LITTELLS LIVING AGE. Fifth Series, No, 2180. April 3, 1886~ From Beginning, Volume LIV. -. & Vol. CLXIX CONTENT S. I. THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF IRELAND TO GREAT BRITAIN II. THIS MANS WIFE. Part III., III. SEBASTIAN VAN STORCK. By Walter Pater, IV. REMINISCENCES OF MY LATER LIFE. By Mary Howitt V. A PILGRIMAGE TO SINAI. By Isabella Bird Bishop, author of Unknown Tracks in Japan, A Ladys Ride in the Rocky Mountains, etc. Part IL VI. AMERICAN MANNERS VII. A COUNTRY VILLAGE IN THE BEGINNING OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY, VIII. THE STORY OF THE ONE PIONEER OF TIERRA DEL FUEGO~ . A MEMORY OF THE THAMES, Nineteenth Century, Good Words,. Macmillans Magazine, Good Words,. Leisure Hour, All The Year Round, Longmans Magazine, Cornhill Magazine, P0 E TRY. 2 A HOLIDAY, MISCELLANY, PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY BY LITTELL & CO., BOSTON. TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION. For EIGHT DOLLARS, remit/ed directly to the Publishers, the LIVINO AGE will be punctually forwarded for a yearfree ofpsostage. Remnilsances should be made by bank draft or check, or by post-office money-order, if possible. If neither of these can be procured, the money should be sent in a registered letter. All postmasters are obliged to register letters when requested to do so. Drafts, checks, and money-orders should be made payable to the order of LITTELL & Co. Single Numbera of THE Lsvneo AOE, iS centa. .3 13 28 38 45 49 53 6o 2 64 2 A MEMORY OF THE THAMES, ETC. A MEMORY OF THE THAMES. AUGUSTS blithe sun flamed high oerhead, And from his radiant quiver Ten thousand burnished shafts had flung On hill, and mead, and river. We sallied from the quaint white inn, And trimmed our dainty boat That by the bridge in dimpled shade Rocked jauntily afloat. Then pushed we to the wide main stream, But soon were fain to stray Where Patrichs scant and slender brook Scarce winds a doubtful way. Twixt mazy banks we forced our keel Oerhung with hawthorn bushes, And here through writhing water-weeds, And here through waving rushes. What spoils those bowery shores must yield XVhat wealth of scent and hue! Posies that mocked Hyperions beams, And shamed th ethereal blue! We pulled the loosestrifes crimson spikes, The floating lilies white; We pulled the sceptred bulrushes, The marsh-stars golden bright. Nor less, the woodbines clustered crowns, And spines of meadow-sweet With trailing bronze of bryony In careless union meet. We pulled the bearded clematis in tangled garlands twined, And azure-eyed forget-me-nuts, Each oozy marge that lined. Gay sprite! in flushed exultant mirth, I seem to see you yet, Holding the bloomy prize aloft In both hands wringing wet. The murmurous throb of sunlit wings Made musical the day, Like sound of stir in silver chords Touched by an elf at play. And racing swallows fleet and shrill, With chirp of tireless glee, Skimmed rippling stream, or darted high Not happier than we! Anon some fluttered water-hen Made off with plashy shambles, Or bright-eyed warbler of the copse Skipped nimbly through the brambles. The minnows flashed, in startled troops, Full many a shining side; And so we wandered, till we reached Fair Loddons ampler tide: Fair Loddons ampler tide, that ran Darkling in willowy shade, Where scarce, in latticed verdure lost, A truant sunbeam strayed. By pebbly slope, by moss-clad bole, How sweet the watery swirl How fair the willows pensile sprays Half emerald and half pearl On, on, neath leafy cool arcades I tugged the dripping oar, Till Thames again our flower-decked skiff On his broad bosom bore. We turned the prow. And Wargraves lawns Astern slant trim and green We pierced the lock, where Shiplakes church Peers through its sylvan sheen. What recked we that the westering sun Had dipped his ruddy lamp? Or of the steam-white mist that showed A warning finger damp? The latest swallow from the stream By this had disappeared, And faint in windless twilight calm The beetles hum we heard. Her borrowed moisture now to earth The just air reconveyed, And dropped a liquid crystal sphere On every grassy blade. Now tranced beneath a glimmering sky Each feathery elm-top slept, And, one by one, big bashful stars From heavens hushed spaces crept. I poised the sculls; you held the strings; We lingered face to face. We spoke sweet words. Ah, would we might That sacred hour retrace! You asked of me a little thing; I vowedno matter what. That vow is still inviolate; Believe me, will you not? National Review. QUALISCUMQUE. A HOLIDAY. Is the age sordid, impotent, and cold? None the less sweetly shrill the thrushes call; None the less swiftly snowy blossor~ fall On slim young grasses and buds manifold Where kingcups raise their chalices of gold As tender breezes drift the hawthorns pall; None the less milky sway the chestnuts tall; Or royally are large white clouds enrolled, Where up the azure mighty branches climb. On eyes that see and hearts that contemplate No shadow falls of days degenerate, They reckon but by seasons change the time; Here the vain babblings of unlovely hours Cringe into silence before holier powers. Macmillans Magazine. THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF IRELAND TO GREAT BRITAIN. 3 From The Nineteenth Century. scribed as in itself formidable. With the THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF IRELAND TO loss of a seventh, the United Kingdom GREAT BRITAIN. would be as great a power as it was in THAT one of the roots of mischief in 1870, and in fact a much greater power, Ireland is economic, everybody agrees. because the remaining sixsevenths are The curse of Ireland is its poverty. The richer and stronger individually than the hunger for land which is so unintelligible population of 1870. Their condition in to English feeling is at the bottom of out- the interval has enormously improved. rages of every kind, and is played upon Of course, if by any arrangement the by political agitators. It is not, however, splitting of partnership were only to be generally understood how the weakness partial if we retained Ulster, while per. of Ireland affects the whole aspect of the mitting to the rest of Ireland more or less Irish political difficulty. complete separation the deduction from I have thought it worth while, therefore, the United Kingdom would be materially when the notion of splitting partnership is less. The disaffected parts of Ireland are in the air, to bring together some notes as not more than three-fifths of the whole, or to the economic position of Ireland, rela- three millions. In losing the three mil- tively to Great Britain, from the point of lions we should only lose one-twelfth of view of a statesman in Great Britain look, our numbers, or less than the growth of ing at the suggested proposal to part com- our population every decade. pany as a mere matter of business as Looking at the matter historically, we he would look, in fact, at the analogous must come to the conclusion that the prob- suggestion of union with a State which lem of disaffection in Ireland is mitigated was seeking partnership with us. The in its intensity by the changes of popula. statesman, of course, must weigh moral tion which have occurred. Down to about and political considerations as well as 1845, from the beginning of the century, economic, and the various questions in- the people of Ireland were about half volved are necessarily intermixed; but it those of Great Britain about a third of is expedient nevertheless to separate the the whole population of the United King- economic from the other elements. We dom. The population of the disaffected shall know better what we are doing or parts of Ireland was also nearly three- going to do in Ireland if the business loss fourths of the whole of that country, and or gain is clear. consequently about a fourth of that of the United Kingdom. The change from such The first point to notice in such a ques- proportions to those of about one-seventh tion is population. The people of Ireland for the proportion of Ireland itself to the are rather less than five millions, as com- United Kingdom, and o ne-twelfth for the pared with nearly thirty-one and a half proportion of the disaffected parts of Ire. millions in Great Britain. If Great land, requires no comment. Disaffection Britain were to be offered a partnership in Ireland is obviously not what it was in of about five millions of people of equal relation to the United Kingdom as a character and resources to those of Great whole. Britain themselves, the addition to the I have called attention to this point for strength of the empire would be as five to some years past as necessarily altering thirty-one and a half. The population our entire conception of the Irish diffi. thus to be added would constitute in the culty. It is dealt with in Essays in new State somewhat less than a seventh Finance(first series), in an essay on the of the whole. Equally the deduction of Taxation and Representation of Ire. a people of this magnitude from the exist- land, which was first published in 1876, ing Union would be the deduction of and I have introduced the same topic in rather less than a seventh, two essays in the second series of Es- A change of this description would be says in Finance viz., an essay on The a very considerable one. But, apart from Utility of Common Statistics, and another what it might lead to, it cannot be de- on Some General Uses of Statistical 4 THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF IRELAND TO GREAT BRITAIN. Knowledge. I doubt if the full force of and that of Ireland alone as just over this consideration is properly appreciated 70,000,000/. But I have a strong feeling even yet. Relatively Ireland is still los: that in these figures, which ~vere based very ing ground most rapidly, not so much much on what Mr. Dudley Baxter and Mr. because irish population diminishes, as Leone Levi had done, I gave too little to because that of Great Britain increases. Great Britain, if not too much to Ireland. We grow a new people in Great Britain With regard to Ireland specially, it is equal to the whole disaffected part of Ire. easy to see that the income cannot be land at the present time every ten years. very large. The chief industry is agricul. In a few generations, at this rate, Ireland ture, which employs in round figures about must become relatively to Great Britain sixty per cent. of the population. Out of very little more than a somewhat larger 1,290,000 males of twenty years and up. Isle of Man or Channel Islands. To let wards, with specified occupations, accord- Ireland split partnership would differ in ing to the census of i88i, no fewer than no way in kind, and comparatively little in 757,000 were engaged in agriculture, which degree, as far as business is concerned, is just under sixty per cent. Among the from letting the Isle of Man remain a remainder, there were no fewer than separate State. 115,000 called mechanics or laborers, among whom, I suspect, would be many The second point is even more impor- partly or largely engaged in agriculture. tant. The people of Ireland are not equal Tbe proportion of sixty per cent. may, in industrial character and resources to however,be taken. In other words, three those of the United Kingdom. They are millions of people in Ireland depend on far from being equal. Great Britain, in agriculture directly the breadwinners of adding to itself an Ireland, would add a the family are engaged in that occupation. community having only a twentieth part And this means that, all told, the average of the income of the United Kingdom income of these three millions, including the United Kingdom, in losing an Ireland, those who receive rent, as well as farmers would only lose a small percentage of its and laborers, is not more than about 13/. strength. or 141. per head. The gross produce of It is very difficult, of course, dealing the crops of Ireland, according to the with questions of the aggregate income of latest returns, is about 33,000,000/. only, different communities ; but, practically, from five million acres, of which about we need have little doubt of the propor. io,ooo,ooo/. are from cereal crops, io,ooo,- tions stated. ooo/. from potatoes, and the remainder In the assessments to the income tax mainly from hay and green crops, which the proportion of Ireland is as to 17 latter, of course, along with a large part viz., United Kingdom (including Ireland), of the cereal crops themselves, are not in 629000,000/. sterling; Ireland, 37,000,- their final form when thus valued. Mak- ooo/. sterling. This is more than five per ing a deduction from the 33,000,000/. on cent., but not very much more. And this account, and making an estimate for there is reason to believe that Ireland is the value of cattle, sheep, and pigs sold, more strictly valued than Great Britain, and for dairy produce, the gross produce and that it is over-valued, of pasture land being, of course, much less At any rate, when it comes to be a ques- than that of cereal or other crops, it seems tion of the whole aggregate income of the impossible to arrive at a larger figure than different communities, there can be little about forty to forty-five millions as the doubt that other sources of income, out- value of the agricultural produce of Ire- side of the income tax, are larger rela- land, deducting seed, manures, and ex- tively in Great Britain than in Ireland. penses of that nature On this forty to In dealing with the subject lately in Fur- forty.five millions, three millions of people ther Notes on the Progress of the Work. have to live, which gives about 14/. per ing Classes, I put down the whole income head; or less than 6o/. for a family of of Great Britain as about 1,200,000,000/., four persons. THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF IRELAND TO GREAT BRITAIN. Deducting a total rent of just under Io,ooo,ooo/. according to the income-tax returns, with practically no deduction from the numbers of people on the other side, we should leave about iii. per head only for farmers and laborers and their families. And if we take the rent at a less figure,as I believe we ought to do say at about eight millions sterling only we should still make the income of the Irish agricultural classes, farmers and la- borers together, only 12/. per head ; or under 50/. for a family of four persons. Comparing this with England, it would appear that the tenant farmers and labor- ers of Ireland are not so well off as the average of the English agricultural labor- ers, which implies that very many must be far below that level. On this basis, also, we may calculate the aggregate incomeof Ireland. Assum- ing the income per head of the rest of the people of Ireland to be one-half equal to the income per head of those engaged in agriculture, and the other half fifty per cent, more, we should still arrive at a figure of less than eighty millions only as the total aggregate income of the whole people of Ireland. In this way, according to estimates of income generally, the proportion of Ire- land to the United Kingdom also comes out as one to seventeen, the same as from income-tax assessments only. Another test of resources would be the relative capital of Great Britain and Ire- land. I have to refer to Irish capital later on, and estimate it at 400,ooo,ooo/. or thereabouts. There can be no exact esti- mates in such matters; but the total capi. tal of the United Kingdom ten years ago I ventured to estimate at not less than 8,~oo,ooo,oooZ., and, calculating on a simi- lar basis now, it cannot be less, I think, than 9,600,ooo,oool. In other words, Irish capital is only a twenty-fourth part of that of the United Kingdom. And, whatever doubt there may be about the figures, which are necessarily very wide, and which assume that a nation can be valued as a going business concern, it is at least certain that no emendation would sensibly alter the proportions. An addition to Irish capital and a deduction from English 5 capital that would both be large, would leave the proportions much the same. It is easy to see, then, how little the gain of an Ireland would add to the re- sources of Great Britain, or the loss of it would deduct from those resources. The taxable income of Ireland must bear a still smaller proportion to the taxable in- come of Great Britain than does its gross income or capital to the gross income or capital of Great Britain. The taxable income is the income remaining after allowance for the minimum necessary to maintain a population upon a given stand- ard of living. In this sense, giving the people of Great Britain an average of 12/. per head as the minimum, they have a taxable income of about 8oo,ooo,ooo/. sterling annually.* On the same scale, five millions of people in Ireland would absorb sixty out of, say, seventy-five mil- lions gross income, leaving a taxable in- come of 15,000,000/. sterling only. Even allowing that the standard in Ireland is necessarily lower, the taxable income would not be much increased. As a part- ner with so rich a State as Great Britain, Ireland must therefore be considered strictly as entirely insignificant. It hardly counts one way or the other. Of course the practical taxable income of Great Britain is not so much as 8oo,ooo,- cool. The State could not levy 8oo,ooo,- ooo/., or anything like that sum, without reducing many classes in the scale of liv- ing. There would be a revolution if any such levy were attempted. But, limiting the 8oo,ooo,ooo/. as we may, there would still be a vast amount to compare with the taxable income of Ireland, where the practical taxable income must be very small indeed. Here again, as with regard to population itself, it is quite true that Ireland is be- coming less and less important to Great Britain. At the beginning of the century there was some excuse for an expectation that was never fulfilled that Ireland would participate in the burdens of the United Kingdom to the extent of two- seventeenths. With a third of the popu * Thirty-two millions, multiptied by I2~ is 384 mu- lions, deducting whicts from s,zoo millions leaves rather more than Son millions. 6 THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF IRELAND TO GREAT BRITAIN. lation of the United Kingdom, Ireland, it with Ireland, imports and exports together. was calculated, might contribute rather The Indian and Australian trades also less than one-eighth to joint objects. give more employment to our shipping in This was allowing that even then Ireland, proportion than that of Ireland does. man for man, was not half as rich as And neither India nor Australia imposes Great Britain, which seemed an extreme on us any direct charge for government, calculation, as both countries ~vere then such as we shall find Ireland does, to mainly agricultural, and Ireland had quite constitute a deduction from the profit ~ve a third of the cultivated area. No~v there derive, as a community, from the connec- is no question that Irelands resources in tion. proportion, instead of being two to seven- teen, are less than one to seventeen. Its numbers are relatively to Great Britain not half what they were, and the distance between the average incomes per head of the two communities continues very great. The taxable income and capital of Great Britain have increased enormously, and those of Ireland hardly at all. To put the matter shortly, and in the roundest figures there can, of course, be no exact figures of income and capital Ireland in population has sunk from one-third to less than one seventh in gross income, from two-seventeenths to less than one-seventeenth; in capital, from a proportion that was material to about one-twenty-fourth only; in taxable re- sources, from a proportion that was also material, being perhaps about one-tenth, to a proportion that is almost inappreciable the proportion of only one to fifty. In resources, Ireland has no doubt increased absolutely. The Irish people are much better off individually, partly because there are fewer people than there were fifty years ago, but with much the same re- sources; but as a community in relation to Great Britain there is an immense decline. The relative decrease of the disaffected part of ireland only is quite as remarkable. From being about one-tenth of the United Kingdom in resources, it has become about one-fortieth or less. As regards taxable income, the proportion of the whole of Ireland to the United Kingdom being only about one to fifty, that of the disaf- fected part of Ireland only must be about one to a hundred! How small the proportion of Ireland is will also be impressed on us more if we consider for a moment the economic rela- tions of Great Britain with other British dependencies. Compared with Ireland, our interests in India, where ~ve have in vested over 200,000,000/., and in Australia, where we have invested over IOo,ooocoo/., are enormous. And our trade with India figures up as 66,ooo,ooo/. annually, and with Australia as 55000,000/. annually, as compared with a trade of about 40,000,000/. As regards this question of resources, it will be interesting to go farther and to look at the matter a little more closely. Great Britain and Ireland have been in close partnership for over eighty years. How does the account stand as regards government and people? Has Ireland been a help or the reverse? It is obviotis, to begin with, that Ire- land has not helped as the framers of the Union expected. According to the Act of Union, Ireland was expected to con- tribute to the joint expenditure of Great Britain and Ireland in the proportion of t~vo-seventeenths. In point of fact, Ire- land could not do so under the strain of the enormous outlay at the beginning of the century. Under that arrangement be- tween I8oo and 18i5 Irish debt increased rapidly viz., from 24,000,000/. to 128,- 000000/. although Irish taxation was enormously increased, viz., from three and a half to nearly seven millions. In i8i6, the amalgamation of the exchequers and indiscriminate taxation were recommend- ed, because it was quite impossible for Ireland to bear two-seventeenths of the joint burdens. Actually at the present moment Ireland is no gain to the exchequer of Great Brit- ain. The facts are as follows: Irelands gross coniributions from customs, excise, and inland revenue gel~erally are put down in Thoms Almanac as about 7,700,000/.; l)ut of course no such account shows ex- actly what Irelands proper contribution is. Duties are paid in Ireland on spirits consumed in England, and duties are paid in England on tobacco and tea con- sumed in Ireland. An exact account is impossible. It seems to be believed, how- ever, according to the return No. 36, ses- sion 1884, that, after corrections are made on this head, about 6,700,000/. represents the contributions of Ireland to iml)erial purposes, exclusive of post-office, etc., the contributions of Great Britain being nearly ten times that amount. In other words, Ireland, while constituting only abotit a twentieth part of the United King- dom in resources, nevertheless pays a THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF IRELAND TO GREAT BRITAIN. tenth or eleventh of the taxes. Ireland ought to pay about 3,500,000/. and it pays nearly 7,000,0001. To the extent of the difference Great Britain is better off in the partnership than could have been ex- pected beforehand. This is only a part of the account. When we look at the other side viz.. the disposal of the taxes we shall see that Great Britain does not gain so much as would appear from the revenue side only. But I ought to explain in passing that it is not surprising, considering the nature of our imperial taxes, that Ireland should contribute more than its proper share, although the taxes are not merely indiscriminate, but Ireland is really ex- empted from some of them. The reason is that imperial taxes fall so much on the common luxuries of the poor on spirits, tobacco, and tea. Nearly the whole cost of the first two articles to the consumer is a tax, and the ad valorein tax on tea is also very high. The poor, if they are to have these common luxuries at all, must contribute disproportionately to the ex- chequer. Ireland as a poor country is disproportionately taxed, although the taxes of the United Kingdom are techni- cally indiscriminate. Turning to the other side of the ac- count, what we find is that the imperial government has, first, to garrison Ireland to a degree unnecessary in Great Britain; and, second, to pay disproportionately for the local government of Ireland. If the home troops were to be stationed in Ire- land in proportion to the population, the troops in Ireland would be about 12,000 only; if in proportion to resources, about 5,000 only. Actually Ireland has at least 24,000 troops, sometimes more,* an ex- cess on the first basis of 12,000 troops, and on the second basis of nearly 20,000. At 150/. per man, which is the cost of the British standing army, we thus spend in Ireland on the first basis i,8oo,oool. which we might save; and on the second basis nearly 3,000,000/. Next, the imperial government spends a certain amount of money on the internal administration of different parts of the United Kingdom the civil-service ex- penditure. Altogether it spends in this way the sums shown in the following ta- ble (the particulars being extracted from the last finance and revenue accounts): Statement of Charges on Zmperia/ Revenues for Local Administration in Great Britain and Ireland compared. From the Finance and Revenue Accounts, 188485. [Zn thousands ofjounds 000s omitted.] Pensions for judicial services, pp. 5260 Salaries and allow- ances, pp. 6365 - Courts of Justice sala- ries, pp. 6679 - Civil Service, Class I. Public Works and Buildings (less spent abroad) - Civil Service, Class II. (Civil Departments) Civil Service, Class III. (Law and Jus- tice) - Civil Service, Class IV. (Education) - Civil Service, Class VI. (Non-effective) Great Total. Britain. Ireland. 127 841 506 103 42 392 1,662 1,457 2,397 2,tO9f 6,34t 5,135 1,193 4,101 4,363 1,078 C 24 42 114 205 288 2,239 767 Its Total . 17,445 13,650 3,794 In addition there have been numerous grants of loans to Ireland in the last forty years which have never been repaid. It is easy to see that, on any hypoth- esis, the imperial government spends on Ireland more than its proper share, wheth- er measured by its resources, its popula- tion, or its actual contributions to imperial revenues. Out of a sum of 17,500,000/. spent out of imperial revenues for the internal administration of Great Britain and Ireland, it obtains very nearly a fourth. The following compares what Ireland would be entitled to on these different hypotheses with what it actually receives out of this sum of 17,500,000/.: Proportion to resources population - contributions Proportion. Lth ~th Sum due to Ireland from Imperial Revenues. 872,000 2,492,000 1,744,000 Sum actually Excess of actual received by Ireland. Receipts. C 3,800,000 3,800,000 3,800,000 2,928,000 1,308,000 2,056,000 In .884 the numbers were 24,400, out of a total of 90,000 at home. including salary of Lord-lieutenant and Queens Colleges. I have only included salaries and allowances special to Great Britain and Ireland. I Ireland gets tlse benefit of part of this sum. 7 8 THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF IRELAND TO GREAT BRITAIN. In any case Ireland gets more than is due to it, assuming in the last two cases that a contribution according to popula- tion or on the present scale is just. In these two ways, then, partly through ex- cessive military expenditure, and partly through excessive civil expenditure, Great Britain spends upon Ireland a dispropor- tionate sum. Taking the resources as a measure, the account would balance as follows Overspent for British troops in Ireland - 3,000,000 Overspent for local ad ministration - - Deduct excess of receipts from Ireland in pro- portion to its re- sources - . - Deficit - - 2,928,000 5,928,000 - - 3,200,000 - - 2,728,000 The English government is thus a loser by Ireland to the extent of about 2,750,- 000/. per annum, although it receives from Ireland over 3,000,000/. more revenue than Ireland, on any fair computation, ought to pay. If Ireland only paid a fair contribution for imperial purposes, we should be out of pocket by this 3,200,000/. more, or nearly 6,ooo,ooo/. Actually, it is beyond question, we lose as a govern- ment nearly 3,000,000/., while taxing Ire- land over 3,000,000/. more than it ought to be taxed. Of course it may be said that we do not lose by the army expenditure; that the troops being in Ireland are available, to a certain extent, for the miscellaneous pur- poses of the United Kingdom. Unfortu- nately, it is beyond question that the troops are not available. The extra 12,000 or 20,000 troops that are in Ireland, be- yond what is necessary to garrison it in proportion to Great Britain, are lost to us for imperial purposes. The expenditure is pure waste. So much for the balance of the account as far as the government is concerned. The question remains as to the account of the community as a whole. English capital, it may be said, is in- vested in Ireland, and there is a large profit to the community, if not to the government. I am sorry to say I can find little foundation for this impression. There is some profit, but not a large profit. The whole capital of Ireland must be inconsiderable probably not over 400,- ooo,ooo/. the principal items beina~ Value of land (i6o,ooo,oool.) and houses (40,000,000/.) - - Tenants capital - - - - Railways Furniture of houses and other movable property - - Other capital (say) - - - Total - - - - 200,000,000 8o,ooo,ooo 36,000,000 20,000,000 64,000,000 400,000,000 What banking capital there is I include in other c. Dital, as part of it at least is no doubt invested by loan or otherwise in agriculture, railways, etc., and it ought not to be counted twice over. The 400,000,- ooo/. is probably over the mark. And most of this capital must be held locally. The trading and farming capital is so held. The banking capital is so held; out of the 40,000,000/. of resources of the Irish banks, capital and deposits together, the share owned by English peo- ple must be very small, for the deposits are necessarily those of the locality, and Irish bank shares, I know, are held lo- cally. Part of these resources finds its way to London, and is invested in Lon- don. Irish railway shares are also, for the most part, held in Ireland. There remains only the real property, which is said to be mortgaged largely to English insurance companies, and so on. But English insurance companies only hold a little over 70,000,000/. of mortgages alto- gether, and I should doubt if a fifth part of these mortgages are in Ireland. The mortgages there, all told, can hardly ex- ceed 5o,ooo,ooo/., of which only a part would be held in England. There are, of course, the landlords who reside in En- gland. Per contra, however, residents in Ireland hold English securities, not in- considerably, I believe, in proportion to the resources of Ireland, and this hold- ing, putting the two communities against each other, is a set-off to Irish securities held in England. Ireland, as a field for English capital, does not seem, therefore, to count for much. But, if we allow that even a sum equal to the fourth part of the nominal agricultural rent of Ireland, which appears to be under io,ooo,ooo/., finds its way to England on balance in the shape of mort- gage inte rest, etc., deducting what is rc- ceived in Ireland on similar account from Great Britain, the English community as a whole, government and people together, would still have very little out of Ireland. The gain to the community, whatever it is, would be balanced, ~ro ta;zto, by the deficit on government account. If Ire- THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF IRELAND TO GREAT BRITAIN. land were only to be taxed according to its resources, there would be a very large deficit. It is quite clear, it may be added, that, as compared with the enormous capital and income from capital which the com- munity of Great Britain enjoys, the share due to the Irish connection, even if the whole nominal rental of Ireland were to be remitted to Great Britain, would be in- considerable. Our income from capital is over 400,ooo,ooo/. annually, to which a contribution of Io,ooo,ooo/. would not be very material. What has been said above as to the superior importance to us of India and Australia has a bearing on this point. There are many parts of the world which are more important, economically, to Great Britain than Ireland is. Next, it may be said, we gain by the trade of Ireland. Ireland is a good cus- tomer of Great Britain, and we get con- veniently from Ireland much of what we require. It will follow, however, from what has been said, that, as the income of Ireland altogether is about 75,000,000/. only, the trade with Ireland must be lim- ited (1) by the surplus which Ireland can afford to export out of that sum, and (2) by the proportion of that surplus which Ireland can afford to spend on the prod- uce and manufactures of Great Britain. The total exportable surl)lus of Ireland cannot be very large. The exports and export value of cattle, sheep, and pigs, valuing them at about the average given by Thom for Irish live stock in general in 1884* are as follows (average of three years 18813): Cattle - Sheep - Pigs - Value per head. - 630,000 12 - 530,000 2 3S. - 450,000 3 Total 7,560,000 1,220,000 1,350,000 10,130,000 And the export of butter and cheese, allowing that the produce available for export from each milch cow is about 4/. per head, would not be more than about 6,ooo, ooo/. Adding these two sums together, the total agricultural exports of Ireland would be about i6,ooo,ooo/. only; of course at lower prices the exports would be less. In addition, there are the exports of the linen manufacture, the Belfast ship- building trade, the spirits and porter of Dublin and Belfast, the produce of Irish fisheries, and other miscellaneous produc- tions, amounting in all, I should say, to * Thorns Almanac for 1885, pp. 99294. 9 about other 5,ooo,ooo/. total 2 1,000,000/. The calculation is necessarily very rough. The imports on the other side would more than balance, I think, but they are largely of articles which are not the prod- uce and manufactures of England. Grain of different kinds is a principal item. There are no returns of imports now, but in 1874 they amounted from foreign coun- tries only, principally grain and flour, to 10,000,000/. At recent prices the same quantity of imports would of course be of less value. Ireland in addition takes sugar, tea, and other articles of tropical produce, princi- pally imported from Great Britain, proba- bly to the amount of 5,ooo,ooo/., giving a much smaller quantity of tea and sugar per head than is consumed in the United Kingdom generally. Adding these two amounts together, the total is 15,ooo,ooo/., and the difference between this sum and the total required to balance the estimated exports only amounts to 6,ooo,ooo/. Ireland probably imports somewhat more; the particulars I cannot give, except for coal, of which Ireland imports 3,000,000 tons, worth, say, including freight, rather more than 2,000,- ooo/. The other articles which Ireland must import, including textiles, would necessarily contain a large amount of raw material. Altogether, it may be doubted whether Ireland is a customer for British labor to the extent of more than a few millions per annum. When it is considered that even com- plete separation need not involve loss of trade, and partial separation, by which I mean any tolerably comprehensive scheme of local self-government, would not in- volve loss of trade at all, except through Ireland falling into anarchy, it cannot be said that the risk to our trade is a very serious element in the question of the loss or gain which the separation of Ire- land, and a frrtiori a mere alteration of the form of the political connection, would involve. I have been looking at the question ex- clusively from the British point of view. The view presented, when looked at from an Irish standpoint, is somewhat differ- ent. The precise interest of Ireland in the connection requires a little explana- tion. t. On the direct government account, Ireland would probably gain by separa- tion or by a revisal of present arrange- ments. It would have about 7,000,000/. of revenue to dispose of, which it now io THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF IRELAND TO GREAT BRITAIN. contributes to the imperial exchequer, and out of the difference between this sum and the sum of 3,800,000/. it gets back from the imperial treasury for internal administration, it would have to defray its army and navy, if any, its share of the imperial debt, and any expenses of that sort. Assuming economy in spending for the purposes on which the 3,800,000/. is now spent, Ireland might get on very well, the scale of expenditure all round being lower than in Great Britain. For less than a million a year Ireland could have a very tolerable force to maintain internal order; its share of the imperial debt, proportioning that share to its re- sources, would not cost more than 1,500,- ooo/. per annum; there would remain over 4,000,000/. for all the miscellaneous purposes of internal administration, which is more than what is now spent. Ireland would thus gain by the severance; while Great Britain, which loses now, although extracting over three millions more from Ireland than its proper share of taxation, would decidedly gain. Both sides would gain, assuming no political danger to arise, because the present government of Ire- land by England involves very serious waste. 2. Ireland would lose indirectly by the withdrawal of English troops. English army expenditure in Ireland now recoups a part of the loss inflicted on Ireland by disproportionate taxation. 3. Separation, if it should bring about an interruption of trade between Ireland and Great Britain, would be disastrous to Ireland. The 20,000,000/. which Ireland exports find almost their sole market in Great Britain. If more capital is to be invested in Ireland, the capital must come from England. In this respect Great Britain is indispensable to Ireland. On balance the direct advantages to Ire- land from complete or partial separation are apparently so little that they cannot compensate the danger involved in any- thing like complete separation. Of course in isolation and hostility to Great Britain, Ireland would be lost. It is utterly with- out resources to maintain such an attitude. On the other hand, the advantage to Ire- land of a partial separation, involving a settlement of the direct accounts, and leaving to it all the advantage of forming part of the United Kingdom, would be enormous. I have thus answered the question with which I started, or nearly so. The con- clusion is that Great Britain has not much to lose in dissolving partnership, while Ireland has. The only point I have left untouched is the question of the indirect political dan- ger in separation and the loss it may involve. This is almost too remote a speculation for such an inquiry as I have been making. It is obvious, however, still keeping strictly to the economic question, that the sum of 2,750,000/., the amount of the deficit we now incur on account of Ireland, would go some way towards the expense of extra military and naval prep- aration which the presence of a hostile Ireland near us might involve. I should like further to ask the question why a State like Ireland beside us, if completely separate, should add sensibly to the dan- gers we incur from States like Belgium and Holland, which are just about as pop. ulous and much richer, and almost equally near. The question is one of military strategy; but, without being dogmatic, I would suggest that the experience of past times, when France tried to use Ireland against us, does not wholly apply. In past times Ireland was useful positively to Great Britain, because of the relative magnitude of its resources in both men and ~vealth. The loss of it would have been a great loss to Great Britain in the life-and-death struggles in which it was engaged. Further, Ireland hostile might in former times have been a real danger to England for two reasons the first, its relative magnitude, already referred to; and next, the necessity or convenience, in the days of sailing ships, of using as the basis of hostile operations against a State which was to be reached by sea a place near to that State, so that a power like France might have gained something by enveloping Great Britain. Now all the circumstances have changed. Ireland is so poor in resources that the loss of it positively would hardly count. Even as a recruiting-ground it is no longer required, because a State like Great Britain with 314 millions of men, not to speak of its colonial reserves, can have as many men for soldiering as its finances can afford out of its own numbers. Negatively also we can keep military possession of Ireland much more easily than ~vas formerly the case; it is an easier task than it was in proportion to our resources; and just be- cause it is easier, it is less ~vorth the while of an opponent to seek to overcome us through Ireland. In these days of steam also a great power meaning to attack us could do so as easily, or nearly as easily, from Antwerp or Hamburg or Havre, or THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF IRELAND TO GREAT BRITAIN. x i even Cadiz, as from Dublin or Belfast; to attempt to reach us through Ireland would not be worth while. To guard against accidents, it is prudent and best for both countries that we should keep military hold of Ireland; but it would seem to be conceivable that Ireland, even if disposed to be hostile, ~vould not count when separate, if we were only to put forth our strength. If we lose command of the sea, we shall be liable to be assailed directly by a military power; if we keep the com- mand, Ireland will not count. There is less need, however, to discuss a point like the last, because there is no question, under any scheme of local self- government or home rule that I have seen, of permitting to Irish local authorities an army or a navy. Many of those who are in favor of home rule appear to admit as a possibility that the Irish local authorities may attempt illegally and covertly to raise a military force. But the cost of guarding against such a risk, which is the economic aspect of the question, ought not to be very material. Would it conceivably be necessary to keep more troops in Ireland than we now do? I consider myself pre- cluded from fully discussing the latter question. It involves those moral and political considerations from which I have endeavored to disentangle the economic problem. But it would seem just at least to notice, economically, that Ireland, even if separate, would have overwhelming mo- tives to be on good terms with Great Britain. I propose to leave the question of the economic value of Ireland to Great Britain at this point. As I have stated at the beginning, and as I have just been repeat- ing, there are moral and political consid- erations to be taken into account after the economic aspect of the question has been studied. For historical reasons, for the sake of the connection between Ulster specially and Great Britain, for the sake of a minority who have been encouraged to trust to English law administered by an English Parliament, neither separation nor any form of home rule for Ireland may be desirable or possible. To discuss all these matters would take me into regions which, for many reasons, even if I desired to do so, I must avoid. I may venture to express the hope, however, that the facts I have stated are of a ten- dency to mitigate apprehensions which are generally entertained. If Ireland in a business view- hardly counts in a question of force against Great Britain, we can afford to arrange its destinies and its relations to Great Britain in any way that may be politically found expedient. Hav- ing practically omnipotent power, we should discuss with reasonable coolness how Ireland is to be governed. I shall only, then, permit myself one or two remarks appearing to verge on politics, because they arise directly out of a consideration of the economic and busi- ness aspects of the Irish problem. The first of these remarks is that all claim of Ireland to be represented in Par- liament, if it really contributes nothing material to the strength of the empire when properly taxed, is taken away. At present it is unprofitable to us, because, though it is overtaxed, the circumstances are such that it absorbs the surplus taxa- tion. If it ~vere to be taxed properly. and the present system of government ~vere to continue, it would be still more unprofit- able. It appears then to be an intoler- able anomaly that such a State should be represented in the imperial Parliament, helping to vote the taxes which another community pays, and meddling in all the affairs of that community. The anomaly might be endurable if the representatives returned happened to be friendly or to be sensible of deriving advantage from the imperial connection. But to admit into the imperial Parliament representatives of a State which can be no contributory to imperial needs; which could not bear the strain of an imperial emergency; which requires for its own internal administra- tion all the taxable income it can spare, and which, moreover, sends representa- tives avowedly hostile, with no other mis- sion than to make imperial government impossible, is nothing less than the re- ductia ad absurdiem of Parliamentary government. The affairs of an empire like that of England cannot possibly go on upon such conditions. The enormous reduction or absolute extinction of the Irish representation in the imperial Par- liament, with or without terms of home rule for Ireland, is a measure on which both parties in Great Britain might justifi- ably unite. Another remark I have to make is with reference to a certain scheme which ap- peared in the Statist newspaper, and which became known as Economists plan of settling the land and home-rule questions in Ireland. There is no reason why I should not assume responsibility for a suggestion which I was encouraged to ventilate, when I first put it forward in conversation, by official and political 12 THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF IRELAND TO GREAT BRITAIN. friends, although for obvious reasons I am most anxious to keep out of political controversy, and could take no part, either in my own name, or anonymously, in the incessant discussions of the last few months. What I should like to point out is that the idea of buying out Irish landlords at the expense of the imperial exchequer, and of handing over a rent- charge to Irish local authorities in lieu of the present imperial payments for the in- ternal administration of Ireland, is closely related to the view of Irelands economic position which I have set forth in this paper. It is all based on the notion that Ireland is a comparatively small State which has gained a footing in the imperial system of Great Britain to which it is not entitled, and for which, therefore, another system, excluding Irish representatives wholly, or nearly so, from the imperial Parliament, must be devised, if Irish local authorities can be set up amicably, and with the consent of Irelands repre- sentatives, so much the better; if~no such authorities can be set up, then it will be necessary still to exclude hostile Irish representatives from the imperial Parlia- ment, and set up local authorities of a non-popular kind. As far as I can see, there is no getting out from between the horns of this dilemma. In either case a settlement of the land question seems expedient, in order to give the new au- thorities a chance, and in order to disen- tangle the imperial and Irish exchequers. No merely Irish authorities could buy out the landlords, because they would not have credit enough. If the exchequers are not disentangled, the Irish people would have the apparent grievance of be- ing taxed without representation, whereas in some form or other they could be repre- sented in local councils. It is, therefore, expedient at the same time at once to buy out Irish landlords effectively, which can be done by the imperial exchequer, and to give the new local authorities a revenue which they could collect and administer themselves, and which would be the equiv- alent of the contributions to the imperial exchequer they would continue to make under existing taxes, deducting a certain fixed proportion as due from them for the imperial protection. Subject to the con- dition that the imperial Parliament im- posed no ne~v taxes on Jreland, which it is not worth while doing, there would be no injustice in such an arrangement, and the Irish people could not then say they were taxed without representation. But the existing intolerable anomaly would be got rid of, and Great Britain would cease to be governed in a large degree by a hos- tile faction coming from a country which contributes nothing to imperial strength~ I desire, likewise, to call special atten- tion to the fact which has come out in- cidentally that Ireland is overtaxed in comparison with Great Britain. It con- tributes twice its proper share, if not more, to the imperial exchequer. The taxation in one view is not reprehensible; it is levied in the shape of indirect taxes, mainly on spirits and tobacco. The Irish masses could untax themselves by the simple expedient of consuming less spirits and tobacco. This is the easy view which has often been acted upon when the sub- ject has come up in the imperial Parlia- ment. Long ago, in 1864, when there was a committee on Irish taxation, Mr. Lowe embarrassed an able witness, Mr. E. Senior, a poor-law inspector in Ireland and well acquainted with Irish poverty, by putting this very point (see No. 513, session 1864). But it is not the right view. How much of the expenditure of the Irish people on spirits and tobacco is really wasteful is not certainly known. People who have so little taxable income have at any rate a claim to have the money thus taken from them by the government applied for their special benefit. At pres- ent, nearly the whole taxable income of the Irish people is, in fact, absorbed by the State. The taxable income being about i~,ooo,oooL only, the imperial gov- ernment, as we have seen, takes nearly 7,000 oool., and the local taxes are over 3,0oo,ooo~!. more, or about io,ooo,oool. in all. So large a proportion of taxation to taxable income would be a serious fact for any country, and there can be little accu- mulation in Ireland under such condi- tions. Considerations like these, which are so material, have however made no impression in the imperial Parliament hitherto, and that this has been the case is one reason, among many others, why on this side of St. Georges Channel we should speak with some modesty of the imperial Parliament being capable of dealing with Irish affairs. Here is cer- tainly a matter on which, with no inten- tion to be unjust, with an apparent will- ingness to be more than fair to Ireland, as is shown by the exemption of Ireland specially from certain taxes, we have nev- ertheless acted unjustly and to the injury of Ireland. 1 may commend Mr. Seniors evidence on this head, in the bluebook of 1864 already referred to, to those who care to study the subject. Surely the THIS MANS WIFE. 3 whole blunder clearly suggests the expe- diency of devising some form of govern- ment for Ireland, under which the special needs and circumstances of the country and people would receive more and better attention than they do under present ar- rangements, although the attention which they do get disturbs and disorganizes the management of imperial affairs them- selves. ROBERT GIFFEN. From Good Words. THIS MANS WIFE. A STORY OF WOMAN S FAITH. BY GEORGE MANVILLE FENN. BOOK I. THE NEW CURATE. CHAPTER X. THISBE GIVES HER EXPERIENCE. THISBE KING was huffy; and when Thisbe King was huffy, she was hard. When Thisbe was huffy, and in conse- quence hard, it was because, as she ex- pressed it, Things is awkward, and when things were like that Thisbe went and made the beds. Of course the beds did not always want making; but more than once after an encounter with Mrs. Luttrell upon some domestic question. where it was all mild reproof on one side, acerbity on the other, Thisbe had been known to go up to the best bedroom, drag a couple of chairs forward, and relieve her mind by pulling the bed to pieces, snatch- ing quilt and blankets and sheets off over the chairs, and engaging in a furious fight with pillows, bolster, and feather bed, hit- tin g, punching, and turning, till she was hot; and then, having thoroughly con- quered the soft, inanimate objects and her own temper at the same time, the bed was smoothly remade, and Thisbe sighed. I shall have to part with Thisbe, Mrs. Luttrell often used to say to her husband and daughter; but matters went no farther; perhaps she knew in her heart that Thisbe would not go. The beds had all been made, and there had been no encounter with Mrs. Luttrell about any domestic matter relating to spreading a cloth in the drawing-room before the grate was blackleaded, or using up one loaf in the kitchen before a second was cut. In fact, Thisbe had been all smies that morning, and had uttered a few croaks in the kitchen, which she did 9ccasionally under the impression that she was singing; but all at once she had rushed up-stairs like the wind in winter when the front door was opened, and, to carry out the simile, dashed back a bed- room door, and closed it with a bang. This done, she had made a bed fun. ously so furiously that the feathers flew from a weak corner, and had to be picked up and tucked in again. After this, red- faced and somewhat refreshed, Thisbe pulled a housewife out of a tremendous pocket, like a saddle-bag, threaded a nee- dle, and sewed up the failing spot. Its dreadful, thats what it is ! she muttered at last, and Im going to speak my mind. She did not speak her mind then, but went down to her work, and worked with her ears twitching like those of some ani- mal on the qul vive for danger; and when Thisbe twitched her ears there was a corresponding action in the muscles about the corners of her mouth, which added to the animal look, for it suggested that she might be disposed to bite. Some little time afterwards she walked into the drawing-room, looking at its occu- pant in a soured way. Letter for you, Miss Milly, she said. A note for me, Thisbe? And Milli- cent took the missive, which Thisbe held with her apron to keep it clean. Mr. Bayle give it me hissen. Millicents face grew troubled, and Thisbe frowned and left the room shaking her head. The note was brief, and the tears stood in Millicents eyes as she read it twice. Pity me Forgive me. / was mad. Poor boy! she said softly, as she refolded it and placed it in her desk, to stand there, thoughtful and with her brow wrinkled. She was in the bay-window, and after standing there a few minutes, her face changed; the troubled look passed away as a steady, regular step was heard on the gravel path beyond the hedge. There was the faint, creaking noise, too, at every step of the hard, tight boots, and as their wearer passed, Millicent looked up and returned the salute; for a glossy hat was raised to her, and he who bowed passed on, leaving Millicent with her color slightly heightened and an eager look in her eyes Any answer, miss? Millicent turned quickly, to see that Thisbe had returned. Answer? Yes, miss. The note. Is Mr. Bayle waiting? 4 THIS MAN S WIFE. No, miss; but I thought you might want to send him one, and Im going out and could leave it on the way.~ No, Thisbe, there is no answer. Are you sure, miss? Sure, Thisbe? Of cour5e23 Thisbe stood pulling the hem of her apron and making it snap. Oh I I would send him a line, miss. I like Mr. Bayle. For such a young man, the way he can preach is wonderful. But, Miss Milly, she cried.~vith a sudden, pas. sionate outburst, please, dont dont do that I What do you mean, Thisbe? I cant abear it, miss. It frightens and worries me. 71hisbe I cant help it, miss. Im a woman too, and seven years older than you are. Dont, please dont, take any notice of him. There, dont look cross at me, miss. I must speak when I see things going wrong. What do you mean? cried Millicent, crimsoning. I mean I used to lead you about when you was a little thing and keep you out o the puddles when the road was clatty, and though you never take hold o my hand now, I must speak when youre going wrong. Thisbe, this is a liberty! I cant help it, Miss Milly; I see him coming by in his creaking boots, and tak- ing off his hat, and walking by here, when he has no business, and people talking about it all over the town. And in this house. Thisbe, you are forgetting your place. Oh, no, Im not, miss. Im thinking about you and Mr. Hallam, miss. I know. Thisbe, mamma and I have treated you more as a friend than a servant; but Thats it, miss, and I shouldnt be a friend if I was to stand by and see you walk raight into trouble without a word. Thisbe! I dont care, Miss Milly, I will speak. Dont have nowt to do wi him; hes too handsome; never you have nowt to do wi a handsome man. Millicents ordinarily placid face as- sumed a look foreign to it a look of anger and firmness combined; but she compressed her lips, as if to keep back words she would rather not utter, and then smiled once more. Ah, you may laugh, Miss Milly; but its nothing to laugh at. And theres Mr. Bayle, too. Youre having letters from he. Millicents face changed again ;but she mastered her annoyance, and, laying her hand upon Thisbes shoulder, said with a smile, I dont want to be angry with you, Thisbe, but you have grown into a terribly prejudiced woman. Enough to make me, seeing what I do, Miss Mill). Come, come, you must not talk like this. now youre beginning to coax again, as you always did when you wanted your own way; but its of no use, my dear, I dont like him, and I never shall. Id rather youd marry old Sir Gordon. He is nice, though he do dye his hair. I dont like him, and theres an end of it. Nonsense, Thisbe! No, it isnt nonsense. I dont like him, and I never shall. But why? Have you any good rea- son? Yes, said Thisbe with a snort. What is it? I told you before. Hes so horrid handsome. Why, you dear, prejudiced, silly old thing 1 cried Millicent, whose eyes were sparkling, and cheeks flushed. I dont care if I am. I dont like handsome men; theyre good for nowt. Why, Thisbe! I dont care, they aint; my soldier fellow ~vas that handsome it made you feel wicked, you were so puffed out with pride. And so you were in love once, This- be? Why, of course I was. Think Im made o stone, miss? Enough to make any poor girl be in love when a handsome fellow like that, with moustache-i-ohs, and shiny eyes, and larnseer uniform making him look like a blue robin redbreast, came and talked as he did to a silly young goose such as I was then. I couldnt help it. Why the way his clothes fitted him was enough to win any girls heart him ~vith such a beautiful figure tool He looked as if he couldnt be got out of em wiout unpicking Think of our Thisbe falling in love with a soldier! cried Millicent, laughing, for there was a wild feeling of joy in her heart that was intoxicating, and made her eyes flash with excitement. Ah, its very funny, isnt it? said Thisbe, with a vicious shake of her apron. But its true. Handsome as handsome THIS MANS WIFE. he was, and talked so good that he set me thinking always about how nice I must be. Stuffed me out wi pride, and what did he do then? Im sure I dont know, Thisbe. Borrered three pun seven and six- pence of my savings, and took my watch, as I bought at Horncastle fair, to be reg- gilated, and next time I see my gentleman he was walking out wi Dixons cook. Handsome is as handsome does, Miss Milly, so you take warning by me. There, I will not be cross with you, Thisbe,said Millicent,smiling. I know you mean well. And youll send an answer to Mr. Bayle, miss? There is no answer required, Thisbe, said Millicent gravely. And Mr. Hallam, miss? Thisbe, said Millicent gravely, I want you always to be our old faithful friend as well as servant, but She held up a warning finger, and was silent. Thisbes lips parted to say a few angry words; but she flounced round, and made the door speak for her in a sharp bang, after which she rushed up stairs with the intent of having a furious encounter with a bed; but she changed her mind, and on reaching her own room, sat down, put her apron to her eyes, and had what she called a good cry. Poor Miss Milly! she sobbed at last; shes just about as blind as I was, and shell only find it out when its too late. CHAPTER XI. ANOTHER EVENING AT THE DOCTOR S. BUT but I dont like it, my dear, said Mrs. Luttrell, wiping her eyes, and looking up at the doctor, as he stood rub- bing his hands, to get rid of the harshness produced by freshly dug earth used for potting. Neither do I, said the doctor calmly. But why should she choose him of all men? sighed Mrs. Luttrell. I never thought Millicent the girl to be taken by a man only for his handsome face. I was not when I was young! Which is saying that I was precious ugly, eh? Indeed you were the handsomest man in Castor! cried Mrs. Luttrell proudly; but you were the cleverest too, and dear, dear! what a little while ago it seems! Gently, gently, old lady! said the doctor, tenderly kissing the wrinkled 5 forehead that was raised towards him. Well, Heavens blessing be upon her, my dear, and may her love be as evergreen as ours. Mrs. Luttrell rose and laid her head upon his shoulder, and stood there, with a happy, peaceful look upon her pleasant face, although it was still wet with tears. Thats what Im afraid of, she sighed; and it would be so sad. Ah, wife! said the doctor, walking slowly up and down the room, with his arm about Mrs. Luttrells waist, its one of natures mysteries. We cant rule these things. Look at Milly. Some girls begin love.making at seventeen, ah, and before! and here she went calmly on to four and-twenty untouched, and finding her pleasure in her books and music, and home life. As good and affectionate a girl as ever breathed! cried Mrs. Luttrell. Yes, my dear; and then comes the man, and he has but to hold up his finger and say Come, and it is done. But she might have had Sir Gordon, and he is rich, and then it would have been Lady Bourne! He was too old, my dear, too old. She looked upon him as a child would look up to her father. Well, then, Mr. Bayle, the best of men, Im sure; and he is well off too. Too young, old lady, too young. Ive watched them together hundreds of times. Milly always petted and patronized him, and treated him as if he were a younger brother, of whom she was very fond. Heigho! Oh dear me! sighed Mrs. Luttrell. But I dont like him this Mr. Hallam. I never thought when Mil- licent ~vas a baby that she would enter into an engagement like this. Cant we break it off? The doctor shook his head. I dont like it, mother. Hallam is the last man I should have chosen for her; but we must make the best of it. He has won her; and she is not a child, but a calm, thought- ful woman. Yes, thats the worst of it, sighed Mrs. Luttrell; she is so thoughtful and calm and dignified, that I never can look upon her now as my little girl. I always seem to be talking to a superior woman, whose judgment I must respect. But this is very sad! There, there! we must not treat it like that, old lady. Perhaps we have grown to be old and prejudiced. I own I have. Oh, no, no, my dear! Yes, but I have. As soon as this i6 THIS MAN S WIFE. seemed to be a certainty I began to try and find a hole in the fellows coat. In Mr. Hallams coat, love? Oh, you wouldnt find that. No, said the doctor drily, as he smiled down in the gentle old face, not one. There, there! you must let it go! Now then, old lady, you must smile and look happy, heres Milly coming down. Mrs. Luttrell shook her head, and her wistful look seemed to say that she would. never look happy again; but as Millicent entered, in plain white satin, cut in the high-waisted, tight fashion of the period, and with a necklet of pearls for her only ornament, a look of pride and pleasure came into the mothers face, and she darted a glance at her husband, which he caught and interpreted, I will think only of her. Oh, Milly! she cried, that neck. lace! what lovely pearls! Roberts present, dear. I was to wear them to-night. Are they not lovely? Almost as lovely as their setting, said the doctor to himself, as he kissed his child tenderly. Why, Milly, he said aloud, you look as happy as a bird!~ She laid her cheek upon his breast, and remained silent for a few moments, with half-closed eyes. Then, raising her head, she kissed him lovingly. I am, father dear, she said in a low voice, full of the calm and peaceful joy that filled her breast. I am, father, I am, mother so happy! She paused, and then, laughing gently, added, So happy, I feel ready to cry. It was to be a quiet evening, to which a few friends were invited; but it was understood as being an open acknowledg- ment of Millicents engagement to Robert Hallam, and in this spirit the visitors came. Miss Heathery generally arrived last at the social gatherings. It gave her entry more importance, and, at her time of life, she could not afford to dispense with ad- ventitious aids. But there was the scent of matrimony in this little party, and she was dressed an hour too soon, and arrived first in the well-lit drawing-room. My darling! she whispered as she kissed Millicent. That was all; but her voice and look were full of pity for the victim chosen for the next sacrifice, and she turned away towards the piano to get out her handker- chief, a:~d drop a parting tear. It ~vas a big tear, one of so real an emotional char- acter that it brimmed over, fell on her cheekbone, and hopped into her reticule just as she was drawing open the top, and was lost in the depths within. There was as much sorrow for herself as emotion on Millicent Luttrells behalf. Had not Millicent robbed her of the chance of an offer? Mr. Hallam might never have proposed; but still he might. Suddenly her heart throbbed, for the next guest arrived also unusually early, and as Thisbe held open the door for him to pass, hope told again her flattering tale to the tune that Sir Gordon might have known that she, Miss Heathery, was com- ing early, and had followed. The hopeful feeling did not die at once, but it received a shock as Sir Gordon en- tered, looking very bright and young, to shake hands warmly with the doctor and Mrs. Luttrell, to bow to Miss Heathery, and then turn to Millicent, who in spite of her natural firmness was a good deal agi- tated. She had nerved herself for these meetings, and striven to keep down their importance; but now the night had come, she was fain to confess that hers was a difficult task, to meet two rejected lovers, and bear herself easily before them with the husband of her choice. And now here was the first shock to be sustained, so forcing herself to be calm, she advanced with extended hand. Oh, whispered Sir Gordon, in tones that only reached Millicents ear, too bad too bad. Supplanted twice. But there, I accept my fate. As he spoke he drew Millicent towards him, and kissed her forehead with tenderreverence. An old mans kiss, my dear, to the child of his very dear friends. God bless you! May you be very happy with the man of your choice. May I? He dropped her hand to draw from his breast a string of large single pearls, so regular and perfect a match that they must have cost a goodly sum. For answer Millicent turned pale as she bent towards him and he clasped the string about her neck. There, he said, smiling, I should have made a dif- ferent choice if I had known. Millicent would have spoken, but her voice failed, and to add to her agony at that moment, Bayle came in, looking, as she saw at a glance, pale and somehow changed. He will do or say something absurd, she said to herself as she bit her lip, and strove for composure. Then the blood seemed to rush to her heart and a pang shot through her as she realized, more than if he had said a thousand things, how deeply her refusal had influenced his life. THIS MAN S WIFE. 17 Only four months since that day, when she had told him that they could be true friends, she speaking as an elder sister to one she looked upon as a boy. And now she felt ready to ask who was this calm, grave man, who took her hand without hesitation, so perfectly at ease in his gen- tlemanly courtesy, and who had so thor- oughly fallen into the place she had bidden him take? I see, he said with a smile, I shall not be out of order, my dear Miss Lut- trell. Will you accept this little offering too? He was holding a brilliant diamond ring in his hand. For answer Millicent drew her long glove from her soft, white fingers, and he took it gravely, and, in the presence of all, slipped on the ring, bending over it afterwards to kiss her hand, with the chivalrous delicacy of some courtier of a bygone school, then, raising his eyes to hers, he said softly, Millicent Luttrell, our friendship must never fail. Before she could say a word of thanks he had turned to speak to Mrs. Luttrell, giving way to Sir Gordon Bourne, who began chatting to her pleasantly, while her eyes followed Christie Bayles easy gestures, wondering the while at the change in his manner, but unable to real- ize the agony of soul that he had suffered in this his first great battle with self be- fore he had obtained the mastery, wound- ed and changed, stepping at once, as it were, from boyhood to the position of a thoughtful man. Hallam soon arrived, smiling and agree able, and it was piteous to see Mrs. Lut- trells efforts to be very warm and friendly to him. Millicent noted it, and also that her father was quiet towards his son-in-law elect. She watched, too, the meeting be- tween Hallam and Bayle, the former being as nearly offensive as his gentlemanly manner would allow the latter warm, grave, and friendly. ~Has Bayle been unwell ? said Hallam the first time he was alone with Millicent. I have not heard, she replied, glanc- ing at the curate, and wondering more and more, as the evening went on, at the change. Among others, the Trampleasures ar- rived, and to Miss Heatherys grief Mrs. Trampleasure pretty well monopolized Bayles remarks, or else made him listen to her own. And what do you think of this en- LIVING AGE. VOL. LIV. 2758 gagement, Mr. Bayle? she said, in so audible a voice that he was afraid it would be overheard. They make a very handsome couple, he replied. Ah, yes, handsome enough, I dare say, but good looks will not fill mouths. I wonder L. has allowed it. Mr. Hallam is all very well, but he is, I may say, our ser- vant, and if we, who are above him, find so much trouble to make both ends meet, I dont know what hell do. But Mr. Hallam has a very good sal- ary, I presume. I tell T. it is too much, and old Mr. Dixon and Sir Gordon might have taken a hundred off, and let us draw it. I dont approve of the match at all. Indeed, Mrs. Trampleasure? said Bavle, who felt hurt at hearing her speak like this. Yes; Im Millicents aunt, and I think I ought to have been consulted more but there! it is of no use to speak to my brother; and as to Millicent she always did just as she liked with her mother! Poor Kitty is very weak! I always find Mrs. Luttrell very sweet and motherly. Not so motherly as I am, Mr. Bayle, said the lady bluntly. Ah! its a great stress on a woman a large familyes. pecially when the father takes things so coolly. I shouldnt speak to every one like this, you know, but one can talk to ones clergyman. Do you like Mr. Hal- lam ? 1 find him very gentlemanly. Ah, yes, hes very gentlemanly. Well Im sure, I hope theyll be happy; but theres always something in married life, and you do ~vell to keep out of it; but, of course, you are so young yet. Yes, he said, with a grave, old looking smile, I am so young yet. You dont know what a family is, Mr. Bayle. Theres always something; when it isnt measles its scarlatina, and when it isnt scarlatina its boots and shoes. Oh, but children are a deal of com- fort, Sophia, said the doctor, coming up after whispering to Mrs. Luttrell that his sister looked grumpy. Some children may be, Joseph mine are not, sighed Mrs. Trampleasure, and the doctor ~vent back to his wife. Ah, Mr. Bayle, if I were to tell you half of the troubles Ive been through I should harass you. Kitty, said the doctor, I want every- thing to go well to-night. Try and coax THIS MANS WIFE. Sophia away, shes forcing her doldrums on Mr. Bayle. But how am I to get her away, dear? you know what she is. Try to persuade her to taste the brandy cherries, or we shall be having her in tears. Ill come and help you. They walked back to where Mrs. Tram- pleasure was still talking away hard in a querulous voice. Ah! youve come back, Joseph, she said, cuttingshort her remarks to the cu- rate to return to her complaint to her brother. I was saying that some chil- dren are a pleasure, but it did not seem as if you could listen to ~ My dear Sophia, Ill listen to you all night, but Kitty wants you to give your opinion about some brandy cherries. My opinion? said the lady loudly. I have no opinion. I never taste such luxuries. Millicent could not help hearing a por- tion of her aunts querulous remarks, and, out of sheer pity for one of the recipients, she turned to her uncle Trampleasure, who always kept on the other side of the room. Uncle, dear, she said, aunt is mur- muring so. Do try and stop it. Stop it, my dear ? he said, smiling sadly. Ah, if you knew your aunt as well as I do you would never check her murmurs; they carry off her ill-temper. No, no, my dear, it would be dangerous to stop it. I always let it go on. There was no need to check Mrs. Tram- pleasure after all. Mr. Bayle threw him- self into the breach, and made her forget her own troubles by consulting her about some changes that he proposed making in the parish. That changed the course of her thoughts, and in the intervals of the music, and often during the progress of some song, she alluded to different mat- ters that had given her annoyance ever since she had been a girl. It was not an agreeable duty, that of keeping Mrs. Trampleasure amused, but Millicent rewarded him with a grateful smile, and he was content. There was a pleasant little supper that was announced unpleasantly just as Miss I-leathery had consented to sing again, and was telling the assembly in a birdlike voice how gaily the troubadour touched his guita h ah, as he was hastening home from the war. Suppers ready, said a loud, harsh voice, which cut like an arrow right through Miss Heatherys best note. Now you shouldnt, Thisbe, said Mrs. Luttrell in tones of mild reproach, but the reproof was not heard, for the door was sharply closed. It is only our Thisbes way, Mr. Bayle, whispered Mrs. Luttrell; please dont notice it. Excellent servant, but so soon put out. She nodded confidentially, and then stole out on tiptoe, so as not to interrupt Miss Heathery, who went on singing from Palestine hither I come, to the end. Then words of reproof and sharp retort could be heard outside; and after a while poor Mrs. Luttrell came back looking very red, to lean over the curate from behind the sofa, brooding over him as if he were a favorite chicken. I dont like finding fault with the ser- vants, Mr. Bayle. Did you hear me? I could not help hearing, he said, smiling. She does provoke me so, continued Mrs. Luttrell in a soft, clucking way, that quite accorded with her brooding. I know I shall have to discharge her. She does not like alittle extra trouble perhaps. Company. Oh, no; it is not that, said Mrs. Lut- trell. Shell work night and day for one if shes in a good temper, but the fact is, Mr. Bayle, she does not like this engage- ment, and quite hates Mr. Hallam. Bayle drew his breath hard, but he turned a grave, smiling face to his host- ess. Thats the reason, Im sure, why she is so awkward to-night, my dear I beg pardon, I mean Mr. Bayle, said the old lady, coloring as ingenuously as a girl, but she pretends it is about the pota- toes. Potatoes? said Bayle, who was eager to divert her thoughts. Yes. You see the doctor is so proud of his potatoes, and I was going to please him by having some roasted for supper and brought up in a napkin, but Thisbe took offence directly, and said that cold chicken and hot potatoes would be ridicu- lous, and she has been in a huff ever sin ~ Just then the door opened and the per- son in question entered, to come straight to Mrs. Luttrell, who began to tremble and look at the curate for help. Theres something gone wrong, she whispered. Can I speak to you, please, mum? said Thisbe , glaring at her severely. Well, I dont know, Thisbe, I Let me go out and speak to Thisbe, mamma dear, said Millicent, who had THIS MAN S WIFE. crossed the room, divining what was wron~. Oh, if you would, my dear, said Mrs. Luttrell eagerly; and Thisbe was com- pelled to retreat, her young mistress fol- lowing her out of the room. Thats very good of her, Mr. Bayle, said Mrs. Luttrell, with a satisfied sigh. Millicent can always manage Thisbe. She has such a calm, dignified way with her. Do you know, Mr. Bayle, she is the only one who can manage her aunt Tram- pleasure when she begins to murmur. Ah, I dont know what I shall do when she has gone. You will have the satisfaction of know- ing that she is happy with the man she loves. I dont know, Mr. Bayle, I oh dear me, I ought to be ashamed of myself for speaking like this hush here she is. In effect Millicent came back into the room to where her mother was sitting. Only a little domestic difficulty, Mr. Bayle. Mamma, dear, it is all smoothed away, and Thisbe is very penitent. And she will bring up the roast pota- toes in the napkin, my dear? Yes, cried Mii~icent. laughing mer- rily, she has retracted all her opposition, and we are to have two dishes of papas best. In napkins, my dear? cried Mrs. Luttrell eagerly; both in napkins? Yes, mamma, in the whitest napkins she can find. She glanced at Christie Bayles grave countenance, and felt her heart smite her for being so happy and joyous in his pres- ence. Dont think us childish, Mr. Bayle, she said gently. It is to please my fa- th er. He rose and stood by her side for a moment or two. Childish? he said in a low voice, as if I could think such a thing of you. Millicent smiled her thanks, and crossed the room to where Hallam was watching her. The next minute supper was again announced simple, old-fashioned sup- per and Millicent went out on Hallams arm. You are going to take me in, Mr. Bayle? Well, Im sure Id rather, said Mrs. Luttrell, and I can then see, my dear, that you have a good supper. There, im saying my dear to you again.~ It is because I seem so young, Mrs. Luttrell, replied Bayle gravely. Oh, no, my dear, said Mrs. Luttrell 9 inno~ently; it was because you seemed to come among us so like a son, and took to the doctors ways with his garden, and - were so nice with Millicent. I used to think that perhaps you two might oh dear me, she cried, checking herself sud- denly, what a tongue I have got! Pray dont take any notice of what I say. There was no change in Christie Bayles countenance, for the smile hid the pang he suffered as he took in the pleasant, garrulous old lady to supper; but that night he paced his room till daybreak, fighting a bitter fight, and asking for strength to bear the agony of his heart. CHAPTER XII. JAMES THICKENS IS MYSTERIOUS. I THINK, previous to taking this step, Sir Gordon, I may ask if you and Mr. Dixon are quite satisfied? I believe the books show a state of prosperity. That does us credit, Mr. Hallam, said Sir Gordon quietly. Yes, Mr. Dix- on bids me say that he is perfectly satis- fied eh, Mr. Trampleasure? Quite, Sir Gordon more than satis- fled, replied Mr. Trampleasure, who was standing with his hands beneath his coat- tails, balancing himself on toe and heel, and bowing as he spoke with an air that he believed to be very impressive. Then, before we close this little meet- ing, I suppose it only remains for me to ask you if you have any questions to ask of the firm, any demands to make? Hallam rose from behind the table cov- ered with books and balance-sheets in the managers room of the bank, placed his hand in his breast, and in a quiet, digni. fled way, replied, Questions to ask, Sir Gordon de- mands to make? No; only to repeat my former question. Are you satisfied? I did reply to that, said Sir Gordon, who looked brown and sunburned, conse- quent upon six ~veeks yachting in the Mediterranean; but have you no other question or demand to make previous to your marriage? Excuse me, said Mr. Trampleasure excuse me. I want to say one word. Hem! hem! I erI er What is it, Trampleasure? said Sir Gordon. It is in regard to a question I believe Mr. Hallain is about to put to the firm. I may say that Mrs. Trampleasure drew my attention to the matter, consequent upon a rumor in the town in connection with Mr. Hallams marriage. 20 THIS MAN S WIFE. Hallam raised his eyebrows and smiled. Have they settled the date? he said pleasantly. No, sir, not that I am aware of; but Mrs. Trampleasure has been given to un- derstand that Mr. Hallam, upon his mar- riage, will wish, and is about to send in a request for the apartments connected with this bank that I have always occupied. It would be a great inconvenience to Mrs. Trampleasure with our family I mean to me to have to move. My dear Sir Gordon, said Hallam, interrupting, allow me to set Mr. Tram- pleasure at rest. I have taken the little Manor House, and have given orders for the furniture. There, Trampleasure, said Sir Gor- don, dont take any notice of gossips for the future. Hem! I will not; but Mr. Gemp is so well informed generally. That he is naturally wrong some- times, said Sir Gordon. By the way, are they ever going to put that man under the pump? Now, Mr. Hallam, have you anything more to ask? Certainly not, Sir Gordon, replied the manager stiffly. I understand your allusion, of course; but I have only to say that I look upon my engagement here as a commercial piece of business to be strictly adhered to, and that I know of nothing more degrading to a man than making every change in his life an excuse for asking an increase of salary. And you do not wish to take a holi- day trip on the occasion of your wed- dino? No, Sir Gordon. But the lady? Miss Luttrell knows that she is about to marry a business man, Sir Gordon, and accepts her fate, said Hallam with a smile. Of course you can take a month. Im sure Trampleasure and Thickens would manage everything in your absence. Excuse me, Sir Gordon, 1 have no doubt whatever that everything would run like a repeater watch in my absence; but, in accepting the responsibility of manager of this bank, I could not feel comfortable to run away just in our busiest time. Later on I may take a trip. Just as you like, Hallam, just as you like. Then that is all we have to do? Everything, Sir Gordon. Yes, Mr. Thickens, I will come; for the clerk had tapped at the door and summoned him into the bank. Dig for you, Trampleasure, about the salary, eh? said Sir Gordon, as soon as they were alone. And in very bad taste too, said Trampleasure stiffly. Ah, well, hes a good manager, said Sir Gordon. How I hate figures! Theyll be buzzing in my head for a week. He rose and ~valked to the glass to be- gin arranging his cravat and shirt-collar, buttoning the bottom of his coat, and pull- ing down his buff vest, so that it could be ~vell seen. Then adjusting his hat at a correct, gentlemanly angle, and tapping the tassels of his Hessian boots to make them s~ving free, he bade Trampleasure good morning and sauntered down the street, twirling his cane with all the grace of an old beau. I dont like that man, he said to him- self, and I never did; but his manage- ment of the bank is superb. Only one shaky loan this last six months, and he thinks we shall clear ourselves, if we wait before we sell. Bah! Im afraid Im as great a hum- bug as the rest of the world. If he had not ~von little Millicent, I should have thought him a very fine fellow, I dare say. He strolled on towards the doctors, thinking as he went. No, I dont think I should have liked him, he mused. Hes gentlemanly and polished; but too gentlemanly and pol- ished. It is like a mask and suit that to my mind do not fit. Then, hang it! how did he manage to win that girl? Cleverness. That calm air of superi- oritv; that bold deference, and his good looks. Ive seen it all; he has let her go on talking in her c!ev erwayand she is clever; and then when he has thought she has gone on long enough, he has checked her with a touch of the tiller, and thrown all the wind out of her sails, leav- ing her swinging on the ocean of conjec- ture. Just what she would like; made to feel that, clever as she is, he could be her master when and where he pleased. Yes, that is it, and I suppose I hate him for it. No, no. It would not have been right, even if I could have won. I would not be prejudiced against hini more than I can help; but Im afraid we shall never be any closer than we are.,~ That afternoon Mr. Hallam of the bank was exceedingly busy; so was James Thickens, at the counter, now giving, now receiving and cancelling and booking cheques or greasy notes, some of which were almost too much worn to be deci- phered. THIS MANS WIFE. 21 The time went on, and it was the hour for closing the doors. Thickens had had to go in and out of the managers room several times, and Hallam was always busy writing letters. He looked up, and answered questions, or gave instructions, and then went on again, while each time, when James Thickens came out, he looked more uneasy. That is to say, to any one who thoroughly understood James Thick- ens, he would have looked uneasy. To a stranger he would only have seemed pe- culiar, for involuntarily at such times he had a habit of moving his scalp very slow. iy, drawing his hair down over his fore- head, while his eyebrows rose up to meet it. Then, with mechanical regularity, they separated again; and all the while his eyes were fixed, and seemed to be gazing at something that was not there. You need not wait, Thickens, said Hallam, opening his door at length. I want to finish a few letters. The clerk rose and left the place after his customary walk round with keys, and the transferring of certain moneys to the safe; and as soon as he was gone, Hal- lam locked his door communicating with the house, and began to busy himself in the safe, examining docketed securities, ticking them off, arranging and rearrang- ing, hour after hour. And during those hours James Thick- ens seemed to be prosecuting a love affair, for, instead of going home to his tea and goldfish, he walked down the market- place for some distance, turned sharp back, knocked at a door, and was admit- ted. Then old Gemp, who had been sweeping his narrow horizon, put on his hat, and walked across to Mrs. Pinet, who was as usual watering her geraniums, and hunting for withered leaves that did not exist. Two weddings, Mrs. P.! he said with a leer. Lor, Mr. Gemp, what do you mean she exclaimed. Two weddings, maam. Your Mr. Hallam first, and Thickens directly after. No more bachelors at the bank, ma~ am. Why, you dont mean to say that, Mr. Thickens oh dear me! But I do mean to say it, maam. Hes dropped in at i\liss Heatherys as coolly as can be; and has hung his hat up be- hind the door. You dont say so! Oh, yes, I do. Its her doing. Going there four or five times a week to cash cheques, and he has grown reckless. Lets wait till he comes out. Perhaps then, said Mrs. Pinet prim- ly, people may begin saying things about me. Therell be no one to say it, said Gemp innocently. Lets see how long he stops. I cant very well from my place. I couldnt think of such a thing, said Mrs. Pinet grandly. Mr. Hallam will be in directly too. No, Mr. Gemp, Im no watcher of my neighbors affairs; and she went indoors. Very well, madam. Very well, said Gemp. We shall see; and he walked back home to stand in his doorway for three hours before he saw Thickens come from where he had ensconced himself be- hind Miss Heatherys curtain with his eyes fixed upon the bank. At the end of those three hours Mr. Hallam passed, looking very thoughtful, and five minutes later James Thickens went home to his goldfish and tea. Took care Hallam didnt see him, chuckled Gemp, rubbing his hands. Oh, the artfulness of these people! Thinks he has as good a right to marry as Hal. lam himself. Well, why not? Make him more staid and solid, better able to take care of the deeds and securities, and pounds, shillings, and pence, and hullo! hello ! hello! Whats the meaning of this? This was the appearance of a couple coming from the direction of the doctor s house, and the couple were Miss Heath. ery, who had been spending a few hours with Millicentin other words, seeing her preparations for the wedding and Sir Gordon Bourne, who was going in her direction and walked home with her. Why, Thickens didnt see her after all! No; James Thickens had not seen her, and Miss Heathery had not seen James Thickens. Who? she cried, as soon as Sir Gor- don had ceremoniously bidden her good- night, raising his curly brimmed hat, and putting it back. Mr. Thickens, maam, cried the little maid eagerly; and when I told him you was out, he said, might he wait, and I showed him in the parlor. And hes there now? whispered Miss Heathery, who began tremblingly to take off the very old pair of gloves she kept for evening wear, the others being safe in her reticule. No, maam, ple~se he has been gone these ten minutes. But what did he say? cried Miss Heathery querulously. 22 THIS MAN S WIFE. Said he wanted to see you particular, ma~ ~ Oh dear me; oh dear me! sighed Miss Heathery. Was ever anything so unfortunate? How could I tell that he would come when I was out? CHAPTER XIII. MR. HALLAM HAS A ViSITOR. MYSTERIES were painful to old Gemp. If any one had propounded a riddle, and gone away without supplying the answer, he would have been terribly aggrieved. He was still frow& ng, a nd trying to get over the mystery of why James Thickens should be at Miss Heatherys when that lady was out, and his ideas were turning in the direction of the little maid, when a wholesome stimulus was given to his thoughts by the arrival of the London coach, the alighting of whose passengers he had hardly once missed seeing for years. Hurrying up to the front of the George, he was just in time to see a dashing-look- ing young fellow who had just alighted from the box-seat, stretching his legs, and beating his boots with a cane. He had been giving orders for his little valise to be carried into the house, and was staring about him in the half-light, when he be- came aware of the fact that old Gemp was watching him curiously. He involuntarily turned away; but seem- ing to master himself, he turned back, and said sharply, Where does Mr. Hallam live? Mr. Hallam! cried Gemp eagerly banks closed hours ago. I didnt ask for the bank. Where is Mr. Hallams private residence? Well, said Gemp, rubbing his hands and laughing unpleasantly-, thats it the Little Manor, as he calls it; but its a big name, isnt it ? Oh, he lives there, does he? said the visitor, glancing curio usly at the ivy- covered house across the way. Not yet, said Gemp. Thats where he is going to live when Hes married. I know. Now then, old Solomon, if you can answer a plain question, where does he live now? Mrs. Pinets house, yonder on the left, where the porch stands out, and the flower-pots are in the window. H umph! hasnt moved, then. Lets see, muttered the visitor, thats where I took the flower-pot to throw at the dog. No; thats the house. Can I began Gemp insidiously. No, thank ye. Good eveninG- said the visitor. You can tell em lve come. Ta, ta! Gossiping old fool 1 he added to himself, as he walked quickly down the street; while after staring after him for a few minutes, Gemp turned sharply on his heel, and made for Gorringes Mr. Gor. ringe being the principal tailor. Mr. Gorringes days work was done, consequently his legs were uncrossed, and he was seated in a Christian-like manner that is to say-, in a chair just inside his door, smoking his evening pipe, but still in his shirt-sleeves, and with an inch tape gracefully hanging over his neck and shiders. I say, neighbor, cried Gemp eagerly, - you bank with Dixons. Mr. Gorringes pipe fell from his hand, and broke into a dozen pieces upon the floor. Is is anything wrong? he gasped; and its past banking hours. Yah ! get out! cried old Gemp, show. his yellow teeth. Youre always think- ing about your few pence in the bank. Why, I bank there, man, and you dont see me going into fits. Yah I what a coward youarei - Thenthen, theres nothing wrong? Wrong? No. Hah! ejaculated the tailor. Mary, bring me another pipe. I only come in a friendly way, cried Gemp, to put you on your guard. Then there is something wrong, cried~ the tailor, aghast. No, no, no. I want to give you a hint about Hallam. Hallam! Ay! Has he ordered his wedding suit of you ? No. Thought not, said Gemp, rubbing his hands. I should be down upon him if I were you. Threaten to withdraw my ac- count, man. Dandy chap down from Lon. don to-night to take his orders. ~ Yes. By the coach. Saw he was a tailor in a moment. Wouldnt stand it if I were you. Mrs. Pinet, who came to the door with a candle, in answer to a sharp rap with the visitors cane, held up her candle above her head, and stared at him for a moment. Then a smile dimpled her pleas- ant, plump face. Why, bless me, sir! how you have changed! she said. You know me again, then? he said, nodding familiarly. THIS MANS WIFE. 23 That I do, sir, and I am glad. Youre the young gentleman Mr. Hallam helped just about a year ago. Yes, thats me. Is he at home? Yes, sir. Will you come this way? Mrs. Pinet drew back to allow the vis- itor to enter, closed the door, and set down her candle, and then tapped softly on the panel at her right. Heres that gentleman to see you, sir, she said, in response to the quick Come ~ Gentleman to see me? Oh, its you, said Hallam, rising from his seat to stand very upright and stern-looking, with one hand in his breast. Yes, Ive come down again, said the visitor slowly, so as to give Mrs. Pinet time to get outside the door; and then, by mutual consent, they ~vaited until her step had pattered over the carefully reddened old bricks, and a door at the back had closed. Meanwhile Hallams eyes ran rapidly over his visitors garb, and he seemed satisfied, though he smiled a little at the extravagance of the attire. Why have you come down? he said at last. Because I didnt want to write. Be- cause I thought youd like to know how things were going. Because I wanted to see how you were getting on. Because I thought youd be glad to see me. Because you wanted more money. Be. cause you thought you could put on the screw. Because you thought you could frighten me. Why, I could extend your list of reasons indefinitely, Stephen Crel- lock, my lad, said Hallam, in a quiet tone of voice that was the more telling from the anger it evidently concealed. What a one you are, Robby, old fel- low! Just as you used to be, when we were at Let the past rest, said Hallarn, in a whisper. It will be better for both. Oh h h h ! said his visitor, in a peculiar way Dont talk like that, Rob, old chap. It sounds like making plans, and a tall, handsome man in dis- guise waylaying a well-dressed gentleman from town, shooting him with pistols, car- rying the body in the dead of the night to the bank, doubling it up in an iron chest, pouring in a lot of lime, and then shutting the lid, sealing it up, and locking it in the far corner of the bank cellar, as if it was somebodys plate. Thats the game, eh? I should like to, said Hallam coolly. Ha ha ha ha! laughed his visitor, sitting down; but Im not afraid, Rob, or I should not have put my head in the lions den. Thats not the sort of thing you would do, because you always were so gentlemanly, and had such a ten- der conscience. See how grieved you were when I got into trouble, and you escaped. Will you Will I what? Speak like that before any one else? Will I threaten you with telling tales, if you dont give me money to keep my mouth shut? Will I be a sneak? cried Crellock, speaking quite as fiercely as Hallam, and rising to his feet, and looking, in spite of his ultra costume, a fine, manly fellow. Well, yes, you cowardly cur; have you come down to do this now? said Hallam menacingly. Aha! said the other contemptuously as he let himself sink back slowly into his chair. Dont try and bully, Rob. It did when I came down, weak and half- starved and miserable, after two years imprisonment; but it wont do now. I dont look hard up, do I? No; because youve spent my money on your wretched dress. I only spent your money when I couldnt make any for myself. I havent had a penny of you lately, and as to being a coward and a cur, Rob, when I stood in the dock, and you were brought as a witness against me, and I could have got off half my punishment by speaking the truth, was I a sneak then, or did I stand firm? There was a pause. Answer me; did I stand firm then? cried Crellock. You did stand firm, and I have been grateful, said Hallam in a milder tone. Look here, Stephen, why should we quarrel? Ah, thats better, man, said Crellock, laughing. You ~vere so terribly fierce with me last time, and I was brought down to a door-mat. Anybody might have wiped his shoes on me. Im better now. And youve come down to try and bully me, said Hallam fiercely. His visitor sat back, looking at him hard, without speaking for a few minutes, and then he said quietly, I give it up. Give what up the attempt? I couldnt give that up, because I was not going to attempt anything, said Crel- lock, smiling. I mean give it up about you. What is it in you, Rob Hallam, made so many fellows like you, and give 24 THIS MAN S WIFE. way to you in everything? I dont know. But there, never mind that. Wont you shake hands? Tell me first why you have come down here. Do you want money? Then why did you come down? Crellocks face softened a little, and it was not an ill-looking countenance as he sat there, softly tapping the arm of the chair. At last he spoke. I never had many friends, he said huskily. Father and mother went when I was a little one, and Uncle Richard gave me my education, telling me brutally that I was an encumbrance. I always had to stop at school through the holidays, and when I was old enough he put me, as you know, in the bank, and told me he had done his duty by me, and I must now look to myself. Yes, I know, said Hallam coldly. Then I got to know you, Rob, and you seemed always to be everything a man ought to be handsome, and clever at every game, the best writer, the best at figures. Then, after office hours, you could sing and play, and tell the best story. There, Rob, you know I always got to feel towards you as if I was your dog. There was nothing I wouldnt have done for you. Then came those Hush I Well, Im not going to say anything dangerous. You know how I behaved. I did think you would have made it a bit easier for me, when it was found out; but when you turned against me like the rest, I said to myself that it was all right, that it was no good for two to bear it when one could take the lot, and if you had turned against me it was only because it was what you called good policy, and it would be all right again when I came out. I thought youd stick to me, Rob. How could I, a man in a good posi- tion, know a Felon a convicted thief? There, say it, old fellow, if you like. I dont mind; I got pretty well hardened down yonder. No; of course you couldnt, and I know I was a fool to come down as I did before, such a shackbag as I was. Out of temper, too, and savage to see you looking so well ; but I know it was foolish. It was enough to make you turn on me. But Im different now; Ive got on a bit. What are you doing? said Hallam sharply. Oh, never mind, said the other laugh. ing. Ive opened an office, and Im doing pretty well, and I thought Id come down and see you again, Rob, old fellow, and Youll shake hands? Is this a bit of maudlin sentiment, Stephen Crellock, or are you playing some deep game? Hallams visitor rose again and stood before him with his hand outstretched. Deep game! he said softly. Rob, old fellow, do you think a man can be all a blackguard, without one good spot in him? Ah, well, just as you like, he con- tinued, dropping his hand heavily; I was a fool to come; I always have been a fool. 1 was cat, Rob, and you were mon- key, and I got my paws most preciously burned. But I didnt come down to grum- ble. There ,good-night. Where are you going? Back to the George, and tomorrow I shall go up to the gold-paved streets. There, you need not be afraid, man. If I didnt tell tales when I was in the dock, I shant now. I thought, after all, that you were my friend. And so I am, Steve! cried Hallam, after a few moments hesitation, and he held out his hand. Well be as good friends again as ever, and you shall not suffer this time. Creliock stifled a sob as he caught the extended hand, to wring it with all his force; then, turning away, he laid his arms upon the chimney-piece, his head dropped upon them, and for a few minutes he cried like a child. Hallam stood fuming and gazing down upon him, with an ugly look of contempt distorting his handsome features. Then taking a step forward, he laid his hand upon his visitors shoulder. Come, come! he said softly. Dont go on like that. Crellock rose quickly, and dashed the tears from his eyes, with a piteous attempt at a laugh. Thats me all over, Rob, he said. Did you ever see such a weak fool? I was bad enough before I had that two years low fever; Im worse now, for it was spirit-breaking work. Soft wax, to mould to any shape, said Hallam to himself. Then aloud: I dont see anything to be ashamed of in a little natural emotion. There, sit down, and lets have a chat. Crellock caught his hand and gripped it hard. Thank ye, Hallam, he said husk- ily thank ye; I shant forget this. I told you I always felt as if I was your dog. I feel so more than ever now. Theyre sitting a longtime, said Mrs. THIS MANS WIFE. 25 Pinet, as she raked out t~e kitchen fire to the very last red-hot cinder. Mr. Hal. lam seemed quite pleased with him; hes altered so for the better. He said I neednt sit up, and so Ill go to bed. Mrs. Pinet sought her room, and about twelve heard the door close on the stran. ger, between whom and Hallam a good deal of eager conversation had passed in a low tone. You see Im trusting you, said Hal. lam as they parted. You know you can, was the reply. And now, look here, if anything goes wrong I tell you, if you do as I have ar- ranged, nothing can go wrong. I want an agent in London, whom I can implicitly trust, and I am going to trust you. Once more, your task is to do exactly what I tell you.~, But if anything goes wrong, I cant write to you. Nothing can go wrong, I tell you. Yes, said Crellock to himself, you told me that once before. Then aloud: Well, we will say nothing can go wrong, for I shall do exactly what you have said ; but if anything should, I shall come down; and if you see me look out. CHAPTER XIV. LIKE GATHERING CLOUDS. THERE is one very pleasant element in country-town life, and that is the breadth of the feeling known as neighborly. It is often veined by scandal, disfigured by petty curiosity, but a genial feeling, like a solid stratum, underlies it all, and makes it firm. Mrs. White gets into difficulties, and her furniture is sold by auction; but the neicrhbors flock to the sale, and the love of bargains is so overridden that the old things often fetch as much as new. Mrs. Blacks family are ill, and every one around takes a real and helpful interest. Mrs. Scarlets husband dies, and a fancy fair is held on her behalf. Then how every one collects at the marriage; how all fol- low at the death I It must be something very bad indeed that has been committed if, after the customary unpleasant and censorious remarks about walking blind- fold into such a slough, Green is not drawn out by helping hands in fact, there is a kind of clannishness in a coun- try town, disfigured i~y the gossips, but very true and earnest all the same. Consequently as soon as the day was fixed for Millicent Luttrells wedding, presents came pouring in from old pa- tients and young friends. A meeting was held at the Corn Exchange, at which Sir Gordon Bourne was to take the chair, but at which he did not put in an appearance, and the reverend Christie Bayle took his place, while resolutions were moved and carried that a testimonial should be pre- sented to our eminent fellow-townsman, Robert Hallam, Esq., on the occasion of his marriage with the daughter of our es- teemed and talented neighbor, Dr. Lut- trell. The service of plate was presented at a dinner, where speeches were made, to which Mr. Hallam of the bank responded fluently, gracefully, and to the point. Here, too, Christie Bayle took the chair, and had the task of presenting the silver, after reading the inscription aloud, amidst abundant cheers; and as he passed the glittering present to the recipient, their eyes met. As their eyes met there was a pleasant smile upon Hallams lip, and a thought in his heart that he alone could have inter- preted, while Bayles could have been read by any one skilled in the human countenance, as he breathed a hope that Millicent Luttrell might be made a happy wife. The whole town was in a ferment not a particular state of affairs for Kings Castorin fact, the people of that town in his Majestys dominions were always waiting for a chance to effervesce and alter the prevailing stagnation for a time. Hence it was that the town band prac- tised up a new tune; the grass was mowed in the churchyard, and some of the weeds cleared out from the gravel path. Miss Heathery went to the expense of a new bonnet and silk dress, and indulged in a passionate burst of weeping in the se- crecy of her own room, because she was not asked to act as bridesmaid ; and though Gorringe did not obtain any order from the bridegroom, he was favored by Mr. James Thickens, to make him a blue dress-coat with triple-gilt buttons a coat so blue, and whose buttons were such daz- zling disks of metal, that it was not until it had been in the tailors window, fin- ished, and on show for three days, that James Thickens awakened to the fact that it was his, and paid a nocturnal visit to Gorringe to beg him to send it home. But you dont want it till the day, Mr. Thickens, said the tailor, and that coats bringing me orders. But I shall never dare to wear it, Gor- ringe everybody will know it! 26 THIS MANS WIFE. Of course they will, sir! said the tailor proudly, and glancing towards his window with that half-smile an artist wears when his successful picture is on view, thats a coat such as is not seen in Castor every day. Look at the collar! Theres two days hard stitching in that collar, sir I I have looked at the collar, said Thickens hastily, and I must have it home. Gorringe gave way, and the coat went home; but he felt, he said to his wife, as as if lie had been robbed, for that coat would have won the hearts of half the farmers round. At the doctors cottage Mrs. Luttrell was in one constant whirl of excitement, with four clever seamstresses at work, for at Kings Castor a brides trousseau was called by a much simpler name, and pro- vided throughout at home, along with the house-linen, which in those days meant linen of the finest and coolest, and it was absolutely necessary that every article that could be stitched should be stitched with rows of the finest stitches, carefully put in. Youre about worrying yourself into a fever, my dear, said the doctor, smiling, and I cant afford such patients as you. Where can I have this bunch of radish- seed hung up to dry? Give it to Thisbe to hang in the kitchen. Now, my dear, how can you be so unreasonable! cried Mrs. Luttrell, half whimpering. Radishseed at atime like this! Thisbe is re-covering the pots of jam. \Vhat jam? what for? For Millicent. You dont suppose Im going to let her begin housekeeping without a pot of jam in the store-room! Thank goodness Ive only one child! said the doctor with a half-amused, half- vexed countenance. Why, papa, you always said you ~vished we had had a baby. Ah, I did not know that I should have to suffer all this when the wedding time came. Now, if you would only go into your garden, and see to your patients, my love, everything would go right, cried Mrs. Luttrell; but you are so impatient! Look at Millicent, how quiet and calm she is ~ The doctor had looked at Millicent, as she stole out to him in the gardenoften now, as if moved by a desire to be as much with him as she could before the great step of her life was taken. There was a quiet look of satisfaction in her eyes that told of her content, and the happy peace that reigned within her breast. The doctor understood her, as she came to him when at work, questioning him about the blossoms of this rose, and the success of that creeper, and taking endless interest in all he did; and when she was summoned away to try something on, or to select some pattern, she smiled and said that she would soon be back. Ah! he said with a sigh, sheis trying to break it off gently! and his work ceased until he heard her step, when he became very busy and cheerful again, as they both played at hiding from one another the separation that was to come. Poor papa! thought Millicent, he will miss me when I am gone ! If that fellow does not behave well to her, said the doctor to himself, and I do happen to be called in to him, I shall well, I suppose it would not be right to do that. As for Mrs. Luttrell, she was too busy to think much till she went to bed, and then the doctor complained. I must have some rest, my dear! lie said plaintively, and 1 dont say that you will but if you do have a bad face-ache from sleeping on a pillow soaked with tears, dont come to me to prescribe. It was very near the time, and all was gliding on peacefully towards the wed- ding day. Hallam came regularly every evening; and, after a good deal of strug- gling, Mrs Luttrell contrived to call him my dear, while, by a similar effort of mind, the doctor habituated himself, from saying Mr. Hallam and Hallam, to the familiar Robert, though in secret both agreed that it did not seem natural, and did not come easily, and never would be Rob or Bob. One soft, calm evening, as the moon was rising from behind the fine old church, and Milhicent and Hallam lin- gered still in the garden among the shrubs, where they could see the shaded lamp shining down on Mrs. Luttrells white curls and pleasant, intent face, as she busily stitched away at a piece of linen for the new house, while the doctor was reading an account of some new plants brought home by Sir Joseph Banks, Mil- licent had become very silent. Hallam was holding her tenderly to his side, and looking down at the sweet, calm face, lit by the rising moon, his own in shadow; and after watching her rapt as- pect for a time, he said, in his deep, mu- THIS MAN S WIFE. 27 sical voice, How silent and absorbed! You are not regretting what is so soon to be? Regretting ! she cried, starting; and, looking up in his face, she laid her hands upon his breast. Dont speak to me like that, Robert dear. You know me better. As if I could regret! Then you are quite happy? Happy? Too happy; and yet so sad ! she murmured softly. It seems as if life were too full of joy, as if I could not bear so much happiness, when it is at the cost of others, and I am giving them pain. Dont speak like that, he said ten- deny. My own I It is natural that a woman should leave father and mother to cling unto her husband. Yes, yes; I know, she sighed; but the pain is given. They will miss me so much. You are smiling, dear; but this is not conceit. I am their only child, and ~ve have been all in all to each other. But you are not going far, he said tenderly. No, not far; and yet it is away from them, sighed Millicent, turning her head to gaze sadly at the pleasant picture seen through the open window. Not far but it is from home. But to home, he whispered to your home, our home, the home of the husband who loves you with all his heart. Ah, Millicent, I have been so poor a wooer, I have failed to say the winning, flattering things so pleasant to a woman s ear. I have felt half dumb before you, as if my pleasure was too great for words; and quick and strong as I am with my fel. lows, 1 have only been an awkward lover at the best. She laid her soft, white hand upon his lips, and gave him a half-reproachful look. And yet, she said smiling, how much stronger your silent wooing has been than any words that could have been said! Did I ever seem like one who wanted flattering words and admiration? Robert, you do not know me yet. No, he whispered passionately, not yet, and never shall, for I find something more in you to love each time we meet, Millicent my own my wife! She yielded to his embrace, and they remained silent for a time. At last he spoke. But you seemed sad and disappointed to-night. Have I grieved you in any way have I given you pain? Oh, no, she said, looking gravely in his face, and you never could. Robert, she continued dreamily as she clung to him, I can see our life mapped out in the future till it fades away. There are pains and sorrows, the thorns that strew the wayside of all; but I have always your strong, guiding arm to help and protect always your brave, loving words, to sus- tain when my spirit will be low, and to- gether, hand in hand, we tread that path, patient, hopeful, loving to the end. My own! he whispered. I have no fear, she continued; my love was not given hastily, like that of some quickly dazzled girl; my love was slow to awaken; but when I felt that it was being sought by one whom I could reverence as well as love, I gave it freely all I had. And you are content? I should be truly happy, but for the pain I must give others. Only a pang, dear love; that will pass away in the feeling that their child is truly happy in her choice. There, there, the moonlight and the solemn look of the night have made you sad. Let us talk more cheerfully. Come, you must have something to ask of me? No; you have told me everything, she said gravely. I wish they, could have been here to give their blessing on our love. Their blessino? he said half wonder- ingly. Your mother your father, Robert, she whispered reverently as she bent her head. Hush I he said, and for a few mo- ments they were silent. But come, he cried, as if trying to give their con versa- tion a more cheerful turn, you must have something more to ask of me. I mean for our house. No, she said; it is everything I could wish. No, he said proudly, it is too hum- ble for my queen. If I were rich, you should have the fairest jewels, costly reti- nues a palace. Give me your love, and I have all I need, she cried, laughing, as she clung to him. Then you must be very rich, he said. But is there nothing? Come, you are a free agent now. In another week you will be my own my property, my slave, bound to me by a ring. Come, use your liberty while you can.~~ Well, then, yes, she said; I will make a demand or two. Thats right; I am the slave yet, and obey. What is the first wish? 28 SEBASTIAN VAN STORCK. I like Sir Gordon, dear; he has al- ways been so good and kind to me. Ask him to come. Too late. He left the town by coach this evening. From a hint he dropped to Thickens about his letters, I think he has gone to Hull, and is going on to Spain. Oh ! It was an ejaculation full of pain and sorrow. I am grieved, she said softly, and the news brought up that day when he had made her the offer of his hand. Hallam watched her mobile face and its changes as she gazed straight before her, towards where the moon was beginning to flood the leaden root of the old church, the crenelated wall, and the crockets on the tall spire standing out black and clear against the sky. His face was still in the shadow. There is another request, she said at last, and her voice was very low as she spoke. Robert, will you ask Mr. Bayle to marry us? I would rather it was he. Bayle! he exclaimed, starting, and the word jerked from his lips, as if he had suddenly lost control of himself. No, it is impossible! Impossible? she said wonderingly. This man has caused me more suffer- ing than I could tell you. If you knew the jealous misery No, no, I dont mean that, he said quickly, as he caught her to his breast. Oh, Robert! she cried. No, no; dont notice me, he said hastily. It was long ago. He loved you, and I was not sure of you then. Yes, darling, I will ask him, if you wish it. That folly is all dead now. Robert, she said after a thoughtful pause, do you wish me to give up that request? Give up? No, I should be ready to insist upon it if you did. There, that is all past. It was the one boyish folly of my love, one of which I am heartily ashamed. I think he wants to be your friend as well as mine, she said, and I should have liked it; but Your will is my law, Millicent! he cried quickly. He shall marry us. But, Robert If you oppose me now in this, I shall think you have not forgiven the folly to which I have confessed. I can hardly forgive myself that meanness. You will not add to my pain. Add to your pain? she said, laying her hand once more upon his breast. Robert, you do not know me yet. And so it was that Christie Bayle joined the hand of the woman he had loved to that of the man who had told her she would in future be his very ownhis property, and his slave. Pretty well all Castor was present, at the highest pitch of excitement, for a handsomer pair, they said, had never stood in the old chancel to be made one. And they were made one. The regis- ter was signed, and then, in the midst of a murmuring buzz and rustle of garments that filled the great building like the gath- ering of a storni, Robert Hallam and his fair young wife moved down the aisle, towards where a man was waiting to give the signal to the ringers to begin; and the crowd had filled every corner near the door, and almost blocked the path. The sun shone out brilliantly, and the buzz and rustle grew more and more like the gathering of that storm, which burst at last, as the young couple reached the porch, in a thundering cheer. Millicent looked flushed, and there was ared spot in Hallams cheeks as he walked out, proud and defiant, towards where the yellow chaise from the George, with four post horses, was waiting. The coach had just come in, and the passengers were standing gazing at the novel scene. Again the storm burst in a tremendous cheer as Hallam handed his young wife into the chaise, and then there seemed to be another nearing storm, sending its harbinger in a fashion which made firm, selfcontained Robert Hallam turn pale, as a hand was laid upon his arm. He said that if anything did go wrong, he should come back, flashed through his brain. Stephen Crellock was bending forward to whisper a few words in his ear. From Macmillans Magazine. SEBASTIAN VAN STORCK. BT WALTER PATER. IT was a winter scene, by Adrian van de Velde, or by Isaac van Ostade. All the delicate poetry, together with all the delicate comfort, of the frosty season was in the leafless branches turned to silver, the furred dresses of the skaters, the warmth of the redbrick house-fronts un- der the gauze of white fog, the gleams of pale sunlight on the cuirasses of the mounted soldiers as they receded into the distance. Sebastian van Storck, confess- SEBASTIAN VAN STORCK. 29 edly the most graceful performer in all that skating multitude, moving in endless maze over the vast surface of the frozen water-meadow, liked best this season of the year for its expression of a perfect impassivity, or at least of a perfect repose. The earth was, or seemed to be, at rest, with a breathlessness of slumber which suited the young mans peculiar temper. The heavy summer, as it dried up the meadows now lying dead below the ice, set free a crowded and competing world of life, which, while it gleamed very pleas- antly russet and yellow for the painter Albert Cuyp, seemed well-nigh to suffo- cate Sebastian van Storck. Yet with all his appreciation of the national winter, Sebastian was not altogether a Hollander. His mother, of Spanish descent and Cath- olic, had given a richness of tone and form to the healthy freshness of the Dutch physiognomy, apt to preserve its youth ful- ness of aspect far beyond the period of life usual with other peoples. This mixed expression charmed the eye of Isaac van Ostade, who had painted his portrait from a sketch taken at one of those skating parties, with his plume of squirrels tail and fur muff, in all the modest pleasant- ness of boyhood. When he returned home lately from his studies at a place far inland, at the proposal of his tutor, to recover, as the tutor suggested, a certain loss of robustness, something more than that cheerful indifference of early youth had passed away. The learned man, who held, as was alleged, the tenets of a sur- prising new philosophy, reluctant to dis- turb too early the fine intelligence of the pupil entrusted to him, had found it, per- haps, a matter of honesty to s*end back to his parents one likely enough to catch from others any sort of theoretic light; for the letter he wrote d~velt much on the lads intellectual fearlessness. At pres- ent, he had written, he is influenced more by curiosity than by a care for truth, according to the character of youth. Cer- tainly, he is strikingly different from his equals in age, in his passion for a vigor- ous intellectual gymnastic, such as their supineness of mind causes to be distaste- ful to most young men, but in which he shows a fearlessness that at times makes me fancy that his ultimate destination may be the military life; for indeed the rigidly logical character of his mind always leads him out upon the practical. Dont misunderstand me! At present, he is strenuous only intellectually; and has given no definite sign of preference, as regards a vocation in life. But he seems to me to be one practical in this sense, that his theorems will shape life for him, directly; that he will always seek, as a matter of course, the effective equivalent to the line of being which shall be the proper continuation of his line of think- ing. This intellectual rectitude, or can- dor, which to my mind has a kind of beauty in it, has reacted upon myself, I confess, with a searching quality. That searching quality, indeed, many others also, people far from being intellectual, had expe- rienced an agitation of mind in his neighborhood, oddly at variance with the composure of the young mans manner and surrounding, so jealously preserved. In the cro~vd of spectators at the skat- ing, whose eyes followed, so well satisfied, the movements of Sebastian van Storck, ~vere the mothers of marriageable daugh- ters, who presently became the suitors of this rich and distinguished youth, intro- duced to them, as now grown to mans estate, by his delighted parents. Dutch aristocracy had put forth all its graces to become the winter morn; and it was char- acteristic of the period that the artist tribe was there, on a grand footingin wait- ing for the lights and shadows they liked best. The artists were, in truth, an im- portant body just then, as the natural complement of the nations hard-won prosperity; helping it to a full conscious- ness of the genial yet delicate homeliness it loved; for which it had fought so brave- ly, and was ready at any moment to fight anew, against man or the sea. Thomas de Keyser, who understood better than any one else the kind of quaint new Atticism which had found its way into the world over those waste salt marshes, won- dering whether quite its finest type, as he understood it, might ever actually be seen there, saw it at last, in lively motion, in the person of Sebastian van Storck, and desired to paint his portrait. A little to his surprise, the young man declined the offer; not graciously as was thought. Holland, just then, was reposing on its laurels after its long contest with Spain, in a short period of complete well-being, before troubles of another kind should set in. That a darker time might return again, was clearly enough felt by Sebas- tian the elder a time like that of William the Silent, with its insane civil animosities, which might demand similarly energetic personalities, and offer them similar op- portunities. And then it was part of his honest geniality of character to admire those who get onin the world. Him- self had been, almost from boyhood, in 30 SEBASTIAN VAN STORCK. contact with great affairs. A member freely in great society, giving and receiv- of the States-General which had taken ing hints as to the domestic picturesque. so hardly the kingly airs of Frederick Creatures of leisure of leisure, on both Henry, he had assisted at the Congress sides they were the appropriate com- of Munster, and figures conspicuously in plement of Dutch prosperity, as it was Terburgs picture of that assembly, which understood just then. Sebastian the elder had finally established Holland as a first. could almost have wished his son to be rate power. The heroism by which the one of them ; it was the next best thing national well-being had been achieved was to the being an influential publicist or still of recent memory the air full of statesman. The Dutch had just begun its reverberation, and great movement, to see what a picture their country was There was a tradition to be maintained; its canals, and boomjz5}is, and endless, the sword by no means resting in its broadly lighted meadows, and thousands sheath. The age was still fitted to evoke of miles of quaint water-side; and their a generous ambition; and this son, from painters, the first true masters of land- whose natural gifts there was so much to scape for its own sake, were further in- hope for, might play his part, at least as a forming them in the matter. They were diplomatist, if the present quiet continued, bringing proof, for all who cared to see, Had not the learned man said that his of the wealth of color there ~vas all natural disposition would lead him out around them, in this, supposably, sad always upon practice? And in truth, the land. Above all, they developed the old memory of that Silent hero had its fascina- Low Country taste for interiors. Those tion for the youth. When, about this time, innumerable genre pieces conversation, Peter de Keyser, Thomass brother, un- music, play were in truth the equivalent veiled at last his tomb of wrought bronze of novel-reading for that day; its own ac- and marble in the Nieuwe Kerk at Deift, tual life, in its own proper circumstances, the young Sebastian was one of a small reflected in various degrees of idealiza- company present, and relished greatly the tion; with no diminution of the sense of cold and abstract simplicity of the monu- reality (that is to say) but with more and ment, so conformable to the great, ab- more purged and perfected delightfulness stract, and unuttered force of the hero of interest. Themselves illustrating, as who slept beneath. every student of their history knows, the In complete contrast to all that is ab- good-fellowship of family life, it was the stract or cold in art, the home of Sebas- ideal of that life which these artists de- tian, the family mansion of the Storcks picted; the ideal of home in a country a l)ouse, the front of which still survives where the preponderant interests of life, in one of those patient architectural pieces after all, could not well be out of doors. by Jan van der Heyde was, in its minute Of the earth earthy genuine red earth and busy well-being, like an epitome of of the old Adam it was an ideal very Holland itself, with all the good-fortune different fro~i that which the sacred Ital- of its thriving genius reflected, quite ian painters had evoked from the life of spontaneously, ~n the national taste. The Italy, yet, in its best types, was not with- nation had learned to content itself with out a kind of natural religiousness. And a religion which told little, or not at all, in the achievement of a type of beauty so on the outsides of things. But we may national and vernacular, the votaries of fancy that something of the religious purely Dutch art might well feel that the spirit had gone, according to the law of Itahianizers, like Berghem, Both, and Jan the transmutation of forces, into the scru- Weenix, went so far afield in vain. puhous care for cleanliness, into the grave, The fine organization and acute intelhi- old-world, conservative beauty of Dutch ~ence of Sebastian would have made him houses, which meant that the life people an effective connoisseur of the arts, as lie maintained in them was normally affec- showed by the justice of his remarks in tionate and pure. those assemblies of the artists which his The most curious florists of Holland father so much loved. But in truth the were ambitious to supply the burgoniaster arts were a matter lie could but just tol- Van Storck with the choicest products of erate. Why add, by a forced and artificial their skill, for the garden spread below production, to the monotonous tide of the windows on either side of the portico, competing, fleeting existence? Only, find- and the central avenue of hoary beechies ing so much fine art actually about him, which led to it. Naturally, this house, he was compelled (so to speak) to adjust within a mile of the city of Haarlem, be- himself to it; to ascertain and accept came a resort of the artists, then mixing that in it which should least collide with, SEBASTIAN VAN STORCK. 3 or might even carry forward a little, his own characteristic tendencies. Obviously somewhat jealous of his intellectual inter- ests, he loved inanimate nature, it might have been thought, better than man. He cared nothing, indeed, for the warm sand- banks of Wynants, nor for those eerie relics of ancient woodland which survive in Hobbema and Ruysdael, still less for the highly colored sceneries of the aca- demic band at Rome, in spite of the escape they provide one into clear breadth of atmosphere. For though Sebastian van Storck refused to travel, he loved the dis- tant, he enjoyed the sense of things seen from a distance, carrying us, as on wide wings of space itself, far out of ones actual surroundings. His prefer- ence in the matter of art was, therefore, for those prospects 4 vol doiseau of the caged bird on the wing at last of which Rubens had the secret, and still more Philip de Koninck, four of ~vhose choicest ~vorks occupied the four walls of his chamber, visionary escapes, north, south, east, and west, into a wide-open, though, it must be confessed, a somewhat sullen land. For the fourth of them he had exchanged with his mother a marvel- lously vivid Metsu, lately bequeathed to him, in which she herself was presented. They were the sole ornaments he permit- ted himself. From the midst of the busy and busy-ooking house, crowded with the furniture and the pretty little toys of many generations, a long passage led the rare visitor up a winding staircase and (again at the end of a long passage) he found himself as if shut off from the whole talk- ative Dutch world, and in the embrace of that wonderful quiet, which is also possi- ble in Holland, at its height all around him. It was here that Sebastian could yield himself, with the only sort of love he had ever felt, to the supremacy of his difficult thoughts. A kind of ern~ty place! Here, you felt, all had been men~ally put to rights by the working out of a long equation, ~vhich had zero equals zero for its result. Here one did, and perhaps felt, nothing; one only thought. Of liv- ing creatures only birds came there freely, the sea-birds especially, to attract and detain which there were all sorts of in- genious contrivances about the windows, such as one may see in the cottage scen- eries of Jan Steen and others. There was somethThg perhaps of his passion for dis- tance in this welcoming of the creatures of the air. A great simplicity in their manner of life had, indeed, been charac- teristic of many a distinguished Hollander, William the Silent, Baruch de Spinosa, the brothers De Witt. But the simplicity of Sebastian van Storck was something different from that, and certainly nothing democratic. His mother thought him like one disembarrassing himself carefully, and little by little, of all impediments, habitu- ating himself gradually to make shift with as liitle as possible, in preparation for a long journey. The burgomaster Van Storck enter- tained a party of friends, consisting chiefly of his favorite artists, one summer even- ing. The guests were seen arriving on foot in the fine weather, some of them accompanied by their wives and daugh- ters, against the light of the low sun, fall- ing red on the old trees of the avenue and the faces of those who advanced along it Willem van Aelst, expecting to find hints for a flower-portrait in the exotics which would decorate the banqueting- room; Gerard Dow, to feed his eye, amid all that glittering luxury, on the combat between candle-light and the last rays of the departing sun; Thomas de Keyser, to catch by stealth the likeness of Sebastian the younger. Albert Cuyp ~vas there, who, developing the latent gold in Rembrandt, had brought into his native Dordrecht a heavy wealth of sunshine, as exotic as those flowers or the Eastern carpets on the burgomasters tables; ~vith Hooch, the indoor Cuyp, and Willem van de Velde, who painted those shore-pieces, with gay ships of ~var, such as he loved, for his patrons cabinet. Thomas de Keyser came in company with his brother Peter, his niece, and young Mr. Nicholas Stone from England, pupil of that brother Peter, who afterwards married the niece. For the life of Dutch artists, too, was exem- plary in matters of domestic relationship, its history telling many a cheering story of mutual faith in misfortune. Hardly less exemplary was the comradeship which they displayed among themselves, obscur. ing their best gifts sometimes, one in the mere accessories of another mans work, so that they came together to-night with no fear of falling out, and spoiling the musical interludes of Madame van Storck in the large hack parlor. A little way behind the other guests, three of them together, son, grandson, and the grand. father, moving slowly, came the Honde- coeters Giles, Gybrecht, and Melchior. They led the party, before the house was entered, by fading light to see the curious poultry of the burgomaster go to roost; and it was almost night when the supper- room was reached at last. The occasion 32 SEBASTIAN VAN STOROK. was an important one to Sebastian, and to others, through him. For was it the music of the duets? he asked himself next morning, with a certain distaste as he remembered it all, or the heady Span. ish wines poured out so freely in those narrow but deep Venetian glasses? on this evening he approached more nearly than he had ever yet done to Mademoi- selle van Westrheene, as she sat there beside the clavecin, looking very ruddy and fresh in her white satin, trimmed with glossy crimson swansdown. So genially attempered, so warm, was life become, in the land of which Pliny had spoken as scarcely dry land at all. And, in truth, the sea which Sebastian so much loved, and with so great a satisfac- tion and sense of well-being in every hint of its nearness, is never far distant in Holland. Invading all places, stealing under ones feet, insinuating itself every- where along an endless network of canals (by no means such formal channels as we understand by the name, but picturesque rivers, with sedgy banks and haunted by innumerable birds) its incidents present themselves oddly even in ones park or woodland walks; the ship in full sail ap- pearing suddenly among the great trees, or above the garden wall, where we had no suspicion of the presence of water. In the very conditions of life in such a coun- try there was a standing force of pathos. The country itself shared the uncertainty of the individual human life; and there was pathos also in the constantly renewed, heavily taxed labor, necessary to keep the native soil, fought for so unselfishly, there at all ; with a warfare that must still be maintained when that other struggle with the Spaniard was over. But though Se- bastian liked to breathe, so nearly, the sea and its influences, those were considera- tions he scarcely entertained. In his pas- sion for Schwindsuclt/in English we havent the word he found it pleasant to think of the resistless element which left one hardly a foot-space amidst the yielding sand; of the old beds of lost rivers, surviving now only as deeper chan- nels in the sea; of the remains of a cer- tain ancient town, which within mens memory had lost its few remaining inhab- itants, and, with its already empty tombs, dissolved and disappeared in the flood. It happened, on occasion of an excep- tionally low tide, that some remarkable relics were exposed to view on the coast of the island of Vleeland. A country- man s wagon overtaken by the tide, as he returned with merchandise from the shore, you might have supposed, but for a touch of grace in the construction of the thing,lightly ~vrought timber-~vork, united and adorned by a multitude of brass fastenings, like the work of children for their simplicity ; while the rude, stiff chair, or throne, set upon it, seemed to distinguish it as a chariot of state. To some antiquarians it told the story of the overwhelming of one of the chiefs of the old primeval l)eople of Holland, amid all his gala array, in a great storm. But it was another view which Sebastian j5re- ferred; that tbis object was sepulchral, namely, in its motivesthe one surviv- ing relic of a grand burial; in the ancient manner, of a king or hero, whose very tomb was dissolved away. Sunt me/is me/ce / There came with it the odd fancy that he himself would like to have been dead and gone as long ago, with a kind of envy of those whose deceasing was so long since over. On more peaceful days he would ponder Plinys account of those primeval fore- fathers, but without Plinys contempt for them. A cloyed Roman might despise their humble existence, fixed by necessity from age to age, and with no desire of change, as the ocean poured in its flood twice a day, making it uncertain whether the country was a part of the continent or of the sea. But for his part Sebastian found something of poetry in all that, as he conceived what thoughts the old Hol- lander might have had at his fishing, with nets themselves woven of seaweed, wait- ing carefully for his drink on the heavy rains, and taking refuge as the flood rose on the sand-hills, in a little hut constructed but airily on tall stakes, conformable to the elevation of the highest tides; like a navigator, thought the learned writer, when the sea was risen, like a ship. wrecked mariner when it was retired. To the fancy of Sebastian, he lived with great bread ths of calm light above and around him, influenced by, and in a sense, living upon them; and he felt that he might well complain, to Plinys so infinite surprise, on being made a Roman citizen. And certainly Sebastian van Storck did not felicitate his people on the luck which, in the words of another old writer, hath disposed them to so thriving a genius.~~ Their restless ingenuity in making and maintaining dry land where nature had willed the sea, was even more like the in. dustry of animals than had been the life of their forefathers. Away with that tetchy, feverish, unworthy agitation, with this and that, all too importunate, motive SEBASTIAN VAN STORCK. 33 of interest! And then, My son! said his father, be stimulated to action I he too thinking of that heroic industry which had triumphed over nature, pre- cisely where the contest had been most difficult. Yet, in truth, Sebastian was forcibly taken by the simplicity of a great affection, as set forth in an incident of real life of which he heard just then. The eminent Grotius being condemned to perpetual imprisonment, his wife determined to share his fate, alleviated only by the read- ing of books sent by friends. The books, tinished, were returned in a great chest. In this chest the wife inclosed the hus- band, and was able to reply to the objec- tions of the soldiers who carried it, com- plaining of its weight, with a self-control which she maintained till the captive was in safety, herself remaining to face the consequences; and there was a kind of absoluteness of affection in that, which attracted Sebastian for a while to ponder on the practical forces which shape mens lives. Had he turned, indeed, to a prac- tical career, it would have been less in the direction of the military or political life than to another form of enterprise popu- lar with his countrymen. In the eager, gallant life of that age, if the sword fell for a moment into its sheath, they were for starting off on perilous voyages to the regions of frost and snow in search after that north-western passage, for the dis- covery of which the States-General had offered large rewards. Sebastian, in effect, found a charm in the thought of that still, drowsy, spell-bound ~vorld of perpetual ice, as in art and life he could always tolerate the sea. Admiral-general of Holland, as painted by Van der HeIst, with a marine background by Bakhuysen at moments his father could fancy him so. There was still another very different sort of character to which Sebastian would let his thoughts stray, without check, for a time. His mother, whom he much resembled outwardly, a Catholic from Brabant, had had saints in her fam- ily, and from time to time the mind of Sebastian had been occupied with the subject of monastic life, its quiet, its ne- gation. The portrait of a certain Carthu- sian prior, which, like the famous statue of Saint I3runo, the first Carthusian, in the church of Santa Maria dei Angeli at Rome, could it have spoken, would have said, Silence! kept strange company with the painted visages of men of affairs. A great theological strife was then raging LIVING AGE. VOL. LIV. 2759 in Holland. Grave ministers of religion assembled sometimes, like the painted scene by Rembrandt, in the burgomas- ters house; and once, not however in their company, came a renowned young Jewish divine, Baruch de Spinosa, with whom, most unexpectedly, Sebastian found himself in sympathy, meeting the young Jews far-reaching thoughts half ~vay to the confirmation of his own; and he did not kno~v that his visitor, very ready with the pencil, had taken his like- ness as they talked, on the fly-leaf of his note-book. Alive to that theological dis- turbance in the air all around him, lie re- fused to be moved by it, as essentially a strife on small matters, anticipating a va- grant regret which may have visited many other minds since,the regret, namely, that the old, pensive, use-and-wont Catholi- cism, which had accompanied the nations earlier struggle for existence, and con- soled it therein, had been taken from it. And for himself, indeed, what impressed him in that old Catholicism was a kind of lull in it a lulling power like that of the monotonous organ-in usic, which Hol- land, Catholic or not, still so greatly loves. But what he could not away with in the Catholic religion was its unfailing drift towards the concrete the positive image- ries of a faith, so richly beset with per- sons, things, historical incidents. Rigidly logical in the method of his inferences, he attained the poetic quality only by the audacity with which he con- ceived the whole sublime extension of his premises. The contrast was a strange one, between the careful, the almost petty, fineness of his personal surrounding all the elegant conventionalities of life, in that rising Dutch family and the mortal coldness of a temperament the intellec- tual tendencies of which seemed to neces- sitate straightforward flight from all that was positive. He seemed, if one may say so, in love with death; preferring winter to summer; finding only a tran- quillizing influence in the thought of the earth beneath our feet cooling down for- ever from its old cosmic heat; watching pleasurably how their colors fled out of things, and the long sandbank in the sea, which had been the rampart of a town; was washing down in its turn. One of his acquaintance, a penurious young poet, who, having nothing in his pockets but the imaginative or otherwise barely po- tential gold of manuscript verses, would have grasped so eagerly, had they lain within his reach, at the elegant outsides of life, thought the fortunate Sebastian, SEBASTIAN VAN STOROK. 34 possessed of every possible opportunity But though of good birth she was poor, of that kind, yet bent only on dispensing while Sebastian could not but perceive with it; certainly a most puzzling, and that there he had many suitors of his comfortless creature. A few only, half wealth. In truth, Madame van West- discerning what was in his mind, would rheene, her mother, did wish to marry fain have shared his intellectual clearness, this daughter into the great world, and and found a kind of attractive beauty in plied many arts to that end, such as this youthful enthusiasm for an abstract daughterful mothers use. Her healthy theorem. Extremes meeting, his cold freshness of mien and mind, her ruddy and dispassionate detachment from all beauty, some showy presents that had that is most attractive to ordinary minds passed, were of a piece with the ruddy came to have the impressiveness of a great coloring of the very house those people passion. And for the most part, people lived in; and for a moment the cheerful had loved him ; feeling instinctively that warmth that may be felt in life seemed to there must be somewhere the justifica- come very close to him to come forth, tion of his difference from themselves. It and enfold him. Meantime the girl her. was like being in love; or it was an intel. self, taking note of this, and that on a lectual malady, such as pleaded for for. former occasion of their meeting he had bearance, like bodily sickness, and gave seemed likely to respond to her inclina- at times a resigned and touching sweet. tion, and that his father would readily ness to what he did and said. Only consent to such a marriage, surprised him once, at a moment of the wild popular ex- on the sudden with those coquetries and citement which at that period ~vas easy to importunities, all those little arts of love, provoke in Holland, there was a certain which often succeed with men. Only, to group of persons who would have shut Sebastian they seemed opposed to that him up as no well-wisher to, and perhaps absolute nature we suppose in love. And a plotter against, the common weal. A while, in the eyes of all around him to- single traitor might cut the dykes in an night, this courtship seemed to promise hour, in the interest of the English or the him, thus early in life, a kind of quiet French. Or, had he already committed happiness, he was coming to an estimate some treasonable act, who was so anxious of the situation, with regard to that ideal to expose no writing of his that he left his of a calm, intellectual indifference, of letters unsigned, and there were little which he was the sworn chevalier. Set stratagems to get specimens of his fair in the cold, hard light of that, this girl, manuscript? For with all his breadth of with the pronounced personal views of mystic intention, he was anxious, as the her mother, and in the very effectiveness hours crept on, to leave all the inevitable of arts prompted by a real affection, bring. details of life at least in order, in equa. ing the warm life they prefigured so close tion. And all his singularities appeared to him, seemed vulgar. And still he felt to be summed upin his refusal to take his himself bound in honor; or judged from place in the life-sized family group, paint- their manner that she and those about ed, /r?s dislingud et tr?s soz~gne, remarks a them thought him thus bound. He did modern critic of the workabout this not reflect on the inconsistency of the time. His mother expostulated with him feeling of honor (living, as it does essen- on the matter,she must needs feel, a tially, upon the concrete and minute de- little icily, the emptiness of hope, and tail of social relationship) for one who, on something more than the due measure of principle, set so slight a value on any. cold in things for a woman of her age, in thing whatever that is merely relative in the person of a son who desired but to its character. fade out of the world like a breath, and The guests, growing late and lively, suggested filial duty. Good mother! were almost pledging the betrothed in he answered, there are duties towards the rich wine. Only Sebastians mother the intellect also, which women can but knew; and at that advanced hour, while rarely understand. the company were thus intently occupied, The artists and their wives were come drew away the burgomaster to confide to to supper again, with the burgomaster him the misgiving she felt, grown to a Van Storck. Mademoiselle van West. great height just then. The young man rheene was also come, with her sister and had slipped from the assembly; but cer- mother. The girl was by this time fallen tainly not with Mademoiselle van West- in love with Sebastian; and she was one rheene, who was suddenly withdrawn also. of the few who, in spite of his terrible And she never appeared again in the coldness, really loved him for himself. world. Already, next day, with the ru mor that Sebastian had left his home, it was known that the expected marriage would not take place. The girl, indeed, alleged something in the way of a cause on her part; but seemed to fade away continually afterwards, and in the eyes of all who saw her was like one perishing of wounded pride. But to mak.e a clean breast of her poor girlish worldliness, be- fore she became a b6guine, she confessed to her mother the receipt of the letter the cruel letter that had killed her. And in effect, the first copy of this letter, writ ten ~vith a very deliberate fineness, reject- ing heraccusing her, so natural, and simply loyal I of a vulgar coarseness of character was found, oddly tacked on, as their last word, to the studious record of the abstract thoughts which had been the real business of Sebastians life, in the room whither his mother went to seek him next day, littered with the fragments of the one portrait of him in existence. The neat and elaborate manuscript vol- ume, of which this letter formed the final page (odd transition I by ~vhich a train of thought so abstract drew its conclusion in the sphere of action), afforded at length, to the few who ~vere interested in him, a muchcoveted insight into the curiosity of his existence; and I pause just here to indicate in outline the kind of reasoning through which, making the infinite his beginning and his end, Sebastian was come to think all definite forms of being, the warm pressure of life, the cry of hu- manity itself, no more than a troublesome irritation of the surface, a passing vexa- tious thought, or uneasy dream, of the absolute mind at its height of petulant importunity in the eager human crea- ture. The volume was, indeed, a kind of trea- tise to be a hard, systematic, well-con- catenated train of thought, still implicated in the circumstances of a journal. Lib- erated from the accidents of that l)articu- lar form, its unavoidable details of place and occasion, the theoretic strain would have been found mathematically continu- ous. The already so weary Sebastian might perhaps never have taken in hand, or succeeded in, this detachment of his thoughts; every one of which, beginning with himself there, as the peculiar and intimate apprehension of this or that particular day and hour, seemed still to protest against such disturbance, as if reluctant to part from those accidental associations of the personal history which had prompted it, and become a purely intellectual abstraction. 35 The series began with Sebastians boy- ish enthusiasm for a strange, fine saying of Doctor Baruch de Spinosas, concern~ ing the divine lovethat whoso loveth God truly must not expect to be loved by him in return, Through mere reaction against an actual surrounding of which every circumstance tended to make him a finished egotist, that bold assertion de- fined for him the ideal of an intellectual disinterestedness, of a domain of unim- passioned mind, with the desire to put ones subjective side out of the way, and let pure reason speak. And what pure reason affirmed, in the first place, as the beginning of wisdom, was that the world is but a thought, or series of thoughts, existent, therefore, solely in mind. It showed him, as he fixed the mental eye with more and more of self-absorption on the facts of his intel- lectual existence, a picture or vision of the universe as actually the product, so far as he really knew it, of his own lonely thinking power of himself there, think- ing; as being zero without him; and as possessing a perfectly homogeneous unity in that. Things that have nothing in common with each other, said the ax- iomatic reason, cannot be understood or explained by means of each other. But to pure reason things discovered them- selves as being, in their essence, thought all things, even the most opposite things, mere transmutations of a single power, the power of thought. All was but conscious mind. Therefore, all the more exclusively, he must minister to mind, to the intellectual power, submit- ting himself to the sole direction of that whithersoever it might lead him. Every- thing must be referred to, and, as it were, changed into the terms of that, if its es- sential value was to be ascertained. Joy, he said, anticipating Spinosa, that, for the attainment of which men are ready to surrender all beside is but the name of a passion in which the mind passes to a greater perfection or power of thinking; as grief of the passion in which it passes to a less. Looking backward for the generative source of that power, from himself to the cause of his mysterious being, he still re- flected, as one can but do, himselfthe pattern of himself vaguer and enlarged, upon the broad screen of the supposable world without. In this way, some, at all events, would have explained his mental process. To him it was nothing less than the apprehension, the revelation, of the greatest and most real of ideas the se SEBASTIAN VAN STORCK. 36 SEBASTIAN VAN STORCK. cret structure of all things. He, too, ~vith his vividly colored existence, with this picturesque and sensuous world of Dutch art and Dutch reality all around, which would fain have made him the prisoner of its colors, its genial warmth, its struggle for life, its selfish and crafty love, was but a transient perturbation of the absolute mind; of which, indeed, all finite things whatever, time itself, the most durable achievements of nature and man, and all that seems most like independent energy, are no more than petty accidents or affec- tions. Theorem and corollary! Thus they stood There can be only one substance. corol- lary, the greatest of errors is to think that the nonexistent, the world of finite things seen and felt, really is: theorem, for whatever is, is but in that; corol- lary (practical), ones wisdom, therefore, consists in hastening, so far as may be, the action of those forces which tend to the restoration of equilibrium, to the calm surface of the absolute and untroubled mind, to tabiela rasa, by the extinction in one of all that is but correlative to the finite illusion by the suppression of our- selves. In the loneliness which ~vas gather- ing round him, and oddly enough as a somewhat surprising thing, he wondered whether there were, or had been others, who had like thoughts, ready to welcome any such as his veritable compatriots. And, in fact, he became aware just then, in readings difficult indeed, but which their absorbing interest caused to seem almost like an illicit pleasure, a sense of kinship with certain older minds. The study of many an earlier adventurous the- orist satisfied his curiosity, as the record of daring physical adventure, for instance, might satisfy the curiosity of the healthy. It was a tradition, a constant tradition that daring thought of his; an echo, or haunting, recurrent voice of the human soul itself (and as such, sealed with nat- ural truth), which certain minds would not fail to heed ; discerning also, if they were really loyal to themselves, its practical conclusion. The One alone is: and all things beside are but its passing affec- tions, which have no proper right to be. Even as, but its accidents or affections, there might have been found, within the circumference of the infinite thinker, an adequate scope for the joy and love of the creature. There have been dispositions in which that abstract theorem has only induced a renewed value for the finite interests around and within us. Centre of heat and light, truly, nothing has seemed to lie beyond the touch of its perpetual summer. it has allied itself to the poetical or artistic sympathy, which feels challenged to become acquainted with and explore the various forms of finite existence all the more intimately, just because of that sense of one lively spirit circulating through all things a tiny soul in the very sunbeam, or leaf. Sebastian van Storck, on the contrary, was determined, perhaps by some inher- ited satiety and fatigue in his nature, to the opposite issue of the practical di- lemma. For him, it was the pallid arctic sun, disclosing itself over the dead level of a glacial, a barren and absolutely lonely, sea. The lively purpose of life had been frozen out of it. What he must admire, and love if he could, was equilibrium, the void, the tabula rasa, into which, through all those apparent energies of man and nature that in truth are but forces of disintegration, the world was really settling. And, himself a mere circum- stance in a fatalistic series, to which the clay of the potter was no adequate paral- lel, he could not expect to be loved in return. At first, indeed, he had a kind of delight in his thoughts in the eager pressure forward, to whatsoever conclu- sion, of an intellectual gymnastic, which was like the making of Euclid. Only, little by little, under the freezing influ- ence of the propositions themselves, the theoretic vitality itself, and with it his old eagerness for truth, the care to track it from proposition to proposition, was chilled out of him. And, in fact, the con- clusion was there already (might be fore- seen) in the premises. By a singular perversity, it seemed to him that every one of those passing affections himself, alas! at times was forever trying to be to assert itself; to maintain its isolated and petty self, by a kind of practical lie in things ; all through every incident of that hypothetic existence it had protested that its proper function was to die. Surely I they marred the freedom, the truth, the beatific calm of the absolute selfishness, which could not, if it would, pass beyond the circumference of itself; to which at times, with a fantastic sense of well-being, he found himself capable of a kind of fanatical devotion. And those, as he con- ceived, were his moments of genuine the- oretic insight, in which, under the abstract light perpetual, he died to self; while yet the intellect, after all, had attained a freedom of its own, through the vigorous act which assured him that as nature was SEBASTIAN VAN STORCK. but a thought of his, so himself also was but the passing thought of God. No! rather a puzzle only an anomaly upon that one, white, unruffled con- sciousness! His first principle once rec- ogn ized, all the rest, the whole array of propositions down to the heartless practi- cal conclusion, must follow of themselves. Detachment; to hasten hence; to fold up ones whole self, as a vesture l)ut aside to anticipate, by such individual force as he could find in him, the slow disintegra- tion by which nature herself is levelling the eternal hills; here would be the se- cret of peace, of such dignity and truth as there could be in a world which after all was essentially an illusion. For Sebas- tian at least, the world and the individual alike had been divested of all effective purpose. The most vivid of finite objects; the dramatic episodes of Dutch history; the brilliant personalities which had found their parts to play in them; that golden art, surrounding one with an ideal world, through which the real world was discern- ible indeed beyond, but etherealized by the medium through which it came to one, all this, for most men so powerful a link to existence, only set him on the thought of escape means of escape into a formless and nameless infinite world, evenly grey. The very emphasis of those objects, their importunity to the eye, the ear, the finite intelligence, was but the measure of theirdistance from what really is. Ones personal presence the pres- ence, such a~i it is, of the most incisive things and persons around one could but lessen by so much, that which really is; yet is, undeniably, of a very transient nature. To restore tabula rasa, then, by a continual effort at self effacement! Actually proud, at times, of his curious, well-reasoned nihilism, he could only re- aard ~vhat is called the business of life as no better than a trifling and wearisome delay. Bent on making sacrifice of the rich life possible for him (as he would readily have sacrificed that of other peo- ple) to the bare and formal logic of the reply to a query, never proposed by en- tirely healthy minds re~arding the remote conditions and tendencies of that life, he did not reflect that if others had inquired as scrupulously the world could never have come so far at all that the fact of its having come so far was itself a weighty exception to his hypothesis. His fantas- tic devotion soaring into fanaticism, into a kind of religious mania, with what was really a vehement assertion of his indi- vidual will, he had formulated duty as the 37 principle to hinder as little as possible what he called the restoration of equilib. rium, of the primary consciousness to it- self its relief from that uneasy, tetchy, unworthy dream of a world, made so ill, or dreamt so weakly to forget, to be forgotten. And at length this dark fanaticism, losing the support of pride in the mere novelty of a reasoning so hard and dry, turned round upon him, as our fanaticism will, in black melancholy. The theoretic, or imaginative, desire to urge times creep- ing footsteps, was felt now as the physical fatigue which leaves the book or the letter unfinished, or finishes eagerly, out of hand, for mere finishings sake, unimportant business. Strange! that the presence to the mind of a metaphysical abstraction should have had this power over one so fortunately endowed for the reception of the sensible world. It could hardly have been so with him but for the concurrence of physical causes with the influences proper to a mere thought. The moralist, indeed, might have noted that a kind of pride, a morbid fear of vulgarity, lent secret strength to the intellectual preju- dice, which realized duty as the renuncia- tion of all finite objects, the fastidious refusal to be or do any limited thing. But beyond this, it was legible in his own ad- missions from time to time, that the body, following, as it will ~vith powerful tem- peraments, the lead of mind and the will, the intellectual consumption (so to term it) had been concurrent with, strengthened and was strengthened by, a vein of physical phhisisby a merely physical accident, after all, of his bodily constitution ; which might have taken a different turn had an- other accident led him to the hills instead of to the shore. Is it only the result of disease? he would ask himself sometimes with a sudden suspicion of his intellectual cogency this persuasion that myself, and all that surrounds me, are but a diminution of that which really is? this unkindly melancholy? The journal, with that cruel letter to Mademoiselle van Westrheene coming as the last step in the rigid process of theo- retic deduction, circulated among the curious; and people made their judgments upon it. There were some who held that such opinions should be suppressed by law; that they were, or might become, dangerous to society. Perhaps it was the confessor of his mother who thought of the matter most justly. The aged man smiled, observing how, even for minds by no means slight, the mere dress alters the 38 REMINISCENCES OF MY LATER LIFE. look of a familiar thought with a happy sort of smile as he added (meaning that the truth of Sebastians apprehension was duly covered by the propositions of his own creed, and quoting Sebastians fa- vorite pagan wisdom from the lips of Saint Paul) In Him, we live, and move, and have our being. Next day, as Sebastian escaped to the sea under the long, monotonous line of windmills, in comparative calm of mind reaction of that pleasant morning from the madness of the night before he was making light, or trying to make light with some success, of his late distress. He would fain have thought it a small matter, to be adequately set at rest for him by certain well-tested influences of external nature, in a long visit to the place he liked best; a desolate house, amid the sands of the Helder, one of the old lodgings of his family, property now, rather, of the sea- birds, and almost surrounded by the en- croaching tide; though there were still relics enough of hardy, sweet things about it, to form what ~vas to Sebastian the most perfect garden in Holland. Here he could make equation between himself and what was riot himself, and set things in order, in preparation towards such delib- erate and final change in his manner of living as circumstances so clearly neces- sitated. As he stayed in this place, with one or two silent serving people, a sudden rising of the wind altered, as it might seem, in a few dark, tempestuous hours, the entire world around him. The strong wind changed not again for fourteen days; and its effect was a permanent one; so that people might have fancied that an enemy had indeed cut the dykes somewhere a pin-hole, enough to wreck the ship of Holland, or at least that portion of it, which underwent an inundation of the sea the like of which had not occurred in that province for half a century. Only, when the body of Sebastian was found, appar- ently not long after death, a child lay asleep, swaddled warmly in his heavy furs, in an upper room of the old tower, to which the tide was almost risen; though the building still stood firmly, and still with the means of life in plenty. And it was in the saving of this child, with a great effort, as certain circumstances seemed to indicate, that Sebastian had lost his life. His parents were come to seek him, believing him bent on self-destruction, and were almost glad to find him thus. A learned physician, moreover, endeavored to comfort his mother by remarking that in any case he must certainly have died ere many years ~vere passed, slowly, per- haps painfully, of a disease then coming into the world; disease begotten by the fogs of that country waters, he observed, not in their place, above the firmament on people grown somewhat over-deli- cate in their nature by the effects of mod- ern luxury. From Good Words. REMINISCENCES OF MY LATER LIFE. BY MARY HOWIYT. FIRST PAPER. ON our return to England in 1843, I was full of energy and hope. Glowing with aspiration and in the enjoyment of great domestic happiness, I was antici- pating a busy, perhaps overburdened, but nevertheless congenial life. It was, how- ever, to be one of darkness, perplexity, and discouragement. On March 12th, 1843, we had celebrated my birthday at Heidelberg by a pedestrian excursion into the remnants of the ancient Hardt Forest, where, seated at the foot of a mighty pine-tree, Frau von Schoultz, the niece of the Royal Academician, Thomas Phillips, sang so splendidly, in Swedish, Geijers Old Gothic Lion, an heroic national air greatly beloved in Sweden, that some peasant girls cutting an early growth in the glades of the wood came forth, and with brandished sickles kept time to the strain. It was a lovely day and a beautiful scene, yet marked by an unspeakable sad- ness, which was afterwards to dim the brightness of our lives. Our handsome, nimble little Claude, then in his tenth year, and called by his preceptors for the sweetness of his disposition and his bril- liant attainments, der goldene 7unge, was perceived to be lame. He said, It was nothing. But when we insisted on an explanation, he confessed to his right knee being tired. It hurt him Just a little; nothing to speak of. He contin- ued to limp, and we, naturally troubled, to ask, What did it mean? He fancied it was sprained. He had felt it ever since M. N. (mentioning an English youth), fol- lowing him up the staircase about Christ- mas, had for a joke lifted him up by his collar over the balustrade. Somehow he had slipped out of his hand and dropped to the pavement, but he had lighted on REMINISCENCES OF MY LATER LIFE. 39 his feet. He had not been hurt. He only felt his knee when he was tired. Poor Claude! He seemed so bright and cheerful that, by some strange chance, although shocked by the disclosure, we accepted his explanation. The entire party returned home weary, and he seem- ing not more so than the rest, we forgot in the stir and occupation of leaving Hei- delberg our momentary anxiety. But after my husband and I with the younger children had arrived in England. and were busy settling in a house we had taken at Upper Clapton, we received a letter from our daughter Annie, then re- siding in a French family at Heidelberg, that filled us with dismay and anguish. Claudes knee had suddenly developed the most alarming features of disease. The English physician at Mannheim who had seen him desired that his parents might be immediately apprised and he taken home. With scarcely the delay of an hour, therefore, William set off to Heidel- berg, and brought back the dear child from the first-rate private school where we had left him with his eldest brother. The eminent surgeon, Mr. Liston, who examined the knee, considered the life of the sufferer might be saved by the ampu- tation of the limb. Sir Aston Key, after scrutinizing the case thoroughly, saw dan- ger on every side. The knee had been jarred by the sudden dropping of the boys entire weight from a second flight of stairs to the pavement. His naturally strong constitution had been weakened by the excessive amount of study peculiar to German schools, and which he had pur- sued with his whole being, by the innu- tritious food, and his having slept in a chamber under a hot metal roof. No means had been immediately taken to counteract the effects of the accident, which had likewise been aggravated by the pedestrian excursion into the Hardt Forest. Thus white swelling had set in, and by that time gained such entire power over the system, that even amputation could not arrest it. Sir Aston Key told us this with the utmost gentleness and consideration; then, declining a fee, left us to our sorrov. We had already acquired considerable faith in homceopathy, and as Dr. Epps assured us that it succeeded where other methods failed, we were thankful to try it, but without result. The poor child mean- time, in his helpless condition, never murmured. Once, when his father in great distress of mind suddenly exclaimed to him, I wish the lad who dropped you had to undergo all this, dear Claude, raising his eyes with an expression of sorrow and surprise he replied, Oh, papa, d6nt say that. I cannot bear the thought of it. Please let my love be given to him, for I remember him with nothing but kindness. And the message ~vas sent. His thirst for knowledge remained in- satiable. And thus, surrounded by a per. fect library, chiefly consisting of books bestowed upon him by his warm friend, Mr. Thomas Tegg, the publisher, of Cheapside, reclining in his little carriage, he was drawn about our large garden and the pleasant shrubbery encompassing our field, and, what he greatly enjoyed, for miles into the country, his father and I accompanying him. Later in the year he had the delight of welcoming back his elder sister and brother under the escort of Herr Muller, a favorite usher in his former school, now to his satisfaction engaged by us as tutor. Thus he was gladdened by dear old asso- ciations; and as by divine mercy he did not appear to suffer much, his waning existence was gently upheld by a quiet happiness. Winter came and went. By that time he was too feeble to go out of doors. Then it pleased Almighty God, in the springtime of his life, to call him to a bet- ter home. A wild, stormy night ushered in March 12, 1844, the anniversary of that unfortunate birthday picnic. The wind roared round the house, the rain beat against the windows, and I, sitting up with our sick child, felt my being filled with a strange terror of woe. Morning came, the storm subsided, the chamber was dim with a heavy cloud. Then the sun broke through, a bright ray illumined the bed from head to foot, the room was full of light, and the dear spirit had de- parted. This grief came into our lives like a pathetic variation in a painfully familiar dirge, reviving a sorrow that had never been really vanquished. After fathers death, at the close of 1823, the first ques- tion with his widow, daugnters, and sons- in-law had been, What was Charles to do? And the handsome, manly, generous- hearted boy, although but fifteen, having no occupation at home, was as anxious to fix on a profession as any of us. Father had thought of the law for him. There seemed some uncertainty, however, wheth- er, as a Friend, he could conscientiously fulfil all the duties, and enjoy all the privi- leges, of an attorney. Richard Phillips was a lawyer, but he had a partner not 40 REMINISCENCES OF MY LATER LIFE. belonging to our Society to attend to busi- ness done in the law courts; and were Charles, as in his case, reduced to mere conveyancing, he ~vould find little employ- ment in Uttoxeter. We were all aware of his passion for the sea and shipping, and even dreaded its consequences, yet we cast our fears away when he consented to being articled, in October, 1824, to Mr. Rowland Roscoe, a merchant of Liver- pool. We knew the enjoyment he would find in the society of Anna and her hus- band, with whom he could spend his lei- sure hours; and he ~vas to board with an elderly Quaker couple, Joseph and Mary Nicholson. Alas, how little attention do parents and guardians pay to the innate tastes and abilities of the young! Had Charles, who displayed great skill with his lathe, been placed with a shipbuilder instead of with a merchant, his sad fate and our misery might have been averted. The pride and hope of his family, and the admiration of all beholders, Charles had hitherto led a most guarded and se- cluded life; his mind had been carefully trained in moral and religious principles by his indulgent but anxious father; and his attractive exterior and manners sub- jected to the peculiarities of Friends. Now placed in a more exposed situation, in a large seaport, the natural bias speed- ily asserted itself. His dress, language, conversation, the tone of his voice, as- sumed so completely the character of a sailor that a stranger would have sup- posed him born and bred at sea. How carefully and accurately he had studied the building of a ship is proved by a three-masted schooner, about a foot in height, of exquisite workmanship, pro- nounced by connoisseurs to be perfect in all its parts, which he constructed in his spare hours, and, calling it the Anna Mary, sent as a present to his first little niece, my daughter. He had become ac- quainted with seafaring youths, who, learn- ing that he was the only son of a widow, by artful persuasions led him, in the sim- plicity of his heart, to suppose that he would relieve his mother of a monetary burden, if, following his inclination and providing for himself, he went to sea; and, although giving great satisfaction to Mr. Roscoe, in August, 1825, he suddenly disappeared. He left his lodgings one First-day morn- ing, attired in his best suit, which awoke no suspicion in the minds of Joseph and Mary Nicholson, until the next day came, and he had not returned. Moreover, the sailors jacket and trousers, which he ~vore sometimes when employed about the ship- ping, and his worsted stockings were found to be missing. A letter, addressed to his sister Anna, and brought to land by a pilot, informed his distracted relatives that but for his mother he should earlier have carried out his resolution to go to sea. He hoped, however, that, as she would henceforth be burdened with no expenses on his account, she would allow herself greater comforts. He expected to be out for three months, and would write again from Quebec, where he should be in about four weeks. We learned by inquiry later, that he had engaged himself with Captain Bell, part owner of the trade ship the Lady Gordon; that his indentures were procured, but owing to the hurry in which the vessel went to sea, were left unsigned; that Bell had been detained by a broken leg and his place supplied by a Captain Clement- son, who had received Charles, with the other apprentices and sailors of the Lady Gordon, as those who were to work her to Quebec. Nothing more was to be ascertained, and though the thought was bitter of our idolized son and brother having thus sev- ered himself from us, we believed he had acted from good but mistaken motives, and would ultimately do well wherever placed. I n the second week of November the shipping intelligencementioned the Lady Gordon as lying off Quebec. She would then be homeward bound, and no letter from Charles having arrived, we concluded we should not receive direct tidings until he himself was in port; and mother hastened to Liverpool to meet him. The Lady Gordon, firm-timbered, all her tackle trim, after a most prosperous voyage, sailed up the Mersey, but the strained eyes eagerly watching in the docks for Charles, saw the crew leap one by one on shore without him. Then poor, wounded hearts learned he ~vas no more. A last sad letter, and the statements of the crew, especially of the ships carpen- ter, told the terrible tale. Scarcely had the Lady Gordon left Liverpool, when she encountered head winds and heavy seas, which made her toil on her northern way for seven weeks. She had been out a month when Charles, ordered aloft for some change of sail, was precipitated to the deck, breaking his leg in the fall. There was no surgeon on board, but the captain ordered all that was possible in the circumscribed space and with the lim- ited supplies of the vessel, to be done for the injured lad; and the sailors, rough, REMINISCENCES OF MY LATER LIFE. 4 hearty Cumberland men, waited on him the Earl of Daihousie, governor of Can- as, with pale and altered face, his body ada, certifying that Charles Botham, a racked ~vith pain, his mind with regret, mariner, aged seventeen years, died on self-banished from home and country, he the 3rd of November in the H6tel Dieu, lay studying the Bible as his only re and was buried on the 4th of November, source, and finding in its sacred pages 1825, in the burial ground of the parish consolation and encouragement. At length church of the Protestant parish of Que- the Lady Gordon reached Quebec, and bec. the seamen, in mournful array, bore him One other great sorrow awaited mother, to the great hospital and convent of the the departure of her beloved, hitherto H6tel Dieu, where gentle women, over- almost inseparable youngest daughter, flowing with love and pity, received, with her husband and little children, to soothed, and tended him in his sisters America in 1842. This grief was followed, stead. a few years later, by the tidings of that Anna had later a visit from a Quaker daughters death. They came as her sea captain, named William Doodle. He summons to the better land. She was had been in a provision shop in Quebec, residing with us at the time of her decease, when a French physician entered, and and was interred by the side of Claude in after observing his attire and mode of the Friends burial ground, Stoke New. speech, told him that a young man, a ington. stranger from England and one of his In looking back to the period of my Society, who was lying ill at the hospital, mothers abode with us, I am struck vith had requested hi,n if he saw any of the affectionate admiration at the remem- Friends, to ask them to call on him. Cap- brance of her great tact and forbearance tam Doodle went immediately. He sat under circumstances not readily assimilat. some time with Charles, who confided to ing with her convictions, and of her keen him the whole sad story, from the moment observation and good sense which would of his forming the desperate resolution of have preserved us from various pitfalls going to sea to the occasion of his being had we been willing to profit by them. in the hospital. He lamented most deeply She chiefly employed herself reading or the error into which he had fallen, but knitting in her own room, and merely saw spoke of the comfort he derived from the our intimate friends, who were very favor- Scriptures, expressed the most yearning ably impressed by her peaceful exterior affection for his beloved, distant relatives, and unsectarian utterances. Dot whilst and the most unbounded gratitude to his she highly approved of our literary pro- devoted caretakers. He thought the doc- ductions and sentiments, she took excep. tors and nuns did more for him than for tion to our advocacy of the stage, from the any other patient. He took the captains persuasion that virtuous persons assum- hand between his own and held it, as if he ing fictitious characters became ultimately could not let him go. what they simulate. She consequently The honest, kind-hearted sailor, greatly eschewed some estimable actresses, our affected by the interview, parted from him familiar associates, terming them stage with the intention of speedily renewing it. girls whom she pitied, but whose accom- But when next he went, Charless leg had plishments she abhorred. been amputated, and he was allowed to All friends, however, were not so severe see no one except his doctors and nurses. as my excellent mother in their condein- The captain called again, and learned that nation of actresses, for Charlotte Cush- he had expired. Dr. Holmes, one of the man met with great appreciation from a physicians, most kindly wrote us that he wealthy Quaker manufacturer in York- had been with Charles when he passed shire. On one occasion, when staying away, and his last words were of his with her great friend Eliza Cook at his mother. fine mansion, she received from him an And that mother, bowing her head in entire piece of a woollen fabric, similar submission, felt divine love had found her to modern Cashmere, of his manufacture, poor boy and borne him to the haven of and of a new dark color called steel-blue, peace, where the wicked cease from trou- which was worn by both ladies with no bling and all temptation to sin is at an little pride. Miss Cook, who dressed in end. Yet for long weeks and months it a very masculine style that was considered seemed to her a terrible dream, from which strange at the time, with short hair parted she must wake to find her bright, buoyant on one side, and a tight-fitting lapelled Charles at her sde, until she held in her bodice showing a shirt-front and ruffle, hand an indubitable document, signed by looked well in her dark steel-blue; and 42 REMINISCENCES OF MY LATER LIFE. Miss Cushman, ho possessed a strongly built, heroic figure, not less so. The fact of some ladies of our acquaint- ance recommending a house in their nei~,hborhood had led us to settle at the East End of London. The choice was not an unwise one. We were within easy reach of the great publishing mart of Pa- ternoster Row, and of vast districts teem- ing with i,,norance and squalor, for whose amelioration we were desirous of labor- ing; and as nature, combined with a cer- tain amount of social refinement, seemed necessary to our mental well-being, there was the rural character still pervadin~ Clapton and the old-fashioned dignity of its sedate mansions within well - kept ~grounds, suggestive of much accumulated comfort and satisfactory dealings with Lombard Street. In 1844 we moved from Upper to Lower Clapton, to one of a couple of well-built, substantially finished houses of the last century, called the Elms, from the row of noble old elm-trees in their front. It contained ample wain- scoted chambers, and a broad staircase of polished oak, leading to spacious recep- tion-rooms; whilst the windows at the back looked into the pleasant arden, with its creeper festooned walls, long lawn, and flowering shrubs, and beyond to quiet meadows, through which flowed the River Lea, to vast marshes, and the woodland line of Epping Forest. We had for next-door neighbors, and thence for lifelong friends, Mr. Henry Bateman and his family. He was a mer- chant and Congregationalist, on the com- mittee of the Religious Tract Society, and deservedly esteemed in Nonconformist circles for his active benevolence, promo- tion of religious freedom, calm, outspoken denunciation of evil, unflinching adher- ence to duty, and faithful trust in God under all circumstances. We had also living near us from 1846 our warm-hearted and gifted German friend Freiligrath, who on account of his political opinions had been compelled to take refuge in England, and was honor- ably supporting himself, his wife, and little children, in the employment of Messrs. Huth. But in 1848 the famous lyric poet hastened back to his native land to share in the revolution, in some minor en,~agement of which outbreak our sons former tutor, Herr MUller, fell. At the Elms, a little girl, the chosen playmate and counsellor of my younger children, Octavia Hill, devised, even in their games, schemes for improving and bri ~, htening the lot of the poor and op pressed. And the retiring and meditative young poet, Alfred Tennyson, charmed our seclusion by the recitation of his ex- quisite poetry: Like an A~olian harp that wakes No certain air, but overtakes Far thought with music that it makes. I may also mention in connection with this period of our life that my husband, on the announcement of his intended Visits to Remarkable Places, received in 1838 a letter from Manchester, signed E. C. Gaskell, drawing his attention to a fine old seat, Clopton Hall, near Stratford- on-Avon. It described in so powerful and graphic a manner the writers visit as a schoolgirl to the mansion and its in- mates, that in replying he urged his cor- respondent to use her pen for the public benefit. This led to his receivin,, at the Elms for criticism the first volume of a novel, describing with great feeling and local knowledge the life of the Lancashire operatives. William, delighted by its perusal, bade Mrs. Gaskell go on and prosper; and in 1848 Mary Barton ap- peared. It immediately obtained a most cordial welcome from the readin,, world. My husband, considering the remedy for the wrongs of labor to be the adoption of the co-operative principle, or the com- bination of work, skill, and capital by the operatives themselves, wrote Letters on Labor, which led to the establishment of the Co-operative League. Its object was to supply the industrious classes, both male and female, with gratuitous informa- tion on the great social questions of the day, unfettered by sectarian theolo,,y or party politics, with the motto, Benefit to all, and injury to none. He was asked to preside at co-operative meetings, and to lecture on the subject in different towns in the kingdom; but in complyin,,, a series of disappointments soon proved to him that it would require years of active, steady effort before any practical success could be attained, the masses being quite unprepared calmly and wisely to consider great principles. It was on the occasion of his absence at Leeds, where the interest displayed in co-operation by the population formed a cheering contrast to the general apathy, that I was subjected to a peculiar expe- rience, whose awful reality has never passed away from my mind. I had retired to rest in good health and spirits, when suddenly a strange, alarming sense of perplexity, of impending, all - embracing darkness and evil overwhelmed me. My REMINISCENCES OF MY LATER LIFE. 43 terror made the heavy four-post bedstead shake under me. I was not ill, nor faint, nor did I think it requisite to call assist- ance. My dear old mother occupied the room next me, my grown-up son and daughter were within reach, but I needed none of them. I knew the power which controlled me was either mental or spirit- ual. Surely I must have cried to God for help, as slowly the horror of great dark- ness passed away, and all was tranquil within me. It was, I am willing to be- lieve, a token permitted by divine love and wisdom to warn and prepare me for the discipline required to loosen my trust in the creature and place it wholly in the Creator. A time of calamity ensued; we had severe losses and mortifications, and gained new and sad revelations of human nature. William, after cherishing for many years the idea of devoting himself to pe- riodical literature a plan delayed by our residence in Germany had in 1846 become one of the editors and part pro- prietor of a cheap weekly journal, exclu- sively devoted to the instruction and im- provement of the people. We were both uncompromising advocates of the working classes; and as we considered sin to be the result of the defective education of mankind, we aimed at universal progress by the mental, moral, and physical eleva- tion of the human race; believing that with the growth of the mind, and its freedom from adverse circumstances, religion would come of itself. Finding his literary plans frustrated, and himself made respon- sible for liabilities over which he had no control, William retired from the concern, and in January, 1847, started Howilts 7our;zai, of which he was sole proprietor and I joint editor. Assisted by Samuel Smiles, a most able defender of the rights of industry and the benefits of self-culture, and other gifted and popular writers, we sought, in an attractive form, to urge the laboring classes, by means of temperance, self-edu- cation, and moral conduct, to be their own benefactors. Our magazine proved, like its predecessor, a pecuniary failure; and Ebenezer Elliott remarked to us, in a shrewd, pithy letter: Men engaged in a death struggle for bread will pay for amusement when they will not for instruc- tion. They woo laughter to unscare them that they may forget their perils, their wrongs, and their oppressors, and play at undespair. If you were able and will- ing to fill the journal with fun it would pay.~~ Curiously enough, a niece of Ebenezer Elliotts might herself in after years have benefited by his advice. She was a work- ing woman, and told me3 amongst other schemes for the elevation of her neighbors, she had a school for poor country lads, and, not confining the instruction to ele- mentary subjects, taught them to write essays. She had, however, been much disconcerted by a pupil saying, Ay, mis- sis, im sick o these nesses. In the spring of 1847 Edward Youl made our acquaintance. He was about thirty, with abundant black hair, and, be- ing very short-sighted, wore spectacles. He mentioned that he was a Cambridge graduate, and a classical tutor, but, hav- ing just finished the education of his late pupil, he resolved to seek no other en- gagement, but devote himself to litera- ture. Later he added in confidence that he was struggling with poverty for conscience~ sake. He was the only child of a pawnbroker, who had amassed a large fortune, and died intestate; but he was determined to die of starvation rather than claim such ill-gotten wealth, and had married a lady in straitened circumstances connected with the Society of Friends. XVe believed the romantic story, which was in keeping with the spirit of his clever ~vritings, permitted him to come to our house, introduced him to several of our friends, and procured him, amongst other literary employment, a permanent engage- ment with John Cassell, who gave him a salary of 200 per annum for what amounted to about three days work a week, on the Standard of Freedom. In this situation he displayed remarkable efficiency; but when he had been about a 3-ear with Mr. Cassell he became very lazy, and consequently, after repeated warnings, was discharged in the summer of 1849. Still we did not wish to abandon Mr. Youl, and as his wife (who had never at- tracted us) manifested an insatiable desire to ~o on the staue our friend Charles Kean very obligingly obtained her an en- gagement with a manager at Hull- and Mr. Linwood, a Unitarian minister, who had become a Congregationalist and the purchaser of the Eclectic Review, con- sented to meet Youl at our house we were then living in Avenue Road, Re- gents Park on Sunday evening, No- vember tith, to secure him as a regular contributor. How great, then, was my surprise to ceive a call the previous Friday from a respectable woman, who, introducing her- 44 REMINISCENCES OF MY LATER LIFE. self as Mrs. Copeland, of i Upper Stam- ford Street, Blackiriars, demanded the rent due to her from September. How still greater my consternation when she, with equal amazement at my ignorance, explained, that a gentleman named Youl had taken her rooms for poor Mrs. How- itt, who was in such destitution that she was compelled to make private applica- tion for relief to the nobility, adding, 1 was very sorry for you, maam, I am sure, but when letters, evidently containing money, and sealed with coronets, kept coming, and I never got my rent, I made so bold as to learn your address at the British Museum, and was surprised to find you living in so good a house. The next day my husband, after ob- taining a warrant for Youls apprehen- sion, and a detective to put on his track, proceeding along Stamford Street, recog- nized him approaching at a great distance, when suddenly, although without specta- cles, Youl dived down a by-lane and entirely disappeared. He must have in- stantly gone to Hull, as his wife wrote to me on the morrow, Sunday: My hus- band will make every explanation if you ~vill forgive him. Dear Mrs. Howitt, pray think of our prospects, and mine will be sacrificed with his, and they are just open- ing so bright. The ensuing day Youl, from York, wrote a begging letter in my name to Macaulay, and received to by return of post. The detective traced him to Leeds, where he seemed to sink into the gr.oun d, for, impatient of the stigma lying upon me in many unknown quarters, I insisted, in spite of the entreaties of our legal adviser, on sending a statement of the fraud to the daily papers. We had immediately instituted an extensive inquiry, and found that amongst other persons of rank and influence, he had forged my name to Lords John Russell, Lansdowne, Den- man, Mahone, and Brougham. The latter, writing in explication from Cannes, stated that on receiving an application from me, speaking of great pecuniary difficulties and requiring immediate assistance, he had instantly sent it to Lord John Russell, with a strong recommendation to settle a pension on me, applied on my behalf to Miss Burdett Coutts, and himself for- warded 20. He would, if needful, re- turn from Cannes to give evidence. Sir Robert Peel had generously remitted 50. The forged letters returned to me ~vere written in a crawling, exaggerated strain. in acknowledging a donation from the Bishop of Oxford (Wilberforce) I was made to say: I went down on my knees and thanked God who had moved his lord- ships heart to such noble kindness to me. In December Mr. Justice Talfourd sent us word that an individual, who in the previous summer had extracted 20 from him under the assumed name of Thomas Cooper, author of The Purgatory of Suicides, had written to him from Liver- pool, and was certainly our man. The same evening our eldest son and the de- tective went to Liverpool, put themselves into communication with the police, the post-office, and the owners of the Ameri- can packets; but Youl eluded their vigi- lance, in the following April, 1850, Mrs. Youl called in Liverpool on the wife of the celebrated manufacturing chemist, Dr. Muspratt, and sister to Charlotte Cush- man, saying her husband was the per- son who had made use of my name to obtain money. It was only lately she had learnt what he had done. I never saw a poor creature in such affliction, wrote Mrs. Muspratt; she has pawned everything, even her wedding ring. I gave her the money to go to London, where she hoped she might find some as- sistance. Some years afterwards, John Cassell encountered Youl sitting opposite him in a New York eating-house. Although dif- ferently disguised he recognized the voice and features, and accosted him by name. Youl, however, most coolly denied ever having been in England. In March, 1870, one Robert Spring, alias Sprague, alias Redfern Hawley and a host of other aliases, was tried and convicted in the Court of Quarter Sessions in Philadelphia for false pretences ; and experts believed this man and Youl were identical. He had been, in America, the distracted father of a large family, a poor widow with a few autographs of the distinguished dead, the orphan daughter of Stone- wall Jackson, Maggie Ramsey under religious convictions, the kind Dr. Hawley, etc. We were assured by a gentleman in the Department of the In- terior, that the various dodges he was discovered to have originated and success- fully played, the versatility of character he had assumed, the systematic mode of keeping his accounts (for his ledger had been captured), the very extraordinary manner in which he had shaped his frauds to avoid the penalties of the law if caught, and the success with which he had for years foiled all efforts to trace him out, would, if given in a narrative form to the A PILGRIMAGE TO SINAI. 45 public, present them with the picture of the prince of swindlers. I had earlier often said and honestly thought that it was a fine thing to combat with ones self and stand victor; and when residing in Avenue Road I deter- mined to be strong and joyful, life under all circumstances was full of riches, which I would neither disregard nor squander. Thus treasuring up all the simple elements of beauty around me I still remember the charm of a suburban spring morning; up and down the road the lilacs and tacama- hacs coming into leaf, the almond-trees full of blossom, and the sun shining amid masses of soft, silvery cloud. Then again there was rural Belsize Lane, delightful at all seasons, with its lofty elms and luxu- riant hedgerows of rosebushes, elders, and hawthorn. How green too were the sloping fields leading from the St. Johns Wood end of Belsize Lane to Hampstead I I remember walking with my husband down these fields one brilliant Sunday morning in the spring of i8~t, with all London lying before us, when we suddenly saw a wonderful something shining out in the distance like a huge diamond, the true mountain of light. It marked the first Great Exhibition in Hyde Park, a new feature not only in the fine view but in the history of the world. We met a humble Londoner evidently on his way to Hamp- stead Heath. William said to him, Turn round and look at the Crystal Palace, shining out in the distance. He did so and exclaiming, Oh I thank you, sir, how wonderful I stood gazing as long as we could see him. From The Leisure Hour. A PILGRIMAGE TO SINAI. DY ISABELLA BIRD BISHOP, AUTHOR OF UN- BEATEN TRACKS IN JAPAN, A LADYS RIDE IN THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS, ETC. II. THE routine of the day will not be varied unless some unforeseen event happens. Up to this halting-place the journey has been monotonous; an expanse of hard, gravelly sand, with low red ranges of hills on the east, and on the west the blue waters of the Red Sea, here and there rocks a few feet high, the sh ingly bed of a dry wady, with tufts of wormwood here and there, a skeleton of a camel at inter- vals, suggestive of the end of unwilling labors, a whitish-blue sky, and a sun which blazes and scintillates so long as it is above the horizon. About two hours after leaving Am Musa the wind changed from north to south, and the air became very sultry and oppressive. The wind is strong eno ugh to blow the sand against us in stinging drifts and is dry and hot, as if it came over hot metal. Yesterday at noon the mercury was t070 (F.) in the shade, at 890 in my tent at night; today there has been no shade in which to test the temperature, and now, at 7 P.M., it is at 9i~ in the tent. The sand is so hot as to burn the feet uncomfortably if one has only stockings on. The glare from the sand and the vibration of the heated lower strata of the air have been very distressing to-day. About noon I saw, some miles ahead, a lovely scene a sheet of bright blue water, with tall, graceful palms re- flected in it. I asked Hassan if he could not camp there as well as here, but he shook his head and said something in Arabic. As the shadows lengthened, and the heat and fatigue increased, still that tantalizing blue water ~vith the mirrored palms beckoned me forward, but the ~veary tramp brought us no nearer, and before sunset it faded as a vision, leaving nothing behind but the scorching sand. Though on the lookout for the mirage, this was so real and beautiful that I was entirely deceived, and supposed that we were nearing anoasis. To-day we met a caravan of six American clergymen on camels, with a dragoman, two mounted servants, and eleven bag- gage camels. One of these still carried claret, two more barrels of water, one, coops still containing fowls and a sheep, and the others were loaded with camp equipage tents, beds, chairs, tables, etc. For in the desert when men meet, They pass not as in peaceful street. So the travellers came up to me and we exchanged experiences. They were four days out from Sinai; they had found the Greek monks grasping and exorbitant in their charges; the heat had been in- tense for two days; did I not think I was running a risk in going alone? etc. They invited me to dine with them, but my scanty fare seemed more suitable for a pilgrimage than their four or five courses eaten at a table; and, though I should have been glad to compare notes with them, I was so anxious to push on that we parted. They were in much fear of being detained at the quarantine station. With this exception, I have not seen man, beast, bird, or insect for two days, and not a trace of man. The glossiness 46 A PILGRIMAGE TO SINAI. which the desert takes from the repeated with their waving palms, vanished from passage of the spongy feet of camels has the plains. The mercury in the shade been effaced by the drifting sand, so that has marked from I~~O to io80, an unusu- the desert is literally the trackless des- ally high temperature for April. ert. Along the wadys I have seen a It seems almost ludicrous now, and if I few stunted tamarisks (manna-trees), some live to return will seem quite so, that I wizened brooms (the juniper of the Bible), am having some kind of illness. 1 had some tufts of wormwood, and some yellow shivering fits in Cairo, with great lassitude gourds, the shape and size of Seville and drowsiness, and was told that nothing oranges, lying among shrivelled leaves, would work such a speedy cure as life in The Bedaween collect these gourds with the desert. There were several cases of great care. They scoop out most of the typhoid fever in the Cairo hotel. Mr. inside and let goats milk stand in the who sat next me at dinner is severely rind. This milk, which is very nauseous, ill of it, and I think I have some form of is the medicine which they most prize, the fever. Three days ago I took a bad sore gourd being the fruit of the colocynth. throat, accompanied by headache, nausea, The wadys, which are simply rents or severe pain in my back, and very bad depressions, down which water, when eyes, the discomfort of the latter being there is any, flows, are the great high- much aggravated by flies. A rash which ways of this peninsula, without which it came out much like scarlet fever has de. would be impossible for beasts of burden veloped into blisters or pustules like lac- to penetrate the granitic ranges of the quer poisoning, and the whole skin is so interior. In the winter and early spring inflamed and burning that for the last two these valleys or depressions or water. nights sleep has been impossible. Under courses for a wady may be any one of these circumstances the miseries endured theseare for a few hours or days the from vermin, boils, the glare, the awful beds of tremendous torrents. When the heat, the fatigue of riding a slow-paced rains have run off pools remain for a time, camel for ten or eleven hours daily, and, but these have dried up already. worse than all, the thirst, have been only Last night, after a toilsome march of just endurable. Yet even in the midst of ten hours, we encamped at Wady Sadur, a it I feel that this glorious desert, this stony depression marked by a few stunted waste howling wilderness, the new and tamarisks, from which there is a view of a rich experiences, and the prospect of striking, isolated peak called Gebel Bisher. Sinai, are worth them all. The heat during the night was great, and On the first and second days there were though I slept soundly I awoke unre- no marked features to vary the monotony, freshed and unwilling to move on. To. but on the third day the plain became day the heavens have been as brass, or more undulating and diversified by hills rather as steel, and the earth as iron, and small plateaux glittering with gypsum Wady esh Sizeykh, Easter Sunday. crystals, while spurs running down from I have encamped here to.day with the the Tih on the left, and glimpses of the traditional Sinai within an hours journey, blue, sparkling waters of the sea on the and Gebel Serbal, the highest mountain right, give a degree of variety. This is in the peninsula Opposite the camp, rising the Wilderness of Shur, in which the magnificently above two curtain ranges Israelites went three days and found no which form the opposite side of the valley water. There are two claimants to be I arranged with my escort to take a Sab- Marah, Wady Ain~rah and Am Haw~rah. bath to-day, my seventh day from Am The last is a very uninteresting spring, Musa. This wady is a broad, shelving overshadowed by two or three desert depression of stones and gravel dotted palms. The water is intensely nauseous over with gray tamarisk shrubs and boul- and bitter. Turning off the shortest route, ders of granite. I am sitting in the tent and passing below some magnificent cliffs door in the cool of the day, but the cool of crystalline limestone, we came down is 950, The mercury did not fall below upon the sea. The foam-crested, spark. 90 last night in my tent. For three days ling blue waters dashed blithely on the the k/iarnseeg, or hot wind, has blown shore, and I revelled in the cool spray on strongly, and the sun, with rays untem- my face, delicious after the long, blazing pered either by mist or cloud, has glared day. There we encamped by the sea, be- fiercely down from a bright blue sky. tween black and white cliffs and deep blue The blue waters of the Red Sea were left water, and all night long the waves mur- behind on the third day from Am Musa, inured along the silent shore. The sun and the mocking waters of the mirage, set in glory, bathing the desert in fiery A PILGRIMAGE TO SINAI. 47 light, and I strolled in the evening along the shell-strewn shore, reading Numbers xxxiii., feeling sure that the Israelites came down the Wady Taiyibeh to the sea which had befriended them so well, and once more, and possibly for the last time, saw the hills of Africa, behind which lay the house of bondage purpling in the sinking sun, for this Dean Stanley makes no doubt is the site of the encampment by the sea. In the Wady Taiyibeh the glare from the walls of limestone rock was fearful, and the thirst very hard to bear. In the afternoon we came upon some pleasantish- looking springs of clear water, among a cluster of shaggy palms and ragged tama- risks. Hassan had gone on, so I made signs to my camel-driver to draw some water, holding out to him an iron pan which hung on the camel, and pointing to the pools. He shook his head and made various gestures of unwillingness; but at last he drew some water and brought it to me all sparkling and beautiful, I seized it from him with a feeling of ecstasy, and took one long, deep draught, though the sun had warmed it, only to find it salt, bitter, nauseous. Again, as so often be- fore, I sympathized with the vast and thirsty host parching upon these glaring sands, and recalling the sweet waters of the abundant Nile. My sufferings-from thirst after that were considerably in- creased. That encampment by the cool blue sea was the last gleam of comfort. The next morning was hotter, and the heat more blasting than before. I was sick and faint from the hot wind before eight AM., and a new discomfort was added in incessant drifts of fine sand, burning and blinding, gritty in the eyes, nose, and mouth, and stinging the inflamed skin of my face. Still it was possible to admire the white marble terraces above the sea, with dull brown cliffs streaked with purple bands above them, as we turned into the plain of Markhah, supposed to be the Wilder- ness of Sin, passing a promontory of lime- stone rocks washed by the ocean, through which the camels somewhat unwillingly splashed their way for some distance. Then came the bold white cliffs of Gebel el Markhah, painfully dazzling, followed, as I said, by the plain of El Markhah. This ~vas a woeful experience. The khamseen was blowing strong, with its blinding, stinging drifts of sand, the sun, white and scintillating like a huge mag- nesium light, blazed from a sky blue in- deed, but full of a white light. The air simmered above the heated earth. The mirage spread out its mocking waters and waving palms, but I was no longer de- ceived. Through that evil simmering air I now and then had glimpses of an oily, simmering sea. For three hours we glided silently over a hard and hateful expanse of sand and flints, from which even the grey wormwood was absent. The shad- ows shortened, but when noon came there was no shadow of a great rock in all that weary land. I flung myself into a rift in a boulder of sandstone, from which some lively lizards were ejected, and covered myself with blankets. Sand and rock radiated a burning heat. The supply of water in the skins was not abundant, and what there ~vas, though it was taken from a cooler, was tepid and thick, and tasted of goat, leather, and tannin. The camels were quarrelsome and listless, and when we resumed the march after an hours halt, protested more loudly than ever. The sun was scorching that afternoon. I thought I should fall from my camel. The fatigue was intense, and tired of the effort of holding my umbrella against the hot wind, I put two blankets over my head and desired the shadow as ear- nestly as any hireling in the days of Job. It was a comfort to me to think that the Israelites, with their women, young children, and flocks and herds, never, even under the worst circumstances, had to make forced marches as I was doing. I tried to read, but the pages of Murray, over which I had pored till I nearly knew them by heart, seemed for once insuffer- ably dull. I took my Bible then, and was impressed afresh, not only with its faith- ful Orientalism, but with its faithful local- ism. How different would have been the imagery of a prophet of the watery West from that of Isaiah! A man would have been represented as sunshine, or as the shadow of a spreading tree, rather than as rivers of water in a dry place, or as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land. In the scorching desert one realizes the unspeakable rapture con- tained in the promise, In the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert, and the awfulness of a barren and thirsty land where no water is. As the hours passed by with their thirst, glare, and furnace heat, I sympathized more and more with the israelites shut in by the wilderness, behind them the sea, whose waters would divide no more, around them this burning, waterless expanse, and be- fore them, as before me as the day closed, a mountain region with granite walls, with 48 A PILGRIMAGE TO SINAI. nearer cliffs of fantastic forms and bril- The water, as I said before, had been liant colors, all radiating heat and devoid hardly drinkable at noon, and at night, of vegetation, when I asked for rice, Hassans gloomy Instead of continuing ten miles farther countenance grew yet more gloomy, and over this horrid plain to the mouth of the he said there was not water enough ; the Wady Feiran, the supposed route of the Bedaween had stolen it. Being unable to Israelites, we left it to rejoin it a little have either rice or chocolate, what I had later, and then went up the Seih Baha, a in the morning having been made of sal/- narrow valley between glaring hills of ish wa/er, possibly from Marah, Isupped limestone, which shortly opened up on on raisins and chocolate paste only. Of Wady Shellal, the Valley of the Cata- course, there was not any water for wash. racts, now an arid, blazing defile between ing either that night or the next morning sandstone and limestone rocks. Here a discomfort under any circumstances, the monotony of the desert came to an and an actual hardship in these. When I end, and hour after hour brought addi- lay down I asked Hassan to bring me all tional majesty and fresh surprises in the water that there was, and he presently color. I thought that the porphyry and reappeared with a most glum and clouded ore-stained rocks of the Rocky Mountains face, bringing a teacup nearly full of a were all that nature could do in the wayof thick, dark-colored fluid like the refuse color, but the glorious peaks of the Si- stream of a dye-work, and, putting it down naitic group far exceed them. Fantastic by me, said, You get all you very ill. color moulded into fantastic form has Then, smelling it, he said, with a look of kept my attention strained and eager ever infinite disgust, S/inks. I felt as if I since we left the plain of El Markhah could drink up the Nile, and as I raised walls, peaks, ridges, spires, battlements, myself on my elbow frequently during towers, rifts, chasms, abysses, forms so the night and sipped this f~tid decoction definite at times in their simulation of of goats hide in teaspoonfuls, the suffer- mans work as to deceive me as effectu- ing hourly increased. 1 was really ill, ally as the mirage. Here we plunged into and wondered if I could remain sane un- the heart of that glorious group of moun- til the afternoon of the next day, twenty tains which, as seen from the Red Sea hours later, when we should reach the glowing in the sunset, had lured me to wells of the Wady Feiran. It was a night this toilsome pilgrimage. These closed of misery. I could not keep my thoughts the prospect in front, their bases black to any subject. or bottle green, their tops orange, lake, Venetian red. Joyfully that evening, as Thoughts on thoughts, a countless throng, the shadows lengthened and the great Came chasing countless thoughts along. walls of rock at last threw their deep shade All the watery texts of the Bible came to over the valley, I saw in the distance the my memory, and those beautiful words, gleam of my white tent pitched near a A pure river of water of life, clear as cliff, here and there tinged green by the crystal, absolutely tortured me. Water bright leafage of the caper plant. There in all its forms filled my imagination. was a charm about the encampment that The height of human happiness the night, though shade did not mean cool- goal of all desirewas clear, cold water ness, and the burning breath of the kham- without stint. Once I thought I heard seen still rendered existence painful, and an abundance of rain, but on rising to I had much fever and suffering of various go out into it I found that the sound was kinds, but the sweep of the desert wind through A few mannadistilling /arfa, or tam- the stunted tamarisks. arisk shrubs, with a little aromatic herb- We began the march soon after the age such as goats and camels love, had sun had risen, turning the eastern sky attracted some wandering Bedaween to into the aspect of a conflagration. The the same spot, and the night was noisy heavens above were as hrass and the with the loud talk between them and my earth beneath as iron. I breakfasted men. I was entirely sleepless, and won- on raisins and half a cup of stirabout dered what the staple of this Ishmaelite made with some stale water ~vhich had talk was, and just as I had decided that been begged from the scanty stock of the it was probably about camels, goats, wells nomads of the night before. These folded and springs, and the increasing scarcity their tents and passed away on that search of water, day broke, hot and cloudless, for water which is the lifelong occupa- and with it all the camels began their tion of the dwellers in the desert. They noisyprotestations, growling and roaring, left not a trace behind. Soon after they AMERICAN MANNERS. 49 went out of sight I walked on alone, as is my usual practice, in advance of the camels, but soon sank on a stone from ex- haustion and suffering. Hass an had peb- bles in his own mouth, and gave me some to put in mine, but he spoke thickly, though doubtless he had taken more water than he gae to me. We marched for four hours a burning, weary, silent marchand halted at noon in the sharp, deep shadow of a high rock, where the mercuryfe// to ttt~. The glare on the sand beyond the shadow was blinding. The lower strata of the air were simmer- ing with heat. It was terrible to emerge from the shadow of that great rock into the furnace glare once more and plod on once more under the fiery sun. I usually soak a towel, several times folded, in wa- ter and lay it on my head under my hat, letting the end hang over the back of my neck; and being unable to get any water, I suffered severely from the sun. As the afternoon went on, I became dizzy and distracted; I felt that I should soon be delirious. I tried to speak to Hassan, but my tongue only rattled in my mouth. I felt that if any one were carrying water and would not give it to me that I would take it by force that I could commit even a desperate crime to get one cupful. And still we marched on silently under the blazing skies, through the heated, sim- mering air. I felt my reason going, and tied a handkerchief over my eyes; then lassitude came on and the longing for water turned into a longing for death, and the fancied murmur of the dark river in my ears was a pleasant sound. Then there were voices, and Hassan, speaking thick, uttered the one word, Water! I took the bandage from my eyes, and saw that we were in a valley. In front palms waved, and there was greenness on the earth. I thought I was again being mocked by the mirage, but the blessed reality was confirmed the next moment, when I saw in the distance the Sheykh Barak running towards me with a pitcher of water in his hand. I seized it, and in unreasoning haste drank an enor- mous quantity, when Hassan forced the cooler from me and drank the remainder, poor fellow I The thirst still raged, but there was hope, for in the long valley which we had entered I recognized the Wady Feiran, the great oasis of the Si- naitic Desert. The Arabs lifted me very gently from my camel and laid me on a blanket under a palm - tree. Hassan brought me a cup of goats milk, warm and healing, and putting a water-cooler LIVING AGE. VOL. LIV. 2760 beside me, warned me to take the water only by sips. It was pure and ice cold; it was abundant; and reason having re- turned, I drank it rationally. Three thou- sand fruit-bearing palms, and perhaps two thousand young ones, grow in that grand oasis. Barley was springing, flocks were nibbling herbage, which though scanty was green ; there was a murmur of water, and as I fell asleep that murmur became transformed into the sound of the river of the water of life, and the rustle of the palm fronds overhead into the whisper of the foliage of that tree whose leaves are for the healing of the nations. * I. L. B. * I have transferred to these pages this account of the suffering caused by thirst as having a special inter- est at a time when attention has been so recently con- centrated on the perils and hardships of our brave soldiers in the Soudanese Desert. From All The Year Round. AMERICAN MANNERS. SOME OLD AND NEW OBSERVATIONS. IT is remarkable, as indicative of one of the chief characteristics of the North American peol)le, as now constituted and being constituted, that strangers visiting their continent form very different opin- ions of the manners current in the States, according to their sex. Most lady trav- ellers, since Mrs. Trollope, return to En- gland with more eulogies of the Ameri- cans in their hearts than they can find words to express. But, with rare excep- tions, male tourists condemn the Ameri- cans out of hand. The manners of the Americans are the best I ever saw, says Harriet Martineau. I like the Ameri- cans more and more; either they have improv~d wonderfully lately, or else the criticisms on them have been cruelly ex- aggerated, says Lady W ortley. And, as spoke these early travellers, so speak the later ones of their own sex; while Mr. Arnold, as representative of so many oth- ers of his sex, does not hesitate to imply that the social conduct of the people is, on the whole, execrable. Mr. Henry James, Americas cleverest living writer, seeking to explain the courtesy (as he un- derstands it) of English life, traces it to the struggle for existence; it is rather the suavity of the beggar than real gentleness of heart. But we will return him satire for satire in quoting Miss Martineau on the civilities of American life: I imag- ine, she says, that the practice of for- 50 AMERICAN MANNERS. bearance requisite in a republic is answer- able for this peculiarity [sweetness of temper]. In a republic no man can in theory overbear his neighbor, nor, as he values his own rights, can he do it much or long in practice. Whatever sweetness of temper the Americans may have shown towards Miss Martineau fifty years ago, we recommend no one to go to the States nowadays, whether as a tourist or an emi- grant, expecting to be received with kindly words and courtesies wherever he may be. Rather the contrary, indeed. From the moment of his landing at the bottom of Canal Street he must be prepared for new conditions of life. He has left a country where, howsoever humbly he may estimate himself, he has had many inferi- ors, for a country where, out of question, every one whom he meets or accosts is at least as good in worldly value as he is. All officials will let him know pretty quickly that their officialism does not make them into servants, public or pri- vate. To secure even the curtest of an- swers from a police officer, for instance, he must carefully modulate the tone of his enquiry. The guards on the different trains may condescend to fraternize with him, but he will soon see that they have little or nothing in common with the tip- loving, cap-touching, corduroy-clad men of our own railway stations. And so on, up and down the scale, to the small nigger boy, who will clean his boots for a nickel, and take the money with never a Thank you. Life in the States is a cold condi- tion of barter. I do something for you; you do something for me. One service balances and cancels the other; thanks on either hand are supererogatory, and a waste of precious time. The sooner a new arrival understands this code of con- duct, the better for him, the fewer his humiliations. It is not so bad in the Southern States, where the people profess much unenvious good-will for British- ers, and profound hatred for their North. em brethren; but West and far \Vest it is rather worse than better. Again, brevity of speech is praiseworthy enough at times, though it is chilling to be met with the most laconic of answers to all questions. The following dialogue, resulting from an interview of Miss Mar- tineau with a settler in an unfortunate part of the country, is still sufficiently typical. XVhose land was this that you bought ? Moggs Whats the soil ? Bogs. Whats the climate ? Fogs.~~ W hat do you get to eat? Hogs.,~ What did you build your house of? Logs. Have you any neighbors ? Frogs. Besides absolute indifference, incivility, and an unpleasant brevity of speech, the stranger in the States must accustom him- self to not a little blasphemy. The aver- age European is a little free in his use of the name of the Deity, but there is noth- ing so wholly abhorrent about (for exam- ple) the Frenchmans Mon Dieu! as the unction with which a rough American will pour forth indecency and blasphemy in conjunction. Alas for innocent Miss Stricklands comfortable theory that since blasphe- my is neither a want nor a luxury, it presents after all small temptation to human nature, howsoever personally dis- posed! Miss Strickland lived all her days among refined people, and knew nothing absolutely nothing of the needs and capacities of an unrestrained democracy. And those people who regard the progeny of the slaves who were eman- cipated barely a score of years ago as the mildest, worst-used, and most gentle race under the sun, should dwell for a few months or years in the South, and then see how they would appear to them. If a wicked Northerner at his worst swears in the coml)arative degree, an excited nig. ger, though a church-goer, and the virtu- ous husband of but one wife, will swear freely in the superlative degree. Nor is it at all uncommon to hear the I)eitys name used from the pulpit of the conven- tide of the colored people in a decidedly profane manner. Truly, as it has been said, nothing fails in this extraordinary country, except the strangers old-fash- ioned notions of political economy. Every one may be supposed to know that America is the country, par excel- lence, which does justice to its ~voinen. The French are civil enough to their women, but the Americans claim, and with reason, to treat them as a superior class. They may be termed the aristocracy of the States. From the city shopman, with his respectful notice, Boys and misses hats, to the president himself, every one is imbued with the spirit of chivalry from sex to sex. The wonder is that American ladies are not more self-consequential than they are, which is saying not a little. But it n~ust be acknowledged that there are in the States an extraordinary number of the sex who respond to Stuart Mills test for a clever woman in other words, who pos- sess strong intuition and sensibility to the present, and are quick of apprehension. Another characteristic of American life AMERICAN MANNERS. is the hurry of it. Alike in the heart of New York in Broadway and on its ferry. boats, morning or evening, on its overhead railway and in the yet grassy streets of Todayville, every one is driven by a de- mon of impatience to live feverishly for the present and in the coming future. Re~t there is none, except for the crip- pled; and hardly have the others time for a word of pity to these. And when a man dies, it is more than probable he will be galloped to the grave. The writer chanced to see the funeral of an opulent merchant at the beautiful cemetery of Greenwood, overlooking the bay of New York. Thirty coaches followed the body; and the coaches, driven by men in white hats, drawn by horses of all colors, were filled with a number of gaily dressed chatterers, some holding bouquets, and all in excel- lent good humor. But it was a spirited spectacle to see the coaches, one after another, break into a brisk trot after the hearse, when this had entered the ceme- tery precincts. Later, a man in a blouse, with a spade over his shoulder, led the procession to the grave, and the sumptu- ous velvet-covered coffin having been en- cased in a common white box, this impor- tant and far from unassuming functionary completed the ceremony of burial. Then, with much glib conversation, the mourn- ers hurried back to their coaches, and these hurried back into the city. Again, in foreign travelling, the American gives himself little rest and time for reflection; his experiences have ultimately to shake themselves into shape how they may. Similarly, at his meals, the average Amer- ican eats like a mere animal ; he sits down to his dinner of half-a-dozen messes and viands on separate plates, and neither speaks nor lifts his head until the plates are cleared; and then, perchance, he scampers for his train. No wonder quacks, with digestive cures, flourish in all the large American cities. And small won- d~er that in an analytical list of fatal casu- alties throughout the Union, we meet with such a heading as Choked by tough beefso many. It is really appalling to consider how the happiness of lives is wholly neutral- ized by this spirit of unrest which rules tyrannically in the States. The laws of behavior yield to the energy of the indi- vidual, says Emerson; and, of a truth, the maw of individual energy in his coun- try-men is lamentably capacious. The same writer says, further: The men we see are whipped through the world; they are harried, wrinkled, anxious; they all seem the hacks of some invisible riders. How seldom do we behold tranquillity! - . There are no divine persons with us, and the multitude do not hasten to be divine No; but l)erhaps one may be pardoned for adding that they hasten to be everything else. Emerson, the philo- sophic and placid thinker, has many ad- mirers among the Americans, but few followers. Even the pulpit not only catches the impelling spirit of the times, but makes the restless man yet less rest- ful by such words as these (heard from Talmage at the great Brooklyn Taber- nacle): Religion accelerates business, sharpens mens wits, sweetens acerbity of disposition, fillips the blood of phlegmat- ics, and throws more velocity into the wheels of hard work. One may almost beihankful that this onomatopcetic defi- nition is not applicable on this side the Atlantic. At times, however, this energy leads a man into difficulties he would surely have avoided by a little sober, judicious thought. D~mocratie et libert~ ne sont pas syno- nymes, said De Cousin. A tombstone in a St. Louis burying-ground, not long ago, bore these words: Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let me hide myself in thee. Drowned by Philander Bailey and Mark Beggs. One might suppose that in America the ~vill of a dead man in so simple and un- aggressive a matter as his epitaph would be uncontested. Not so, however. For Messrs. Bailey and Beggs sued the exec- utors of the defunct, and got the really handsome award of eight hundred dollars compensation. Of the intolerable little precocities in the States called children one may say something, though little or nothing in praise of them. Wherever they are, they make theirpresence tobe seen and heard, and it is but just that they should weary their fond parents rather more than they weary the rest of the ~vorld that touches them. Spoiled, of course, they are; and bitterly, no doubt, do they have to pay for their spoiling in such a rough school as that of American life in manhood. But none the less do they, when parents in their turn, bring up precocities, and go through the same process, the effects of which they have spent bitter years in combating. The sister to Sir John Haw- kins, one of Johnsons biographers, in her Book of Anecdotes, gives an example of parental injudiciousness and its conse- quence which we may quote as typical of 5 52 AMERICAN MANNERS. infant life in the States. The sister of an important statesman of the last cen- tury, says Miss Hawkins, heard a boy, humored to excess, tease his mother for the remains of a favorite dish. Mamma at length replied Then do take it, and have done teasing me. H ereupon, how- ever, the boy flew into a passion, roaring out: What did you give it me for? I wanted to have snatched it. Frequently in the dining saloons of very respectable hotels the clamor of little peevish rogues of seven and eight is such as to make all other conversation an effort or an impos- sibility; and the ~vorst of it is that this kind of thing is condoned, not condemned. Take that right away, now, cries the Northern boy, pointing to a basin of por- ridge. And the obsequious darkey ob- sequious to children more particularly, thanks to his traditions of servitude says Yes, sar, deferentially, and lays quick hands on the steaming stuff. Here, P11 have it after all, 1 ~vill. Bring it back, will you? shouts the boy when the man is just disappearing through the door. No one of the fifty other guests heeds this little domestic drama of conduct. Mam- ma and papa smile approval, and. with another humble Yes, sar, and a flash of his white teeth, the humbugged nigger replaces the porridge, and stands aside with clasped hands to see the young gen- tleman enjoy himself. Nor is this humoring of children con fined to the richer classes. When in Jacksonville, Florida, for a week, the writer used to dine and breakfast at a small restaurant adjoining his own house. This restaurant was kept by a yellow man and his wife; yellow, understand being the sobriquet for a nigger once or twice removed towards the white race. These people had one child, a fat boy of four, not quite so sallow as his parents, and the joy of their hearts~ The mother, a pretty woman, like many other of the so-called yellow women, could not at- tend on her guest unaccompanied by her young treasure, and when this wilful little rascal took it into his abnormally large head to fancy anything on this or that plate, without scruple or apology he had to be satisfied at the writers expense. Moreover, when his mother was busy, and his father away, the boy was turned loose to amuse himself, and, as often as not, he ~vould stand by the saloon door for minutes at a time, with his thumb in his mouth, staring in a way fit to haunt a menber of the Psychical Society for months; nor would he heed coaxings, counsel, or threats until, with a sudden whoop, he would turn his back and run down the passage screaming Mammy! at the top of his vigorous voice. And mammy was as rational in most things as she was pretty. She would not blame the child for whooping, but by main force, would sometimes tug the young monsfer back into the writers presence, and tell him he must get accustomed to the gen- tleman. The gentleman, you see, was to have no voice in the matter,so long as the childs wellbeing was assured. One more instance of the outward ex- pression of the spirit of bullyism which is so peculiarly prevalent in the Northern States; a grotesque example, but taken from the life. In one of the lesser streets of the old part of New York City, a bar- bers shop may be seen bearing a terrible signboard. On this board is depicted a helpless customer imprisoned in a shav- ing-chair, and over him is a fiendish bar- ber flourishing despotically a huge razor, vhile from his mouth proceeds a scroll, on wl)icl) these ~vords are written : Dont have much to say, or Ill shave you ~vith- out soap. The drift of this eccentric advertisement is not apparent. Person- ally, one would rather be shaved else- where. But this sign board is a most happy epitome of Yankee character. As for the inward significance of this same spirit of bullyis in, we cannot do better than quote once more the man who, though a recluse, probably knew his coun- trymen better than a stranger may pretend to know them. Says Emerson: Every man is actually weak, and apparently strong. To himself he seems weak; to others, formidable. You are afraid of Grim, but Grim also is afraid of you. You are solicitous of the good-will of the meanest person, uneasy at his ill-will. But the sturdiest offender of your peace and of the neighborhood, if you rip up his claims, is as thin and timid as any, and the peace of society is often kept, because,, as children say, one is afraid, and the other dares not. Far off, men swell, bully, and threaten; bring them hand to hand, and they are a feeble folk. There is truth here, but not, maybe, the whole truth. One must go to the heart to dis- cern the real root of the matter, it seems to us. The defiant independence, uni- versal in the States, is due to an internal disease rather than to a mere malignant excrescence: it is vital, not superficial. The determination not to acknowledge an indebtedness to any one may indeed, on the surface, have something to ecom mend it to the social philosopher. But .only on the surface, we think. For just as it is by courtesy and kindness, and little else besides courtesy and kindness, that life outside the home is sweetened, so it is a prodigious mistake to suppose there is anything majestic or laudable in an exist- ence of absolute and unbending indepen- dence. The effort of striving to live gregariously in a state of severe spiritual isolation is hardening in the extreme. Gentleness of manners dies out as a mat ter of course. And gentleness of man- ners, though by no means an infallible index, may well be taken as indicative of kindness of heart. For the times will not admit of the growth of a number of Lord Chesterfields. Remove kindness of heart, or, rather, harden the heart so that it becomes impervious to all influences save those of self-interest, and the man is trans formed, degraded into an animal. An animal, possibly, of noble parts, of much mechanical genius, and with a large apti- tude for absorbing such sensual sweets as a high state of civilization and much wealth of silver and gold may put within his reach, but none the less an animal solely. It is by the heart that the animal part of us becomes transfigured into the human, the superhuman, and even the divine, and by the heart alone. - The art of pleasing, says Johnson, like others, is cultivated in proportion to its usefulness, and will always flourish most where it is most rewarded for this reason we find it practised with great assiduity under ab- solute governments. Johnson himself did not practise this art himself with much success, nor did he attempt to practise it; for this reason, if for no other, he is an authority on it, both in its cause and effect. If his dictum be accepted, we may affirm at once that the art of pleasing courtesy or kindliness will never be included in the curriculum of the life of ninety per cent. of the Americans. XVe have already referred to Matthew Arnold, and his bold criticism of the peo pIe whom he visited and lectured a couple of years ago. And we cannot end this paper better than with a single sentence from the lecture on Numbers delivered by him at Boston during his tour. It is the outcome of a great mind touching a great people, and none will question its truth - I suppose, says Mr. Arnold, that in a democratic community like this, with its industrialism and its sheer freedom and ~equalitY~ the danger is in the absence of 53 the discipline of obedience, the discipline of respect, in the prevalence of a false acuteness, a fable smartness, a false au- daci ty. Exactly; Mr. Arnold discerns the un- worthy characteristics of our half-brethren, and impales them on the needle of his criticism unerringly. From Longmans Magazine. A COUNTRY VtLLAGE tN THE BEGtNNtNG OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. ABOUT four miles from Maidenhead Station, on the Great Western Railway, there lies a little village, so retired that even a traveller on the road hard by might pass it unnoticed, unless his eye caught the top of a tapering spire just rising above the large forest trees by which it is surrounded. But for that spire he would certainly suppose that no parish could intervene between the two Walthams White Waltham on the east, and Waltham St. Lawrence on the west. But to stu- dents of the history of England during the period of the later Stuarts, the name of Shottesbrook * will be much more fa- miliar than that of its neighbor on either side. For Shottesbrook has much his- torical interest in connection with that exciting time when men were divided in opinion as to who should hold the sceptre of this mighty kingdom; when wire-drawn distinctions were made between kings de lure and kings defacto; when some were Jacobites and some were Williamites; some supporters of a king in possession, some of a king over the water; some advocates of a divine, hereditary right, others of a Parliamentary title. it is dif- ficult for us to realize now this state of affairs; for, whatever our politics may be, we are pretty ~vell agreed upon one point that the throne of our gracious queen is firmly established, and that any dispute about that must be relegated to a very dim and distant future indeed. The little village of Shottesbrook, with its pop- ulation of hardly more than a hundred, represents in miniature these disputes. The preponderance of opinion at Shottes- brook was decidedly in favor of the king over the water; and I am inclined to think that this was the case in most country districts. Only it was of no use to quarrel $ In the time of the Stuarts it was atways spelt Shottesbrooke, but the ~e is now dropped. A VILLAGE IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. 54 A COUNTRY VILLAGE IN THE BEGINNING with the master of twenty legions, so men sulkily acquiesced in what it would have been fruitless to attempt to resist. The general state of feeling was wittily summed up in these once-familiar lines : God bless the King, our holy faiths defender; God bless the King, and drive out the Pre- tender, Which the Pretender is, and which the King, God bless my soul, thats quite another thing! The lines were written a few years later, when George L was on the throne, but they are at least as applicable to the time we are speaking of, when William III. was reigning. The reason why Shottes- brook comes promptly forward in this con- nection is because the lord of the manor and owner of all the land was a staunch Jacobite, and a kind and sumptuous en- tertainer of all distressed jacobites who sought the shelter of his ample and hospitable roof. But before we speak of the inhabitants, let us cast a glance upon the place itself, which is obviously but little altered since the beginning of the last century. In the midst of a lovely park, full of noble forest trees, lie the church and hall of Shottesbrook. There is no village worth speaking of; only the gardeners house, and at a little distance the manor farm. What village there is is blended with Waltham. The Hall is a fine Elizabethan structure; the church belongs to the fourteenth century. it is cruciform a real Greek cross, with nave, transepts, and chancel apparently (I did not measure them) of the same length. The singularly graceful spire, one hundred and forty feet in height from the ground, is in the centre. The body of the church is built of flint, and is a fine piece of masonry. The structure inside is sin- gularly interesting the joy of architects and antiquaries. It is full of brasses still intact, and in the north transept is a can- opied tomb of the founder; or, rather, two tombs, one of the founder, the other of his wife. It must strike the stranger as a difficulty why such a church was built in such a place. The two neighboring vil- lages White Waltham and Waltham St. Lawrencehave each its church. Why build this church in the wilderness or rather in the forest garden, for it is any- thing but a wilderness, except in point of solitude? Let us hear what the Reve- lations of Peter Brown a modern book, but now out of print have to tell us of the matter. St. Johns of Shottes- brook: a Berkshire Legend, is the title, and it begins: Shottcsbrooke Church is near Shottesbrooke Hall; The house rather great and the church rather small. (The church by the way, is only small com- paratively; it would certainly hold more than the whole population of Shottes. brook.) But a gem of a church in its way, all the while; A cathedral in miniature, Gothic in style, With choir and with transept, with nave and with aisle. (It has no aisles, by the way.) And tower and steeple built in the diagonal The former is square, and the latter octago- nal And tapering and graceful, and wonderously tall, With a weathercock perched on the top of a ball. This church of the Baptist is built in the cruci- form, And Im free to confess that, if I were to choose a form For my own delectation And edification, Severe, and yet graceful, expanded, not loose of form, To rear up a church to some saint, I would use a form Just the same in its style As the quaint little pile, With its calm, holy look, In that elm-sheltered nook, The church of the Baptist, Saint Johns, Shottesbrooke. Then the legend goes on to show how Sir William de Trussell, a worthy old knight, the lord of Shottesbrook in the fourteenth century, was addicted to drink- ing; how on one occasion he nearlydrank himself into his grave; how by taking water drenches and water stupes, water gruel and water soups, he recovered, to the amazement of all ; how his wife, a pious lady, so troubled his conscience and tortured his soul, that on his re- covery An oath he sware To his lady fair By the cross on my shield A church Ill build! And therefore the deuce a form Is so fit as the cruciform; And the patron saint that I find the aptest Is that holiest water-saint John the Baptist. Now follows the saddest part of the story. The village blacksmith volunteered to place the vane on the steeple if he might drink the kings health in a pot of beer when he reached the top. He reached the top, drank his beer, lost his balance, OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. 55 fell down headlong, and died uttering the exclamation 0, 0 They buried the smith on the spot where he fell, With prayer of priest and toll of bell; Over his body they placed a stone, And carved, in memory of his moan, Upon the slab two large round 0s, Which the bald-headed sexton shows To any stray peripatetic thats willing To look at the church and to give him a shil- ling. They pointed out the slab to me, but I must honestly confess that I could not trace the two round 0s. Sir William Trussell has clearly been libelled in this legend. Hearne took a transcript of the original documents respecting the church and college (or religious house) of Shottes- brook, and from them, he says, it plainly appears that Sir William Trussell himself was sole founder, without mention of his wife, as joyntly concerned, he being at that time, I believe, unmarried. There had also been a church tho far less decent and beautiful, long before Sir XVilliam Trussells time; so the whole story of the water-saint~~ and Sir Wil- liams drinking-bout is happily apocryphal. As to the last part of the legend, Hearnes account (which on such a point is mani- festly to be trusted) runs thus: Tis a common report amongst the inhabitants of the Parish and others thereabouts that tis the very stone that was laid over the Architects [not the smiths] grave that built the church and spire in the time of KingEdward III. Theysay(anditis a constant Tradition) having either laid the last stone of the spire, or else fixed the Weathercock, he calld for some wine or ale on purpose to drink the Kings health; which being brought to him, he had no sooner drunk it but he accidentally fell down, was dashd in pieces, and after- wards buried under the spire with this rough stone over his grave. He makes no mention of the two round 0s, but says: Tis a plain free-stone, without any Inscription, or the least memorial to signify to Posterity either who was buried under it, or the misfortune that had be- fallen the person over whom it was placd. In those days they were not so forward and ready to write encomiums upon the dead. They thought Flattery a very great crime (as without doubt it is), and that the plainer sepulchral monuments are, so much the more sincere tokens of real sor- row they carry with them. If the church is interesting, so is the churchyard. There is a noble old yew- tree, with an enormous bole on the north side of the porch, which is said to be of the same age as the church that is, up- wards of five hundred years old and under this yew-tree the tomb of a departed rector, Dr. William Vansittart (the family name of the present owner of Shottes- brook), who is described as~having been incumbent during forty years (18071847) of White Waltham with Shottesbrook: The faithful pastor of an attached flock. In his parochial ministrations, meek, mild and benevolent, in domestic life tender, kind, considerate; in all relations, re- vered, respected, beloved. Epitaphs are not to be trusted implicitly; but I believe that in those days, which are supposed to have been the sleepiest days of the Church, there were many good clergy, not perhaps so active as in our own busy time, but quietly living and working among their people, and much respected by them; and let us charitably hope that Dr. Van- sittart was one of them. But there are two much more curious epitaphs on two earlier rectors, now affixed to the west wall of the churchyard, re- moved thither from the church. One is called the epitaph of the sinner, the other the epitaph of the saint. Both are in ex- cellent Latin. Good Latin was much more general in the eighteenth century than it is now. The sinners epitaph runs: Infra depositum quicquid mnor- tale fuit Edmundi Stephen, Hujus Ec- clesim immeriti pastoris, qui sui gregisque rationem redditurus hinc decessit sexto die Januarii, 1722, ~tat. 48. That is: Below is laid all that was mortal of Ed- mund Stephen, the unworthy pastor of this church, who departed hence to give an account of himself and of his flock on the 6th day of January, 1722, aged 48. The saints runs: Samuel Lindsey, Hujus Ecclesi~ per aliquot annosfidelis rector, obiit annosalutis 1745, ~tatis 62. That is: Samuel Lindsey, the faithful rector of this church for several years, died in the year of Salvation, 1745, of his age, 62. I like the sinners epitaph best. It is time to pass on from the place to the inhabitants of Shottesbrook at the beginning of the eighteenth century. The first who claims our attention is Mr. Fran- cis Cherry, the lord of the manor, and resident at Shottesbrook Hall. He was an excellent specimen of the English coun- try gentleman a thorough sportsman, one of the best riders in the county, but not a mere Nimrod. He had received a university education, having been a gen- tleman commoner of St. Edmund Hall, A COUNTRY VILLAGE IN THE BEGINNING Oxford, and all through his life took a Eminent Virtues and singular Learning, deep and intelligent interest in theology, and who has upon account of his great general literature, the fine arts, and poli. Prudence, Affability, and wonderful Hu- tics. He was an excellent classical inanity the good word of all acquainted scholar, and drew up a chronology of. with him. And here I must protest Herodotus, which is said by an unim- against the popular opinion about country peachable authority (Mr. Dodwell)to have gentlemen of the seventeenth and eigh- been done very ~vell, but it was never teenth centuries. I do not believe that published. He was a virtuoso, and loved they were all, or nearly all, the mere pon- to collect rare manuscripts, medals, and derous masses of beefsteak that they have coins, a taste which his ample fortune al- been represented. Of course there were lowed him to induVe H learned men . e was fond of such; but there were Squire Aliworthys having about him, and this, as well as Squire Westerns, and Mr. combined with his strong sympathy with Cherry was by no means an exceptional the Jacobites, was the reason why Shottes- instance of the former class indeed, we brook is a name which has emerged from shall meet with others even in the small obscurity, for he loved to fill his house group at Shottesbrook. with distressed nonjurors, ~vho could not Mr. Cherry, however, was not without conscientiously take the oaths of alle- his strong prejudices, if there be any truth giance to the new sovereigns, William in the following anecdote: Shottesbrook is and Mary, especially those who were noted only about six miles from Windsor; and for learning and piety. For Mr. Cherry then, as now, his or her Majestys stag. was a pious as well as a learned man, hounds frequently met both in Shottes. strictly honorable and high . minded, brook Park itself and in the immediate That probably is the reason ~vhy Shottes- neighborhood. Mr. Cherry, as has been brook, though a nest of Jacobites, was said, was a famous horseman, and very never connected with any of the plots, real fond of hunting; so also was King Nil. or imaginary, to restore James II. or his ham III. The two wereasortof rivals as son to the throne. There is a tradition riders, and it is said that Mr. Cherry that Mr. Cherry impaired his fortunes by would risk his life at the most difficult his extreme hospitality to the nonjurors, leaps, for the chance that the king (or, as but it is only a tradition. Hearne, how- he would have called him, the usurper) ever, hints something of the sort, and would follow him and break his neck. more than hints that his concern for pub- This truculent feeling is singularly unlike hic affairs hastened his end. For in his the general amiability of character which diary this entry occurs : August ii, 1715: is attributed to Mr. Cherry on all hands. Mr. Cherry of Berks (I mean my great But really one can believe almost anything friend, Mr. Francis Cherry) died in the of the animosity which was felt even by forty-eighth year of his age, which was men who were full of the milk of human the same age that King Charles I. died kindness against the hook nosed Dutch. in. Observe, as a curious instance of the man. They had secret signs among enthusiastic royalist feeling that was then themselves by which they showed their very prevalent, how this is recorded, cvi- abhorrence of the Prince of Orange, den tly as if it were a sort of honor even for they would never recognize him as to have died at the same age as the royal king of England. They would squeeze martyr died in. I remember, Hearne an orange savagely, with a meaning look goes on, that his (Mr. Cherrys) afflictions at their friends, to show that was the way had made a strange alteration both in his they would like to treat another Oranges hair (though he wore a wig), and in his head; they would drink to the health of countenance, though before he had been the little gentleman in black, i.e., the mole a very brisk, vigorous man. Nor did he that built the hill over which Williams show any discontent to the last. But he horse fell, and gave his rider his death was in a perfect concern for the good of fall. One preacher is said to have had the nation, and of his family, and twas the brutality to take as the text of his this concern that brought the change sermon upon the death of Queen Mary, (Reliqui~ Hearnian~) Mr. Cherry pos. Go, see to this cursed woman and bury sessed the advantage of a singularly hand- her, for she is a kings daughter. These some and graceful person, and he was so little amenities were not all on one side. universally popular that he was called The mere title of Pretender, which was the idol of Berkshire. Hearne does conferred on James II.s son (for the not exaggerate the reputation of his pa- warming-pan fable was exploded long be. tron when he calls him a Gentleman of fore), was surely a libel, and it was no less incorrect than insulting to call him Perkin, as if he were as undoubtedly an impostor as Perkin Warbeck was. Both in words and in caricatures, the pope, the Pretender, and the devil were coupled to- get her, as if all three stood on the same level. There is not much to choose be- tween Williamite and Jacobite in point of politeness. The accession of Queen Anne somewhat allayed this bitterness; but it naturally did not satisfy a thorough-paced Jacobite like Mr. Cherry. The brother, he would think, not the sister, ~vas the lawful occupant of the throne. Anne, while yet only princess, frequently hunted at Shottesbrook, and being by no means indifferent to a handsome person and agreeable manners, paid great attention to the well-favored and well-bred squire when she met him in the hunting-field, and he, of course, accepted it respectfully; but when the princess became queen he pointedly avoided her, and it is said that the queen, instead of resenting this, point- ed him out to her attendants and said: There goes one of the honestest gentle- men in my dominions. From the squire let us pass to the op- posite end of the social scale. Thomas Hearne was the son of the parish clerk of White Waltham, just outside the palings of Shottesbrook Park. He showed such remarkable aptitude for learning that Mr. Cherry determined to have him taught Latin, and sent him to the free school-of Bray for that purpose. Here he made such rapid progress that Mr. Cherry, on the advice of Mr. Dodwell (of whom I shall speak presently), decided to receive him into his own house and educate him himself, with the help of Mr. Dod- well, for the university. In due time he was sent, at the sole expense of Mr. Cherry, to St. Edmunds Hall, Oxford. Surely this is a pretty picture of a rich country gentleman, not only paying for but actually taking upon himself the edu- cation of a poor village lad. I fancy such instances were more frequent in the sev- enteenth and eighteenth centuries than they are now. One frequently reads of so-and-so being bred a scholar on ac- count of the aptness of his parts through the bounty of such-and-such a gentleman. It is a pity the fashion has gone out. Shottesbrook Park was Thomas Hearnes home all through his undergraduate ca- reer; and when, having declined the offer of the rector of Shottesbrook to procure him a post under Dr. Bray as missionary in Maryland, he finally settled for the rest of his life at Oxford as sub-librarian of 57 the Bodleian, he still continued in con- stant communication with Shottesbrook until Mr. Cherrys death. He amply re- paid Mr. Cherrys kindness by embalming his memory in his most interesting diary (or Collections, as he preferred to call it), which is now being published, more or less in full, by the New Oxford His- torical Society. That delightful work, Reliqui~ Hearnian~, published by Dr. Bliss some years ago, is only a very infin- itesimal, though exceedingly well chosen, extract from the voluminous Collec- tions Hearnes fame as an antiquary, historical student, and classical scholar casts a reflected glory upon the little vil- lage where he was brought up. But it is as a diarist that he is now, and still more will be when the rest of his Collections are given to the world, chiefly known. The diaries are mainly concerned with literary and antiquarian matters, but they gve us incidentally most amusing and in- teresting pictures of contemporary life and manners. Only it should be remembered that his views are so tinctured with parti- sanship that h~s estimate of character must always be taken with the l)roverbial grain of salt. In the Hearnian language an honest man and a Jacobite are synonymous terms, and the most that he will admit of one who took an opposite view is that he was pretty honest consid- ering that he was a complyer. When George I. succeeded Queen Anne, Hearne was more bitter than ever. He writes on May 28th, 1715. This being the Duke of Brunswick, commonly called King Georges, birthday, some of the bells were jambled in Oxford, by the care of some of the Whiggish fanatical crew; but as I did not observe the day in the least myself, so it was little taken notice of (unless by way of ridicule) by other horest people, who are for King James 3, who is the un- doubted king of these kingdoms, and tis heartily wished by them that he may be restored Still more amusing are his comments upon the great musical com- poser, Mr. Handel. Music in this case did not tend to produce harmony. Han- del was a German by birth, and therefore there was a strong party against him. A certain Mr. Bononcini was set up as a rival, and their rivalry is thus described by John Byrom, the Lancashire poet: Some say compared to Bononcini That Mynheer Handels but a ninny; Others aver that he to Handel Is scarcely fit to hold a candle. Strange that such difference should be Twixt Tweedledum and Tweedledee I OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. A COUNTRY VILLAGE IN THE BEGINNING Handel, writes Hearne, and his lousy near his own; and at Shottesbrook Mr. crew a great number of foreign fiddlers Dodwell resided nearly twenty years, till have been here. His book (not worth his death in 1711. Like many great schol- id.) he sells for is. ars, Mr. Dodwell was rather an eccentric Hearnes chief hero is another resident man very careless about his dress and of Shottesbrook, Mr. H. Dodwell. Refer. his health, and to the dismay sometimes ences to the Great Mr. Dodwell with of his friends, fond of broaching in print a capital G) are incessant in the diaries, strange theories, backed up with enor- When a difficulty occurs we frequently mous learning; but a more pure, guile. have, Qucere, ask Mr. Dodwell. He less, humble-minded, unselfish Christian was the greatest scholar in Europe; but, never lived. For multifarious and pro. what exceeds that, his piety and sanctity found learningas scholar, theologian, was beyond compare. One of the great- historian, and antiquary he had few est, and yet one of the humblest, men that equals. His writings, like himself, were the last age hath bred, the celebrated Mr. too eccentric to become standard works; Henry Dodwell: a name that will always but they are a perfect mine of information be mentioned with respect as long as on all sorts of subjects. His style is pure there is any due regard for religion, vir- and luminous, and his arguments most tue, and learn ma There is, of course, a logical and profound. Like many great little pardonable exaggeration in Hearnes men, he was little in stature, and one estimate of his great friend and benefac- might say of him with more truth than tor; for, as we have seen, Dodwell got Goldsmith said of his village schoolmas- him installed at Shottesbrook, and helped ter: to educate him but Henry Dodwell was And still the wonder grew unquestionably a great and very good How one small bead could carry all he knew. man. He was an Irishman by birth, and became a fellow of Trinity College, Dub. The rector of Shottesbrook was a very lin then, as now, a difficult honor to prominent man during the period of our attain. He lost his fellowship, as he de- survey. He was non-resident, but was dined to take holy orders, for this noble brought into close, and often painful, con- reason; he thought he could be a more nection with its principal inhabitants. effective champion of religion as a layman, Dr. White Kennett was a very able and above any suspicion of being interested voluminous writer, and his History of in its defence, than he could be as a cler- England, though one-sided, is still valued gyman; and a layman he continued to be, by historical students. He was presented all his life. He came over to England to the living of Shottesbrook by Mr. Nil. and settled at Oxford, and was made Cam- ham Cherry, the father of our Mr. Francis den professor of ancient history in that Cherry, who was his pupil at St. Edmund university, he being, says Hearne, Hall, and he writes to an Oxford friend then absent, and altogether a stranger to most hopefully about his prospects there. the design. The university pitched upon The church, he says, is good, the him without any previous interest what- Parish small, the Patron resident, and ever, purely out of regard to his merit. the country mighty pleasant. But, alas! But, having conscientious scruples about these bright prospects were soon clouded taking the oaths of allegiance to William over. We soon have another letter (his and Mary, he, of course, lost his profes- letters have never been published, but I sorship. He retired first to a little cell in have seen them in MS. in the British the north suburb of Oxford, and then to Museum) complaining that, in spite of all the beautiful little village of Cookham on his efforts, and they appear to have been the banks of the Thames, about three very laudable, matters did not go on com- miles from Maidenhead, in a different fortably at Shottesbrook. It was hardly direction from Shottesbrook. But he used likely that they should. Mr. Francis daily to walk into Maidenhead to hear the Cherry had recommended him to his news and to learn what new books were father for the living, as one who sympa- being published, and Mr. Cherry~ used to thized more or less with his views; and walk in from Shottesbrook on the same so perhaps he did; for, though he was of errands. So the two gentle men frequently course obliged to comply with the new met, and, being men of kindred spirit, government in order to become rector, he fraternized. They enjoyed one anothers was, like thousands, both of laity and society so much that Mr. Cherry per- clergy, a Jacobite at heart. But he suaded his friend to leave Cookham and changed his opinions, as every man has a come and live at Shottesbrook in a house right to do; only it was unfortunate that OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. 59 the rector of Shottesbrook, of all men in the world, should become a warm partisan of the cause of which all his principal pa. rishioners were equally warm opponents. Our old friend Hearne is perpetually girding at the doctor. He gives a sort of jaundiced biography of him. White Kennett, son of I3asil Kennett, a IKentish Divine, was enterd of Edm. Hall, and sometimes waited on Dr. Wallis to church with his skarlett [i.e., his scarlet doctors gown, which heads of houses have to wear at the university sermon], and wt other offices of a menial servt he might do for him I cannot tell (Qu~re). When Bach. of Arts (I think) he translated Plinys Panegyrick, to ~ch he prefixed a highflown Preface agreeable to ye loyalty of yt time. When Master of Arts he was preferred to Amersden by Sr Win Glyn, who patronizd the said first Performance of his. He became Vice-Principal of Edm. Hall, and all ye while he continued there passd for a High. Churchman: Otherwise he had not had ye Rectory of Shottesbrooke in Berks conferred on him by Mr Cherry. Then he goes on in the same vein to describe his change of opin- ions, and concludes: He makes ye world believe yt he will doe great matters in ye Antient Church History of England; but wisoever he knows of these matters is only ye Gleanings of Dr. Hutton. His history is full of Whiggis m, Trifling, Grubstreet Matter, and base Reflections out of his Way; it is done wth Dr Ken- netts usual unaccuracy, Pride, Injudi- ciousness, and Knavery. Mr Cherry of Shottesbrooke is much dissatisfid ~th him, but being a man who has a great Respect for ye Clergy, and being very cautious of disobliging any one of them (of whatsoever Persuasion) he always ap- pears extraordinarily kind to him, and tho he hates his Principles, yet he takes care to reverence his Person. Others shared Hearnes animosity to Dr. Kennett. He was regarded as a traitor to the cause, and this feeling was shown in a most offensive way. A pulpit was erected in Whitechapel parish church, with figures of the twelve apostles carved upon it. Judas Iscariot was represented exactly like Dr. Kennett, sitting in an elbow-chair, and, to make the likeness more complete, was actually portrayed with a black velvet patch over his eye, such as Dr. Kennett always wore, owing to an accident he met with in his youth. The Bishop of London very properly insisted upon the odious caricature being removed. But there is another side to Dr. Kennetts character; he was not only a very able, well-read man, and a most industrious writer, but he was also a very amiable, kind, and liberalminded man. Nothing could show this more closely than the fact that he entertained, in his rectory at Amersden the learned Dr. Hickes, the nonjuring Dean of Worcester, and that the two agreed to differ, and to meet on the common ground of literature. Dr. Kennett was also one of the earliest and most vigorous and successful advocates of Christian missions, taking a leading part in the establishment of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in For- eign Parts, and working amicably in that noble undertaking with men of widely dif- ferent views. He rose to be first a dean, and then a bishop, and perhaps lived to smile at the troubles be had met with at Shottesbrook. The nonjurors, as a rule, did not wor- ship at their parish churches, because they could not conscientiously join in the prayers for those whom they did not con- sider their rightful sovereigns. Perhaps it was as well that they did not; for when they did, they were ~vont to rise from their hassocks, or be seized with a troublesome cough, when the obnoxious prayers began, which must have been embarrassing to the clergyman, and not very edifying to the congregation. But they had services in their own houses, and a nonjuring cler- gyman to perform them. There was such a clergyman at Shottesbrook Park, main- tained at the joint cost of Mr. Cherry and Mr. Dodwell. His name was Mr. Fran- cis Brokesby, and before the Revolution he held a valuable living near Hull; this he resigned because he could not take the oaths to William and Mary, and thus made a large sacrifice for conscience sake. But his lines fell in pleasant places when he became chaplain at Shottesbrook. Two more delightful patrons than Mr. Cherry and Mr. Dodwell one can scarcely conceive; andall three lived in the utmost harmony. He was a great friend of Robert Nelson, which in itself speaks volumes in his praise, and took the deep- est interest both in Nelsons benevolent and in his literary works. Silver and gold, he ~vrites to Nelson, about the former, have I none; but what I have give I unto thee, my hearty prayers. As to the latter, his friends have actually claimed for him the authorship of the Festivals and Fasts. That is, of course, absurd; but there is no reason to doubt that he and Nelson had many con- sultations about literary matters. Imme 6o STORY OF THE ONE PIONEER OF TIERRA DEL FUEGO. diately after Mr. Dodwells death, Mr. Brokesby wrote his life Hearne speaks very contemptuously of this work: Nov. 30, 1714, Mr. Brokesby, who writ a book that he called Mr. Dodwells Life, dyed suddenly about a- week before said work came out. This gentleman was a learned and honest man, and a general scholar, but not fit to write the life of that great man. It bears a very mean character, he having had very little information, and his remarks being generally very light and trivial. The criticism is not unjust, but the work gives a very favorable idea of the writers simple-hearted piety. Two resi- dents at Shottesbrook, Madam Cherry, as Hearne always terms her with the deep. est respect, the squires wife, and Thomas Cherry, his kinsman, and Hearnes chain- ber.fellow or chum at St. Edmund Hall, and his very dear friend, a gentleman of great beauty, singular modesty, of won- derfull good nature and most excellent principles, who died at the early age of twenty-three, are too shadowy beings to require notice. But besides the residents at Shottes- brook Park there was a constant stream of distinguished visitors. The deprived Bishop Ken, writer of what are emphati. cally the morning and evening hymns, is said to have divided his time between Longleat and Shottesbrook. But this is putting it too strongly; he was a resident at Longleat, only a visitor at Shottesbrook. Robert Nelson, one of a happily numer- ous class in England, the class of Chris. tian and philanthropic laymen, was a con- stant visitor, and an intimate and honored friend of all the group. Charles Leslie, the able writer of the Short Methods against Deists and Jews, and many other exceedingly powerful works, was another of the guests at Shottesbrook Park. In short, it would be difficult to find a coun- try place where so many men, noted for their learning and piety, could be found in the beginning of the eighteenth cen- tury. The utmost harmony seems to have prevailed among them. The one rift in the lute was their temporary inability to worship in their parish church. Happily this one note of discord was removed when Bishop Ken waived his rights, on ihe death of the only other survivor of the deprived bishops. Then Mr. Cherry, Mr. Dodwell, Mr. Nelson, and Mr. Brokesby once more became worshippers at the na- tional altars, and the bells of Shottes- brook rang merrily to welcome their re- turn. The rich halo of romance which sur rounds Jacobitism has naturally made it a favorite subject for the minstrel and the novelist. Most people know something of the Jacobite songs such as The White Cockade, Over the Water to Charlie, Charlie is my Darling, and that most touching one of all, Prince Charlies Lament; and the two greatest novelists of our century, Thackeray, in that wonderfully powerful work, Es- mond, and Sir Walter Scott, in Rob Roy, have depicted the fascination which the cause exercised. Shottesbrook trans- ports us from the airy dreamland of ro- mance and poetry to the solid ground of history; and if it does not present us to such fascinating Jacobites as Di Ver- non and Beatrix Esmond, it shows us some able and honorable men who, with- out in the least sympathizing with those Romanist views ~vhich cost their master his throne, clung to him with desperate tenacity through evil report and good re- port. We may admire their constancy, even if we cannot share their sentiments. P.S. I am indebted to Mrs. and Miss Sharp, of the Cottage, White Waltham, for much local information ; and to both those ladies, and also to the present rector of Shottesbrook, for kindly looking over this article before it went to press. J. H. OVERTON. From The Corohill Magazine. THE STORY OF THE ONE PIONEER OF TIERRA DEL FUEGO. MODERN ideas of unexplored lands are limited almost entirely to the north and south poles, whither costly exl)editions are constantly being despatched; while in South America alone there are the inte- riors of Guiana, Brazil, Patagonia, and Tierra del Fuego, besides smaller patches of only half explored land, all calling for more attention than they have hitherto received. The whole of Brazil has indeed been explored in a superficial sort of way; that is to say, there are certain narrow lines of explored land, chiefly along rivers which intersect the country; but only two people from all the civilized world have ever penetrated beyond the coast of Tierra del Fuego, though the coast itself has been well surveyed, and whalers boats frequently land there for water. One of these two pioneers is a Chilian lady who was shipwrecked on the coast, STORY OF THE ONE PIONEER OF TIERRA DEL FUEGO. and saved alive by the chief of a Fuegan tribe which murdered all her companions. She was seen alive and happy by the other pioneer, a seaman, by name Thomas Tho- rold, who spent nearly six months in the interior of this strange country, and came safe home to England again. It is his story that I propose to tell. Less than six years ago an English sailing ship, homeward bound from Val- paraiso, foundered off the west coast of Tierra del Fuego during the cruel wintry month of July. The crew got into three boats and pulled to the shore, which was not far distant. After rounding a head. land, they found themselves in compara- tively smooth water, surrounded by bare, bleak hills, beneath which there was a broad sandy beach, which would afford them easy landing. But on this beach and about the foot of the hills they saw what above all things they dreaded the signs of the doom they felt must sooner or later be theirs the stunted forms of Fuegan natives, standing and lying about their rude huts and canoes. As soon as the Fuegans espied them, they crowded into their canoes and rowed out towards them, while their shouts brought a multitude of natives to the beach, where they clustered like a flock of vultures hovering over their prey. The Fuegans are a small race, with a dark, copper-colored skin. The men are mostly clad in old vests and trousers that they have acquired from some ship. wrecked crew, or from the steamers pass. ing through the Straits of Magellan; others wear deer or guanaco skins. The women are dressed more simply in a sin- gle garment resembling a poncho, made of some skin; a simple square, wtth a hole in the middle for the head. Their boats have none of the graceful gliding of the North American canoes, but are simply made of pieces of bark or wood clumsily tied together with fibres, and are awkwardly rowed with oars formed of poles with flat pieces of wood tied on to the end. The only manufacture in which these men the lowest type of hu- manity at all excel, is that of barbed spear-heads, which they make with con- siderable skill of an almost transparent sort of flint, very similar to some of the arrow-heads used by the wild Bugr~s of Brazil. These, dipped in poison and fixed on to long wooden shafts,- become dan- gerous weapons for poor weary sailors to face who have nothing to defend them- selves with but oars ~nd stretchers. Before the three doomed boats were within half a mile of the shore, they were surrounded by seven or eight canoes crammed with these gibbering aborigines, before whom the sailors were perfectly helpless, for from a considerable distance the unerring spears came hurtling towards them. The miserable men tried in vain to parry them. One by one they dropped into the bottom of the boat and died in agony, as the fiery venom from the spear- heads coursed through their veins. Suddenly, when there were only two or three left untouched in each of the boats, one of the Fuegans, who seemed to be a chief among them ,gave a shout that made all the others stand motionless, ~vith spears poised in their hands; and he spoke to them in their loud, cracked language for a minute or more ; it seemed years to the helpless men waiting to be killed. At the helm of one of the boats sat the mate, Thomas Thorold, a tall, strong man of about thirty, towards whom the chief pointed several times as he was sJ)eaking. Soon he stopped shouting and gesticulat- ing, and again the spears came whizzing from the strong savage arms. But a change had taken place; the weapons were aimed at all the sailors except Thomas Thorold. He sat there untouched, expecting every moment to receive his death ~vound, and receiving it not. Only he saw his companions dropping one by one, meeting their deaths bravely, as Englishmen are wont to do, but ~vith features tortured into that rigid glare which indicates the height of sup. pressed terror and extreme suspense. When at last the mate was the only liv- ing one left, to his horrortheysurrounded him, bound his hands and feet, and lifted him into one of their canoes. Then they turned towards shore, towing the three boats behind them. Thorold, naturally supposing that they were keeping him for torture, and prefer. ring immediate death to a deferred but more horrible fate, attempted to jump into the sea, or dash out his brains against the sides of the canoe; but they carefully pre- vented him from doing himself any harm. Arrived at the shore, they retired to their huts, leaving him still bound hand and foot upon the beach. This was late in the afternoon, and all that night he lay there helpless, expecting every moment to be carried to the fire or some other torture. But they went about their business, gathering clams and mussels and eating them ra~v, collecting fuel and heaping up the fires, and never 62 STORY OF THE ONE PIONEER OF TIERRA DEL FUEGO. touched their prisoner at all; only they slightest interest, and was unable to relate kept looking towards him, and crowds of many details about them. Most of the little half-naked hideous children stood a work, such as hewing wood and drawing few yards off and gazed at him in awe, water, was done by the women; the men and lean dogs came and snarled and sniffed did very little, but spent their time mostly at him suspiciously. in lying about their huts. Sometimes a The tribe appeared to consist of be- few of them went off in their canoes seal tween one and two hundred, and there hunting, and always returned with one or were several rude huts formed of trees cut two seals; sometimes they went hunting down and stuck close to one another in inland, and returned with a guanaco a the ground, while their branches and species of llama; then they all immediately foliage were tied together and formed an fell upon it, tore it to pieces, and ate it inefficient roof. raw. If a dead seal was washed ashore, Fuegans appear to be insensible to cold, they ate it in the same way, gorging them- for though the climate is as cold or even selves on the putrid blubber and flesh. colder than the extreme north of Scotland, After these disgusting feeds they lay they do not attempt to make comfortable on the ground for hours in a torpor, and huts for themselves, and they wear noth. Thorolcl could easily have stabbed them ing but the light clothing which I have as they lay asleep, but that some of the described. At night, however, most of weaker ones, having been unable to secure them slept by the fires, like dogs on a much of the food, were awake and ready winters night. to cast their spears at him. Moreover, if All that night long Thomas Thorold lay he had killed them all, he would have been bound upon the beach, trembling with no better off. cold and terror, and praying, Lord, now All these weeks he was in a horrible let me die! state of suspense as to why he was being In the early morning he felt that his kept alive and what torture was preparing hour had come, for two or three of the for him, so much so that he was unable to Fuegans came towards him, and one of sleep for terror, until forced into uncon- them had a knife in his hand. But when sciousness by fatigue. they had cut the fibre ropes that bound But on the thirty-eighth day an event him they left him alone again, standing occurred which, although in itself grue- on the beach, free to do what he liked, some and terrifying, put into his heart a It was useless to think of flight, for hope that he might some day return to their eyes were always upon him, and be. the outer world again, and gave him a sides, one man could have done nothing clue as to what was his captors only con- with a boat in the sea outside the bay. ceivable object in preserving him alive. So after a while he obeyed the cravings of It was about noon, on a fine, cold day, nature, and collected mussels and clams when Thorold, standing on the beach and on the shore, as he had seen the natives looking out to sea, saw two whalers boats do; and on this cold food he made a pull round the headland to a distant part wretched breakfast. of the shore, where they proceeded to Thus he spent all that day and all the land and get fresh water. The huts of next thirty-seven days, for he kept a care- the Fuegans were between Thorold and ful count of the time. He ate only the the new-comers, who apparently did not miserable shellfish that he found on the perceive the natives, and ~vere quietly fill. beach, drank water from a torrent that ing their water-casks at a stream flowed down the mountain-side, and slept As Thorold was following his natural by one of the fires, which he boldly ap- impulse to run to them, get into one of proached the first night after they unbound their boats, and make them row away, he him, for he had experienced the cold of was pinioned by three or four strong na- one wintry night, and that was enough. tives. Then a few canoes put out to cut They were neither kind nor unkind to off the boats, should they attempt to es- him, but took no notice of him whatever; cape, and all the rest of the fighting men, they nevei attempted to speak to him, and many of the women, caught up their even by signs, except on one occasion long spears and ran towards their victims. when he wandered too far from them, and To Thorolds surprise, he was made to one of them ran after him and made signs run along with them. The whalers men to him to go back. were intercepted before they got off, and During the leaden-footed days he neces- then it ~vas the old ghastly tale repeated; sarily observed how the natives passed they were shot down to a man with the their time, but he did so without the poisoned spears. All the while the Fue STORY OF THE ONE PIONEER OF TIERRA DEL FUEGO. 63 gans who were holding Thorold made him understand that they wished him to watch what ~vas going on, by gesticulating and pointing towards the slaughter. After it was over they pillaged the dead bodies and the boats of everything they had, and then threw the corpses into the sea. While Thorold was lying awake that night, and brooding over the horrible event, a sudden inspiration came to him that the object of the Fuegans in keeping him alive was to send him back to his people that he might tell them how they would be treated if they came to the land of the Fuegans to declare unending war between themselves and the white world; and though, of course, he never knew for a certainty, yet the way in ~vhich they made him watch the slaughter of the whalers men, and everything that hap- pened before and after, pointed to this explanation of their conduct. From that night his great fear and suspense were mingled with this grain of hope. The next morning the Fuegans col Jected their belongings, which consisted of nothing but spears and knives, a few skins, and some utensils for holding water, and marched inland, taking their prisoner with them. They spent about six hours a day on the march, over difficult mountain passes and down into deep valleys, making fires to sleep by at night, and living on guanacos, which they occasionally shot. Thorold took little interest in observing the nature of the country, but he reported it to be very similar to that seen on the coast bleak mountains, with occasional copses of stunted trees, and all else abso- lutely barren and uncultivated. There is little doubt, however, that it is a treasure- house of mineral wealth, for various ores, including gold, are picked up in plenty on the coast, and there is every indication of coal. If a coal mine was once got into working order here, it would be of inesti- mable value for the coaling of ships alone, as well as for use in South America itself, for coal is at present brought from En- gland at great expense all the way to Monteaideo, and to Sandy Point, in the Straits of Magellan, from the north of Chili. On the fourth day of the march they met another tribe, also on the march, and the two bodies of men fell to fighting at once, as is their invariable custom. After an hours fighting th~re were only about fifty men left of the first tribe ; these sur- rendered, and became prisoners of war to their conquerors, who had also sustained heavy losses. The prisoners, however, did not appear to be regarded as slaves at all, but simply mingled with the victorious tribe. After the battle the prisoners spoke to their captors about Thorold, whom they brought forward, apparently explaining their object in keeping him; and he lived with the new tribe on exactly the same footing as he had done with the old one. Nearly six months Thorold spent in this way, the tribe in which he lived some- times marching for five or six days, and then settling down for several weeks; sometimes they were on the seashore, and then he lived as they did, chiefly on raw mussels and other shellfish; when they were inland he lived on pieces of raw guanaco, which he grabbed along with the others. There is a story current in Chili that the Fuegans, when driven to necessity, first eat their dogs, the only domestic ani- mal which they keep, and when these are all gone, proceed to devour the old women of the tribe. Thorold saw no signs of cannibalism, but this was perhaps because no necessity for it arose. He states that the old women were treated with especial care; and it is doubtful whether this affec- tion arose from the hearts or the stomachs of their grandchildren. Five times he saw a fight with another tribe; in three out of the five his tribe was conquered, and he changed hands, the prisoners always appearing to explain to their captors their object in keeping him. Among the third tribe with which he lived he saw a white woman ; she was the Chilian lady whom I have already men- tioned, and Thorold took the first opportu- nity of going up to her. The Fuegans held him back at first, for they regarded her as a goddess; but at her command they let him approach her. They were unable to converse, for she spoke only Spanish, and he only English; but from that time Thorold ~vas treated by the na- tives with more deference than before. He was never allowed again to approach the Chilian woman, who appeared to be rather ashamed of her situation before him, but he saw her manner of life. She was the wife of the chief, and had appar- ently a large number of children. The natives treated her with the greatest re spect, and cooked meat for her, and made her a more elaborate hut than they made for themselves. Her dress was a mixture of civilization and barbarism. On the whole she appeared satisfied with her strange life. 64 STORY OF THE ONE PIONEER OF TIERRA DEL FUEGO About four weeks after Thorold joined this tribe, another tribe came upon them; there was a fight, and he changed hands. Just before the fight began the Chilian woman went away with a few companions, and he saw her no more. Towards the end of the sixth month the tribe which possessed Thorold reached a place on the seashore which consisted of a bay almost shut in by land. He had often reached a similar place, for there are many bays on that coast with an island facing them. On the morning of the third day after they had reached this spot he was on the beach gathering his usual breakfast of shellfish, when he heard a sound that sent the blood rushing towards his heart. It was the familiar sound of a steamer, and looking up he saw the black smoke float- ing away in the wind. Then he knew that he was on the shore of the Straits of Magellan, and before he had time to consider how to secure his safety he had dropped on the beach in a dead faint, for six months living in horri- ble suspense, without shelter, and with the poorest apology for food, had left him very little of his old strength. On that day the steamer Aconcagua, of the Pacific Steam Navigation Company, bound from Liverpool to Valparaiso, left Sandy Point and was proceeding west- ward through the straits. The bulwarks were crowded with passengers and offi- cers and crew looking out for native ca- noes, for it is the custom of steamers passing through these straits to slow down, unless they are in a great hurry, and interview the natives in their canoes, ending by dropping over the ships side a barrel filled with old clothes and tobacco and other things calculated to please the savage mind. Once or twice a couple of natives have been hoisted on board and shown round the steamer. With awe they gazed at the long saloon, and in hor- ror they fled when they were taken down to the fire-room and a furnace door was suddenly opened at them, reminding them of a crater of one of the volcanoes that gave their land its name of fire. Before the awful adventure of Thorold, all that was known about these strange people was learned in this way, and thus the curious fact was discovered that al- though their near neighbors the Patago- nians will drink all the rum and other fire- water they can lay their hands on, the Fuegans will take no alcohol of any kind, but, when offered it, turn away with the same appearance of disgust that a dog shows under similar circumstances, in this way, among others, showing how low they stand in the scale of humanity. To- bacco, however, they greatly appreciate. On this occasion the passengers of the Aconcagua were not disappointed in their desire to see the natives. Several canoes were shooting out to meet them, and in one of them they saw to their intense sur- prise a white man standing up, and heard him shouting to them in English to stop for Gods sake ! Of course they stopped. The canoes came alongside, and the white man was hauled up on deck without the slightest opposition from the Fuegans, and indeed by their evident desire. On reaching the deck Thorold fainted. He was carried away and attended to by the doctor; and the natives, we may be sure, got a good toll that day. Several barrels were dropped over the ships side, laden with all things that the savages could desire. The rescued man soon recovered suffi- ciently to tell his wonderful story. He was taken to Valparaiso, and thence back again to England in the steamship Gali- cia, as a distressed British seaman. During the first part of the voyage his mental faculties appeared to be a good deal weakened. He would frequently hang over the bulwarks in a sort of stupor, and the doctor ordered any one who saw l)im in this state at once to approach him and touch hiri, and ask him what he was thinking of, until he answered them. And the answer that came at last was always the same I was thinkin of how the faces of my mates looked when them savages was murderinof them. A CORRESPONDENT gives some interesting the surface of the sea to a height of from three particulars to a Norwegian journal of the hab- to six feet, On one occasion the fish formed its of herring jumping out of the water when a mass even with the top of the mast of a frightened. He states that he has observed fishing-boat, viz, about fifteen feet, and had whole shoals of this fish, in their anxiety to part of the same fallen into the boat it would escape when pursued by whales, piled up above doubtless have sunk.

LITTELLS LIVING AGE. Fifth Series, No. 0101 April 10 1886. 5 From Beginning, Volume LIV. ~J.oL, j Vol. CLXIX. CONTENT S. I. THE RELATIONS OF HISTORY AND GEOG- RAPHY. By James Bryce II. AMBROSE MALET ILL IRELAND UNDER HER OWN PARLIAMENT, IV. NEWMAN AND ARNOLD V. A PILGRIMAGE TO SINAI. By Isabella Bird Bishop, author of Unknown Tracks in Japan, A Ladys Ride in the Rocky Mountains, etc. Part III Leisure Hour, VI. REMINISCENCES OF MY LATER LIFE. By Mary Howitt. Part II VII. ABOUT KENSINGTON GORE VIII. DUTCH SKATING-GROUNDS IX. INDIAN DEATH CUSTOMS Contemporary Review,. 7~rnple Bar, National Review,. Contemporary Review, Good Words, Fortn~htly Review, St. 7amess Gazette, Knowledge, 67 77 83 95 III 117 123 126 127 SUNRISE,. DOUBT, POETRY. 661 THE DYING CHRISTIAN, 66 66 PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY BY LIT TELL & CO., BOSTON. TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION. For EIGHT DOLLARS, remitted directly to the Iubliskers, the LIVING AGE will be punctually forwarded for a year,free of poetage. Remittances should he made by bank draft or check, or by post-office money-order, if possible. If neither of these can be procured, the money should be sent in a registered letter. All postmasters are obliged to register letters when requested to do so. Drafts, checks, and money-orders should be made payable to the order of LITTELL & Co. Single Numbers of THE LIVING AGE, xS cents. 66 SUNRISE. LORD, in the clear white starlight how they gleam Those myriad crosses thou hast set to be Guide posts and guardiansfor the heart of me, That quails, and cowers, as some faint moon- beam Lightens their pallid faces, till they seem Frowning and fierce! 0 Lord look piteously From thy far heaven as once from Calvary, On me who struggle thro lifes anguished dream! Sudden the starlight waneth wan, and dead, The moon a blown rose-petal, faint and white; And, lo! the dawn with fair gold flowers and red Hath filled the empty skies, and one bedight With sunshine for a garment, standeth nigh, Child, where mine hand sets crosses there am I Month. EVELYN PYNE. DOUBT. WHERE is it leading us, this sad procession Of veiled hours and weeks, all grim and grey? The summer dies in autumns chill embraces, Then winter calls drear autumn-time away; Till spring days come, all redolent with flowers, Once inure to mock us with their brief, bright smile, And summer comes but once again to vanish, For all the seasons last so short a while. But whither do they take us in their passing? Eyes ~vax but dim, hearts beat a slower tone; Hands fail to do the work that seems so press. lug Tis winter time, eer we have welcomed J one. We cannot stay them, passing ever passing Een though our lives wax shorter as they go, Although we tremble at the gathering shadows, That wait around, and hide what none may know. Of life, sad life, I did not ask thy dower, I did not take on me thy weary pain; Thy pleasures never were by me demanded, And having lived, I would not live again. Still woold I fain be given wider knowledge, See clear and fair, not darkly through a glass, Made darker yet to sight dimmed oft by cry- ing, So dim I cannot see the way I pass! There is no sunshine here without a shadow, No smile that has not its swift following tear, No bliss that is not paid for by a sorrow, That casts before its shade of mortal fear. SUNRISE, ETC. Is there no land, oh, life, where we are happy, Safe in the knowledge that our blessings are; That love is real; lifes best joys unending Beyond the horrors of some judgment bar? None answer, for the shadows grim and dreary Are silent with the silence of the dead The dead, that are so quiet, safe, untroubled, Not knowing aught, within their churchyard bed! Oh, can it be that all our lives but lead us, To share the silence where past ages sleep; That Life himself doth yield our only harvest, And what we sow, we here alone may reap All The Year Round. THE DYING CHRISTIAN. Quentends-je? Autour de mol lairain sacr~ re sonne? Da LAMARTINE. I. WHAT sounds are these? Why tolls that solemn bell? What sobs, what prayers of mourners do I hear? What mean those tapers pale, that chanted knell? Dost thou, 0 Death, thus whisper in mine ear For the last time? On the graves brink I break My earthly slumbers; and to life awake! 2. Soul, spark most precious of a flame divine, Immortal dweller in a frame that dies, Hush these alarms: for freedom shall be thine. Break from thy fetters: on thy wings arise To quit the load of mortal misery, Is that, 0 timid soul ! is that to die? 3. Yes, Time hath ceased my hours and days to tell. Ye sun-orbed heralds, in what mansions bright Will your high guidance usher me to dwell? Een now, een now, I bathe in floods of light, The earth beneath me flees, before my face Unfolds the infinite expanse of space. 4. But hark! what vain laments, what choking sighs, At this last moment agitate my sense? Comrades in exile, why should dirges rise For him who homeward now is passing hence? You weep! While I, by Heaven absolved and blest, Enter with joy the port of halcyon rest! Blackwoods Magazine. J. P. M. THE RELATIONS OF HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY. From The Contemporary Review. THE RELATIONS OF HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY.* BY JAMES BRYCE. THE subject of which I have to treat a subject so large that I shall not be ex- pected to do more than touch on a few of its salient features is the relation which ought to exist between the study and the teaching of history and the study of ge- ography; what are the points in which chiefly these two subjects touch one an- other; what is the kind of geographical knowledge which the teacher of history ought to possess in order to make his his- torical teaching as exact and complete, as philosophical and suggestive, as possible~ I will attempt to indicate some of the points where geography and history touch one another, and to show from what sort of treatment of geography it is that light may be thrown on the progress and life of nations and of States. Geography is as a meeting-point be- tween the sciences of nature and the sci- ences of man. I do not say it is the only meeting-point, for there are others; but it is one of the most conspicuous and impor- tant, for geography has to look upon man as being a natural growth that is to say, a part of nature, a part of the physical world who is conditioned in his devel- opment and progress by the forces which nature brings to bear upon him. In other words, he is in history the creature of his environment, not altogether its creature, but working out also those inner forces which he possesses as a rational and moral being; but on one side, at all events, he is largely determined and influenced by the environment of nature. Now, this environment is not everywhere in nature the same. There are certain elements of environment which belong to the whole world, and affect all its inhabitants, but there are others in which different coun- tries and different parts of a country dif- fer; and it is in discovering the varying effects produced on the growth of man as a social and political, a wealth-acquiring and State-forming creature, by the geo * An address delivered to the Royal Geographical Society on January 19, i886, in the rooms of their Geographical Exhihition. 67 graphical surroundings in which he is placed, that we find the meeting-point of geography and history. If we were study- ing zoology and investigating the history and peculiarities of any species of animal, we could not do so apart from a knowl- edge of the country which it inhabits and the kind of life which the character of that country compels it to lead. In the same way, if we look at man as a part of animate nature, we must have the same regard to the forces nature brings to bear upon him, and the opportunities nature holds out to him. Of course, in the case of man, the problem is far more complex and interest- ing than in the case of any other creature, because man is a more varied and intricate being, with his activities more multiform, and because these activities have been continually expanding themselves and es- tablishing fresh relations between himself and the rest of the world. Therefore the study of man in nature is far more vast and difficult than the study of other tyl)es of life. Yet even man, although he may lift himself above his environment, cannot altogether escape from its power. He must obey it; suiting himself to the condi- tions and to the influences in and through which the environment plays upon him. We may divide these influences of the environment under three heads or groups. The first will include those due to the configuration of the earths surface; that is to say, to the distribution of land and sea, the arrangement of mountain chains, table-lands, and valleys, the existence of rivers and the basins which they drain. These features of the configuration of the earths surface act upon man in a great variety of ways. I will endeavor pres- ently to illustrate some of them, but for the moment it may be enough to say that in early times it is they which determine the directions in which races move,* the spots in which civilization first develops itself, the barriers which separate races * Sir J. D. Hooker made kArotos of ttsis the inter- esting remark that some of the lowest and apparently oldest of the races of man are found at the extremities of the continents, to which they would seem to have heen pressed down hy more vigorous tribes. Thus the Bostsmen are at the southern end of Africa, the Foe gians of South America, the Tasmanians of the Asiatic Atistralian group of lands, the Veddaha of Ceylon at the southern extremity of Asia. 68 THE RELATIONS OF HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY. and States from one another. Upon them depend, in more advanced periods, the frequency and ease with which communi- cation takes place between two races or political communities. The configurations of land and sea are, of course, the domi- nant factors in fixing the lines which com- merce takes. Even if we come down to such a minor point as the character which the structure of the land gives to the coast, we remark that it depends on this structure whether there are many ports and harbors or not. In Norway, for in- stance, one perceives that a mountainous land, raised at a very remote geological epoch, has caused the coast to assume its present highly indented form, and has fringed it with a line of sheltering islands. Hence an abundance of safe ports and inlets giving opportunities for the growth of a seafaring people, who at one time became famous for piracy, at another wealthy by their mercantile marine. Com- pare such conditions with those of coun- tries where the want of harbors makes it difficult for the people to turn to account the advantages which the sea offers them. A second class of environment influ- ences would be those belonging to meteor- ology and climate, meaning thereby the conditions of heat and cold under which a race of men develops itself, with the amount of rain and frequency of drought. Such influences tell upon the strength and stature, as well as upon the health, of a race. There are also the winds, whose importance is not confined to commerce, but powerfully affects climate also. Heat and cold make all the difference to the kind of life which primitive man leads. Rain and drought are prime factors as re- gards the fertility of a country, its products and the habits of life of the people who dwell in it; for instance, a race will be- come settled and agricultural in a well- watered country, while remaining nomads in one subject to extreme droughts; and all the influences that bear on the healthi- ness of the people of a particular country have an immense deal to do with the degree of civilization which the population attains, and the capacity of the territory to become the home of immigrants from other regions. I may, perhaps, tell you of a remark I once heard on the subject from the most illustrious patriarch of mod- ern science. The last time I saw Mr. Darwin, shortly before his death, but when he was apparently in good health, the conversation happened to turn on the parts of the earth which still remain avail- able for occupation by civilized man; and it was remarked that as North America was now nearly filled up, it was not to be expected that there would be in any other region an equally great development of civilized nations, since such comparatively thinly peopled regions as exist in central Africa and South America suffer from the prevalence of malarial fever and other maladies incident to hot and moist cli- mates. Mr. Darwin observed that this might depend on the progress of medical science, that it was quite possible discov- eries might be made in medical science which would render tropical countries less dangerous to the white races, referring to the researches of M. Pasteur, and the probability that that line of medical re- search might be worked out much fur- ther by discovering methods of inocu- lation which would preserve the human body against the attacks of intermittent fevers. Any one can see how important a factor in the future of the human race, is the circumstance that nearly all the regions w hich can be inhabited by civil- ized European man, with our present knowledge of medicine, are fast being occupied, and that some further discovery in medical science or change in modes of life will be necessary if the equatorial regions are to become available for Euro- pean immigration. We may, I think, put into the third class of influences of environment the products which a country offers to human industry. There are its mineral products, which be- come valuable by mining, or digging for sulphur and gypsum, or quarrying build- ing-stone. It is worth observing that you may classify countries and parts of coun- tries according as they are stone-building or brick-building regions, and you will be surprised to find the difference in archi- tecture between the two. If you travel across Italy from east to west, for in- stance, you constantly get out of brick and THE RELATIONS OF HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY. 69 into stone regions as you enter the moun- tains, and you find the character of the cities alters immediately. In civilized States, the products of a country obtain their chief importance as determining the extent and nature of its commerce. But in primitive times they affect the type of the race itself through the primary neces- saries of life, such as food, clothing, fuel. A race, however naturally vigorous, which finds itself in a country where the severity of the climate or sterility of the soil limits production, will find its progress in the arts and refinements of life fatally re- stricted. This has happened in Iceland, where the race is of admirable quality, but the country produces nothing save a few sheep and horses, and some sulphur; it has not even fuel, except such driftwood as is cast on the shores. And if you take such a part of the world as central or northern Asia, you will see that the high. est European races would, if placed there, find it almost impossible to develop a high type of civilization for want as well of fuel as of the sources of commercial wealth. The same considerations apply to the animals the country produces. The animals affect man in his early state in respect to the enemies he has to face, in respect to his power of living by the chase, in respect to the clothing which their furs and skins offer to him, and in respect to the use he is enabled to make of them as beasts of burden or for food. Therefore, zoology comes. to form a very important part of the environment out of which historical man springs. The consideration of these various kinds of influence will suggest a number of heads or branches of geography ~vhich may be worked out, each of which may be found to have an important bearing on history. I will suggest a few. There is ethnological geography, which will be concerned with the races of men, their distribution and mutual relations to one another. There is sanitary geogra- phy, in which we shall examine the ex- tent to which different parts of the earths surface are fit for the maintenance of man with a prospect of long and vigorous life, what kinds of diseases dangerous to man each region gives rise to, what influence these health conditicns will exert on the capability of the region to receive or per- mit the increase of a race accustomed to a different climate. Then there is com- mercial geography, which is concerned with the interchange of products. There is linguistic geography, showing the dis- tribution of languages and examining the causes which diffuse some tongues and extinguish others. The constant diminu- tion in the number of languages spoken in the world is among the most striking facts of history, and proceeds faster now than in earlier times. There is political geography, which shows what are the rela- tions of the artificial boundaries of States to the natural boundaries which nature has tried to draw, and which have become of later years more important by the con- solidation of small States into large ones. It is a subject with several subdivisions, such as military geography, legal geog. raphy, the geography of religions. Mili- tary geography will show how mountain chains and passes and the courses of rivers determine the lines follo~ved by national immigrations, by invasions, and by the march of armies, and will indicate particular parts of the world, such as the plains of Lombardy, Belgium, the north- east of France, or, to take a familiar in- stance from our own island, that part of Scotland on the middle course of the river Forth, as the places where we must look for the theatre of military history. With regard to the military study of the geography of the Alps, I do not know any more interesting work for a member of the Geographical Society or of the Alpine Club to devote himself to than a history of the Alps, showing what during the dark and Middle Ages were the means of transit across this great mountain bar- rier, and the routes followed by the armies which so frequently marched from Ger- many or France into Italy. There is also legal geography, which is concerned with the relations which law bears to geography in respect to the spe- cial provisions that have been made re- garding those particular parts of the world where different States are concerned in securing free transit through arms of the sea. Legal geography has had a great 70 THE RELATIONS OF HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY. deal to do with regulating the navigation of the Sound between Denmark and Swe- den, and of the Great and Little Belts, as also ~~ith the Bosphorus and the Darda- nelles, as being sea channels in which several States are interested, and which therefore cannot be surrendered to the absolute control of one State. And I need not say that in respect of that half- artificial, half natural passage, the Suez Canal, one finds geography intimately connected with a subject apparently so remote from it as law. Then there is commercial geography. The science of commerce depends so directly upon the configuration of the earth and the produc- tive aptitudes of its countries, and in its turn affects so potently the course of economic and political history, that I shall be content with one illustration,that drawn from the Suez Canal, which has just been referred to in its legal aspect. The line of the Red Sea, and the passage from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean through Egyptian territory, was a very important trade route in ancient times, and it was with a view to the trade coming from the East that Alexander the Great did one of the most considerable acts of his life when he founded Alexandria. That continued to be an important route during the later Roman Empire and through the Dark Ages, so far as those troublous times permitted, and the prod- ucts of India and equatorial Africa came up the Red Sea and across the isthmus, and were shipped at Alexandria to the Western world. There was also an im- portant trade route through central Asia, which coming (lown through Persia and Mesopotamia to the Levant, reached the sea in northern Syria, and another through northern Persia and Armenia to the easternmost ports of the Black Sea. These trade routes assumed enormous importance in the earlier Middle Ages, and upon them great I)Olitical issues turned. Venice, Genoa, Pisa, and the other commercial cities of Italy, depended on this Eastern trade The Genoese had for a time a monopoly of that in the Black Sea, and founded settlements and built forts of which the ruins may still be seen on the north coast of Asia Minor. So things went on till the Portuguese discov- eries of the fifteenth century. After the discovery of the Cape of Good Hope these trade routes into the Mediterranean fell into disuse. Thus withered the commer- cial greatness of Venice. She ceased to be a great trading power, and had to live on her Italian territories and such frag ments of dominion as she was able to pick up out of the wreck of the eastern Roman Empire. Venice was in most intimate re- lations with the other States of Italy with Germany, with the pope, and with Franceand all these political relations were affected by the discovery of the route round the Cape. In the course of the last century the sea traffic with the East, which had been divided between Portugal, England, and Holland, for the share of Spain had become small, passed chiefly into the hands of English mer- chants. England has become the great maritime po~ver, for the purposes of coin- merce as well as of war, and it is her com- mercial interests that led her to acquire dominions on the Asiatic continent, and made her at last the imperial power of the East. Then comes M. Ferdinand de Lesseps. When the Suez Canal is opened the trade route round the Cape suddenly stops, as the passenger route had ceased some time previously, and trade again be- gins to flow through the Red Sea and by the new canal into the Mediterranean, and the products which came round the Cape now come to southern Europe direct, and the Russians get their tea straight from Canton or Shanghai by steamers which run from those ports to Odessa, and southern France gets her cotton and silk through the Suez Canal to Marseilles whereas formerly the great bulk of Eastern imports were shipped to England and the other ports of north-western Europe, and were thence distributed over the Conti- nent. Thus the result of the making of the Suez Canal is that we are no longer the great centre of European distribution. We are still a financial centre, where the financial part of the business is mainly transacted; but ~ve are no longer a coun- try which receives and distributes the products, as we ~vere before the Suez Canal was opened. This change is ob- viously fraught with results which may be of great importance in the future. We know what a large part the Suez Canal has played in the politics of Europe dur- ing the last ten or fifteen years, and herein we see how much may be due to one single change in the relations of land and sea. So, also, it would be easy to show how the opening of the Panama Canal (if it ever is opened, and its prospects are for the moment not encouraging) will affect trade, and through trade, political history. It would powerfully tell upon the com- merce of Europe with Australasia, a great part of which would be diverted from the THE RELATIONS OF HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY. 7 Suez to the Panama route. A great de- velopment would be given to Oregon, British Columbia, and the western coast of South America. The Californians would be able to defy that great trans- continental railroad company which now controls them in so many ways. Chili, Peru, and Ecuador would be brought with- in the closer touch of the great European powers, and of the United States. In fact, the history of all the countries bordering on the Pacific would be absolutely changed if this cut were made between the Carib- bean Sea and the Pacific. Perhaps no two illustrations could be more to the point than these of the two inter-oceanic canals. But a simple method of endeavoring to apply such general con- siderations as have been put forward is to run through some of the leading countries of the world, and show how we can bring the light of geography to bear on their political, social, and economical history. Such illustrations will explain how the possession of geographical knowledge and a full grasp of the geographical conditions under which nations and States grow up will enable a person studying their history to comprehend it more adequately and realize it more vividly. Let us begin with the largest of the continents and the one where the curtain first rises on civilized man. XVhat light on the historical growth and progress of Asia will be thrown by a knowledge of her natural conditions? We perceive that the whole centre of Asia is a mass of high land, of dry land, and of land not pierced by any inlet from the sea. This is the dominant fact of Asiatic geography. Consequently, we shall not expect to find in this central area ~vealth, or the com- merce which grows out of wealth, or any large population, because the conditions for the growth of wealth and population do not exist in a lofty and arid table land. We shall rather be led to look for such growth of population in the river valleys which fall in different directions from the great central plateau of Asia; but we shall find it in the east and south, not in the north, because the rigorous climate of the north will not permit the production of wealth by agriculture, or of the exist- ence of a large population. The north of Asia is cold, not only in respect to its lat- itude, which is, after all, a secondary con- dition in these matters, but because it is cut off by the great intervening mass of h;gh land from the kindly influences of the south and exposed to blasts from the frozen ocean. We shall find, therefore, that the inhabitants of the centre of Asia will not be in very close commercial or political relation with the north, because the north is poor and thinly peopled; nor in active relation with the ~vest, because the west is mainly desert down to the Sea of Aral and the Caspian. Neither will there be a great deal of intercourse with the south, because Tibet and eastern Turkestan are cut off by the great snowy barrier of the Himalaya from the plains of India. This barrier is indeed pierced by passes, but owing to the very heavy rainfall on its southern face, forms a belt of country which the masses of snow and glacier above, the deep and densely wood- ed valleys below, make more difficult to traverse than are the dreary plateaux of Tibet. These things being so, the historical relations of central Asia must obviously be rather with the east than with the west, but more with both east and west than with the north and the south. Such has been the case. Central Asia has come comparatively little into the history of the world. When she has done so by send- ing out swarms of invaders, as in the days of Attila, or again in those of Zinghis Khan and Timour, these invading tribes have seldom maintained their connection with the centre. Sometimes they have shrunk back, their empires being broken up after one or two generations. Some- times they have become absorbed in the population of the conquered country, and lost their hold on their old home. This has been the case with the Ottoman Turks, who are to a comparatively small extent of pure Tartar or Turcoman blood. A central Asiatic race may form an em- pire a vast one like that of Zinghis, or a smaller one like that of the Ephthal. ites; but such an empire either swiftly dissolves, owing to its wanting a nucleus of settled and civilized population, or else the race which creates it becomes practi- cally merged in the inhabitants of the conquered districts, it is thus that the Turkish Empire lives on now after two centuries of steady decay. The Mogul Empire in India lasted to our own day, for it was not absolutely put an end to till the queen of Great Britain assumed the direct sovereignty of British territories in that country after the mutiny of 1857, although it had practically ceased to exist a good while before. Here you have the fact that wherever the central Asiatic races come down to the west or south, they get severed from the original stock. Whether they found empires or are ab 72 THE RELATIONS OF HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY. sorbed and so disappear, in neither case is the connection a lasting one. But in the east they have more than once con- quered China, and their connection with China is maintained because there is no such marked barrier between the great central plateau of Asia and the valleys of China, as is constituted by the deserts of the west, or the mountains in the south. To this day China rules as far west as the Thian Shan, her own present dynasty being sprung from the sons of the desert. The tie between central Asia and China has thus been maintained, whereas that between central Asia and the rich south- ern and south-western countries of Asia was soon broken. One may apply what has been said about Asia to Asia Minor. The inner part is a high, dry, bare plateau, not so inhospitable as the great central plateau of Asia, but presenting, in miniature, sim- ilar features; and you will find here, also, that civilization has sprung up round the coast, but has attained less high develop- ment in the interior, that the influence and importance of the interior has there- fore been comparatively slight, and that some of its mountainous regions have been but little affected by the great changes which passed upon Asia Minor as a whole. It was the nature of his ter- ritories that enabled Mithridates to give so much trouble to the Romans. Later on, we observe that the Isaurians were but little affected by the Roman Empire down to the seventh or eighth century; as similarly the people of the hill country of Cilicia remained scarcely touched by the tides of invasion and conquest which swept past them. Thus a body of Arme- nian Christians has in its mountain fast- nesses north of the Gulf of Scanderoon maintained a freedom almost amounting to legal independence from the fourteenth century down to our own days. This was due to the fact that there was little in these countries to attract invaders, and that they were difficult of access owing to the mountain structure. I pass to Greece. You all know how much the circumstance that the territory of Greece is cut up by the sea and moun- tains into small plains and valleys, into peninsulas and islands, has had to do with all the salient features of Greek his- tory. Some minor points deserve notice. I mention one as an example of the new light to be got by actually seeing a thing, because I do not recollect it as referred to in any book, and yet it is the very first thing that impresses itself on you when you travel in Greece. From most parts of Greece you can see Mount Parnassus. I suppose no one ever realizes how small Greece and Palestine are unless he goes there. One is misled by the atlas, because in the same atlas we see Greece, Russia, France, and Palestine all as maps of the same size, each occupying a quarto or doublequarto page. It is hardly going too far to say you can see Parnassus from all the higher ground of eastern and cen- tral Greece. You can see it from all B~otia, from the long valley of which it stands up as the Church of St. Mary does when you look along the Strand. You can see it from many parts of Attica, from the Acropolis of Athens, for instance; you see it from ~Egina, in the Saronic Gulf; you see it from most parts of Argolis; you see it from the northern coast of Achaia. Of course you do not see it in the middle of Arcadia or in Laconia; but when you go west to Ithaca to visit Ulysses in his home, you see Parnassus again stand up grand and grey on the eastern horizon. Think what an importance that fact has had. The central point of Greek history for many purposes is Delphi, and a great deal of Greek history centres round the god who has there his sanctuary. How much this visible presence of Apollo must have affected his worship, and all the as- sociations which the Ionic race had with him! What a difference it must have made when you were actually able from your own home, or when you went to the top of your own Acropolis, or sailed to the neighboring port, to see this Parnas- sus, to know that hard by the cleft beneath the two peaks there was this oracle and this sacred home of the lord of light and song! That gives you an idea of the extent to which Apollo and his dwelling- place came to be a living factor in Greek history, which is not possible before you know the fact that Parnassus is in sight from almost any part of Greece. To the north-west of Greece we find the people of the Skipetar or Albanians. They are one of the earliest races in Europe. Their language and the lan- guage of the Basques are the only two still surviving European languages whose relations with other languages it has been found very difficult to determine, although I believe that philologists are now dis- posed to hold that Albanian belongs to the Indo-European (or, as it is now com- monly but somewhat incorrectly called, Aryan) family of tongues. Northern Al- bania is a country of wild and savage mountains, exceedingly bold and precip THE RELATIONS OF HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY. 73 itous, and forming a sort of knot at the head of the upper valleys of the Drin and Vardar. When you sail across the Lake of Skodra (Scutari), and see this splendid mass of rocky mountains towering above the smooth lake bosom on the east, deep gorges below, and patches of snow on the summits even in midsummer, you begin to understand why the Albanians should have remained a distinct people, preserv~ ing their ancient tongue and their primi- tive usages, many of them singularly like those recorded in Homer. It is a remark. able fact that to the south and south.east of the city of Skodra, for seventy or eighty miles, scarcely any remains of buildings, roads, or bridges have been found that point to Roman occupation; and yet this country was for many centuries an integral part of the Roman Empire. The conclu- sion is that the Romans did not trouble themselves to civilize it they left the tribes to their own independence. That independence they have in substance retained ever since. Even in the less difficult regions of southern Albania Ali Pasha ruled as a sovereign at Jan ma, and the tribes of the northern mountains are the most troublesome of all the nominal subjects of the sultan in Europe, a stand- ing menace to the peace of those coun- tries. Montenegro is an extremely curious instance of the way in which favorable geographical conditions may aid a small people to achieve a fame and a place in the world quite out of proportion to their numbers. The Black Mountain is the one place where a south Sciavonic com- munity maintained themselves in inde- pendence, sometimes seeing their territory overrun by the Turks, but never acknowl- edging Turkish authority de/ure from the time of the Turkish conquest of the fif- teenth century down to the Treaty of Berlin. Montenegro could not have done that but for her geographical structure. She is a high mass of limestone; you can- not call it a plateau, because it is seamed by many valleys, and rises into many sharp mountain peaks. Still, it is a moun- tain mass, the average height of which is rather more than two thousand feet above the sea with summits reaching five thou~ sand. It is bare limestone, so that there is hardly anything grown on it, only grass and very good grass in spots, with little patches of corn and potatoes, and it has scarcely any water. Its upland is covered with snow in winter, while in summer the invaders have to carry their water with them, a serious difficulty when there were no roads, and active moun- taineers fired from behind every rock, a difficulty which becomes more serious the larger the invading force. Consequently it is one of the most impracticable regions imaginable for an invading army. It is owing to those circumstances that this handful of people because the Monte- negrins of the seventeenth century did not number more than forty or fifty thou- sand have maintained their indepen- dence. That they did maintain it is a fact most important in the history of the Balkan Peninsula, and may have great consequences yet to come. The Illyric Archipelago suggests an- other illustration of the influence of geog- raphy on the life and character of a people. The coast of lllyria or Dalmatia is a mass of promotories and islands, all rocky, unfit for tillage, but usually well wooded, sepa- rated by narrow arms of the sea. It is just the sort of place where a fierce mari- time people would spring up. It was ~ar excellence the pirate country of the ancient world; its rovers were the scourge of the Adriatic and lonian seas until Rome, not without great trouble, suppressed them. For some centuries it supplied light and nimble galleys, and skilful sailors for the Roman fleets; and when in the disorders of the fifth and follo~ving centuries these fleets disappeared, the Illyrian pirates were again the terror of the Adriatic and the seas opening into it during the earlier Middle Ages. Now the Dalmatians feed the navy of Austria, and send out bold sailors over the world. In fact, you have very much the same conditions which made Norway the honac of the pirates of the Atlantic. Just as the Norse and Dan- ish vikings undertook the whole of the piracy for the Western ~vorld between the eighth and thirteenth centuries, so in the same way the Illyrians did in the ancient world, a parallel ~vhich adds interest to the history of both those countries as well as to their geography as soon as it is made clear. It is easy for any one studying the geography of Norway, as of Illyria, to understand why the Norwegians should have been, in ages of disorder a piratical people, in ages of peace the owners or a great mercantile marine. We pass to Italy. The dominant fea- ture of the Italian peninsula is the fact that the Apennines are nearer the east coast than the west; consequently civili- zation and empire begin and grow on the southern and western side of the Apen- nines rather than on the northern and eastern side, and you have the ruling 74 THE RELATIONS OF HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY. powers of Italy, the Etruscans, the Sam- the Alps, but they found the greatest pos. nites, and lastly the Romans, on the Arno sible difficulty in keeping a country in and Tiber side of the Apennines. Hence subjection divided by that great mountain also the history of Rome brings her into barrier. The same remark applies to the early relations with Carthage as the mis- Pyrenees. No Opposition in Europe is tress of the western seas, whereas she sharper than that between the French and had comParatively little intercourse with the Spaniards, and yet you are struck by the States of continental Greece. She the fact that along the eastern Pyrenees comes into relation with Greek civilization, the language is almost the same in Cata- but it is through the Greek colonies in lonia on the south, and in Foix and Rous- southern Italy and Sicily. And when we sillon on the north, while at the western come to the Middle Ages, we find that the end of the chain the Basque race and first conspicuous development of wealth tongue occupy both slopes of the moun- and the arts in Italy took place in the tains. The antagonism of Frenchmen and great Lombard plain, with its immense Spaniards lies not so much in a difference fertility, and in Tuscany. And here we of race as in the fact that history has come upon an ethnological influence, be- impressed so deep and diverse a stamp of cause the admixture of the northern races nationality on each people. The political with the Italic population had been chiefly history of the two countries has been so in Lombardy and in northern and central much severed by the existence of this Italy, whereas Teutonic conquest and set- mountain chain, that the Pyrenees always tlement had scarcely affected the countries became a political boundary, even when of southern Italy. Hence it is chiefly in territories belonging to Spain were added the north and centre that we find the new to France. Charles the Great for in- republics springing up, filled with an ac- stance, held the northeast corner of tive and industrious population, soon dis- Spain, but it was soon lost. Some one playing a wonderful creative power in art said after a famous Franco-Spanish mar. and literature. Thus the brilliant and riage, The Pyrenees have ceased to ex- eventful annals of medi~val Italy are con- ist. They soon reappeared, and Spain ditioned partly by the circumstances of was again the enemy of France. The soil and climate, which are more gener- debatable ground in France is in the north- ally favorable in Lombardy and Tuscany east. That is the region through which than in southern Italy, since in the plains the immigrations come. It was the open of Apulia and Lucania the richness of gate whereby the Burgundian and Frank- the soil is balanced by its unhealthiness; ish tribes entered Gaul. So far as there partly by an ethnological influence, that of is a natural boundary on this side, it is the Teutonic invaders, who coining from constituted, not as geographers used to the north settled in the northern parts of allege, by the Rh:ne, but by the moun- the peninsula, and reinvigorated its de- tains, the principal part of which we know caying population; part~y by the hold under the name of the Vosges, which are which the East Roman Empire maintained really the dividing line between the Lat- on south-eastern Italy, because that region inized Celtic pOl)Olation on the one side, lies near the coast of Epirus, which still and the Germanic population on the other. obeyed the emperors. It is also a remarkable fact that you have France offers herself for a few remarks, got no division of mountains or high land which show the connection of her geo- running across France from east to west; graphical structure with her history. The consequently, although ethnological or ho- salient facts in French geography are the guistic differences have at various times sharp lines of demarcation between France existed between northern and southern and Spain, created by the Pyrenees, and France, these have tended to disappear. between France and Italy, created by the There have been many times in the history Alps. It has been found extremely diffi- of France when, if there had been a chain cult to maintain any political connection of mountains from the mouth of the Loire, across these. Among the Romans there or the neighborhood of La Rochelle, across was a marked distinction between Cis- to Lyons and Geneva, there might have Alpine Gaul and Trans-Alpine Gaul, befalJen a permanent separation of France though the population on both sides was into northern and southern ; but such a Gallic; and you find that when the French separation has never taken place. There kings, at the end of the Middle Ages, was a time when the /an~ue doc was endeavored to keep a hold on northern more different from the lan~zie doil than Italy, the existence of the Alps was a fatal from the speech of northern Italy; and obstacle. They could carry an army across even now, in the lower valley of the THE RELATIONS OF HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY. 75 Rhone, the passing traveller is struck by the difference between the dialects there and those of northern France; but the fact that there is nothing that constitutes a natural boundary has prevented a sharp separation of north and south in France, and has made France what it is, an emi- nentlv unified country, in spite of the original diversity of its races.* On the other hand, the Burgundian kingdom, which was an important political factor at one time, found itself cut in two by the J ura Mountains. Its northern part in- cluded both western Switzerland and Franche Comt6; but these regions, be- cause severed by the Jura, fell asunder, and while eastern Burgundy became the western part of modern S~vitzerland, western Burgundy dropped into the hands of the French kings, and is now as French as any other part of France. The British Isles do not offer us quite as much opportunity for observing the influences of physical geography as those other countries that 1 have mentioned. The scale of physical phenomena in our isles is comparatively small, and the features of our history so peculiar as to require a long examination in order to trace their relation to our physical geog- raphy But one may attempt to indicate a few points. It is remarkable that the balance of population and political influ- ence should have, ~vithin the last hundred years, shifted from the south to the north of England. This is mainly due to the mineral wealth of the north of England; perhaps also to the larger immixture in the north-eastern counties of Scandina- vian blood. The discovery of the coal- fields and deposits of ironstone has given an immense impetus to wealth, to manu- factures, and to population there, and has correspondingly shifted the balance of power. In the days of the early Plantage- net kings the north was of no account whatever. English history, except in connection with the wars with the Scots, lay south of the Trent, but it now lies quite as much to the north as to the south. The same remark may be made with re- gard to Scotland. There you have the Highlands dividing the northern part from the southern, and until a century ago the inhabitants of the Highlands were almost foreigners to the inhabitants of the south; and it was not until after t745, ~vhen * It is worth remarking that there are considerable differences between the population, as also between the architecture, of the parts of France to the eastand west respectively of the Cevenuta and mountaina of the Ard~che. roads ~vere introduced into the Highlands, and the country was reduced to peace and order, that the population began to be- come assimilated to that of the Lowlands. The battlefields of Scotland lie either be- tween Edinburgh and the English border, or about the frontier line of the Lowlands and the Highlands. Within a radius of ten miles from Stirling Castle there are four famous battle-fields (Bannockburn, Abbey Craig, Falkirk, Sheriffmuir); and the history of Scotland, in the romantic times of the Stuart kings, centres itself in the piece of country from Edinburgh to Perth and Stirling, including the so-called kingdom of Fife. in our most recent political history it is w-orth while to notice how the results of the late general election have been affected by the physical geography of the country. Some people have been astonished to find that eastern and w-estern Lancashire have returned members of a different po- litical complexion, as have also western and eastern Yorkshire; but the reason is very obvio.us if you look at the geology and mineral-bearing character of the dis- trict. Eastern Yorkshire is mainly agri- cultural, and all the influences which the upper class and the farmers can bring to bear on the agricultural population have full scope there; while south-western Yorkshire is manufacturing and mining, with a population inclined to Radical opinions, in the same way, eastern Lan- cashire is manufacturing and mining; while western Lancashire is agricultural, and disposed to follow the lead of the old landowning families. Those who examine Lancashire schools are struck by the dif- ference between the sharpness of the boys in the east Lancashire hill country and the sluggishness of those who dwell on the flats along the coast between Liver- pool and Morecambe. Another illustration is found in the case df Ulster. The Scotch colony which en- tered Ulster in the seventeenth century penetrated almost an equal distance in every direction from the point where it crossed the North Channel from southern Scotland to the Bay of Belfast; and if you put one end of a compass on that bay and describe a semicircle, you find the Scotch Protestant population goes to almost an equal distance all round, from the Atlantic coast near Londonderry until you strike the Irish Sea in the neighborhood of Newry. But there is one exception to this. It is found in the south-western division of Down. The north and east of that county are mainly occupied by the 76 THE RELATIONS OF HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY. descendants of the Scotch settlers. But time runs on and history works herself in the south-west there is a group of lofty into new forms. The first of these is that mountains, the mountains of Mourne. man in his early stages is at the mercy of Into those mountains the aboriginal Irish nature. Nature does with him practically retired, and therefore south-west Down whatever she likes. He is obliged to returns a Catholic and Nationalist mem- adapt himself entirely to her. But, in ber to Parliament, while the other parts process of time, he learns to raise himself of Down and Antrim return Protestant above her. It is true he does so by hu- and Conservative members. moring her, so to speak, by submitting to Time fails me to show with proper de- her forces. In the famous phrase of Ba. tail the relations between the geography con, Na/ura non nisi ~arendo vincitur, and the history of North America, a con- Nature is not conquered except by obey- tinent where we see many of the features ing her; but the skill which man acquires of Europe repeated on a larger scale, but is such as to make him in his higher with some striking differences. I may, stages of development always more and however, observe how much the econom- more independent of nature, and able to ical conditions of North America are bend her to his will in a way that aboric~. affected by the fact that the great valley inal man could not do. he becomes i~- plain of the Mississippi River lies open dependent of climate, because he has towards the north, permitting the cold houses and clothes; he becomes indepen- influences to be felt down to the Gulf of dent of winds, because he propels his Mexico, while there does not exist to the vessels by steam; to a large extent he south any great reservoir of hot air simi- becomes independent of daylight, because lar to the Sahara. From these and other he can produce artificial light. Think causes we find much colder temperature what a difference it makes to the indus- in the same latitude in North America tries carried on in our manufactories that than in the Old World. New York is in we can carry them on by night as well as about the same latitude as Madrid and by day, because we have gas and electric- Naples, but has a more severe climate. ity; whereas six centuries ago the work- New Orleans is in about the same latitude man in the south of Europe was able to as Cairo; but, as you know, Cairo is prac- get many more working hours than a tically tropical, whereas New Orleans is workman in northern Europe. You may not. It is hot in summer, but has a to- say that the northern workman was rec- tally different kind of climate from Cairo. ompensed for his winter darkness by That is a fact of the utmost importance longer summer days; but there must be a with regard to the political and economi- certain regularity about labor, and in the cal history of America. The white race case of great industrial establishments it maintains itself and is capable of labor in is essential that work should proceed dur- the Gulf states, although, to be sure, the ing a certain number of hours all the year black race works more easily and increases round. Therefore, the discovery of arti- more rapidly. All America east of the ficial light has been a most important Rocky Mountains seems likely to cohere factor in changing the industrial and eco- .n one political body, because the West nomical conditions of northern countries. is firmly linked to the Eastand the South In the same way, the early races of man through which its commerce reaches the were only able to migrate as nature made sea; and because there is nothing resem- it easy for them, by giving smooth or nar- bling a natural boundary to sever any one row seas and favoring winds; but in a part of the country from any other. It is more advanced state, man is able to mi- only in a few places that the Alleghanies grate where and how he pleases, and finds are a barrier interrupting communication, conveyance so cheap that he can carry On the other hand, huge mountains and labor from one continent to another. wide deserts part California from the Mis- Think of the great migration of the Irish sissippi states, and although economic to America, of the great migration of the and political forces will probably continue Chinese to western America and the isles to bind the Pacific States to their older of the Pacific. In Hawaii the Chinese sisters, there is to some extent already a now begin to form the bulk of the labor- Californian type of manners and character ing population; and they are kept with different from that which prevails through difficulty from occupying Australia. The other parts of the \Vest. enormous negro population of North and Before I close, I will make two general South America is due to the slave trade. observations as to the different relations We have in our own times begun to im- that exist between man and nature as port Indian coolies into the West India AMBROSE MALET. 77 islands, whose staple products are now due to their labor. Such transfers of population would be impossible but for the extreme cheapness of transport due to recent scientific discovery. In consid- ering how geography and natural condi- tions affect the development of man we must therefore bear in mind that the -longer he lives on this planet and becomes master of the secrets of science, the more he is able to make the forces of nature his servants. Another observation is, that as the re- lations of remote parts of the world to one another have become a great deal closer and more intimate than former- ly; so the whole system of politics and commerce is now more complex than it was in the ancient or in the medkeval world. In fact, one of the greatest achieve- ments of science has been in making the world small, and the result of its small- ness is that the fortunes of every race and State are now, or may at any moment become, involved with those of any other. This is due partly to the swiftness of steam communication, partly to the inven- tion of the telegraph, partly to cheapness of transit, which makes such progress that an invention like the compound steam- engine reduced the charge for marine transportation something like twenty or thirty per cent., and one hears that dur- ing the last two or three years improve- ments in machinery and in the economiz- ing of fuel have reduced it twenty-five per cent. more. I will give two instances of how this works. One is the enormous development of pilgrimages, particularly in the Mohammedan world. Hosts of pilgrims from Turkestan, from Morocco, from India and the further East, now find their way to Mecca by steamships, and thereby the intensity of Mussulman feel- ing, the sense of solidarity in the Mo- hammedan world, has been powerfully quickened. Another is the cheapening of the conveyance of food products. See how that works. Our English agricultur- ists have been ruined, not merely by the greater richness of virgiR American soils, but also by cheap transportion from the North-Western States; and now the farm- ers of these States are feeling the competi- tion of Indian weat coming through the Suez Canal; and ~ very railway that is made in India, cheapening the conveyance of wheat from the inland towns to Bombay, and every improvement in marine engines, tells on the farmers in Minnesota, and by inflaming their animosity against the rail- road and elevator companies, affects the internal politics of these new democratic communities. In the same way, the rela- tions of the different States of Europe to one another are altered, because the wealth and trade of each depend on variou arti- cles of exchange; and so the political measures to which each ruling statesman resorts are largely suggested by the com- mercial problems he has to face. The protective system of Prince Bismarck has been mainly due to the cheaper importa- tion from abroad into Germany of the staple articles of food; and the attempts to foster the sugar industries in the States of central Europe by bounties, all tell upon the commercial relations of those States with one another and with ourselves. It is not too much to say that this whole planet of ours, as we now know it, is for practical purposes very much smaller than the world was in the time of Herodotus. To him it extended from Gades and the Pillars of Hercules to the further end of the Black Sea at the river Phasis and the Caucasus Mountains. He just knew of the Danube on the north, and of Ethiopia on the south, and that was all. Yet that world of his, twenty-five hundred miles long by fifteen hundred wide, was a far larger world, with more human variety in it, more difficult to explore, with fewer and fainter relations between its different parts, than the whole planet is to us now, when nearly all its habitable parts have been surveyed, when the great races, the great languages, the great religions, spreading swiftly over its surface, are swallowing up the lesser. Yet, though the earth has become so much smaller, it is not either less interesting or less diffi- cult to interpret, and the problems with which a philosophical geographer has now to deal in making his science available for the purposes of practical economics and politics, are as complex and difficult as they ever were before, and indeed grow more complex and more difficult as the relations of peoples and countries grow closer and more delicate. From Temple Bar. AMBROSE MALET. THIS evening, turning over an old port- folio, in search of a document of which I was in need, I came upon a note dated some five-and-thirty years back. I had not forgotten its contents, but I was una- ware of its existence; and as I glanced at it now, my eyes gre~v dim with memories. 78 AMBROSE MALET. AMBROSE MALET. DEAR MERRIDEW, it ran, Your let- ping in the big hotel of a little village ter pained me, of course; you meant it to lying among hills and woods. I was sup. do so, I presume. But it is no matter, ping alone, ae the end of the long table of You know my philosophythat the sum an empty salle d manger. A nu mberof of human things comes even in the end. holiday folk from a neighboring town had Once more, you are altogether wrong come to dine, and departed; silence had about Lucy. I know nothing of her, and succeeded their clamor; the room, lighted had nothing to do with her disappearance. by a single lamp at my end of the table, You do not believe me; well, that is no seemed abandoned to shadows and moon- matter either I go up by the first train light, and to me, when a young man en- to-morrow, and we shall not meet again. tered, and calling for coffee and cognac, If you care to ~vrite, my home address sat down in the circle of light just opposite will find me. God bless you, old fellow; to me. He was a man of about thirty, you will take my blessing for what you with a pleasant and remarkably clever think it worth, face; and, presently falling into conversa tion with him, I discovered he was the village doctor. He was a native of the place, able to give me information, of which I was in need, concerning the sur- rounding country; and we were engaged in talking with my travelling.map spread on the table between us, when a waiter entered and addressed a few words to my companion in a low voice. Excuse me for a moment, he said, turning to me courteously, there is a sick man up-stairs who requires my at- tendance. I shall not be gone many min- utes. In less than a quarter of an hour he returned, and sat down opposite to me again; but he did not at once resume our conversation. He sat with his hands clasped behind his head, gazing before him in silence. A sad case, he said at last, letting his hands fall to his side ; a life thrown away. A young fellow wounded mortally in a dud, and brought in here, yesterday, to die. All the doctors in Europe could not save him. He wont live throuTh the night. In a duel! I said, surprised. Such things, so far, had lain outside the range of my experience. Yes, with some Frenchman. They had come here across the frontier. Such affairs are not uncommon hereabouts; but they rarely terminate fatally. The other fellow has made off; this one, by-the-by, is a countryman of yours. Stay, I have his name somewhere. He fumbled in his pocket for a note- book, and abstracting a card, handed it to me across the table. I read the name; I let the card drop. Good God! I said. Ambrose Ma- let. Do you know him? said the doctor. I know the nameit may be another man, I answered, in profound agitation. Is he young a big, loose-limbed man, No, I had not believed him, and I did not write. My eyes grew dim with mem- ories as I read the note now. I laid it down and fell into thought. I had but just come from the death-bed of an old parishioner, who had passed away in peace. To parsons, as to doctors, famil- iarity with death presently begets a certain indifference. But that note recalled a death-bed that must always remain one of the most poignant memories of my life. Yes, until my own hour shall come, the hour that I can least forget is that which held in it the death of the man who had once been my best friend. More than thirty years ago, I was mak- ing a fortnights tour in Belgium. I had lately been ordained to a curacy, and was taking my first holiday. I was a fresh- looking young fellow in those days, hold- ing serious views of life; and though young for my years, had the fullest sense of the dignity, no less than the responsi- bilities, of the sacred profession I had lately entered. My old aunt, who lived with me I had lost both my parents whilst still a child thought me the best boy in the world, and petted me as though I were a girl. Well, I was conceited and presumptuous, no doubt; something of a prig too, perhaps, as nev.fledged curates are apt to be I have had plenty of expe- rience with them since then but not a bad young fellow on the whole. To do right myself, and to set everybody else right, seemed to me the most important thing in life; and the first part of the proposition, at any rate, is not a bad formula for a man to start with on his lifes career. I had set out on my travels alone, and plunging at once into some of the more picturesque Belgian scenery, found my- self, on the evening of the third day, sup- AMBROSE MALET. 79 with marked features, a large nose, dull brown hair lying straight across his fore. head, and the kindest, the most genial smile imaginable? Your description answers in every par. ticular, said the doctor, except, indeed, as regards the smile, which I have not seen. He looks sad enough, poor fellow. He is young, about your own age, I should think. He looked at me with a momen- tary, humorous gleam that seemed to say: In all other respects as unlike you as possible. He has grey eyes and wears no beard; on his little finger is a green signet ring. If you are a friend of his, I shall be glad. I asked him to-day if I should send to any one, and he replied that he had no relations, and not a friend in the world that would come to him. The tears rushed to my eyes; I could not help it. I rose, and walking to one of the long windows, stood with my back turned to the room, looking out on the moonlit garden. Three years before, at Oxford, Ambrose Malet had~.been my best friend. A lonely man, a solitary soul, he had sought me out through one of those contradictions that sometimes provoke and cement the firmest friendships. He was little known personally at Oxford, yet made his mark at once as a man of powers so unusual that everything might be expected of him. The expectation was founded on a mis- conception of his character; and yet per~ haps not. Who shall say? since death came at six-and-twenty to solve the prob- lem after its own fashion. A prodigious and unfailing memory, an almost incred- ible facility for acquiring and assimilating knowledge, were combined with one of the strangest and most original minds I have ever come across. He took, without ap- preciable effort, every honor that Oxford has to offer, and he took them with abso- lute indifference. Knowledge, and always more of the knowledge that he acquired with such ease, seemed all that he de- sired. He read for hours, not as the bookworm reads, or the ordinary student, but with a prodigious, a devouring curios- ity, an insatiable craving, until in one direction or another he reached the final limit and faced the blank beyond. At such times, as I learned to know, he fell into a despondency that lasted sometimes for days; then, rousing himself, he would start again on some other track, to arrive at the same result. His mind, I say, was one of the strangest and most original I have met with; but it had no impulse that I ever discovered, towards original crea tion, little even towards original research. He had read every poem worth reading in the English language, and knew half of them by heart; but I do not know that he ever wrote a line of poetry. He would take up some branch of science, and de- vour every book on it he could find; but that done, he made no independent effort towards fresh discovery he turned to something else. Some spring that moves to practical action, some link common between otan and life, was lacking in Ii im; his soul dwelt solitary and apart, thirsting, drinking, insatiable; only demanding in- cessantly what no man ever yet had no, nor can have ever until the end of time. He had few acquaintances at Oxford, and no intimate friend but myself. Some- times he would come to my rooms and sit silently watching me as I plodded on at my reading. My vocation had early been fixed, and I never wavered in my choice; I had never any idea but that of entering the Church. Malet would sit smoking and watching me in silence. Good old Frank, he would presently say, with his good, affectionate smile, laying a hand on my shoulder as he left the room. Not unfrequently we took long walks together; and by degrees, though he spoke little of his affairs, 1 learned something of his life. He was a man of small independent for- tune some hundreds a year, I think; he had no relations living but a parajyzed and childish old mother, with whom he spent the whole of his vacations, in some remote country spot. He spoke little of himself, and sometimes our walk would begin and end in almost total silence. At other times his flow of conversation was almost unceasing; and I have not yet met the man who can talk as Malet did, when the mood was upon him. I would not, if I could, try to reproduce those talks. What withered and scentless weeds are those that would fain represent the radiant flow- ers of last years garden? He was some- times gay, more often serious. He was no orthodox believer; his unorthodoxy shocked me at first; he saw it, and while never hiding his opinions, was careful to av~d shocking me again. But all his views of the conduct of life were simple, pure. and noble; I have never met purer or nobler; and I can trace their effect on my own mind to this day. But he had planned no future career; the hopes and ambitions of other men seemed to have no meaning for him. Something, I say, was wanting in him, some link that reconciles common humanity to life, that binds society to- 8o AMBROSE MALET. gether, that helps the eternal duty of man to man. A tender heart, an endless crav- ing, a solitary soul; such was Ambrose Malet. I remember his face raised one winter night to the frozen, starlit sky. One day we shall know, he said; yes, we shall knowwe shall know. You believe in the immortality of the soul, Ambrose? I said. How do you reconcile that with your other opinions? On no logical grounds, he answered briefly, and changed the subject. I have said he had a tender heart; that is to say little. He had a capacity for profound and passionate love. In the course of our rambles, we made the ac- quaintancean ordinary young mans adventure of a farmers daughter, a young girl who, not without intention, as I had afterwards reason to believe, strongly attracted us both. I was in love; if not for the first time in my life, as much as I had ever been before. But Lucy Smiles was not a girl I could have made my wife; and I must do myself the justice to say that, recognizing the fact early in our acquaintance, I broke off, with some resolution, even the semblance of a flirta- tion. With Malet it was different; he fell deeply and passionately in love with the girl. The difference in station and education seemed not to affect him; it was impossible indeed that an intellect such as his could ever look for, or expect the sympathy that springs from equal minds; and on the one occasion on which he spoke to me on the subjectfor a reserve had sprung up between us in the matter I inferred, though he did not state it in so many words, that he hoped to make Lucy his wife immediately on leaving Oxford. Shortly afterwards, the girl disappeared from her fathers home. Certain circumstances threw suspicion on Malet; nothing was, nothing could be, proved aaainst him; but, to tell the story briefly, I thought I had reason to believe the worst, and I believed it. All my in- cipient love for the girl herself blazed up in a flame of passion and jealousy, and what I held to be righteous indignation, at the story of her disappearance and of her parents despair. Malet said very lit- tle; he gave me his word that he had had nothing to do in the matter; he saw that I did not believe him, and he said no more. I, on my side, broke with him. He had been my best friend; on more than one occasion he had served me in a way that should have won my undying gratitude. But what gratitude survives a sense of wrong? And indeed, I held my- self not ungrateful, but just. I broke with him; that little note that fell under my hands to-night was the last I ever re- ceived in his writing; it ~vas th elastl heard of him until that fatal evening when I learned that, under the same roof with myself, he lay dying among strangers in a strange land. What storm of memories, old affection, remorse, swept over me matters little now. Where were doubts and past sus- picions? Alas, that, living or dying, clear- ness of vision should come to enlighten us at the supreme moment only! I turned from the window to the doctor. Can I see him? I said; he was the best friend I had in the world. Certainly you can see him, he an- swered. I rejoice indeed that you or any one belonging to him should be here. I will take you to him at once. He has a little feve~r, but is otherwise quite quiet; no acute suffering, happily. Nothing can harm him now. Do you mean that as a certainty? I said. Forgive me, I have no reason whatever to doubt your capacity, or that you have done everything that is right; on the contrary, you inspire me with con- fidence. Still, in certain cases, a consul- tation He shook his head, smiling a little. I lay no claim, he said, to infallibility, and could I see the faintest hope in a possible change of treatment, I should be the first to invite a consultation. But your friends case is hopeless; the merest tyro in my profession could not fail to see it at once. It is only an unusual strength of constitution that has enabled him to live till now. He led the way as he spoke, up flight after flight of the shallow hotel stairs, and down a long passage to a remote and silent part of the house. At the end of the passage a door stood ajar. The doc- tor paused before we reached it. You will no doubt wish to remain with your friend? he said. Undoubtedly, I answered. He gave me one or two brief directions, then, signing to me to wait for a moment, opened the door and went in. The room he entered was so small that, standing there in the doorway, I took it in at a glance. It was a little wooden room, with brown walls, and a brown, uncarpeted floor, fresh and pleasing in its simplicity. One or two chairs, a table in the window, a smaller one with a lighted candle, and some phials at the head of the bed where AMBROSE MALET. my friend was lying, ~vere, with the bed itself, the principal furniture. He was alone. A woman of the village who had attended him during the day was but just gone, and the doctor had undertaken to watch him through the night; but not the less, the silence, the loneliness in which he lay there dying, struck me painfully. He lay wiLh closed eves, his hands spread out on the counterpane, his head sul)port- ed by pillows. The night was warm, and though the little casement stood wide open, he seemed oppressed by the heat, and to breathe with difficulty. He was not changed; in early youth even his features had been too marked to alter readily; only the lines with which I I~ad been familiar had deepened, and the pal- lor of mortal sickness overspread his countenance. He opened his eyes as the doctors step approached his bedside. XVhat time is it ? he said feebly. About half past nine, said the doctor. He laid his hand on his patients wrist as he spoke, and stood for a moment noting the pulse. There is a friend of yours here, he said then, who wants to see you. I have brought him up. His forehead and mouth contracted painfully for a moment. A friend of mine? he said ; but I have no friends. I came forward. His glance fell upon me and ~vas suddenly illuminated. Frank I he cried. He held out both hands; I grasped them in mine. For a long time we remained motionless. I could not speak; in what words could I address him after my long silence? And I saw that he was dying. His hold relaxed at last. The doctor had silently disappeared, and we were alone, it was lie who spoke first. You never believed me about Lucy, Frank, lie said, looking at me. Dont speak of it, I cried. I know that I was wrong, utterly wrong. I want to tell you that. Never mind the rest. On the contrary, I mind it very much, he said, in his feeble voice. It is a long story, but I must tell it briefly. I sus- pected at the time who was at the bottom of Lucys disappearance, but I could never bring it home to him. I could never come upon a trace of her until a .few weeks ago, when I saw her by chance in Paris. His voice sank and failed a little with weak ness, but in a moment he rallied, and went on. She was living there with some Frenchman never mind his name. I hunted her up, and tried to persuade her to go home to her parents. He resented LIVING AGE. VOL. LIV. 2762 my interference; we foughtand hea-e I am. It was that! I cried, confounded ; it was on account of Lucy? Poor child, poor girl, he murmured, closing his eyes. I stood speechless for a while. For the first time I realized fVlalets part in the duel of ~vhich the doctor had spoken. In face of his mortal malady, I had forgotten for the moment that maladys cause. \Vell? he said at last, as I did not speak. Good heavens, Ambrose, I said, you are the last man, yes, the last man in the world I should have thought would fight a duel. He smiled a little. Why not? lie said. I had no intention of killing the poor wretch who challenged me ; he was safe enough from me. But the sin of it I began. Oh, the sin of it the sin of it, he said. Sit down, Frank, lie went on, raising his head and looking at me with a smile by the dim light of the candle. So youre a parson now, a j)riest I suppose you would call yourself; and are going to save men s souls. Well, youll do a world of good, old fellow, one way or another. I know so much of you. His head fell back on the pillow. Move the light, will you ? lie said ; there is nothing to do, and it hurts my eyes; we dont need a candle to talk by. I rose, and set the candle on a deal ta- ble in the passage outside. The door stood ajar; only a thread of light fell through the opening. But though the moon was on the other side of the house, its suffused whiteness filled the room, and through the open casement its light could be seen falling on a tree-covered hill that, rising just behind the hotel garden, de- fined its summit against the pale summer heavens. I took my place again beside Mahets bed. I could see his face plainly in the twilight as he lay with it turned to- wards the window, his eyes fixed on the sky. For a long time he was silent; I also did not speak. My heart was weighed down by the sense of our long estrange- ment; it ~vas breaking at the thought that we should have met only to find him like this. He spoke again, quite suddenly. You never believed me about Lucy, he said. For Gods sake, Ambrose, dont speak of that again, 1 cried, in anguish. For- give me, forgive me! the loss all these years has been nine. No, no, he said, it is no matter; all 82 AMBROSE MALET. at my own watch by the candle outside, told him the hour. It is later than I thought, he said, and again lay silent, his face turned to the window. I sat down beside him, and took his hand in mine. He let it lie there. Strange, lie said again, one lives alone, and one dies alone; and yet human fel- lowship is sweet. I like to feel your hand in mine, Frank. He was growing weaker. I could see it by the ~vay his head lay on the pillow, and by the increasing difficulty with which lie swallowed the cordial I gave him frorii time to time. I asked him presently whether he had any wishes I could fulfil. No, he said at first ; then, bury me here, of course, lie said; one spot of earth is like another, and there is no one at home to niourn for me. Dont say that, I said ; I I broke down, and, laying my head on the counterpane, cried like a girl. It dis. tressed him. Dont, lie said twice; and in a minute I had conquered the weakness. I have longed for death, he said, and now it has come. Yes, I ani glad to die. Some- thing was ~vrong between me and life ; I could have made nothing of it. Death is best, and what comesafter. You do believe, Ambrose? I cried. The words were involuntary; for though the thought had been in my mind since I entered the room, I had not meant to utter it. He looked at me with eyes whose kindness and affection I can never forget. Good old Frank! he said. If you ever see Lucy, he ~vent on, after a pause, tell her from nie to go back to her par. ents. I have written to them ; she will have no difficulty. Tell her so from me. The roomii was growing darker; the moon had set. I could not make out the changes in his face any more. But he still kept it turned towards the window. How bright the stars are to nigl)t! lie said once. Surely we shall know. And once again : Soon I shall know. Then a long silence. About midnight the doctor had come in, had laid his hand on his l)atients pulse, and goiie ~vithout a word. I brought the light back into the room in the darkest hour before dawn; but Ambrose took no notice. About dawn he died. is over now, and it is all one. Life too will be over in a few hours, and that is well. Strange, he went on after a pause, that men should dread death as they do. I have thought so always; now that I am dying, I think so more than ever. To dread the unknownwhen to know the unknowable, is the great and unattain- able desire of life. Most miien think otherwise, I said; the love of life is strong. Yes, yes, I know it, lie said, and it is better so; it should be so. But some- thing hai gone wrong between me and life; 1 have felt a stranger in it always. Death is best. He lay silent again for a long while. His breathing ~vas difficult and oppressed; but he was suffering no acute pain, he told me; lie may even have dozed, as he lay there, his eyes opening and closing from time to time. Now and then the wind stirred the trees on the hill outside; the shadows slowly moved with the advancing night ; otherwise all was sdlh. But pres- ently he began to turn restlessly in the bed ; his hands, hot with fever, strayed over the counterpane. When lie spoke again, his mind was wandering a little. I suppose you go back to Oxford at once, old fellow? he said. I should like to get back there, if it were only for a day. My mother is dead, you know; poor mother. The meadows down by the river, it would be cooler there than here; we might have another walk together. Lucy The words died away in a murmur; but all at once, half raising himself in bed: No one has believed in miie, no one has cared for me, lie said, in a strange, loud, solemn voice, such as I had never heard him use before; and knowledge is igno- rance, and one drinks and drinks, and the eternal thirst is never quenched, never He looked round wildly, till his eyes falling on me in the imperfect light, grad. ually full consciousness returned. He lay back quietly. Give me some water, will you, Frank? he said in an exhausted voice. I did as he desired. I must have been asleep, I think, he said, as his head sank again on the pillow. I should have liked to tell you all about my wanderings, Frank. 1 have wandered a good deal since we last met; but I sup- An hour later I vent through the front pose there wont be time. What oclock door of the hotel, and out into the court- is it? yard to breathe the morning air. The He felt feebly under the pillow for his night had been a terrible one to me; I did watch. 1 went to the door, and, looking not, until afterwards, know how terrible IRELAND UNDER HER OWN PARLIAMENT. 83 and poignant. No, only in after years I came to understand what scales of self- sufficiency had fallen from my eyes, and that, from that day forward, I was a changed man. I went out into the court- yard, looking up at the morning sky, which had the pathos of the light that first dawns after one whom we love has died. The day would clear into brightness later on, but at that early hour everything was grey and misty; low vapors veiled the hills, a long line of mist marked the course of the little stream through the valley. As I crossed the courtyard on my way to the gates that shut it in from the road, one of them was pushed back, and a woman came towards me. She wore a veil that concealed her face ; but, seeing me, she started, and by a sudden impulse, I sup- pose, threw it back. Then I saw who she was. Lucy! I said. The blood rushed to her face, then for. sook it. It was.a lovely face still, though strangely altered since I had last seen it. She stared at me uncertainly for a mo- ment. I didnt expect to meet you, sir, she said at last. I came to ask after Mr. Malet. Can you tell me how he is? He is dead, I answered. She gave a cry, and dropped down on a bench by which we vere standing. For a long time she did not say a word, nor after that cry utter a sound. She sat with her hands clasped round her knees, gazing fixedly before her. A look of indescrib- able dreariness, rather than of grief, grad- ually overspread her face. As for me, who shall say what emotions I felt? I had once loved the girl yes, I had loved her and up in yonder room lay the man whose death she had caused. At last she spoke. I wanted to see Mr. Malet again, she said, in a low voice, without looking up. I followed them; they didnt know it. Cant I see him now? She rose as she spoke; but, before I could answer, dropped on to the seat again. No, I couldnt, she said. I never saw any one dead yet. I couldnt go., Lucy, I said, Mr. Malet left a mes- sage for you. He bade me entreat you to go back to your parents. He had written to them, he said. You ~vill have no diffi- culty with them Again she sat silent, gazing drearily before her. Mr. Malet said the same to me, she said at last. Of course he couldnt un derstand. Its not only father and mother, it would be the neighbors, the whole life no, I can never go home again never! She rose as she spoke, pulling down her veil, and drawing her cloak tightly round her against the chill morning air. I made one more effort, though what it cost me I could not say. It was a mo- ment surely for angels tongues to plead; and on my tongue the words seemed to weigh like lead. Lucy, I said, surely Mr. Malets wish Dont! she said very sharply, turn- ing from me. At least promise me, I said, laying a detaining hand on her shoulder, that for his sake, as for your own, your life shall henceforward be different. She turned suddenly, and seizing my hand, without looking at me, wrung it. Good-bye, Mr. Merridew, she said, and, turning from me, hurried to the gate. Outside, for one moment, she paused; her back was to~vards me, but I saw her shoulders move as with a convulsive sob. The next moment she had disappeared in the mist. Whither did she go? Alas, I have never known. But visiting in after years Ambrose Malets grave, I found laid on it afresh wreath of immortelles. A stranger had passed and left it there, I was told. ANONYMOUS. From The National Review. IRELAND UNDER HER OWN PARLIAMENT. THERE is little in common between the Separatist movement conducted by Mr. Parnell and that associated in the last century with the name of Henry Grattan. With Mr. Parnell no~v, as with Grattan then, separation is a means to an end but the ends have no resemblance. The agitation of 177982 was as distinctly commercial as the present agitation is agrarian; and while the Irish Gracchus of our time and his eighty-five votes are the Parliamentary expression of a desire to rob the Irish landlord, Grattan and his colleagues were land-owners almost to a man, and cherished as their own the in- terests of the proprietors of the soil. Had he lived a century later, Grattan would have looked with distrust on Mr. Parnell. An Irish Parliament would now be a ma- chine for enabling the tenant to plunder the proprietor; in 1782 it was sought as a safeguard against the commercial tyranny 84 IRELAND UNDER HER OWN PARLIAMENT. of England. The freedom of trade that she had unwillingly conceded in 1779, she ~vas suspected of intending to revoke at the first convenient opportunity; and to prevent that revocation a hundred thou- sand armed Irishmen united in compelling her to convert the phantom Irish Parlia- ment into a reality. The spirit in which the agitation of 177982 was conducted was pithily expressed by those Dublin Volunteers who paraded the streets of their city with a couple of field-pieces, inscribed with the motto Free trade or th~s. From the reign of Charles II. onwards, the price that Ireland paid for her connec- tion with England was the surrender of her trade. While Dublin was vainly try- ing to extirpate Catholicism, Westminster, with more success, was legislating for the commercial ruin of Protestants and Cath- olics both. The missionary zeal of the Irish Par- liament found expression in the Irish penal laws. These practically offered the Catholic a choice between serfdom and conversion. He was shut out from Parlia- mentary and municipal life; could practise no profession but that of medicine, had not a vote, and could not make a will. At his death, the State took charge of his property, and divided it among his chil- dren ; unless the eldest son consented to become a Protestant, in which case the worthy convert was rewarded with the whole estate. Especial care was taken to provide a substitute for the antiquated process of slaughter and confiscation by which the Irish Catholic in ruder times had been deprived of his property in the soil. Under the penal laws he could sell land, but ~vas forbidden to buy it ; if he risked money on a mortgage, he had no protec- tion but the honesty of his debtor; if he took a lease of any land, the lease was invalid. These provisions, if enforced to the letter, would have left hardly an acre in Catholic hands. Fortunately for the estated professors of the old religion, the feeling of their I~rotestant lords towards them softened wonderfully in the eighty. seven years that intervened between the expulsion of Catholics from the Irish Par. liament and the first alteration of the penal laws. For a time, indeed, the division between Protestant and Catholic ~~as greater than that between Loyalist and Parnellite now. In the early years of the eighteenth century Irish Parliaments and viceroys had a set phrase by which they described fourfifths of the Irish people the Catholic population was habitually re ferred to as the common enemy. By the middle of the century the term had dropped into disrepute, and the penal laws were no longer strictly enforced; in 1777 the Catholic peers and gentry besought George III. for a relaxation of these laws, and the grandchildren of the men who had placed them on the statutebook joined with the petitioners in praying for this grace. Their common grudge against England had brought about a reconcilia- tion of the hereditary enemies ; or, rat her, they were content to suspend intestine warfare for a while, and combine in taking advantage of the distresses of a country that had persecuted both. The hatred of the Irish Protestant to England was greater in the early years of George III .s reign than that of the Irish Catholic. England had encouraged the enactment of penal laws in 1703, but the coercive zeal of the Irish Parliament ex- ceeded her desires ; and while she con- sented to the statutes, she ~vas always unwilling to see them executed in their inhuman entirety. So long as the temper of the Irish Protestant continued to be that of a persecutor, it was to England and the English governors of Ireland that the distressed Catholic looked for what- ever protection he obtained. The Protes- tant, on the other hand, had been cruelly injured by the action of his mother coun- try. He hated her as the most selfish and unnatural of parents, a harpy who, reversing the fable of the pelican, had nourished herself with her childrens blood. She had beggared him that she might enrich herself, had swept his ship- ping from the sea, destroyed his com- merce, and ruined his manufactures. It is difficult to find in the history of nations anything more grossly and meanly selfish than the commercial policy pursued by England towards Ireland; and it had the common fate of selfishness it over- reached itself. The country that had re- fused her children in Ireland freedom of trade was forced, in the end~, to grant them not only liberty to trade, but liberty to separate from her. The con veniency of ports and harbors, which nature bestowed so liberally on this kingdom, wrote Swift, fifty years before the time of the Irish Volunteers, is of no more use to us than a beautiful prospect to a man shut up in a dungeon. It was hardly an overstrained comparison En- gland had labored to destroy the trade of Ireland, and with almost complete suc- cess. Her first great blow was struck at the IRELAND UNDER HER OWN PARLIAMENT. Irish cattle-trade. As early as the reign of Charles II. English landowners took alarm at the influx of Irish cattle ; and laws were passed by the English Parlia- ment, forbidding Ireland to export to us live stock of any kind, dead meat, and even butter and cheese. Deprived of their natural market in England, Irish breeders turned their attention to the woollen manufacture. Threefourths of the island became a sheep walk, and its unequalled pastures, and the care bestowed in stocking them, resulted in the production of an excellent quality of wool. English, Scotch, and even foreign manufacturers were attracted to the country, capital was rapidly in- vested, and in a few years the Irish woollen industry gave employment to thousands of hands. English manufacturers began to tremble for their supremacy, and vehe- mently l)etitioned the English Parliament to protect their interests. Faithful to the maxim that a colony existed only for the benefit of the mother country, the Houses lent a ready ear to complaints of injury done to English trade; and in 1698 a Parliament was summoned at Dublin with the declared object of destroying the irish industry. The lords justices in their opening speech informed the Irish people that England claimed the man ufac- ture of woollens as her monopoly, and was imperially pleased that the sister island should cease from weaving them, and turn her attention instead to linen and hemp. The Irish Parliament reluctantly agreed to lay heavy duties on the export of woollens. Even this concession failed to satisfy; and in 1699 England framed an act prohibiting the export from Ireland of woollen fabrics. The industry was ruined, capital left the country, and mul- titudes of the Protestant population fol- lowed it. For many years there was a drain of the best blood, industrially speak- ing, of Protestant Ireland; and ten or twelve thousand emigrants of that reli- gion sometimes forsook the country in a year. As late as 1773, four thousand emi- grants sailed in t~velve months from Bel- fast alone. Together with the ruin of the woollen manufacture, came the crushing restric- tions imposed on the attempts of Ireland to create a mercantile navy of her own. She was shut out from trade with the Continent, and as regarded the English colonies, linen fabrics were almost the only export admitted to her. Even this concession was restricted to white and brown linens, the exportation of checked, striped, and dyed materials being abso- lutely prohibited. All direct importation from the colonies was forbidden; the goods that she required from them were to reach her by way of England, or not at all. The result was that Irish shipping either rotted in Irish harbors, or was em- ployed in carrying on a smuggling trade with France. A terrible despondency paralyzed the unhappy country. The Protestant settler, lately so active, had no heart to attempt the creation of a substitute for the ruined woollen manufacture; he foresaw th~t the day of its prosperity would give the signal for England to destroy it, as the woollen trade had been destroyed. The burden of supporting the population was cast almost wholly on the soil; and the soil, from a multitude of causes, proved unequal to the demand. There was hardly a year in which Ireland ~vas not on the verge of famine; and when the harvest proved bad the famine came. In that of 174041 nearly a tenth of the population was swept away; and everywhere might be seen wretches endeavoring to support life on the wild herbs of the field, and even on the nettles and docks that grew by the wayside. Fortunate was the peasant who possessed any cattle; he bled them from time to time, and boiled the blood drawn from the living animal with the weeds that he had gathered. With the disasters of the American War of Independence came the opportunity of Ireland. Many of the Protestant Irish whom Englands selfish commercial policy had ruined and, driven from home were now in America, and hatred of the mother country enlisted them by the thousand in the armies of Congress. The Protestant who remained in Ireland was smarting under the memory of the same wrongs and animated by similar feelings of re- sentment. When France and Spain joined America, and the control of the sea passed for a time from England, he felt that the moment had come for his coun- try to attempt the recovery of her com mercial freedom. A French invasion was in prospect. Ireland demanded an in- crease of her military establishment ; and the English government replied by con- fessing their inability to furnish it. Un- der the plea of organizing a means of national defence, the manhood of Prot- estant ireland hastened to take up arms. Regiment after regiment of Volunteers was formed ; the Irish peers and gentry placed themselves at their head; and with this force to back him, Grattan, on the 86 IRELAND UNDER HER OWN PARLIAMENT. 12th of October, 1779, moved in the Irish declaration that Englands difficulty was Parliament: That it is by a free export Irelands opportunity. He pointed to the the nation is now to be saved from im- terms lately offered to the American in- pending ruin. Flood, by turns his col- surgents as a proof of what might be league and rival, proposed the substitu extorted from Englands fears, if only de- tion of the words free trade for free manded by an armed nation. The House export, and with this alteration the reso- istened and wavered; but if it was l)atri- lution was voted, neinine contra dicente. otic, it was still more corrupt; and the Lord North and his colleagues had al viceroy had arguments at his command ready France and America on their hands. which, for the moment, outweighed those Was a war with Ireland to be added? of Grattan. A judicious distribution of They questioned the viceroy, and the bribes, and the lavish promise of peer. viceroy gave it as his opinion that, if the ages and places, staved off the evil day; demand for free trade were resisted, the and the resolutions were defeated. Irish Volunteers would fight. They al- Grattan fell back on the Volunteers. ready numbered fifty thousand, and there A cry arose that the Irish representatives were not five thousand English troops in were betraying the liberties of Ireland. the country. The Cabinet shrank from Thousands of new patriots hastened to civil war at such a crisis; and the En- enrol themselves; meetings and reviews glish restrictions on Irish commerce were were held; and the sword of armed Ire- promptly and unconditionally repealed. land was ostentatiously cast into the scale For the moment, Irish men of all classes against the bribes of the viceroy. At united in a burst of thanksgiving. En- first the House refused to be dictated to gland was warmly assured that her action by an armed mob, and resolutions ~vere had united the sister island to her forever passed censuring the action of the Vol. by a tie that could not be broken a tie unteers. It was not long before this tem- of gratitude. Grattan devoted all his elo- per changed, and the irish Parliament quence to hymning the praise of the consented to follow the lead of the na- mother country; and the English viceroy, tion; but during the sessions of i~8o and Lord Buckinghamshire, filled his letters 1781 honorable members were more amen- to English ministers with predictions of able to the seductions of the government the advent of an era of peace, prosperity, than to the threats of the patriots. and contentment. This mood lasted a A bill had been broLwht forward by Mr. few months, and then the ineradicable Bushe creating a separate mutiny law for Irish suspicion of England began once Ireland. In obedience to the instructions more to stir in patriot bosoms. of the English minis try, the viceroy op- The mother country had granted free posed it; but the mind of the country trade rather than risk an Irish war. Was was set on the measure, magistrates were it to be expected that a concession forced everywhere liberating deserters arrested from her in the moment of her deepest under the English Mutiny Act; and, in distress would be maintained when the spite of Lord Buckinghamshires efforts, Americans should have achieved their the bill was l)assed, and sent to London. independence, and peace had been made The Privy Council struck out the provis. with France and Spain? Grattan de- ion making it renewable at intervals of dared the contrary, and the suspicions of two years; and, having thus transformed the nation responded to him. A feeling it into a perpetual enactment, accepted spread through Ireland that, if commer- and returned it. Not yet wholly obedient cial independence were to be preserved, to popular sentiment, the Irish Parlia- the Irish Parliament must be free. The ment agreed to the English amendment, sentiment of never-dying gratitude that in spite af the protests of Grattan; and bound Irish hearts to England was for- the Irish Mutiny Act was declared per- gotten, and on April x9th, 1780, Grattan petual. In the same session the Irish moved, in the Irish House of Commons, supply bill included a duty on the import a declaration of the rights of Ireland. of loaf sugar. The Irish manufacturer (t) That the king, with the consent of had already discovered that free trade did the Parliament of Ireland, was not prevent his British rival from under- alone competent to enact laws to selling him in his own market, and a bind Ireland. t~velvemonths experience of his inability (2) That Great Britain and Ireland was to compete with British capital and en- indissolubly united, but only under ergy had made him clamorous for protec- the tie of a common sovereign. tion. Lord Norths government refused The great patriot repeated his favorite to agree to the imposts on British sugars; IRELAND UNDER HER OWN PARLIAMENT. 87 and the Irish Parliament, by yielding the pont, inflamed anew the frenzy of the Volunteers. They met to pass a series of resolutions, demanding for Ireland lib- erty to close her markets against English goods, and declaring that, without this protection of domestic industry, the re- peal of restrictions on Irish commerce, over which they had rejoiced so wildly a twelvemonth before, was a meaningless concession. At the same time the pass. ng of the perpetual Mutiny Act was point- ed to as a proof that, under its shelter, the army in Ireland was to be increased, and employed as an instrument for coerc- ing Irish patriots. Outside the walls of the Dublin Parliament this belief was general. Grattan brought forward a de- mand for the repeal of the provision that made the act perpetual, and, on his defeat, Flood followed him with a similar motion. It was in turn rejected; but the general support that during two stormy sessions the Irish Houses had accorded to the gov- ernment was plainly drawing to an end. Parliament had censured the Volunteers in 1780. In 178! it addressed to them a vote of thanks, the only discernible justifi- cation of which lay in the fact that they were more numerous and importunate than ever. When the news of the surren- der of Corn wallis at Yorktown announced to Ireland that America had achieved her independence, the Separatists felt that the moment of their triumph was at hand. The Catholics, whose antipathy to all with which their Protestant neighbors sympathized had induced them, as late as 1775, to transmit through the viceroy an address to George III. expressive of their loyalty to England and detestation of the rebellion in America, were now of another mind. They had aided the Volunteer movement by liberal subscriptions, and were only deterred from forming regi- ments of Catholic patriots by the danger of exciting the jealousy of their late tyrants and present allies. Some recognition of their cordial attitude was due to them; and, at the instance of Grattan, the Vol- unteers conceded it. In February, 1782, delegates from the various regiments of Ulster assembled at Dungannon, to urge the demand for Irish independence, and to the resolutions voted on this subject the meeting appended a declaration that, as Irishmen, Christians, and Protes- tants, they rejoiced in that repeal of the most oppressive penal laws which had signalized the year 1778. It was plain that, if an independent Parliament were conceded, a further relaxation of the penal laws would follow; but on the great question of the political emancipation of the Catholics, Protestant opinion was di- vided. Of the triumvirate that in 1782 led the Protestant Separatists, Grattan was heartily in favor of conceding to the Irish Catholics every political privilege enjoyed by the dominant caste, while Flood and Lord Charlemont were dis- posed to deny them even the exercise of the elective franchise. For the moment, however, the necessity of supporting the demand for Parliamentary independence with the full strength of Ireland led both Flood and Charlemont to acquiesce in Grattans policy of encouraging Catholic hopes. Already, before the Dungannon meet- ing, a member of the patriot party had taken charge of a fresh Catholic Relief Bill. The measure was subsequently separated into two bills; one allowing Catholics to purchase land and to be- queath property, the other conferring on them the ri~ht of educating their children in their own religion. While the fate of these compliances with the spirit of the time was still ~n abeyance, Grattan, fresh from the enthusiasm of Dungannon, once more proposed to the Irish Parliament to declare itself independent of England. He was opposed by the ablest of the steady supporters of government, Fitzgib- bon, afterwards Earl of Clare, who pointed out to the perplexed House that, if they denied the authority of the English Par- liament to legislate for Ireland, they re- pudiated the title on which the Protestant ownership of much of the soil of Ireland was based. Either this argument, or the fact that a majority of the members ~vere practically in the pay of the government, prevailed over Grattans eloquence; and the Irish House of Commons acknowl- edged its dependency on England by one hundred and thirty-seven votes to sixty- eight. The rage of the patriots grew fiercer and fiercer. They paraded daily in uni- forms of every color of the rainbow; the press was filled with incendiary senti- ments; and various of the leaders of the movement, including, it would seem, even Grattan himself, hinted in private at their readiness to draw the sword. In the mean time, the Irish viceroy, Lord Car- lisle, was negotiating for a compromise, on terms somewhat short of absolute separa- tion. Had Lord Norths government re- mained in power, it is probable that the viceroys efforts would have been crowned with success; but the disaster at York- 88 IRELAND UNDER HER OWN PARLIAMENT. town was fatal to the Tory premier, and, after a narrow escape from a vote of no confidence, he announced the resignation of his Cabinet. The Whigs came into office; Lord Carlisles negotiations fell through; and Rockingham and Fox sent over the Duke of Portland as viceroy, in the full confidence that his Grace would be able to appease the Separatists, while refusing them separation. The Irish policy of Mr. Gladstone is by no means an original product of his genius. Charles James Fox anticipated it more than a century ago. The great Whig orator, while in opposition, testified towards Irish disaffection sentiments as benignant as those of Mr. Gladstone; and, when in office, vacillated in the same mis. chievous fashion between conciliation and coercion. His language in the English House of Commons, when opposing Lord North, had rendered services to the party led by Grattan even superior to those that Mr. Gladstone, within the last ten years, has rendered Mr. Parnell. Fox was now a leading member of the English govern- ment, and Grattan and his followers, re- membering how warmly he had pleaded their cause, anticipated at the hands of the Whigs nothing short of the immediate concession of Irish independence. Hardly had the Duke of Portland landed in Ireland, when he found that his mission was a failure. The news from America and the menacing attitude of the Irish Volunteers had already shaken the fidelity of the government majority in the Irish Parliament; the accession of Fox and the Whigs to power confirmed them in their inclination to desert to the side of Foxs friends, the patriots. When Grattan, on April i6th, 1782, rose for the last time to move his declaration of Irish indepen. dence, it was not as a leader cheering on his forces to battle that he spoke, but as the same leader when the victory is won. Ireland, he began, is now a nation. In that character I hail her, and, bowing the knee to her august presence, I say, Esto ~er~etua The House frantically applauded the intimation and the rhapsody that followed it; the vote of two months before was cancelled by acclamation; and the Irish House of Lords, following the example of the Commons, repudiated all connection with Great Britain but the tie of a common sovereign, and declared that only the Irish Parliament was competent to legislate for Ireland. The Whig government hesitated for a moment between coercion and submission but chose the latter. Poynings Act was repealed, so far as it constituted the En. gush Privy Council a tribunal for sitting in judgment on Irish bills, and along with it went the act of George I. that asserted the authority of the English Parliament to legislate for Ireland. Ireland believed herself to be, as Grattan had said, at last a nation; and Grattan himself was, for a few months, the darling of every Irish heart. A reward of moo,ooo was pro. posed for his services by the grateful legislature that had so long allowed the pay and peerages of the lord lieutenant to outweigh his patriotic eloquence, and he finally accepted half the sum. In the ensuing session the emancipated Parliament addressed itself zealously to the task of legislation, and, for the most part, did admirable work. The price of Catholic support was paid, and the late victim of the penal laws acquired the right to buy land and make a will, to worship free from restraint, and to bring up his children in his own faith. Irish judge- ships ceased to be tenable during the sovereigns pleasure, and their holders were placed on an equal footing with the English bench. The Irish Presbyterian had been relieved, in 1779, from the hard- ships of the Test Act; his claim to be married by a clergyman of his own per. suasion was now conceded. On two points Parliament showed itself hostile to popular feeling. It was composed of landlords and placemen, and had no inclination to tax absentees or reform boroughs. The non-resident landlord, who drained the country of its money and left his estates in the hands of middle-men, had long been the greatest curse of Ireland, and in the days before separation patriot members were loud in censuring him; but when a proposal was made, in 1783, to tax absen- tees, it was rejected by one hundred and eighty-four votes to twenty-two. Against electoral reform the Irish House of Coin. mons was still more stubbornly set, and its attitude on this question speedily brought it into collision with the Volun. teers. Ihese heroes were no longer at the beck of Grattan. Within six months of his Parliamentary triumph, the darling of Ireland had become one of the most un- popular of Irishmen, and the late recipient of a nations bounty had suffered a pelting at the hands of the Dublin mob. If the Athenian government, wrote his son and biographer (meaning by government the practice of ostracism), had accompanied the popular frenzy of the day, Mr. Grattan would, perhaps, have been forced to go IRELAND UNDER HER OWN PARLIAMENT. 89 to America. His unpopularity ~vas the work of Flood. That very venal patriot had long been jealous of his colleagues stainless reputation and superior influ- ence, and he now contrived to deal a dex- terous blow at Grattan and England 1)0th. The liberation of Ireland, he declared in Parliament, had been managed in a bun-. gling fashion. The simple repeal of Poyn- ings Act and the Act of George I. was insufficient. At the first favorable op- portunity the English Parliament would undoubtedly re-enact these st4utes, and, with the help of the EpgjjA~ forces in Ireland, once more enslave the Irish na- tion. Floods remedy was to demand from the mother country a declaration that she renounced forever the claim to legis- late for IrelGnd. With the indignation of an author who hears his work condemned, Grattan hotly combated the proposal, and argued that to demand from England an express renunciation of her right to legIs- late was, in fact, to admit that such a right existed, whereas the simple repeal of the Act of George I. was a silent admission on the part of the English Parliament that it had usurped the authority the act assigned to it. Logically he had the bet- ter of the dispute; but the Irish Volun- teers and people, in whose mind suspicion of England, when once aroused, swallowed up all other sentiments as rapidly as Aarons serpent devoured those of the in agicians, took part against him and with Flood. To increase their clamor, Lord Mansfield, at this unfortunate moment, gave judgment in an Irish appeal case that had been long before the English courts. A wild cry arose that Ireland was betrayed, and the English government could only silence it by hurrying through Parliament a bill that expressly recog- nized the independence of the Irish courts of law. The net result of the whole busi- ness was that Grattans popularity forth- with sank to zero, and Flood, a few years before the tool of the government, took his place as the idol of the hour. Mr. Flood, exclaimed the enthusiastic Ho- inanity Martin, in the Irish House of Commons, is the greatest character that has ever adorned this country a char- acter not to be profaned by the tongues of impious men. Yet, at that very moment, the ornament of Ireland was secretly ne- gotiating with the viceroy, and perfectly ready to desert to the side of the govern- ment if only English ministers would come up to his terms. It was not long before a new instance of English perfidy provoked the fury of the Irish people. The bitter conviction forced itself on the minds of patriots that, while the House of Commons continued unreformed, the independence that the country had armed itself to secure was little better than a sham. In the Irish Lower House there sat exactly three hun- dred members, sixty-four for the counties of Ireland, and no fewer than two hundred and thirty-six for the boroughs. Of the borough seats one hundred and seventy- six, or a majority of the whole House, were the property of individual bishops, peers, and commoners, and were bought and sold in the most open manner, being sometimes parted with outright and some- times leased to the purchaser for a single Parliament. The buyers design was commonly to reimburse himself by the sale of his vote, and, as the Irish govern- inent was the only buyer of votes, a result ensued that, had Grattan been a practical statesman, he would have foreseen as the certain consequence of his success. On questions that did not affect their own pockets the majority in the House were all ready to sell themselves to the English viceroy, and, at an exorbitant cost to her- self, England, for eighteen years to come, contrived to govern Ireland by bribing Irish Parliaments. The taint spread even beyond the region of politics. When the first appeal case came before the Irish House of Lords, Lord Strangford, the Dean of Down, was proved to have offered his conscience for sale to one of the par- ties to the suit, and lost his privilege of voting as a peer of Parliament in conse- quence. It was certain that the government had no disposition to part with the command of Irish politics that an unreformed House of Commons gave it; and the House itself prized as the most precious of irelands commodities her rotten boroughs. Flood, who, as the successor to Grattans influ- ence, headed the agitation for reform, fell back on Grattans old allies, the Volun- teers. On September 6th, t783, a second convention assembled at Dungannon, and a daring scheme was agreed upon for overawing the treacherous representatives by whom the dearest rights of Irish men were betrayed for place and pay to the enemy beyond St. Georges Channel. This was the creation of a body of three hundred delegates, matching the number of the House of Commons, whose func- tion it should be to assemble in Dublin and coerce Parliament into the acceptance of Floods Reform Bill. Under the protection of an armed mul 90 IRELAND UNDER HER OWN PARLIAMENT. titude of patriots, this illegitimate Parlia- ment accordingly met in November, 1783. The Rotunda had been selected for its sittings, and thither the deputies were escorted by the Dublin Artillery Volun- teers, whose guns the blasphemous wit of Napper Tandy had decorated with the sentence from the Liturgy, Open thou our mouths, 0 Lord, and our lips shall show forth Thy praise. So completely eclipsed, for the time being, was the pop- ularity of Grattan, that one of the dele- gatesthe premier ruffian of Ireland, Fighting Fitzgerald laid an ambush of patriots for hin~, and the liberator possi- bly escaped death at the hands of the lib- erated by happening to dine that evening at the Castle. In spite of the cannon of the Volunteers and the rival assembly of representatives sitting on the other side of the Liffey, the House stood firm. Floods bill for the abolition of rotten boroughs was rejected by a majority of two to one. It comes to us, said Fitzgibbon, under the mandate of a military congress. The congress in question met to deliberate on the course that Irish patriots should adopt and the counsels of its moderate members, and perhaps the fact that the military estab- lishment of Ireland had been recently in- creased, turned its decisions to the side of prudence. Not for the only time in his- tory, the mountain of Irish agitation brought forth a mouse the three hun- dred delegates adjourned, sine die, after agreeing on a petition to the king. It was in this session of 1783 that the memorable encounter between Grattan and Flood supplied for the benefit of pos terity a happy example of the temper and manners of the Irish Parliament. I am not, declared Flood tauntingly, a men- dicant patriot bought by his country for a sum of money, and who sold his country for prompt payment. Grattan sprang to his feet; and, under cover of Parliamen- tary forms, retaliated with a vindictive por- trait of his adversary. Suppose him a great ecrotist his honor equal to his am- gition ;and I will stop him and say looking Flood in the face as he spoke: Sir, your talents are not so great as your life has been infamous. You were silent for years, and silent for money. You can be trusted by no man. The peo- ple cannot trust you. The ministers can- not trust you. . - - You tell the nation it is ruined by other men, while it is sold by you. I, therefore, tell you, in the face of the country, and before all the world, and to your beard you are not an honest man I Flood naturally challenged his brother patriot after hearing this ;but was thought to have taken no great pains to avoid being arrested, and the projected duel ended in a binding-over to keep the peace. In 1784, Flood again brought forward his motion for reform, and Grattan sup- ported it on principle; but leave to intro- duce a bill was refused by one hundred and fifty-nine votes to eighty-five. In 1785, Irish Parliamentary patriots were employed for a great part of the session in furious abuse of England, the provoca- tion being the attempt of Pitt to negotiate a commercial union between the two coun- tries. The young premier, true to the spirit of his master, Adam Smith, wished to see England and Ireland placed on the same commercial footing; but the hostility of English mercantile and manufacturing interests compelled him to modify his first proposals, and the treaty he ultimately submitted to the I)ublin Parliament was denounced by every patriot, from Grattan downwards. The Irish government found that their salaried majority of placemen and pensioners could not be relied on to pass the bill, and prudently withdrew it. Ireland was left to do as she liked with her trade, and her pleasure was to nurse her feeble industries by protection. Nor did home products escape taxation. So universal is the present system of national taxation, and so many objects does it em~ brace, says a Dublin newspaper of 1788, that there are few articles, either neces- saries orsuperfluities, that are not subject to an impost. Whiskey, of course, con- tributed largely to the national exchequer; and a curious picture of Irelands lawless condition in the golden age that Mr. Par- nell looks back to is afforded by the ac- count of an inspector of excise, with two companies of the 27th Regiment, and as many field-pieces, marching in this same year, 1788, to the attack of an old castle, where, for years, an illegal distillery had been openly carried on. Ireland is now a nation. Grattans words of 1782 were as delusive as the benefits that he had conferred on his unhappy country. Ireland was never farther from being a nation than under her own Parliament; the ancient hatreds that seemed to have died away while the battle was being fought with England revived as soon as it was won. Church- man quarrelled with Presbyterian; and the two agreed in refusing political eman- cipation to the Catholic. The Catholics themselves were divided into two parties; IRELAND UNDER HER OWN PARLIAMENT. 9 there were the nobles, gentry, and traders, for the most part loyal to the English con- nection; and behind these the mass of the peasantry, nourished, as their children are nourished to-day, on legends of English oppression, and regarding themselves as the rightful owners of the soil It was among these ignorant, wayward, passion- ate masses that hatred of England was fiercest and Grattan s remedy for the disease was to give them votes and allow them to fill the Irish House of Commons with mouthpieces of their demands. He had persuaded himself inirabile dictz4 / that the possession of a vote and the privilege of sending Catholics to the Irish Parliament would work a miraculous change in the temper of the disaffected Catholic population; and the supreme blessing he longed to confer on Ireland ~vas the creation of a truly national Parlia- ment, where Catholic should work in har- mony with Protestant, and the two shouid vie in loyalty to the English crown. It was a magnificent dream; but, fortunately for the unity of the empire, Catholic eman- cipation was not fully accomplished until Ireland had long ceased to possess a Par- liament of her own. The great year of the Irish Parliament vas 1793. Before its close the Catholic had acquired a vote; nominally through the action of the Irish Houses, really be- cause Pitt had issued a mandate that the Dublin Parliament obeyed. Pitts motives for the part he played in Irish affairs of that year were singularly mixed; but two influences predominated the dread of seeing the whole body of Catholics com- bine in disloyalty, and the desire of forc- ing on the Union. By 1793, the Society of United Irish men had been fully constituted. It originated among the discontented demagogues whose attempts to reform Parliament in spite of itself had been defeated; and its object was to unite the Catholics of the south and the Presbyterians of Ulster against England and the Churchmen. From the day of its birth the Society had looked to France. Before 1789, its found- ers might be seen drinking the health of Louis XVI. on their knees; after the fall of the Bastille they became admirers of Marat and Robespierre, and learnt the Ca Ira. Their hope was to establish an Irish republic, with the help of France; and in anticipation of the day when French troops should land, they drilled patriots and stored up arms. Had Grattan been a clear-sighted statesman, he would have recognized the Society as the natural off- spring of 1782; had the United Irishmen been grateful sons, they would have set up the bust of Grattan at their meetings and have drunk the health of that patriot as their true parent. It was from Grattan they learnt the lesson that Catholic and Protestant might be induced to combine against England; and the disloyalty of Volunteer and United Irishman was, at bottom, the same. Grattans declaration, made in the session of 1785, is on record: If ever the question was presented to Ireland whether the empire or the Irish constitution was to be sacrificed, I, as an Irishman, would say, Perish the em- pire! At first there was real danger that the movement would become a national one. The Ulster Presbyterians had bitter grudges, political and religious, against the Irish Churchmen; and the farmers of Ulster, in especial, had been worse than harshly treated by their landlords. When a lease fell in, exorbitant fines were de- manded for its renewal; and if the tenant could not raise the money, the farm was let over his head, and lie was mercilessly evicted. In many cases the incoming oc- cupiers were Catholics; and thus a con- siderable Catholic population was added to Ulster. The evicted Protestant was divided between hatred of the landlord who had ruined him and hatred of the papist who had taken his place; and while he was swayed by these feelings, the United Irishmen approached him with their proposals. Join with us to over- throw the landlords, they said; and when the victory is won, Catholics and Presbv- terians can arrange terms on which they may live at peace. Many Ulster men listened; and the brotherhood of Irish republicans soon possessed a formidable organization in that province. Meanwhile, the Irish Catholics even the most intelligent and loyal of their bodyhad grown dissatisfied with the measure of relief conceded to them. The gratitude with which they hailed the re- peal of the penal laws died a natural death in the course of a few years, and was suc- ceeded by a passionate craving for the possession of political power. Grattan, and the few members of the Dublin Par- liament ~vho shared his views, were eager to concede their claims. Not so the great majority of the House. When a member presented a petition in 1792 in favor of the Catholics, it was rejected by two hun- dred and eight votes against twenty-five. Grattan exerted all his eloquence in vain. I could hardly obtain a hearing, he 92 IRELAND UNDER HER OWN PARLIAMENT. wrote to a friend. As to Denis Browne, they would not listen to him. The cpr- poration of Dublin passed a vote of thanks to the majority. Pitt now interfered. The viceregal gov- ernment had spies in the most secret councils of the United Irishmen, and transmitted to England regular accounts of their proceedings. It was plain to the English premier that there was danger of the Catholics throwing themselves into the movement en masse. He determined to conciliate them, and at the same time to bring the union of the two Parliaments one step nearer. It is doing no injustice to Pitts memory to believe that in sup. porting Catholic claims he sought to work on the fears of the Protestants. He fore- sav that when the Catholic had become a political power the ruling caste of Irish. men would be less hostile to a Parlia- mentary union with England, in whose strength alone they could find protection; and with this object in view, he was pre- pared to grant the franchise to the Cath- olics, and even to go to the length of admitting them to Parliament a con- cession that could do little harm while that Parliament was unreformed. The session of 1793 opened. To the amazement of the House, the claims of the Irish Catholics were pressed by the lord lieutenant in a speech from the throne. Oblivious of the vote of the pre- ceding year, the troop of placemen and pensioners followed theii- paymasters lead; and the elective franchise was con- ferred on Catholics. The acquisition of the franchise only made the latter more eager for seats in Parliament. They strongly urged their claim; and it was favored by a majority of the English Whigs. In 1794 the rad- icalistn of Fox influenced the aristocratic XVhigs to desert him and league them- selves with Pitt; and they pressed on their new ally the expediency of consider- ing whether further concessions could be made to the Irish Catholics. Grattan ~vas taken into the counsels of the Cabinet. He came to London and saw Pitt, who hinted that, while the government would not bring forward a bill themselves, they would not oppose it if brought forward by others. Grattan returned tome persuaded that the day of the final emancipation of the Catholics was at hand; and Lord Fitzwilliam, a Whig peer whose senti- ments on the Catholic question were those of Grattan, was sent to Dublin as lord lieutenant. Had Fitzwilliam refrained from inter- ference with the great families that fat- tened on the plunder of Ireland, Catholic emancipation might have been secured; and Pitt would undoubtedly have proceed- ed to force on a union of the two Parlia- ments. Unluckily for the Catholics, Fitz- william commenced an attack on Irish placemen. The Irish chancellor, Fitzgib- bon, withstood him; and a political duel ensued between the two, each man~u- vring to oust the other. An adroit stroke secured the victory to Fitzgibbon, who entered into communication with a sec- tion of the Enolish Cabinet that was opposed to the Catholic demands, and through these, reached the ear of the king. George III. readily listened to the suggestion that to sanction the entrance of Catholics into Parliament would be a breach of his coronation oath, and put his veto on the project. Pitt deferred to the will of the sovereign; and peremptory instructions were sent to Fitzwilliam to desist from any encouragement of the Catholic claims. Unfortunately, Fitzwilliam had already committed himself. A bill had been promptly introduced by Grattan, and un- der the patronage of the lord lieutenant, ~vas read a first tune unopposed. This was more than the viceroys instructions warranted; and mutual recriminations en- sued between Fitzwilliam and the English Cabinet, resulting in his speedy recall. With his departure closed the era of con- ciliation~ The bill for repealing absolutely all penalties and disabilities affecting Ro- man Catholics was thrown out of the Irish Parliament on the second reading; and an outburst of popular feeling was an- swered by conferring on the magistracy extensive powers for dealing with sedi- tion. Fortunately for government, the United - Irishmen were no longer united. Dis- trust of their Catholic allies had prevailed with the Ulster men; and they converted their share of the movement for liberating Ireland into a crusade for the expulsion of Papists from Ulster. A reign of terror set in throughout the north of Ireland. The Catholic farmers and cottiers were warned to quit their holdings; and when they refused, their houses were attacked, and the occupants savagely beaten and sometimes murdered outright. In their desperation the Catholics took up arms; and the year that saw Grattans Emanci- pation Bill rejected, also saw the Battle of the Diamond, a skirmish in which victory remained wtth the Protestants. The same night the first Orange Lodge was founded: IRELAND UNDER HER OWN PARLIAMENT. 93 and scores of others were speedily added. Such a movement was practically a decla- ration that Ireland was in a state of civil war. Throughout the remaining three prov- inces the Catholics, in their turn, were arming and organizing fast. There were very few troops in ireland; the English government would not, or could not, send more; and the Irish executive was forced tn fall back on the Protestant yeomanry. With the brutal Carhampton at their head, these were let loose on the peasantry, and troops of them scoured the country. com- mitting every conceivable outrage under color of searching for hidden arms. The yeomanry lived at free quarters in houses of the better class, and burnt the poorer sort. The peasant suspected of conceal- ing arms was flogged into declaring where they were hidden; or sometimes his tor- mentors hanged him and cut him down before life was extinct, repeating the chok- ing until he confessed. Then, with a back bleeding from the lash or a throat bruised by the rope, he was left to curse his tyrants among the ruins of his cabin often to listen to a wife or daughter com- plaining of wrongs still fouler than his own. Like his friend Burke, Grattan pos- sessed in a pre-eminent degree the first of social virtues, a sympathy ~vith his fellow- men. in the Irish House of Commons he poured forth passionate denunciations of the cruelties with which the search for arms had been attended; but to no pur- pose. The House responded by passing a bill of indemnity to shield the crimi- nals. Weapons, however, continued to be sent into the country from America and France; and in 1797 General Lake was ordered to disarm Ulster, where the whole of the Catholic population and those of the Protestants who still clung to the cause of United Ireland were ripe for rebellion. The scenes of two years earlier were repeated; and fifty thousand mus- kets, twenty-two cannon, and seventy thousand pikes passed into loyal hands. Before this, the United Irishmen had played their best card and had lost. In 1796, Hoches fleet of invasion was scat- tered by a December tempest and al- though eighteen ships reached the ren- dezvous in Bantry Bay, the vessel was not among them that carried the great republican general. In his absence the French did nothing. Had Hoche and his fifteen thousand veterans landed, there would have been an Irish Saint Bartholomew. There were still few regular troops in the country, and the French might well have led on their allies to victory; but most assuredly they could not have restrained them from converting it into massacre. The ~vhole power of the priesthood could not have restrained them, and yet it was even greater then than now, and at that very moment was being exerted on the side of order; for horror of the French Revolu- tion had made Irish priests, for the most part, prefer the tyranny of heretic England to alliance with infidel France. The priests could keep their flocks quiet while the invader was still in his ships ; but had he landed I know my country- men, said General Clarke, an Irishman in the service of the Directory, to ~Volfe Tone, when the founder of the United Irishmen was in Paris seeking French aid: I know what will happen if the peas- antry are let loose. Shocking things, no doubt, was the answer, but the o~ pressors of Ireland well deserve them. Tones opinion of the deserts of Irish landlords was more than shared by the wretched creatures who had undergone the discipline of Carhampton and his yeo- manry; and when all is said that can be said of the many good qualities of the Irish peasant, the fact remains that at the end of last century he was a savage rather than a civilized being, and revenged his wrongs,when opportunity offered, with all a savage s ferocity. The French fleet sailed away; and the Irish executive, conscious of a great dan- ger and a narrow escape from it, addressed itself vigorously to the task of unearthing concealed arms and laying hands on the leaders of the United Irishmen. Early in 1798, eighteen of these pests were trapped in Dublin. Their arrest precipitated the long-organized and longdelayed explo- sion; and on May 28th the irish Rebel- lion began with the treacherous massacre of a party of militia at Prosperous, near Dublin. In the absence of the hated French a few priests were drawn into the rising, and became the most ferocious of its leaders. The peasantry of Wexford, Kildare, and Wicklow, were speedily in arms; and a camp that served also for a prison and a slaughter-house, was formed by the rebels on Vinegar Hill. For the next three weeks its occupants went mad with the delight of shedding Protestant blood. A mock court was ap- pointed to try the prisoners brought into camp; and from the ruined windmill, w-here it held its sittings, the condemned were led out to the pikes that waited for 94 IRELAND UNDER HER OWN PARLIAMENT. them. The cruelties of Vinegar Hill were imitated on a smaller scale in every dis- trict that the rebels occupied. In at least one instance they were surpassed. After nearly ninety years, it is not forgotten by the Orangemen of Ireland that, on the day of the battle of New Ross, a division of the Irish army stopped in its flight from the field to set fire to a barn crammed with Protestants, and guarded it with their pikes till the victims of this frightful auto daft were burnt or suffocated. Ihe rebels received more mercy than they gave thanks chiefly to a change of viceroys. On the 21st of June, General Lake stormed theircamp at Vinegar Hill; and the day before there had landed at Dublin a lord lieutenant who mistook a maddened peasantry, burning with hat.red of the owners of the soil, for irish converts to the doctrines put forth in the Rights of Man. Persuaded that the people had l~en misled by Jacobin mission iries, Lord Cornwallis determined to spare them as much as possible, and hang their lead. ers. Such a policy effectu ally seconded the victory of Lake; and while the heads of Harvey, Colclough, Grogan, and their brother chiefs were being set to blacken on spikes in the July sun, the mass of their followers were dispersing sullenly to their homes. Ireland quieted, the Irish Parliament, at the instance of the viceroy, committed suicide. The negotiations that preceded the act took nearly two years; for the shrewd patriots who had a country to sell, naturally wanted a good price for her. Their greed and impudence confounded the viceroy, who soon learned to look on the Parliament in the light of a cess-j)ool that he had been sent to cleanse. 1 long, he wrote, to kick those whom my public duty obliges me to court. My oc- cupation is to negotiate with the most corrupt people under heaven. I despise and hate myself every hour for engaging in such dirty work, and am supported only by the reflection that without a union the British empire must be destroyed June, i8oo, saw the long bargaining at an end, and the Treaty of Union accepted by the irish Lords and Commons. The English Houses promptly ratified it; and on the 1st of August George III. gave his royal assent to the act that undid the work of 1782. At a cost of millions, En- gland had bought back her concessions; and the course of events has since taught her that the Union was worth the money. The eloquent patriot who in 1782 had hailed Ireland as a nation, uttered pathetic and impassioned laments over what he was pleased to call her corpse. To Grat- tan the miserable history of eighteen years had taught no lesson. He still believed that the changes of 1782 only failed to bring peace in their train because they did not go far enough; that in a reformed and national Irish Parliament a Cathoiic majority would hold out the right hand of fellowship to Protestant landlords; that the hunger of the peasant for the land could be appeased by giving him a vote and letting him return Catholic members to the House of Commons on College Green. We may judge by the light of recent history if the event would have been as he imagined. if the Ireland to which Mr. Gladstone has successively sacrificed the Church and the landlord as peace-offerings is so disloyal to.day, what would have been her teml)er had Church and landed interest been handed over to her tender mercies at the end of the last century? it tempts an Englishman to forgive the old Dublin Parliament its many sins when he reflects that it refused to follow Grattan in the paths of Reform and Catholic Emancipation. The venal majorities that voted in obedience to the orders of English viceroys prevented the disruption of the empire; and Grattan, in his great love for his country, would have cut her wholly adrift from England, at the same time putting the Irish landlord in the power of the peasant, with a tender entreaty to the latter to forget the past. England, said Hussey Burgh in 1779, has sown her laws like dragons teeth, and they have sprung up in armed men. The patriots of the Irish House of Com- mons applauded the felicity of the image; and forthwith proceeded, at the call of Grattan, to sow the dragons teeth that sprang up in the shape of the rebels of 1798. if Englishmen desire to be cursed with a second and more extensive crop of the kind, there is an admirable opportunity just now for sowing the seed. Happily, the signs of the times ~vould rather indi- cate the determination of the country that no axe not even Mr. Gladstones shall be laid to the roots of the Union of iSoo. J. L. DERWENT. NEWMAN AND ARNOLD. 95 From The Contemporary Review. NEWMAN AND ARNOLD. I. CARDINAL NEWMAN. IT may be thought that there is some- thing incongruous between the two sub- jects of my lectures Newman and Arnold the one a prince of the Church which holds as articles of faith, the immaculate conception of the Virgin, the invocation of saints, and the efficacy of indulgences; the other a rationalizer ~vho dissolves away the very substance, nay, the very possibility, of revelation, recognizes no God but a stream of tendency not our- selves which makes for righteousness, no Saviour except sweet reasonableness in a human life, and no resurrection except the resurrection from a selfish to an un- selfish heart. But the greater you make the contrast between Cardinal Newman and Matthew Arnold, the more remark- able is the relation between them. New- man was far and away the most character- istic and influential Oxonian of the second quarter of this century; Matthew Arnold the most characteristic and influential Oxonian of its third quarter. Both drank deep of the genius of the great university to which they belong. The cardinal is perhaps most widely known by his invoca- tion to that kindly light which amidst the encircling gloom of this troubled existence he implored to lead him on. Matthew Arnold is perhaps most widely known by his description borrowed from Swift of the spirit for which we ought to yearn, as one of sweetness and light. I3oth are great masters of the style in which sweetness and light pre- dominate. Both are poets the one a theologian first and a poet afterwards the other a poet first, and a theologian, I will not say, for a theologian without theism is almost a contradiction in terms, but a rationalizer of theology, an anx- ious inventor of supposed equivalents for theology, afterwards. In both there is a singular combination of gentleness and irony. Both give you the amplest sympa- thy in your desire to believe, and both are merciless ~vhen they find you practically dispensing with the logic which they have come to regard as final. Both are wit- nesses to the great power of religion the one by the imaginative power he shows in getting over religious objections to his faith; the other by the imaginative power he shows in clothing a vacuum with im- pressive and majestic shadows till it looks something like a faith. Again, both, with all their richness of insight, have had that strong desire to rest on something beyond that insight, something which they can regard as independent of themselves, which led Newman first to preach against the principle of private judgment, and finally to yearn after an infallible Church, while it led Arnold to preach ~vhat he calls his doctrine of verification namely, that no religious or moral instinct is to be trusted unless it can obtain the endorse- ment on a large scale of the common consent of the best human experience. Surely there is no greater marvel in our age than that it has felt profoundly the influence of both, and apl)reciated the greater qualities of both the leader who with bowed head and passionate self-dis- trust, nay, with many a start of prayer and fear, has led hundreds back to sur- render their judgment to a pope whose rashness Dr. Newmans own ripe culture ultimately condemned, and the poet whQ in some of the most pathetic verses of modern times has bewailed the loss of the very belief which, in some of the most flippant and frigid of the diatribes of mod- ern times, he has done all that was in his power to destroy. Cardinal Newman has taught men to take refuge in the greatness of the past from the pettiness of the pres- ent. Mr Arnold has endeavored to re- store the idolatry of the Zel/geist, the time-spirit, which measures truth by the dwindled faith of the existing genera- tion, and which never so much as dreams that one day the dwindled faith of the existing generation may in its turn be judged, and condemned, by that truth which it has denied. Surely, that the great University of Oxford should have produced first the one and then the other first the great Romanizer, and then the great rationalizer is such a sign of the times as one ought not lightly to pass by. When I consider carefully how the great theologian has vanished from his pulpit at St. Marys, and how, finally transformed into a cardinal, he has pleaded from his Birmingham Oratory with the sadie touch- ing simplicity as in his old tutorial days for the truth that to the single heart there are but two things in the whole universe, our own soul and God who made it, and then how the man who succeeded him in exercising more of the peculiar influence of Oxford over the world than any other of the following generation and where is there a promise of any younger Oxford leader who is likely to stand even in the place of Mr. Arnold?tells us with that mild intellectual arrogance which is the 96 NEWMAN AND ARNOLD. leading characteristic of his didactic prose, I do not think it can be said that there is even a low degree of probability for the assertion that God is a person who thinks and loves, when I consider this con- trast, I realize more distinctly than in looking at any of the physical changes of the universe what Shakespeare meant ~vhen he wrote, We are such stuff as dreams are made of. What are messages flashed under the ocean, what is our more rapid flight through space, what is the virtual contraction of the distances on this little molehill of a planet till the most distant points upon it are accessible to almost all, compared with the startling mental revolution effected within thirty or forty years at most? When the highest intellect of a great place of learning in one generation says in effect, Because I be- lieve so utterly in God and his revelation, I have no choice but to believe als-~ in the pope, while the highest intellect of the same great school in the next generation says, As there is not even a low degree of probability that God in the old sense exists, let us do all that we can with streams of tendency, and morality touched with emotion, to sul)ply his place, we must at least admit that the moral insta- bility of the most serious convictions of earth is alarming enough to make the whole head sick and the whole heart faint. Perhaps I may be able in some degree to attenuate, before I have dealt with both these great men, the more painful aspects of the paradox on which I have insisted. I dare say you all know, by bust, photo- graph, or picture, the wonderful face of the great cardinal ; that wide forehead, ploughed deep with parallel horizontal fur- rows which seem to express his careworn grasp of the double aspect of human na- ture, its aspect in the intellectual and its aspect in the spiritual world, the pale cheek down which long lines of shadow slope Which years, and curious thought, and suffer- ing give, the pathetic eye, which speaks compas- sion from afar, and yet gazes wonderingly into the impassable gulf which separates man from man, and the strange mixture of asceticism and tenderness in all the lines of that mobile and reticent mouth where humor, playfulness, and sympathy are in- tricately blended with those severer moods that refuse and restrain. On the whole it is a face full in the first place of spir- itual passion of the highest order, and in the next, of that subtle and intimate knowledge of the details of human lim- itation and weakness which makes all spiritual passion look so ambitious and so hopeless, unless indeed it be guided, amongst the stakes and dykes and pitfalls of the human battlefield, by the direct providence of God. And not a little of what I have said of Cardinal Newmans face may be said also of his style. A great French critic has declared that style is the man. But surely that cannot be asserted without much qualification. There are some styles which are much better than the man, through failing to reflect the least admira- ble parts of him ; and many that are much worse for example, styles affected by the artificial influence of conventional ideas, like those which prevailed in the last century. Again, there are styles which are thoroughly characteristic of the man in one sense, and yet are character- istic in part because they show his delight in viewing both himself and the universe through colored media, which, ~vhile they brilliantly represent some aspects of it, greatly misrepresent or completely dis- guise all others. Such a style was Car- lyles, who may be said to have seen the universe with wonderful vividness, as it was when in earthquake and hurricane, but not to have apprehended at all that solid crust of earth symbolizing the con- ventional phlegmatic nature which most of us know only too well. Gibbon, again, sees everythingeven himselfas if it were a striking moral pageant. You re- member how he describes his fathers disapprobation of his youthful passion for Mademoiselle Curchod (afterwards Ma- dame Necker), I sighed as a lover, I obeyed as a son. It was the moral pag- eant of that very mild ardor, and that not too reluctant submission, of ~vhich he was thinking, not of the emotion itself. And Macaulay, again, has a style like a coat of mail with the visor down. It is burnished, brilliant, imposing, but it presents the world and human life in pictorial antith- esis far more vivid and brilliant than real. It is a style which effectually conceals all the more homely and domestic aspects of Macaulays own nature, and represents mainly his hunger for incisive contrast. But if ever it were true that the style is the man, it is true, I think, of Newman nay, of both Newman and Arnold. And there- fore, you will, I am sure, bear with me if I dwell somewhat longer on the style of both, and especially of the former, than would be ordinarily justifiable. Both styles are luminous, both are marked by NEWMAN AND ARNOLD. that curious distinction which only genius, and in general only poetic genius, can corn mand. Both show a great delight in irony, and use it with great effect. Both can, when the writer chooses, in- dulge even in extravagance, and give the rein to ridicule without rousing that dis- pleasure which any such excess in men of high intellectual power is apt to excite. Both are styles of white light rather than of the lurid, or glowing, or even rainbow order. Both, in poetry at least, and New- man in 1)0th poetry and prose, are cal)able of expressing the truest kind of pathos. Both have something in them of the older Oxford suavity, though in very different forms. You know that the characteristic Oxford manner is accused of being os- tentatiously sweet, as the characteristic Cambridge manner is of being ostenta- tiously clumsy. But while neither New- man nor Arnold have the slightest trace of this excess of suavity, of the eaz~ sucrde attributed to the university, Newmans sweetness is the sweetness of religious humility and ardor, Arnolds is the sweet- ness of easy condescension. Newmans sweetness is wistful, Arnolds is didactic; the one yearns to move your heart, the other kindly enlightens your intellect. Even Newmans prose style is spiritual in its basis, Arnolds intellectual. Even when treating spiritual topics, even when saying the best things Arnold has ever said as to the secret of Jesus, his man- ner, though gracious, is gently dictatorial. Again, when Newman gives the rein to his irony, it is always with a certain ear- nestness, or even indignation against the self-deceptions he is ridiculing. When Arnold does so, it is in pleasurable scorn of the folly he is exposing. Let me just illustrate the very different irony of the two men by two passages of a some~vhat analogous kind, in which each of them repels the imputation of having something new and wonderful of his own to commu- nicate to the world. Here is the striking passage in which Arnold describes the embarrassment with which he should find himself addressing a select circle of his special admirers in the best room of the Spotted Dog: The old recipe [he says] to think a little more and talk a little less, seems to me still the best recipe to foilow. So I take comfort when I find Ihe Guardian reproaching me with having no influence, for I know what influence means a party, practical proposals, action; and I say to myself, Even supposing I could get some followers, and assemble them, brim- ming with affectionate enthusiasm, in a com- LIVING AGE. VOL. LIV. 2763 mittee-room at some inn, what on earth should I say to them? What resolutions could I pro- pose? I could only P~Ol)~5O the old Socratic commonplace, Know thyselA and how black they would all look at that! No; to inquire, perhaps too curiously, what the present state of English development and civilization is, ~vhich, according to Mr. Lowe, is so perfect, that to give votes to the working class is stark madness; and, on the other hand, to be less sanguine about the divine and saving effect of a vote on its possessor than my friends in the committee-room at the Spotted Dog that is my inevitable portion. To bring things under the light of on& s intelligence, to see how they look there, to accustom oneself simply to re- gard the Marylebone Vestry, or the Educa- tional Home, or our Divorce Court, or our gin palaces open on Sunday and the Crystal Palace shut, as absurdities, is, I am sure, in- valuable exercise for us just at present. Let all persist in it who can, and steadily set their desires on introducing, with time, a little more soul and spirit into the too too solid flesh of English society. And now hear Father Newman making a somewhat similar protestation. He has been recalling the Tractarian horror of private judgment in theology, and is con- sidering the position taken by some of the Anglicans, that it would be enough if they should succeed only in making a little party of their own, opposed to private judgment, within a Church that rests en- tirely upon private judgment : For me, my dear brethren, did I know my- self well, I should doubtless find I was open to the temptation as well as others, to take a line of my own, or what is called, to set up for myself; but whatever might be my real infirmity in this matter, I should, from mere common sense and common delicacy, hide it from my- self, and give it some good name in order to make it palatable. I never could get myself to say, Listen to me, for I have something great to tell you, which no one else knows, but of which there is no manner of doubt. I should be kept from such extravagance from an intense sense of the intellectual absurdity, which, in my feelings, such a claim would in- volve; which would shame me as keenly, and humble me in my own sight as utterly, as some moral impropriety or degradation. I should feel I was simply making a fool of myself, and taking on myself, in figure, that penance, of which we read in the lives of saints, of playing antics and making faces in the market-place. Not religious l)rincil)le, but even worldly pride would keep me from so unworthy an exhibi- tion. - . - Do not come to me at this time of day with views perfectly new, isolated, origi- nal, sui generis, warranted old neither by Christian nor unbeliever, and challenge me to answer what I really have not the patience to read. Life is not long enough for such trifles. Go elsewhere, not to me, if you wish to make 97 98 NEWMAN AND ARNOLD. a proselyte. Your inconsistency, my dear brethren, is on your very front. . . I began myself with doubting and inquiring, you seem to say; I departed from the teaching I re- ceived; I was educated in some older type of Anglicanism; in the school of Newton, Cecil, or Scott; or in the Bartletts Buildings school or in the Liberal Whig school ; I was a Dis- senter or a \Vesleyan, and by study and thought I became an Anglo-Catholic. And then I read the Fathers, and I bave determined what books are genuine and what are not; which of them al)l)ly to all times, which are occasional, which historical, and which doctrinal; what opinions are l)rivate, what authoritative; what they only seem to hold, what they ought to hold; what are fundamental, what ornamental. Having thus measured, and cut, and put together my creed by my own proper intellect, by my own lucubrations, and differing from the whole world in my results, I distinctly bid you, I solemnly warn you, not to do as I have done, but to take what I have found, to revere it, to use it, to believe it, for it is the teaching of the old Fathers, and of your mother, the Church of England. Take my word for it that this is the very truth of Christ; deny your own reason, for I know better than you ; and it is as clear as day that some moral fault in you is the cause of your differing from me. It is pride, or vanity, or self-reliance, or fulness of bread. You require some medicine for your soul. You must fast; you must make a general con- fession; and look very sharp to yourself, for you are already next door to a rationalist or an infidel. (Lectures on Anglican Difficulties, pp. 126-134) Or as be put the same thing in another passage, in which he described how the authorities of the Anglican Church had ruled er ca//zedrd, that the Anglican divin- ity was all wrong: There are those who, reversing the Roman maxim, are wont to shrink from the contuma- c;ous and to be valiant towards the submis- sive; and the authorities in question gladly availed themselves of the power conferred on them by the movement against the movement itself. They fearelessly handselled their Apos- tolic weapons upon the Apostolic party. One after another in long succession, they took up their song and their parable against it. It was a solemn war dance which they executed round victims who, by their very principle, were bound hand and foot, and could only eye with disgust and perplexity this most unaccountable movement on the part of those Holy Fathers, the representatives of the Apostles, and the Angels of the Churches. . - - When Bish- ops spoke against them, and Bishops courts sentenced them, and the Universities degraded them, and the people were against them, from that day their occupation was gone - henceforward they had nothing left for them but to shut up the school and retire into the country. Nothing else was left for them Un- less, indeed, they took up some other theory, unless they changed their ground, unless they ceased to be what they were, and became what they were not; unless they belied their own principles, and strangely forgot their own lumi- nous and most keen convictions; unless they vindicated the right of private judgment, took up some fancy religion, retailed the Fathers, and jobbed Theology. Both passages are admirable in their very different irony. But how strangely wide apart are the characters of that irony! Arnolds is the irony of true intellectual scorn, directed against all who appeal to vulgar prejudices, and wish to rally party feeling by ad ca~/andum cries. He is delighted to boast that he has nothinw to say to such people, and can hardly congratulate himself sufficiently on the thought that they would have nothing to say to him. If he can but make them feel how thorough is his contempt for that whole field of popular combinations in which political manceuvres are attempted, he is quite satisfied with himself. Ne~v- mans irony, on the other hand, is directed against what he regarded as the real self- deception which went on in the minds of some of his own most intimate associates and friends of former days. He is all on fire to make them feel that if they had really given up private judgment in theol- ogy, they could not consistently hold a position which is tenable only on the score that a vast number of most uncertain and arbitrary private judgments, approved by no Church as a whole, nor even by any influential section of any, have concurred to define and fortify it. Keen as his irony is, there is a certain passion in it too. He cannot endure to see what he thinks such unreality, such self-deception, in those whom he has trusted and loved. He seeks to cut them almost by main force out of a position which he thinks humiliating to tl~em, and which for himself he would certainly regard as wanting in candor and sincerity. And the difference between the nature and bias of Arnolds irony and Newmans irony runs into the difference between their styles in general. J3oth are luminous, but Arnolds prose is luminous like a steel mirror, Newmans like a clear atmosphere or lake. Arnolds prose style is crystal, Newmans liquid. And with this indication of the charac- teristic difference, I will now turn to my proper subject, Cardinal Newmans style only. It is a style, as I have said, that more nearly represents a clear atmosphere than any other which I know in English literature. It flows round you, it presses gently on every side of you, and yet like a steady current carries you in one direction too. On every facet of your mind and heart you feel the light touch of his pur pose, and yet you cannot escape the gen- eral drift of his movement, more than the ship can escape the drift of the tide. He never said anything more characteristic than when he expressed his conviction that, though there are a hundred difficul- ties in faith, into all of which he could enter, the hundred difficulties are not equivalent to a single doubt. That saying is most characteristic even of his style, which seems to be sensitive in the highest degree to a multitude of hostile influences which are at once appreciated and resisted, while one predominant and overruling power moves steadily on. I will try and illustrate my meaning briefly. Take the following passage con- cerning the lower animals: Can anything be more marvellous or start- ling, unless we were used to it, than that we should have a race of beings about us whom we do see, and as little know their state, or can describe their interests or their destiny, as we can tell of the inhabitants of the sun and moon? It is, indeed, a very overpowering thought, when we get to fix our minds on it, that we periodically use I may s;tv hold in- tercourse withcreatures who are as much strangers to us, as mysterious, as if they were the fabulous unearthly beings, more powerful than man, and yet his slaves, ~vhich Eastern superstilons have invented. We have more real knowledge about the angels than about the brutes; they have, apparently, passions, habits, and a certain accountableness ; but all is mystery about them, We do n~t know whether they can sin or not, whether they are under l)unishment, whether they are to live after this life; we inflict very great sufferings on a l)Ottion of them, and they, in turn, every now and then, retaliate upon us, as if by a wonderful law ast your thoughts abroad on the whole number of them, large and small, in vast forests, or in the water, or in the air, and then say whether the presence of such countless multitudes, so various in their na- tures, so strange and wild io their shapes, living on the earth without ascertainable ob- ject, is not as mysterious as anything Scripture says about the angels. Now, may I not say of that passage that its style perfectly represents the character of the mind which conceived it, as well as the special meaning it conveys? Inferior styles express the purpose but conceal the man ; Newmans expresses the purpose by revealing the man. This passage and I could find scores and scores ~vhich would suit my purpose as well, and many that would suit it better 99 is as luminous as the day, but that is not its perfect characteristic, for luminous- ness belongs to the ether, which is the same whether the atmosphere be present or absent, and Newmans style touches you with a visible thrill, just as the atmo- sphere transmits every vibration of sound. You are conscious of the thrill of the writers spirit as he contemplates this strange world of countless animated be- ings with whom our spiritual bond is so slight; the sufferings we inflict, and the retaliations permitted in return; the blind- ness to spiritual marvels with which cus- tom strikes us; the close analogy between the genii of Eastern superstition and the domestic animals which serve us so indus- triously with physical powers so much greater than our own; the strangeness and wildness of the innumerable forms which hover round us in forest, field, and flood, and yet with all these undercurrents of feeling, observe how large is the imag- inative reach of the whole, how firmly the drift to make it easier to believe in an- gelic hosts is sustained ; how steady is the subordination of the whole to the ex- istence of the spiritual mystery in which he desires to enforce the belief. Once more, how tender is the style in the only sense in which we can properly attribute tenderness to style, its avoidance of every harsh or violent word, its shrinking aside from anything like overstatement. The lower animals have, he says, apparently passions, habits, and a certain accounta- bleness Evidently Dr Newdnan could not have suggested, as Descartes did, that they are machines, aping feelings without having them ; he never doubts their sufferings; be could not, even by a shade, exaggerate the mystery he is delin- eating. Every touch shows that he wishes to delineate it as it is, and not to over- color it by a single tint. Then how pierc- ing to our dulness is that phrase, It is indeed a very overpowering thought wken we get /0 f.~- our minds on ii. We are not overpowered, he tvoulcl say, only be- cause we cannot or do not fix our minds on this wonderful intercourse of ours with intimates, after a kind, of whose inner being we are yet entirely ignorant. And how reticent is the inference, how strictly it limits itself to its real object, to impress upon us how little we know even of the objects of sense, and how little reason there is in using our ignorance as the standard by which to measure the super- sensual. I have taken this passage as a fair illus- tration of Dr. Newmans style in relation NEWMAN AND ARNOLD. I00 NEWMAN AND ARNOLD. to one of the class of subjects with which he most often deals. Let me take another illustration from his style when he is de- scribing purely outward facts, though of course style means less, and ought to mean less, when it expresses only vivid physical vision, with perhaps a dash of wonder in it, than when it expresses a variety of moral emotions. Newmans external descriptions are not magnificent. A magnificent style in describing ordinary physical objects almost always means a style that suggests ~vhat the eye neither sa~v nor could see. And Dr. Newmans style is far from magnificent, for it is del- icately vivid. The subject is one of the locust plagues devastating north Africa: The s~varm to which Juba pointed grew and grew till it became a compact body as much as a furlong square, yet it was but the vanguard of a series of similar hosts, formed one after another out of the hot mould or sand, rising into the air like clouds, enlarging into a dusky canopy, and then discharged against the fruit- ful plain. At length the large innumerous mass was l)ut into motion, and began its career, darkening the face of (lay. As became an in- strument of Divine power, it seemed to have no volition of its own it was set off, it drifted with the wind, and thus made northward straight for Sicca. Thus they advanced, host after host, for a time wafted in the air, and gradually declining to the earth, while fresh hordes were carried over the first, and neared the earth after a longer flight in their turn. For t~velve miles they extended from front to rear, and the whizzing and hissing could be heard for twelve miles on every side of them. The bright sun, though hidden by them, illu- mined their bodies, and was reflected from their quivering wings, and as they heavily fell earthward they seemed like the innumerable flakes of a yellow-colored snow, and like snow did they descend, a living carl)ed, or rather pall, upon fields, crops, gardens, copses, groves, orchards, vineyards, olive-woods, orangeries, palm-pla~tatiot~s, ar~1 the deep forests, sparing nothing within their reach, and where there was nothing to devour, lying helpless io drifts, or crawling forward obstinately as they best might, with the hope of prey. They couldI spare their hundred thousand soldiers twice or thrice over and not miss them; the masses filled the bottoms of the ravines and hollow ways, impeding the traveller as he rode for- ward on his journey, audI trampled by thou- sands under his horses hoofs. In vain was all this overthrow and waste by the roadside; in vaio all their loss in river, pond, and water- course. The poor peasants hastily dug pits and trenches as the enemy came on ; in vain they filled them from the wells or with lighted stubble. heavily and thickly did the locusts fall ; they were lavish of their lives ; they choked the flame and the water which de- stroyed them the while, and the vast living hostile armament still moved on. . . . They come up to the walls of Sicca and are flung against them into the ditch. N )t a moment s hesitation or delay ; they recover their footing, they climb ul) the wood or stucco, they sur- mount the paral)et or they have entered in at the windows, filling the apartments and the most l)rivate and luxurious chambers; not one or two like stragglers at forage or rioters after a victory, but in order of battle and with the array of an army. Choice plants or flowers, about the impluvia and xysti, for amusement and refreshment, myrtles, oranges, pomegran- ates, the rose and the carnation, have disap- l)eared. They dim the bright marbles of the walls and the gilding of the ceilings. They enter the triclinium in the midst of the ban- quet, they crawl over the viands and spoil what they do not devour. Unrelaxed by suc- cess and enjoyment, onward they go; a secret mysterious instinct keeps them together as if they had a king over them. They move along the floor in so strange an order that they seem to be a tessellated l)avet~ent themselves, and to be the artificial embellishment of the floor, so true are their lines and so perfect the pat- terns they describe. Onward they go, to the market, to the temple sacrifices, to the bakers stores, to the cookshops, to the confectioners, to the druggistsnothing comes amiss to them; wherever man has aught to eat or drink there are they, reckless of death, strong of ap- petite, certain of conquest. Now, that is a passage in which only a few of the greater qualities of style can be exhibited, but are not those few exhib- ited in perfection? Could there be a more luminous and orderly grasp of the strange phenomenon depicted, of its full physical significance and moral horror; could there be a more rich and delicate perception of the weirdness of that strange fall of yel- low snow? Could there be a deeper feeling conveyed of the higher instru men- tality under which plagues like these are launched upon the world? And now to bring to a close what I have time to say of Dr. Newmans style though the stmbject grows upon one let me quote one or two of the passages in which his style vibrates to the finest notes, and yet exhibits most powerfully time drift and undercurrent by which his mind is swayed. Perhaps he never ex- presses anything so powerfully as he ex- presses the deep pining for the rest of spiritual simplicity, for the peace which passes understanding, which underlies his nature. Take this frotn one of his Rn- man Catholic sermons: Oh, long sought after, tardlily found, the desire of the eyes, the joy of the heart, the truth after many shadows, the fulness after many fore- tastes, the home after many storms ; come NEWMAN AND ARNOLD. I0I to her, poor children, for she it is, and she alone, who can unfold to you the se- cret of your being, and the meaning of your destiny. Again, in the exquisite tale of martyrdom from which I have al- ready quoted the account of the locusts, the destined martyr, whose thirst for God has been awakened by her intercourse ~vith Christians, thus repels the Greek rhetorician, who is trying to feed her on the husks of philosophic abstractions, as she expresses the yearnings of a heart weary of its desolation Oh, that I could find Him! Callista exclaimed passion- ately. On the right hand, and on the left I grope, but touch him not. Why dost thou fight against me; why dost thou scare and perplex me, oh, First and only fair? Or take one of Dr. Newmans most charac- teristic poems the few poems which have really been fused in the glow of his heart before they were uttered by his tongue. The lines I am going to read ~vere written on a fancy contained in the writings of Bede; the fancy that there is a certain meadow as it were, in which the souls of holy men suffer nothing, but ~vait the time when they should be fit to bear the vision of God : They are at rest: We may not stir the heaven of their repose With loud-voiced grief, or l)assionate request, Or selfish plaint for those Who in the mountain grots of Eden lie, And hear the fourfold river as it hurries by. They hear it sweep In distance down the dark and savage vale, But they at eddying pool or current deep Shall never more grow pale; They hear, and meekly muse as fain to know, How long untired, unspent, that giant stream shall flow. And soothing sounds Blend with the neighboring waters as they glide; Posted along the haunted gardens bounds Angelic forms abide, Echoing as words of watch, oer lawn and grove. The verses of that hymn which seraphs chant above. In another of these poems he has re- ferred to the sea described in the book of Revelation : A sea before The throne is spread ; its pure still glass Pictures all earth scenes as they pass. We on its shore Share in the bosom of our rest Gods knowledge, and are blest. It has always seemed to me that New- mans style succeeds, so far as a human form of expression can, in picturing the feelings of earth in a medium as clear, as liquid, and as tranquil, as sensitive alike to the minutest ripples and the most po- tent tidal waves of heaven-sent impulse, as the sea spread before the throne itself. I have dwelt so much on Dr. Newman s style because in his case, at least, I take the style to be the reflection of the man~ But when I say this it must not be sup. posed that in describing his style as a clear atmosphere or liquid medium, which makes itself felt everywhere, and yet urges him whom it envelops steadily in one direction, I mean to suggest that Cardinal Newman is wanting in the most marked personal character. A very brief refer- ence to his career will show how very false an impression that would convey. New. mans early life at Ox ford was, as we know, a very tranquil, and rather a soli- tary one. Never less alone than ~vhen alone, were the words in which Dr. Co- pleston, the provost of Oriel, addressed him in an accidental meeting in one of his Oxford walks. And he tells us: It was not I who sought friends, but friends who sought me. Never man had kinder or more indulgent friends than I have had, but I have expressed my own feelings as to the mode in which I gained them, in the year 1829, in the course of a copy of verses. Speaking of my blessings, 1 said blessings of friends which to my door, unasked, unIzo~ed, have come (Apolo- gia, p. 73). In a word, others were at- tracted towards the mind which had its own highest attraction in the invisible world. Keble was from the first New- mans chief object of hero worship, for Newman at least never lost sight of qual- ity in sheer force, never made the mistake whuich is usually attributed to Carlyle. When, after his election as a fellow of Oriel, he went to receive the congratula- tions of the other fellows, I bore it, he wrote, tili Keble took my hand, and then felt so abashed and unworthy of the honor, that I seemed desirous of quite sinking into the ground. This was 3-ears before the publication of The Christian Year. But even Kebles influence was less per- sonal than theological. The Christian Year appeared in 1827, and immediately took the strongest hold of Newman. In- deed, the whole history of his early life shows how absurd is the view which has sometimes been taken by able men, that Newmans life has been a continuous struggle against a deep-rooted scepticism. No one can read his long series of ser 102 NEWMAN AND ARNOLD. mons, and his remarkable though much and the evidence of his singularly self- shorter series of poems, and still less re- consistent life for the former. read them by the light of his lectures We have seen that Newman early rested On Anglican Difficulties, his Apolo- on the conviction of the existence of two, gia and his Grammar of Assent, and two only, supreme and luminously without being profoundly convinced that self-evident beings, myself and my Crea. the Roman Catholic in Newman is as tor (Apologia, p. 59). Qf all points of deep as his thought; the High Churchman faith, he tells us elsewhere, the being as deep as his ternAeramenz; and the of a God is to my mind encompassed with Christian as deep as his character; being the most difficulty and borne in on our intertwined with it inextricably; nay, not minds with most power (Apologia, p. only intertwined, but identified. I can un- 374). And to the aid of this central con- derstand what Dr. Newman was as an viction came Kebles teaching, that the Anglican, because the first part of the sacramental system has its roots deep in most characteristic work of his life was the natural creation itself, or, as Dr. New. done as an Anglican, and I believe that it man, expressing his obligations to Keble, was reason, and reason almost alone, puts it, that material phenomena are working on the assumptions which were both the types and the instruments of real so deeply rooted in him in 1845, which things unseen, a doctrine which embraces made him a Roman Catholic. I cannot not only what Anglicans no less than understand what he w~is as an Evan. Catholics believe about sacraments prop. gelical Protestant, because even so far erly so called, but also the article of the as he ever was an Evangelical Protes- communion of saints in its fulness, and tant it was only during his earliest youth, likewise the mysteries of the faith. and the whole drift of his nature seems to Now the more earnestly Newman em- have carried him soon away from the braced the doctrine that the natural uni- moorings of his early creed. But what verse is full of the types and the instru. would be left of Dr. Newman if you could mentality of spiritual beings unseen wipe the Christian heart out of his life and and no one can read Newmans poems creed, I could as little guess as I could without feeling how deeply this conviction what would have been left of Sir Walter had struck its roots into him the more Scott, if you could have emptied out of perplexing the external realities of human him the light of old romance and legend ; history and human conduct, barbarous or or of Carlyle, if you could have manage cI civilized, medi~eval or modern, seemed to somehow to graft upon him a conventional him. His faith in the sacramental prin- gigmanic creed. Keble s conception ciple taught him to look for a created of the poetry in the Christian faith and universe from which the Creator should the Christianity in the highest poetry, took be reflected back at every point; but he a hold upon Newman which made his actually found one from which disorder, career what ii. became. In many respects, confusion, enmity to God, was reflected of course, his own mind vastly enlarged back at every point. Here are his own and deepened the intellectual view of words: Keble, turned it into something more masculine, more logical, more construc- Starting then with the being of a God (which, tive; but it woulc~be almost as unreason- as I have said, is as certain to me as the cer- able to speak of Keble himself as fighting tainty of my own existence, though when I try all his life against a mordant scepticisn~ to put the grounds of that certainty into logical as of Newmans doing so. It is true, of shape I find a difficulty in doing so in mood and figure to my satisfaction), I look out of course, that Newman has seen, as Keble myself into the world of men, and there I see probably never saw, how profoundly the a sight ~vhich fills me with unspeakable dis. moral assumptions with which the con- tress. The world seems simply to give the lie scious intellectual life begins, influence to that great truth of which my whole being is our faith or want of faith. He has done as so full, and the effect upon me is in conse- much justice to the logical strength of cer- quence, as a matter of necessity, as confusing tam types of sceptical thought, as be has as if it denied that I am in existence myself. to the logic of Christian thought itself. If I looked into a mirror and did not see my But that, since his first conversion, as face, I should have that sort of feeling which he calls it, he ever felt even the smallest actually comes upon me when I look into this living busy world and see no reflection of the temptation to reject Christianity, whether Creator. This is to me one of the great difli- before he became a Roman Catholic or culties of this absolute l)rimary truth to which since, is simply incredible. We have his I referredjustnow. Were itnotforthis voice own explicit assertion for the latter denial, speaking so clearly in my conscience and my NEWMAN AND ARNOLD. 103 heart, I should be an atheist, or a pantheist, or a polytheist, when I looked into the world. I am speaking for myself only, and I am far from denying the real force of the arguments in proof of a God drawn from the general facts of human society; but these do not warm me or enlighten me; they do not take away the winter of my desolation or make the buds un- fold and the leaves grow within me, and my moral being rejoice. The sight of the world is nothing else than the prophets vision, full of lamentations and mourning and woe. To consider the ~vorld in its length and breadth, its various history, the many races of men, their starts, their fortune, their mutual aliena- tion, their conflicts; and then their ways, hab- its, governments, forms of worship, their en- terprises, their aimless courses, their random achievements and acquirements, and then the impotent conclusion of long-standing facts, the tokens so faint and broken of a superintending design, the blind evolution of what turn out to be great powers or truths, the progress of things as if from unreasoning elements, not towards final causes, the greatness and little- ness of man, his far-reaching aims, his short duration, the curtain hung over his future, the disappointments of bfe, the defeat of good, the success of evil, physical pain, mental anguish, the prevalence and intensity of sin, the prevail- ing idolatries, the corruptions, the dreary hope- less irreligion, that condition of the whole race, so fearfully yet exactly described in the Apostles words, Having no hope, and with- out God in the world, all this is a vision to dizzy and appal, and inflicts on the mind the sense of a profound mystery which is abso- lutely beyond human solution. (Apologia, pp. 376S.) This is a passage taken from the Apo- logia, but long before Dr. Newman be- came a Roman Catholic, even at a time when he held confidently that the Roman Catholic Church was anti-Christian, he had pressed home the same deep conviction that the spectacle of the moral universe and of human history is so utterly abhor- rent to the heart taught from within, that it can only be explained at all on the principle that the human race has been implicated in some great aboriginal calamity which can only be obviated by some equally great supernatural interfer- ence in human affairs, specially adapted to remedy that calamity. Even before he threw himself into the Tractarian move- ment, even before he went abroad with Mr. Hurrell Froude in 1832 on that mem- orable journey in which, whether quaran- tined in lazarettos, or conversing with Roman ecclesiastics, or lying sick almost to death in Sicily, or tossing in an orange- boat on the Mediterranean, he was so haunted by the belief that he had a work to do in England, that he shrank from every kind of contact with influences which seemed to him incongruous with that work, he had urged on Oxford students and Oxford audiences of every kind, with pas- sionate earnestness, his warnings against trusting what Mr. Arnold delights to call the Zei4reist, the modern spirit, the spirit of the age. Our manners are courteous [he says], we avoid giving pain or offence; our words be- come correct, our relative duties are carefully performed, our sense of propriety shows itself even in our domestic arrangements, in the em- bellishment of our houses, in our amusements, and so also in our religious profession. Vice now becomes unseemly and hideous to the im- agination, or as it is sometimes familiarly said, out of taste. Thus elegance is gradually made the test and standard of virtue, which is no longer thought4 to possess an intrinsic claim on our hearts, or to existfurl/ier than it leads to the quiet and comfort of others. Con- science is no longer recognized as an inde- pendent arbiter of actions, its authority is ex- plained away; partly it is superseded in the minds of men by the so-called moral sense which is regarded merely as the love of the beautiful ; partly by the rule of expediency which is forthwith substituted for it in the de- tails of conduct. Now, conscience is a stern, gloomy principle; it tells us of guilt and of prospective l)unishment. Accordingly, when its terrors disappear, then disappear also in the creed of the day those fearful images of divine wrath with which the Scripture abounds. (Parochial Sermons, vol. i., p. 311.) And then he utters that celebrated sen- tence I will not shrink from uttering my firm con- viction that it would be a gain to this country were it vastly more superstitious, more bigoted, more gloomy, more fierce in its religion than at present it shows itself to be. Not, of course, that I think the tempers of mind herein im- plied desirable, which would be an evident absurdity, but I think ~em infinitely more desirable and more promising than a heathen obduracy, and a cold, self-sufficient, self-wise tranquillity. (Ibid., p. 320.) In short, when Newman went abroad in 1832, with his consumptive friend Hur- rell Froude, his thought by day and his dream by night seems to have been of the quickening of a Church which would fight against this Zeilgeist against the religion of the day, against the theophil- anthropic ideas of the Society for the Dif- fusion of Useful Knowledge, and fix the minds of its children upon those eternal realities, which the modern spirit of our own time is as anxious to soften, blanch, and water down, as the medi~vai spirit was to travesty by isolating and exagger 104 NEWMAN AND ARNOLD. ating their austere and terrible warnings. There was a passion at this time in all Newman said and did. He told himself to learn to hate evil as the only adequate preparation for loving good. He was conscious of a driving force which carried him on Wave reared on wave its godless head While my keen bark, by breezes sped, Dashd fiercely through the ocean bed, And chafed towards its goal. He passed through Roman Catholic countries, carefully avoiding their wor- ship; he fell sick of malaria when in Sicily, and told his servant that he should not die, adding to himself, because 1 have not sinned against the light, a phrase ~vhich he says he has never under- stood, but which no doubt meant that he had not so forfeited the right to be, what he felt himself destined to be, Gods in- strument for quickening the Church of England. When tossing at sea in the Straits of Bonifazio, this austerer mood for once relented, and he felt for once that more gentle spirit which has marked all the later portions of his career. You all know well the poem to which I allude; I recall one verse only to show how differ- ent is its keynote to that of the eager flame of zeal ~vith ~vhich during this jour- ney he seems in general to have been burnt up : So long Thy power hath blest me, sure it still Will lead me on, Oer moor and fen, oer crag and torrent, till The night is gone, And in the morn those angel faces smile, Which I have loved long since and lost awhile. But mostly during this journey he harps on the lukewarmness of the age, the indif- ference to eternal truth which it displays. Becalmed at sea, he implores patience, and confesses tha4 he feels very sorely the languor of delay. He muses much, too, on certain tendencies which he finds in his own character, tendencies which he believes to be pure, but which he knows are likely to be confounded by the world with craft and pride: How didst thou start, thou Holy Baptist, bid To pour repentance on the sinless brow! Then all thy meekness from thy hearers hid Beneath the ascetics port and l)reachers fire, Flowed forth, and with a pang thou didst de- sire He might be chief, not thou. And so on us at whiles it falls to claim Powers that we dread, or dare some forward part; Nor must we shrink as cravens from the blame Of pride, in common eyes, or purpose deep, But with pure thoughts look up to God, and keep Our secret in our heart. Nay, he has a dream of St. Paul, tvhich tells him that St. Paul too was exposed to the same unjust charges to which he him- self was liable : I dreamed that with a passionate coml)laint I wishd me born amid Gods deeds of might, And envied those who had the presence bright Of gifted prophet and strong-hearted saint, Whom my heart loves and fancy strives to pant. I turned, when straight a stranger met my sight, Come as my guest, and did awhile unite His lot with mine; and lived without restraint. Courteous he was and grave, so meek in mien It seemd untrue, or told a purpose weak, Yet in the mood he could with aptness speak, Or with stern force, or show of feelings keen, Marking deep craft, methou~ht or pride; hidden Then came a voice, St. Paul is at thy side. In this spirit Newman went back to commence the Tractarian movement. There was, he has since confessed, at that time a double aspect in my bearing towards others. My behavior had in it a mixture both of fierceness and of sport, and on this account, I dare say, it gave offence to many, nor can I here defend it. The truth was that he really did feel to the bottom of his heart that he was doiiig a work of which he himself knew neither the scope nor the goal, and that, so far as he was acquitted by his own conscience, he did not much care what men said of him. He believed that it was given to him to restore to the Church of England a new career, to raise it up as a new power to witness against the sins and whims and false ideals of the day, and the various idolatries of the Zeitgeist. Where did he go wrong? Of course one does not like to say of a man of the highest genius, and of a kind of genius specially adapted to the subject on which he ~vrites, that he is wrong, and that a man of no genius, who criticizes him, is right; but still, as I believe that he did go seriously wrong, and should be a Ro- man Catholic myself if I did not, I must give my explanation of the error I think I see. It seems to me, then, that he went wrong in his primary assumption, that what he calls the dogmatic principle involves the existence of an infallible human authority, which can say, without possibility of error, This is what God re- vealed, and this again is radically incon- sistent with what he has revealed. Let NEWMAN AND ARNOLD. 105 me quote his own account of his convic- tions on this subject from the Apologia. It is a very striking passage, and very instructive as to the course of this great thinkers personal history: Supposing, then, it to be the will of the Creator to interfere in human affairs, and to make provisions for retaining in the world a knowledge of Himself, so definite and distinct as to be proof against the energy of human scepticism, in such a case, I am far from saying that there was no other way, but there is nothing to surprise the mind, if He should think fit to introduce a power into the world ir~ested with the prerogative of infallibility on religious matters. Such a provision would be a direct, immediate, certain, and prompt means of withstanding the difficulty; it would be an instrument suited to the need; and when I find that this is the very claim of the Catho- lic Church, not only do I feel nu difflcu~ty in admitting the idea, but there is a fitness in it which recommends it to my mind. And thus I am brought to speak of the Churchs infalli- bilitv as a provision, adapted by the nreii~r of the Creator, to preserve religion in the world, and to restrain that freedom of thought, which of course in itself is one of the greatest of natural gifts, and to rescue it from its own sui- cidal excesses. (Apologia, p. 382.) That seems to me a definite contention that the reason of man is naturally so restless, so disposed to devour its own offspri rig, as to need the bit and bridle of an infallible human authority in addition to the guidance of Gods spirit. But is not that in a sense really putting man above God, or at best putting Gods prov- idence, as revealed in human institutions, above Gods spirit as revealed in con- science and reason? I should have sup- posed that to a thinker with so passionate a belief in God as the & epest of all reali- ties, the true security for the ultimate stability of our reason, for the ultimate subjection of our reason to the power and fascination of revelation, would have been simply this, that God after all sways our spirits, and draws them to himself. But Newman has so keen an insight into the morbid side of the cravings of rationalism for devouring its own offspring, that he can hardly believe that we shall ever rest on what God has revealed, unless that revelation receives a genuinely human embodiment in an infallible institution set upon a rock for all men to recognize as stamped by Providence with one of Gods greatest attributes, inability to err. This is saying, in other words, that when New- man passes from the world within to the world without, he discerns far more keenly the evils, the miseries, the weaknesses, the diseases, the woes, the corruptions of our nature, than he does its affinity with the divine life. Like a great physician, when he looks out of himself, his sight is sharper for the signs of disorder and in- ternal malady than for the signs of life and strength. It is, I think, profound pity for the restlessness and insatiability of human reason which has made him a Ro- man Catholic. He is always seeking for some caustic which may burn away the proud flesh from our hearts, for some an- tiseptic which shall destroy the germs of canker in our intellect. He has a won- derful insight into the natural history of all our morbid symptoms. His hand is ever on the feeble and rapid pulse of human iml)atience, his eye is keen to dis- cern the hectic flush on the worn face. He sees in the Roman Catholic Church a great laboratory of spiritual drugs which will lower fever and arrest the growth of fungoid parasites, and he cannot help grasping at the medicaments she offers. Newman never shows more unique genius than in mastering the morbid symptoms, both of human conscience and human reason, though he is spiritually greatest when, after showing us how deep is his knowledge of all the intricate mala- dies of human nature, he shakes the trou- ble from him, and passes quietly into the peaceful rest of perfect faith. But his at- tachment to the Roman Catholic Church is, I think, in great measure given to its functions as a mediciner of souls, to its various appliances of penance, its ex- haustive study of casuistry, and its elab- orate pharmacopceia of spiritual tonics and febrifuges. But to go back to the evil for which he maintains that an infalli- ble Church is the only remedy, the ten- dency of reason to undermine every faith for which ~ve have not daily the evidence of universal experience. He holds, truly I think, that no Church, no witness to the existence of God, can stand without a steady dogmatic basis, and that without submission to some visible vicegerent of God no dogmatic basis of religious truth can ever be established. Well, I should be the last to assail dogma, as Mr. Arnold, for instance, has assailed it. It seems to me that even the fact of my addressing you implies a dogmathe dogma that you and I really exist. If God announces his holiness and love to man, he announces implicitly his own existence. if he an- nounces the redemption of man, he an- nounces the existence of the Redeemer. If we are convinced that a divine light has illumined our consciences, that fact io6 NEWMAN AND ARNOLD. alone implies a good many intellectual truths, which will more and more impress themselves on us as we recognize the fact and conform our lives to it. Theological dogma is nothing in the world but a ra- /io;iale of the relations in which God places himself towards us in the very act of revealing himself. But why does reve- lation imply the possession of any infalli- ble rationale of these relations? The Jews had a revelation continued during many centuries, a revelation ~vhich made them undoubtedly the specific medium through which divine truth was revealed to the world. But they had no infallible author- ity to which they could appeal on points in dispute. And it cannot be said that there never were any points in dispute. As a matter of fact, one of the greater prophets has assured us that, at one time during the history of that people, the propl~ets themselves prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their means, and my people love to have it so. How ~vere the Jewish people to know, except by trusting their impressions of character a character educated by God himself that Jeremiah was divinely taught in re- vealing to them that other prophets, who also claimed to be the organs of divine revelation, in this case at least made that claim falsely? Again, not only had the Jewish Church no infallible exponent of the drift of the divine teaching, but where is the evidence that even the primitive Christian Church made any such claim? What was the apostolate of Judas Iscariot except a kind of divine warning against attributing too final an authority even to those earthen vessels chosen by the Re- deemer himself? Moreover, how should an infallible authority even if one ex- isted on the dogmatic truths involved in revelation, iml)ly the right understand- ing of these truths, unless the believer be guided by the spirit of God in receiving them? The same words mean totally dii- ferent things to the humble mind and the arrogant mind, to the selfish mind and to the self-denying. Even the infallible hu- man authority could inculcate only a les- son of error and illusion when addressing itself to a fallible and sinful believer. I cannot for the life of me see how the in- fallible human authority for dogma could, even if it existed, be of any service to rebellious, misguided, passionate men, unless it could infuse the grace to under- stand spiritually, as well as authorize the right form of ~vords to be understood. Surely revelation, once communicated, must live and exert itself, and deepen for itself the spiritual channels in which it is to run, just as the original moral teaching, engraved both on tables of stone and on the heart, has lived and exerted itself, and deepened for itself the moral channels in which it is to run. Both revelations have been misunderstood; both have been per- verted; both have been defied; both have been ridiculed; both have been scorned; yet both have exerted an ever deepening and widening influence, and have found out. the true hearts for which they were intended. I cannot help thinking, then, that Dr. Newmans belief, that the most fitting power to subdue the anarchy of human passions and intellectual pride is an infal- lible Church, is an error, and an error of that most serious kind which, by throwing the Church which boasts infallibility off its guard, produces an abundant crop of special dangers and mistakes. So far from the assumption of infallibility having actually preserved religion in the world, and restrained the freedom of thought which is so apt to run into suicidal ex- cesses, I cannot help thinking that that assumption has done more not only to foster suicidal excesses in the Church which makes it, but to drive the Churches which deny it into suicidal excesses of another kind, than any other equally im- portant factor in the history of revelation. I do not deny, on the contrary I heartily join Dr. Newman in believing, that the only attitude of mind in which we can hope to profit by revelation is that of profound humility towards an infallible authority above us; but by whom is it wielded, by man or by God? Where is the evidence, or the vestige of evidence, that since Christs ascension it has ever been put in commission in human hands at all? Was not one apostle rebuked as Satan the moment after his confession had been treated as putting him in posses- sion of the keys of the new kingdom? Was not another avowedly doubtful whether in certain instances he spoke by inspiration or only out of his own fallible judgment? That an infallible authority should impart ~visdom to fallible men I can understand; that it should make over its own infallibility on any terms to fallible men, I cannot understand. And it seems to me that the result of the assumption in all countries which have accepted the in- fallible Church, has been to secure indeed the intellectual ascendancy of dogma, but often at the cost of destroying the moral ascendancy of the truths of which dogma is but the skeleton. Roman Catholics who, NEWMAN AND ARNOLD. 107 like Dr. Newman, nourish themselves on a genuinely spiritual view of their own theology, seem to me among the salt of the earth. But what seems to be far com- moner amongst Roman Catholic nations than ever amongst Protestant nations, is the habit of assenting with the mind to what the heart ignores and is not this the direct consequence of attaching so much importance to the infallibility of a Church of which the earthly cornerstone may be such a Judas as Alexander Borgia? In his remarkable lecturewhich as a youth I had the privilege of hearing on The Political State of Catholic Coun- tries no Prejudice to the Sanctity of the Church, I remember the full sympathy and even enthusiasm vith ~vhich I heard I)r. Newman say what I trust a great many Protestants would say with him, that the Church aims not at making a show, but at doing a work. She regards this world and all that is in it as a mere shade, as dust and ashes, com- pared with the value of one single soul. She holds that unless she can in her own way do good to souls, it is no use her doing anything; she holds that it were better for sun and moon to drop from heaven, for the earth to faP, and for the many millions upon it to die of starva- tion in extremest agony, as far as temporal affliction goes, than that one soul, I will not say should be lost, but should commit one single venial sin, should tell one wilful untruth, though it harmed no one, or steal one poor farthing ~vithout excuse. She considers the action of this world and the action of the soul simply incommensurate, viewed in their res