, to a condition of our
+people that must strike all intelligent minds with alarm. The
+corner-stone in the foundation of communism is that agency of the
+government which makes of the sovereign power that legal process which
+controls all private affairs for the good of the people. In popular
+phrase, it upholds the paternal form which enters every man's house
+and regulates by law all his transactions. This is the foundation,
+while the holding of property in common is rather a consequence than a
+cause. If there are no rights pertaining to the citizen but those
+derived from government, to give practical effect to the scheme all
+property owned by the government must be held in its care in common by
+its dependents.
+
+Heretofore this theory has been advocated by the poor and oppressed,
+and stoutly resisted by the rich. We are treated to a reversal of
+position in the parties, and the rich are practically pressing the
+scheme upon the poor.
+
+Jefferson, the father of modern democracy, taught that the government,
+a mere form of expression, in the way of rule, by the people, who held
+the sovereignty was only a trust of power, instituted for the sole
+purpose of keeping the peace between the citizens. To use a popular
+phrase, it was nothing but the intervention of the constable.
+
+Our central government, not being built altogether upon this broad yet
+simple proposition, opened in its mixed nature the door to communism
+found in the paternal form. Indeed, it would have been entirely
+divested of the Jeffersonian theory had it not been for the necessity
+under which the framers found themselves of conciliating the States,
+that then jealously fought every proposition looking to a deprivation
+of their sovereign rights. All that we so happily gained then came
+from a regard to the several States and not to any thought of popular
+rights.
+
+This fact gave us a Constitution under which, we have managed to
+live, comparatively prosperous, for a century. Had it been otherwise,
+our Constitution would have gone to pieces in the first twenty-five
+years of its existence. A constitution is a legal recognition of
+certain general rules of conduct that are ever the same under all
+circumstances. Legislation is the adaptation of those rules to
+individual cases; and as these vary and change with continuously
+new conditions, a fixed application in a constitution is impossible.
+For this restriction, as far as it goes, we have to thank the States
+and not the sagacity of the fathers.
+
+The Constitution was scarcely enacted before the communism of a
+paternal form began to manifest itself. The Federal party was of this
+sort. It sneered at and fought the sovereignty of the people, and
+found its governing element in a class that was supposed to hold
+in itself the intelligence and virtue of the people. It has
+departed and been done to death, not by the people, who failed to
+comprehend or feel the situation, but by the same cause that
+created the Constitution,--and that was the jealous opposition of
+the States to a centralization of power at Washington.
+
+After the death of the Federal party the Whig organization was formed,
+on the same line and for the same purpose as those of its Federal
+predecessor. Henry Clay, its author, an eloquent but ignorant man,
+formulated his American system, that was a small affair in the
+beginning, but had deadly seeds of evil in its composition. Mr. Clay
+saw the necessity for manufactures in the United States; and as
+capital necessary to their existence in private hands could not be
+obtained, he proposed that the government should intervene through a
+misuse of the taxing power and supply the want. It was a modest want
+at first. "Let us aid these infant industries," he said, "until they
+are strong enough to stand alone, and then the government may withdraw
+and leave competition to regulate prices." It was a plausible but
+insidious proposition.
+
+This was fought bitterly by the South, not altogether from a high
+ground of principle, although the argument was made that the
+government at Washington had no such power under the Constitution, but
+the main motive was self-interest. The South was an agricultural
+region, and found in cotton, rice, sugar, and tobacco staples that had
+their better, indeed their only, market in Europe, and saw no sense in
+trammelling it with laws to benefit Eastern capital. The American
+system was having a rough time and bidding fair to die out, when the
+sectional issue between the North and South culminated in war, and
+driving not only the South but the democracy from the government, left
+the paternal party in power.
+
+This organization was made up mainly of Whigs. The abrupt dissolution
+of that party threw in the newly formed Republican organization the
+majority that from the first until now has governed its movements. How
+patriotic a party founded on property is, we learn from its first act
+after securing control of Congress. In the terrible war that followed
+secession, the greatest of dangers that threatened success was in
+European interference. Common sense, to say nothing of patriotism,
+dictated that Congress should at least abstain from measures likely to
+offend the governments abroad, if it did not do all in its power to
+conciliate. Greed recognized no such duty. Almost the first measure of
+any importance introduced and passed to a law was the Morrill tariff,
+that slapped the greatest war powers of Europe in the face. Under
+pretence of raising a war revenue, they made a deadly attack on
+resource from that source, for they well knew that as they increased
+the duties they lessened the income.
+
+The panic and distress that followed this measure in all the markets
+of the world can well account for the deadly hostility to our
+government felt abroad. Small wonder that while arms were furnished
+the South in the greatest abundance, cruisers were fitted out in
+English ports to prey upon our helpless commerce. The greater danger
+of official recognition was only averted by the stubborn stand taken
+by Great Britain; and as it was, we now know that had the South been
+able to continue the war ninety days longer that intervention would
+have come. A French army, sent there for that purpose, would have
+invaded our lands from Mexico, while the fleets of allied France and
+England would have dissipated our so-called blockade, lifted the
+Confederacy's financial credit to par, and we would have been called
+on to make terms of peace at Philadelphia.
+
+All this gathered evil was shattered at Nashville by the gallant
+Thomas and his noble Army of the Cumberland, when he not only defeated
+the fifty thousand veterans under Hood, but annihilated an army.
+
+This was the birth of the communism of wealth that is to govern our
+country for the next four years. Of course it is absurd to charge
+nearly a half of our people with corrupt motives and unpatriotic
+conduct. We have no such intent. We are only striving to show that the
+success of the Republican policy is fatal to the Republic. This party,
+as we have said, is in no sense a political organization. It is a
+great combination of private interests that seek to use the government
+to further their own selfish ends. Governments through all the ages
+have been the deadly enemies of the people they governed. Ours,
+controlled by the Republican party, makes no exception to the rule.
+The gigantic trusts, or combinations, are eating the substance out of
+honest toil, and back of them stands the awful shadow of a powerful
+organization making those trusts possible, and doing to the people
+precisely the cruel wrong it was created to prevent. Palaces multiply
+as hovels increase; and while millionaires are common, the million
+sink back to that hopeless poverty of destitution that has the name of
+freedom, as a mockery to their serfdom.
+
+
+THE INFAMY OF IT.
+
+For years past it has become more and more patent to the people of the
+United States that the ballot has come to be a commercial affair, and
+instead of serving its original purpose of a process through which to
+express the popular will, represents only the money expended in its
+use. For a long time it was abused through stuffing, false counts,
+repeating, and switching tickets. In the late Presidential election we
+seemed to have passed from that stage to open and shameless bribery.
+
+This is simply appalling to those who love their country and believe
+in our great Republic. The old system of roguery that attacked the
+integrity of the ballot was that of a few low villains, who could be
+met by an improved box and other stringent, legalized guards that
+would make the vile practices difficult, and punishment easily
+secured. But this open purchase of votes indicates a poison in the
+spring head itself, and a consent found in the apathy of the public.
+
+What good would be the Australian system, that seeks to shield the
+secret ballot, where the official agents themselves would of course
+be corrupt and purchasable? Under this system the voter entering a
+stall by himself finds an official to give him such ticket as he may
+demand. What will be the good of this when that agent can be
+purchased? We really simply give the corruption into the hands of the
+corruptionists through the very enactment called in to protect us.
+
+Our unhappy condition is recognized. There is not a man, woman, or
+child in our country possessed of any brain but knows that Benjamin
+Harrison was elected President by open, wholesale bribery. Mr. Foster
+advertised this in his well-known circulars wherein he called for
+funds, and quoted Senator Plumb as saying that the manufacturers ought
+to be squeezed. And why should they be squeezed?--because, he said,
+they are the sole beneficiaries of the one measure at issue in the
+canvass. This was followed by Senator Ingalls' famous advice to the
+delegate at the Chicago convention, which said, "Nominate some such
+fellow as Phelps, who can tap Wall Street." This was followed by the
+Dudley circular directing the purchase of "floaters in blocks of five
+or more," and assuring those dishonest agents that the funds would not
+be wanting to close the purchase.
+
+Under this exhibit of evidence the fact cannot be denied; but to make
+it conclusive, the New York _World_ has gathered from all parts of the
+country clear, unmistakable proof of wide-spread, clearly planned, and
+openly executed purchase of voters.
+
+The chair of the Chief Executive has followed the seats of Senators to
+the market, and that highest gift of the citizen has been sold to the
+highest bidder. The great political fabric of the fathers, built from
+woful expenditure of patriotic effort and blood, is honeycombed with
+rot, and remains, a mere sham, to shame us before the world.
+
+Of course we are not so silly as to attach blame only to one party.
+The difference between the two lies in the fact that the one had more
+money than the other, and a stronger motive for its use. The
+Republicans being a "combine" of property interests, depending upon
+the government to make those interests profitable, were impelled to
+exertion far beyond the Democrats, who were struggling for the power
+only that a possession of the government brings. But we are forced to
+remember that the votes purchased came from the Democratic party. Said
+a prominent Democrat of Indiana to the writer of this: "We had enough
+money to purchase the State had we known the nature of the market, and
+possessed agents upon whom we could rely. The agents of our opponents
+were preachers, deacons, elders, class-leaders, and teachers in
+Sunday-schools, and could be relied on to use their swag as directed.
+Our fellows put our money in their pockets, and left the voting to
+care for itself. And then, again, while we were on the lookout for
+repeaters, pipe-layers, and ballot-box stuffers, they were in open
+market purchasing votes. We learned the nature of the business when
+too late to meet it, had we even had the means to make our knowledge
+available."
+
+No doubt this gentleman told the truth. The sums subscribed, that
+counted in the millions, came from men not only of means, but of high
+social positions, who, not being altogether idiots, well knew the
+purpose for which their ample means were assessed. That able and
+honorable gentleman, Judge Gresham, whose well-known courage and
+integrity rendered him unavailable as a candidate for the Presidency
+at Chicago, points openly to these respectable corruptionists as the
+real wrong doers. It is more than probable that such may escape the
+penitentiary, and it is poor comfort to know that when such die
+lamented, their souls, in the great hereafter, will have to be
+searched for with a microscope.
+
+The pretence offered for such assessments is too thin to cover the
+corrupt design. Says a prominent editor of the political criminals:
+
+"The legitimate expenses of a national political canvass have come to
+be enormous. There is a great educational work to be done; a vast
+literature to be created and circulated; an army of speakers to be
+brought into the field; various organizations to be made and
+mobilized; machinery to be perfected for getting out the full vote;
+safeguards to be provided against fraud: all the immense enginery for
+persuading and marshalling at every fighting point the last score
+among six million voters."
+
+The comments upon this made by the New York _Evening Post_ are so to
+the point, and conclusive, that we quote them in full. The _Post_
+says:
+
+"Well, now, this being so, why did Wanamaker and Quay, when they had
+finished their noble work, burn their books and accounts? Missionary,
+tract, and Bible societies for mutual improvement and for aid to home
+study, lyceums and lecturing associations, not to speak of charitable
+and philanthropic associations, do not, after six months of unusual
+activity, commit all their papers, vouchers, and books of accounts to
+the flames. No such thing is ever thought of in Wanamaker's Bethel
+Sunday-school. Why, then, was it done by the Advisory Committee?
+Religious and educational organizations, such as the Advisory
+Committee seems to have been, on the contrary, when they have raised a
+large sum of money and spent it in worthy ways are usually eager to
+preserve and spread the record of it, that others coming after them
+may be encouraged to do likewise. In fact, the more one reflects on
+the Wanamaker-Quay holocaust, the more mysterious it seems."
+
+This election of a chief magistrate, that shook the great republic
+from centre to circumference, was but a continuation of the corrupt
+system that began some years since, and is known to the public as that
+of "addition, division, and silence."
+
+This condition of the polls is no menace to our government. That
+period is gone. It is a loss of all. The ballot is the foundation
+corner-stone of the entire political fabric. Its passage to the hands
+of corrupt dealers is simply ruin. We may not realize this, but we do
+realize the contempt into which it has fallen. When the new President
+swings along Pennsylvania Avenue to the Capitol to be inaugurated,
+upon the side of his carriage should be printed what history with its
+cold, unbiased fingers will put to record:
+
+                 "BO'T FOR TWO MILLIONS OF DOLLARS."
+
+
+THE PULPIT CULT.
+
+In the days of our Saviour the rich man of Jerusalem would, on a
+Sabbath morning, bathe and anoint his body, and putting on fine linen
+and wearing-apparel, move in a dignified fashion to the synagogue,
+feeling that he was serving God by making God respectable in the eyes
+of men.
+
+The proneness of poor human nature to lose in the mere form that for
+which the form was created to serve is the same throughout the world,
+and through all the ages, evolution to the contrary notwithstanding.
+As our physical being is, and has been, and will ever be about the
+same, our spiritual suffers little change. When Adam and Eve, leaving
+the garden of Eden, encountered the typhoid fever, that dread disease
+had the same symptoms, made the same progress to death or recovery,
+that puzzles the physicians to-day. That horrible but curious growth
+we call cancer was the same six thousand years ago that it is in this
+nineteenth century. The sicknesses of the soul are the same in all
+climes and in the presence of all creeds.
+
+Said a witty ordained infidel who preached the salvation of unbelief
+many years at London, on visiting a business men's prayer meeting:
+"Our merchants may not be Jews in their dealings, but they are
+certainly Hebrews in their prayers."
+
+The form has survived the substance. We have retained the customs
+and phraseology, while losing the meaning. As the rich men of
+Jerusalem who on the Sabbath thronged the Temple and were solemnly
+earnest in their prayers, returned to their cheating the day after,
+so we give unto God one-seventh part of our time and devote the rest
+to the practices of Satan. We are full of wrath and disgust at the
+Sunday-school cashier who appropriates the money of other people and,
+unable longer to conceal his thefts, flees to Canada. This is
+unjust. The poor man was not less pious than his president or his
+directors who neglected their duties and in many cases shared in
+the luxury. His crime was not in what he did, but in being caught at
+it before he could carry out his intent to replace the funds from his
+successful speculations. He saw in the leaders of his little
+congregation in the Lord, millionaires who had made all they
+possessed through fraud, and why should he, with the best intentions,
+not accumulate a modest competence through the same means? He
+heard nothing to the contrary from the pulpit. The eloquent divine
+told, in winning words, of the righteousness of right and the
+sinfulness of sin, but the illustrations were all, or nearly all,
+two thousand years old, and the words were the words of Isaiah and
+the prophets. To denounce the sins of to-day in "the vulgar tongue"
+would be to offend the millionaires of the congregation and lessen
+the salary of the worthy divine.
+
+The late Chief Justice Chase once startled the writer of this by
+saying: "The wicked men are not in the penitentiary, they are in the
+churches. The criminals we convict are not wicked, they are simply
+weak--weak in character and weak in intellect. The men from whom
+society suffers are the cold, selfish, calculating creatures who not
+only keep clear of the courts but seek the churches, and deceive
+others as they deceive themselves and hope to deceive the Almighty."
+
+Sin is never so dangerous as when it gets to be respectable. The
+sanction of law, whether it gets to be such through custom or legal
+enactment, so nearly resembles the order of God that we accept it as
+such, and if it furthers our selfish greed we take it gladly.
+
+The moral code, like that of municipal law, is made up of a few simple
+rules, easily understood, and the trouble comes in on the practice of
+the one and the application of the other. That church is divine which
+subordinates the rule to the practice, and has works as well as faith
+to testify to its commission. That is the true religion which leaves
+the sanctuary with the believer, and is with him at all hours, eats at
+his table, sleeps in his bed, and accompanies him to his labor. It
+never leaves him alone.
+
+How we have separated the two, the precept from practice, this pulpit
+cult bears evidence. The high-toned infidel and lofty agnostic sneer
+at the humble Catholic who, in deepest contrition, confesses his sins
+to his spiritual adviser and goes forth relieved, probably to fall
+again. How much better it is to attend divine worship one day in
+seven, put on a grave countenance, and listen to eloquent discourses,
+more eloquent prayers, and heavenly music, and then go out with no
+thought of religion until the next Sunday returns for a like
+performance!
+
+Two thirds of what comes under the head of moral conduct in one is
+pure selfishness. A man may be honest in his dealing, honorable in his
+conduct, a good citizen, a loving husband, and an affectionate father,
+and yet be without kindness, charity, faith, hope--in a word, all that
+brought Christ upon earth in His mission of peace.
+
+One summer and autumn we lived at a mountain resort on the line of a
+great railroad. We saw, day after day, long lines of cattle-cars
+crowded with their living freight in a three-hundred-mile pull of
+intensest agony. The poor beasts were jammed against each other,
+unable to lie down,--to get under the hoofs of the others was
+death,--fighting, hungry, in the last stages of thirst, panting with
+tongues protruded, and their beautiful eyes staring with that
+expression of wild despair which the scent of blood brings to them,
+they rolled on to their far-off slaughter-houses with moans that were
+heart-breaking.
+
+It was our fortune that same autumn to meet one of the cattle-merchants
+at church. He was there with his family. A stout, middle-aged man of
+eminent respectability, he was a church-member, and looked up to as a
+model citizen. We saw him listening to the eloquent sermon, and
+wondered if there were not a low, deep undertone of agony running
+through the discourse. When the prayers were offered up he knelt
+humbly, and covered his face with his hands. Did they shut out the
+wild, despairing eyes of those suffering beasts?
+
+Yet how amazed would that estimable citizen have been had his minister
+said to him: "You are railroading your soul to hell. Every moan of
+those tortured animals goes up to God for record. You are freighting
+disease to great cities, and the fevers and death are yet to be
+answered for by you--wretched sinner!"
+
+There is not a fashionable church in any city of our land that has not
+within gunshot of its door great masses of starving, sinful,
+poverty-stricken humanity. Crowded into tenement-houses, from the damp
+cellars to the hot garrets, they make one wonder, not that they die,
+but that they live. No eloquent discourse on the righteousness of
+right and the sinfulness of sin; no well-balanced sentences of
+prayers, sent up on perfumed air to our heavenly Father; no deep-toned
+thunder set to music in hymns, ever reach their ears, or could, if
+they did, carry consolation to the sorrowful, or curing to the sick.
+And yet, from marble pulpits to velvet-cushioned pews, the work goes
+on.
+
+We beg pardon: it does not go on. The well-meaning divines complain of
+non-attendance. They are startled by the fact that not one-tenth of
+our population of sixty millions are really attending church-members.
+What can be done to popularize the pulpit? There is but one way, and
+that is to make the people desire to attend. Time was when the great
+truths of Christianity were new to the human race. The multitudes were
+eager to hear of the revelation, and the Church sent out its
+missionaries to preach and teach mankind. So far as a knowledge of
+these truths is concerned, the civilized people have been taught.
+There is not a criminal in jail to-day but knows more theology than
+St. Paul. The people are weary of this everlasting thrash of
+theological chaff. The civilized world is fairly saturated with
+preaching, which has come to be stale, flat, and in every sense
+unprofitable.
+
+Instead of asking the people to come to the church, let the church go
+to the people. This is the secret of the sneers attending the Catholic
+faith. There is, with it, very little preaching, but a great deal of
+practice. Its orphan asylums, its homes for the aged poor, its
+hospitals, to say nothing of its great body of devoted priests and
+holy sisters of charity, tell why it is that its temples are thronged,
+and its conversions almost miraculous.
+
+It is a grave error to suppose that true religion is to be advanced
+through the intellect. It makes its appeal to the heart. If it is not
+a refuge to the woful wayfarers of earth, it is nothing. If the
+sorrowful may not find comfort; they who are in pain, patience and
+hope; if the poor may not get sympathy and aid, and the dying
+consolation, it is of doubtful good.
+
+As for the preaching, all that we can say is, that when one produces
+evidence and proceeds to argue, he admits a doubt that neither
+evidence nor argument is of avail. God's truths call for no evidence.
+If they are not self-evident, no process of poor human reason can
+make them visible. An argument in behalf of such is a confession and a
+defeat. The man who undertakes to prove that the sun shines is insane
+and a bore.
+
+The pulpit work of worthy divines who think aloud upon their legs has
+lost its attraction in losing its novelty. They imitate the late Henry
+Ward Beecher. And these immediate divines are filling their churches
+as merely platform-lecturers indulging in certain mental gymnastics
+that glitter and glisten like a winter's sun on fields of ice. It is
+all brilliant and amusing to a few, but it is not religion.
+
+
+A BEAUTIFUL LIFE.
+
+"Died at New York, 28th of November, 1888, Mrs. Eleanor Boyle
+Sherman."
+
+The above simple announcement of a sad event was read through more
+tears than usually fall to the lot of one whose unassuming, quiet life
+was passed in the privacy of a purely domestic existence. This not
+because she was the wife of a noted officer, nor the daughter of one
+of Ohio's most famous statesmen, but for the excellence of her
+character and the Christian spirit of her retired career, that made
+her life one long, continuous deed of goodness. If ever an angel
+walked on earth administering to the sorrows and sickness of those
+about her, that angel was Mrs. Sherman. Inheriting much of her great
+father's fine intellect, she added a heart full to overflowing with
+the sweetest sympathy for affliction in others. Self-sacrifice was to
+her a second nature. She not only carried in patient humility the
+cares imposed upon her by our Saviour, but cheerfully took up the
+woful burdens of those whose failing spirits left them fainting on
+their way. Her exalted social position was no bar to the poor,
+downtrodden, and oppressed. Her hand like her heart was ever open.
+
+The heroism of private life is little noted among us. Acting out great
+deeds of self-sacrifice in the silent, unseen walks of domestic
+existence, it lacks the sustaining plaudits of a thoughtless public,
+and has no incentive to effort other than that found in the conscious
+presence of an approving God, and no hope of recompense beyond the
+promised approval of the hereafter when our heavenly Father shall say,
+"Well done, thou good and faithful servant."
+
+No man, however exalted his position may be, or distinguished his
+services, is ever followed to his tomb by more real mourners than one
+carriage can convey. The crape-canopied hearse, the nodding plumes of
+woe, the wailing music of the hired bands, the long procession of
+slow-moving coaches, the tramp of hundreds, tell only of human vanity:
+we make our show of sorrow. One vehicle only holds hearts breaking in
+an agony of grief--hearts that know nothing in their woe of the dear
+one's greatness; know only that he has gone from their household that
+his presence had made so happy. In his death the dear walls of that
+home were shattered, the fire upon the hearth is dead, and the hard
+world darkened down to desolation's nakedness. Could all who were
+favored in knowing this beautiful character, and blessed by her very
+presence, been called to form the funeral cortege, real heart-felt
+grief would have lived along the entire procession, and sobs, not
+strains of mournful music, would have broken on the ear. And in this
+procession would have been found not only the rich and well-born, clad
+in costly silks and furs, who had received from this gracious lady the
+divine influences of the Christian spirit, but the thinly clad poor,
+the dependent orphans, and helpless age. It is such a procession that
+does not disperse and disappear at the cemetery, but follows in prayer
+the mourned-for spirit to its home in heaven.
+
+It is not for us to invade the sacred privacy of this lovely life. We
+owe an apology to her blessed memory for even this mention of her
+name. We know how she shrank from such while among us, and it is only
+as a duty to the living that we venture on this tribute to her
+excellence.
+
+What we feel, and what must be felt by all, a pagan poet imbued
+unknowingly with the truest Christian impulses has sung in immortal
+verse:
+
+                                    "But thou art fled,
+          Like some frail exhalation which the dawn
+          Robes in its golden beams;--ah, thou hast fled!
+          The brave, the gentle, and the beautiful,
+          The child of grace and genius! Heartless things
+          Are done and said i' the world, and many worms
+          And beasts and men live on, and mighty earth,
+          From sea and mountain, city and wilderness,
+          In vesper low or joyous orison,
+          Lifts still its solemn voice:--but thou art fled--
+          Thou canst no longer know or love the shapes
+          Of this phantasmal scene, who have to thee
+          Been purest ministers, who are, alas!
+          Now thou art not!
+
+                 *       *       *       *       *
+
+                                    "Art and eloquence,
+          And all the shows of the world, are frail and vain
+          To weep a loss that turns their lights to shade.
+          It is a woe 'too deep for tears' when all
+          Is reft at once, when some surpassing Spirit,
+          Whose light adorned the world around it, leaves
+          Those who remain behind, not sobs nor groans,
+          The passionate tumult of a clinging hope,
+          But pale despair and cold tranquillity--
+          Nature's vast frame, the web of human things,
+          Birth and the grave, that are not as they were."
+
+As a low, sweet echo to the music of those words, we add a tribute to
+the memory of this noble woman from the gifted pen of Helen Grace
+Smith:
+
+          Ah! Death hath passed us by--hath passed us near;
+          The swift, keen arrow cutting the light air,
+                  And falling where she stood
+                  In perfect motherhood,
+          With silver crown of years upon her hair.
+
+          The many years--the glorious full years,
+          All shining with her charity and truth--
+                  How tenderly we trace
+                  Their silent work of grace,
+          Fulfilling the sweet promise of her youth!
+
+          A life complete, yet lived not all in sun,
+          But following sometimes through shadowed ways,
+                  Where sorrow and distress
+                  Cried loud that she might bless
+          With her pure light the darkness of their days.
+
+          Resplendent mission, beautiful as his
+          Who fought for her in fighting for his land--
+                  Who heard the loud acclaim
+                  That gave his honored name
+          To live wherever deeds of heroes stand.
+
+          And she, the wife, the mother--ah! her tears
+          Fell for the wounded sufferers and the dead--
+                  Fell for the poor bereaved,
+                  The helpless ones who grieved
+          Where ruin and despair lay thickly spread.
+
+          Now peace--God's peace--is brooding o'er the land,
+          And peacefully she sleeps, her life-work done.
+                  We would not break that sleep,
+                  That rest so calm, so deep,
+          That sweet reward by faithful service won.
+
+          Only we kneel, as often she hath knelt,
+          Where Heaven's love lights up the quiet aisle,
+                  And, praying as she prayed,
+                  Our sorrow is allayed--
+          Our grieving changed to gladness in God's smile.
+
+
+
+
+THE PASSING SHOW.
+
+The political season is over, and popular fancy lightly turns to
+thoughts of the drama. New York's gay winter festivities are opening,
+and the theatres are nightly crowded with appreciative audiences. It
+would be strange indeed if, with upwards of twenty-five comfortable
+resorts for popular amusement in the metropolis, and a weekly change
+of attractions drawn from the best American and European sources, the
+most fastidious taste should fail to be pleased.
+
+Probably the most successful of this year's dramatic ventures is "The
+Yeomen of the Guard" at the Casino. The managers of that theatre have
+been wise to replace their variety-shows with this excellent comic
+opera. It steadily holds its own in spite of the critics, and after a
+three-months' run continues as popular as ever. Mr. Aronson says it
+may remain at the Casino until the end of April. Gilbert and
+Sullivan's productions are always new, always attractive. Each has a
+character of its own, yet no one could fail to detect the humor of
+Gilbert and the merry melodies of Sullivan in them all. If one may
+venture to compare their beauties, we should say that "Pinafore"
+excelled in vivacity--that peculiar sprightliness which the French
+call _verve_; "The Pirates" in humor; "Patience" and "Iolanthe" in
+satire--the one of a social craze, the other of political flunkeyism;
+and "The Yeomen of the Guard" in quaintness. The patter songs of the
+first are lacking in the last, hence its airs are not so dinned into
+one's ears by the whistling youth of every street-corner, but the
+music is of a distinctly higher order. It is unfortunate that there is
+no change of scenery between the two acts. The dingy background of the
+Tower is not relieved by brilliance of costume, and the eye of the
+ordinary theatre-goer, accustomed to look for altered scenic effects,
+is disappointed at the repetition, only relieved by moonlight in the
+second act.
+
+Some of the incidents of the play resemble "Don Cæsar de Bazan," and
+are similarly worked out. Colonel Fairfax, imprisoned as a sorcerer,
+marries a young ballad-singer, who receives a hundred crowns, with the
+assurance that within an hour she will be a widow through her
+husband's execution. He escapes, and is disguised as one of the Yeomen
+of the Guard, with whom, in spite of her vows, the young girl falls in
+love. A pardon for Fairfax arrives, his identity is established, the
+singer learns that the man she loves is already her husband, and all
+ends happily. In this transmutation of character, from the imprisoned
+sorcerer to one of the prison-keepers, we recognize the topsyturvydom
+of Gilbert, which is the distinguishing mark of his genius, from the
+Bab Ballads all through his later productions. In catchwords the
+present opera is lacking, and in the puns which never failed to draw
+out the "ohs" of the audience. But there is the same genial
+undercurrent of innocent humor which for years has amused the whole
+English-speaking public, and for which Mr. Gilbert deserves the
+lasting gratitude of a world too much given to life-sadness and mental
+worry. If "a merry heart doeth good like a medicine," it is safe to
+say that the prescriptions of this most ingenious dramatic author have
+effected more widespread good than those of the most celebrated
+followers of Æsculapius.
+
+It is especially to its music that the operetta owes its success. In
+this production Sullivan has excelled his former efforts. The first
+chorus is very fine, and in orchestration Sir Arthur shows himself to
+be without a rival. Its pure melodies form a valuable addition to
+English music, and mark the growth of a new school of which he is the
+leader. The influence of Wagner is clearly seen in some of its
+majestic marches, but the English composer escapes the metaphysical
+and unintelligible harmonies of the German school. Sir Arthur has
+evidently aimed at producing a more classical composition than any of
+his previous works, and he has done this perhaps at some slight
+sacrifice of immediate popularity. The jingle of "Pinafore" and "The
+Pirates" is replaced by a more sober style, which is likely to produce
+a lasting impression on English music.
+
+Mary Anderson captured the town, as usual, on her return from England
+early in November. Palmer's theatre was so crowded that it was
+difficult to get a seat even four weeks in advance, and the audiences
+were so enthusiastic that their enthusiasm constituted quite an
+interruption to the play. She chose "The Winter's Tale" as her opening
+piece, taking the parts both of Hermione the queen and of her daughter
+Perdita. Miss Anderson is the first actress who has ever dared to so
+interpret the play. She tried it at the London Lyceum, to the horror
+of the critics, but it proved a great success. The resemblance between
+Hermione and her daughter, which Shakespeare insists on so strongly,
+gave Miss Anderson the idea of trying both parts. This plan had the
+additional advantage, that the leading lady is not suppressed by being
+cut out of the act in which Hermione does not appear. Her studies
+abroad have undoubtedly improved "Our Mary." The coldness and
+statuesqueness with which she has been reproached could not now be
+discovered by the most adverse critic. She is more womanly, softer,
+less angular, and more graceful. The programme at Palmer's should have
+been varied so as to give the public opportunity to see her in the old
+_rôles_ that used to charm all beholders. One must not forget the
+exquisite scenery with which this piece has been set. It was used at
+the Lyceum, and, although it has been considerably cut down to fit the
+smaller stage of Palmer's theatre, it is one of the best settings ever
+seen in this country.
+
+Edwin Booth and Lawrence Barrett have been doing fairly with their
+Shakespearean revivals at the Fifth Avenue. There is no truth in the
+report that any difference has occurred between them. They will appear
+together at the Broadway Theatre next season, with better support, it
+is to be hoped, than they have recently had. Miss Mina Gale, who plays
+the leading female parts, however, is a promising young actress.
+
+Agnes Booth has scored a great triumph as Mrs. Seabrook in "Captain
+Swift" at the Madison Square. For painstaking attention to detail,
+nicety of intonation, and powerful expression, Agnes Booth is in the
+front rank of leading ladies. We have seen her in many society dramas,
+and in each she has shown a charming appreciation of all the
+requirements. At the Madison Square, with its cosey stage, the visitor
+forgets that he is one of the audience, and feels almost like an
+intruder upon a scene in a private drawing-room. The situations in
+"Captain Swift" are striking. The hero, an illegitimate son of Mrs.
+Seabrook, goes away in his youth to Australia, cracks a bank, and
+returns after many years, unconsciously to become a rival to the
+legitimate son for the affections of his cousin. The mother discovers
+his identity, and discloses it to him in order to prevent the
+ill-starred marriage. The mingled expression of shame, suffering, and
+maternal love in Agnes Booth's face during this scene is one not soon
+to be forgotten. The audience remains spellbound for a moment, then a
+burst of enthusiastic applause crowns her effort. In the original
+play, as written by Mr. Haddon Chambers, the hero, being followed by
+an Australian detective, commits suicide. As altered for the American
+stage--by Mr. Boucicault, it is said,--Captain Swift, to relieve the
+Seabrook family from embarrassment, gives himself up to the officers
+of justice. In either case the _morale_ of the play--the portrayal of
+an absconding bank-burglar and horse-thief as polished, brave,
+generous, gentle--is to be regretted, as every apotheosis of vice
+should be. Mr. Barrymore, as Captain Swift, exhibits some capital
+acting, and Annie Russell makes a very graceful Mabel Seabrook.
+
+Mrs. Burnett's dramatization of her well-known story, "Little Lord
+Fauntleroy," is attracting large crowds at the Broadway Theatre. It is
+peculiar in that it depends entirely for its success on the acting of
+a child, or rather children, Elsie Leslie and Tommy Russell
+alternating in the title _rôle_. This arrangement has been adopted
+because the part is so long that it would be too fatiguing for a young
+child to play it night after night. Both the children show a
+delightful unconsciousness in the recitation of their lines, but
+Tommy's natural boyishness fits the character rather better than
+Elsie's assumed character, although her gracefulness charms the
+audience. The motive of the play, as in the story, is the love of a
+boy for his mother; and this makes it a great attraction for the
+ladies.
+
+A pretty play is "Sweet Lavender" at the Lyceum. Its plot is simple. A
+young lawyer falls in love with his housekeeper's gentle little
+daughter, but family pride prevents their union until, by the
+opportune failure of a bank, his fortunes are reduced to a level with
+hers. Its clever details and quiet humor make it well worth seeing.
+Pinero, the author, is a playwright skilled in the mechanical
+arrangement of his situations, and everything runs smoothly. Miss
+Louise Dillon as Lavender, fits the part exactly.
+
+Thompson and Ryer's play of "The Two Sisters" at Niblo's made many
+friends, in spite of its somewhat threadbare theme. There was the
+typical dissolute young man who seduces one of the sisters, and the
+benevolent hotel-keeper who befriends and marries the other. The
+villain murders his father, is arrested, and dies, while the betrayed
+girl is given a home by her sister's husband. Some good singing is
+scattered throughout the play.
+
+A similar drama, full of love and murder, was "The Fugitive," by Tom
+Craven, which had a very brief run at the Windsor.
+
+Vivacious Nelly Farren and the London Gaiety Company, which recently
+held the boards of the Standard Theatre in "Monte Christo, jr.," gave
+New Yorkers an enlivening taste of English burlesque. The play is
+nothing, the dancing everything.
+
+The German opera season is well under way. The Metropolitan Opera
+House opened with "The Huguenots," which was followed by "William
+Tell" and "Fidelio." Herr Anton Seidl, with his unrivalled orchestra,
+makes these productions of the great German and Italian composers a
+yearly treat to lovers of music, which is looked forward to with
+eagerness and parted from with regret.
+
+"The Old Homestead" holds its own at the Academy of Music; the "Brass
+Monkey" at the Bijou has had a longer run than it deserves; Clara
+Morris has been appearing in Brooklyn; Louis James and Marie
+Wainwright are beginning their New York engagement. "She" was
+pronounced a great success in Boston, over $1600 being taken in at one
+performance. Mr. Boucicault is conducting his Madison Square
+theatre-school of acting with patience and confidence, although the
+results thus far are not very promising. Of the eighty pupils, the men
+are awkward and the women lack talent. However, as Mr. Boucicault
+said, if but three or even one out of the eighty should come to
+dramatic eminence, it would be well worth all the trouble.
+
+Our German fellow-citizens are to be congratulated on the opening of
+Mr. Amberg's new theatre in Fifteenth Street. The location is central,
+the house is well built, the company good, and the repertory includes
+drama, comedy, farce, and comic opera.
+
+There have not been many dramatic events abroad this season. The new
+Shaftesbury Theatre in London is possessed of such a wonderful
+fire-proof curtain that a few weeks ago the audience had to be
+dismissed because they could not raise it. "Captain Swift" proved a
+great success, financially, at the Haymarket, and "Nadjy" is
+attracting crowds at the Avenue Theatre. At Terry's, "Dream Faces," a
+one-act play, and "The Policeman," a three-act farce, had good houses.
+Grace Hawthorne has just had to pay a hundred pounds to the owners of
+some lions. She was seeking to produce an English version of
+"Theodora," and engaged a den of lions twelve months in advance of the
+time she wanted them. She demurred to paying for the animals that she
+had not used, but the case went against her. On the Continent there is
+not much doing. P. A. Morin, the dean of Holland's dramatists and
+actors, recently celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of his first
+appearance, his golden jubilee, at Amsterdam. It is announced that
+Patti will sing in "Romeo and Juliet," at the Grand Opera House,
+Paris, giving three performances for one thousand dollars each.
+
+More attention than usual is being paid just now to the development of
+musical taste on both sides of the water. Mr. Walter Damrosch has been
+lecturing in New York on Symphony. The Liederkranz and the Symphony
+Society have been giving enjoyable concerts; and Herr Moriz Rosenthal,
+the pianist, has met with a success that has only been rivalled in
+late years by Joseffy.
+
+
+
+
+REVIEWS.
+
+
+When the late George Butler, quite regardless of fact, and for the fun
+of the thing, telegraphed from Long Branch to Dion Boucicault at New
+York, that Billy Florence and Jack Raymond had been saved from a
+watery grave by a huge Newfoundland, Boucicault responded, "God is
+good to the Irish." This sentence, so often quoted, passed, without
+its point, among the masses. What Dion caught on the nib of his pen
+and wired to the world was the fact that these two famous comedians,
+with their English names, were Irish by birth, instincts, and
+blunders. The people that present to the earth the only race that has
+wit for its national trait never had two more striking illustrations
+of the fact than in these stage delineators of genius. Raymond is in
+his grave, and the inevitable dust of forgetfulness is gathering upon
+his tomb. But Florence, so kindly known throughout the land as Billy
+Florence, is yet alive, and very much alive. The evidence of this fact
+is before us in a book entitled _Florence Fables_ (Belford, Clarke &
+Co.). Those so-called fables are not fables, but fiction without
+morals, but full of interest, which is much better, and come to the
+reader in the shape of love-stories, odd adventures, and strange
+incidents at home and in foreign lands.
+
+The book is sure of a wide sale, for the multitudes that have seen
+Florence in his merry performances, and learned to love as well as
+enjoy this finished comedian behind the footlights, will be curious to
+learn how he appears as an author. But they "who come to scoff" will
+hold on to enjoy. The name is enough to attract; the book itself is
+sufficiently charming to entrance the reader.
+
+In the last issue of BELFORD'S we gave a specimen of the humor: to
+find the pathos and the true love the reader must consult the volume.
+
+
+_Divided Lives_, a novel, by Edgar Fawcett (Belford, Clarke &
+Co.).--There is no more charming writer of English fiction than Edgar
+Fawcett, and the volume before us is one of his best. He builds upon
+the English method, animated by the French motive, and deepens the
+shallow affection of the first to the unfathomable depths of human
+passion to be found in the last. His dramatic ability holds one to the
+interest of his book whether it has plot or not. Of course he has his
+faults. His characters are known to us mostly by name, labelled, as it
+were, and he will at any time sacrifice one or a dozen to work up a
+dramatic effect. Then he has affectations, not precisely of style, but
+of phraseology, that irritate; and he cannot resist putting smart
+speeches into the mouths of everybody. Here is an example:
+
+"Indeed, no," Angela replied, "there never was a more devoted friend
+than Alva is. To leave her charming home, and all her gay town life,
+for weeks, just that she may be near me! It is something to vibrate
+through one's entire lifetime."
+
+This is said by a little girl to her lover, and the lover responds:
+
+"It teaches me a lesson. What is easier than to misjudge our
+fellow-creatures, and how wantonly we're forever doing it! We are all
+like a lot of mountebanks behind an illuminated sheet. The uncouth
+shadows we cast there are the world's misrepresentation of us."
+
+As these young people were desperately in love with each other, but
+then just engaged, this sort of talk, however clever, is as much out
+of place and jarring on one as would be the murder scene from
+Macbeth.
+
+Edgar Fawcett is given to a delineation of social life in New York.
+This is a wide and varied field, and the author makes it intensely
+interesting. We have called attention, however, to the fact that he is
+not altogether correct. The English motive, of turning the interest
+upon social caste, is not true when applied to our mixed condition. We
+have no aristocratic class, as recognized in England; and the
+assumption of such in real life is too ludicrous and unreal for the
+purpose of the novelist. Mere wealth without culture, and culture
+without wealth, contend in a mixed condition with each other, without
+supplying the interest to be found in earnest endeavor to overcome
+unjust distinctions and power. When Mr. Fawcett does deal with a class
+he is not always just. In his _Miriam Balestier_, published in the
+November number of BELFORD'S, by far the most artistically beautiful
+work from the pen of our author, he by implication attacks an entire
+profession that has held through generations not only the admiration
+but love of the public. There is absolutely nothing in the vocation of
+an actor that either degrades or demoralizes. On the contrary, there
+is much to elevate and refine--the work sustained by art found in
+painting and music, the thought and feelings of the poets; and while
+this is meant to amuse, the stage has been the most potent factor in
+not only furthering civilization and culture in the masses, but
+awaking in the hearts of the many the loftiest patriotism known to
+humanity. It has awakened a deeper feeling for the home, a firmer
+trust in the law of right, and a stronger faith in virtue than aught
+else of human origin. That taints, stains, and abuses have attached is
+no fault of the drama. One could as well attack the bar or the pulpit
+because a few unworthy members have disgraced themselves, as to hold
+the stage responsible for the recognized evils that have fastened
+themselves to a part. That we have senseless burlesques and lascivious
+exhibits of nakedness at a majority of our theatres is the fault of
+the patrons, not the stage. The manager, like any other dealer in
+commercial wares, caters to the taste of his customers, and the stage
+is no more responsible for their productions than the street is for
+the wretched street-walker.
+
+So long as citizens take their wives and children to witness the
+shameless productions, so long will the managers produce them, and
+when remonstrated with, shrug their shoulders, and ask, "Well,
+what would you?" The pulpit denounces the drama, but leaves untouched
+their congregations in their patronage of its abuse. The great city
+of New York, for example, lately entertained a convocation of
+Protestant clergymen, met to consider the sad fact that they were
+preaching to empty churches, and to devise means through which to
+awaken the religious conscience of the multitude. They went to
+their meetings along streets where every other house was a saloon,
+where the beastly American practice of "treating" makes each a door
+to ruin; and they passed corners where the walls were aflame with
+pictured advertisements of naked legs, bare bosoms, and faces fairly
+enamelled with sin. One reads their debates with amazement. Their
+clerical minds were troubled with what? The doings of "papists," as
+Catholics were designated.
+
+Our pen has carried us from our author. Of course Mr. Fawcett will
+say--and say with truth--that his strictures were aimed at the abuse
+and not the legitimate use of the drama. But his fault was that he
+does not make this clear, and by intimation he leaves himself open to
+the charge.
+
+Aside from this, his work is a work of genius; and his story of the
+little girl who struggled with such vain endeavor against her
+environment will live among the noblest productions of fiction given
+us.
+
+
+_The Professor's Sister_, by Julian Hawthorne (Belford, Clarke &
+Co.).--This is the most successful work of a successful novelist, and
+holds the reader entranced from the first page till nearly the last.
+We say reader, but not all readers. Mr. Hawthorne is as peculiar in
+his work as his eminent father was, with a more select audience. He is
+at home in the wild, weird production of humanity, touched and marked
+by a spiritualism that is far above and beyond the average readers of
+romance. If it calls for as much culture, in its way, to enjoy a work
+of art as its creation called for in the artist, Mr. Hawthorne's
+fictions demand the same tastes and thought the author indulges in.
+The little girl who craves love-stories, or the traveller upon the
+cars who picks up a book to lose in its pages the wearisome sense of
+travel, will scarcely select the _Professor's Sister_, and if he or
+she does, will wonder what in the name of Heaven it is all about.
+
+There is another class, however, that will read with avidity and
+interest every page of this book, and this class grows wider in our
+midst every day. One meets at every turn a man or woman who will tell,
+in a matter-of-fact way generally, that is positively comical, of some
+experience he or she has had with spooks. This, not the old-fashioned
+experience with ghosts. All that has long since been relegated to the
+half-forgotten limbo of superstitious things. One hears of communions
+with the dead, told off as one would tell of any ordinary occurrence
+common to our daily life. This is the natural reaction of the human
+mind against the scientific materialism of the day, that seeks to
+poison and destroy all religious faith. Religion is as necessary to
+health of mind as pure air is to that of body, and when deprived of
+either, we struggle for loop-holes of light and breath with
+instinctive desperation. Shut out the light of heaven from the soul,
+be it in library or laboratory, and one sickens and resists.
+
+Mr. Hawthorne wisely lays the scene of his story in Germany. The
+rarefied condition of the German mind is recognized the world over,
+and through the everlasting smoke of philosophers' and students' pipes
+one is prepared for all sorts of fantastic shapes moving through the
+mist. The author opens with a talk on occult subjects that sounds like
+voices heard in a fog-bank. With the reader thus prepared, he plunges
+him into a drama where substantial men and women mingle with spirits,
+and the strange story does overcome us like a summer's cloud, without
+our special wonder.
+
+We have said the story holds one spellbound till near the end. The
+_dénoûment_ is not good. "Calling spirits from the vasty deep" is much
+easier than disposing of them after they come. To give a satisfactory
+explanation of the mystery, and to exorcise the spirit back to rest,
+make no easy task, and Mr. Hawthorne is not to blame for finding it
+difficult.
+
+We cannot drop the book without calling attention to the author's
+happy use of English, in depicting character. Here is a specimen:
+
+"Madame Hertrugge was white, red, and black. Her skin was white, her
+cheeks and lips red, her hair, eyes, and eyebrows black. Her mouth was
+beautifully formed, and firm, with a firm chin. Her eyes were rather
+full, imperious, and ardent. She was overflowing with vitality. The
+hand which she extended to one in greeting was soft but strong, with
+long fingers. She was dressed in black, as became her recent
+widowhood; but she had not the air of mourning much. She was sensuous,
+voluptuous, but there was strength behind the voluptuousness. You
+received from her a powerful impression of sex. Every line of her,
+every movement, every look, was woman. And she made you feel that she
+valued you just so far as you were man. You might be as nearly Caliban
+as a man can be, but if you were a man she would consider you. You
+might court her successfully with a horsewhip, but if she felt the
+master in you, and were convinced that you were captivated by her, she
+would accept you. It was ludicrous to think of the senile old merchant
+having married such a creature. In fact, marriage, viewed in
+connection with this woman, seemed an absurdity. There was nothing
+holy about her, nothing reserved, nothing sacred. I don't mean that
+she was not ladylike, as the phrase is. She knew the society
+catechism, and practised it to a nicety, but like a clever actress,
+rather than by instinct or sympathy. It was obvious that she didn't
+value respectability and propriety the snap of her white fingers, save
+as a means to an end; and if she were in the company of one whom she
+trusted intimately, she would laugh those popular virtues to scorn
+with her warm, insolent breath. As it was, all the forms and
+ceremonies in the world could not disguise her. Her very dress
+suggested rather than concealed what was beneath it. She was a naked
+goddess--a pagan goddess--and there was no help for it. She made you
+realize how powerless our nice institutions are in the presence of a
+genuine, rank human temperament.
+
+"And be it here observed that I am here writing of her as a
+temperament, and nothing more. I knew nothing of her former life and
+experience. I had no reason to think that her conduct has ever been
+less than unexceptionable. But the facts about her were insignificant
+compared with her latent possibilities. Circumstances might hitherto
+have been adverse to her development; but opportunity--rosy, golden,
+audacious opportunity--was all she needed. She certainly bore no signs
+of satiety; she had nothing of the _blasé_ air. She was thirsty for
+life, and she would appreciate every draught of it. She was impatient
+to begin. And, contemplating her abounding, triumphant, delicious
+well-being, it seemed as if she might maintain the high-tide of
+enjoyment until she was a hundred. It really inclined one to paganism
+to look at her."
+
+
+_What Dreams May Come_, by Frank Lin (Belford, Clarke & Co.).--This is
+a cleverly constructed story of English life by an American pen, and
+the average reader is kept in doubt as to the sex of the author. There
+is a clear, incisive style of the masculine sort on one page that
+indicates the man; there is a treatment of female wearing apparel on
+another that gives proof of the feminine. With us there is one feature
+that solves the doubt. The pages abound in convictions. Now the female
+mind, as a general thing, is not given to doubt. When a woman believes
+anything she believes it, and her faith is as firm as the solid rock.
+She stands "on hardpan," to use a phrase common to the Pacific slope.
+Although the book is built on dreams, the theory of heredity it is
+written to promulgate is no dream in the mind of this fair author. We
+have called attention to the fact that the use of the novel to
+illustrate some doctrine, philosophical or religious, is really an
+abuse. One takes up such form of fiction to be amused, and one feels
+put upon and abused to find it an essay more or less learned on life
+and things. If a little information can be injected in the story
+unbeknownst, like the parson's liquor told of by President Lincoln,
+well and good; but it is rarely done successfully. If philosophy is
+indulged in, one quickly detects the bald head and wrinkled brow; if
+it is religion, the cloven hoof or wicked tail of Satan betrays the
+author.
+
+When it was once proposed by a staff officer to drive an obnoxious
+guest from headquarters by a liberal use of burnt brimstone, General
+Sherman said, "That is high strategy in its way, but it is not war."
+"When one goes a turkey-hunting one does not care to be killed by
+bears," said an old hunter; and when a seeker after amusement, to be
+found in a love-story, opens what purports to be a novel, it is
+shocking to find it a learned treatise on some abstruse subject.
+
+The book before us is another illustration of this defect. It opens
+with an exquisite picture of Constantinople a hundred years since. In
+this prologue some wicked conduct is rather hinted at than told. After
+this the story opens and moves on pleasantly enough, until the fact is
+developed that the hero and heroine are reproductions of the sinful
+grandfather and grandmother long since lost to the census-taker of the
+British empire. What was evil in the ancestors is an innocent love in
+the descendants; and the fair author exhibits considerable power by
+preserving the sanity of her characters, to say nothing of that of the
+reader, in the complications and situations that follow.
+
+The book is of interest to us, not so much for what it accomplishes,
+as the promise of better things. It exhibits all the qualities
+necessary to a successful writer of fiction. There is a keen
+appreciation of character, a love of nature, and a clear, incisive
+style that make a combination which if properly directed insures
+success.
+
+
+
+
+THE PASSING OF THE YEAR.
+
+
+         Like some triumphal Orient pageantry
+           Beheld afar in slow and stately march,
+         Glittering with gold and crimson blazonry,
+           Till lost at length through many a dusky arch--
+         I saw the day's last clustering spears of light
+           Enter the cloudy portals of the night.
+
+         The wind, whose brazen clarions had blown
+           Imperious fanfarons before the sun
+         All the brief winter afternoon, died down,
+           And in the hush of twilight, one by one,
+         Like maidens leaning from high balconies,
+           The early stars looked forth with lustrous eyes.
+
+         Then came the moon like a deserted queen,
+           In blanchèd weed and pensive loneliness;
+         Not as she rises in midsummer green,
+           Hailed by a festal world in gala dress,
+         With thin sweet incense swung from buds and leaves,
+           And strident minstrelsy of August eves;
+
+         But treading in cold calm the frozen plain,
+           With bare white feet and argent torch aloft,
+         Unheralded through all her drear domain,
+           Save where the cricket sang in sheltered croft,
+         And, faintly heard in fitful monotone,
+           A solitary owl made shuddering moan.
+
+Charles Lotin Hildreth.
+
+
+
+
+THE LION'S SHARE.
+
+By Mrs. Clark Waring.
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+SUKEY IN THE MEADOW.
+
+"Where's that cow?"
+
+The speaker was old Farmer Creecy. He was coming up the back steps,
+and his words were addressed to his wife, who was manipulating an
+archaic churn on the back porch.
+
+"What cow?" sharply retorted Mrs. Creecy, startled out of all
+knowledge of four-footed beasts by the unexpectedness of the
+question.
+
+"_What cow!_ Look here, now, Alvirey, have you got any sense at all?
+How many cows have we got? Can't you count that far? Don't you know
+how many?"
+
+Alvirey did. Looking like a sheep being led to the slaughter, and
+feeling worse than two sheep under such circumstances, she hung her
+head low, and answered, meekly:
+
+"One cow."
+
+"Then I ask you, again, where is that cow?"
+
+"And why do you ask me that, Jacob Creecy? You know as well as I do
+where she is. She's down in the meadow."
+
+"And where's Mell?"
+
+"Down there, too. They ain't nobody else to keep Sukey out the corn."
+
+"Ain't, hey? Ha! ha! ha! That's all you know about it! Where does you
+keep your senses, anyhow, Alvirey? Out o' doors? Because, I ain't
+never had the good luck to find any of 'em at home, yet, as often as
+I've called! This very minute there's somebody else down in the meadow
+long side o' Mell."
+
+"Why, who, Jacob? Who can it be?"
+
+"You wouldn't guess in a month o' Sundays, Alvirey. Not you! Guessing
+to the point ain't in your line. It's that chap what's staying over at
+the Guv'ner's, who looks like he had the title-deeds of the American
+continent stuffed loose in his vest-pocket."
+
+"You don't say so! Lor'! Jacob, what does he want down there with
+Mell?"
+
+"What does he want? If you had a single grain of sense, Alvirey, you'd
+know without any telling. He wants to make a fool of her! That's what
+a man generally has in view when he runs after a woman. But, I am a
+thinking, that chap won't make no fool out of Mell, for Mell's got a
+long head, like her old daddy, and a tongue of learning to back it!
+Just you keep on a saying nothing. You never missed getting things
+into a mess yet, as I knows on, 'cept when you let 'em alone. I'll
+shut down on him right away, and then I'll be _blarsted_ if Mell can't
+take care of herself! Don't be nowise uneasy, Alvirey. Mell takes
+after her old dad."
+
+Alvirey did not return immediately to her churning. She craned her
+neck and got on her tiptoes, and gazed curiously after her husband as
+his stout figure rolled heavily to the edge of the breezy woodland,
+and thence beyond to the newly cleared grounds, and onward still to
+that narrow path among the pines, whose turf-margined and daisy-dotted
+track was a covert way to the meadow. Presently, through its mazy
+windings and the medium of a hazy summer atmosphere, Mr. Creecy came
+in sight of a youthful Jersey, sedately cropping some tender blades of
+grass on the enticing borderland of a promising cornfield, and a young
+girl not far away seated on an old stump in a shady nook under a clump
+of trees. Her costume consisted principally of an airy muslin frock,
+nebulous in figure, and falling about her in simple folds, and a white
+sun-bonnet, which was a bonnet and something more--to be explicit, an
+artistic elaboration of tucks and puffs and piled-on embroideries,
+beneath which peeped forth a face as prodigal of blooming sweets as a
+basket heaped with spring flowers.
+
+At her feet lounged in careless fashion a young man. He was lithe and
+straight, and had that striking cast of countenance which catches the
+observant eye on first sight. This look of distinction, which in him
+was as marked in form as in feature, has been called, not inaptly,
+thoroughbredness. A self-made man never has it. All that a man may do
+will not put it upon himself, but his son possesses it as an
+heritage.
+
+Looking upon such persons, we know intuitively that they have always
+had the best of everything, beginning from their cradle, the best of
+_its_ kind.
+
+Not always strong, these thoroughbred faces are generally attractive.
+The one before us possesses both strength and beauty. We may consider
+it foremost among his first-rate advantages.
+
+Seeing this huge monster of humanity bearing down upon them,
+slow-wabbling, like a proboscidian mammal, fast-puffing, like a steam
+locomotive, the young man lifted himself to a sitting posture, and
+without any suspicion as to the true state of the case, remarked to
+his companion:
+
+"Here comes a doughty old customer, upon my word! 'What tempest, I
+trow, threw this whale with so many tons of oil'----"
+
+The young lady cleared her throat--she cleared it point-blankly.
+
+"Excuse me, but, perhaps you do not know, that is--is--my father."
+
+Stammering forth these words, she at the same time turned very red in
+the face.
+
+This was slightly awkward, or would have been to another. As for this
+young man, he did not mind a little thing like that.
+
+"I did not know it," he told the girl, unruffled; "I crave your
+pardon. The fact is, it is an habitual failing of mine to make sport
+of fat people. The lubberly clumsiness of a huge corporation of human
+flesh is to me so irresistibly comic! My mother tells me a dreadful
+day of retribution is coming--a day, wherein I shall be fifty and fat,
+and a fit subject for the ridicule of others."
+
+"I cannot discern the foreshadows of such a day," replied the girl,
+glancing with unconscious approbation at the admirable outlines of
+a figure whose proportions were well-nigh faultless. She fingered
+nervously at her bonnet-strings, smiled a panic-stricken little smile,
+broke out into a cold sweat of fearful expectation, and through all
+the horrors of the situation, tried her best to emulate the young
+man's inimitable air of cultured composure. He got up at this
+juncture from the ground, not hastily, not awkwardly, but in his own
+time and at his own pleasure, and standing there, entirely at his
+ease, looked every inch the living exemplar of that expressive
+little phrase--"don't-care."
+
+Some persons object to being interrupted, he did not.
+
+The girl stood up, too, but stood with such a difference! More and
+more disconcerted she became with every passing second, so ashamed was
+she of her unsightly old father, in his blue cotton farm clothes,
+dirty and baggy, and his red cotton handkerchief--no redder than his
+face--so ashamed, and with such a sense of guilt in her shame! Truth
+to tell, the contrast between the two men thus confronted, was almost
+startling; the bloated ungainliness of the one, the sinewy shapeliness
+of the other; the misshapen grotesqueness of the one, and the
+sculpturesque comeliness of the other. It was a contrast painful to
+any intelligent observer, and for the poor girl before us, about to
+introduce a lover of such mold to a father of such aspect, it was like
+being put to the rack.
+
+"Mr. Devonhough, father."
+
+"Mr. _Who?_" gasped a big voice, struggling out from smothered depths
+of grossness.
+
+"Mr. Devonhough," repeated the daughter, looking all manner of ways,
+"a friend of the Rutlands."
+
+"How does ye, Mr. Deviloh?" inquired the old farmer, in his
+exceedingly countrified, agonizingly familiar manner; extending a big,
+rough, red, and very filthy hand to be shaken by this exquisite sprig
+of refined gentility. Mr. Devonhough, needless to mention, touched it
+as gingerly as if it had been a glaringly wide awake and aggressively
+disposed Cobra de Capello. He endured the ceremony in silence,
+however; about as much as could be reasonably expected from one so
+superbly self-controlled.
+
+"What will father do next?" wondered the perturbed young lady, in
+burning suspense. What he did was to stare unmercifully into the young
+man's face, as if every separate feature was a distinct and
+incomprehensible phenomenon, and, afterward, inspect him with due
+carefulness, and at his very deliberate leisure, from the hat on his
+head to the shoes on his feet.
+
+Mr. Devonhough did not flinch. Some persons object to being stared at;
+he did not. It is very foolish to mind such things. And besides, he
+had eyes as well as this old Brobdingnagian, and knew how to use them
+to quite as good a purpose. While the bellicose Creecy took in slowly
+the outward manifestations of this bland young stranger, the young
+stranger himself, in about two seconds and a half, had cross-examined
+every constituent element in the old man's body, and thoroughly
+analyzed even the marrow in his bones.
+
+We have intimated that the old man's figure was bad; his face was a
+dreadful climax to a bad figure, so marred it was by worry, so
+battered by time, so travel-stained on life's rough journey, so
+battle-scarred in life's hard strife. Behind this forbidding frontage,
+the old man kept in store a good, sound heart; but what availed that
+to his present inquisitor? A good, sound heart in an ugly body, is the
+last thing a young man looks for in this world, or cares to find.
+
+From the inspection of so much ugliness, Mr. Devonhough glanced
+towards the daughter; it was merely a glance, for with a delicate
+sense of feeling, he quickly looked away in an opposite direction.
+Flushed she was with shame, ill at ease, ready to cry out with a
+bitter cry, accusingly towards heaven, unspeakably humiliated; but,
+withal, a winsome lass, so fresh and fair, so pretty. Such a father!
+Such a girl! In heaven's name how do such things come about?
+
+Satisfied with his investigations, Mr. Creecy now remarked, quite
+cheerfully:
+
+"I s'pose, sir, you air a drover?"
+
+"A drover? No, sir; as far as I am able to judge, I am not. More, I
+cannot say, as I do not know what you mean."
+
+"Den I reckin, sir, you air er furiner inter the bargin."
+
+"No, sir; not a foreigner either, though I was educated abroad--partly."
+
+"Dat's it," ejaculated the old man, triumphantly. "Eddicashun is the
+thing what plays the Ole Harry wid the onderstan'in'. Dar is my little
+Mell, dar, when she war er chit of er gal, an' knowed nuthin' 'bout
+the things writ down in books, she war er mighty smart gal. She had a
+onderstan'in' of plain English, mity near es good es mine, an' she
+could keep house, an' make butter, an' look arter farm bizniss in
+gin'ral, not ter say nuthin' 'bout sowin' her own cloes; an' now,
+bless God! arter gittin' er fine eddicashun, she don't know the
+diffrance 'tween er hoss an' er mule, or er bull an' er heifer; an'
+she'd no mo' let yer ketch 'er wid er broom in her han', or er common
+word on her lips dan steal er chickin! Es fur es my experance goes,
+nuthin' spiles er gal like high schoolin'. I purt myself ter a heap er
+trouble, young man, ter edicate my only darter, but I'd purt myself
+ter er long site mo', ter onedicate 'er, ef I know'd how!"
+
+This speech amused Mr. Devonhough to such an extent that he
+reluctantly displayed a set of very white teeth, and Mell's rather
+strained gayety found an agreeable echo in his pleasant-sounding
+laughter. Even the old farmer's features relaxed. He was "consid'ble
+hefted up" at the undisguised effect of his own facetiousness.
+
+"The reason I axed ef yer wuz er cattle dealer," he proceeded, "is
+dis. You 'pears ter be in the habit er comin' hur every mornin' ter
+see our fine Jersey. She's er regular beauty, ain't she?"
+
+"She is--worth coming to see; but since you press the point, I feel
+called upon to disavow coming here for any such purpose."
+
+Here Mr. Devonhough turned his contemplative glance from the direction
+of Suke's charms, and fixed it mischievously upon Mell who, having
+already, since the beginning of this interview, looked into the four
+quarters of the globe, now dropped her eyes in search of the mysteries
+beneath it.
+
+"To be honest wid ye," admitted old Creecy, "I didn't 'low ye wuz
+arter Suke, ezzactly, but I sorter reckin'd ef yer'd come ter see
+Mell, it's the front do' yer'd er knockt at, es I ust ter do when I
+went er courtin' my gal--Mell's mammy--an' had it out comferterble in
+the parler. We has er very nice home up dar on the hill, with er whole
+lot er fine furnisher in the front room, which Mell never rested 'till
+I went in debt ter buy. Now its mos' paid fur, an' I kinder 'low Mell
+'ud be glad ter see yer mos' enny time."
+
+"Thank you," responded Mr. Devonhough, with frigidity.
+
+"He mought go now, Mell, ef yer'd ax him."
+
+"Not to-day, thank you," turning to Mell, with more graciousness of
+manner. "In fact, I have not yet breakfasted;" and he abruptly bowed
+adieu, and made his escape.
+
+He was quite out of sight before father or daughter addressed a word
+to each other. At length the old farmer demanded roughly of the girl
+"What in the tarnation she wuz er blubberin' erbout?"
+
+"What, indeed!" sobbed Mell, in a frenzy of passion, and with eyes of
+storm. "I have good cause to cry. What else can I do? I can't say
+_Damn!_"
+
+"Can't yer? Why not? 'Tain't the cuss what's so bad; it's the feelin'.
+Ef the devil's in yer, turn him out, I say. I ain't no advercate er
+bad language, but ef er man feels like cussin' all the time, he mought
+as well cuss! Dat's my opinion. An' ef it will help yer to cool down
+er bit, my darter, I'll express them sentiments, which ain't too bad
+for a young lady ter feel, but only to utter. So here goes--but
+remember, Lord! 'tain't me, it's Mell--damn! damn! damn! Sich er
+koncited, stiff-starched, buckram-backed, puppified popinjay, as this
+Mr. Devil--"
+
+"Hush your mouth," screamed the daughter, beside herself with rage; "I
+don't want _him_ damned!"
+
+"You don't! Then who?"
+
+Mell, wrought up to the highest pitch of exasperation, made no reply
+beyond looking daggers and gnashing her teeth.
+
+"Not your old dad, Mell?"
+
+"No, father; I don't want you damned either. But what did you come
+down here for? What did you call him a cattle dealer for? What did you
+talk about such horrid, nasty, disgusting things, for? Oh! I am
+mortified almost to death."
+
+"I sorter reckon'd yer'd hate it worser'n pisen," chuckled the old
+farmer; "but er good dose of pisen is jess what some folks needs bad.
+Come, come, Mell, hold your horses! It's your eddicashun what's er
+botherin' of yer!"
+
+"I wish to God I had no education!" exclaimed Mell, passionately.
+"It's turned out to be the worst thing I ever did do, to get an
+education! It has made me unhappy ever since I came home and found
+things so different from what they ought to be. How poor and mean a
+home it is! How lowly its surroundings, how rude its ways and how I am
+degraded and fettered and hampered and looked down upon for things
+beyond my control!"
+
+"I knows--I knows"--answered her old father, with that suspicious
+thrill-in-the-voice of a subjugated parent. "It's yo' ignerront ole
+daddy an' yo' hard-workin' ole mammy what's er hamperin' ye! We ain't
+got no loving little Mell, no longer, to say, Popsy and Mamsy, so
+cute, but only er fine young miss, who minces out 'father' and
+'mother' so gran', an' can't hardly abide us, the mammy what bare her,
+and the daddy what give her bein'. I knows. Ef it warnt fer us, ye'd
+be the ekill of the finess' lady in the lan', wouldn't ye, Mell? Wall,
+ye kin be, my darter, in spite o' us, ef you play yo' kerds rite.
+You'se got es big er forshun es Miss Rutlan'--bigger, I believe.
+Hern's in her pockit, yourn's in yo' phiz. But, arter all, a gal's
+purty face don't 'mount ter mor'n one row er pins, ef she ain't got no
+brains to hope it erlong. Play yo' purty face, Mell; play her heavy,
+but back her strong wid gumshun! Then you'll git ter be er gran' lady
+o' fashion, in spite o' yer ugly ole dad an' common ole mammy. Now, I
+wants ye ter tell me somethin' 'bout dat young jackanapes. What's his
+bizniss? What is he?"
+
+"A perfect gentleman!"
+
+"Sartingly--sartingly. I seed dat, as soon es I sot my eyes on 'im,
+but what sorter man? My ole dad ust ter say, 'one fust-rate man could
+knock inter blue blazes er whole cart load er gentlemin'. I'll tell
+yer fer er fack, er gentlemin ain't nothin' nohow, but er man wid his
+dirty spots whitewasht. But what air the import er this one's
+intentions respectin' of ye?"
+
+Whatever her ideas on this point, the girl was too modest to express
+them.
+
+"Wall, maybe you kin tell me the dispersition of your own min'
+regardin' him?"
+
+"Yes, I can do that," she replied with alacrity. "Make up your mind to
+it. I'm going marry him just as soon as he asks me. And the sooner the
+better!"
+
+"Exactly! But when is he gwine ter?"
+
+"How do I know, father?"
+
+"I kin tell ye, Mell. _Never!_"
+
+"You don't know one thing about it--not a thing!"
+
+"Sartingly not! It's the young uns these days what knows everything,
+an' the ole ones what dont know nuthin'. But yo' ole dad knows what
+he's talkin' 'bout. The likes o' him will never marry any gal who puts
+herself on footin' wid er cow. Does yer reckin Miss Rutlan' would
+excep' his visits in er cornfiel', and let him make so free?"
+
+"It only happened so, father."
+
+"Hump! It's happen'd so er good many times, es I happen ter know.
+Happenin' things don't come roun' so reg'ler, Mell. See hur, my gal,
+'tain't no use argufyin' wid me on the subjec'. I ain't got nary
+objecshun ergin yo' marryin' the young man; provided--now listen,
+Mell!--_provided you kin git him_. He's es purty es er grayhoun', an'
+I reckin has es much intellergence, but insted ef lettin' him make a
+fool er you, es he's now tryin' ter do, turn the tables, Mell. The
+biggest fool on top o' this airth is the woman who wants ter git
+married; the next biggest fool is the man in er hurry ter git er wife!
+One mo' word, Mell, an' I'll go my way, an' you kin go yourn. Ain't
+gwine ter mortify you no mo'. Remember, what I say: thar's only one
+thing you dassent do wid er fine gentlemin--_trus' him!_ Don't trus'
+him, Mell; don't trus' him! My chile, the good Lord ain't denied ye
+brains, use 'em! Here ends the chapter on Devilho--"
+
+Turning off abruptly, Mr. Creecy puffed sturdily up the hill, leaving
+his daughter deep in the sulks, but with much solid food for
+reflection.
+
+Her eyes followed him sullenly. He was but one remove from--a darkey.
+Never had he appeared so irredeemably ugly, awkward and illiterate;
+never acted so altogether and exasperatingly vulgar, horrid and
+abominable, and yet she pondered deeply on his words. Their effect
+upon her surprised even herself. Can an unschooled man be wise? Ah,
+Mell! wisdom is not curbed by rhetoric, nor ruled by grammar. The
+_respicere finem_ of the unlettered appears oftentimes to be _jure
+divino_.
+
+After a while Mell wiped away the very last tear of agonized pride,
+which hung like a dewdrop on her long curling lashes. The gall and
+wormwood of her present feelings were somewhat abated. She knew what
+she was going to do.
+
+"I'll get out of this!" exclaimed Mell, speaking to herself in
+particular, and into space at large. "Get out of it, the very first
+chance."
+
+Get out of what, Mell? This humdrum life of little cares and big
+trials? this uncongenial association with an overworked and sickly old
+mother (once as pretty as yourself, Mell) and an ill-favored,
+ill-mannered and illiterate old father?
+
+Is that what Mell intends to get out of?
+
+Yes, and she means to do it in the easiest possible way, according
+to her own conception of the matter. Other girls may find it
+necessary to work their way, by a long and tedious process, out of
+disagreeable surroundings, but she will do it with one brilliant
+master-stroke--_coûte qu'il coûte_.
+
+Put a placard on pretty Mell; proclaim her in the market place; hawk
+the news upon the street corners; inscribe it on the pages of the
+great Book up yonder!
+
+To unite her destinies with some being--not divinely, blessing and
+being blessed--not vitally, loving and being loved; not necessarily a
+being affectionately responsive and, therefore, fitted to become the
+sharer of her joy and the assuager of her grief, but simply some being
+of masculine endowment serving in the capacity of a latch-key, through
+whose instrumentality she can gain admission into the higher worldly
+courts, for whose untasted delights her whole nature panted, is
+henceforth, until accomplished, the end and aim of Mellville Creecy's
+existence.
+
+Ho, there! all ye buyers, come this way!
+
+Here's a woman for sale!
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+A MOTE IN THE EYE.
+
+In Pompeii, eighteen hundred years ago, people--a good many people,
+were dreadfully afraid of dogs; so much so that many of the
+householders in that famous old city put _Cave Canem_ on their
+front-door-sills, as a friendly piece of advice to all comers-in and
+goers-out. Just how their feelings were affected towards the domestic
+cow, we are left to conjecture; but now, after eighteen hundred years,
+and in less famous localities, people--a good many people--are still
+afraid of dogs, and without a nice sense of discernment in their
+fears, include cows, putting the two together as beasts that want
+"discourse of reason."
+
+Now, this is unrighteous judgment; for even a cow should be looked at
+fairly, even if she does show the cloven hoof. There are cows and
+cows, as well as men and men. Suke, the young Jersey, would not toss
+her horns at a butterfly, much less hurt a baby. She was sagacity
+itself, and granting she did not know the buttered side of bread,
+which is likely, she did know, to a moral certainty, where she got her
+grass and how.
+
+Early the next morn, Suke began to low, and hoping to be heard by
+virtue of insistence, kept it up until nightfall, by which time she
+had bellowed herself hoarse. Suke could make nothing out of it, and no
+doubt dropped to sleep, theorizing on the perversity of remote
+contingencies, and wondering why it was that she had spent all the
+long hours of that breezy summer day in the lot, and the companion of
+her outings in the house.
+
+The late afternoon found Mell in dainty attire, seated on the front
+porch, gazing wistfully in the direction of the Bigge House. He had
+not found her in the meadow in the morning, perhaps, he would seek for
+her in the little house on the hill, in the evening. It could not be
+that he had avoided paying her any attention that could be noticed by
+others; she had sometimes thought so, but then it could not be. She
+dismissed the idea; it was too uncomplimentary to herself, and too
+defamatory towards him.
+
+But the slow hours dragged on; he came not. Mell sat alone. At ten
+o'clock she crept sadly into bed--into bed, but not into the profound
+slumber of youth and a mind at ease. Far into the night, her unquiet
+thoughts were yet heaving to and fro; advancing as restless billows of
+the sea, retreating as vaporous cloud-mists in the sky. Her snow-white
+bed--a feathered nest--erst so well suited to light-hearted repose,
+had changed its flexible lines of comfort into rigid lines of care.
+
+Dropping to sleep at last, Mell dreamed she had made the world all
+over, from pole to pole, after a new model and on a modern plan, and
+having fitted it up expressly for her own needs, found it ever so much
+pleasanter, and a great improvement on the old.
+
+It was upon the same old world, however, she opened her eyes the next
+morning, and into one of its most worrying days, holding, indeed, more
+than its share of disappointment and worry.
+
+But when the third day was drawing to its weary close, and her
+longing heart longed still unsatisfied, existence had become a burden
+almost insupportable to poor Mell. For the third time she donned her
+prettiest dress. He _must_ come to-day. Out again upon the little
+porch, with a book in her hand, and trying to read, Mell was oppressed
+with a sense of extreme isolation, a wasting famine of the heart, a
+parching thirst of the eye. In her despairing loneliness, incapable of
+any other occupation, she scanned eagerly every passer by; brooded
+deeply on many passing thoughts. This lonely waiting, in a small waste
+corner of the great wide universe, for a girl of Mell's ambitious turn
+of mind, was, in truth, hard. It was lowest pauperism to her panting
+spirit--panting to achieve not little things but great. Humble strife
+in a little world, amid work-a-day environment, and among everyday
+people, had no charms for Mell. Such living was, in a word,
+unbearable.
+
+And over there across that beauteous valley, in the enchanted halls of
+the unattainable, life was a delightful series of interesting events,
+redolent of delicate sentiments and sweet-smelling savors, spiced with
+novelty, brimful of pleasure, amusing, absorbing, far-reaching,
+all-embracing; in brief, a ceaseless symposium, purged of every ugly,
+common or narrow element, as roseate and as captivating to the fancy,
+as hand-painted satin framed in mosaic.
+
+A boy walked up the garden path. The young lady seated on the porch,
+saw him coming, and a feeling of exultation shot through all the blood
+in her veins. The boy held a note in his hand, and Mell jumped into
+the contents of that note, intellectually, in less than the millionth
+part of a second. He could not stand it any longer; he was writing to
+know if he might call, and when. She had a great mind to let him come
+this very evening, though he did not deserve it; but then, do men ever
+deserve just what they get, good and bad, at women's hands?
+
+"A note, ma'am," said the boy. Mell took it in silence, opened it
+tremulously, and read:
+
+"Suke is unhappy. Me too. Don't disappoint us to-morrow, and send me a
+bit of a line, sweet lassie, to say that you will not. J. P. D."
+
+"The scribblings of a school-boy," muttered Mell, inconceivably
+dashed.
+
+"No answer," she told the boy. When the messenger was beyond reach of
+recall, she was sorry she had not replied to the note, or sent word,
+yes; for, perhaps, it would be better to see him once more, have a
+plain talk, and come to some understanding. The more she dwelt upon
+the matter, the more certain she became that this was her best course;
+so upon the morrow, the half-past five o'clock breakfast was hardly
+well over, when, with alternate hope and fear measuring swords within
+her, she fled to the lot for Suke. With one arm thrown affectionately
+around the Jersey's neck, the two proceeded most amicably to the
+meadow. There she waited an hour nearly, before Jerome came; but he
+did come, eventually, wearing the loveliest of shooting-jackets, with
+an English primrose in his buttonhole, radiantly handsome, deliciously
+cool, and as much at his leisure as if it did not make much difference
+to him whether he ever reached his destination or not.
+
+Thus Jerome--but what of Mell? Every medullary thread, every
+centripetal and centrifugal filament in her entire body was excited
+over his coming. She was flushed, and so hot and flurried, and had
+been waiting for him, it seemed to her, twelve months at least, and it
+enraged her now to see him sauntering so slowly toward her, just as if
+they had parted five minutes ago. Poor Mell, after her experiences of
+the past three days, was in that condition of body when a trifle
+presses upon one's nervous forces with all the weight of a mountain.
+Irritated, she returned his good morning coldly.
+
+"Dear me, Mr. Devonhough! Is it really you? Why did you come? I did
+not send you word I would be here."
+
+"No, you did not. Nevertheless, I knew you would."
+
+"Nevertheless, you knew nothing of the sort! How can you say that? I
+had a strong notion not to come."
+
+Jerome made a gesture of incredulity.
+
+"Oh, a notion! I dare say. Girls live on notions, bonbons, sugar-plums,
+taffy, and what not; a pound of sweetened flattery to every half
+ounce of wholesome truth. But laying all notions aside, you will always
+come, Mellville, when I send for you."
+
+"How dare you," began Mell, nettled to the quick and purposed to give
+him an emphatic piece of her mind, and then ignominiously breaking
+down, constrained, dismayed, crimsoning to the tips of her ears,
+paling to the curves of her lips, and wishing she had died before she
+left the farm-house that morning.
+
+"And now I have offended you," said Jerome drawing nearer, "and I did
+not mean to do that, pretty one! I cannot help teasing you, sometimes,
+because when you are teased your face has that innocent, grieved
+expression of a thwarted child, which I do so dearly love to see. And
+I must, perforce, do something in self-defence, you have been so cruel
+to me." His tones were low, now, and as oily as a lubricating
+life-buoy. "I have waited for you one hour each day; I have gone away
+after every waiting, desolate and unhappy. Don't you know, when two
+people think of each other as we do, when two people love each other
+as we do, that separation is the worst form of misery? Then why have
+you been so cruel, Mell?"
+
+Peeping under the fluted archway of the white sun-bonnet for an
+answer, his face came in dangerous nearness to its wearer; their
+quickened breath united in a symphony of sweet sighs, their quickened
+pulses throbbed in a unison of reciprocal emotion.
+
+One moment more, and--Mell stood off at some little distance, looking
+back roguishly at the figure kneeling alone beside the old stump, with
+outstretched arms tenderly embracing naught, and stealthy lips
+defrauded of their prey.
+
+Mr. Devonhough did mind a losing game such as this. To be made to feel
+foolish and to look foolish, was more than he could tolerate under any
+conjuncture of circumstances. He extricated himself as speedily and as
+gracefully as possible.
+
+"Miss Creecy!"
+
+"Mr. Devonhough!"
+
+"You will probably treat me with ordinary civility, at the time of our
+next meeting."
+
+"And you will probably do the same toward me."
+
+"We shall see, as to that."
+
+He bowed blandly, and turned upon his heel. He was going away? Well,
+he wouldn't go far. Mell was so confident on this point, that she
+seated herself comfortably on the old stump again, and gave herself no
+uneasiness. She could not credit the evidences of her own senses when
+the moving figure became first a mere speck upon the horizon, and then
+a something gone, lost, swallowed up into the unseen.
+
+"It passes belief," said Mell; "surely he will come back, even yet!"
+
+She waited one hour longer; she waited two--he evidently did not
+intend to come back.
+
+She went home with a troubled heart.
+
+The next morning, feeling somewhat more cheerful at what she
+considered the certain prospect of seeing him again, and to a somewhat
+better purpose, she called for Suke, in feverishly high spirits, and
+the two set off together on a spirited race down the hill.
+
+One hour--two hours--three hours--and not a sign of her truant lover.
+
+Mell burst into an agony of tears.
+
+"I am no match for him," she sobbed. "He is heartless and cynical, and
+imperious and selfish. He does not care in the very least bit for me
+and I"--springing to her feet, and dashing away her tears--"I do not
+know, at this moment, Jerome Devonhough, whether I most love or hate
+you!"
+
+This feeling of sullen resentment sustained her through that long,
+long day. In the cool of the evening her mother sent her on an errand
+to the little country store, about a mile distant. Coming back she
+encountered a gay cavalcade of ladies and gentlemen on horseback,
+conspicuous among them, Jerome. She had no reason to suppose he
+recognized, or even saw, the quiet figure plodding along on foot, and
+catching the dust from their horses' hoofs.
+
+"This is my life," said Mell, looking after them with yellow eyes,
+"while others ride, I walk!"
+
+The noise of their clattering feet and merry voices had scarcely died
+away, when there came another sound; faint at first and uncertain, it
+came nearer and nearer. A solitary horseman dashed up to her side and
+dismounted.
+
+"Jerome! Is it you?" exclaimed Mell, with a glad start, forgetting all
+the anger she had been nursing against him since yesterday, in the joy
+of seeing him again. "How could you tear yourself away from that
+lively crowd?"
+
+"One, if she is the right one, is crowd enough for me," declared
+Jerome, with a laugh; and throwing his bridle reins negligently across
+his arm, he walked along beside her. "When I saw you, Mellville, I
+dropped my whip out of pure delight, and as it is a dainty trifle
+belonging to Clara--Miss Rutland, that is--adorned with a silver
+stag's head and tender associations, I had, of course, to come back
+for it. At all events, I could not have closed my eyes this night,
+without seeing you, making my humble confessions, and imploring your
+forgiveness for my conduct of yesterday. I behaved abominably. I
+confess it. I am truly sorry. And, at the risk of falling in your
+esteem, I am going to tell you something--my temper is a thing
+vile--villainous, but it does not often get the better of me as it did
+yesterday. Forgive me, dearest?"
+
+"I am not your dearest," Mell informed him, with head erect.
+
+"Not? Why, how's that? 'Nay, by Saint Jamy,' but you are! I have one
+heart, but one, it is all yours; you have one, but one, it is all
+mine. We are to each other, dearest, _Ita lex scripta_."
+
+"The matter is one in which I, myself, shall have a say-so."
+
+"You have had a say-so! You have said: 'Jerome, I love you!'"
+
+"How can you speak so falsely? It is not true--I did not say so."
+
+"Not in words," conceded her tormentor, "but you do, all the same,
+don't you, petite?"
+
+"I am not your petite, either," protested Mell, driven almost to
+desperation.
+
+"No? Then you are sure to be my darling. That's it, Mell! You are
+certainly a darling, and mine."
+
+"I am not!" shrieked Mell, choking with anger. This mockery of a sore
+subject was really unbearable.
+
+"Not my darling, either?" inquired Jerome, grave as a Mussulman. "Then
+what the dickens are you?"
+
+"A woman not to be trifled with," said Mell, hotly; "who finds it much
+easier to magnify injuries than to forgive them."
+
+"Like the rest of us," interposed Jerome; "but that is not Christian,
+you know."
+
+"You are enough to turn the saintliest Christian into a cast-away,"
+proceeded Mell, severely. "Can't you be serious for a little
+while? I am not a child to be mocked at and cajoled and cozened and
+hood-winked, _faire pattes de velours_, treated to flim-flam and
+sweet-meats, knowing all the while that you are ashamed of my mere
+acquaintance."
+
+"You can't think such a thing!"
+
+"I do think it! I have cause to think it! See here, suppose you were
+in love with Miss Rutland--"
+
+"I can't suppose that! I couldn't be if my life depended on it; not
+after seeing you. Why do you wish me to suppose that?"
+
+He shot a keen glance at her.
+
+"That I may ask you this question--If you were, would you make love to
+her after the same methods you employ toward me?"
+
+"No; I don't believe I would. I am quite sure I would not. The woman
+is herself responsible for the way in which love is made to her. I
+can't be with you any time without wanting to call you some pet name,
+and I never feel that way with Clara."
+
+"It is my fault, then, that you are so disrespectful?"
+
+"Am I disrespectful?"
+
+"You are. Listen to me for a moment, Mr. Devonhough. If you really
+care for my society, as you say you do, why do you not seek it as you
+do the society of other young ladies--at home? My father is a poor
+man, but he is honest; and honesty should count for something, even in
+good society. He is also illiterate, but no one can say aught against
+his character; and character ought to be more desirable than much
+learning. Then, again, although the blood in my veins may lack in
+blueness, it is pure, which is a matter of some importance.
+Altogether, I don't see why you should look down upon me."
+
+"I do not look down upon you!" Jerome was earnest enough now. "I
+know that I ought to have called at the house, but--ahem! my time is
+not exactly at my own disposal. In a word, I have not had an
+opportunity."
+
+Jerome, saying this, looked far away in pensive thoughtfulness. Mell,
+listening, looked hard into his face.
+
+"Opportunity!" ejaculated Mell. "You manage somehow to call upon me
+pretty often elsewhere!"
+
+"Not at a visitable hour."
+
+"Were I a man and wanted to see a girl, I'd _make_ my opportunity!"
+
+She laughed, derisively--there is something very undiverting in such a
+laugh.
+
+"Would you, Mell? No, you would not. You would do like the rest of
+mankind; submit as best you could to the inflexible logic of events
+and do the best you could under the circumstances."
+
+"Is a cornfield the best you can do under the circumstances?"
+
+"It is Mell--the very best. Now, my sweet Mell, I am going to be
+serious--really serious--dreadfully in earnest. I acknowledge that you
+have some cause to find fault with me. There are things 'disjoint and
+out of frame' in my wooing, which I cannot explain to you at this
+time. Bear with them, bear with me for a little--there's a dear
+girl--and when I come back--"
+
+"You are going away! Where, Jerome? When?"
+
+"Only a run over to Cragmore, for a week or ten days. I have friends
+there, who are writing for me. Another guest is coming to the Bigge
+House, and I rather think we shall be in each other's way, Mell."
+
+She leant upon his words as if they planned
+
+                 "Eternities of separate sweetness."
+
+"Mell, will your regard for me bear a heavy test? I cannot now speak
+such words to you as my feelings prompt me to speak, but will you not
+trust me blindly until certain difficulties which surround me are
+overcome? Is your affection great enough for that?"
+
+"I do not know," faltered Mell; "I would trust you to the world's end,
+and to the very crack of doom, if you would only tell me."
+
+"And then it would not be trust," Jerome gently reminded her, with his
+mysterious smile. Catching his glance of penetrating tenderness, a
+vivid breathing reality from a misty background of fogs and doubt,
+under the spell of its enchantment, Mell thought she could. Her face
+softened.
+
+"It will be hard, Jerome, but I will try."
+
+"Then, believe me, all will yet be well with us. Whatever untoward
+event may occur, whatever else you may have cause to doubt, never
+question the sincerity of my attachment. I call upon God, who readeth
+the heart of man, to witness that you, only, are dear to me--you,
+only, precious in my sight. Believe that; be patient, and trust me."
+
+The deep silence which followed these words was broken only by their
+slow moving feet, crushing the crisp leaves beneath them, and the wild
+palpitations of the girl's heart. Crystal stars made haste to lend
+their liquid glimmering to the scene, and blinked knowingly at each
+other from azure heights on high. The sweet south wind, in melting
+mood, murmured tunefully above their heads, swelling in delicious
+diapason of melodious suggestions, and mingling with mysterious
+elements in stirring pulse and thrilling nerves.
+
+The rasp of a discordant tone, thrust vehemently into this sweet
+blending of concordant harmonies, disturbed upon a sudden Mell's
+unwonted peace of soul. She heard her father's voice. He was saying:
+"Don't truss him, Mell; don't truss him."
+
+"How can I be patient," she asked, with a touch of her old petulance,
+"unless I know why it is you treat me so? Jerome, tell me your
+difficulties."
+
+"And by so doing increase them? No. My hands are full enough as it is,
+and to have you incessantly fretting and fuming about little crooked
+things which all the fretting in creation won't straighten out, would
+be more than I could stand. Melville, you must really consent to be
+guided blindly by my judgment in this matter. I have studied the
+subject carefully, and it is only for a little while, sweet. We are
+young, we can afford to take things easy."
+
+"Men of pluck," exclaimed Mell, with spirit, "don't take things easy!
+They grip hold of things and turn them into moulds of purpose."
+
+"Do they, little wiseacre? Then, manifestly, I am not a man of pluck.
+I am made of weak stuff, a feeble straw, perhaps, in your estimation,
+tossed about by every little puff of air! Ha! ha! ha! How little you
+know about me, Mell!"
+
+"That is true," responded Mell, promptly, adding, with that lively
+turn of expression which gave such zest to her conversation, "very
+little, and that little nothing to your credit!"
+
+Jerome was amused. He laughed and stopped, and forthwith laughed
+again.
+
+"Ah, Melville, you charm me afresh at every meeting. Where do you get
+all your _sauce piquant_? Beside you for life, that old meddling
+busy-body, _ennui_, will never get a single chance at a fellow. Your
+name ought to be Infinite Variety."
+
+"And yours," retorted Mell, with the quickness he enjoyed, "Palpably
+Obscure! But here we are at my own gate. Fasten your horse and come
+in."
+
+Her voice was absolutely pleading.
+
+"I would with ever so much pleasure, but--that whip is yet to be
+found, and the riders will be coming back. I must at once rejoin them.
+Good night, Mell."
+
+"Good-night," responded Mell, from the other side of the gate, and in
+angered tones, "Jerome, have I not spoken plainly enough to you? Must
+I repeat that I am not your toy--not your plaything--but a resolute
+woman, determined to maintain my own respect and to accept nothing
+less than yours? You shall not so much as make free with the tip end
+of this little finger of mine, until--"
+
+"Well," said Jerome, "let me know the worst. When will that terrible
+interdict be removed?"
+
+"When you can enforce the right by virtue of possession."
+
+"Heaven speed that moment!" exclaimed he, sighing audibly and mounting
+his horse. "When shall we meet again, Melville?"
+
+"That rests with you."
+
+"Let me see, then. Not to-morrow, for at daylight we are off to Gale
+Bluff for the day. Not on Wednesday, for there's a confounded picnic
+afoot for that day. I wish the man who invented picnics had been
+endowed with immortal life on earth and made to go to every blessed
+one of 'em! But on Thursday, Mell, I shall be in the meadow at the
+usual hour."
+
+"But I won't!"
+
+"Yes, you will, Mell."
+
+"Positively, _I will not!_"
+
+"Nonsense. What is your objection? Where is the harm? The young ladies
+at the Bigge House entertain me out of doors."
+
+"Do they?"
+
+Mell was astonished, and began to waver.
+
+"I thought it wasn't considered the thing."
+
+"On the contrary, it is _the_ one thing warranted by the best usage.
+Out-of-doors is now in the fashion. Doctors preach it, preachers
+expound it, legislators enact it, and the whole people make it a
+decree _plebiscite_. Clara sits with me for hours under the trees--"
+
+"Oh, does she!" interrupted poor Mell, with a pang. Seeing her way to
+a question she had long been wanting to ask, she subjoined quickly:
+"And what do you think of Clara Rutland, Jerome? Do you call her an
+interesting girl?"
+
+"I never have called her that," replied Jerome, "never that I know
+of, but--she'll do. One thing, she can talk a fellow stone blind at
+one sitting. But that's nothing. Starlings and ravens can talk, too."
+
+At the end of this speech, Mell was doubly anxious to know Jerome's
+real opinion of Clara Rutland. It seemed to her that the question was
+more open at both ends than it ever had been before.
+
+Jerome patted his horse's head, told him to "Be quiet, sir!" and
+resumed the threads of discourse.
+
+"What was I saying? Oh, yes! We live out of doors at the Bigge House.
+There wouldn't be any use for a house there at all, if it wasn't for
+bad weather. Those girls try their best to be agreeable, but none of
+them are _provoquante_ and charming, like you, Mell. While they sleep
+away the sweetest hours of these golden summer mornings, what harm is
+there in you and I enjoying pleasant converse together in the green
+fields, inhaling the pure air of heaven? I promise you to be on my
+best behavior. I promise you to uphold the integrity of the tip end of
+that little finger inviolate; and so you will be on hand without fail,
+Mell, and so will I, and so will something else."
+
+"What else, Jerome?"
+
+He bent low from his saddle-bow to whisper into her ear:
+
+"That supreme happiness which is present everywhere when you and I are
+together. Be sure to come, darling. And now, once more, good-night!"
+
+He galloped off, leaving Mell standing in the gateway, and on the
+uncomfortable side of a very knotty point. Did Jerome really love her?
+She believed he did--ardently. Did he love her well enough to surmount
+those difficulties of which he had spoken? Did he love her well enough
+to marry her?
+
+"Aye, there's the rub!" cried Mell. Her mind fairly swarmed with ugly
+suspicions, some of them as infinitesimal, and at the same time as
+dangerous as those microscopic bacteria which enter the physical
+laboratory, disorganizing, and, if not quickly eliminated, destroying
+the very stronghold of life itself. And as biological analysis was not
+yet, at that time, practiced as a method of research into the germs of
+things, Mell must needs fall back entirely upon inferential
+deductions.
+
+Those difficulties, what could they be that she might not know them?
+If this tantalizing, and yet, withal, most fascinating, of created
+beings, truly loved her--loved her in love's highest sense, and with
+no thought of deception, would he at every turn put her off with
+honeyed words and paltry evasions? Would he have said, "You must
+really consent to be guided blindly by my judgment in this matter," if
+he valued her as she valued him?
+
+Of one thing she was sure; she would be guided blindly by no human
+being, man or woman, in anything.
+
+"_No, I won't!_" she audibly informed the dew-damp lilies and
+the secretive rose, stamping her foot to impress it upon their
+understanding. Catch any wide-awake, thoroughly independent,
+altogether self-sufficient and splendidly educated American girl
+going it blind at any man's behest! She would make short work of
+his courtship, and him too--first.
+
+Still pacing distractedly up and down the garden path, Mell heard a
+window open, saw a head protrude, and heard a voice, which said:
+
+"Send 'im ter his namesake, Mell. Let 'im git thar before he gits the
+better o' you!"
+
+"So he shall, father."
+
+"Then go ter bed."
+
+"I am going now--going to bed," she continued, communing with
+herself--"to bed, but not to the meadow Thursday morning. I'll cut my
+throat from ear to ear, just before I start to the meadow again at the
+bidding of Jerome Devonhough!"
+
+Bravo for Mell! Strong in this determination, she is now comparatively
+safe, except for the one menacing fear, that this sentimental feeling
+she has for Jerome may interfere with the more serious business of
+life. Love was all well enough in its way, but what this country
+maiden panted for, was a new life on a higher plane, with or without
+love. It was the thing her education demanded. It was the thing she
+intended to accomplish.
+
+After all, she went to bed in very good spirits. She was tolerably
+sure of bringing Jerome to her own terms, and if not--well, not to
+make a sad subject likewise tedious, Mell, in spite of all her love
+for Jerome, was as much for sale as ever.
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+A TOTAL ECLIPSE.
+
+Nothing ever turns out just as we expect.
+
+The next day promised to be long to Mell, but before the old tall
+clock in the corner tolled out the hour of ten, something happened
+which gave to its every moment a pair of golden wings. Miss Josey
+Martlett, one of those ancient angels who personate youth, who
+endeavor to assimilate facial statistics and unfledged manners, who
+are interested in everything under the sun except their own business,
+came driving up to old man Creecy's farm. Under this lady's auspices
+it had been, and through her material assistance, that the sprightly
+little country girl had been mercifully snatched out of regions of
+ignorance and darkness, and maintained for a number of years at a
+famous boarding-school, where, among other things, she had been taught
+to worship the beautiful in all its forms, to cultivate the refined in
+all its processes, and to execrate the common and the ugly in all its
+manifestations. A defective curriculum--for what is more common than
+human frailty; what uglier than, oftentimes, duty?
+
+Let us hasten to concede that old man Creecy has some show of reason
+on his side. Not all education educates. The best may furnish us with
+feet and hands, eyes and wings, trained members, fit implements,
+shields, anchorage, strongholds, and stepping-stones; but also
+hiding-places, weak spots, loopholes, clogs, and stumbling-blocks.
+
+"I would stay, but I can't," protested Miss Josey, as Mell insisted
+upon her taking off her hat and sitting down in the most comfortable
+rocker in the house, while she herself sat beside her and toyed with
+the visitor's hand, and fanned away the heat; and then ran for a glass
+of fresh buttermilk, and brought in some red peaches and blue grapes
+on an outlandish little Jap waiter in all colors, "just too 'cute for
+anything." Miss Josey was Mell's only connecting link with the country
+"quality," and hence appreciated in due proportion to her importance.
+
+"I declare, Mell, you spoil me to death," simpered Miss Josey, "and
+nothing else in life is half so nice as being spoiled to death. But I
+must eat and run--must, really--I'm just so busy I hardly know which
+way to turn. I want you to go to a picnic with me to-morrow."
+
+"A picnic!"
+
+Mell's heart got into her throat at one single bound, and stuck there.
+Jerome had said something about a picnic.
+
+"What picnic, Miss Josey?"
+
+"The Grange picnic. I'm one of the lady managers, as perhaps you know,
+and I want you to help me with the tables. Mrs. Rutland cannot go, and
+there are so few to be depended on."
+
+"You can depend on me," said Mell; "I will go with you gladly--gladly
+spend and be spent for you, who have been always so kind to me."
+
+Hadn't she, though? But this was the crowning act of all Miss Josey's
+kindness. At this picnic she would see Jerome, and, who knows, perhaps
+find out his difficulties!
+
+"You are a sweet girl, Mell," returned Miss Josey, gratified. "So
+grateful, in a world chock full of the basest ingratitude. I told Miss
+Rutland, 'Mell Creecy is the girl to take your place. She knows what
+to do, and she'll do it!'"
+
+After this, Mell could scarcely follow the drift of her visitor's
+conversation. She was in a ferment of impatience for Miss Josey to be
+gone, that she might put the finishing touches to a new white dress in
+readiness for to-morrow's festivities. But Miss Josey, who couldn't
+possibly stay two short minutes when she arrived, did not get off
+under two mortal hours, or more. This is one of those little
+peculiarities of the sex, which the last one of them disavows.
+
+Gone at last, Mell went dancing over the house and singing over her
+work at such a lively rate, that her father put his head in at the
+chamber-door wanting to know "what she was er makin' sich er fuss
+erbout?"
+
+"The Grange picnic, father, tra-la-la! I'm going with Miss Josey,
+folderolloll!"
+
+"Oho! Devilho gwine ter be thar, I s'pose?"
+
+"Yes, indeed! Hail, all hail! La-la-tra-la!"
+
+"Make him toe the mark, darter!"
+
+Mell's song abruptly ceased.
+
+To make an individual of Mr. Jerome Devonhough's subtle intellect and
+masterful will toe the mark was going to be no easy matter. He was far
+from being an exact science whose formula could be reduced to the
+touchstone of certainty. Softer were his ways, and more complex his
+web, the fabric of his purpose more difficult to trace, than the
+intricate meshes of this cob-webbery lace she was basting in the neck
+of her dress. Nevertheless, every stitch of her needle fastened down
+her gathering intentions to the figure of her mind. Jerome must have
+done with these evasions; he must tell her the truth, and the whole
+truth; he must henceforth act right up to the notch, or else she would
+put an end to everything between them, and in the future have nothing
+whatever to do with him. Several measures such as these, rightly
+enforced, would, she believed, bring the most slippery Lothario in
+existence down on his knees at a woman's feet, _If_ the man really
+loved the woman. _If_ Jerome really loved Mell.
+
+"If, _Si, Wenn, Se!_" vociferated Mell, stamping her fiery little
+foot. "Why was it ever put into articulate speech?"
+
+She knew it, this highly educated girl, in so many languages, and
+could not blot it out in a single one of them! Is not mere human
+knowledge a kind of blunt tool?
+
+But she was ready, bright and early, the next morning, so promptly
+ready that Miss Josey commended her in unstinted terms.
+
+"Had it been Clara," said Miss Josey, as Mell sprang lightly into the
+little basket phaeton, "she'd have kept me waiting, probably, a whole
+hour without a scruple of compunction! Come, we will go to the Bigge
+House first for some things I must carry."
+
+To the Bigge House? The gates of Paradise were about to open for
+Mell. Rejoice with her, all ye who read. How will you feel when
+the doors of your big house are about to unclose themselves before
+your long-aspiring and wistful gaze, disclosing within the risen
+Star of Conquest, the bright realization of many golden visions and
+many rose-colored dreams?
+
+This Bigge House, of so much local fame and importance, was, in fact,
+a spacious mansion of no small pretention, and having been originally
+built for a man named Bigge, in spite of all that the present owners
+could do in the way of writing and calling it Rutland Manse, it
+remained, year after year, the Bigge House. Pleasantly situated,
+well-constructed, and well-kept, the house itself was surrounded by
+extensive and beautiful grounds, a grove, a grass plot, a flower
+garden embellished with trellises, terraces, fountains, rare
+shrubbery, and an artificial pond to row pretty little boats on, and
+secondly, to propagate fish. The family were of an old stock, but a
+newly rich--a class who like much to enjoy their money, and better
+still, to show it.
+
+On this cloudless summer morn, perfect as weather goes, so perfect
+that one might look upon it as a Providential complicity in the
+booming of the Grange picnic, a gracious provision of nature to suit
+one special occasion, the approaches to the Bigge House presented a
+stirring scene. Carriages, buggies, and wagons, vehicles of every
+description, and vehicles nondescript, lined the roadways in every
+direction. Servants were rushing hither and thither, fresh arrivals
+coming every few moments to swell the throng, voices calling to each
+other in joyous recognition, fair hands waving _au revoirs_, as they
+dashed by, without stopping, on their way to the scene of the day's
+festivities. A pleasurable sense of expectation brightened every face,
+a buoyant sense of exhilaration quickened every heart, and high above
+the heads of all, a brilliant sun, regnant on a field of blue, lighted
+up the long sloping hills and broad green valleys. Mell looked about
+her wonderingly. Who were all these people, and how many of them would
+she know before the day was done?
+
+Miss Josey had left her holding the reins while she ran in for a cargo
+of bundles. It was not at all necessary, except in Miss Josey's
+imagination. Her well-groomed little nag was alive, it is true, but
+some live things creep, and Aristophanes--called Top,--was one of
+them. He never thought of starting anywhere as long as he could stand
+still. In this respect, he differed from his mistress, who never
+stayed anywhere, as long as she could find enough news to keep going.
+
+"Hold him tight, Mell," had been Miss Josey's injunction when she left
+Mell alone with Top.
+
+At another time this arrangement would have greatly disappointed Mell.
+Her whole being had clamored to get inside the Bigge House, and,
+behold! here she sat along with Top outside the sacred precincts. But,
+somehow, her heart beat so high with rainbow-tinted fancies, she was
+altogether unconscious of anything amiss in the situation. If not
+within the very courts of the wonderful palace, the very penetralia of
+the Penates, she was very near the goal; nearer than she had ever been
+before. She could almost look in--she could almost see the shining
+garments and gloriously bright faces of the beings she envied, the
+beings who lived that life so far above her own. She had come thus
+far; she waited at the gate, and some day the great doors would be
+flung wide open for her; she would cross the threshold. But not alone.
+One would bear her company who was ever an honored guest there, and
+in many another home of wealth and fashion and influence.
+
+These thoughts transferred their suppressed rapture into the
+expression of her face--into cheeks dazzling for joy--into eyes
+swimming in lustre--into a mouth wreathed into curves of exquisite
+transport. She was beautiful.
+
+A number of young gallants came crowding about the gate. They stood in
+the plentitude of checked tweeds and light flannel, with the latest
+sheen on a boot, and the latest paragon of a hat--mighty swells,
+conscious of their own superiority, eying this deuced pretty girl, and
+wondering who she was.
+
+"You ought to know, Rube," said one.
+
+"But, I don't!" said Rube. "I will know before I'm much older though,
+you can depend upon me for that! She's with Miss Josey."
+
+Mell did not notice them beyond a casual glance. They had about them,
+incontestably, an enormous lot of style, but compared to Jerome, they
+were flat,--awfully flat. She caught a glimpse of him now, this
+swellest swell of the period, coming down the marble steps of the
+mansion.
+
+Some one is with him--a lady. Yes, just as she thought, Clara Rutland.
+Here they come. She, so--so--almost ugly, and he, so--so--so
+Jerome-like. That's the only way to express it. Jerome is more than
+simply handsome, more than merely graceful, more than a man among
+men--he's a non-such, in a nut-shell!
+
+But here he is, almost in speaking distance, and every step
+bringing him nearer. Isn't he going to be surprised? Isn't he going
+to be delighted? Isn't he going to shake her hand and smile that
+impenetrable smile, and--?
+
+How is this? Jerome has come and gone. He did not look at her--he did
+not once raise his eyes in passing.
+
+Just ahead of this poky little vehicle, where Mell awaited the return
+of Miss Josey, stood a lordly equipage, all silver plate and shine,
+with a well-dressed groom standing in front of the champing, restive,
+mettlesome animal, as eager to be off and gone somewhere as the most
+restless of human hearts in a human bosom.
+
+Into this nobby turnout Jerome assisted Miss Rutland, and then
+springing in himself, grasped the reins from the groom's hands. For
+one awful moment (to Mell) the horse stood straight upon his hind
+legs, and then, obeying Jerome's voice, who said in the quietest of
+tones, 'Go on, Rhesus,' gave one wild plunge and dashed ahead, leaving
+Mell with a stifled feeling, as if she was buried alive under twenty
+feet of volcanic ashes.
+
+But what did it mean--his passing her without a sign of recognition?
+Jerome might be of a truant disposition, of unstable fancy, and
+superior in his own strength to most ordinary rules, but he couldn't
+help knowing her face to face. There was a bare possibility that he
+had not really seen her; his sight, come to think of it, was none of
+the best, or, at least, he habitually wore an interesting little
+_pince-nez_ dangling from his button-hole, and sometimes, though not
+often, stuck it across the bridge of his well-shaped nose with telling
+effect.
+
+With such arguments, and much wanting to be convinced, Mell recovered
+her equipoise to some extent, managing to hear about half Miss Josey
+was saying, and to answer only once or twice very wildly at random.
+Arrived at their destination, she assisted her patroness in
+receiving and arranging the baskets; this important contingent of
+the day's proceedings being satisfactorily disposed of, they
+followed the example of the crowd at large and strolled about in
+search of some amusement. A more delightful location for a day's
+outing it would be hard to find, the world over. On three sides of
+the principal grove, stretched an immense plateau, smooth as a
+flower-garden, and level as a plumb line, and on the fourth side a
+sudden, bold declivity, just as if a giant hand had pulled the
+clustering hills apart and left them wide asunder, laying bare the
+heart of a magnificent ravine. In this wild gorge were stupendous
+cliffs and brinks, shady shelves o'erhanging secluded and romantic
+nooks, enormous rocks holding plentiful treasures in moss and
+lichen, singularly constructed mounds, probably the remaining
+deposit of a prehistoric race, wild flowers in variety, wild scenery
+in perfection, and a beautiful stream of running water, wherein
+disported finny tribes in abundance. Nothing in the highest art of
+gardenesque could produce such results as this. A mere ramble amid
+such scenes of diverse picturesqueness--nature's wear and tear in
+moods of passion--amounts to a study of geological architecture under
+favoring conditions.
+
+Mell loved nature, but not as she loved Jerome. Her brains were
+crammed with wild speculations in regard to him, which accounts for
+the fact that she had no mind on that eventful day to invest in all
+those wonderful manifestations of nature's power and nature's
+mystery.
+
+During their circuitous meanderings, two young men joined Miss Josey
+and were duly presented to her _protégé_. They were fine young
+fellows, and very pleasant, too, but Mell continued so preoccupied in
+the vain racking of her brain, trying to imagine what had become of
+Jerome and Clara Rutland, that she did not catch their names, and
+replied to their efforts at conversation with monosyllabic remarks.
+One of them, a merry-tempered, straightforward, stalwart young chap,
+armed with rod and bait, asked her, with a flattering degree of
+warmth, if she wouldn't go with them a-fishing; but reflecting if she
+did so, she would in all likelihood be out of the way of seeing Jerome
+for hours to come, Mell declined without circumlocution, glad to get
+rid of him on the pretext of having promised to assist Miss Josey in
+her onerous duties, as commissary of subsistence. Discouraged, the
+young fisherman bowed and left.
+
+"Such a pretty girl," he remarked to his companion. "It's a pity she
+doesn't know what to say!"
+
+Think of Mell Creecy not knowing what to say! The girl who was always
+saying things nobody else had ever thought of saying. Such is the
+pretty pass to which an unhappy love may bring the brightest girl!
+And, after all, she saw absolutely nothing of Jerome until all those
+wagon upon wagon loads of baskets had been ransacked, and their
+tempting contents emptied out upon the festive board, giving forth
+grateful suggestions of the coming mid-day meal.
+
+While squeezing lemons, flushed and more than ever anxious, deft of
+hand, but uneasy in mind, the buggy containing Jerome and Miss Rutland
+dashed into the grove.
+
+"We've been all the way to Pudney," called out the young lady, holding
+up to view some tied-up boxes, "and here are the prizes."
+
+"All right," responded Miss Josey, "but do let us have the ice. The
+prizes are of no consequence to a famishing people, but the dinner is,
+and we are about ready."
+
+"She's powerfully interested in the prizes," commented a girl at
+Mell's elbow, "but she has a good right to be."
+
+"Why?" inquired Mell.
+
+"Because she is going to be crowned queen of love and beauty."
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"I've put things together, and that's the way they sum up to me. That
+young man with her can beat all of our boys, and he's going to crown
+her."
+
+"Is he?" ejaculated Mell.
+
+Let him dare to do it! Before Jerome Devonhough should place a
+victor's crown on Clara Rutland's head, she would--well, what would
+she do? "_Anything!_" muttered Mell, between her teeth.
+
+Poor Mell! She had been to such an expensive school and learned so
+many things, and not one of them was of the slightest use to her in
+this sore strait. Could there not be established a new school for
+girls, differing materially from the old; founded upon a more
+adaptable basis, taught after a hitherto unknown method, and including
+prominently in its curriculum of studies, that branch of knowledge
+whose acquisition enables a woman to bear long, to suffer in silence,
+and in weakness to be strong? These are the practical issues in a
+woman's daily life, and although in such a school she might not get
+her money's worth in German gutturals and French verbs, she would, at
+least, have indulged in a less reckless expenditure of time in
+obtaining useless knowledge.
+
+But let us not blame the schools over much, and without a just
+discrimination. Not all the fault lies at their door. Something there
+is amiss among the girls themselves. It may be, that they love and
+hate, and talk too much, even in one language.
+
+In a girl of Mell's temperament, love would not have been love,
+lacking jealousy, and its twin-feeling, revenge. More's the pity,
+Mell!
+
+That picnic dinner was splendid. Everybody enjoyed it but Mell, and it
+was not the young fisherman's fault that she did not. Although he was
+in attendance upon another young lady, who seemed to know what to say,
+and said it incessantly, he kept an eye on Mell, and proffered her
+every tempting dish he could lay his hands upon. To no purpose; for
+Mell could not eat. She tried, and the very first mouthful paralyzed
+her ability to swallow. It was altogether as much as she could do to
+keep from sobbing aloud in the faces of all these omnivorous, happy
+people. What made it all the worse, at breakfast time she had been
+happier than they--too happy, in fact, to eat, and now, here at
+dinner, she was too miserable.
+
+And there sat the author of all her misery, not twelve feet distant,
+perfectly oblivious to her proximity, nay, her very existence. Not by
+any chance did he ever look toward her, or show any consciousness of
+her presence. So devoted and so marked were his attentions to that
+uninteresting and anything but attractive Clara Rutland, that Mell
+heard it commented upon on all sides. These two, so sufficient unto
+themselves, were among the first to leave the festal board and wander
+off in sylvan haunts. Anon, all appetites were satisfied, and amid the
+buzzing of tongues and boisterous flashes of merriment, the multitude
+again dispersed. Unobserved and in a very unenviable frame of mind,
+the unhappy Mell stole away to herself. The paramount desire of her
+wounded spirit was to get beyond the ken of human eye. In a hidden
+recess screened by an overhanging rock, she sat down, the prey of such
+discordant and chaotic thoughts as wear away, in time, the bulwarks of
+reason. It was yesterday, no, the day before, no, longer, that he had
+called upon God to witness that she alone was dear to him, she only
+precious in his sight, and now, how stands the case? Ah, dear God, you
+heard him say it! Oh, All-seeing Eye, you have looked upon him this
+day, and will not a lightning blast from an indignant Heaven palsy the
+false tongue, whose words have no more meaning than loose rubble!
+
+Into the heaviness of these thoughts, growing heavier with access of
+bitterness as the moments sped, there came the ringing tones of a
+voice--a voice well known to Mell.
+
+Shaking off her lethargy and looking out from her hiding place, she
+beheld the object of all these harrowing reflections, grasping Miss
+Rutland's two hands in his own, as they together, and laughingly,
+descended a precipitous declivity. Once down, they proceeded with
+access of laughter, to push their way through a tangle of brushwood.
+To get out of this into the beaten path, they must necessarily advance
+in the direction of her place of concealment, and, devoured with
+jealousy, inflamed with distrust, tortured with the cruel madness of
+love, Mell determined to satisfy herself on the spot, as to whether
+Jerome's avoidance was premeditated or unintentional. Just as the
+couple emerged from their nether difficulties, and stood on clear
+ground and firm footing, Mell suddenly stepped forth upon the same
+path, confronting them face to face. Miss Rutland did not speak. Mell
+knew she would not, although they had attended the same boarding
+school for years, lived in the same house, and graduated in the same
+class, where Miss Rutland, unlike herself, achieved no distinction of
+self-merit; being content to be accounted distinguished through the
+sepulchre of a dead father.
+
+Mell did not expect recognition from her in such a place at such a
+time; for the neighboring rocks were alive with the best families in
+the county, and Clara was one of those feeble brained persons, who
+have minds suited to all purposes, save use and knowledge of that kind
+which may be put on and off as a movable garment. Such creatures,
+tossed about helplessly on the billows of circumstance, keep one
+finger on the public pulse, and know you, or know you not, according
+to its beat. For all this, Mell cared nothing in that supreme moment.
+One swift glance at Clara, and after that every faculty of her mind
+and body was centered on Jerome. He was evidently surprised at being
+nearly run over by this blustering and blowsy young lady, but beyond
+that--nothing. He looked her full in the face, the unknowing look of a
+total stranger. The result of this look was to Mell calamitous. A
+waving blankness came before her sight, her knees trembled, her
+strength seemed poured out like water, and staggering to a tree, she
+caught hold of it for support.
+
+"Cut--cut, dead!"
+
+This, after all that had passed between them, was simply brutal. But
+the despised and slighted country girl was only momentarily stunned,
+not crushed. Out of the throes of her wounded pride and injured
+affection, there burst forth the devouring flames of a fiery and
+passionate nature, incapable of any luke-warmness in emotion. Her eyes
+dilated, her fingers twitched, her face set like a flint, her lip
+curled in scorn, and she shook her clenched fist at Jerome's
+retreating figure.
+
+"Contemptible coward! Miserable trickster! What have I ever done, that
+you should refuse to speak to me in the presence of Clara Rutland?"
+
+Her bosom heaved; she sobbed aloud, and shook her fist again.
+
+"I'll make you sorry for this! I'll get even with you, yet!" Words,
+whose fierce earnestness embodied a prophesy, and were followed by a
+prayer:
+
+"Oh, God, only give me the power to make him feel it, and I ask no
+more! I care not what then befalls me!"
+
+This paroxysm of passion swept over her as a besom of destruction,
+leaving her quenched as tow, white, unnerved, quite pitiful and hushed.
+She sank to the ground and into a state of semi-unconsciousness.
+
+Some one coming near, some one lifting her into a sitting posture,
+some one pouring cold water upon her head, and holding something to
+her nose aroused her.
+
+"That's right," said the young fisherman, "open your eyes--open them
+wide! It's nobody but me. I wouldn't tell another soul, for I know you
+wouldn't want the mischief of a fuss made over it. But how did you
+come to pitch over?"
+
+"I did not come to pitch over," said Mell, bewildered, "did I?"
+
+"Of course you did! I had been looking for you for ever so long, and
+standing on top there, I happened to look down, and saw you lying
+here. And you never will know how scared I was, for, at first, I
+thought you were dead. Gad, didn't I make tracks, though, after I got
+started! But, drink a little more of this, and now, don't you feel set
+up again?"
+
+"Considerably so," said Mell, trying, too, to look set up. He was so
+kind, and she, poor, bruised thing, so grateful. This little word,
+kind, so often upon the lip--upon yours and mine, and the lips of our
+friends, as we encounter them socially on our pilgrimage day by day,
+is only at certain epochs in our own lives fully understood, and
+deservedly cherished deep down in the heart. And yet, so few of us can
+be great, and so many of us could be kind if we would, and oftener
+than we are.
+
+"I know just why you toppled," proceeded Mell's kind rescuer.
+
+"But I didn't topple!" again protested Mell.
+
+"Did you fall down on purpose?"
+
+"No. I did not fall at all, as far as I know."
+
+"Exactly! those are the worst kind--the falls you can't tell anything
+about."
+
+So they are. Her's had not been far in space--she remembered it all
+now, with an acute pang--but, oh, so far in spirit!
+
+"You could walk now a little, couldn't you?"
+
+"I think I could," said Mell.
+
+She got upon her feet with his assistance.
+
+"You are shaky, yet."
+
+"A little shaky," Mell admitted.
+
+"Then take my arm."
+
+She took it, as a wise being takes the inevitable all through life,
+submissively, and without saying much about it.
+
+They walked slowly, and the young follower of dear old Ike watched his
+companion's every step, with a solicitude bordering on the fatherly.
+
+"What do you suppose I am going to do with you, now?"
+
+She could not imagine.
+
+"Give you something to eat--not that only, make you eat it! I gave you
+enough at dinner time, if you had only eaten it, but you left all my
+goody-goodies untasted."
+
+"And you unthanked," added Mell, with a ghost of her old smile, and a
+_soupçon_ of her old sprightliness.
+
+"No matter about that! Only, I was worried that you could not eat, and
+I know the reason why."
+
+Did he? Did he know it? The girl at his side dreaded to hear his next
+words.
+
+"Miss Josey had been working you to death all the morning. I saw you
+how you stayed around and looked after everything, while Miss Josey
+sat on one side with her hands folded. She's good at that! She never
+does anything herself but reap all the glory of other people's
+successes. The very worst of these picnics is, that a few do all of
+the work, and the many all the enjoying. Now, you--_you_ haven't had
+much of a time, have you?"
+
+She had not, but no girl in her right mind is going to confess, out
+and out, that she hasn't had a good time, even in the Inferno.
+
+"Rather slow, perhaps," answered Mell, putting it as mildly on a
+strained case, as the case would bear, "but there's nobody to blame
+for it, but myself. If I wasn't such a fool in some respects, I might
+have had a--a perfectly gorgeous time. _You_ would have given me all
+the good time a girl need to look for."
+
+"But you wouldn't let me!"
+
+"Well, you see," explained Mell, warming with her subject, "I had
+promised Miss Josey--"
+
+"Never promise her anything again!"
+
+"I don't think I will! But, as I was saying, I promised her to come
+and take Miss Rutland's place--to come for that very purpose, and when
+I make a promise, however hard, I'm going to keep it."
+
+"Bravo for you! Not every girl does that."
+
+"Every high-principled girl does." Her tones were severely
+uncompromising.
+
+"_Ought to_, you mean," rejoined her companion, with an incredulous
+laugh.
+
+"No--_does!_"
+
+Light words, lightly spoken, lightly gone! Alas! How these bubbles of
+talk, subtle as air, come back home after a time, to twit us with
+scorn, to taunt us with falsity, to impute wrong unto us, to arraign,
+to accuse, to denounce, to condemn out of our own lips.
+
+"Here we are," said Mell's companion, still laughing at the idea of a
+young woman thinking it necessary to hold tight to her word. "Here we
+are. Now sit right down here and rest your head comfortably against
+this tree. I'll be back in a twinkling."
+
+So he was, with a plate in his hand filled with edibles, and a bottle
+of sparkling wine.
+
+"Eat," commanded this eminently practical young man; "eat and drink.
+That's all you need now to fetch you round completely."
+
+This settled the question, and settled it most judiciously and
+satisfactorily. The solid food proved a balm of comfort to that
+desolate goneness within her, which Mell had wrongly ascribed as due
+entirely to the volcanic derangement of her heart; and the strong wine
+sped through her veins a draught of health, a cordial to the mind, a
+rosy elixir of life.
+
+Mell began to take some interest in her companion and her present
+surroundings. She recognized in them a certain claim to her
+consideration, and a certain charm. This young stranger was a
+gentleman in looks and bearing; he had some manliness in his nature,
+nevertheless, (Mell felt down on gentlemen) and a heart as brimming
+full of charity as St. Vincent de Paul, himself. He was not ashamed
+among all his fine friends, to speak to a simple country girl, who,
+destitute of fortune, had nothing to commend her but innate modesty
+and God-given beauty. So far from being ashamed, he was ministering to
+her wants as no one had ever ministered to them before--as kindly and
+courteously as if she were in every respect his equal in social
+standing. Jerome would not speak to her, and this gentleman, in her
+weakness, held the cup to her lips, and put the food into her mouth
+with his own hands.
+
+"I'll pray for him this very night," thought Mell, and moistened the
+thought with a grateful tear.
+
+But, long before the edibles were consumed, every vestige of a tear
+had disappeared from Mell's eyes, and she was talking back to this
+pattern of a gentleman, as few girls of her age knew so well how to
+do. The blood rushed back to her pallid cheeks, witchery to her
+tongue, magic to her glance.
+
+"Don't be offended," she remarked to him, with enchanting candor,
+after they had become the best of friends; "but I did not hear your
+name this morning, and I have not the slightest idea who you are."
+
+"Have you the slightest desire to know?"
+
+"Indeed I have! You can't imagine--the very greatest desire!"
+
+"Then let me refresh your memory somewhat. Do you recall a pug-nosed,
+freckle-faced, bull-headed youngster, who used to pommel Jim Green
+into blue jelly, every time he wanted to lift you over the swollen
+creek or carry your school-bag, or--"
+
+"I do; I remember him well. But you--you are not Rube Rutland?"
+
+"Then I wish you'd tell me who I am! I've been thinking I was Rube
+Rutland for a good many years now--for I am older than I look."
+
+"And to think I did not know you!" exclaimed Mell.
+
+"And to think I did not know _you!_" exclaimed Rube. "That's what gets
+me! I was asking everybody and in all directions who that stunning
+girl was, with--"
+
+"Well," inquired Mell, laughing, "with _what?_ I'd like to know what
+is stunning about me."
+
+"With the sweetest face I ever looked into."
+
+This reply caused Mell's eyes, intently fixed upon the speaker, to
+drop with rare grace to meet the maiden's blush upon her cheek. A
+perfectly natural action, it was for that reason and others, a very
+effective one.
+
+"When I found out who you were," pursued Rube, studying the face he
+had praised, seeing it glorified by his praises, "I fairly froze to
+Miss Josey, wanting so much to renew our acquaintance, and when you
+had no word of welcome for an old friend, and gave me the cold
+shoulder with such a vengeance, I was cut all to pieces over it. Fact!
+I couldn't enjoy fishing, and I feel bad yet!"
+
+"You might have known I did not recognize you," said Mell, lifting her
+eyes. "I cannot tell you how glad I am, Mr. Rutland."
+
+"_Mr. Rutland!_ It used to Rube."
+
+"And shall be Rube again, if you so desire! Rube, I am just delighted
+that you've come back home!"
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+EVEN.
+
+So far, she had dallied innocently enough with her old playfellow;
+neither seeking to please nor deceive, spreading no nets of
+enchantment, nicely baited, to entrap the fancy of this agreeable
+young man (rich too), who was as frank in nature and as transparent in
+purpose, as physically muscular and daring.
+
+At three o'clock, Miss Josey came to sound the horn for the races, and
+the crowd came surging back. Old and young, big and little, the cream
+of the county and its yeomanry, a congregation of the mass, a
+segregation of the cliques, mounting high into the hundreds. The order
+of the Grange was then at the zenith of its fame and power.
+
+The crowd, as we have said, came surging back. The best of the fun was
+yet to come. Mell roused herself and looked about her. Here were other
+girls with sweet faces, and many of them, as she was aware, possessed
+of those heavier charms of worldly substance which oftentimes outweigh
+the sweetest of faces. None of them must lure him from her. He should
+stick to her, now, come what would. The careless beauty, the ingenuous
+and undesigning woman, is immediately transformed into a greedy
+monopolist, a wily fox, a cunning serpent, a contriving, intriguing,
+manoeuvring strategist, bent upon mischief, who will play a deep game
+and stoop to the tricks of the trade, and shift, and dodge, and
+shuffle, and aim to bring down, by fair means or foul, the noble
+quarry.
+
+Eye, lip, tongue, mind, heart, soul, the graces of youth, the
+allurements of beauty, the treasures of a cultivated mind, and all
+those sweet mysteries of sense which float in the atmosphere between a
+young man and the maiden of his fancy, were put in motion to bear upon
+Rube's case.
+
+He did not move; no wonder; gorged on sweets, Rube had neither power
+nor inclination to be gone.
+
+After a little, a group of young men stationed themselves at a given
+point, not far from where this couple sat. They had been into an
+adjacent farm-house and changed their clothes, and now appeared in
+knee pants, red stockings, and white jackets, a striking and
+interesting accessory to an already animated and glowing landscape. In
+this group of picturesque figures Jerome was conspicuous. Jerome
+looked well in anything, and generally well to everybody.
+
+Not so, to-day.
+
+To one pair of eyes, not distant, he now loomed up blacker in broad
+daylight than the blackest Mephistopheles in a howling Walpurgis
+night.
+
+He saw Rube beside her, and she noted his start of surprise.
+
+"Have a care!" cogitated Mell. "There may be surprises in store for
+you--greater than this and not so easily brooked."
+
+She turned her back upon him and gave her whole attention again to
+Rube. The first duty of a woman is to respect herself, the second duty
+of a woman is to enforce the respect of others. Some of these days
+Jerome Devonhough would be only too glad if she would deign to permit
+him to speak to her.
+
+"Aren't you going to take part?" she asked her companion.
+
+"No; I'm not in trim, and it's no use trying to beat Devonhough."
+
+"_You_ could beat him," said she. She spoke with confidence and
+seductively.
+
+"You are awfully complimentary, I declare! Do you wish me to run,
+Melville?"
+
+"I do. Yes, Rube, I wish it particularly. Why should this stranger
+carry off the palm over our own boys?"
+
+"For the best of reasons. He deserves to carry it off. Devonhough can
+out-run, out-leap, out-ride, out-do anything in the county."
+
+"Except _you_," again insinuated Mell.
+
+"Say! what makes you believe so strong in me?"
+
+"Nothing makes me, but--I cannot help it!"
+
+At this point, dear reader, if you are a man, and happily neither
+blind, nor deaf, nor over eighty years of age, take Rube's seat for a
+moment, at Mell's feet. Let her tell you in the sweetest tones, that
+she cannot help believing in you strong--let her bend upon you a
+glance sweeter than the tones, stronger than the words, and then say,
+honestly, don't you feel, as Rube did at this juncture, mighty queer?
+
+Under the spell, her victim stirred--he lifted himself slowly toward
+her, inquiring in a low voice, but with intense energy:
+
+"Melville, are you fooling me?"
+
+"Fooling you!" she ejaculated, in soft reproach. "Would I fool you,
+Rube? Is that your opinion of _me_? You think, then--but tell me,
+Rube, why do you think so?--that those early days are less dear to me
+than to you--their memory less sweet?"
+
+"I have thought so," murmured he in great agitation, "because I have
+not dared to think otherwise--_until now_."
+
+And into his great soul there entered, then and there, the ineffable
+beatitude of the true believer.
+
+Oh, wicked, wicked Mell! One little hour ago, and you had forgotten
+his very existence! Is the Recording Angel, who stands above your head
+up there, off duty, that you should dare to do it? Or, will it help
+your case in the day of reckoning, that deception foul as this, has
+been raised by clever women into the dignity of a fine art, and goes
+on among them all the while, as inexpugnable as an Act of Congress?
+
+"Melville, I will run this race--run it to please you."
+
+"I knew you would! And believe me, Rube, nothing could please me
+more."
+
+"Suppose I should win," said Rube, "what then?"
+
+"You will be the hero of the day, and--" Mell halted very prettily,
+but finally brought it out in sweet confusion, "and maybe _I_ would
+wear a crown."
+
+"By my troth, you shall! But what of me? I take no stock in crowns
+like that. If I should win, Mell, may I name my own reward?"
+
+"You may."
+
+"It will be a big one."
+
+"The man who runs and wins generally gets a big one."
+
+"But understand my meaning, Mell, understand it perfectly. I do not
+want the shadow of a doubt to rest upon this matter. Who shall decide
+when lovers disagree?"
+
+He had been toying with a twig broken from a flowering bay; it was
+stripped of foliage, save a few green leaves at the end, and with this
+he lightly touched the dimpled hand reposing upon her lap.
+
+"_That_ is what I would ask. Will you give it to me, Mell, if I win
+the race?"
+
+Mell trembled violently, but she said "yes."
+
+That was natural enough. When a woman says yes, it is time to tremble.
+Even Rube knew that.
+
+"You mean it? It is a solemn promise! One of those promises you always
+keep!"
+
+Again Mell trembled violently--worse than before, and again said
+"yes."
+
+That barely audible yes, had scarcely died upon her white lips when
+Rube sprang to his feet, and casting off his fawn colored flannel
+jacket and light waist-coat, tossed them in a careless heap upon the
+ground at her feet. Divested of those outer garments, the symmetrical
+curves of his young manhood, and the irregular curves of his honest
+face showed up to great advantage in white linen and a necktie--the
+latter a very _chic_ article of its kind, consisting of blazoned
+monstrosities of art, in bright vermillion on a background of
+white--blood on snow.
+
+"You must excuse my shirt-sleeves," said Rube, during the process of
+disrobing. "I have no costume, so must do the best I can under the
+circumstances."
+
+He next made off with his suspenders, and began tugging at his shirt
+in an alarming fashion.
+
+"What are you going to do?" interrogated Mell, with a horrified
+expression. "You are not going to--"
+
+"No," said Rube, laughing, and coloring too. "I'm not going to take it
+off. I'm only going to--" tugging all the while--"make myself into a
+sailor boy, or flowing Turk, or a loose Brave, or a something or
+other, to keep pace with those brocaded Templars, Hospitallers, and
+Knights of the Golden Fleece over there. Come, now, can't you fix a
+fellow up?"
+
+"Fix a fellow up?" echoed Mell, helplessly. She never had 'fixed a
+fellow up,' and she knew less about it than the sacred writings of
+Zoroaster.
+
+"Yes," said Rube. "Give me those ribbons you've got on--fix me up, put
+your colors on me, don't you see?"
+
+Mell did see at last, and greatly relieved, proceeded to do his
+bidding. The sash from her own supple waist was deftly transferred to
+his, and a knot of ribbons at her throat, after many trials, was
+finally disposed of to their mutual liking.
+
+"Now, don't I look as well as any of 'em?" inquired the improvised
+knight, quite carried away with the fixing-up process.
+
+"As well, and better," she assured him.
+
+"Well, then," he held out his hand to her, "let us seal the compact.
+If I win, Melville----"
+
+"Yes," said Mell, hurriedly.
+
+"But if I fail."
+
+"You _cannot_ fail, not if you love me!" She spoke impatiently, and
+with flashing eyes. "A one-legged man could not, if he loved me! Love
+finds a way, and love which cannot find a way is not love."
+
+"Enough," said Rube, below his breath. "You will know whether I love
+you or not."
+
+Their hands were still clasped together in bond, until, perceiving
+they had become a subject of curiosity to those about them, Rube at
+length allowed Mell to withdraw hers, whereupon he turned off with a
+light laugh; that proficuous little laugh, which amid life's
+thick-coming anxieties, great and small, serves so many turns, and
+turns so many ways, and covers up within us so much that is no
+laughing matter.
+
+Rube laughed and mingled with the crowd.
+
+"Come out of that!" shouted an urchin. It was the signal for a regular
+broadside of raillery and chaff from the pestiferous small boy, a
+many-tongued volume out of print, and circulating in open space at the
+rate of a thousand editions to the minute.
+
+Nothing abashed, amid groans and jeers, and gibes, and hoots, Rube
+took his place with the others, the only make-shift knight among
+them.
+
+"For pity's sake, look at Rube," exclaimed Miss Rutland, "actually in
+his shirt sleeves? Rube, don't! You are not in costume, and you spoil
+the artistic effect."
+
+"Look sharp," came Rube's laughing reply, "or I'll spoil the artistic
+result, also."
+
+"Don't get excited over the prospect," commented Jerome, nodding his
+head reassuringly at Miss Rutland, "there's not the remotest cause for
+alarm."
+
+Miss Rutland sat on a tub turned bottom side up, which had served its
+purposes in lemonade. Jerome took his ease on a wagon-body, also
+turned bottom side up, which had served its purposes as a table. Such
+are the phases of a picnic--and one picnic has more phases than all of
+Jupiter's moons.
+
+"The tortoise," pursued Jerome, now turning his attention more
+particularly to Rube, "is a remarkable animal, but like thee, oh
+friend of my soul, 'thou drone, thou snail, thou slug,' not much on a
+run. How much is it I can beat thee, Rube, every time and without
+trying--three lengths?"
+
+"Just you keep quiet," retorted Rube. "The man so sure, let him look
+to himself; the man who blows, let him beware! In all our trials at
+speed there never was before anything to win, and I'm a fellow who
+can't run to beat where there's nothing to win."
+
+"A tremendous issue is involved on the present occasion," announced
+Jerome in withering scorn. "A lot of paper flowers strung on a piece
+of wire to stick on a girl's head, and when it's all over and done, I
+don't know who feels most idiotic or repentant, the girl who wears 'em
+or the fellow who won 'em. I've been there! I know. I hope a more
+enduring crown than this perishable travesty will fall to my lot!"
+
+"So do I!" prayed Rube aloud, and with devoutness.
+
+"Oh, Rutland, Rutland!" exclaimed his friend, going off into an
+uncontrollable fit of laughter. "There isn't anything in this
+wide world half so deliciously transparent as your intentions,
+unless--unless," subjoined Jerome, as soon as he could again
+command his voice, "unless it be Miss Josey's juvenility."
+
+"Hush laughing," said Rube, drawing near and speaking low. "See here,
+Devonhough, you don't care the snap of your finger about this affair;
+you've said as much; so hold back, dear old fellow, won't you? Give me
+a chance!"
+
+"Ha! ha! ha!" roared Jerome, again going off. "'_Dear old fellow._'
+That's rich! Very dear old fellow, never so dear before!"
+
+"Oh, go along with you," responded Rube crossly. "Go to the devil
+until you can stop laughing!"
+
+He was about to turn off in high dudgeon, when Jerome with an effort
+pulled himself together and soberly considered the subject. "Hold on,
+then! I'd like to oblige you Rutland, of course I would, but there's
+Clara! She expects me to--"
+
+"Hang Clara!" said Rube, with the natural unfraternalness of a
+brother.
+
+"That's what I propose to do," answered Jerome. "Hang her with a
+wreath!"
+
+"Don't!" again pleaded Rube. "Not this time. If you just won't,
+I'll--"
+
+"Rub-a-dub-dub!" beat the drum.
+
+"Into place!" shouted a stentorian voice.
+
+"Ready?"
+
+"One--two--Boom!"
+
+They were off in fine style, Jerome quickly showing the lead, and Rube
+gaining gradually upon him towards the middle of the course. To one
+spectator it was more interesting than the sword-dance, more exciting
+than a steeple-chase. But the eager spectators at the starting place
+could see very little beyond a certain point, owing to the crowd of
+boys and men which lined the sides of the track and closed up as the
+runners passed. They could hear vociferous yelling and screaming,
+sometimes the outcry, "Devonhough ahead!" and then, again, "Hurrah for
+Rutland!" and, at the last, a tremendous whooping and cheering and
+clapping of hands, in which no name was at first distinguishable.
+Then, amid the unbounded enthusiasm of the multitude, the victor was
+lifted above the heads of the crowd and brought back in triumph.
+
+Mell had scarcely moved from the spot where Rube left her. She had
+had some time for reflection, and had profited by it, to such an
+extent, that she now felt quite miserable. That was the way with Mell,
+and continues to be the way with Mell's kind. They make a practice of
+hitching together the cart of Unthought and the sure-footed beast
+Think-twice; the cart in front, the horse in the rear; and if, under
+such circumstances the poor brute, nine times out of ten, lands his
+living freight into very hot water, too hot for their tender feelings,
+who is to blame for it?
+
+Some very strange thoughts coursed through the girl's mind. Now,
+suppose it was Rube seated up there on the heads of an idolizing
+populace, and it became incumbent upon her to fulfill that promise so
+rashly and foolishly given, could she do it? No! No! She would rather
+live a thousand years and scratch an old maid's head every hour in all
+those years, than marry Rube Rutland!
+
+It made her sick to think about it; every nerve in her body recoiled;
+every good instinct within her lifted up a dissentient voice.
+
+"Can't you see who it is?" She inquired hoarsely of her nearest
+neighbor, a much be-banged girl, who peered above the crowd from the
+top of a dry-goods box, with the cute expression of a fluffy-faced
+puppy, "Can't you see?"
+
+"Not distinctly yet, but I think it is that young stranger, Rube
+Rutland's friend; I'm pretty sure it is."
+
+"Thank God!" muttered Mell. She was ambitious, but she was not yet the
+hardened thing that ambition makes.
+
+"My goodness!" suddenly exclaimed the girl on the box. "It isn't that
+strange young man! It is Rube Rutland! I can see him distinctly now.
+Oh, how glad I am! It is Rube Rutland, boys." "Rutland forever!"
+shouted back the boys.
+
+In all that big crowd there was but one heart not glad. Rube was in
+the house of his friends, the other a stranger. County pride, State
+pride, local prejudice, all sided with Rube. Jerome was an alien. He
+had come there to beat "our boys," and one of our boys had beaten him.
+Huzza! Huzza! Shout the victory!
+
+They did shout it with a noise whose loudness was enough to bring down
+the roof of heaven. Never had there been such a victory at a Grange
+picnic before.
+
+Deafened by the noise Mell slunk back into the wood. All color forsook
+her face once more. She had played for high stakes, this ambitious
+girl; she had won her game, and in the winning cursed her own folly
+and realized with a pang of unspeakable bitterness, that a victory for
+which one pays too dear a price is the worst kind of defeat.
+
+Released from the well-meant persecutions of his many admirers, Rube
+asked for his coat and things, and a fan, and was next subjected to a
+statement from the master of ceremonies.
+
+"With this wreath," explained that individual, "you may crown the lady
+of your choice, crown her queen of Love and Beauty, and it will be her
+prerogative to award the other prizes won on this occasion. Who is the
+fortunate lady?"
+
+Every woman in hearing distance held her breath, every man opened wide
+his ears.
+
+"Miss Mellville Creecy."
+
+"Whom did he say?" queried Miss Josey, tremendously excited and not
+quite certain she had heard aright. Miss Josey was nibbling at a
+peach; she nibbled no more. Though blessed with an excellent appetite,
+Miss Josey in her hungriest moment was more eager to hear something
+new than eat something nice.
+
+"Did you say Mell, Rube?"
+
+"I did," said Rube.
+
+It struck the crowd speechless. What? Rube Rutland, the son of an
+ex-Governor, an ex-Judge, an ex-Senator, dead now, but dead with all
+his titles on him; Rube Rutland, the greatest catch in the State,
+going to crown Mellville Creecy, daughter of that old ignoramus who
+made "fritters" of the King's English, and dug potatoes, and hoed
+corn, and ploughed in the fields with his own hands? The thing was
+preposterous! It was a thing, too, to be resented by his friends and
+equals.
+
+Miss Rutland drew her brother aside.
+
+"Rube, you cannot mean it! You surely have some sense! A little, if
+not much! You can't crown that obscure girl with the cream of the
+county, your own personal friends, all around you."
+
+"Can't I?" said Rube. "I can and _will!_ The cream of the county may
+go to--anywhere." Rube closed up blandly: "I will not limit them in
+their choice of locations. That would be not only ungenerous but
+ungentlemanly."
+
+"Rube," persisted Miss Rutland, "do listen to reason. What will mother
+say? What will everybody say?"
+
+"Say what they darned please!"
+
+Rube was first of all a freeborn American--secondly, an aristocrat.
+
+"What's the use of being somebody if you've got to knuckle down to
+what people say?"
+
+"But you are not obliged to crown anybody," insinuated Clara. "Rather
+than crown this low-born girl, make some one your proxy. Jerome
+would--"
+
+"Oh, I have no doubt, with pleasure! You are a deep one, Clara, but
+you'll wear no crown this day. Might as well give it up."
+
+So she perceived, and turned off in a rage, first informing him that
+he always had been, and always would be an unconscionable ass.
+
+"You have fully decided, then?" questioned the master of ceremonies.
+"I have," Rube told him, beginning to get put out. Pretty Mell might
+well have been a scare-crow, such consternation had she created
+amongst them all. "I decided some time ago. Will it be necessary for
+me to mount a tree-top and blow a clarion blast before I can make you
+all understand that I am going to crown Mellville Creecy, and nobody
+else?"
+
+"Certainly not, certainly not," hastily replied the master of
+ceremonies. He too was disappointed; he had a sister. Was there ever a
+man in power who didn't have a sister?--who didn't have a good many,
+all wanting crowns?
+
+"Will you make a speech?"
+
+"Nary speech," declared Rube, laughing. "I'm not so swift in my tongue
+as my legs! See here, Cap'n, there's no occasion for an unnecessary
+amount of tomfoolery about this thing. Some gentleman bring Miss
+Creecy forward. I'll put this gewgaw on her in a jiffy, and that'll be
+the end of it!"
+
+Rube smiled softly to himself. That was very far from being the end of
+it.
+
+"Mell! Mell!" screamed Miss Josie, running up to her _protegé_, the
+bearer of astonishing news, "you don't know what's going to happen!
+You'd never guess it! Rube is going to crown you, my pretty darling!
+You are to be queen of Love and Beauty."
+
+"But, I'd rather not," said Mell, drawing back.
+
+"Rather not?" screamed Miss Josey. "Did anybody ever before hear of a
+woman who would rather not be a queen--a queen in the hearts of men?"
+
+"I don't see how you can help it," continued Miss Josey. Mell did not,
+either, alas! "But I don't wonder you feel a little frightened about
+it. It is such a wonderful thing for Rube to do: but Rube has two eyes
+in his head, Rube has, and knows the prettiest girl in the county when
+he sees her! This thing is going to be the making of you, Mell (rather
+say the undoing, Miss Josey) so don't be so frightened, but hold your
+head high, and bear your honors bravely, and remember all eyes are
+upon you. The rest of the girls are fairly dying with envy, don't
+forget that!"
+
+This last remark brought Mell to her senses. Not one of them but would
+gladly stand where she stood--gladly put themselves in her shoes if
+they could. Rube was not a mate, as mating goes, to be met with every
+day in the year. The sugared point of this timely suggestion served
+Miss Josey's purpose effectually. It stilled the wild throbbing in the
+girl's heart, brought the blood back to her face, and turned the
+purple of such wondrous hue in her eyes, to the softest black; with
+intensity of gratification, Jerome himself was forgotten for the
+nonce.
+
+Miss Josey, still in a flutter of delight, now proceeded to put on her
+sash, to replace the knot of ribbons at her throat, to pass her hands
+assuagingly across Mell's wilderness of frolicsome hair, and to put an
+extra touch or two to her simple toilette generally; whispering words
+of stimulation and encouragement all the while.
+
+Thoroughly put to rights, Miss Josey placed the girl's hand into that
+of a very grand personage--the president of the Grange, in fact--who
+led her gallantly to the spot selected for the coronation ceremonies.
+There stood the hero of the day. He advanced a step or two as she drew
+near, he bowed low, and then in a distinct voice with a somewhat
+heightened color, but in his usual simple, straightforward manner,
+said: "Miss Creecy, I beg you will do me the honor to accept this
+trophy of my victory."
+
+Miss Creecy silently bowed her head; he placed the wreath upon it, and
+lo! what has become of our rustic maiden? She is a Queen!
+
+Nevertheless, she immediately fell back again into Miss Josey's hands,
+who hastened to push the crown this way and then that,--forward a
+little, and then backward a little--just one barley-corn this side and
+just one the other; until the magical spot of perfect-becomingness
+having been reached, she wisely let it be. As soon as the crowd caught
+sight of this bright splendor of yellow hair, surmounted by a wreath
+of flowers, the shouting and yelling re-commenced; and when it was
+passed with electric swiftness from mouth to mouth, that the head of
+the Rutland family, the owner of an honored name and a big estate, had
+chosen for his queen, not the daughter of a rich planter or a great
+statesman, but a child of the yeomanry, a ripple of intense excitement
+flashed through the multitude, and enthusiasm knew no bounds.
+
+"Rutland for the people, and the people for Rutland!" was the joyous
+outpouring of the common heart. A sentiment which only subsided
+occasionally, to be renewed with increased vigor and manifold cheers.
+
+"I see your game," said the secretary of the Grange to Rube, with a
+sly wink. "You are going to run for the Legislature?"
+
+"Your penetration surprises me," returned Rube with a laugh. "What a
+pity the voting couldn't be done now; I'd be willing to risk a couple
+of thousand on my own election, if it could!"
+
+"It's awfully becoming to her, isn't it?" inquired Jerome, speaking to
+Clara, and referring to the crown which sat upon the queen's head.
+
+"I don't think so," returned Clara, "not in the least becoming. It
+doesn't suit the color of her hair."
+
+"Sure enough! I had forgotten that. We bought it to suit yours, didn't
+we? It is too bad! but never mind; we'll come in for the second prize,
+certain."
+
+"Not I!" exclaimed Clara, with a toss of her head. "It is first or
+none with me. There is something mean, little, contemptible, about a
+second prize, just like all second-rate things! Having failed in
+securing the first, were I in your place, I would not try for the
+second."
+
+And she left him, much angered.
+
+"Whew!" softly whistled Jerome. "It strikes me that what pleases one
+woman, doesn't please another. Why is that? It also strikes me that
+it's no use trying to please any of 'em. A man can't; not unless he
+converts himself into a sort of synchronous multiplex machine, and
+tries seventy-five different ways all at once."
+
+The stream of people now poured in one direction,--towards royalty.
+Queens differ; but there is a something about every one of them which
+fetches the crowd. While this one stood hemmed in on all sides, an
+object of curiosity to all classes and conditions, all eager for a
+sight of her, some eager to be made known to her, others wanting to
+catch a look, a word, a smile, Mell heard some one at her elbow say,
+softly:
+
+"Mellville."
+
+Turning, she confronted Jerome. In a flash, her whole appearance
+changed. The moment before she had been a gracious sovereign,
+accepting with queenly grace the homage of her loyal subjects. Now,
+she was an outraged monarch jealous of her rank, standing on her
+dignity.
+
+"How dare you, sir!" asked Mell, eyeing him haughtily and drawing
+herself up to her fullest height. "How dare you to speak to me! How
+dare you touch me! I have not the honor of your acquaintance, sir!"
+
+Jerome was undeniably astonished; but this was not the time, not the
+place to indulge in a feeling of astonishment, or to make an
+exhibition of himself or her.
+
+"Your Majesty," said Jerome, with his characteristic coolness, "will
+graciously pardon me. The crowd is great, it pressed heavily upon all
+sides and I have not been able to resist it."
+
+He fell back at once, and Mell bowed, just as if nothing had happened,
+to the gentleman, whom the master of ceremonies was in the act of
+introducing to her.
+
+In the crush, Jerome encountered Rube. He had been called off on some
+matter under discussion among those running the shebang--Rube's way of
+putting it--and was now endeavoring to push his way back to Mell.
+
+"How-do, old fellow?" said Jerome, by way of congratulation.
+
+"Tip-top!" said Rube, by way of thanks, and seizing his friend's hand
+he wrung it as if his intention was to wring it clean off. "You're a
+trump!"
+
+"Don't mention it!" begged Jerome. He began to laugh again. For some
+reason the whole thing was excessively amusing to Jerome.
+
+"But I _will_ mention it," persisted Rube. "I'll thank you for it to
+my dying day. It was so self-sacrificing on your part, considering
+everything."
+
+"Oh, was it?" exclaimed his companion, choking down his risibles.
+"Well--ah--I don't exactly feel it that way. A mere trifle."
+
+"Not to me," declared Rube.
+
+"Perhaps not to me, either," conceded Jerome, looking on the subject
+more seriously. "For Clara--"
+
+"You can patch up Clara," Rube suggested, soothingly.
+
+"Do you think so? It's a rankling _casus belli_ at present, I can tell
+you! But how about your rustic beauty, eh, Rube? Is she pleased? Does
+she like it?"
+
+"Pleased? Like it? You bet she does! She's delighted!"
+
+"No one has introduced me yet," Jerome next remarked, quite
+incidentally. "And I am sure if her Gracious Majesty smiles upon any
+of her loyal subjects it ought to be me."
+
+"That's so! So come right along now." They reached her side.
+
+"Mell, here's the very best fellow in the world," said Rube, out of
+the fullness of his heart, forgetting the prescribed forms of
+etiquette in the absorption of warm feeling.
+
+Mell had noted their approach. She was not taken unawares. She bent
+her head slightly to the newcomer, she looked him over for a whole
+minute, it seemed, before she opened her lips and said:
+
+"How do you do, Mr. Very-Best-Fellow-in-the-World?"
+
+Those near enough to hear roared with laughter, for the young queen's
+manner made the whole thing so absurdly funny; and perhaps there is
+nothing a crowd so much enjoys as the taking down of a person whom
+they regard in the light of one much needing to be taken down.
+
+"His name is Devonhough," Rube hastened to explain, not relishing the
+laugh against his friend at this particular time by his particular
+fault. "Mr. Devonhough, Miss Creecy. He is my very best friend, Mell.
+Shake hands with him."
+
+Mell did so; but without the faintest glimmering of a smile, and with
+such glacial dignity as fairly charged the atmosphere with iciness.
+Not content with this, she met all his subsequent efforts to cultivate
+her acquaintance with the briefest and chilliest repulses.
+
+Rube was much concerned. He saw dimly that his best friend had not,
+somehow, made a favorable impression upon his future wife; but he
+could not tell the why or wherefore. While he wondered within him what
+he could do to put things on a pleasanter footing between them,
+someone else demanded his attention.
+
+"See here," said Jerome, as soon as Rube's back was turned. "I hope
+you now consider me sufficiently punished. I hope you feel even. I
+hope you won't treat me to any more state airs. I am tired of them.
+Your Majesty, let me tell you something. Mark well my words. It is to
+me, not Rube, you owe your present exaltation."
+
+"_To you!_"
+
+The unsmiling countenance now broke into a ripple of scorn.
+
+"What a ridiculous thing for you to say!"
+
+"The whole thing has been ridiculous," said Jerome. "I never in my
+whole life ever enjoyed anything so much. 'Tis the one grain of truth
+which gives point to the ridiculous. Think of Rube, dear fellow, so
+anxious to crown you, knowing nothing, suspecting nothing, begging me
+not to run fast, and I, so ten thousand times more anxious than he
+could possibly be, to have you crowned."
+
+"_You?_"
+
+"Yes. _Me!_ Don't you know, in your heart, Mellville, that I wanted
+you crowned?"
+
+"No, I know nothing of the kind! When a man wants a thing done, he
+does it with his own hand; when he does not want it done, or cares
+not much about it, he does it with another man's hand. Had you been
+anxious you would not have left it to Rube."
+
+"But with that wreath in my own hand, Mell, I was morally bound to put
+it upon another head."
+
+"Ah, indeed! Why?"
+
+Jerome did not answer immediately. When he did, it was with averted
+eyes, and with some impatience, and not in reply to her first question
+at all, but her quick repetition of his own words, "Morally bound,
+eh?"
+
+"Yes, Mellville. You forget I am a guest in her mother's house."
+
+"I do not forget it! I remember it every hour in the whole twenty-four;
+but does that make it incumbent upon you to ignore me? Jerome, look me
+in the face. What is Clara Rutland to you?"
+
+"Nothing!" exclaimed he, savagely, between compressed lips. "Less than
+nothing! A hundred times to-day I have wished her at the bottom of--"
+
+"There! No use to send her there _now_. It's too late!"
+
+The knowledge of what she had done, the wretchedness she saw it was
+destined to entail upon her, all this while couchant like a wild beast
+within her, now uprose into her expressive features. Jerome was struck
+with it.
+
+"What do you mean?" he asked.
+
+"You will know soon enough," she responded.
+
+He stooped to pick up the handkerchief she had dropped, and in
+restoring it, his hand, so cool and steady, came in contact with hers,
+so hot and tremulous; it touched and lingered, lingered long, and
+clung in a tender pressure; while a voice so low and firm, a voice,
+oh! so faint and sweet, stole its way into her ear, murmuring but one
+word, one little, fond word, which moved her in the strangest way,
+which thrilled, yet soothed her. Cooler than snow it fell upon her
+burning cheeks, warmer than a sunbeam into her freezing heart. That
+little game with Rube passed out of her memory.
+
+But looking up all too soon, she saw him. He smiled upon her. He was
+glad to see that she and Devonhough were getting along quite
+pleasantly.
+
+"I wish you would go away!" she suddenly exclaimed, turning upon her
+companion rudely. "Go back to Clara Rutland! You have no business
+here! I do not believe a word you have said to me! I yet fail to
+comprehend why a man may not be the master of his own actions."
+
+"Heigh-ho!" sighed Jerome. "Just so it is in life. Just as a man
+begins to think he has put everything in order, and settled the
+question, here comes chaos again. You do not understand that,
+Mell? Well, I will tell you. Every man has a master--circumstance. On
+my side, I am surprised that you, with all your quickness of
+apprehension, have not been able to see clearer and deeper into this
+subject. You ought to have known, you must have felt that I had
+some good reason for acting towards you as I have to-day. Have you
+been true to your promise to trust me--and trust me blindly? I fear
+not. You have been cruelly angry with me ever since this morning,
+when I dared not speak."
+
+"And why was it that you dared not speak?" demanded Mell, her lip
+curling contemptuously, but with a tremolo movement in her voice.
+"Does it then require some courage for a man, in your position to
+speak to a poor girl like me? Rube does not think so."
+
+"With Rube it is different."
+
+"_It is_, very different. There is no false pride about Rube."
+
+"And I hope there is none about me. But, Mell, you do not in the least
+understand my position."
+
+"I know as much about it as I care to know. Henceforth, Mr.
+Devonhough, let us be strangers."
+
+"We can never be strangers," said Jerome. He was growing earnest; he
+spoke very low and with that rapidity of utterance which accompanies
+excited feelings. "This no time nor place, Mell, for such an
+explanation; but here, and now, I will make it. I cannot longer exist
+under the ban of your displeasure. Know then, dear, that I would not
+speak to you this morning for your own sweet sake--not mine. I was
+driven to it to protect your good name, and keep you out of the mouths
+of those shallow-pated creatures, who have nothing else to talk about
+but other people's failings. Had Clara Rutland once seen me speak to
+you--had she for one moment suspected the least acquaintance between
+us, that hydra-headed monster, Curiosity, would have lifted its
+unpitying voice in a hundred awkward questions: 'How did you come to
+know Mell Creecy? Where did you meet her? Who introduced you to her?'
+And so on to the end of a long chapter. I did not wish to say, for
+your sake, that I had never met you anywhere but in a cornfield. I did
+not wish to say, for your sake, that we had became acquainted in a
+very delightful, but by no means conventional, manner. I have thought
+it best, all along, to keep the fact of our acquaintance in the
+background, until we were brought together in some way perfectly
+legitimate and customary. Always for your sake, dear, not mine. Now
+you know in part; to-morrow I will make a clean breast of all my
+difficulties; so disperse these clouds, and give me one sweet look ere
+I go."
+
+Instead of that, Mell swallowed a lump in her throat which felt as
+big as her head. She studiously avoided, for the rest of the day,
+any further speech with Jerome. His explanation was plausible
+enough on its face; but Mell was in no condition of mind to draw
+conclusions which might stand the test of reason, or be satisfactorily
+demonstrated on geometrical principles; and nothing that Jerome
+could say was now calculated to act as a sedative on Mell's nerves.
+She kept whispering to herself, "He feels it, yes, he feels it;"
+and thus nourished the firmness and the bravado necessary to her in
+the further requirements of her high position. She needed it all, and
+more, when it came to bestowing upon Jerome a handsome pair of
+spurs, as the second prize of the day. Certainly he cared for her,
+or why this glow on his clear-cut face, or why this light in his
+speaking eyes now bent upon her. Mell turned her head quickly.
+
+"I can't understand why you don't like Devonhough," Rube remarked,
+noticing the movement. "I think it odd. He carries things with a high
+hand among the girls, I can tell you. Most all of 'em are dead in love
+with him."
+
+"And do you wish me added to the list?" interrogated Mell, finding
+herself in a tight place, and hardly knowing how to get out of it.
+
+"Well, no; I don't!" laughed Rube, much appreciating the sly humor of
+the question.
+
+By seven o'clock the day's festivities were concluded; and then ensued
+a melting of all hostile elements into a homogeneous mass, all
+ravenous after iced-lemonade and home-made cake, and a heterogeneous
+devouring of the same; after which, the crowd, well pleased, but
+pretty well fagged out, turned their faces homeward, under a sun still
+shining, but shorn of its hottest beams.
+
+No one will gainsay the statement that our heroine has made great
+social strides in one summer's day. In the morning a simple country
+girl, poor in pocket, humble in rank, unknown in society, seated
+beside Miss Josey in the little pony phaeton, full of fair hopes and
+inspirations; in the evening the affianced wife of the best-born and
+most eligible young man in the county; returning to the old farm-house
+in grand style, leaning back on soft cushions, beside her future lord,
+in a flashy open carriage drawn by a ravishing pair of high mettled
+roans.
+
+Ambitious, indeed, must be that girl not satisfied with this wonderful
+result of one single operation in matrimonial stocks. And yet Mell is
+not happy. She forgets to give heed to what Rube is saying; she
+forgets almost to answer him back; so full of regret is she for her
+own lost self. She had had a thousand longings to get out of her old
+self, and out of her old life, and now, on the threshold of a new
+existence, Mell finds herself with only one desire--just to get back
+where she came from. If only she could--oh! if only she could, most
+gladly would this lately crowned queen have relinquished the glories
+of empire, the spoils of captive hearts, the trophies of social
+triumphs, the high emprise of a brilliant future, only to be simple
+Mell once more.
+
+Ah, poor Mell! Not for sale now. Sold!
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+PLAYERS ON A STAGE.
+
+Now, then, here is Thursday. Jerome had said: "You will be on hand
+without fail, Mell; and so will I, and so will something else."
+
+"But that something else," moaned the hapless Mell, bowed down and
+heart-stricken, "will never be on hand again in the meadow for me, nor
+anywhere else."
+
+Saddest of all, she had herself laid the axe to the root of her own
+happiness; she had baited her own hook and caught a big fish; she had
+provoked her own doom, and herself sealed it.
+
+Rube was not to blame.
+
+And Jerome--he had made out a good case. Had he loved her less he
+would, perhaps, have acted differently.
+
+She had digged a pitfall for her own occupation; and of all
+comfortless and stony places, such pitfalls as this make the hardest
+lying.
+
+Out in the narrow hall, on its own particular peg, hung Mell's white
+sun-bonnet. She took it down and put it on her head, and walked slowly
+to the top of the hill. With no intention of going to the meadow
+herself, her feelings demanded that she should find out if Jerome was
+there.
+
+He was, strolling moodily to and fro, in deep thought.
+
+He knows now. Rube has told him. He despises her to-day, and yesterday
+he had loved her. Look at him down there in the meadow! a beam from
+the sun, a breath from the hills, a part of the morning, the most
+glorious expression of nature in all nature's glory! Observe how he
+walks! Note how he stands still! Most men know how to walk, and most
+men know how to stand still, after a fashion; but not after Jerome's
+fashion. In motion, Jerome is a poem set a-going; standing still, he
+is grace doing nothing. He can lift one hand, and in that ordinary act
+sow the seed of a dozen beautiful fancies; he can wield such mastery
+over the physical forces of expression as has wondrous potency to sway
+the emotions of others.
+
+So she thought; so she stood, hidden herself from sight, but with the
+meadow in full view; and while so thinking, and so standing, drinking
+him in with every breath, feeding upon him with her eyes, devouring
+him with her soul, she, the affianced wife of another!
+
+Oh, wicked Mell!
+
+Jerome grows impatient; he looks at his watch, and turns inquiringly
+towards the hill; and Mell flies back to the house as if pursued by
+fiery dragons. For if he but caught sight of her, if he but crooked
+his finger at her, she would go down there, and then--what then?
+
+Mell was not blind to her own weakness. The afternoon brought Rube,
+overwhelmingly happy, overwhelmingly devoted. She must take an airing
+with him in his brand new buggy; and while they scoured the country
+round about, Rube was making diligent inquiry as to how soon they
+might get married. Mell caught her breath, and, in the same breath, at
+a possible reprieve.
+
+"Won't you give me a little time to think?" she pleaded. "It has come
+so sudden!"
+
+"Hasn't it, though!" cried happy Rube. "Do you half realize the romance
+of the thing, Mellville? 'Tis like a page out of Knight-Errantry, the
+days of lances and standards, and blood-thrilling adventures, when
+warriors in steel swore by the Holy-rood, and won fair women's
+smiles by deeds of valor--something very unlike the prosaic happenings
+of this practical modern life. But yesterday a wandering pilgrim, to-day
+I have found a shrine. ''Tis a dream!' I thought, when I opened my
+eyes this morning, 'a dream, too sweet to be true! Rube, old fellow,'
+I said to myself, 'you've got something to live for now. You must
+look to your ways and improve upon the old ones. There's a dear little
+hand that belongs to you; there's a pair of blue eyes to watch for
+your coming; there's a sweet little woman who believes in you, God bless
+her! For her sake I will run the race of life like a man; for her
+sweet sake I will win it!'"
+
+This was the time for Mell to speak. She wanted to speak, but--she did
+not. There were just exactly six reasons why she did not.
+
+Here they are, all in a row:
+
+Reason Number One.--She was not quite sure of Jerome--quite sure,
+perhaps, in regard to his affections, but not his intentions. Love is
+much, but not everything, and a lover surrounded by difficulties is
+not to be depended upon matrimonially.
+
+Number Two.--She was as resolutely bent upon getting out of this mean,
+sordid life as ever, and what way was there but this way?
+
+Number Three.--Rube was rich, and Rube's wife would be rich, too. For
+her part, she was sick and tired of poverty. Poverty, in a world
+governed by wealth, is the most unpardonable sin in that world's
+decalogue.
+
+Number Four.--Rube was in "society," and what ambitious woman ever yet
+saved her soul outside the magic circle of society?
+
+Number Five.--Rube was an aristocrat, and Rube's wife would be _ex
+necessitate rei_, an aristocrat also. Her Creator, she believed, had
+intended her for an aristocrat; otherwise why had He endowed her with
+intellect, beauty, and the power to sway men's passions?
+
+Number Six.--The fact that she did not love Rube had, in reality,
+nothing to do with Rube's eligibility as a husband. He would make a
+very good one, an infinitely better one than none at all!
+
+Of course, she would be paying a tremendous price for all these
+worldly advantages. Mell was aware of that all the while, but after
+deducting from the gross weight of their true value the real or
+approximate weight of their possible evils and disadvantages, she
+would undoubtedly still be getting the best of a good bargain.
+
+What is life but an enigmatical offset of losses and gain--so much
+gain on the one hand, so much loss on the other? And what was this
+transaction between herself and Rube but a repetition, under a
+somewhat different formula, of those mathematical problems worked out
+on her slate at school? It was all very simple.
+
+Young woman, if you were in Mell's place; if you had six good reasons
+for not telling the man you are about to marry that you did not care a
+straw about him, wouldn't you hold your peace?
+
+Then cast no stones at Mell.
+
+Mell _was_ deeply moved by Rube's words, but not deep enough to damage
+her future prospects. And since a woman has very poor prospects
+outside of matrimony, ought we not to excuse her for attending closely
+to business?
+
+At all events, although Mell's thoughts were heavy, and her soul
+stirred within her, and her thick breathing almost stifled in a
+painful sense of guilt, she did not say a word. Feeling that Rube's
+eyes were fixed upon her, she raised to him her own, suffused in
+tears; an answer which fully satisfied her companion. From which it
+will appear that a woman may weep for the man she takes in--weep, and
+yet keep on taking him in.
+
+And what can a man do? How could Rube tell that it was the hidden
+pathos of his own groundless faith, and not a feeling of sympathetic
+affection, which brought such softness of expression into that girl's
+luminous orbs?
+
+If the actual is the only true thing, and amounts to everything, as it
+really does in the school of Realism, there is still one difficulty to
+be encountered--to get hold of the actual. He who aspires to find out
+the actual, where a woman is concerned, must get himself another kind
+of eye, one whose vision is introspective and able to penetrate into
+that mysterious element in a clever woman's nature which enables her
+so successfully to clothe the Not-True in the beautiful garments of
+Truth.
+
+Rube Rutland felt uncertain about a good many things--his own strength
+under temptation, his mother's consent to this marriage, Clara's
+temper, the great sea serpent, the Pope's infallibility, the man in
+the Iron Mask, and many a cock-and-bull story beside, but he never
+once doubted Mell Creecy's love, the purest myth among them all.
+
+He came, after this, every day to the little house upon the hill, and
+had it out "comferterble in the parler," as old man Creecy had advised
+Jerome to do. He courted with the enthusiasm of an incorrigible
+faddist over a new fad; and no lover of those olden days of which he
+had spoken, when goodly knights tilted in the jousts of arms, and won
+fair lady's favor with deeds of prowess, ever yet surpassed a modern
+mighty man with a mission. Devotion itself is paralyzed when it comes
+to them.
+
+At the Bigge House, as one may suppose, there had been considerable
+consternation when its young master announced his intention of taking
+to wife old Jacob Creecy's daughter. Consternation, but hardly
+surprise; for Rube had ever been one of those lawless members of
+well-conducted households privileged to say and do outrageous things,
+and expected to turn out of the beaten track on the slightest
+provocation.
+
+Miss Rutland was most concerned. Said she to her brother:
+
+"Rube, why not marry a female Ojibbwa, and be done with it? _That_
+would be an improvement on Mell Creecy as a _mésalliance_. My God!
+Rube, you can't bring a girl here into this house as your wife, whose
+father talks like a nigger, who says 'dis,' and 'dat,' and 'udder;' or
+do you expect to hold your position in society, your place among
+honorable men, simply by the grace of heaven?"
+
+This was severe; but it was not all--not half, in fact, that Rube had
+to hear before he got rid of Clara. But it was not the first time he
+had brought a hornet's nest about his ears, nor swam against the
+stream, nor borne the brunt of Clara's tongue. Through much practice
+Rube had pretty well mastered the art of holding out, which does not
+consist so much in talking back as in saying nothing. Moreover, his
+cause was good, and half a man can hold out with a good cause to hold
+on. One hard speech Rube did make to Clara; he told her, in effect,
+that whatever might be the grammatical shortcomings of old Jacob
+Creecy himself, his daughter knew more in one single minute than Clara
+would ever learn in a lifetime.
+
+Mrs. Rutland was not less unwilling, but more reasonable.
+
+"You are my only son," she said to him, "my first-born. I expected you
+to add lustre to the family and make a great match."
+
+"The family is illustrious enough," replied he; "if not, it will never
+be more illustrious at my expense. I will have none of your great
+matches, mother. I intend to marry the woman I love. I have loved her
+ever since she was a child. None of the rest of you need marry her,
+however; I will not impose that task upon you. But Mellville is to be
+my wife to a dead certainty, and I am my own master."
+
+"You are, my son. I have not sought to prevent your marrying her. I
+have only expressed my disappointment."
+
+"Well, I am sorry about that. But see here, mother; I will make it
+easy for you. Keep this as your own home as long as you live, and I
+will make another home for myself and the wife you do not like."
+
+"No, no, my dear boy, ever generous, ever kind! As your wife she
+_must_ be dear to me. What is a mother's greedy aspiration compared to
+her child's real happiness? Follow your bent, my boy; follow it with
+your mother's sanction. And now, do you still love me a little, Rube,
+in spite of this new love?"
+
+"A little, dear mother!" He threw his arms about her. "No, not a
+little! Much, very much; more than ever before! And believe me, when
+you know Mell, you will feel very differently about it. You have only
+seen her so far, through Clara's eyes; come and see her as she is;
+come now, mother, with me."
+
+And so it came about that on a certain day Rube came as usual to the
+farm-house, but not as usual, alone. His mother came with him--came,
+looking about her with prying eyes, and a nose bent on thorough
+investigation, and a mind ready to ferret out every idea in Mell's
+brain; a mind ready to probe every weak place in Mell's character; a
+mind ready to catechize every integument in Mell's body.
+
+The look of things about the premises prepossessed her at once in the
+girl's favor. The house was neither large, handsome, nor fresh; but it
+was venerable, an attribute greatly esteemed by people of rank. Much
+of its unpainted ugliness was concealed in trailing vines and creeping
+ivy, much of its dilapidation shrouded in luxuriant shrubbery, an
+every-day adaptation of the simplest elements of relief, technique.
+The little front garden, in its white-sanded walks and well-weeded
+beds, brilliant in many-hued blossoms, was just like a spruce
+country-damsel in her best bib and tucker. The little parlor, daintily
+furnished and tastefully arranged, where the visitor trod, not on bare
+boards, but a neat carpet, commingling Turkish forms and Yankee
+interpretations, was still more suggestive. Into this cozy apartment
+Mell had really crowded, in practical forms, all she had learned of
+human nature as it appears in man's nature. Pretty things there were,
+but none too pretty for use. Perfect neatness there was, but not too
+perfect to interfere with a man's love for the let-me-do-as-I-please
+principle. Here a man who smokes might, after asking permission, puff
+away to his heart's content, puff away without a compunction and
+without a frown from its ministering spirit. Or, if my lord feels in a
+breaking mood, let him break, break right and left, and there's no
+great harm done; a few dollars would put them all back. This is a
+consideration by no means small or unimportant to some men, who seem
+inspired to break everything they touch, from a woman's heart to the
+most venerated of old brass icons.
+
+This little room did everything it could to please a man, and put
+nothing in his way; although it made him feel, with its presiding
+genius in it, every kind of way, except uncomfortable.
+
+There's a rose upon the mantle, stuck by careless hand in a vase of
+antique design--one rose, no more; for one such faultless rose as this
+fills up all the spirit's longing in a rose. A thousand roses, perfect
+of their kind, could do no more. Here we have _sub rosa_ a profound
+philosophical maxim showing its colors--as brief as profound, i.e.,
+enough is enough, whether it be enough rose or enough stewed pigeon
+with green peas.
+
+On a spider-legged table in this diminutive lady's bower, there sat a
+dish of ferns; some moss was growing in a basket; some colored strands
+of wool lay across a piece of canvas; a carved paper-cutter peeped out
+from the leaves of an unread book, left lying on an ottoman by some
+person who had been seated in an easy-chair with silken cushions, soft
+to rest upon in weariness, in a cozy corner; and on a sofa of crimson
+plush reposed, in restful quiet, a guitar with blue ribbon attached.
+This guitar told its own tale; Mell _had_ learned something useful,
+after all, at that famous boarding-school; for to the strumming of
+this guitar she could sing you, with inimitable taste and in a
+bird-like voice, an English madrigal, or a French _chansonnette_, or
+one of those plaintive love ditties which finds its way into the
+listener's heart through any language.
+
+"Now, mother," said Rube, looking about him with pardonable pride,
+"isn't this pleasant? Have we, amid all our grandeur, any such snug
+den as this?"
+
+"Well, no, Rube! It _is_ charming! _Multum in parvo_, one may say. But
+whom have we here?"
+
+It was Mell, halting for one awe-struck instant in the doorway,
+attired in a fresh muslin dress, with ribbons to match her eyes, and
+cheeks dyed a red carnation at the formidable prospect of meeting,
+face to face, the august mistress of the Bigge House. Rube pressed
+forward to meet her, and took her fluttering hand in his own, and led
+her forward.
+
+"Your new daughter, mother, and this, Mellville, is our good mother.
+You'll get along famously with her, I believe, in spite of Clara."
+
+Who but a blundering man, like dear honest Rube, would have so
+completely let the domestic cat out of the bag?
+
+No need for Mell to be the most wide-awake creature in existence to
+understand on the spot, the real status of affairs, as concerned
+herself, at the Bigge House.
+
+Subjugated at once by her beauty, constrained to admit her lady-like
+deportment, Mrs. Rutland kissed the rounded cheek and hoped she would
+make her dear boy very happy. And Mell looked flatteringly conscious
+of the great lady's condescension, and blushingly avowed her
+unalterable determination to try. This interesting little ceremony
+seemed to dissipate all the underlying displeasure at Rube's choice in
+his mother's mind.
+
+She watched the girl closely during the interview which followed. Many
+girls are pretty and lady-like, not many are to be found as well
+educated as Mell Creecy, or as thoroughly equipped by both nature and
+education to entertain, to amuse, to fascinate. This was that part of
+Mell which "tuck arter her ole daddy," as old Jacob was wont to say.
+Even Clara Rutland's manners were not more easy and irreproachable,
+and Clara had never been half so ready in speech and apt in reply. It
+was a matter of agreeable wonder to Mrs. Rutland how a hard-working
+uneducated farmer could have such a daughter, and she wondered also if
+this phenomenal social prodigy could be found so strongly marked in
+any other land under the sun.
+
+Obeying an instinct of curiosity, the visitor inquired:
+
+"Your father and mother, Melville, are they here? Will they see us?"
+
+"Not if I can help it!" inwardly.
+
+Outwardly very different.
+
+"So sorry! Mother is not well to-day. She is rarely well, and rarely
+sees anyone. Father is as usual busy upon the farm."
+
+"Rube says your father is a very thorough farmer," remarked the
+visitor.
+
+"Doesn't a good farmer make money out of it," queried Mell, glancing
+at her betrothed with a doubtful little smile, "just as a lawyer does
+out of law, and a doctor out of physic? The earth is full of gold, and
+ought not a good digger to strike it somewhere--some time? Father, at
+any rate, is devoted to farming, as an occupation, and is happy in it,
+getting out of the ground more of God's secrets than the rest of us
+find among the stars."
+
+"That is a pretty idea, Mellville," said Mrs. Rutland.
+
+"Bless you!" exclaimed Rube, "that's nothing! She's full of 'em!"
+
+Full of them, yes; and feeding his honest soul upon them, in place of
+the real bread of affection.
+
+The visit was long and pleasant, and at its close Mell accompanied her
+guests to the very door of their carriage. There Mrs. Rutland again
+touched the girl's soft cheek with her high-bred lips. Her foot was
+upon the stepping-stone, when with a sudden thought, she turned once
+more.
+
+"Mellville, we are to be very gay next week, a house full of company;
+but I suspect we shall be honored with very little of Rube's society
+unless we first secure yours. Will you come, then, and make us a
+little visit?"
+
+"You are kind," answered she, coloring beautifully with intensity of
+gratification. "Most kind! I will come with exceeding pleasure."
+
+These were perhaps the first unstudied words she had uttered in Mrs.
+Rutland's presence. There was no doubt about her wanting to go to the
+Bigge House. She had been wanting to go there a long time. A veritable
+flood-tide of joy filled her being at this speedy consummation of her
+dearest hopes, but it was not of this she thought at that moment, nor
+of Mrs. Rutland, nor of Rube. "I will see Jerome," was what Mell
+thought.
+
+"Sweetest of mothers!" said Rube inside the vehicle.
+
+"Luckiest of men!" returned his mother. "I am returning home as did
+the Queen of Sheba; the half was not told!"
+
+Rube now felt solid, unquestionably solid, in his own mind.
+
+Mell, standing yet in the gateway, looked after them; gladly received
+they had been, like many another guest; gladly, too, dismissed.
+
+"The chain tightens," cogitated the future mistress of the Bigge
+House, "and if I should want to break it!"
+
+But why should she want to break it, unless--
+
+"There's no use counting upon that," Mell frankly admitted to herself,
+"and no man's difficulties must be allowed to interfere with my
+future. And Rube is _so_ eligible! A good fellow, too; a most
+excellent fellow! There's a something, however. What is it?"
+
+We will tell you, Mell--Rube is not Jerome.
+
+Going back into the house she found her father and mother peeping
+through the blinds.
+
+"Lord, Lord!" exclaimed old Jacob. "You'se jess er gittin' up, Mell! I
+knowed ye could do it, darter; but I mus' say, I never lookt fer yer
+ter git es high es the Bigge House."
+
+Mrs. Creecy inquired about Mrs. Rutland. Was she nice? pleasant?
+
+"Very. No one could be nicer or pleasanter. She asked for you--both of
+you."
+
+"She did? Then why didn't you tell us?"
+
+"Wife!" remonstrated the old farmer, "you is sartingly loss yo'
+senses! Don't ye know, when Mell's fine friends comes er long, we's
+expected ter run inter er rat-hole or some udder hole? All the use
+chillun has fer parients these days is ter keep 'em er going. Onst
+Mrs. Rullan', Mell aint gwine ter know us by site! She aint no chile
+er mine, no how, Mell aint!"
+
+"Wall, now, she is yourn, I kin tell ye," cried Mrs. Creecy, flaring
+up, very much to the enjoyment of her liege lord.
+
+The daughter turned off in disgust. Her father's pleasantries were the
+least pleasant of all his disagreeable ways. A coarse man's humor is
+apt to be the coarsest thing about him.
+
+It was under very different auspices from those of her day dreams,
+that Mell, after a few days of busy preparation, was admitted into the
+sacred precincts of the social hierarchy.
+
+Jerome was to have been the founder of her greatness, her steersman in
+these unknown waters--not Rube.
+
+None in this higher realm welcomed her more graciously than Clara.
+Clara had high views of philosophy, but only one maxim: "See how the
+hare runs, hear how the owl cries, accept the inevitable, and get all
+you can out of it."
+
+Jerome returned from Cragmore the day following her own domestication
+into this new sphere of existence. How strange it all seemed, and how
+unnatural! How strange he should find her there, and with so good a
+right to be there! Surely years have intervened since those lovely
+mornings in the meadow, when Sukey cropped the dew-wet grass, and she
+sat on the old tree-stump and Jerome lay at her feet.
+
+Surely long, long years!
+
+So long that Jerome has forgotten all about them--and her. She is now
+to him only Miss Creecy, the prospective wife of his nearest friend,
+the prospective mistress of the Bigge House, and not attractive, it
+would appear, in these new surroundings. Others, very likely, did not
+notice how he never spoke to her, if he could help it; how he never
+looked at her, if he could help it; how they kept far apart, as far as
+the East is from the West, though sleeping under the same roof, and
+eating at the same table, and constantly together morning, noon, and
+night. Others did not notice all these things, but Mell did.
+
+"He despises me," sobbed Mell in the darkness of her own chamber,
+smothering her sobs in her own pillow. "Once he loved, and now he
+despises me!"
+
+Better go to sleep, Mell; tears cannot wash away stern facts, and what
+good would it do now, if he did love you?
+
+The other guest has come; the one of whom Jerome had spoken. It is the
+Honorable Archibald Pendergast, who is middle-aged, well-fed, and
+somewhat portly, who has big round shoulders and a jolly way of
+looking at things, who bellows out his words with a broad accent, and
+says, Aw! aw! with tremendous effect; who wears his whiskers _à la
+manière Anglaise_, as befits a man proud of his British ancestry and
+his English ways. This great man's marvellous wealth and honors, and
+incalculable influence in national councils, and stupendous grandeur
+of future prospects, carry everything before him--at the Bigge House,
+and everywhere else.
+
+Adapting herself with versatile cleverness, to these prevailing
+conditions in her unaccustomed environment, Mell's conception of modes
+and manners expanded day by day, and she began to see plainly a good
+many objects only dimly discerned before.
+
+"I don't think," remarked she, quite innocently to Rube, the day after
+the great man's advent, "that Mr. Devonhough admires the Senator as
+much as the rest of us."
+
+"I shouldn't wonder!"
+
+Rube looked knowing and laughed.
+
+"If he was as badly stuck on you as he appears to be on Clara, _I_
+wouldn't admire him either!"
+
+"But," said Mell, "is Jerome?"
+
+"Yes, certainly. Didn't you know that? I thought you did. They are in
+the same interesting predicament as ourselves. Only Clara won't
+announce, because she wants to keep up to the last minute her good
+times with other men. I don't see how Devonhough stands it, and I'm
+awfully glad you're not that sort of a girl!"
+
+"How long?" asked not-that-sort-of-a-girl, trying to steady her voice,
+trying to maintain her rôle of a disinterested inquirer.
+
+"How long have they been engaged!" repeated Rube. "Let me see--Six
+months at least."
+
+"Six months!"
+
+"You seem surprised, Mell." He turned his glance full upon her.
+
+"Not at all," said she, pulling herself to rights. "I was only
+thinking that you ought to be willing to wait as long as that."
+
+"So I would; as many years, for that matter, if there was any good
+reason why I should. But there is not; not one, and so, Mell--"
+
+"Six months!" ejaculated Mell, in the privacy of her own room. "So all
+the while he lay at my feet he was engaged to Clara Rutland!"
+
+Mell began to understand Jerome's difficulties.
+
+Later on she saw clearly some other things. Clara is fond of Jerome,
+and would gladly, for that reason, marry him; but she is likewise
+attracted by the mighty Senator's wealth, and national importance, and
+English ancestry, and future expectations; and for such reasons leans
+matrimonially towards the Honorable Archibald, who is thirty years
+older than Jerome, but thirty years richer and thirty years greater.
+Between two fires Clara meanwhile keeps to the letter of the law with
+Jerome, and holds out in ambuscade _le pot au lait_ to the Honorable
+Archibald.
+
+A closer acquaintance with the interior circuit of these unwanted
+surroundings, so delicately refined, so distinctly aristocratic, so
+far above her own poor world, and yet withal, so unsatisfying and so
+"over-charged with surfeiting," developed to Mell the startling fact
+that a life spent in incessant amusement not only soon ceases to
+amuse, but becomes, in process of time, a devouring conflict with
+_ennui_. She recalled with a sense of wondering comprehension the Arab
+proverb: "All sunshine makes the desert."
+
+Another thing, these women at ease, with nothing in the world to do,
+Mell was thunderstruck to discover, were the hardest worked people she
+had ever known, striving each on a daily battle-ground of dawdling,
+dressing, and pleasure. Seeking after some personal end, some empty
+honor, or some favorite phantom just out of reach. What bickering and
+strife; what small conspiracies; what canker at the roots and stunting
+in the fruit; what Guelph and Ghibbeline factions in the midst of all
+this music, and dancing, and laughter! The same amount of time spent
+in a good cause, Mell's long head could not but realize, would ease
+the rack, plant many a blade of corn, staunch many a bleeding wound,
+wipe the death drops from many a ghastly brow, lift up heaps of fallen
+heroes prone on stony plains, and plant the standard of the cross on
+many a benighted shore. Outside, Mell had yearned towards this
+stronghold of the rich, as a place where there was plenty of room for
+growth and happiness: inside, she discovered with astonishment and a
+groan, that there was plenty of room there for dullness and
+unhappiness as well. Idleness without repose, leisure and no ease,
+tears and no time to shed them--on every side, and unexpected dry-rot
+in the substance of things, she had pictured to her own fancy as fair,
+and only fair.
+
+"Then," interrogated Mell of her conscious Ego, "if not here, where
+dwelleth content?"
+
+Mayhap, Mell, upon the rock where the hawks nest, or in that haven
+where the roving wind hideth its tired self for rest. Somewhere, but
+never among the haunts of men. The deep hath its treasures, and there
+are treasures of the mine; the mind hath its treasures, and there are
+treasures of store; but content is the golden treasure, hardest of all
+to find, and when found hardest to keep.
+
+One night there was a ball, and the social lights of Pudney and
+Cragmore, and the capital of the State itself, turned out in full
+force. The Bigge House was crammed to its utmost capacity.
+
+Dressing early, Mell left her room to other guests, in various stages
+of evening toilet, and descending to the first floor, looked about her
+for some quiet spot where, for a time, she could hide herself and her
+tumultuous thoughts. The large reception room was dimly lighted as
+yet, and empty apparently. Glad to find it so, she walked in, and
+standing between the long pier-glasses, a tapering column draped in
+tulle clouds, took a full-length, back and front inspection of her own
+person.
+
+Now this dainty rustic maiden, as we have seen, looked at when framed
+in a high-necked, long-sleeved, simple morning-gown, made a sweet
+picture for any eye; but it was, in some respects, a tame presentation
+compared to this gorgeously arrayed being, bedecked in flowers and a
+low corsage, with marble shoulders, shapely throat, alabaster neck and
+rounded arms, bewilderingly displayed, cunningly concealed. This
+fairy-like being cannot be a _bona fide_ woman; she is more likely a
+study from Reynolds or Gainsborough, who has stepped out of canvas and
+a gilt frame on the wall there, merely to delight the living eye and
+inflame the fumes of vital fancy.
+
+Not long, however, whether sprite or woman, did she pose there in
+admiration of her own face and figure. For, truth to tell, they have
+both become hateful in the girl's own sight. Her fair face looks to
+herself no longer as a fresh-gathered blossom sparkling with dew, as
+the ethereal interpreter of a woman's pure soul, blameless and serene.
+Much more does it look, to her own acute sensibilities, as a painted
+mask, put on for hard service; always in place, always properly
+adjusted, proof against attack, but every little loophole needing to
+be defended at every point. A mask very troublesome to wear, but not
+upon any account to be discarded, since it concealed the discordance
+of a secret love and the clanking of a chain.
+
+But now, to-night, in this empty room, in this deep silence and
+blessed solitude, where there is no eye to see, no ear to hear, she
+will throw off for one thankful moment the ugly, hateful thing. She
+will allow the dejected visage to fitly portray the dejected mind; she
+will breathe freely once more, and sigh and sigh, and moan and moan,
+and wring her hands in uncontrollable agony; and, ignoring the fact
+that the heaviest part of her trouble is of her own making, wonder why
+she had ever been born for such as this.
+
+Hope is entirely dead in Mell's heart. Transplanted out of the lowly
+valley of her own birth to the mountain-tops of her soul's desire, she
+feels as lonely as we might imagine the spirit of Greek art, set down
+in a modern world. Turn whatever way she would, there was but one fate
+for her--martyrdom. If she did not marry Rube, she would be a martyr
+in her own humble home; if she did marry him, she would be a martyr in
+his more pretentious one; and there was not as great a difference as
+she had thought between the air in the valley and the air on the
+mountain-top. It is the lungs which breathe, and not the air inhaled,
+most at issue, and a martyr is a martyr anywhere, the social type
+being hardly less excruciating to undergo than others more quickly
+ended.
+
+Pitiful in the extreme are such thoughts in a young mind; pitiful such
+manifestations of suffering in one too young to suffer.
+
+How the people upstairs would be surprised if they could see her! How
+the Honorable Archibald, who liked things jolly, begawd! who thought
+all evidence of feeling bad form, you know; who believed, root and
+branch, in British stoicism, even in the jaws of death; how he would
+advise her in a spirit of friendliness and a well-bred way, not aw to
+make a blawsted dolt of herself--if he only knew. Fortunately, he did
+not know; fortunately, nobody knew.
+
+Nobody?
+
+Then who or what is that creature in semblance of man, in attitude of
+deepest thought, with folded arms and hanging head, darkly shadowed,
+dimly seen, scarcely discernible in the embrasure of the window over
+there?
+
+Spirit or man? If a man, he might be a dead one for all the noise he
+makes--only a dead man was never known before to use his eyes in such
+a lively manner, or his ears to such good purpose, or to betray so
+deep an interest in a living woman, even in a ball dress.
+
+Mell did not look towards him, did not know he was there; yet, on a
+sudden, as if from some inward sense of vigilance rather than any
+extraneous source of knowledge, her pulses strangely fluttered--she
+became aware that she was not in reality alone. _How_, in the absence
+of visual impression, we can only say by an instinct as unaccountable
+as the phenomenon of sound waves which excite wire vibrations.
+
+She was mysteriously imbued with another presence, if such a thing is
+possible, and in all the world there was but one who could so clothe
+the circumambient air in his own personality.
+
+That one was Jerome Devonhough. Perceiving she now knew he was there,
+he got up and came towards her.
+
+Mell did not look at him; she looked upon the floor. He looked
+straight at her, and looked so long and hard, and with a gaze so fixed
+and steady, that he seemed to be slowly absorbing her very being into
+his own entity.
+
+When this became intolerable, the fairy-like apparition in tulle,
+wrestling with the situation, on a war footing with her own feelings,
+lifted from a glowing face those _lapis lazuli_ eyes of hers--pure
+stones liquified by soul action--to his face and dropped them. In one
+swift turn of those eyes she had taken in as much of that stern, cold,
+accusing face as she could well bear. But there was nothing on it she
+had not expected to see. She knew the unrelenting disdain of that
+proud nature for what is stained, unworthy, unwomanly, as well as she
+knew its strength to esteem, its gift to exalt, its power to bless.
+
+And to look into a once loving face now grown cold, and to find there
+no longer an indulgent smile nor approving aspect, is not an
+experience to be coveted, even by the happiest.
+
+"You are enjoying it, I hope," said at length a low mocking voice.
+
+"Enjoying it!" retorted plucky Mell, "of course I am enjoying it! Why
+shouldn't I? I am probably enjoying it as much as you are!"
+
+"More, I hope. I, for one, never did enjoy being miserable."
+
+"Oh, miserable!" exclaimed Mell, in a lively tone. His misery appeared
+to put her in the highest spirits. "Going to marry a rich girl and
+feeling miserable over it, how is that? You ought to be as happy,
+almost, as I am!"
+
+"The happiness which needs to be so extolled," replied Jerome, with a
+sardonic laugh, "rests on a slim foundation. Mine is of a different
+stamp. It leads me to envy the very worms as they crawl under my
+feet. Even a worm is free to go where his wishes lead him--even a
+worm is free to find an easy death and quick, when life becomes
+insupportable."
+
+Mell pressed her hand upon her heart, beating so fast--that pent-up
+heart in a troubled breast, which rose and fell as a storm-tossed
+vessel amid tempestuous seas.
+
+"You cannot blame me for it," said she wildly. "You slighted me, you
+trifled with me, you goaded me to it! I would do it again; if need
+be!"
+
+"Once has been enough," Jerome told her, in sadness. Speech was an
+effort to him; when a man regards some treasure, once his own now lost
+to him, he thinks much, but he has little to say. That little, nine
+times out of ten, would better be left unsaid. Jerome felt it so; for
+a long time he said nothing more--he only continued to look at the
+woman he had lost.
+
+She continued to contemplate the floor, until those polished boards,
+waxed in readiness for gay dancers' feet, became to her a sorry sight
+indeed, and a source of nervous irritation. When their glances
+encountered again, hers was full of passionate entreaty, his of
+inflamed regret.
+
+"I have a question to put to you," he broke forth, harshly. "What
+right have you to marry Rube Rutland, loving me?"
+
+"The same right that you have to marry Clara Rutland, loving me!"
+
+This turned the tables. Now Jerome's glance was riveted upon those
+polished boards, and she looked at him. She had not had so good a look
+at him in a long time, and her two eyes had never been eyes enough to
+take in as much of him as her heart craved.
+
+"At least," said Jerome, regaining his composure and holding up his
+head, "this much may be said for me. My contract with her was made in
+good faith. I liked her well enough--I loved no one else--it was all
+right until I met you. My soul is as a pure white dove in this matter,
+compared to yours! And these bonds of mine, they hang but by a single
+thread. Our future would have been assured but for your broken
+faith."
+
+"Mine? It is all _your_ fault, not mine! Had you trusted me, as a man
+ought to trust the woman he loves, all might have been well with us."
+
+"All would have been well with us had you trusted _me_, as a woman
+should trust the man she loves. Did I not ask you so to trust me?
+Great God! Mellville, could I conceive that you would stake your
+future happiness--our future happiness, on the paltry issues of a
+foot-race? That whole day my mind was full of projects for bringing
+about a happy termination to all our troubles. I could have done it! I
+would have done it! But now!"
+
+Lashed into fury by a vivid conception of his own wrongs, brought
+about, as he chose to consider, through her treachery alone, Jerome
+turned upon her angrily:
+
+"Let me tell you one thing! You shall not marry Rube Rutland!"
+
+"Shall I not?"
+
+Mell laughed--not one of her musical laughs. Now that she was fairly
+in for it, she rather enjoyed this fencing match with Jerome.
+Hitherto, she had always by stress of circumstances, acted upon the
+defensive with him; now she could assert her mastery.
+
+"Shall I not? How will you prevent it?"
+
+"I will open his eyes. I will tell him you do not care a rap for
+him."
+
+"You will tell him that? Very well. I will _swear_ to him that I do.
+Whom will he believe? _Not you!_"
+
+Her words, her manner, were exasperating, and they were intended to
+be exasperating. That cool and systematic self-control which
+characterized Jerome, had more than aroused a feeling of rebellious
+protest in the girl's impetuous nature. If she could break him up a
+little--
+
+"_I say you shall not marry him!_" The words were not loudly spoken,
+but they were the utterances of a man much in earnest. "Rather than
+see you his wife I would gladly see you dead!"
+
+"Oh, no doubt! But let me tell you, sir, I do not propose to die to
+please you! I propose to please myself by becoming the wife of Rube
+Rutland!"
+
+This was too much, even for Jerome.
+
+"You heartless, cruel, wicked woman!"
+
+With a single stride he reached her side; he shook his finger rudely
+in her face; nay, in a frenzy of mad passion he did worse than
+that--he took hold of the wayward creature herself and shook her with
+such violence that those heavy coils of hair, upon which she had
+expended so much time and pains, loosened and fell about her in a
+reckless loveliness beyond the reach of art.
+
+"Woman, do you know what you are doing? Do you know that you are
+playing with dangerous implements? toying with men's passions?
+dallying with men's souls?"
+
+It is safe to say, Mell had never had such a shaking up, however
+frequent the occasions when she had deserved it.
+
+This unconventional usage on the part of Jerome, a man who wore
+self-possession and correct manners as an every day coat of mail, not
+only surprised Mell, but terrified and subdued her. In undertaking to
+"break up" Jerome by stirring up the green-eyed monster, Mell had
+neglected to take into account the well-established fact, that no
+jealous man stands long upon ceremony. Panting for breath, she awoke
+unpleasantly to a full comprehension of a madman's possibilities, and
+ignoring all those impassioned inquiries with which he had interlarded
+the severer measures of corporeal punishment, she remarked in a spirit
+of meekness and a very faint voice:
+
+"Jerome, let me go, please; you are hurting me."
+
+"But how much more you are hurting me," said Jerome, harshly.
+
+He released her, however, and felt ashamed. No man with real manliness
+in him, but does feel ashamed after he has hurt a woman. She may have
+deserved it, and yet he feels ashamed.
+
+One would think that now after this ungentlemanly conduct on Jerome's
+part, Mell the high spirited will not only be full of a tremendous
+indignation, but be willing, and more than willing, to give him up for
+good and all.
+
+How little you know a woman, you who think that! A harmless man never
+does anywhere so little harm as in a woman's affections. The rod of
+empire sways the world and a woman's mind--all women, to a great or
+less degree; all women are sisters.
+
+In other words, it is very necessary for a man to be capable of
+shaking up a woman for past offences, and present naughtiness, when
+she needs it, or else he must make up his mind to take a back seat and
+give up the supremacy. Some of the fair sex never come to terms
+without a shaking--there may be one or two, here and there among them,
+who never come to terms, even with a shaking!
+
+Mell did not belong to this small minority; she was completely
+subdued. Contrite, and submissive, she now approached her audacious
+antagonist; approached him timidly, where he stood a little apart, and
+with his back turned to her, feeling, as we have said, quite ashamed
+of himself, and said gently:
+
+"Jerome, I will break with Rube if you will break with Clara."
+
+"An honorable man cannot leave a woman in the lurch," answered he, in
+a manner indicative of a strong protest under the existing law.
+
+"And how about an honorable woman?" interrogated Mell.
+
+"She can lie, and lie, and still be honorable," he informed her with
+fierce irony.
+
+"Then you expect me to----"
+
+"I do! I confidently expect you to do it, and at once. Break with him,
+and have a little patience with me, until Clara gets the Honorable
+Archibald taut on the line, and awakens to the fact that she loves me
+still--but only as a brother! It is coming--it is sure to come, and
+before long."
+
+"In the meantime," remarked Mell, with a peculiar expression, "what's
+the use of hurting Rube's feelings?"
+
+"Gods and angels, listen!" exclaimed her companion, in overwhelming
+indignation. "The question then has narrowed down to the getting of a
+husband without regard to any body's feelings--save Rube. His are not
+to be hurt until you can hurt them with impunity! You are bound to
+hold on to _him_ until you secure _me_, beyond a peradventure! That is
+your little game, Mell, is it? Out upon you! Oh, unfortunate man that
+I am, to have fallen into the hands of a woman who is particular as to
+the fit of her ball dress, but has no preference when it comes to a
+husband; who has the aspect of a goddess, but the easy principles of a
+Delilah; who is, in fact, not a genuine woman at all, with a heart and
+a soul in her, but a man-eating monster, seeking prey--a shark in
+woman's clothing, ready to take into the matrimonial clutch, and
+swallow at a single gulp, me, if you can get me; if not me, Rube; if
+not Rube, any other eligible creature in man's guise, whether
+descended from a molecule in the coral, or a tadpole in the spawn:
+whether a swine of Epicurus, or an ape just from Barbary! Shame upon
+you, woman! Shame! Shame!"
+
+Restive under these severe strictures, Mell had made several
+ineffectual attempts to put a stop to them, but her appealing gestures
+implored in vain. Finding he would not desist, she bit her lips in
+great agitation, and crimsoned violently.
+
+"You are the most impertinent man in existence!" she informed him
+petulantly, when he had done.
+
+"That's right, Mell," he answered. "Turn red--turn red to the tips of
+your eyelashes! It is the most hopeful sign I have yet seen.
+Mellville, look at me."
+
+She raised to him wonderingly her wondrously beautiful eyes.
+
+"I have been asking myself how I could love you so well, a woman who
+could condescend to sail under false colors; who knows how to stoop
+from her high estate, and trick, and juggle, and blind; who has set a
+trap to catch a mouse, and victimizes her prey; who has spread her
+toils to obtain a husband under false pretences. I have asked myself
+many times, 'how can you love that woman?' I have wished that I loved
+you less--that I loved you not at all! And I would crush it out--this
+unspeakable tenderness, which shields and defends your image in my
+heart--crush it out, beat it down, tear it into tatters, grind it into
+dust under the heel of an inexorable resolve, but that I believe, but
+that I _know_, Mell, that there is something within you deeper,
+better, worthier! 'Truth is God,' and the woman who is true in all
+things is a part of Divinity. But what of the woman who is false where
+she ought to be true? Let her hide her head in the presence of devils!
+Be true, then, Mell, be earnest! This frivolous trifling with life's
+most serious concerns shows so small in a being born to a noble
+heritage! It is only excusable in a natural _niais_, or a woman
+unendowed with a soul."
+
+Jerome here paused. After a moment spent in thought, he approached his
+companion very near, and in a voice of passionate tenderness resumed:
+
+"My darling! you can never know what hours of torment, what days of
+suffering, this conduct of yours has cost me. But I believe you have
+erred more through thoughtlessness, and a pardonable feeling of
+resentment--more through love turned into madness, than any settled
+determination to do wrong. But now let it go no further. Hasten to set
+yourself right with Rube. No matter whether you and I are destined to
+be happy in each other's love or not; at all hazards be true to the
+immortal within you. Promise me to undo the mischief you have done;
+promise me to be a good, true, useful woman, thinking more of duty
+than your own interest and pleasure. The world is overstocked with
+butterflies, but it needs good women, and I want you to be one of
+them--the best! My darling, you will promise me?"
+
+Mell was much affected; she hung her head and her bosom heaved.
+
+"Do you hesitate?" cried Jerome, mistaking her silence. "Promise me,
+Mell, I implore, I beseech you!"
+
+"Theatricals?" asked a voice in the doorway.
+
+It was Rube.
+
+"Rehearsing your parts?" he again inquired, coming in.
+
+"Yes," replied Jerome. "For are we not all players upon a stage?"
+
+"And what play have they decided upon?" next questioned the
+unsuspecting Rube, who, carrying no concealed weapons himself, was
+never on the lookout for concealed weapons on others.
+
+"I don't recall the name," said Jerome. "Do you, Miss Creecy? It is
+'Lover's Quarrel,' or some such twaddle, I think."
+
+Mell thought it was something of that kind, but she furthermore
+expressed the opinion that it would be well-nigh impossible to get it
+up in time for the delectation of the Honorable Archibald.
+
+"Which is no great pity," declared the off-hand Rube; "I wish he'd
+take himself elsewhere to be delectated."
+
+There was no doubt as to Rube's preferences for a brother-in-law;
+which, however, did not take away from the awkwardness of this remark.
+Not suspicious, neither was Rube obtuse; he noted a singular
+contraction on Jerome's brow, he noted a strange confusion in Mell's
+manner, and he put it all down to his own blundering tongue, which was
+always placing his best friend either in a false or in an annoying
+position before Mell. Out of these considerations he made haste to
+subjoin:
+
+"Ah, Mellville, you should have seen Devonhough how splendidly he
+acquitted himself in our class plays at college!"
+
+This was a pure offering from friendship's store. Honest Rube, with
+his fine open countenance all aglow with enthusiasm for his friend and
+joy in the presence of the woman he loved, looked the archetype of
+hopeful young manhood, untouched, as yet, by sorrow or mistrust.
+Regarded from an architectural standpoint, he had the sublime
+simplicity and dignity of the Doric, which was just wherein he
+differed from Jerome, who was a Corinthian column, delicately
+chiselled, ornately moulded.
+
+Mell remarked, in reply to this expression of lively admiration from
+Rube, that she wished she could have seen Mr. Devonhough--or
+something. Mr. Devonhough, with the expression of a man whose
+self-respect will not admit of his bearing much more, said with an
+impatient "Pshaw," that she needn't wish to have seen him, that this
+good acting of his was all in Rube's eye, and nowhere else; that he
+hated an actor, and that he never would act another part himself, as
+long as he lived, not to oblige anybody, and so help him God!
+
+After which, shadowed by clouds, beleaguered with dark thoughts, with
+sombre fires of jealousy smoldering in his eye, and war-hounds of
+anxiety gnawing at his vitals, he abruptly turned and left the
+room--not with his usual deliberation.
+
+And still Rube saw nothing.
+
+"He's real cut up," said the sympathetic Rube, looking commiseratingly
+after the friend of his bosom. "And all for what? Because a woman
+never seems certain of her own mind. When judgment overtakes you women
+what is to become of you all, anyhow--eh, Mell?"
+
+Mell could hardly say; and Rube, dismissing Jerome from his mind for
+the present, found other occupation. He had never seen Mell before in
+full dress. He addressed himself _con amore_, and exclusively, for a
+time, to the study of structural feminity and those marvels of nature
+presented to the eye of the earnest investigator, in the shape of a
+well-formed woman on the outside of a ball dress.
+
+During this process Rube's sensations were indefinable.
+
+Mell, preoccupied in thoughts of her own, hears, at length, his voice
+dreamily, as a sound from afar, and looks up irritably to see, for the
+hundredth time, how coarse of fibre Rube is compared to Jerome.
+
+She resents the unpalatable fact. She resents something else, and
+makes a very vigorous but unavailing effort to gain her freedom.
+
+"I cannot understand," playfully remonstrated Rube, and with arms
+immovable, "why so simple a matter disturbs you so much. You are as
+white as a sheet, you are quivering like a leaf, your hands are icy
+cold, and what is it all about?"
+
+"I told you never, _never_ to do that!" cried out Mell, in an agony of
+passionate protest.
+
+Even the most cold-blooded among mortals finds the caress of a person
+not dear to them offensive; but take the woman of emotional nature,
+exquisitely sensitive in all matters of feeling, and to such the touch
+of unloved lips is worse than a plague spot.
+
+"Don't you hear me? I cannot bear it! I am not used to it!"
+
+There was something more than maidenly coyness in her tone; there was
+mental anguish, and a downright shade of anger. We wonder Rube did not
+detect it. But you know, gentle reader, how it is. There are so many
+things all around and about us which we do not hear and see, because
+we are intent upon other matters, and are not looking for them. With
+such feelings, in that dreadful moment Mell would rather have
+submitted to a dozen stripes from Jerome, than one single caress from
+Rube--her future husband, bear you in mind! the being by whose side
+she expected to pass the rest of her days. Poor Mell! If getting up in
+the world requires self-torture, self-immolation such as this,
+wouldn't it be better, think you, not to get up? Wouldn't it be
+better, in the long run, for every woman, situated as you are, to use
+a dagger, and thereby not only settle her future, but get clean out of
+a world where such sufferings are necessary? There can't be any other
+world much worse, judged by your present sensations.
+
+But Rube, as we have said, did not hear that piteous wail of a woman
+coercing her flesh and blood, the frame of her mind, the bent of her
+soul. She was his own, and no words could tell, how he loved her. If a
+man cannot lawfully kiss his own wife, or one so near to being his own
+wife, it is a hard case, truly. That one little slip "'twixt the cup
+and the lip," which has played such havoc in men's expectations, from
+the first beginnings of time to the present moment, did not enter into
+Rube's calculations, or his thoughts.
+
+He was in a playful and a loving mood. He tightened his clasp upon
+her, he chucked her under the chin, he pinched her cheek, he patted
+those sunny locks of hers and smiled down into that fair face, _faire
+les yeux doux_, and babbled to her in lover-language, not unlike the
+"pitty, pitty ittle shing" upon which we linguistically feed helpless
+infancy, as little witting the possible sufferings of the child under
+such an infliction, as Rube did Mell's.
+
+"Now truly, Mell," asked Rube, "did you never let any other fellow
+kiss you--never? not once?"
+
+"No!" said Mell, emphatic and indignant. "_Never!_ And _you_ shouldn't
+now, if I could help myself! Do go away! I tell you I'm not used to
+such as this!"
+
+She was almost ready to cry.
+
+The whole thing was immensely amusing and entertaining to Rube, and
+while he laughed, he could also understand how it might come hard on a
+girl, at first, to feel the bloom despoiled on her chaste lips.
+
+"But you will get used to it after awhile," he assured her, with a
+quiet smile. "My word for it, you will! I will see to it that you do.
+There now, my pretty one (just what Jerome called her) sweet,
+frightened bird, why ruffle your beautiful plumage against these bars?
+They are made of adamant; but only be quiet and take to them kindly
+and they will not derange a single feather. You are exquisitely lovely
+to-night! You will intoxicate all beholders! And have you been
+thinking of that blissful time when we are going to get married?"
+
+She had, of course; but what made him so impatient? Couldn't he wait
+until she got back home? Rube could, certainly; but only on
+conditions, and those conditions would come very hard on a girl not
+used to a lover's kiss, and who objected to a lover's fondling, unless
+she managed well.
+
+Fortunately, Mell could manage well. She could have managed the
+diversified attractions of a dime museum if necessary.
+
+"And before he shall desecrate my lips again," Mell vowed to herself,
+under her breath, "I will perish by my own hands!"
+
+Ah! Mell, Mell, you should have thought of that before you sold
+yourself!
+
+At daylight she crawled upstairs and into bed. The ball had been a
+great success and she its reigning belle. Women like her, with such a
+form, with such a face, with such glory of hair and wealth of high
+spirits and physical exuberance, work like a spell in a ball-room.
+There was something bewildering in the gleam of her eye; something
+intoxicating in the turn of her neck, the flow of her garments.
+
+She had danced, to please Rube, more than once with Jerome. It was
+while the two were floating together in that delirious rapture of
+conscious nearness, to which the conventional waltz gives pretext
+and the stamp of propriety, and while their senses swayed to the
+rhythmic measure of the sweetest music they had ever heard, that
+Mell looked up meltingly into her partner's face--a face absorbed,
+excited, yet darkly set with a certain sternness which Mell fully
+understood--looked up and said to him: "Only wait until I get back
+home." Simple words indeed, and holding little meaning for those
+who heard; but they gave a new lease of life to Jerome. He answered
+back in a whisper, certain words. And now it only remained for
+Clara Rutland to accept the Honorable Archibald Pendergast and the
+happiness of two loving hearts would be assured.
+
+The ball is over, gone, past, never to come back again, with its waltz
+melody, its ravishing rhyme without reason, its sweet smelling
+flowers, its foam-crested wine, its outlying joy, its underlying
+pathos, its hidden sweetness, and its secret pain. For, there never
+was a ball yet which had its lights and not its shadows; which did not
+have some heavy foot among its light fantastic toes; some heavy heart
+among its gallant men and beautiful women.
+
+Mell lives it over in the pale dawn. It made her blood curdle and her
+flesh creep to think of those two men. What was she going to do with
+them--Rube and Jerome? How was it all to end?
+
+Horrible it would be to break off with Rube, more horrible still not
+to do so. Fearful it would be to tell him the truth--the whole truth.
+But that was what Jerome expected her to do, what she ought to do.
+
+Those words of his were burned into her memory with fire. He wanted
+her to become a good, true, useful woman, and be no longer a
+butterfly.
+
+He had called her 'my darling.' He had called her so twice. He loved
+her just as much as ever. In fact, he loved her more; for the man is
+not living who does not love a woman more when he finds out somebody
+else loves her as well as he.
+
+She was quite decided, and Jerome was undeniably right; there was but
+one honorable course for her to follow. Even if Jerome married Clara,
+and she herself never had another offer of marriage (she never would
+have another such as Rube) how sweet it would be, even in a life of
+loneliness, to be free, to be able to maintain the dignity and the
+probity of her womanhood, to be able to throw aside the despicable
+part of a double-dealer and a deceiver, to be able to feel that she
+had been worthy of Jerome though never his.
+
+Thus Mell felt when she stretched her weary limbs on that silken couch
+of ease in the dim morning light, and turned her face to the wall, and
+closed her eyes, and thought of that exquisite moment, when from
+Jerome's shoulder, conventionally used, she had proffered to him the
+olive branch of peace and had caught the heavenly beams of that smile
+which restored her to his favor. With the bewitchment of this smile
+reflected upon the fair lineaments of her own face, Mell fell into
+that sweet rest, which remains even for the people who flirt.
+
+But how different everything always seems the day after the ball!
+
+It must be the gas-light in the ball-room, it must be the sunlight in
+the day-time, which makes all the difference. Sunlight is the
+effulgence of a God, and lights up Reality; gas-light is a ray kindled
+by the feeble hand of man to brighten the unreal--a delusion and a
+snare.
+
+The absurd fancies of a ball-room hide their fantastic fumes in the
+broad daylight.
+
+Coming down to a six o'clock dinner--finding Rube at the bottom of
+the stairs to attend upon her--finding the assembled company,
+including the Honorable Archibald, half-famished and yet kept
+waiting for their dinner, until the future mistress of the Bigge
+House put in an appearance, Mell began more clearly to estimate her
+own importance--her own, but through Rube. Her beauty, her wit,
+they were her own; but they had availed her little before her
+betrothment to Rube. Especially was she impressed with this aspect of
+the case, when, hanging upon his arm, she entered the brilliant
+drawing-room to become immediately the bright particular star of the
+social heavens, the cynosure of all eyes; to be immediately
+surrounded by flattering sycophants; to be pelted with well-bred
+raillery for her tardiness and sleepy-headedness; to be bowed down
+to and reverenced and waited upon and courted and admired by these
+high-born people--she, old Jacob Creecy's daughter, but the future
+wife of the young master of this lordly domain.
+
+And Jerome expected her to give all this up--did he? And to give it up
+whether he gave up Clara, or not? Jerome was simply crazy--and she
+would be a good deal crazier herself before he caught her doing it!
+Mell still has an eye to the main chance. Mell still "tuck arter her
+ole daddy!"
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+The summer wanes. The ripened grain is harvested and the chaff falling
+from the sheaves on the threshing floor; the patient teams sniff the
+first cool breeze and put their shoulders to the wheel; the wagons are
+heaped in corn; the fields grow white for the picking. In the windings
+of green valleys yellow leaves and red play fast and loose amid the
+green, and go fluttering to the ground; the deer stalks abroad; glad
+hunters blow their horns, and the unleashed hounds are joyful at the
+scent of noble prey.
+
+Twice has the moon changed, and Mell is still at the Bigge House,
+showing up amid its polished refinements, as a choice bit of Corian
+faïence contrasted with cut-glass. Every day she spoke of going, but
+every day there was some reason why she should not go and should stay.
+Mrs. Rutland wanted her to stay; and Mell herself, whatever her
+misgivings, whatever her struggles, whatever her trials, wanted, too,
+on the whole, to stay. Here was a congenial atmosphere of style and
+fashion, congenial occupation--or the congenial want of any, endless
+variety of amusement, the hourly excitement of spirited contact with
+kindred minds, and no vulgar father and mother to mortify her tender
+sensibilities. Here, too, she was in the presence of the one being on
+earth she most loved, and even to see him under cold restraint, was
+better than not to see him at all. Sometimes it happened they sat near
+each other for a few blissful seconds; sometimes it was a stolen look
+into each other's eyes; sometimes an accidental touch of the hand when
+Jerome was initiating the ladies into the ingenious methods of a
+fore-overhand stroke or a back-underhand stroke, or the effective
+results of skillful volleying--such casual trifles as these, unnoticed
+by others, but more precious to them than "the golden wedge of
+Ophir."
+
+So the days passed on; rainy days, dry days, clear days, cloudy days,
+bright days, dark days, every kind of day, and every one of them a
+day's march nearer the imperishable day.
+
+"There's a messenger outside, Miss Mellville, to say that your father
+is sick and wishes you to come home."
+
+Jerome, it was, who spoke.
+
+"Father sick!" exclaimed Mell. "I will go at once."
+
+"How provoking!" broke in Mrs. Rutland. "I wanted you particularly
+to-day. Rube, too. Don't you remember he wants you to go to Pudney?"
+
+"Yes, yes," interrupted Mell hastily. She did not wish Mrs. Rutland to
+say before Jerome what Rube wanted her to go there for. It was to have
+her picture taken. "I am very sorry, but if father is really sick I
+ought to go."
+
+"Rhesus is under saddle," said Jerome. "Shall I ride over and find out
+just how he is? I can do so in a very few minutes."
+
+"No!" said Mell, with quick speech and restrained emphasis. Whom would
+he see there? What would he hear? Her mother in an old cotton frock,
+talking bad grammar. And Jerome was so delicate in his tastes, so
+fastidious and æsthetic.
+
+"No," said Mell, decidedly. "I'm much obliged, but--"
+
+"Yes," interposed Mrs. Rutland, "I wish you would go, for Rube is not
+here and I've no notion of letting Mell go unless it is necessary."
+
+"Did you say I must not?" inquired Jerome, addressing Mell and not
+moving.
+
+"Go, if Mrs. Rutland wishes it," stammered Mell, furiously angry with
+herself that she could not utter such commonplace words to him without
+getting all in a tremor. They were all blind, these people, or they
+must have seen, long ago, how it stood with Jerome and herself.
+
+He was back in an incredibly short space of time.
+
+"I saw your mother," Jerome reported. (Great heavens! in her
+poke-berry homespun, without a doubt!) "Your father is quite sick, but
+not dangerously so. He only fancied seeing you, but can wait until
+to-morrow."
+
+While the old man waited, Mell had her pretty face photographed for
+Rube.
+
+He drove her home in the buggy the next morning. Coming in sight of
+the quiet and shade of the old farm-house and recalling, as a
+forgotten dream, its honest industry, its homely manners, its sweet
+simplicity, Mell marvelled at her own sensations. Could it be
+gladness, this feeling that swept over her at sight of the old home?
+Yes, it was gladness. Perplexed in mind, heavy at heart, and fretted
+to the lowest depths of her soul by this struggle within her, which
+seemed to be never ending, Mell was glad to get back into the quietude
+of the old farm house after the continuous strain and excitement of
+the past few weeks. The flowers in the little garden stirred gently in
+the breeze; there was a gleam of blue sky above the low roof; birds
+chirped softly in the euonymus hedge under the window of her own
+little room, and the tranquillity and serenity and staidness of the
+spot soothed her feverish mind and calmed her feverish spirit. It was
+lonely, desolate, mean, and poor, but none the less a refuge from the
+storms of a higher region; from the weariness of pleasure and the
+burden of empty enjoyment; from the tiresomeness of being amused, and
+the troublesomeness of seeming to be amused without being; from an
+ecstasy of suffering and an agony of transport; in short, a hoped-for
+refuge from herself and Jerome.
+
+"Hurry up, Mell! Hurry up! He's mos' gone!"
+
+"What, mother! You don't mean--?"
+
+"Yes, I does, Mell. He was tuck wuss in the night. He won't know ye,
+I'm 'fraid."
+
+But he did, and opening his eyes he smiled faintly, as she hung over
+his ugly face--uglier now, after the ravages of disease, than ever
+before; dried up by scorching fevers to a semblance of those
+parched-up things we see in archæological museums; deeply lined and
+seamed and furrowed, as if old Time had never had any other occupation
+since he was a boy but to make marks upon it; uglier than ever, but
+with an expression upon it which had never been there before--that
+solemn dignity which Death gives to the homeliest features.
+
+"Father! father!" sobbed Mell, "don't die! Don't leave your little
+Mell! Don't leave me now, when I've just begun to love you as I
+ought!"
+
+Ha, Mell! Just begun! He has reached a good old age, and you are a
+woman grown, and you have just begun to love your father! It is too
+late, Mell. He does not need your love now. He is trying to tell you
+that, or something else. Put your ear a little closer.
+
+"What did you say, father! Try to tell me again."
+
+And he did; she heard every word:
+
+"Good-bye, little Mell! I ain't gwine ter morteefy ye no mo'!"
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+A DEAL IN FUTURES.
+
+"Why do you fret so much about it?" asked Rube, sitting beside his
+promised wife about a week after the old man was laid to rest. "You
+loved your father, of course, but--"
+
+"There's the point!" exclaimed Mell. "I did not love him--not as a
+child ought to love a parent. What did it matter that his looks
+were common and his speech rude? His thoughts were true, his
+motives good, his actions honest, and now I mourn the blindness which
+made me value him, not for what he was, but what he looked to be. In
+self-forgetfulness and sacrificing devotion to me he was sublime. He
+went in rags that I might dress above my station; he ate coarse food
+that I might be served with dainties; he worked as a slave that I
+might hold my hands in idleness; and how did I requite him? I was
+ashamed of him; I held him in contempt. Oh, oh! My, my!"
+
+"Come, now," remonstrated Rube, trying to stem the torrent of this
+lachrymatory deluge, and wondering what had become of all the
+comforting phrases in the English language, that he could not put his
+tongue upon one of them. "Do try to calm yourself, dearest. I know you
+are exaggerating the true state of the case, as we are all prone to
+do in moments of self-upbraiding. I never saw you lacking in respect
+to him."
+
+"There's a great many bad things in me you never saw," blubbered Mell,
+breaking out afresh.
+
+"Dear, dear!" said Rube, "I never saw such grief as this!"
+
+"You--are--disgusted, I know?"
+
+"Not a bit of it!" declared Rube; "just the contrary! I fairly dote on
+the prospect of a wife who is going to cry hard and cut up dreadful
+when anything happens to a fellow. It kind of makes dying seem sort of
+easy. But, come, now; you've cried enough. Let me comfort you."
+
+"No, no!" cried Mell, shrinking away from him. "If you only knew, you
+would not want to comfort me. I do not deserve a single kind word from
+you. I am unworthy your regard. I am a weak woman, and a wicked one.
+Oh, Rube! I have not treated you right. That day at the picnic I was
+angry with some one else; I was piqued; I did not feel as I made you
+think I felt. I--that is--"
+
+Here Mell broke down completely in her disjointed arraignment of self,
+thoroughly disconcerted by the young man's change of countenance. His
+breath came quick, a dark cloud overspread his features, and he lost
+somewhat of his ruddy color.
+
+"Do you mean, then, to say I was but a tool, and the whole thing a lie
+and a cheat?"
+
+Rube's thoughts sped as directly to their mark, as the well-aimed
+arrow from the bent bow.
+
+"Don't be so angry with me," prayed Mell, "please don't! You don't
+know how much I have suffered over it. I say, at that time I thought I
+cared for some one else, and so I ought not, in all fairness, to have
+encouraged you; but, it is only since father died, that I have been
+able to see things in their true light. I have had a false standard of
+character, a false measure of worth, a false conception of human aims
+and human achievement. Out of the wretchedness of sleepless hours I
+have heard the under-tones of truth: Knowledge is great, but how much
+greater is goodness without knowledge than knowledge without
+goodness!"
+
+Rube made no reply. He left her side, and, crossing the room, folded
+his arms and looked moodily out of the window. He was very simple in
+nature, somewhat slow, sometimes stupid; but loyal and true--true in
+great things, and no less true in small ones, and as open as the day.
+
+Mell dried her eyes, and glanced at him anxiously. The worst part of
+her duty was now over. She began already to feel relieved; she began
+already to know just how she was going to feel in a few minutes more,
+the possessor of a conscience, void of offence before God and man.
+There's nothing like it--a good conscience.
+
+"This beats all!" soliloquized Rube, at the window; "I'll be hanged if
+there's enough solid space in a woman's mind to peg a man's hat on!
+Now, just as things have panned out all right for Devonhough, here's a
+tombstone in my own graveyard!"
+
+"Ha!" thought Mell, hearing, considering.
+
+"_Just as things have panned out all right for Devonhough._"
+
+What did that mean? Her throbbing, panting, bursting heart knew only
+too well. Clara had come to a decision--she would marry Jerome, and
+not the Honorable Archibald.
+
+Rube had scarcely ceased to speak when Mell raised her head.
+
+"Rube!"
+
+Very soft that call!
+
+Unheeding, Rube still looked out of the window and into the past. That
+day at the picnic--that beautiful day, that day of days; a pure,
+white, luminous spot in memory's galaxy of fair and heavenly
+things--that day she had not felt as she had made him think she felt;
+hence, he had been a cat's-paw, a puppet; and she--oh, it could not be
+that Mell was a dissembler, a hypocrite, a serpent!
+
+"Rube!"
+
+A little louder was this call.
+
+He turned, he obeyed--no more able to resist the beckoning hand, the
+dulcet voice, the luring glance, than you or I the spells of our own
+individual Sirens and Circes.
+
+He came back to her, but stood in gloomy waiting, his brow so dark,
+his expression so hard and cold and stern, that the girl on the sofa
+felt herself wilting and withering before him, as a frail flower in a
+deadly blast.
+
+She did not say a word.
+
+She only used two eyes of blue, and two big tears which rolled out of
+them, and down upon her velvet cheek, and splash upon her little white
+hand, with crushing effect--not upon the hand, but the beholder.
+
+"Mell," said he, hoarsely, "what is all this? What is the meaning of
+it? I do not see your drift, exactly. Do you wish to be free?"
+
+"I thought that would be _your_ wish," floundered Mell, "perhaps, when
+you heard of that other--other fancy--you know, Rube; if I had not
+told you anything about it, and it had come afterwards to your
+knowledge, you would have thought I had not acted squarely towards
+you."
+
+"So much, then, I understand; but what are your leanings now? Don't
+beat about the bush; speak out your wishes plainly. I am not a brute.
+I would release a woman at the very altar, if her inclinations leaned
+in another direction. Do you imagine I would care to marry a woman,
+however much I might love her, whose heart was occupied by another?
+Where would be the sanctity of such a marriage? I would be the worse
+defrauded man of the two. So, Melville, if there is any one you like
+better than you do me, speak it now. Tell me plainly, do you care for
+me--or some one else?"
+
+Now, Mell, here's your chance; hasten to redeem your past. He has put
+the whole thing before you in a nutshell. You know just how he thinks
+and how he feels. After this, you dare not further betray a heart so
+noble, so forbearing, so true! Tell him, Mell; tell him, for your own
+sake; tell him, for his sake; tell him, for God's sake! Come, Mell,
+speak--speak quick! Don't wait a second, a single second! A second is
+a very little bit of time, the sixtieth part of one little minute;
+but, short as it is, if you hesitate, it will be long enough for you
+to remember that you may live to be a very old woman, and pass all
+your life in this old farm-house, utterly monotonous and wearisome;
+that you will be very lonely; that you will be very poor; that you
+will be very unhappy; that you will miss Rube's jewels and Rube's
+sugar plums and Rube's hourly devotions, to which you have now become
+so well accustomed;--short, but long enough to remember all this. So
+speak, Mell, quick! quick! The second is gone before Mell speaks.
+
+It was a long second for Rube.
+
+"O Mell, Mell! can it be that you care for him and not for me? At
+least, let _me_ hear it--let me hear the truth! I can bear anything
+better than this uncertainty."
+
+Even this bitter cry brought forth no response. The dumbness of
+Dieffenbachia lay upon Mell's tongue.
+
+"I see how it is," said Rube, turning to go.
+
+"No, you don't!" exclaimed Mell, pulling him back. She was now
+desperate. Her tear-stained face broke into April sunshine. "I do not
+care for that other. How could you think so? Once I thought so myself;
+it was a delusion. A woman cannot love a selfish, tyrannical,
+overbearing creature like that!--not really, though she may think so
+for a time; but you, Rube, you are the quintessence of goodness! you
+are worth a dozen such men as he!"
+
+"So it's me!" ejaculated Rube. "I am the lucky dog! I am the
+quintessence of goodness!"
+
+He drew a long breath; he sank comfortably back into the old seat and
+into the old sense of security, and addressed himself with a joyous
+air and renewed enthusiasm to the old rôle of love-making.
+
+Just like a man--the very man who thinks he has such a deep insight
+into dark matters, who thinks he knows so much about everything in the
+wide world, especially women!
+
+"You are the most conscientious creature alive!" declared Rube,
+happier than ever, over a nearly lost treasure. "The whole amount of
+your offence seems to be that you once thought you cared--"
+
+"Yes--that's it! I once thought so."
+
+"But _I_ once thought that I cared for another girl. You would not,
+for that reason, wish to send me adrift, would you?"
+
+"No. Only I wish you hadn't!"
+
+"Just the way I feel about it."
+
+He laughed uncontrollably.
+
+"Pretty one! Soul of honor! What other girl would have opened her lips
+about such a trifle? And now I will not be put off another moment.
+Name the day which is to make me the happiest of men."
+
+The day was named, and Mell really felt more composure of mind and
+less disquietude of spirit than she had known for many a day. She had
+eased, to some extent, her guilty conscience. She had shed many
+bitter, if unavailing, tears over Rube and her dead father; and now,
+convinced that she could not help herself, and determined to make the
+best of it, her mind drifted complacently over the long stretch of
+prosperous years before her, wherein she would be neither lonely, nor
+poor, nor unhappy, nor unloved; with sugar plums to her taste and
+jewels in quantity--for there are just two things in this world every
+young woman is sure to love--tinsel and taffy.
+
+A healing balm now poured itself, so to speak, into her life and
+future prospects.
+
+Of Jerome she saw no more. He had gone home before her father's
+funeral. He had seemingly passed out of her life forever. She never so
+much as mentioned his name, even to Rube, and she even thought of him
+less frequently than of yore. How could she be expected to think of
+him with the wedding trousseau demanding all her thoughts and time?
+
+But one day Rube came to the farm-house, worried, and told Mell, of
+his own accord, that it was about Jerome and Clara. There had been a
+row between them.
+
+The Honorable Archibald Pendergast, as she well knew, was no ordinary
+man--neither, it seemed, was he an ordinary lover. Notwithstanding his
+late rejection, he had been paying Clara such marked attentions in
+Washington that a society journal had publicly announced their
+engagement; whereupon Jerome had delivered his ultimatum--she would
+marry him at once or else they were quits.
+
+"And I don't blame him," declared Rube, "not one bit! He stood as much
+at her hands, and stood it as long, as a man _can_ stand. I never
+could have taken the same from you."
+
+Ah, Rube, we little know, any of us, just what we are taking at any
+hour in the day and at the hands of our own friends!
+
+It is well for us that we do not.
+
+"And now," inquired Mell, scarcely able to articulate, so great was
+her agitation, "what is Clara going to do?"
+
+"She is going to marry the Honorable Archibald," replied Rube, adding,
+with the breezy disgust of a sunny temper: "It's a confounded shame!
+He's old enough for her father, and I don't believe she cares _that_
+about him! But he's a great statesman, and there's a good prospect of
+his getting into the White House some of these days; and some women
+love social eminence better than they do their own souls! I am glad
+you are not one of that kind, Mell--you will be content with your
+planter husband, won't you, Mell?"
+
+"I have written him to come to our wedding," pursued Rube. "I like him
+as well as ever--even more! He's a splendid fellow! I hope he will
+come, but I think it hardly probable."
+
+Mell thought, too, it was hardly probable. After this, things went
+wrong again with Mell. Her trousseau ceased to occupy her time and
+attention; her wayward thoughts waged internecine strife in regions of
+turmoil and vain speculation.
+
+Meanwhile, Jerome made no sign.
+
+"Woe is me!" wept Mell. Much had she wept since her father died; but a
+dead man is not half so sore a subject of weeping as a living woman's
+unworthiness, when it falls under her own judgment.
+
+"To do right is the only thing," moaned the unhappy girl--"to do right
+and give no heed to consequences. I have learned the lesson at last.
+It has been a hard one. Henceforth I am going to do right though I
+slay myself in the doing."
+
+She prayed that night as she had never prayed in all her life before.
+She asked for divine help in doing right by Rube. And she arose from
+her knees strengthened to do her duty, as she then conceived it.
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+THE LAST STRUGGLE.
+
+And the quiet days pass one by one--each one very like the other--until
+the last sun has set, and the evening lights gleam in the old
+farm-house on the last night before the wedding-day--that wedding-day
+which she had, to the very last, put off to the latest possible time.
+Under the hush of evening skies, in the flower-decked garden, in the
+dreamy grey air, in the sight of fallow fields glistening in the
+moonlight, Rube is saying good-night.
+
+"To bed early," was the parting injunction of Mell's future lord; "we
+have a long journey before us."
+
+"Yes," answered Mell, solemnly, "a very long journey. The journey of
+life."
+
+"However long, all too short," was Rube's fond reply. He stroked her
+lovely hair. "Mell!
+
+                  'May never night 'twixt me and you
+                  With thoughts less fond arise!'"
+
+After he was gone Mell repeated those words, "a very long journey."
+Then she sighed.
+
+It would have to be a very long journey, indeed, to correspond with
+this sigh of Mell's--a very long sigh.
+
+Well, there is no better time for a woman to sigh than the night
+before she is married. Nor are tears amiss. Not one in ten knows what
+she's about; for, if she did, she would not--
+
+On the brink of the Untried there is room enough to stop and look
+about one, to think better of it, to turn around and go back; only no
+man or woman was ever yet gifted with brains enough to do it. The
+things unknown, which loom up so temptingly into sight upon the brink
+of the Untried, look far more desirable, infinitely more tempting,
+than all the known blessings of the past. And so Mell sighed--but
+lifted not a finger to save herself.
+
+She went back into the little parlor to finish packing some
+favorite trifles in a box to be sent to the Bigge House ere she
+returned--school friend's mementoes and some of Rube's presents.
+
+Thus engaged, outside was heard the noise of stamping hoofs and the
+rumbling of wheels--some vehicle stopped at the gate--somebody came up
+the sanded garden path, ascended the steps, crossed the little porch
+and gave a hasty rap upon the front door.
+
+Mell sprang to her feet. It thrilled her strangely, that footstep on
+the porch, that knock upon the door.
+
+Who could be coming there at such an hour--and the night before her
+wedding?
+
+Rube, perhaps; something he had forgotten to do or say. She would go
+to the door; she started, and came back. She listened again.
+
+It was not Rube's step--it was not Rube's knock.
+
+Her senses were ever alert; she always noticed such things.
+
+But the man outside had no time to lose, and did not propose to wait
+there all night. He cleared his throat impatiently and knocked again.
+This knock was louder than the first and more peremptory. It had a
+remarkable effect upon Mell--a startling effect.
+
+She sank upon the nearest chair, she trembled from head to foot; wild
+thoughts whirled through her anarchical brain with the swiftness of a
+whirlwind, and it was not until the persistent intruder knocked the
+third time that she succeeded, through breath coming thick and fast,
+and half-palsied lips, faintly to call out, "Come in!"
+
+And the man came in, and the girl, crouching upon the chair, as if she
+would fain hide herself down in depths of concealment where he would
+never find her, felt no surprise, knowing already the late comer was
+Jerome.
+
+Jerome--but not at his best. He had been sick--or, so she thought, her
+affrighted eyes sweeping over him in one swift glance. Pale was his
+face, and careworn; physically, Jerome had never appeared so ill;
+spiritually, he had never appeared to better advantage.
+
+There are perplexed and ethereal truths in the heart of human things
+which no bloom of health ever yet expressed. The sweetness pressed out
+of suffering by the operations of its own nature, clothes itself in a
+subtler and more irresistible charm than was ever yet discovered in
+the hues of a pearly complexion, or the rays of a brilliant eye. From
+under the potent spell of its attraction, we soon forget a countenance
+merely beautiful; we never forget the one made beautiful through
+suffering.
+
+Our sainted mother, who went through rivers of fire and a thousand
+death agonies ere death itself came; who died, at last, with a joyful
+smile on her face, bidding us meet her on the other shore--we do not
+forget how _she_ looked!
+
+Our heroic father, borne home from the battle-field, with his death
+wound; who bade us with his last breath to serve God and our
+country--we do not forget how _he_ looked! These are the images
+indelibly fixed in the sensitized slide of memory, while the
+peach-bloom face upon the boulevard, the merry face in the dance, fade
+as fades the glory of a flower.
+
+Jerome has suffered. Some of his youth he has left behind him. But
+with that youth he has left, too, much of his suffering. At this
+moment every feature in his facial federation of harmonious elements
+was lighted up with a kindling spirit of its own. Whatever the
+inspiration, whether intrinsically noble, or ignoble, it is to its
+possessor a glorious inspiration. We say noble, or ignoble; for, one
+man's glory may be another man's shame, and both true men. So,
+perhaps, no cause is great in itself, but only great in the conception
+of the soul who conceives it and who fights for it.
+
+Out of Jerome's presence, Mell had branded him as a being selfish,
+tyrannical, and incapable of long retaining a woman's love; in his
+presence she only knew he was the embodiment of life's supreme good.
+
+But worse than a flaming sword was now the sight of the man she loved.
+She dreaded the sound of his coming voice as she dreaded the trump of
+Doom. What would he say--he who handled words as a skilful surgeon
+manipulates cutting-instruments, to kill or cure--what would he say to
+the woman who had been untrue to her word?
+
+He said absolutely nothing.
+
+No formal salutation passed between the two. Drawing a chair directly
+in front of the hostess, by whom his coming was so little expected,
+Jerome sat down upon it and regarded the agitated face and the almost
+cowering form of the woman before him, in profound silence.
+
+She had dreaded his words, had she? Heavens! This wordless arraignment
+of her guilty self at the bar of her own conscience, her silent
+accuser both judge and jury, and only two wretched hearts, which ached
+as one, for witness, was worse than a true bill found in a crowded
+court of justice. A storm of angry words, a typhoon, a sorocco, a
+veritable Dakota blizzard of sweeping invective, would have been easy
+lines compared to this.
+
+She would die--Mell knew she would--of sheer shame and self-reproach,
+before this awful silence, which threatened to continue to the end of
+time, was ever broken.
+
+Would he never open his mouth and say something, no matter how
+dreadful?
+
+He did, at last.
+
+"Mellville," said Jerome, gently, "are you glad to see me?"
+
+"No!" passionately.
+
+"Not glad? Then you are the most ungrateful, as well as the most
+faithless, of mortal beings. I have travelled long to get here. My
+reaching here in time was uncertain, well nigh a hopeless matter; but
+nothing is hopeless to the man who dares. What did I come for? Do you
+know?"
+
+"To load me with reproaches. Do it and begone!"
+
+"No, Mell; I have not come for that! There's no salvation in abuse,
+and I have come to save. Perhaps, Mell, there is no one in the whole
+world who understands you--your nature, in its strength and in its
+weakness--as well as I. You are not a perfect woman, Mell; you have
+one fault, but even that fault I love because I so love you! And I see
+so plainly just how and why your love has failed me in my utmost need,
+and I know so well just how and why the conditions of existence, amid
+such surroundings as this, must be utterly unendurable to a girl of
+your temperament and aims. And so, through all my anger and all my
+sorrow and all my wounded affection, I have made excuses in my heart
+for my pretty Mell, my faithless Mell, whom I still love in spite of
+all her weakness; who in that weakness could find no other way of
+escape from a poor, bald, common-place, distasteful life, except
+through the crucifixion of her own heart, the ruin of her own
+happiness. Weak, you are nevertheless far dearer to me than the
+strongest-minded of your sex; false in act but not at heart, you are
+still the sweetest to me of all sweet womanhood; and I have come to
+save, not to reproach you! Here is what I bring. It goes fittingly
+with the heart long in your possession."
+
+He reached forth his hand to her. Mell inspected it with those dark
+and regretful looks we bestow on the blessings which are for others,
+but not for us.
+
+This was the hand whose touch conferred happiness; a hand so strong,
+so firm, so steady, perfect in every joint and finger-tip, endowed
+with all the intellectual subtlety and effective mechanism of which
+the hand of man is capable--the only hand, among thousands and
+ten-thousands of human hands, she had ever wanted for her own--and now
+here it was, so near, and, alas! farther than ever before! She
+clenched her own hands convulsively together, and closed her eyes to
+shut out the sight of it and the entreating tenderness of its appeal.
+
+"Take it," said Jerome, seductively; "it is now mine to give, and
+yours to accept."
+
+"Too late," returned Mell, in sadness; "to-morrow I wed with Rube."
+
+"_To-morrow?_ Yes, I know. But have you ever reflected what a long way
+off to-morrow is? and how little we need to dread the coming of
+to-morrow, if we look well after to-day? And, my dear Mell, how many
+things occur to-night ere to-morrow ever comes! That's another thing
+you have not thought about. In your plans for marrying Rube to-morrow,
+you have neglected to take into consideration"--the rest he whispered
+into her ear, so low, so low she could scarcely catch it, but the
+sudden crash of brazen instruments, the sharp clash of steel, a
+thunderbolt at her very feet could not have made her start so
+violently or convulsed her with such terror--"_the fact that you are
+going to marry me to-night!_" With a gesture of instinctive
+repugnance, with a look of supplicating horror, she pushed him away.
+
+"Only devils tempt like that!"
+
+"No devil ever yet tempted a woman to right-doing."
+
+"It could not be right to treat Rube so."
+
+"It is the only way to right a wrong already done him."
+
+"No. I am going to make that wrong up to Rube. I have sworn to do it!
+I am going to stick by Rube through thick and thin. You go away! What
+did you come here for? Dark is the fate of the woman who breaks her
+plighted vows."
+
+"Darker still the fate of the woman who seals false vows. Such are
+untrue to the high instincts of the immortal within them."
+
+"But think how infamous! how base such an act! how scandalous! I
+cannot do it!"
+
+"Yet, you will do worse--far worse. A loveless marriage is worse than
+a broken vow. Such a marriage may pass current for legal tender in the
+courts of the world, but when some day, you come to square up
+accounts, you will find fraudulent bonds and unholy speculation in
+married estate the worst investment a foolish woman ever made.
+Dishonesty never pays, but it pays less in a marriage without love
+than anywhere else. And where's the use of trying to deceive Rube and
+the rest of the world, when God knows? You can't very well hoodwink
+_Him_, Mell. And how will you be able to endure it; to be clothed in
+marvellously fine garments and ride in a chariot, and envy the beggars
+as you pass them in their honest rags; to be a Jonas in every kiss, a
+Machiavelli in every word, a crocodile in every tear; Janus-faced on
+one side, and mealy-mouthed on the other; to be a fraud, a sham, a
+make-believe, an organized humbug, and a painted sepulchre? That's the
+picture of the woman who marries one man and loves another. Is it a
+pleasant picture, Mell? You will chafe behind the gilded bars, and
+champ the jewelled bit. You will feel the sickening thraldom of a
+cankering memory, a rankling regret, a sullen remorse, a longing after
+your true self, with every breath a lie, every act a counterfeit,
+every word a mincing of the truth. God only knows how you will bear
+it!"
+
+God only--she did not. Her head drooped lower in unspeakable
+bitterness and humiliation. Amid all the darkness she could see but
+one ray of light.
+
+"But if I do my duty--" began Mell.
+
+"A woman's first duty to her husband is to love him," said Jerome,
+gravely; "failing in that, she fails in all else."
+
+"But love comes with the doing of duty, everybody says. I must do my
+duty by Rube."
+
+"Very well. Do your duty, Mell, but do it now. That is all I ask.
+Manifestly it is not your duty to marry him. With every throb of your
+heart pulsating for me, you will not be worth one dollar to Rube in
+the capacity of a wife. He would tell you so, if he knew. Can't you
+see that, Mell?"
+
+She could see it distinctly. Jerome's words burned with the brilliancy
+of magnesium, throwing out this aspect of the subject in glaring
+light. Rube stood again before her, as he had stood on the morning of
+that day upon which she had undertaken to fulfil her promise to Jerome
+and failed so ignominiously--stood, and was saying: "_I_ would be the
+most defrauded man of the two," and "where would be the sanctity of
+such a marriage?"
+
+Not one dollar would she be worth to him--_if he knew!_ He would know
+some time; everything under the sun gets known somehow, the only
+question is--when?
+
+Seeing the impression made, Jerome spoke again, in words low,
+impassioned:
+
+"Save yourself, for the love of God! Save yourself and Rube from such
+a fate!"
+
+Mell glanced about her in terror and confusion, turning red and pale.
+Gladly would she save herself; but how can a respectable member of
+good society accept salvation at such a price--the price of being
+talked about?
+
+"It is too late," she told her companion, in tones as sorrowful as the
+wail of a wandering bard in a strange land; "too late! Why, man, the
+bridal robes are ready, the bridal cake is baked, the bridal guests
+are bidden; and would you have me, at this last minute, turn Rube
+into a laughing-stock, a by-word on every idle lip, a man to be
+pointed out upon the streets, a man to be jeered at in the crowd?
+Would you have me do that?"
+
+"Yes. That is not a happy lot, but it soon passes, and is better than
+being duped for life and wretched for life."
+
+Mell averted her face. She seemed striving for words:
+
+"I don't see why Rube should be so unhappy as you seem determined to
+make him. Even granting that he knew that I do not feel romantically
+towards him, as I have felt towards you--"
+
+"Have felt?" interposed her listener.
+
+She waived his question aside and proceeded:
+
+"Still there is a love born of habit and propinquity, and that will
+come to my rescue. Rube is a splendid fellow! I respect him. I honor
+his character, and I could be happy with him if--"
+
+"Well," said Jerome, huskily, "go on."
+
+"_If it were not for you._"
+
+"Ha!" exclaimed he, "has it come to that? That alters the case
+completely. I will take myself off, then! I will get out of your way!
+Had I suspected the existence of one drop of real affection in your
+heart towards the man you are about to marry, I would have cut off
+this right hand of mine rather than come here to-night. In coming I
+was sustained by the belief that I would not defraud my friend--not in
+reality--not of any thing he could value; not of a wife, but of an
+empty casket. This belief, on my part, is all that redeems my coming
+from being an act of diabolism. And now it turns out that there is a
+very good reason why the bridal cake cannot be thrown to the dogs, and
+the bridal robes cannot be committed to the flames, and the bridal
+guests cannot upon any account be robbed of their bride upon the
+morrow--_you could be happy with him if it were not for me!_"
+
+Bitter in tone was this repetition of her words--words which wounded
+him so keenly. They were calculated to wound the tender sensibilities
+of any lover, most of all a lover of Jerome Devonhough's stamp. He
+could condone any weakness on her part, except that which touched his
+own dominion over her--the sceptre of his love, the yoke of his power.
+Under a pacific exterior, there seethed in Jerome, volcanic masses of
+self-will and unchangeable purpose; hemmed in, held in bounds, seldom
+breaking forth in violent eruption, but always there. He was totally
+unprepared for any change in the feelings of the woman upon whom he
+had lavished the arbitrary tenderness of his own strong nature.
+Jerome, you perceive, is no more of a hero than Mell is a heroine. He
+is the counterpart of the man who lives round the corner, who sits
+next you in church, whom you meet not unfrequently at your friend's
+house at dinner. This man loves his wife, not because she is an
+artistic production, elaborately wrought out in broad, mellow,
+triumphant lines, grand in character, but rather because he recognizes
+good material in her for his own moulding. We must never approach the
+contemplation of any man's requirements in a wife with our minds full
+of loose generalities. There is so much of the fool in every man, the
+wisest man, who falls in love. He falls in love, not so much with what
+is ideally lovable in a woman, but what is practically complemental to
+his own nature. Jerome, being strong, loved Mell, who was weak, and
+weak in those very places where Jerome was strong. She needed him. He
+felt that he was a necessary adjunct to her perfect development in the
+sphere of womanhood; he felt that she was necessary to him in the
+enlargement of his manhood. For, does not a man of his type need some
+one to guide, to govern, to lord it over, and to get all the nonsense
+out of? But he would love her, too, notwithstanding all this, with
+that sheltering devotion which a woman needs--all women, with one
+exception. A strong woman in her strength is not dependent upon any
+man's love.
+
+"So it has come to this," pursued Jerome, brooding in low tones over
+the matter, "there is but one impediment to your happiness--the man
+whom you have professed to love, whom you have so basely resigned.
+With me safely out of the way, you and Rube are all right. You do, it
+seems, know your own mind at last. And Clara Rutland knows hers at
+last, and everybody is about to be made incontinently happy--everybody
+but me! I am left out in the cold! I am left, between you all,
+stranded on the lonely rock of unbelief, either in a woman's word or a
+woman's love; and must eat alone, and digest as best I may, all the
+sour grapes left over from two marriage-feasts. A pleasant prospect,
+truly! Would to God I had never seen either one of you!"
+
+Mell was dumb. She was dumb from conviction. Clara Rutland _had_
+treated him badly, and so had she; and she could think of nothing to
+say which would put in any fairer light that ugly treatment. She
+marvelled at his patience through it all; she was bewildered that he
+had thus far, during this trying interview, remained
+
+                 "In high emotions self-controlled."
+
+She knew a change must come. She saw through furtive eyes and without
+raising her head, that a change had already come. Not even a strong
+will can regulate a heart's pulsations--a heart which has been sinned
+against in its most sacred feelings. As the storm-clouds sweep up from
+the west and mass themselves with awful grandeur in battle array, so
+lowered dark and tempestuous thoughts, pregnant with danger, on the
+young man's brow. Across his frame there swept a convulsive quiver of
+emotion; his features took on that hard, stern look of repressed
+indignation and passion which Mell so well knew and so much feared.
+
+With that look upon his face, Jerome was not a man to be trifled
+with.
+
+But what was he going to do? Shake her again?
+
+She said nothing when he took hold of her two hands with a grasp of
+iron. Silently she awaited her fate; tremblingly she wondered what
+that fate would be.
+
+He was only telling her good-by. He knew not how hard he pressed upon
+those tender hands; he only knew he might never clasp them in his own
+again. It was a terrible moment--terrible not alone for Mell.
+
+One would have thought, seeing how he suffered in giving her up, that
+she was the last woman in the world; whereas, we know there are
+multitudes of them, many more estimable in character, some equally
+desirable in person, with just such wondrous hair, just such
+enchanting eyes, just such shapeliness of construction, enough in
+itself to inspire mankind with the most passionate love--plenty of her
+kind, but none exactly Mell!
+
+Sensible of that detaining clasp; knowing his keen eyes scanned darkly
+and hungrily every quivering feature in her unquiet face; hearing his
+labored breath and the low sobs wrung from a strong man's agony, Mell
+felt first as a guilty culprit.
+
+If only he would stab her to the heart, and then himself.
+
+We little thought, any of us, when we saw him lying in the meadow on
+the grass at her feet, that out of the joyous inspiration of that
+glorious summer weather, out of two young lives so beautiful, out of
+young love, a thing so full of poetry and romance, would come such
+wretchedness as this.
+
+After a little while, the touch of those rose-leaf palms, the
+whiteness of her face, the appeal for mercy in those eyes seeking his
+own, had a soothing effect upon Jerome. He would now put forth all his
+strength and quietly say good-by.
+
+Softly he pressed to his lips one of those imprisoned hands; softly,
+in a heart-sick rapture of despairing renunciation, he was about to do
+the same with the other, when the glint of Rube's solitaire, the
+pledge of her hated bondage to another, the glaring witness of her
+treachery towards himself, flashed into his eyes and overcame all his
+good resolutions. With a look of unutterable reproach, with a gesture
+of undying contempt, he tossed the offending hand back upon her lap.
+
+"Think not," he broke forth, in vehement utterance, "that no thought
+of me will embitter your bridal joys! I leave you to your fate! I go
+to my own! Dark it may be, but not darker than yours!"
+
+And this was the quiet way in which he bade her good-by.
+
+The words pierced Mell to the very soul, and, combined with the
+blackness of his countenance, filled her with indefinable, but very
+horrible imaginings. He had almost reached the door, when with a
+smothered cry of pain, she followed him.
+
+As irresistibly as ever he drew her.
+
+"Jerome! Jerome! Where are you going?"
+
+"To ruin!" exclaimed he, turning upon her with that barbaric
+fierceness which seems to underlie everything strong in nature--"to
+ruin, where you women without principle, have sent many a better man!
+To ruin, and to hell, if I choose," he added, with fearful emphasis.
+"My going and my coming are no longer any concern of yours!"
+
+"Yes, they are, Jerome," she assured him, deprecatingly. "Don't leave
+me in anger, Jerome!"
+
+"Not in anger? Then, how--in delight?" There was now a menacing gleam
+in his eye which more than ever alarmed her. "My cause is lost. You
+have done me all the wrong you could, and now that I am dismissed, set
+aside, told to begone, debased, and dethroned, you expect me to be
+delighted over it, do you?"
+
+"No, Jerome; but do not leave me feeling so. Promise me to do nothing
+rash."
+
+"I will not promise you anything! You have not spared my feelings, why
+should _I_ spare yours? Since your affection for me has moderated into
+that platonic kind, which admits of your happiness in union with
+another, I will do whatever I please to do, knowing no act of mine,
+however dreadful, will affect you."
+
+"Oh, Jerome, do not say that! You must see, you must know in your
+heart, that I do still care for you--Oh, God! more than I ought."
+
+"And yet not enough to make you do what is right!"
+
+"But to right you, will wrong Rube," she answered in confusion.
+
+"Enough, then; you know your own feelings, or ought to. Since Rube is
+the one dearest to you, marry him!"
+
+He turned again upon his heel. Obeying an impulse she could not
+resist, Mell once more detained him. It is hard to die, everybody
+says; but to die yourself must be easier than to give up the one you
+love.
+
+"Jerome, wait a moment! Come back! Jerome, you do not realize what a
+dishonorable thing this is you are persuading me to do?"
+
+"Don't I?" he laughed wildly. "God Almighty! Mellville, what do you
+take me for? Wouldn't I have been here a week ago, two weeks ago, but
+for the battle I have had to fight with my own scruples--but for the
+war I have had to wage with my own soul? I have said to myself, again
+and again, 'I will not do this thing though I die!' But when I started
+out upon this journey, it had come to this: 'I must do this thing or
+else--die!'"
+
+Shaken as a storm-rifted tree bending in the blast, she was not yet
+uprooted.
+
+"It is hard, hard," she murmured, wringing her hands in nervous
+constraint; "but time, you know, Jerome, time softens everything."
+
+"It does!" he said, harshly--"even the memory of a crime!"
+
+"What do you mean by that?" exclaimed Mell, every word of his filling
+her with indefinable fears.
+
+"I mean what I say. Once out of the way, you and Rube, the two beings
+most dear to me on earth, could be happy together; you have told me
+so. Then, how selfish in me--"
+
+"Oh, Jerome, you would not! Surely you would not do such a thing!"
+
+"I do not say that I would, nor that I would not. A desperate man is
+not to be depended on either by himself or others. I only know that in
+this fearful upheaval of all my life's aims and ends, any fate seems
+easier than living. But Mellville--" his tones were now quiet, but
+they were firm; his lips were set in angles of immovable resolve; his
+brow bent and dark with the shadows of unlifting determination. It
+would be difficult to imagine a more striking figure than Jerome in
+the rôle of a man who had made up his mind--
+
+"But Mellville, this struggle must end. It must end _now_, or it will
+put an end to us. I did not come here to-night to submit to the
+humiliation of begging a woman to marry me against her will. I came to
+rescue a being in distress from the painful consequences of her own
+rash act. Now, then, you love me, or you do not? You will marry me, or
+you will not? Which is it? Answer! In five minutes I leave this house,
+with or without you!"
+
+He dropped upon his knees at her feet; he snatched her to his breast.
+Reason was gone, his soul all aflame:
+
+"Mell, listen: Love is more than raiment, more than food, more than
+the world's censure or the world's praise. It is sweeter in life than
+life itself! But time presses; the other wedding comes on apace; we
+have no time to spare. An hour's hard driving will bring us to Parson
+Fordham's, well known to me. There we will be married at once, and
+catch the early train at Pudney. Our names will be an execration and a
+by-word for a little time, but what of that? What though all friends
+turn their backs upon us! Together we will enter hopefully upon a new
+life, loving God and each other--a life of truer things, Mell; a life
+consecrated to each other and glorified by perfect love and perfect
+trust. Will you lead that life with me?"
+
+"No, I will not!"
+
+"What, Mellville!" he cried. "You will not! I thought you loved me,
+loved me as I loved you?"
+
+"Once I loved you," she said. She spoke now as much to her own soul as
+to his perceptions. "Once--or was it only that I thought I did? For
+long weeks I struggled against deceiving Rube, and out of that I must
+have drifted by slow degrees into deceiving myself. For, to-night,
+even to-night, when I parted from Rube I thought it was you I loved,
+not he! But the mists have lifted from my vision, and now, at this
+moment--never fully until this moment--I see you both in your true
+light; I weigh you understandingly, one against the other; I set your
+self-seeking against his unselfishness, your improbity against his
+high sense of honor. And how plainly I see it all! Just as if a moral
+kaleidoscope were exhibiting by spiritual reflections, to the eyes of
+my mind, the difference between one man and another, at an angle of
+virtue which is the aliquot part of three hundred and sixty degrees of
+real merit! Upon this disk of the imagination appears your own image;
+and what are you doing? Passing me by as an unknown thing, a thing too
+small to know in the presence of mighty magnates at a county picnic!
+There is another manly form; what is he doing? Lifting me up from the
+bare earth where the other's cruel slights have crushed me; feeding me
+with his own hands; even then loving me. How different the pictures!
+Shift the scene. Some one is crowning me: I am a queen before the
+world. Whose hand has held a crown for me? Not yours--Rube's! You had
+not the courage. He had. I love courage in a man. I love it better
+than a handsome face or an oily tongue. A man without courage--what is
+he? He isn't a man at all--not really. Jerome Devonhough," here she
+turned her lovely face, grown so cold, and her exquisite eyes, grown
+so scornful, full upon him, "were you the right sort of a man, would
+you be here to-night? Will a man, false to his friend, be true to his
+wife? I can trust Rube Rutland; can I trust you? No! For, even while
+loving, I could not keep down a feeling of contempt. Beginning with
+respect for Rube, that sentiment of respect has ripened into
+love--real love--not the wild, senseless, mad, unreasoning passion of
+an untutored girl, which eats into its own vitals, and drains its own
+lees,--as mine for you,--but that deeper, better, higher, more
+enduring, and well-nigh perfect affection of the full-lived woman, who
+out of deep suffering has emerged into an enlightened conception of
+her own nature's needs, her own heart's craving for what is best,
+truest, most God-like in a man! That love, which will wear well, nor
+grow threadbare through time, which will take on a more wondrous glow
+in the realms of eternity, is the love I feel for Rube!"
+
+"Bah!" he exclaimed, not yet quenched, not yet hopeless. "Eternity is
+a long word, and all your fine talking cannot deceive _me!_ Oh, woman,
+woman, what a face you have, and what brains! I do not know which
+holds me tighter. That face so fair, that mind so subtle--together
+they might well turn the head of the devil himself, but they cannot
+deceive _me!_ The string which draws you is golden. It is not Rube you
+love so much, so purely, so perfectly; oh, no, not Rube! Not Rube, but
+his possessions. Not the man--the man's house! Its beautiful turrets
+and gables, its gardens and lawns, its lovely views, and spacious
+luxury, and abounding wealth. For that you give me up. Still loving
+me, Rube's pelf is dearer still!"
+
+"Not now--not now! Now I love _him_--the man! Not for what he has, but
+for what he is. For his truth, his nobility, his honor; and, as that
+honor is in my keeping, I bid you go and return no more. Your power to
+tempt me from my duty _and my love_ is over! My faith is grounded, my
+purpose unalterable. Go!"
+
+"This is folly. Come with me!" he cried, striving to draw her towards
+the door.
+
+She resisted.
+
+"Come!" he urged.
+
+She broke from him, crying:
+
+"No, by heaven! Were it the only chance to save my own life, I would
+not go! I have done with you now, forever!"
+
+"Good-night, then," he told her, with a bitter sneer and a low,
+mocking bow. "Good-night; but you will be sorry for this! You will
+regret this night's work all the days of your life. Its memory will
+darken the brightest day of your life!"
+
+She did not speak, or move, as he turned upon his heel and left her.
+
+There sounds his foot upon the stair, and next upon the gravelled
+walk! And now the garden-gate swings open, and the carriage-door bangs
+shut, after which the wheels grate upon the pebbles, and the clatter
+of horses' hoofs rings out upon the midnight air. Gone! Gone!
+
+Her head reels; all her senses seem benumbed. Not even a heavy tread
+through the dark entry did she hear. It was the clasp of strong arms
+around her which woke her from her trance.
+
+She turned, exclaiming in alarm: "Rube! You here! You--you have
+heard?"
+
+"Every word. I was up; I could not sleep. Does any man sleep the night
+before he is married? _I_ could not. I lighted a cigar and went out
+upon the lawn. At the gate I stood, puffing away and looking up in
+this direction, wondering if my sweet wife that is to be had obeyed my
+parting injunctions and gone to sleep, when presently a carriage came
+tearing along, going in the very direction of my own thoughts. A man
+sat within; I cannot say that I exactly recognized that man in the
+moonlight, but I saw him move quickly back when he saw me, and that
+aroused my suspicions. I followed; I could not help following.
+Something told me my happiness was menaced, my love in danger. I was
+determined to know the truth, Mell. I listened."
+
+"And you do not hate me?"
+
+"Hate you, Mell? Dearer to me than ever you are at this moment! I
+know how you have been tempted; I realize all you have overcome. Never
+could I doubt such love! Comforted by it, I can bear up even under
+so heavy a misfortune as the treachery of a friend. But the hour is
+late; we must not talk longer; you must snatch a little rest.
+Good-night once more, dear love. To-morrow, Mellville, you will be
+mine--to-morrow!"
+
+"Aye, Rube! To-morrow, yours! Upon every day and every morrow of my
+life, always yours!"
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Note:
+
+  Authors' archaic and variable spelling and hyphenation is mostly
+  preserved.
+
+  Authors' punctuation styles are preserved.
+
+  Passages in italics indicated by _underscores_.
+
+  Passages in bold indicated by =equal signs=.
+
+  Typographical problems have been changed and are listed below, as
+  are changes made to standardise some hyphenation.
+
+
+Transcriber's Changes:
+
+  Page 169: Was 'territores' (nullify the results of the war by
+            converting the Southern States into conquered =territories=,
+            in order that party supremacy)
+
+  Page 169: Was 'acquiesence' (The hint was taken, the contest of 1868
+            was fought under a seeming =acquiescence= in the views of
+            Stevens and Morton;)
+
+  Page 194: Was 'imperturable' ("No, indeed! I have pledged my word to
+            _her_ never to touch a drop!" protested Andy, with
+            =imperturbable= good nature.)
+
+  Page 221: Was 'anymore' ("W.," she said, "you don't know =any more=
+            about it than Horace Greeley did.")
+
+  Page 225: Was 'contemptously' (Mrs. W. spoke of them
+            =contemptuously= as "nasty black worms.")
+
+  Page 245: Was 'in' (which is much better, and come to the reader =in
+            the= shape of love-stories, odd adventures,)
+
+  Page 248: Was 'of' (and if she were in the company =of one= whom she
+            trusted intimately, she would laugh those popular virtues
+            to scorn with her warm,)
+
+  Page 254: Was 'pleasant, sounding' (Mell's rather strained gayety
+            found an agreeable echo in his =pleasant-sounding=
+            laughter.)
+
+  Page 263: Standardised hyphenation: Was 'pic-nic' (Not on Wednesday,
+            for there's a confounded =picnic= afoot for that day.)
+
+  Page 263: Standardised hyphenation: Was 'pic-nics' (I wish the man
+            who invented =picnics= had been endowed with immortal life
+            on earth and made to go to every blessed one)
+
+  Page 269: Standardised hyphenation: Was 'pre-occupied' (They were
+            fine young fellows, and very pleasant, too, but Mell
+            continued so =preoccupied= in the vain racking of her
+            brain)
+
+  Page 270: Was 'omniverous' (It was altogether as much as she could
+            do to keep from sobbing aloud in the faces of all these
+            =omnivorous=, happy people.)
+
+  Page 273: Was 'inate' (to a simple country girl, who, destitute of
+            fortune, had nothing to commend her but =innate= modesty
+            and God-given beauty.)
+
+  Page 276: Was 'It' ("You mean it? =It is= a solemn promise! One of
+            those promises you always keep!")
+
+  Page 278: Was 'repentent' (I don't know who feels most idiotic or
+            =repentant=, the girl who wears 'em or the fellow who won
+            'em.)
+
+  Page 278: Was 'juvenality' (Jerome, as soon as he could again command
+            his voice, "unless it be Miss Josey's =juvenility=.")
+
+  Page 281: Was 'It' ("But I don't wonder you feel a little frightened
+            about it. =It is= such a wonderful thing for Rube to do:
+            but Rube has two eyes in his head,)
+
+  Page 282: Was 'How--do' ("=How-do=, old fellow?" said Jerome, by way
+            of congratulation.)
+
+  Page 287: Was 'bran' (She must take an airing with him in his
+            =brand= new buggy)
+
+  Page 289: Standardised hyphenation: Was 'farmhouse' (And so it came
+            about that on a certain day Rube came as usual to the
+            =farm-house=, but not as usual, alone.)
+
+  Page 291: Was 'it' (The visit was long and pleasant, and at =its=
+            close Mell accompanied her guests to the very door of
+            their carriage.)
+
+  Page 293: Was 'wont' (Only Clara =won't= announce, because she wants
+            to keep up to the last minute her good times)
+
+  Page 298: Was 'fiercy' ("She can lie, and lie, and still be
+            honorable," he informed her with =fierce= irony.)
+
+  Page 299: Was 'tortment' (you can never know what hours of
+            =torment=, what days of suffering, this conduct of yours
+            has cost me.)
+
+  Page 301: Was 'exquisively' (but take the woman of emotional nature,
+            =exquisitely= sensitive in all matters of feeling, and to
+            such the touch of unloved)
+
+  Page 302: Was 'it' (The ball is over, gone, past, never to come back
+            again, with its waltz melody, =its= ravishing rhyme
+            without reason)
+
+  Page 303: Standardised hyphenation: Was 'gaslight' (It must be the
+            =gas-light= in the ball-room, it must be the sunlight in
+            the day-time, which makes all the difference.)
+
+  Page 304: Was 'forgotton' (the quiet and shade of the old farm-house
+            and recalling, as a =forgotten= dream, its honest
+            industry)
+
+  Page 305: Was 'euonyms' (birds chirped softly in the =euonymus=
+            hedge under the window of her own little room)
+
+  Page 305: Was 'ecstacy' (from an =ecstasy= of suffering and an agony
+            of transport; in short, a hoped-for refuge from herself
+            and Jerome.)
+
+  Page 313: Was 'ignominously' (upon which she had undertaken to fulfil
+            her promise to Jerome and failed so =ignominiously=--stood,
+            and was saying)
+
+  Page 313: Was 'ques-is' (He would know some time; everything
+            under the sun gets known somehow, the only =question
+            is=--when?)
+
+
+
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Belford's Magazine, Volume II, No. 8,
+January, 1889, by Various
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BELFORD'S ***
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