THE GALAXY. VOL. VIIIJULY, 1869.No. i. PUT YOURSELF IN HIS PLACE.* B~ CHARLES READE, Author of Foul Play, Griffith Gaunt, etc. CHAPTER X. p E OPLE that met JacI Dence and Henry Little driving to Cairnhope were struck with their faces ; his so dark, hers so fair, and both so handsome but the ~vomans lit up with lively delight, the mans clouded and sorrowful and his brow knit with care. This very day he must take the lock off Cairnhope old Church, in spite of his uncle Raby. He had got the requisite tools with him hidden in the gig ; but, even should he succeed, it was but the first step of a difficult and, perhaps, dangerous enterprise ; and he was entering on it all with a heart no longer buoyed by hopeful love. But for his pledge to Mr. Cheetham, he could hardly have persisted in the struggle. As for Jael Dence, she had no great reason to be happy either: the man she loved loved another. Still he was kind to her, and they belonged to the same class ;~she had a chance, and gleams of hope. And, after all, the future was un- certain, but the present certain: she had him to herself for the day. She was close to himso close, that she could feel him-and he was driving her out, and to those who loved her: she basked in the present delight, and looked as if she was being taken to heaven by an angel, instead of driven to Cairnope by a gloomy young man, whom the passers-by envied, and wondered at his good luck in having such a companion. She talked to hit~ and got the short answers of an absent man. But she continued to make har little remarks occasionally, and, ere they reached Cairnhope, he found himself somehow soothed by her sex, her heauty, and her mellow, kindly voice. As they drove up the farm-house, he told her to hide her face a moment, for they didnt know who it was. Martha ran out. Yare welcome, yare welcome; and so is your Eh! Why its our JaeI. Tis no avail to hide thy face, thou jade; I know 1 Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1369, by SHELDON & COMPANY, in the Clerks Office of the District Court for the Southerti District of New York. 6 THE GALAXY. ~JULY, every bit o thee. And Patty had her out of the gig in a moment, and there was a cuddling match it did one good to see. Henry perked up for a moment and offered a suggestion. Some of that ought to come my way, for bringing her here. Oh, youll get enough o that fun before you die, said Patty. Now come you in ; the carters boy will take the horse. They ~vent in and greeted the old farmer; and soon the bell began to ring for church, and Nathan Dence told Martha to put on her bonnet. La, father! said she, piteously. She prefers to stay at home and chat with Jael, said Henry. The fact is, he wanted to be rid of them both. Old Dence shook his head. He was one of those simple, grand, old rustic Christians, who have somehow picked out the marrow of religion, and left the devil the bone, ycleped Theology, What? said he, my lasses ! cant ye spare God a slice out of his own day? Nay, it is not that, father. The old man continued his remonstrance. To be sure our Jael is a cordial. But shell dine and sup with us. Take my word fort, all lawful pleasures are sweeter on the Lords day after a bit o church. And so they are, father; but dear heart ! to think of you forgetting. Will nobody tell him? Theyre sworn to give me a red face, Jael and all. This piteous appeal set Jaels wits working. Eh, father, it ~vill be the first of her banns ! Is it me you are asking such a question? cried Patty, and turned her head away ~vith absurd mock-modesty. And so tis, said Dence ; ah, that is a different thing. Henry thought that was no reason for Pattys staying at home; she ought rather to go and hear the banns were cried all right. At this proposal both sisters lifted up their hands, and he was remonstrated with, and lectured, and at last informed that, if a girl was in church when her banns ~vere cried, her children would he all born deaf and dumb. Oh, indeed! said Little, satirically. Thats a fact in natural history I was not aware of. XVell, farmer, then lets you and I go by ourselves. So Patty stayed at home, in obedience to rural superstition, and Jael stayed to keep her company, and Farmer Dence went to church out of piety; and as for Henry, to tell the truth, he went to church to escape the girls tongues, and to be in a quiet, somniferous place, where he could think out his plans undis- turbed. rhe men were no sooner gone, than the sisters began to gossip hard. Eb, Jael, thous gotten a prize. Not as I know of. I do adore a dark young man.~~ So do I ; but this one is not mine. Ill take his word before thine. Why he calls thee his lass in his very letter. Not he. Show me his letter. TvVhat will ye give me? Nay, Patty, pray sho~v it me. Well, and so I will. She brought her the letter. Jael read it and changed color, and was de- lighted for a moment or two; but soon her good sense and humility prevailed. 1869.] PUT YOURSELF IN HIS PLACE. 7 Twas to surprise you, like. I do know he looks higher than me. More fool he. But I dont believe it. You may, said Jael, and turned the conversation to Pattys approaching marriage; once launched in that direction, it flowed without intermission till the men returned, and dinner smoked upon the board. After dinner Henry watched an opportunity, and slipped out into the yard, got the tools out, put his great coat over them, and away to Cairnhope Church. He knew better than go past Raby Hall to it: he xvent back toward Hills- borough, full three miles, and then turned off the road and got on the heather. He skirted the base of a heathery mound, and at last saw the church on an el~- vation before him, made for it incautiously over some boggy ground, and sank in up to his waist. He extricated himself with considerable difficulty, and cast a ~voful look at his clothes. Then he turned to, and piled up a heap of stones to mark the dangerous spot ; for he foresaw he must often travel that way in all weathers. At last he reached the church, removed the lock, and fastened the door with screws. He then ~vent back to the farm as fast as he could. But all this had taken a long time, and the sun was sinking as he got into the yard. He was in the very act of concealing the lock in the gig, when Martha Dence came out at him, as red as a turkey-cock. You thought but little of my sister, young man, to leave her all these hours, and you come out to spend the day with her. Stuff and nonsense I came out on my own business. So it seems. And it have taken you into worse company. A fine figure she has made you. XVho ? The hussy you have been after this while. Thats so like you girls. You think a man has nothing to do but to run after women. What business can you have on the Sabbath-day, Id like to know? XVoulcl you ? Well, Ill tell youwhen I tell the bellman. You are quite right, Mr. Little. Trust none but friends. This was a bitter remark. Henry could not rel)ly to it, and that moved his bile. Patty pursued her advantage, and let him know that, when a young man brought a young woman out for the day, he did not leave her for three hours at a stretch, unless he meant to affront her. She raised her voice in saying this, and so did he in replying, Tell you I came out on my own business, not J aels; but, I am a good-natured fellow, considering all I endure, so I took that opportunity to bring your sister out to see you. Could I guess you two couldnt make yourselves happy for one afternoon without flirting? So much for sisterly affection! Well, next time Ill come aloneif I come at all. Jael came out at the raised voices, and received this last sentence full in the face. She turned pale. Oh, Patty, Patty, what have you been saying ? Ive been speaking my mind, that is all. Ay, and youve made him say the only unkind word I ever heard from his lips. Im very sorry, Jael, said the young man, penitently. Oh, then Im to blame, because he is so ill-tempered. And Patty bridled. Partly. You should not interfere between friends. Having delivered 8 THE GALAXY. [JULY, this admonition, Jaci softened it by kissing her, and whispered, Fathers ask- ing for his tea. Patty went in as meek as Moses. Then Jael turned to Henry, and laid her hand on his arm, while her grey eyes searched his face. Theres something amiss. You are never cross, except when you are unhappy. What is it? Oh, Jael, my heart is broken. She is going to be married. Who says so? Mr. Cheetham told me she was engaged to a Mr. Coventry. What can Mr. Cheetham know? To be sure the gentleman is a good deal with her, and I hear he has courted her this two years ; and she likes his com- pany, thats certain. But she is used to be admired, and she is very hard to please. What, then, you think it is not quite hopeless ? While theres life, theres hope. What had I better do? Nay, you shouldnt ask me. Oh, yes you advised me so wisely about the insurance. Ay, but then I saw clear. He is purse-proud, and I knew hed think a deal more of you if you insured your life for a vast o money. But now I dont see clear: and Im loth to advise. Happen youd hate me afterward if it ~vent wrong. No, no, I wouldnt be so ungrateful. Jael shook her head, doubtfully. Well, then, said Henry, dont advise me; but put yourself in my place. (Ill tell you a secret I darent trust to Patty. I have found a ~vay to beat the Trades, and make my fortune in a year or two.) Now what would you do, if you were me? This question raised a tumult in jaels heart. But her strong will, her loyalty, and, above all, her patience, conquered, though not without signs bf the struggle, a bosom that heaved somewhat higher, and a low voice that trembled a little. If I was a young man, I wouldnt shilly-shally, nor wait till I was rich, before I spoke. Id have it out with her. Id get her alone, and tell her all. Then, if she showed any sign of liking, Id beg her to wait a bit, and say Id soon be a gentleman for her sake. And, if she cares nought for you, better know it, and leave her, than fare in heaven one hour and in hell the next, as I have seen thee do this while, my poor lad. It is wise and good advice, and Ill take it. Ive kept all my courage for the Trades; Id better have shown her a little. But theres one thing more I I want to ask you. This was too much. Jaels courage and patience failed her for once. Keep it, she cried, almost wildly. I cant bear no more. Theres not one lass in a hundred would do what I have done for you; yet you want more. D~ye think Im not flesh and blood, as well as her? And she began to cry bitterly. This took Henry quite by surprise, and grieved him. He consoled her, and coaxed her, in vague terms, that did not produce any effect. So then he kissed her cheek, and dried her eyes with his own handkerchief, and that was not quite so ineffectual. She gave a final sob, and said, with some slight remains of pas- sion, There, there ; never heed me. It takes a deal of patience to go through the world. And so she left him. 1869.] PUT YOURSELF IN HIS PLACE. He was not sorry to be alone a minute, and think. This short dialogue with J ael gave him some insight into female character. It made him suspect that he had been too timid with Grace Carden, and also that there were two women in the game instead of one. When the time came to return he asked leave to borrow a horse-cloth. He aired it by the fire, and remarked that it had turned very cold. Why, said Patty, you have got your topcoat. Well, you are a soft one. And you are a sharp one, said Henry, ironically. When Jael came to the gig, Henry put the cloth over her shoulders. Twasnt for me, ye see, said he twas for my betters. I like you for that, said Patty. Then there was much kissing, and shaking of hands, and promising to come again, and away they drove to Hillsborough. On the road, Henry, for the first time, was very respectful, as well as kind to Jael. She was soft and gentle, but rather silent and reserved. They parted at the door of VVoodbine Villa. Next day, Henry called early, and found Miss Carden alone. His heart beat tumultuously. She was very gracious, and hoped he had spent a pleasant day, yesterday. Pretty well. Is that all ~ XVhy, I quite envied you your ride, and your companion. She is a very good girl. She is something more than that: but one does not find her out all at once. Now it was Henrys turn. But he was flustered, and thinking how he should begin. And, while he hesitated, the lady asked him was he come to finish the bust. No. I didnt come for that. I will finish it, though. And thus he was diverted from his purpose, for the moment. He took a carving tool, and eyed his model, but soon laid down the tool, and said: I havent thanked you yet. And I dont know how to thank you. What for? For what you sent to Mr. Cheetham. Oh! said Grace, and blushed. Then she turned it oW and said she thought if anybody ought to thank her for that, it was Mr. Cheetham. Ay, for the order. But the sweet words that came with it? Do you think I dont prize them above all the orders in the world? She colored high again. What did he show you my note ? He did: and that has made me his friend. Shall I tell you the effect of those words on me? No; never mind. But Im glad I put them in, if they did you any good. Any good? They made me a new man. I was defeated by the Trades: I was broken-hearted: and I hated everybody. Good Doctor Amboyne had set me work to do; to save the lives of my fellow-creatures. But I couldnt; I hated them so. The world had been too unjust to me, I could not return it good for evil. My heart was fuli of rage and bitte.rness. Thats a great pity-at your age. But really it is no wonder. Yes ; you have been cruelly used. And the water stood in Graces eyes. I0 THE GALAXY. [JULY, Ay, but it is all over; those sweet words of yours made a man of me again. They showed me you cared a little for me. Now I have found a way to outwit the Trades. Now Im on the road to fortune. I wont be a workman this time next year. Ill be a master, and a thriving one. Ay, do, do. Beat them, defeat them; make them scream with envy. But I am afraid you are too sanguine. No; I can do it, if you will only give me another word of hope to keep me going: and oh, I need it, if you knew all. Grace began to look uneasy. Mr. Little, can you doubt that you have my best wishes, said she , guardedly, and inuc h less warmly than she had spoken just before. No, I dont doubt that ; but what I fear is, that, when I have gained the hard battle, and risen in the world, it will be too late. Too late. Grace turned more and more uncomfortable. Oh, pray wait a few months, and see what I can do, h~fore you Will it be believed that Mr. Carden, who seldom came into this room at all, must walk in, just at this moment, and interrupt them. He was too occu- pied ~vith his o~vn affairs, to pay much attention to their faces, or perhaps he might have asked himself why the young man was so pale, and his daughter so red. I heard you were here, Little, and I want to speak to you on a matter of some importance. Grace took this opportunity, and made her escape from the room promptly. Henry, burning inwardly, had to listen politely to a matter he thought pitia- My unimportant compared with that which had been broken off. But the Gosshawk had got him in its clutches ; and was resolved to make him a de- coy duck. He was to open a new vein of insurances. Workmen had, hitherto, acted with great folly and imprudence in this respect, and he was to cure them, by precept as well as example. Henry assented, to gratify a person, whose goodwill he might require, and to get rid of a bore. But that was not so easy ; the Gosshawk was full of this new project, and had a great deal to say, before he came to the point, and offered Henry a percentage on the yearly premium of every workman that should be insured in the Gosshawk. This little bargain struck, Henry was left alone ; and waited for the return of Miss Carden. He was simple enough to hope she would come back, and have it out with him. She kept carefully out of his way, and, at last, he went sadly home. Ah, said he, Jael gave me bad advice. I have been premature, and frightened her. He would go to work his own way again. In forty-eight hours he moved into his new house, furnished it partly: bought a quantity of mediocre ~vood-carving, and improved it; put specimens in his window, and painted his name over the door. This, at his mothers request and tearful entreaties, he painted out again, and substituted Row- botham. Nor was Rowbotham a mere norn de tiume. It was the real name of Silly Billy. The boy had some turn for carving, but was quite uncultivated: Henry took him into his employ, fed him, and made free with his name. With all this he found time to get a key made to fit the lock of Cairnhope old Church. 1869. PUT YOURSELF IN HIS PLACE. II At one oclock on Thursday morning he came to Cheethams works, and scratched at the gate. A big workman opened it. It turned out to be Cheet- ham himself, in a moleskin suit, and a long beard. The forge on wheels was all ready, also a cart containing anvil, bellows, hammers, pincers, leathern buckets, and a quantity of steel laths. They attached the forge to the tail of the cart, and ~vent on their silent expedition. Cheetham drove the cart. Henry followed afar off until they had cleared the suburbs. They passed Woodbine Villa. A single light was burning. Henry eyed it wistfully, and loitered long to look at it. Something told him that light was in her bedroom. He could hardly tear himself away from contemplating it: it was his pole-star. There ~vas only one great difficulty in their way; a man on a horse might cross the moor, but a cart must go by Raby Hall to reach the church : and, be- fore they got within a furlong of the Hall, a watch-dog began to bark. Stop, sir, whispered Henry. I expected this. He then produced some pieces of thick felt, and tied them with strings round the wheels. They then drove by the house as fast as they could. They did not deceive the dogs ; but no man heard them, or saw them. They got to the church, opened the door, and drew the forge into the de- serted building. As soon as they got inside, Cheetham cast his eyes round and gave a shud- der. You must have a stout heart: no money should tempt me to work here by myself. Lord XVhats that? For a low musical moan was heard. Cheetham darted back, and got to the church door. Henrys heart beat faster : but he lighted his lantern, and went up the aisle. The place was solemn, grim, gaunt, and m ouldering, and echoed strangely; but it was empty. He hallooed to his companion that it was all right. Then they set the forge up near a pillar at the entrance into the chancel. When they had done this, and brought in the steel laths, the sacks of coals, etc., Cheetham pro- duced a flask, and took a pull of neat brandy. This gave him courage, and he proposed to have a look round before they ~vent. Accordingly they inspected the building. When they came round to the chancel, suddenly there was a rattle, and a tremendous rush of some huge thing that made a cold wind, and blew out the light. Henry was appalled, and Cheetham dropped the lantern, and ran, yelling. And soon Henry heard his voice in the churchyard calling on him to come out. He did go out, and felt very much puzzled and alarmed. However he got matches from Cheetham, and went back, and lighted the lantern, quaking a little, and then he found that the great mouldering picture over the altar had rotted away from some of its supports, and one half of it was now drooping, like a monstrous wing, over the altar. He returned with the lantern, and told Cheetham what it was. Then he screwed on the lock, locked the church, and they went back to Hillsborough in good spirits. But, as he lay in bed, Henry thought the matter over, and, for the first time in his life, felt superstitious. It is very odd, he said, that old picture my forefathers have worshipped under, and prayed to, no doubt, should flap out in my face like that, the moment I offered to set up my forge among their dead bones. 12 THE GALAXY. [JULY Daylight dispersed these superstitious feelings, and the battle began. As usual, the first step toward making money, was to part with it. He could do nothing without a horse and a light cart. In Hillsborough they drive magnificent horses in public cabs: Henry knew one in particular, that had often spun up the steepest hills with him; a brute of prodigious bone and spirit. He bought this animal for a moderate price, considering his value: and then the next thing wasand indeed with some of us it precedes the purchase of the animalto learn to ride. He had only two days to acquire this accomplishment in: so he took a com- pendious method. He went to the Circus, at noon, and asked to see the clown. A gloomy fellow was fished out of the nearest public, and inquired what he wanted. The clown. Well, I am the clown. What! you the merry chap that makes the fun? said Henry, incredu- lously. I make the fun at night, replied the man, dolefully. If you want fun out of me, come and pay your shilling like a man. But it isnt fun Im come for. I want to learn to ride. Then you are too old. Why, we begin as soon as we can stand on a horses back. Oh, I dont mean to ride standing. I want to sit a horse, rearing, or plung- ing, or blundering over rough ground. What will you stand ? A sovereign. The clown dived into the public-house, and told a dark seedy man, with his black hair plastered and rolled effeminately, that he had got a bloke who would stand a quid for a mount. The two came out and the plastered Italian went to the stables: the melancholy punster conducted Henry into the arena, and stood beside him, like Patience on a monument. Presently a quiet mare ran in, and stuck. Henry was mounted, and cantered her round, the two men instinctively fol- lowing in a smaller circle, with jaws as long as your arm. This is delightful, said Henry; but I might as well be sitting in a chair. What I want is a Prancer. Then they brought him another horse, just as docile as the mare. The obedient creature, at a signal, reared suddenly, and seated Mr. Little on the sawdust behind him. A similar result was attained several times, by various means. But Henry showed himself so tough, courageous, and persistent, that he made great progress, and his good humor won his preceptors. They invited him to come to-morrow, at an earlier hour, and bring half a quid with him. He did so, and this time there was an American rider rehearsing, who sho~ved Henry what to do, and what not to do; and gave him a most humorous and instructive lesson. Indeed, his imitations of bad riding were so truthful and funny, that even the clown was surprised into one laugh; he who rarely smiled, unless in the way of business. Well, sir, said Henry, you have given me a good lesson; now take a hint from me; just you go and do all this before the public; for I never saw you do anything half as droll. They all three shook their heads with one accord. Go out of the beaten track, before an audience? Never. Such vagaries were only admissible in private. 1869.] PUT YOURSELF IN HIS PLACE. 3 After this second day, the fee was reduced to a gallon of ale. But, on the third day, the pupil combined theory with practice. He told his mother he was going to Cairnhope for the night. He then rode off to Cairn- hope Church. He had two large saddle-bags, containing provisions, and tools of all sorts. He got safe across the moor just before sunset. He entered the church, led the horse in ~vith him, and put him into the squires pew. He then struck a light, went into the chancel, and looked at the picture. It was as he had left it; half on the ~vall, half drooping over the altar-place. The walls were dank, and streaked here and there with green. His footsteps echoed, and the edifice was all dark, except within the rays of his lantern ; it also sang and moaned in a way to be accounted for by the action of the wind on a number of small apertures; but, nevertheless, it was a most weird and ghostly sound. He was glad of the companionship of his very horse. He took his buckets to the mountain stream, and, in due course, filled his trough, and left one bucket full for other uses. He then prepared and lighted his forge. As he plied the bellows, and the coals gleamed brighter and brighter, monumental figures came out and glared at him; mutilated inscriptions wavered on the walls; portions of the dark walls themselves gleamed in the full light, and showed the streaks and stains of age and weather, and the shadow of a gigantic horses head ; and, as the illuminated part seemed on fire by contrast, so the dark part of the church was, horribly black and mysterious, and a place out of which a ghost or phantom might be expected, at any moment, to come forth into that brilliant patch of light. Young Little, who had entered on this business in all the scepticism of the nineteenth century, felt awed, and began to wish he had selected any other build- ing in the world but this. He seemed to be desecrating a tomb. However, he mustered up his manly resolution. He looked up at a small aperture in the roof and saw a star glittering above: it seemed close, and a type of that omniscient eye from which no secrets are hid. He clasped his hands together, and said, I hope God, who has seen me driven from the haunts of men, will forgive me for taking refuge here ; and, if he does, I dont care who else is offended, alive or dead. And, with this, he drew the white hot strip of steel from the forge on to the anvil, and down came his hammer ~vith a blow, that sent the fiery steel flying all round, and rang and echoed through the desolate building. Instantly there was a tremendous plunge and clatter, follo~ved by a shaking sound, and, whiz, the church was fanned by black wings going zig-zag. Ten thousand devils! yelled Henry, and heaved the hammer high, in his own defence. But it was only the horse plunging and quivering with fear, and a score of bats the blow of the hammer had frightened out of the rotten pulpit. He resumed work with a beating heart, and the building rang and echoed and re-echoed with the rapid blows; and no more interruption came. The nine- teenth century conquered. After four hours of earnest work, he fed his horse, ate a slice of bread and meat, drank ~vater from the bucket, gave his horse some, and xvent to sleep in the pew beside that useful animal. Back to Hillsborough, at peep of day, with the blades he had forged. He now took his mother, in a great measure, into his confidence, under a strict promise to tell nobody, not even Doctor Amboyne. Mrs. Little received the communication in a way that both surprised and encouraged him. She was 4 THE GALAXY. [JULY, as willing to outwit the Unions, as she was unwilling to resist them openly; and Henry found her an admirable coadjutor. Had she known where Henry had set up his forge, she would have been very unhappy. But he merely told her it was in a secluded place, near Cairnhope, where he could never be detected. The carving business, being merely a blind, was not pushed. But Henry gave his apprentice, Billy, instruction, and the youth began to show an aptitude, which contrasted remarkably with his general incapacity. Mrs. Little paid one or two visits to factories, to see what women could do in this sort of work; and, one day, she told Henry she was sure she could sharpen and finish the blades. No, mother, said Henry. You are a lady. I cant have you made a slave of; and your beautiful white hands spoiled. I shall be happier, helping you, dear; and I wont spoil my hands, since you care about them. She insisted on a trial, and soon acquired a remarkable knack: she had a fine light hand: and it is an art easily learned by an attentive and careful wo- man. Indeed they can beat the men at it, if they will only make up their minds. And so the enterprise was launched, and conducted thus : in the day-time, Henry showed himself in the town, and talked big about carving; and, in the afternoon, he rode out, and did the real work of his life, over the dead bodies of his ancestors. His saddle-bags were always full, and, gradually, he collected some comforts about him in the deserted church. He called, more than once, at Woodbine Villa, but Miss Garden was on a visit. He was in the full career of fortune again, and sanguine of success, before they met. One day, having ascertained from Jael what day she would be at home, he called, and was admitted. The room was empty, but Miss Garden soon came into it, accompanied by Jael, carrying the bust. Ah, Mr. Little, said she, before he could possibly utter a word, this is fortunate. There is a party here on Thursday, and I want to show the bust complete, if you dont mind. Henry said he would finish it for her. He accordingly set to work, and and waited quietly till Jael should leave the room, to have it out with Grace. She, for her part, seemed to have forgotten his strange manner to her the other day ; perhaps she chose to forget it, or overlook it. But Henry observed that Jael was not allowed to quit the room. Whatever Miss Garden wanted she fetched herself; and came back softly, and rather suddenly, as if she had a mind to surprise Jael and the other, too. Female subtlety was clearly at ~vork. What do you advise me ? said Henry to Jael, during one of these inter- vals. J ael never lifted her eyes from her work, and spoke under her breath, I think Id be patient to-day. She must give you a chance to speak some day. Talk to me, when she comes backabout the Cairnhope folk, or anything Henry followed this advice, and Grace, for the first time, found herself a little ignored in the conversation. She was astonished at this, and I dont think she quite liked it. Henry was still going on with warmth and volubility about the Cairnhope folk, their good hearts, and their superstitions, when a visitor was announced. Mr. Coventry. 1869.] PUT YOURSELF iN HIS PLACE. 5 Henry stopped in the middle of a sentence. Grace brightened up, and said she was at home. Mr. Coventry entered the room; a tall, ~ve1l-made man, with an aquiline nose and handsome face, only perhaps there were more lines in it than he was entitled to at his age, for he was barely thirty. He greeted Miss Carden with easy grace, and took no more notice of the other two, than if they were chairs and tables. 1\Ir. Frederic Coventry had studied the great art of pleasing, and had mas- tered it wonderfully; but he was not the man to waste it indiscriminately. He was there to please a young lady, to whom he was attached, not to diffuse his sunshine indiscriminately. He courted her openly, not indelicately, but with a happy air of respect and self-assurance. Henry sat, sick with jealousy, and tried to work and watch; but he could only watch his hand trembled too much to work. What may be called oblique flattery is very pleasing to those quick-witted girls, who have had a surfeit of direct compliments and it is oblique flattery, when a man is supercilious and distant to others, as well as tender and a little obsequious to her he would please. Grace Carden enjoyed this oblique flattery of Mr. Coventrys, all the more that it came to her just at a moment when her companions seemed disposed to ignore her. She re~varded l\Ir. Coventry accordingly, and made Henry Littles heart die within him. His agony became intolerable. What a position was his Set there, with a chisel in his hand, to copy the woman he loved, while another man wooed her before his face, and she smiled at his wooing. At last his chisel fell out of his hand, and startled everybody; and then he rose up, with pale cheek and glittering eyes, and Heaven only knows what he was going to do or say. But at that moment another visitor was announced, to whom indeed the door was never closed. He entered the next moment, and Grace ran to meet him, crying, Oh, Mr. Raby this is a surprise. Mr. Raby kissed her, and shook hands with Mr. Coventry. He then said a kind word to Jael Dence, who got up and curtsied to him. He cast a careless glance on Henry and the bust, but said nothing. He was in a hurry, and soon came to the object of his visit. My dear, said he, the last time I saw you, you said you were sorry that Christmas was no longer kept in Hillsborough as it used to be. And so I am. Well, it is kept in Cairnhope, thank Heaven, pretty much as it was three centuries ago. Your father will be in London, I hear; will you honor my place and me with a visit during the Christmas holidays ? Grace opened her eyes with astonishment. Oh, that I will, said she, warmly. You will take your chance of being snowed up? I am afraid I shall not be so fortunate, was the charming reply. The Squire turned to Coventry, and said slily, I would ask you to join us, sir ; but it is rather a dull place for a gentleman who keeps such good compa- ny. I never heard it spoken of as a dull place before, said the young man; and, if it was, you have taken a sure means to make it attractive. That is true. Well, then, I have no scruple in asking you to join us and he gave Grace a look, as much as to say, Am I not a considerate person? THE GALAXY. [JULY, I am infinitely obliged to you, Mr. Raby, said Coventry, seriously; I will come. You xviii stay to luncheon, godpapa? Never touch it. Good-by. Well, then, Christmas eve I shall expect you both. Dinner at six. But come an hour or two before, if you can; and, JacI, my girl, you know you must dine at the hall on Christmas eve ai~d old Christ- mas eve, as usual, you and your sister and the old man. Jael curtsied, and said, with homely cordiality, We shall be there, sir, please God we are alive. Bring your gun, Coventry. Theres a good sprinkling of pheasants left. By-the-by, what about that pedigree of yours; does it prove the point ? Completely. Dorothy Raby, Sir Richards youngest sister, married Thom- as Coventry, who was out in the forty-five. Im having the pedigree copied for you, at a stationers near.~~ I should like to see it. Ill go with you, and show it to you, if you like. Mr. Raby was evidently pleased at this attention, and they went off together. Grace accompanied them to the door. On her return she was startled by the condition of young Little. This sudden appearance of his uncle, whom he hated, had agitated him not a little, and that uncles interference had blasted his last hope. He recognized this lover, and had sided with him was going to shut the pair pair up, in a country house, together. It xvas too much. He groaned, and sank back in his chair, almost fainting, and his hands began to shake in the air, as if he was in an ague. Both the women darted simultaneously toward him. Oh ! hes fainting! cried Grace. Wine ! xvine Fly. Jael ran out to fetch some, in spite of a despairing gesture, by which the young man tried to convey to her it was no use. Wine can do me no good, nor death no harm. XVhy did I ever enter this house ? Oh, Mr. Little, dont look so; dont talk so, said Grace, turning pale, in her turn. Are you ill? What is the matter? Oh, nothing. What should ail me ; Im only a xvorkman. What business have I with a heart? I loved you dearly. I was working for you, fighting for you, thinking f~r you, living for you. And you love that Coventry, and never showed it. Jael came in with a glass of xvine for him, but he waved her off with all the grandeur of despair. You tell me this to my face! said Grace, haughtily; but her bosom panted. Yes; I tell you so to your face. I love you, with all my soul. I-Ioxv dare you? What have I ever done, to justify Oh, if you werent so pale, Id give you a lesson. What could possess you? Its not my fault, thank heaven. You have insulted me, sir. No; why should I? You must be unhappy enough. There, Ill say but one word, and that, of course, is good morning. And she marched out of the room, trembling secretly in every limb. Henry sat down, and hid his face, and all his frame shook. Then Jael was all pity. She threw herself on her knees, and kissed his trembling hands with canine fidelity, and wept on his shoulder. He took her hand, and tried hard to thank her, but the words were choked. Grace Carden opened the door, and put her head cautiously in, for she 1869.] PUT YOURSELF IN HIS PLACE. 7 wanted to say a word to Jaci without attracting Henrys attention. But, when she saw Jael and Henry in so loving an attitude, she started, and then turned as red as fire; and presently burst out laughing. Jael and Henry separated directly. Grace laughed again, an unpleasant laugh. I beg pardon, good people. I only wanted Mr. Littles address. I thought you could get it for me, Jael. And now Im sure you can. Ha! ha! ha! And she was heard laughing after the dour closed. Now there was a world of contempt and insolence in this laugh. It con- veyed, as plainly as words, I was going to be so absurd, as to believe in your love, and pity it, at all events, though I cant approve it: but now you have just set my mind at ease. Ha ! ha! ha! Let me go, cried 1-lenry, wildly. Nay, tell me your address. What for? To tell that cruellaughing Nay then, for myself. Thats a different thing. I respect you. But her, I mean to hate, as much as I loved her. He gave Jael his address, and then got out of the house as fast as he could. That evening Grace Carden surprised her father, by coming into his study. Papa, said she, I am come to ask a favor. You must not refuse me. But I dont know that you ever did. Dearest, I want so. Well, my child ; just tell me what it is for. It is for Mr. Little; for his lessons. XVell, but ;o! He has given me a good many. And to tell you the truth, papa, I dis- missed him rather unceremoniously ; and now I should be glad to soften the blow a little, if I can. Do be very good and obedient, dear papa, and write what I shall dictate. Please / Well, spoiled child: who can resist you? Then Grace dictated, and Mr. Garden wrote: DEAR SIRi daughter informs me that, as yet, you have received no re- muneration for the lessons you have given her. I beg your acceptance of the inclosed cheque, and, at the same time, should be glad if you would put a price on the admirable bust you have executed of her. Yours obediently, WALTER GARDEN. The reply to this letter surprised Mr. Garden, so that he brought it to Grace, and showed it her. DEAR SIR,T he lessons are not worth speaking of. I have learned more in your house than I taught. I beg to return the cheque with thanks. Price of the bust, five hundred guineas. Yours obediently, HENRY LITTLE. Grace colored up, and her eyes sparkled. That young man wants hum- bling. THE GALAXY. [JULY, I dont see that, really. He is very civil, and I presume this five hundred guineas is just a polite way of saying that he means to keep it. Wants it for an advertisement, eh ? Grace smiled and bit her lip. Oh, what a man of business you are And a little while after the tears came into her eyes. Madman ! said she to herself. He wont let me be his friend. Well, I cant help it. After the brief excitement of this correspondence, Little soon relapsed into dull misery. His mother was alarmed, and could restrain herself no longer. She implored his confidence: Make me the partner of your grief; dear, she said; not that you can tell me anything I have not guessed already; but, dearest, it will do you good to open your heart; and, who knows, I may assist you. I know my sex much better than you do. Henry kissed her sadly, and said it was too late now. It is all over. She is going to marry another man. Has she told you so Not in words; but I have seen it. She has burned it into my heart. I wish I knew her, said Mrs. Little, very earnestly, and almost in a whisper. Some day, mother, some day; but not now. Oh, the tortures one heart can suffer, and yet not break. Mrs. Little sighed. What, not even tell me her name? I cant, I cant. Oh, mother, you mean well, but you will drive me mad. Mrs. Little forbore to press him farther just then. She sat silent at her work, and he at his, till they were aroused by a fly drawing up at the door. A fine young woman got out, with something heavy, and holding it like a child on one arm, rapped at the door with the hand that was disengaged. Mrs. Little opened the door to her, and she and Jael Dence surveyed each other with calm but searching eyes. If you please, maam, does Mr. Little bide here ? Mrs. Little said yes, with a smile; for Jaels face and modesty pleased her at first sight. I have something for him. Ill give it to him. If you please, maam, I was to give it him myself. Henry recognized the voice, opened tfle door, and invited her in. Mrs. Little followed her, full of suppressed curiosity. This put Jael out, but she was too patient to show it. It is the bust, said she; and put it softly down on the table with her strong arms. Henry groaned. She despises even that; she flings it at my head without a word. Nay; I have got a note for you.~~ Then why didnt you give it me at once? cried Henry, impatiently. She handed him the note without a word. It ran thus Miss Carden presents her compliments to Mr. Little, and sends him his beautiful bust. She is grieved that he will accept no renumeration for his les- sons ; and begs permission to offer her best wishes for his happiness and pros- perity. 1809.j PUT YOURSELF IN HIS PLACE. 19 The gentleness of this disarmed Henry, and at the same time the firmness crushed him. It is all over he cried, despairingly and yet I cant hate her. He ran from the room, unable to restrain his tears, and too proud and fiery to endure two spectators of his grief. Mrs. Little felt as mothers feel toward those who wound their young. Is it the womans likeness? said she, bitterly; and then trembled with emotion. May I see it? Surely, maam. And Jael began to undo the paper. But Mrs. Little stopped her. No, not yet. I couldnt bear the sight of a face that has brought misery upon him. I would rather look at yours. It is a very honest one. May I inquire your name? Jael Denceat your service. Dence! ah, then no wonder you have a good face; a Cairnhope face. My child, you remind me of days gone by. Come and see me again, will you? Then I shall be more able to talk to y~u quietly. Ay, that I will, maam. And Jael colored all over, with surprise, and such undisguised pleasure, that Mrs. Little kissed her, at parting. She had been gone a considerable time, when Henry came back; he fo~and his mother seated at the table, eyeing his masterpiece with stern and bitter scrutiny. It ~vas a picture, those t~vo rare faces in such close opposition. The carved face seemed alive ; but the living face seemed inspired, and to explore the other to the bottom with merciless severity. At such work the great female eye is almost terrible in its power. It is lovely, said she. It seems noble. I cannot find what I know must be there. Oh, why does God give such a face as this to a fool ? Not a word against her, said Henry. She is as wise, and as noble, and as good, as she is beautiful. She has but one fault; she loves another man. Put her sweet face away ; hide it from me till I am an old man, and can bring it out to show young folks why I lived and. die a bachelor. Good-by, dear mother, I must saddle Black harry, and away to my nights work. The days were very short now, and Henry spent two-thirds of his time in Cairnhope Church. The joyous stimulus of his labor was gone, but the habit remained, and carried him on in a sort of leaden way. Sometimes he wondered at himself for the hardships he under~vent merely to make money, since money had no longer the same charm for him; but a good workman is a patient, endur- ing creature, and self-indulgence, our habit, is, after all, his exception. Henry worked heavily on, with his sore, sad heart, as many a workman had done be- fore him. Unfortunately his sleep began to be broken a good deal. I am not quite clear whether it was the after-clap of the explosion, or the prolonged agi- tation of his young heart, but at this time, instead of the profound sleep that generally re~vards the sons of toil, he had fitful slumbers, and used to dream strange dreams, in that old church, so full of gaunt sights and strange sounds. And, generally speaking, however these dreams began, the figure of Grace Car- den would steal in ere he awoke. His senses, being only half asleep, colored his dreams he heard her light footstep in the pattering rain, and her sweet 20 THE GALAXY. [JULY, voice in the musical moan of the desolate building; desolate as his heart when he awoke, and behold it was a dream. The day after Christmas day began brightly, biit was dark and lowering toward afternoon. Mrs. Little advised Henry to stay at home. But he shook his head. How could I get through the night? Work is my salvation. But for my forge, I should perhaps end like he was going to say my poor father. But he had the sense to stop. Unable to keep him at home, the tender mother got to his saddle-bags, and filled his flask with brandy, and packed up a huge piece of Yorkshire pie, and even stuffed in a plaid shawl. And she strained her anxious eyes after him as he rode off. When he got among the hills, he found it was snowing there very hard; and then, somehow, notwithstanding all the speed he made, it was nearly dark when he got on the moor, and the tracks he used to go by, over the dangerous ground, were effaced. He went a snails pace, and, at last, dismounted, and groped his way. He got more than one fall in the snow, and thought himself very fortunate when, at last, something black towered before hini, and it was the old church. The scene was truly dismal the church was already overburdened with snow, and still the huge flakes fell fast and silently, and the little mountain stream, now swollen to a broad and foaming torrent, went roaring by, behind the churchyard wall. Henry shivered, and made for the shelter. The horse, to whom this church was merely a well-ventilated stable, went in and clattered up the aisle, saddle-bags and all. Henry locked the door inside, and soon blew the coals to a white heat. The bellows seemed to pant unnaturally loud, all was so deadly still. The windows were curtained with snow, that increased the general gloom, though some of the layers shone ghostly white and crystalline, in the light of the forge, and of two little grates he had set in a monument. Two heaps of snow lay in the centre aisle, just under two open places in the roof, and, on these, flakes, as big as a pennypiece, kept falling through the air, and glittered like diamonds as they passed through the weird light of the white coals. Oh it was an appalling place, that night; youth and life seemed intruders. Henry found it more than he could bear. He took a couple of candles, l)laced them in bottles, and carried them to the western window, and there lighted them. This one window was protected by the remains of iron-work outside, and the whole figure of one female saint in colored glass survived. This expedient broke the devilish blackness, and the saint shone out glorious. The horrid spell thus broken in some degree, Henry plied his hammer, and made the church ring, and the flaming metal fly. But by-and-by, as often happened to him now, a drowsiness overcame him at the wrong time. In vain he battled against it. It conquered him even as he worked; and, at last, he leaned with his arms against the handle of the bellows, and dozed as he stood. He had a dream of that kind which ~ve call a vision, because the dream seems to come to the dreamer where he is. He dreamed he was there at his forge, and a soft voice called to him. He turned, and lo between him and the western window stood six female figures, 1869.] PUT YOURSELF IN HIS PLACE. all dressed in beautiful dresses, but of another age, and of many colors, yet transparent ; and their faces fair, but white as snow: and the ladies curtsied to him, with a certain respectful majesty beyond description: and, somehow, by tbeir faces, and their way of curtsying to him, he knew they were women of his own race, and themselves aware of the relationship. Then several more such figures came rustling softly through the ~vall from the churchyard, and others rose from the vaults and took their places quietly, till there was an avenue of dead beauties ; and they stood in an ascending line up to the west window. Some stood on the ground, some on the air; that made no difference to them. Another moment, and then a figure more lovely than them all shone in the windo~v, at the end of that vista of fair white faces. It was Grace Carden. She smiled on him and said, I am going where I can love you. There the world cannot divide us. Follow me; follow; fol- low Then she melted away; then all melted : and he awoke with a loud cry that echoed through the edifice, now dark and cold as the grave; and a great white owl xvent whirling, and with his wings made the only air that stirred. The fire was out, and the place a grave. Yet, cold as it was, the dreamer was bathed in perspiration, so clear had been that unearthly vision, so ghostly was now that flitting owl. Shuddering all over he lighted his fire again, and plied his bellows with fury, till the fire glowed brighter than ever; and even then he prayed aloud that he might never see the like again, even in a dream. He worked like mad, and his hand trembled as he struck. Ere he had thoroughly recovered the shock, a wild cry arose outside. He started back, awe-struck. \Vhat with the time, the place, and that strange vision, the boundaries of the natural and the supernatural were a little confused in his mind. Help, help! cried a voice; and now the familiar tone of that voice made him utter a loud cry in return. He searched for the key, and made his ~vay to the door; but, just as he be- gan to insert the key, the voice was at the door outside. Oh, save me A dying girl ! Save me The cry was now a moan, and the next moment an inert mass fell like lead against the door in a vain attempt to knock at it. The voice was Grace Cardens, and it was Grace Cardens body that fell so inert and powerless against the church door, within a yard of Henry Littles hand. OUR IMPENDING CHINESE PROBLEM. IF we turn from the splendid sunrise of our national morning to the misty veil that enshrouds the future, we shall see ~ giant spectre slowly defining its shadowy form against the Western heavens. Let us look and reflect; for it is the mirage of a distant empire, a looming of one-third of the human race. It is the foreshadowing of a problem which only time can solve; but which is none the less one of the most important in the worlds history. Let us examine the elements of this problem: On the Western shore of the Pacific there is a country, not much larger than the United States east of the Mississippi, in which a population of more than four hundred millions treads closely upon the capacity of the soil for supporting existence. So true is this, that those years in which the productiveness of the earth falls below the average, witness widespread famineand all the horrors that foiow in its train. By untiring patience and industry, by intelligence and the skill attained through ages of experience, by uniting all these qualities in wrestiug from Na- ture the last atom she can yield, and, finally, by returning to Mother Earth, with scrupulous care, all that has been taken from her, with interest drawn from sea and river, this race maintains its vitality unimpaired. But it is a struggle for life. So long as the throes of this tremendous struggle were confined to China by strong natural and political barriers, they found a remedy in decimation by fam- ine and pestilence. But the past twenty years have effected as great breaches in the political barrier ~vhich the Chinese had raised about them, as twenty cen- turies have made in their ancient wall of brick and stone. The social and polit- ical restraints which have opposed emigration are disappearing, and the first con- sciousness of an expansive power is beginning to show itself in the maritime provinces of the empire. A few years since, the confines of Asia and its archipelagoes were the horizon of the world to every Chinaman. The small fields therein opened to a peaceful race attracted many enterprising emioTants but neither were the openings large enough, nor the facilities for reaching them great enough to initiate any very im- portant movement. The discovery of gold in California and Australia and the demand for labor on the distant shores of the Pacific Ocean, gave the needed im- pulse. Timidly, at first, small numbers xvent abroad; then tens of thousands, until now there must be nearly two hundred thousand Chinamen on the Ameri- can continents alone. During these years there has been, also, a continuous stream returning to Asia, and carrying home, in the aggregate, a large amount of money and information. Thus, the number of Chinamen who have seen the outside ~vorld cannot be far from one per cent. of the whole male population of the empire. These act as a leaven on ever-growing circles at home, spreading among hundreds of millions those stories of adventure in distant lands, of won- ders, of boundless demand for labor and of high wages, which make individuals think and become restless. Thoughts arise which, when they become common to large numbers, are intensified to a degree proportionate to the size of the masses swayed by them, until the sympathetic attraction of remote countries pro- duces the tidal wave and currents of emigration. The measure of this move- ment is the exact resultant of all the social and physical forces which operate in its action. These are, of course, intricate and obscure beyond computation;

OUR IMPENDING CHINESE PROBLEM. IF we turn from the splendid sunrise of our national morning to the misty veil that enshrouds the future, we shall see ~ giant spectre slowly defining its shadowy form against the Western heavens. Let us look and reflect; for it is the mirage of a distant empire, a looming of one-third of the human race. It is the foreshadowing of a problem which only time can solve; but which is none the less one of the most important in the worlds history. Let us examine the elements of this problem: On the Western shore of the Pacific there is a country, not much larger than the United States east of the Mississippi, in which a population of more than four hundred millions treads closely upon the capacity of the soil for supporting existence. So true is this, that those years in which the productiveness of the earth falls below the average, witness widespread famineand all the horrors that foiow in its train. By untiring patience and industry, by intelligence and the skill attained through ages of experience, by uniting all these qualities in wrestiug from Na- ture the last atom she can yield, and, finally, by returning to Mother Earth, with scrupulous care, all that has been taken from her, with interest drawn from sea and river, this race maintains its vitality unimpaired. But it is a struggle for life. So long as the throes of this tremendous struggle were confined to China by strong natural and political barriers, they found a remedy in decimation by fam- ine and pestilence. But the past twenty years have effected as great breaches in the political barrier ~vhich the Chinese had raised about them, as twenty cen- turies have made in their ancient wall of brick and stone. The social and polit- ical restraints which have opposed emigration are disappearing, and the first con- sciousness of an expansive power is beginning to show itself in the maritime provinces of the empire. A few years since, the confines of Asia and its archipelagoes were the horizon of the world to every Chinaman. The small fields therein opened to a peaceful race attracted many enterprising emioTants but neither were the openings large enough, nor the facilities for reaching them great enough to initiate any very im- portant movement. The discovery of gold in California and Australia and the demand for labor on the distant shores of the Pacific Ocean, gave the needed im- pulse. Timidly, at first, small numbers xvent abroad; then tens of thousands, until now there must be nearly two hundred thousand Chinamen on the Ameri- can continents alone. During these years there has been, also, a continuous stream returning to Asia, and carrying home, in the aggregate, a large amount of money and information. Thus, the number of Chinamen who have seen the outside ~vorld cannot be far from one per cent. of the whole male population of the empire. These act as a leaven on ever-growing circles at home, spreading among hundreds of millions those stories of adventure in distant lands, of won- ders, of boundless demand for labor and of high wages, which make individuals think and become restless. Thoughts arise which, when they become common to large numbers, are intensified to a degree proportionate to the size of the masses swayed by them, until the sympathetic attraction of remote countries pro- duces the tidal wave and currents of emigration. The measure of this move- ment is the exact resultant of all the social and physical forces which operate in its action. These are, of course, intricate and obscure beyond computation; 1369.1 OUR IMPENDING CHINESE PROBLEM. but they are resolvable, in general terms, into one set of favorable and opposing forces in China, and other sets, with different resultants, for each country out- side of China. In China we have one-third of the human race, suffering from an excessive death-rate and all the misery of an incessant struggle for life, with no remedy but the ability to overflow into other lands, until the population at home shall stand in a proper ratio to the means of support. Leaving out all other questions, the capacity of America for receiving emi- grat ion is at present boundless, as compared with the capacity of all the world to supply it. An eminent English geographer has carefully calculated that the two Americas are capable of supporting thirty-six hundred millions of inhabitants. Room and subsistence are not wanting. The capacity for absorption of labor is scarcely more limited. The end of the long-continued exodus from Europe can- not be far off; to think otherwise is to believe unjustiflably in a rapidly-approach- ing decay of the nations beyond the Atlantic. Social and political reforms rais- ing the condition of the people, especially that of the women of the lowest classes, the increase in industrial prosperity, and the continued drain of skilled labor to foreign countries, seem to be silently working throughout Europe tow- ard the establishment of a proper balance between population and means of support. The Chinaman in this country was for years excluded from all participation in the development of the national prosperity, and was grudgingly allowed to work only in those gold diggings which were considered worthless by the Ameri- can. But when a pressing necessity arose for labor on the public works of Cal- ifornia and Nevada, the Chinaman was found to answer every need; and now, having become identified with our internal improvements, he has obtained rec- ognition as a necessary element of populationthe execution of great enterprises is b2sed on his co-operation. For ~veal or woe, the Pacific Railroad is uniting more distant extremes than the two shores of our continent. The facilities for crossing the Pacific are yearly increasing; and so is also the knowledge of America in China. Unless obstacles be placed in the way, immi- gration will increase rapidly; with additional encouragement it will soon become enormous. Having no rights, exposed to continued extortion, treated with contempt and indignity, branded as an idolator, and charged with every vice by his scrupulous- ly just, religious, and virtuous neighbors, the Chinaman, feeling that he has no position here, seeks California, as the pearl diver does the bottom of the sea, and returns as soon as possible to the free air of his native soil. Place these China- men on the same footing with other immigrants, and the result will be that, while many will return to the home of their forefathers, a large portion will make this the home of their descendants. This was and is the case in the Dutch East Indies, where they were less oppressed than in California. Under these circumstances, if this immigration should be proportionate to the necessity for relief that exists in China, or to the capacity for receiving it here ; or, again, if it should bear the same relation to the parent population that the emigration from Ireland and Germany bears to the home population of those countries, the male adults of Mongolian origin on this continent would soon out- number those of the European race. \Vhen we consider that the I)rejudice of race is, with us, a part of the foun- dation of politics ; that the moral characteristics of various nationalities become important parts of the framework on which parties are constructed; that the 24 THE GALAXY. LJULY, opposing armies which fight with the ballot, and at times threaten the s~vord, are, to a large extent, massed by races ; when we consider this, and then turn to the prospect of a homogeneous mass of people among us, their male adults outnum- bering largely those of all other component parts of the population, and having no sympathetic bond with us in their language, traditions, or, so far as it goes for anything, their religion; then the social and political importance of this great problem dawns on the mind. To the thinker who has come to look upon the Americas as the birthright of the European under the tutelage of the Anglo-Saxon; as presenting the prospect of a hemisphere peopled with a new race built up from the best elements of the European, numbering more than twice the present population of the globe; a race ~vhich will be homogeneous, enjoying the most complete means of inter- communication by steam and electricity, having one language, one form of gov- ernment and one idea of God; to him the startling possibilities involved in the problem before us come as the discovery of neglected data, which may invalidate the results of years of calculation. If the probabilities of the case bear any proximate relation to the possibili- ties, the teeming population of our hemisphere two or three centuries hence may have more Chings and Changs in their geneological trees than Smiths and Browns; for, other things being equal, the predominant blood will be that of the race best able to maintain an undiminished rate of increase; and the vitality of the Chinese nation during a constant struggle for life seems to bespeak for it at least equally favorable prospects in less crowded homes. With an emigration from China standing in the same ratio to the home pop- ulation that the drain from Germany holds to the population of that country, we should have an influx of more than one million Chinese yearly. Ten years of this rate would place upon our soil a preponderance of male adults of Mongolian blood over those of all the other families of man among us. The perception of this possibility cannot but awaken in the mind of the true American the gravest thoughts. The social, political, and ethnological questions involved are of transcendent importance. The question of the prohibition or the heavy taxation of Chinese immigra- tion is almost sure to be one of the earliest and most bitterly fought political issues of the Far West. The hostility to the Chinese of the white laborers, especially of the Irish, is already beginning to show itself openly in the most violent acts of intimidation. But it is not difficult to foresee that any legislation, which has for its object the suppression of any social element or force that has once shown itself to be a necessity in rapidly carrying forward the system of internal improvements on which a large part of our material industry rests, must ultimately fail. We may therefore assume that the recognition of the necessity of Chinese labor in the Far West insures an influx of Chinese proportionate at least to the extent of the great system of public works, which will be needful for the growth of the Western States and Territories. We shall see, further on, that these Asiatics are obtaining strong foothold in almost all other branches of labor, be- cause they answer the requirements better than any other class of people. It is therefore not improbable that they will find their way, in large numbers, to this side of the Rocky Mountains. Is it probable that the party warfare of the country will leave this enormous quantity of possible political force in the latent condition appertaining to aliens? 1869.] OUR IMPENDING CHINESE PROBLEM. 25 Gaining the right to vote means gaining citizenship, the removal of disqualifi- cations, and the protection of their distinctive interests and customs to a degree proportionate to the number of their votes. Having obtained these, the Chinese emigrant will become, beyond a doubt, a permanent citizen. With this prospect before us it may not be uninteresting to glance at the characteristics of this race, both in countries to which they have emigrated, and in their own home. Twenty years of contact between the two races in California have done little toward removing the prejudice against the Chinese. They have poured steadily into and out of the country; but, surrounded by barriers, they have been forced to form a world of their own. XVithin this some fifty thousand men have been thriving, while n~any of them have amassed large fortunes. Many an enterprise, too, has swamped in failure, which would have given brilliant returns but for the tyranny of white workmen who prevented the employment of cheap Chinese labor. This tyranny is met with at every step: from the court-room, where the Chinaman is denied the right of giving evidence in mixed cases, to the gold diggings, where white rowdies, acting as self-appointed collectors, levy the mining tax which is never assessed upon Americans. Recently, however, various manufacturers, farmers, and others, braving that wild beast, the Irish mob, have begun to employ Chinese labor, and with such success that capitalists see in it the sine~v and muscle of the Far West. A writer in the Overland Monthly, March, 1869, says of the Chinamen: What they want is employment snd such pay as ~vill support them and leave something over to send hack to the father and mother, or to the wife and the children, left at home. So accustomed have they always been to give a full and honest days labor to tlsose who have hired them, that they expect to give their employer the service of their muscle and their skill during all the hours of the day, only asking a reasonable time for meals, together ~vith tlse stipulated wages when their work is done. The owners of woollen factories praise them as the best of workmen. The officers and foremen of the Central Pacific railroadon which some ten thousand Chinamen are said to be at workspeak no less highly of them. Their work is full and honest, no lagging and story-telling, no whiskey drinking, and few fights. Overseers declare that they can drill more rock and move more dirt with China- men than with an equal number of men who claim this kind of occupation as their specialty. What they lack in bodily vigor is made up in persistency and steadiness. Indeed, California is just beginning to feel how suicidal her course toward Asiatic labor has been, and she is finding that her material prosperity is increas- ing apace with the innovation upon that policy. The Chinese are found now in woollen, paper and powder mills; in th. borax works; in the hop plantations, fruit orchards and vineyards; following the reaping machines on farms, and work- ing the salt-pits on the coast; doing almost universally the cooking, and engaged in hundreds of branches of industry that would be impossible without their cheap labor. The sure result of this will be that, in a few years, the small savings of these workmen will, by accumulation, transform the coolie of to-day into the capitalist, contracting to build railroads, owning large farms or factories and lines of ships, and making great commercial combinations. This is certain, for no people on the face of the earth advance so unswervingly in the accumulation of capital; and in its investment from childhood upward they combine the shrewdness of the Jews with the many-sidedness of the Yankee. What the Jews have been in banking, the Chinese may easily become in general commerce and industry on the Pacific coast. THE GALAXY. [JULY, On the island of Java, where they have long been tolerated, the Chinese number not far from 150,000, the greater part having more or less Javan blood. The oppression of the Dutch is the cause of the population not being larger. They are obliged to pay a mulct for leave to enter, and a larger one for per- mission to quit, besides a poll-tax; none of which imposts are levied on other foreigners. During the last century they were so badly treated that they revolted, and in i~~o were attacked in their quarter in Batavia, when ten thousand of them are said to have been slaughtered. Sir Stamford Raffles, writing in i8 17, says: The most numerous and important class of foreigners in Java are the Chinese, who do not fall short of soo,ooo, and who, with a system of free trade and free cultivation, would soon accumulate tenfold, by natural in- crease within the island and gradual accessions of new settlers from house. They arrive at Batavia to the amount of a thousand or more in junks, without money or resources; but by dint of industry soon acquire comparative opulence. There are no women in Java who caine directly from China; but as the Chinese often marry the daugbters of their countrymen by Javan women, there results a nunserous mixed race which is often scarcely distinguishable from the native Chinese. Many return to China annually in the junks, but by BO means in the same numbers as they arrive. They are governed in matters of inheritance and minor affairs by their own laws, administered by their own officials appointed by~tbe Dutch governor. They are distinct from the natives and are in a high degree more intelligent, niore laborious, and more luxssrious. They are the life and soul of the commerce of the country. In the native provinces they are still the farmers of the revenue, having formerly been so thoughout the island. Beginning on their arrival as coolies and laborers, they soon accummulate enough to work independently, and many of them amass large fortunes. They have obtained nearly the monopoly of the native produce and an uncontrolled command of their market for foreign commodities. Their industry embraces the whole system of commerce, from the greatest wholesale speculations to the most minute branches of the retail trade. In their hands are all the manufactories, distilleries, potteries, etc., and they have large coffee and sugar plantations. Their means are increased by their knowledge of business? their spirit of enter- prise, and their mutual confidence. They are equally well adapted for trade or agriculture. In the English colony of Singapore 50,000, out of a population of 8o,ooo, are Chinamen, chiefly from the island of Hainan. Here the Chinese have obtained a strong foothold, and, under the full protection of English law, are accumulat- ing great fortunes. Nearly all the trade is under their control, and this repre- sented, in 1867, $35,000,000 imports and $a8,700,000 exports. Carrying with them and retaining their innate energy in a country where both the natives and Europeans succumb, morally if not physically, to the enervating climate, they are absorbing every department of labor. The writer was told some years since that the English owners of a large machine shop at Singapore ~vere gradually remov- ing their English workmen and replacing them with Chinamen, having found the latter more docile, sober and enduring, and, with the same amount of instruc- tion, equafly skilful. So successful is their competition that Parsees, Jews and Europeans can retain no foothold in face of it. The growth of Chinese population and industry in the East Indian Archi- pelago is already a matter of great significance. In it we may see the coming solution of an important problem. The vast areas of tropical lands, insular and continental, have hitherto been, comparatively speaking, a closed world. And yet the warm regions yield larger returns of those plants they have in com- mon with the temperate zones, and have peculiar plants which yield more nour- ishment from the same area. Thus maize, which yields fortyfold or fiftyfold in France, gives one hundred and fiftyfold, on an average, in Mexico. Humboldt estimates that an aey5ent (five-sixths of an acre) which will barely support two men, when sown in ~vheat, will feed fifty with bananas. OUR IMPENDING CHINESE PROBLEM. 27 A good authority has given the following tabular statement of the relation between latitude and productiveness. Lditude 0 deg. 15 deg. 30 deg. 45 deg. 6o deg. Productiveness xoo 90 65 35 12 1-2 It is this excessive bounty of tropical nature that feeds the Southern races without labor. And the absence, during ages, of the necessity for labor in these regions, has unfitted the natives for active participation in making their countries contribute their full share to the needs of mankind. But the time must come, sooner or later, when these vast forests and jungles will be the granaries from which the deficiencies in the production of other lands will be made good; when they will stand in the same relation to other countries that our prairies and the wheat-fields of Russia hold to manufacturing England, or that Siam is just begin- ning to hold to China; and when the great wealth of raw materialgreater by far than ~ve as yet appreciatewhich is contained in the vegetable world of the trol)ics, will be a necessity to countless manufactories, supplying comforts and luxuries to largely increased populations over the whole world. The Chinese alone, of all races, have shown themselves able to maintain vig- orous moral and physical vitality in the unwholesome and enervating climates of the South. Wherever they go and are allowed a fair field, they turn their attention to the discovery and development of the resources of the land in every direction known to their experience, and with fully as much good judgment, en- ergy, and success as are shown by the European. Indeed, they possess, in an eminent degree, the qualities that are essential in colonizers, especially that strongly-marked national individuality which enables them to retain the best characteristics of their race in the midst of the effeminate customs of the inferior natives. The ability to thrive in the most extreme climates is a remarkable characteristic of this people. We have just seen how well they resist the ener- vatincr and unwholesome climate of the tropics. The writer has also seen them collected together from different parts of the Chinese Empirepursuing, in considerable numbers, the different branches of their industry, on the confines of Tartary and Siberia, where the mean annual temperature is thirty-two de- grees (Fahrenheit) and where the mercury sinks, every winter, to sixty degrees below zero. Whate\-er may be the future of China Proper, it is perhaps not too much to foresee in the mutual adaptation which exists between tropical regions and Chinese colonization, the germ oj a growth in which the best elements of their own and the Western civilizations will blend to raise the offshoots of China to the rank of great Powers in the councils of the world. But it is in their own home and in the record of their national growth that we must seek the most important data for estimating the Chinese character. The necessary brevity of a magazine article admits of only a superficial glance at the outlines of this record, and the principles on which the social and political organization rests. For the practical worth and working of these principles, we have a measure in the present social and political condition of the Empire. The most striking features in the history of China, are the persistency of its civilization, and its national vitality which seems still undiminished, notwith- standing the great age of the Empire. This civilization is native to the soil. At every step we find unmistakable proofs that in remote times the ancestors of the race lived under a patriarchal government. The earliest records describe them as entering China from the north-west, and we know that in that direction, upon the high table lands of Central Asia, between Thibet and the Tienslian, there 28 THE GALAXY. [JULY, existed a civilization which was partly pastoral, but acquainted also with many arts, and in which the use of iron was known at the remote period preceding the separation of the earlier branches of the Arian race. Our own ancestors, and those of the Chinese, were perhaps near neighbors, at that epoch. In entering China, the latter found it occupied by an aboriginal race, of which remnants live to this day unconquered, in the southern and western mountains. The earliest records and traditions carrying us back far into the uncertain period of history, show us the founders of the empire gradually forming colonies through the land, and carrying on defensive wars against the northern hordes, at the same time that they conquered both the natives of the soil and the natural obstacles in the way of their expansion. Already in the dawn of their written history, we find them carrying out a great enterprise, building works to control the waters of the Yellow Riverone of the most ungovernable streams of the earthby confining it between dykes several hundred miles in length, to prevent its destructive inundations; at undertaking, the maintenance of which even at the present day, forms a heavy tax on the whole Empire. Thus, in the infancy of the nation, there existed the germs that were necessary to its wonderful growth., Every essential feature of their civilization, moral, social, political, indus- trial, is the offspring of their own minds. More than this, from China there have radiated many of the fundamental features of Asiatic and even of European civilization. The mariners compass, printing, and gunpowder, were early inven- tions of that country, and there is little doubt that they were directly or indi- rectly introduced into the West during the reign of the Mongol dynasty, when so many Europeans wandered freely through all Asia. It has been claimed that the first printed copy of the Bible was made in China. The observing traveller in that country will see at every step the prototypes of familiar objects in com- mon use with us and in Europe. It has often been made a reproach to the Chinese, that their inventions have remained unperfected. This is certainly a remarkable fact, when we consider the fertility of mind necessary to have originated, throughout, such a civilization; but it would seem that the perfecting of the results of thought and labor is, to a certain extent, dependent on their transplantation into other countries, and on the reaction upon each other of different kinds of civilizations. China has ever been too isolated to enjoy the benefits of this interchange, although there is. reason to hope that such an era is now dawning. It must also be remembered that China has ever been a world within itself; sufficient to itself. Having no competitors, their inventions stopped at the point where the desired end was attained; they were intended to be labor-aiding rather than labor-saving. It would seem that with this isolation, the very fact that the Chinese civilization is indigenous would go far toward explaining the persistency of its type. The principles upon which the whole social and political fabric of the Em- pire is based had already been established, and had taken a firm root in the national mind in early historical times; and so firmly were they fixed that every attempt to overthrow them has ended in the extinction of the aggressive dynasties. These principles are, paternal and filial duty, and individual re- sj5onsibillty for the public welfare. As the Emperor is the son of Heaven and the father of the people, he is responsible to heaven for the ~vell-being of the nation; a portion only of his power is delegated to the officers of the govern- ment. So also, in the family, the parent is supreme, but also responsible for the conduct of the children. The entire population of a city is responsible for the 1869.] OUR IMPENDING CHINESE PROBLEM. 29 citizens; each ward, for its families; each family, for its members. No crime is greater than the violation of filial duty in the family relation, and all crimes acting against the public good, are brought to the doors of the public sponsors. But the Chinese, always too material and practical a people to vest the control of the imperial will in heaven alone, established, so far as we know, first among mankind, the principle that the will of the people and the will of heaven are synonymous. In the Shu-King, compiled by Confucius, 500 B. C., from authorities much more ancient, we find the following axiom: That which heaven sees and hears, manifests itself in that which the people see and hear. That which the people judge worthy of reward and of punishment indicates what heaven desires to reward and to punish. Again it is said in the Chung-King, The wise Emperors of ancient times used the eyes and ears of the Empire to see and hear, for the wishes of the people were their wishes, since it is in the wishes of the people that the intentions of heaven are manifested. Believing thus firmly that ~ the voice of the people is the voice of God, a council of the wisest men of the Empire, themselves raised from the people, has ever surrounded the throne, holding the position of censors, memorializing the Emperor on the state of the country, and generally not hesitating to risk their lives in criticising a wrong policy. As the people are the children of the Emperor, they are all equal, as mem- bers of one family. There is no distinction of class. The descendants ofCon~ fucius have indeed by that title certain privileges of nobility, and the members of the Imperial family form, during the existence of a dynasty, a class of nobles but they enjoy only a few slight prerogatives, which end with the ninth remove. Whenever a citizen has rendered some signal service to the State, advancing the public good, he is ennobled, receiving certain titles and privileges, but these cease at his death, his descendants having no further share in them, than the honor of being his offspring. As no man can be greater than his father, the whole line of ancestors is ennobled. Thus, an aristocracy is formed, indeed, but it is wisely perpetuated backward into the other world. All being equal, competition for office is open for all. Education is uni- versal, and proficiency in scholarship forms the basis of this competition. The government, it is true, appoints most of the officials, but they are chosen from those who, in the successive competitive examinations, take the highest honors. That these principles have not merely been acknowledged, but that they have been the true mainspring, acting weakly at times it is true, the Chinese nation at this day is a standing proof. Among them alone, of all peoples, has the principle that forms the basis of our own government, the equality of man, existed through all history. The early philosophers of China taught these doctrines, as a moral and political code, and as the only just basis of government. At that time, the country was split up into numerous feudal kingdoms, but when, some time after the death of Confucius, the Empire was consolidated, the doctrines of the great teacher became gradually the rule of action, and until the present time, they have never lost ground in their hold upon the national mind. As a code of morals, it is not venturing too far to say, that the writings of Confucius have been and still are as much respected, as is the creed of any other people. The universal esteem in which scholarship has ever been held, has made education one of the chief aims of life, to a greater degree in China than in most other nations. An aristocracy of intellect assumes here the position which in other countries is assigned to birth or wealth; schools are universal, 30 THE GALAXY. and the proportion of the inhabitants who are unable to read and write is very small. The classics and history of their own country are very generally studied. That their ability to learn is not confined to the groove of their own system of study is shown by the instances of Chinese educated in the West. About twenty years ago, two b oxs, children of very poor families, were sent to America to be instructed. After leaving the school at Munson, one xvent through Yale, and in graduating took the highest place in English composition ; the other carried off the highest honors in Surgery and Botany in the University of Edinburgh. Since that time the first has carried the experience gained in the West into the conduct of his business in China, and the other is esteemed by the European residents of the English Colony of Hong-Kong, as one of the best surgeons in the East. The science of war is considered inferior to scholarship, and the Chi- nese are essentially a peaceable people, although they have carried on great wars during different periods of their history. The power of the central government is felt but lightly throughout the Em- pire. There is a practical decentralization which leaves a wide scope for free action to the provinces and their subdivisions ; this is exemplified in the applica- tion of the revenues, excepting maritime customs, to the use of the districts in which they are raised. The government of China is really one type of democ- racy, as that of Japan is of despotism. In China the people are represented in the government, in that, though all the principal offices are filled by the Em- peror, they are filled from the people by competitive examination. This is the theory; practically many offices are sold to raise money, as during the wars with England, and the rebellion. The Central government is felt chiefly when its appointees are corrupt; but the power of the people is generally great enough to cause removals in such cases. Their faculty of organization and self-govern- ment showed itself repeAtedly during the late rebellion. The British Consul at Ning-Po paid them a high tribute in this respect, in praising the perfect order and self-government which was shown for a long time at that place, when its ~population, greatly increased by the crowds fleeing from the rebels, was aban- doned by its officials and left to take care of itself. Having no fear of the future world, they meet death with great courage, dread- ing it less than continued pain. The family ties are very close, and family honor is the strongest check on their actions. Their sense of commercial honor is deep, and my own experience, in Central and Northern China, leads me to think that honesty is quite as general there as in other countries. The existence of hospitals, founded by private charity for the sick and for foundlings, and for other purposes, proves that the Chinese are not negligent of social re- sponsibilities. They- are proverbially industrious, and could we measure the amount of productive manual labor performed throughout the world, without the aid of modern labor-saving machinery, we should l)robably find that this third of the human race accomplishes not less than from six-tenths to seven-tenths of the whole. It is no slight tribute to say that during nearly 5,000 miles of travel in this closely peopled land, the writer never saw a drunken Chinaman. The Chinese have been charged with being, as a people, corrupt beyond measure, given over to every abomination, and practisin~ infanticide to the ex- tent of destroying one quarter of the female children. But it is the opinion of Dr. Lockhart, an eminent medical missionary who has studied the question many years in different parts of the Empire, that the latter crime is (in proportion to the population) no more frequent, or perhaps less common, than it is in its 1869.] OUR IMPENDING CHINESE PROBLEM. 3 various forms, in England and America. And it should seem that the healthy and moral condition of society is proved by the vitality of the nation, the overflow- ing population, and the rapidity with which gigantic wounds in the national body are healed. Of course the aggregate of crime must be very large, especially in the great cities ; but it is doubtful whether it is greater, in proportion to the population, than among the nations of the West. \Vith all the admiration a careful observer must have for China, it is cer- tainly not a pleasant country for a foreigner to live in, unless he recognize and keep always before him the fact that organic matter in decaying and giving nutriment to plants loses every vestige of its former character. There is too much of the human element; go where you will, look where you will, it is there. In the more closely peopled parts the traveller is surrounded by a turbid stream of life, while he treads a soil, almost human, the ashes of the unnumbered millions of the past; the very dust which he breathes and swallows is that of a charnel house. The water of wells is everywhere impregnated with the products of or- ganic decay, and the rivers are the sewers of countless cities. On the densely-peopled plain all the organic and much of the mineral ingredi- ents of the soil must have made many times the circuit of plant and animal life: in other words, every thing that goes to make and maintain the human body has formed part of human bodies which have passed away. Few foreigners have the courage to enter the larger southern towns in sum- mer, so horrible is the air. In the neighborhood of great cities on the delta plain, where water is found just below the surface, one may ride for miles, always in sight of coffins bursting in the scorching heat of the sun, and breed- ing the pestilence that yearly sweeps off the surplus population. What I have attempted to make conspicuous is the fact that the spirit of the Chinese, as shown in their enterprise and energy as colonizers, in their com- mercial character and faculty of organization, in the democratic idea of the political equality of man, in the practical decentralization of their government, and in the universality of education and the making of education a necessary qualification for office, is in harmony with the spirit of the present age. This is the strong armor of the race, its safeguard in the future struggle for existence, by which it is clearly distinguished from those inferior races whose social and political systems belong to periods long past, and differ so much from our own that they fall at the first contact with us. \Ve have seen that there exists in China a boundless source of emigration, and the necessity for emigration; that the capacity of America for receiving this emigration is comparatively unlimited ; that the emigration will be at least pro- portionate to the encouragement offered; that the encouragement is springing into existence through the recognition of the Chinese as a necessary element for the development of the resources of the Far West; that the immense influx of these people will constitute a possible political power which cannot remain la- tent and that the attainment of the privileges of citizenship will make of them a fixed instead of a floating population, which, so far as anything we know to the contrary, may at no distant date largely outnumber the European element. The first question which naturally rises, is, in what can this people contribute to our material prosperity? It is not difficult to answer to this that by reason of their many sidedness, their adaptability to all branches of industry, they can contri- bute more than other foreign element in the first generation. They can supply labor for the house and field, for building railroads, for working in mines and fac- tories, for every need on sea and land. Within the really impassable limits set 32 THE GALAXY. [JULY, by nature, they alone can render productive vast tracts of land, the cultivation of which is essential to the prosperity of our mountain territories. They can contribute largely to our wealth and that of the world by their saving of material and by forcing us, through competition, to become more economical in this re- spect. They can advance greatly our material prosperity, not only by the pro- duct of their labor in working for Americans, but by their independent enter- prise as capitalists. Indeed, the lowering of the price of labor in America, through Chinese immigration, taken in connection with the ahnost certain rise in price in Europe, appears to offer the best solution of the vexed question of free trade, by placing us on an equal or superior footing with Europe, in the manufac- ture of those things ~vhich now require protection. It should seem that Chinese mmigration, organized on the most liberal plan, in conformity with the emigration laws of China and under the responsible guidance of Chinese contractors, would rapidly raise our Southern States to a height of prosperity never yet reached by them, and render possible the completion and maintenance of great works, necessary to control the overflow of the Mississippi, and to drain unproductive and malarious regions. Will the price, at which these benefits shall be gained, be too high ? Every one will answer this according to his ow n ~vay of measuring the future by the past. But he who sees in events the resultants of social and physical forces, the operation of great laws, progressive in their action and tending toward that millennium when every part of the earth, according to its natural endowment, shall justify its existence, by contributing its full share, as a part, to the welfare of the whole; toward the unification of mankind by the assimilation of the best parts of its different races into a new typewho believes that Through the ages one increasing purpose runs, will feel the least anxiety in contemplating the future. To the charge that they will largely outnumber the Americans, absorbing many branches of industry and competing in all, he will answer that they can do so only by being able to compete with the European element; in other words, by being really equally efficient and thus justifying their right to citizenship. To the assertion that their use of opium threatens the addition of another national vice to those we have already, he will reply that the rapid spread of the use of this drug, a use of only some sixty years standing in China, was induced by natural causes, acting in a coun- try which had reached an abnormal condition, and that it can exist as a national habit only where it is a natural necessity. The long-continued genera- tions of temperance of this people show their normal condition, and we have little reason to fear that half a century of opium smoking can destroy the deep- seated, inherited vitality of the race, or have fixed it as a constitutional vice upon those who will emigrate hither. The political aspect of the question is that of the most immediate importance, for many obvious reasons. Nothing is more certain than the impossibility of a foreign race continuing to live and increase, in America, in other than two con- ditions, viz., either under the animal-breeding system of slavery, or (and probably only) by being equally strong with the European element, in the average of all things ~vhich constitute strength in this age. The ability of any people to pros- per, multiply and co-exist among us, proves them to possess an average equality with us when measured by our standard, deficiencies in some points being com- pensated in othersthese differences being desirable in the same degree that in- dividuality is desirable. If an inferior race, or large bodies of vicious and criminal people, prosper and multiply, it does not invalidate this rule, but rather 1869.] OUR IMPENDING CHINESE PROBLEM. 33 shows that our actual measure, on certain points, is far below our theoretical standard. If the Chinese, having the exercise of equal rights in a fair field, should prove themselves undesirable citizens, it would be proof of inferiority, of inability to contribute their full share to the general good, and the inability to compete with their neighbors would inevitably result in their disappearance from the arena as important rivals. In view of all the possibilities of the case before us, it becomes evident no~v, more than ever before, how important it is that we should turn our energies toward Americanizing the foreign elements of our population. A large Chinese emigration is the strongest argument against immediate and unqualified suffrage. With the prospect of an unparalleled influx of Chinese, it is of immediate impor- tance that ~ve insist upon their understanding our social and political organiza- tion before giving them a voice, and this can be done only by insisting upon a residence of several years in the country, and by an educational test, which should not be less than the ability to read and speak the English language. Indeed, this is only an additional illustration of the necessity for an educational qualifi- cation, in the matter of citizenship in general, and it should seem sufficiently clear to convince even the most confirmed advocates of universal suffrage. The danger most to be guarded against, is the enactment or continuance of special legislation with regard to Mong~lian& Everything which tends to ex- clude them from the rest of the community, and, in a greater degree, everything which denies to themas do practically the laws of Californiathe common rights of humanity, not only affects seriously the character of the aliens and re- tards the growth of the region in question, but reacts most injuriously on the European element, producing those moral evils which were the worst results of slavery with usa reaction which is Ihe curse following everywhere intercourse between the European and non-European races. To suppose that a whole state or nation is able to rise above all prejudice of race, to look upon such a question from a cosmopolitan standpoint, is almost the same as supposing the average intellectual level of the people to be on an equality with that of its most liberal minds; but it should not be demanding too much to expect to find this quality in the lawgivers of a land which claims that all men are created equal; es- pecially should we look for it in the consderation of a question which presup- poses an influx of Chinese by millions. RAPHAEL PIJMPELLY. THE THRONE OF LOUIS PHILIPPE. ITS ERECTION AND ITS OVERTHROWNo. II. ITS OVERTHROW. LOUIS PHILIPPE, during his reign of about eighteen years, encountered nothing but trouble. The advocates of Legitimacyof the divine right of kingsregarded him as an usurper. As the voice of the nation was not con- sulted in placing him upon the throne, the masses of the people deemed them- selves defrauded of their rights, and hated him. as the representative only of the moneyed aristocracy of Paris. The bitterness with which he ~vas assailed, by the Liberal party, may be inferred from the following extract from the Revolu- tion of 184S, by Louis Blanc. Whatever may have been the baseness of Rome under the C~sars, it was equalled by the corruption in France in the reign of Louis Philippe. Nothing like it had ever been witnessed in history. The thirst for gold ha~ing obt~iined possession of minds agitated by impure desires, society terminated by sinking into a brutal materialism. The formula of selfishness, every one by himself and for himself, had been adopted by the sovereign as the maxim of State; and that maxim, alike hideous and fatal, had become the ruling principle of govern- ment. It was the device of Louis Philippe, a prince gifted with moderation, knowledge, tolerance, humanity; but sceptical, destitute of either nobility of heart or elevation of mind, the most experienced corrupter of the human race that ever appeared on earth. There were thirty-four million people in France. Of these but one hundred and fifty thousand of the richest proprietors enjoyed the right of suffiage. Con- sequently the laws were framed to favor the rich. All the efforts of the people, to secure a reform of the electoral law, proved unavailing. TI~e agitation of the subject increased ever year, and the cry for parliamentary reform was ever grow- ing louder and more menacing. Many of the illustrious men in France joined this reform party. Among others there was M. Lafitte, the wealthy banker, M. Odillon Barrot, the renowned advocate, aud M. Arago, the distinguished philosopher. We may search history in vain for the record of any monarch so unrelent~ ingly harassed as was Louis Philippe, from the time he ascended the throne until he was driven from it. He was irreproachable in morals, a man who had seen much of the world in all its phases, sagacious and well meaning. But he was placed in a position in which no earthly wisdom could rescue him from the direst trouble. There were two antagonistic and very powerful parties watching him. The one was the Liberal party in France of varied shades of opinion, demand- ing equal rights for all menhating the old dynastic despotisms of Europe, who had forced the Bourbons upon them, and ~iating those treaties of Vienna, of i3i~, which had shorn France of a large portion of her territory, and had bound Europe, hand and foot, so as to prevent any future uprising of the friends of popular liberty. The other party consisted of the old aristocracy of France, the Legitimists, supported by the sympathies of all the courts of Europe, who were supposed to be not only willing but eager to unite their armies to maintain the principles of the old r4gime in France, and thus to prevent the establishment there of those principles of popular liberty which would endanger all their thrones.

THE THRONE OF LOUIS PHILIPPE. ITS ERECTION AND ITS OVERTHROWNo. II. ITS OVERTHROW. LOUIS PHILIPPE, during his reign of about eighteen years, encountered nothing but trouble. The advocates of Legitimacyof the divine right of kingsregarded him as an usurper. As the voice of the nation was not con- sulted in placing him upon the throne, the masses of the people deemed them- selves defrauded of their rights, and hated him. as the representative only of the moneyed aristocracy of Paris. The bitterness with which he ~vas assailed, by the Liberal party, may be inferred from the following extract from the Revolu- tion of 184S, by Louis Blanc. Whatever may have been the baseness of Rome under the C~sars, it was equalled by the corruption in France in the reign of Louis Philippe. Nothing like it had ever been witnessed in history. The thirst for gold ha~ing obt~iined possession of minds agitated by impure desires, society terminated by sinking into a brutal materialism. The formula of selfishness, every one by himself and for himself, had been adopted by the sovereign as the maxim of State; and that maxim, alike hideous and fatal, had become the ruling principle of govern- ment. It was the device of Louis Philippe, a prince gifted with moderation, knowledge, tolerance, humanity; but sceptical, destitute of either nobility of heart or elevation of mind, the most experienced corrupter of the human race that ever appeared on earth. There were thirty-four million people in France. Of these but one hundred and fifty thousand of the richest proprietors enjoyed the right of suffiage. Con- sequently the laws were framed to favor the rich. All the efforts of the people, to secure a reform of the electoral law, proved unavailing. TI~e agitation of the subject increased ever year, and the cry for parliamentary reform was ever grow- ing louder and more menacing. Many of the illustrious men in France joined this reform party. Among others there was M. Lafitte, the wealthy banker, M. Odillon Barrot, the renowned advocate, aud M. Arago, the distinguished philosopher. We may search history in vain for the record of any monarch so unrelent~ ingly harassed as was Louis Philippe, from the time he ascended the throne until he was driven from it. He was irreproachable in morals, a man who had seen much of the world in all its phases, sagacious and well meaning. But he was placed in a position in which no earthly wisdom could rescue him from the direst trouble. There were two antagonistic and very powerful parties watching him. The one was the Liberal party in France of varied shades of opinion, demand- ing equal rights for all menhating the old dynastic despotisms of Europe, who had forced the Bourbons upon them, and ~iating those treaties of Vienna, of i3i~, which had shorn France of a large portion of her territory, and had bound Europe, hand and foot, so as to prevent any future uprising of the friends of popular liberty. The other party consisted of the old aristocracy of France, the Legitimists, supported by the sympathies of all the courts of Europe, who were supposed to be not only willing but eager to unite their armies to maintain the principles of the old r4gime in France, and thus to prevent the establishment there of those principles of popular liberty which would endanger all their thrones. 1869.] THE THRONE OF LOUIS PHILIPPE. The difference between these two parties was irreconcilal)le. As Louis Philippe was situated he was compelled to choose between the two. He chose the latter. This involved him in unrelenting and unintermitteci war with the former. Alison says, Concession to the Republican party and a general change in external policy, so earnestly pressed upon him by the Liberals, would lead at once to a general war; that is, the surrounding dynasties would not permit free institutions to be established in France. Louis Philippe was a man of great decision of character, as his friends would say. His enemies called that trait stubbornness. In a letter purporting to have been written on the 9th of November, 1849, by his son, the Prince de Joinville, to the Duke de Nemours, the writer says to his brother I write one word to you, for I am disquieted at the events which I see on all sides thickening around us. Indeed I begin to be seriously ahrmed. The Kino is inflexible, lie will listen to no advice. His own will must prevail over everything. There are no longer any ministers. Their responsibility is null. Every thing rests with the King. He has arrived at an age when observations are no longer listened to. He is accustomed to govern, and he loves to show that he does so. The King is reported to have said, at the close of a Cabinet meeting, in reply to some who urged concessions to the Liberal party, Every one appears to be for reform. Soifie demand it; others promise it. For my part I will never be a party to such weakness. Reform is another word for xvar. When the opposi- tion succeed to power I shall take my departure. This was the declaration of the King, that the surrounding dynasties would not permit popular rights in France. An ancient law of the old re~ri,,?e did not allow the people to assemble to discuss affairs of State. Louis Philippe revived the law, and enforced it vigorously. To evade this prohibition, large dinner parties, or banquets, as they were called, were introduced, which afforded an opportunity of offering toasts and making speeches, in which the measures of government were vehemently assailed. These banquets sprang up in all parts of the kingdom, and were attended by thousands. Arrangements were made for a mammoth banquet in the city of Paris on the 22d of February, 1848. The place selected was a large open space near the Champs Elys6es. It would ac- commodate six thousand persons at the tables, and was to be covered with a canvas awning. The government resolved to disperse the assembly by force. The leaders of the opposition, aware that they were not prepared for a resort to arms, entered into a compromise with the government. The guests were to meet at the ap- pointed time and place for the banquet. The officers of the police were then to appear, order the assembly to disperse, and arrest the leaders, who were to be indicted for a breach of the law prohibiting political gatherings. Thus the question of the right thus to assemble was to be referred to the legal tribunals. This compromise was gladly acceded to by the Liberals, as many of them desired a change of ministry only, being very reluctant to run the hazard of a change of dynasty. The Liberals accordingly announced to Paris, by a proclamation, that the banquet was interdicted by the government; but that there would be a general demonstration by forming a procession on the largest possible scale, to march to the appointed place of meeting, and there peaceably to disperse at the orders of the police. The government was exceedingly alarmed when it learned that the banquet 36 THE GALAXY. [JULY, was converted into a procession. This was magnifying the danger. The ex- citement in Paris was intense. It soon became manifest that not less than one hundred thousand men would join in the procession. A decree wa3 accordingly issued, by the Prefect of Police, stating that all who chose to go to the banquet individually could do so; but that any attempt to form a procession would meet with forcible resistance. This rendered it necessary for the Liberals either to give up the plan of the procession, or to run the risk of a collision with the royal troops, for which they were by no means prepared. The leaders of the Liberal party held a meeting, when the question was anxiously discussed. Opinions on the subject were divided. One of the most prominent men of the party, lvi. Lagrange, urged decided measures. Let the Democracy, said he, hoist its standard, and descend boldly into the field of battle for progress. Humanity, in a mass, has its eyes upon you. Our standard will rally around us the whole warlike and fraternal cohorts. What more are we waiting for. On the other hand, Louis Blanc said, Humanity restrains me. I ask if you are entitled to dispose of the blood of a generous people, without any prospect of advantage to the cause of Democracy. If the patriots commence the conflict to-morro~v they will infallibly be crushed, and the Democracy will be drowned in blood. That will be the result of to-morrows struggle. Do not deceive your- selves. Determine on insurrection, if you please; but for my part, if you adopt such a decision, I will retire to my home, to cover myself with crape and mourn over the ruin of Democracy. Ledru Rollin, following in the same strain, said, Have we arms, ammuni- tion, combatants ready? The government is thoroughly prepared. The army only awaits the signal to crush us. My opinion is that to run into a conflict, in such circumstances, is an act of madness. Under the influence of such views it was decided to abandon the procession. The regular troops in Paris at that time numbered twenty-five thousand. There were as many more, garrisoned in neighboring towns, who could, in a few hours, be concentrated in the city. Orders had been already issued for all the military posts of the capital to be strongly occupied. In consequence of these various measures, excitement pervaded the whole metropolis. Many of the Liberal party were not satisfied with the decision of their leaders. Many of the populace were also ignorant of the resolutions to which the committees had come at a late hour of the evening of the day before the procession was to have been formed. At an early hour in the morning of the 22d, immense crowds had assembled in the Place de la Madeleine, the Place de Ia Concorde, and the Champs Elysdes. Here they swayed to and fro, hour after hour, motiveless, awaiting the progress of events. M. Guizot was then Minister of Foreign Affairs, and M. Duchatel, Minister of the Interior. In the afternoon a large band of students swept through the streets singing the Marseillaise and shouting Long live Reform, Do~vn with Guizot. Agitation was rapidly on the increase. Quite a large body of regular troops was stationed at the junction of the Rue Rivoli and the Rue St. Honor6. Toward evening the excited mob pelted the troops with stones, and commenced erecting barricades in the vicinity. There was however no other serious disturbance during the day. The government, alarmed by these demonstrations, resolved to call out all its military force the next morning, both the regular troops and National Guard, to maintain order. Consequently at an early hour in the morning of the 23d, the 1869.] THE THRONE OF LOUIS PHILIPPE. gJn6ra?e was beat in all the streets, and the National Guard, more than forty thousand strong, hurried to their appointed places of rendezvous. This crowd- ing of the streets with troops greatly increased the general excitement. All business was suspended. Many of the shops were closed. The whole popula- tion of Paris seemed to be upon the pavement. The National Guard, composed of the middling class in the city of Paris, were most of them in favor of reform. Many of their officers belonged to the Liberal party. Their Commander-in-Chief, General Jacquemont, was ready to sustain the government. He was powerless without the co-operation of his officers and men. In anticipation of the conflict which now seemed so menac- ing, large numbers of the officers held a secret meeting the night before, in which they decided to stand between the regular troops and the irresponsible populace. They would on the one hand assist the people in demanding re- form, and would protect them from the assaults of the regular troops. On the other hand they would defend the monarchy, and aid the troops in repelling in- surrection and revolution. As the National Guard occupied every post con- jointly with the regular troops, they would not allow the troops to disperse the assemblages of the people. It would have been destruction to the regular troops to engage in a conflict with the National Guard, supported as it would have been by the whole populace of Paris. In this singular posture of affairs, the guard standing between the regulars and the people, and not unfrequently joining with the people in shouts of Vive la Rejorine, the hours wore on. Many of the Liberal leaders were so encour- aged by this state of things, that they dispatched orders to the secret societies in the faubourgs, immediately to come forth in all their banded strength, hoping to overawe the government. These formidable bodies soon appeared, travers- ing the thoroughfares in appalling numbers. ~Ihe cavalry received orders to clear the streets. The guard formed into line in front of one of these bands, and with fixed bayonets held the cavalry back. The populace, inspired with new zeal, seized arms wherever they could be found and commenced throwing up barricades. The Kino~ was struck with consternation as these tidings were brought to him at the Tuileries. A cabinet council was hastily convened. In view of the peril of the hour the King sent for the Queen and his Son, the Duke of Mont- pensier, to be present at the meeting of the ministers. Lamartine has given an account of the interview. The Queen and the Duke of Montpensier both urged the King to dismiss his obnoxious ministers, and replace them by a Liberal ministry who should introduce parliamentary reform. The King was in entire sympathy with his ministers. They were carrying out his own policy. XVith tears in his eyes he declared that he had rather abdicate the throne than be separated from them. You can not do that, my dear, said the Queen, you belong to France, and not to yourself. You cannot abdicate. True, replied the King mournfully, I am more to be pitied than they. I cannot resio~n M. Guizot, who was absent at the commencement of the meeting, had come in during the interview. The King turned to him and said, My dear M. Guizot, is it your opinion that the Cabinet is in a situation to make head against the storm, and to triumph over it? The minister replied, Sire; when the King proposes such a question he himself answers it. The Cabinet may be in a condition to gain the victory in 3 38 THE GALAXY. [JULY, the streets. But it cannot conquer at the same time, the royal family and the crown. To throw a dQubt upon its support in the Tuileries is to destroy it in the exercise of power. The cabinet has no alternative but to resign. The King ~~as deeply moved, as he felt thus compelled to accept their resig. nation. Tears dimmed his eyes. Affectionately embracing them he bade them adieu, saying, How happy you are. You depart with honor. I remain with shame. Guizot himself announced his resignation to the Chamber of Deputies, then in session. The announcement was received with shouts of applause from the opposition benches. The tidings spread with electric speed through the streets. Night came, and large portions of the city blazed with illuminations, exultant bands surged through the streets, songs resounded, and the city presented an aspect of universal rejoicing. Still, with thinking n~en, there vas great anxiety. Where would all this lead to? XVould the triumphant populace be satisfied merely with a change of ministry ? Might it not demand the overthrow of a dynasty? If so, what government would succeed? There were Legitimists, and Orleanists, and Imperialists, and Moderate Republicans, and Socialists of every grade of ultra Democracy. Was France to be plunged into anarchy by the conflict of these rival parties? While the unreflecting populace drank, and sang, and danced, and hugged each other in exultant joy, thoughtful men paused; pondered, and turned pale with apprehension. The ardent revolutionists began now to organize in bands in different parts of the city. Three large bodies were speedily gathered ; one in front of the office of the Reform, another before that of the National, and a third in the Place de la Bastile. These three columns, led by such men, born to com- mand, as ever emerge from the populace in scenes of excitement, paraded the illuminated streets, with songs ~td shouts and flaming torches, until they formed a junction in the Boulevard des Italiens. It was manifest that some secret but superior intelligence guided their movements. The hotel of foreign affairs, then the residence of M. Guizot, was in the Rue de Choiseul. At the head of that street, a well-armed detachment broke off from one of the processions, and bear- ing with them the blood-red flag of insurrection, advanced to surround the hotel. A royal guard had been stationed here consisting of a battalion of the line. The troops were drawn up across the street, presenting a rampart of bayonets to prevent tue further advance of the column. Here the insurgents halted, face to face with the trGops, almost near enough to cross bayonets. The leader of this column is thus graphically pictured by Lamartine: A man about forty years of age, tall, thin, with hair curled and falling on his shoulders, dressed in a ~vhite frock, well worn and stained with dirt, marched, with a military step, at their head. His arms were folded over his chest, his head slightly bent forward, with the air of one who was about to face bul- lets deliberately, and to brave death with exultation. In the eyes of this man, well-known by the multitude, was concentrated all the fire of the revolution. The physiognomy was the living expression of the defiance of opposing force. His lips, incessantly agitated, as if by a mental harangue, were pale and trem- bling. We are told that his name was Lagrange. The commander of the royal troops sat on horsehack in front of his line. The gleam of the torches and the waving of the insurgent banner frightened his horse. The animal reared, and recoiling upon his haunches broke through the line of troops, which, in some confusion, opened to let him pass to the rear. 1869.] THE THRONE OF LOUIS PHILIPPE. At this moment, either by accident or design, a musket-shot was discharged at the soldiers by some one of the insurgents ; Alison says by Lagrange himself. The troops, in the gloom of the night, agitated by the terrible excitements of the hour, and by the confusion into which their ranks were thrown by the retreat of their commander through them, deeming themselves attacked, returned the fire, point blank, in full volley. By that one discharge fifty of the insurgents were struck down upon the pavements, killed or wounded. The street, thus swept by bullets, was crowded with men, women and chil- dren. The discharge echoed far and wide through Paris, creating terrible alarm. Most, who were present, had not the remotest idea of danger, supposing that they had met only for a demonstration of joy. Apprehensive of another dis- charge, there was an immediate and tumultuous flight of the populace, the strong trampling the weak beneath their feet. The insurgents took with them their dead and wounded. This accidental slaughter roused Paris to frenzy. It was regarded as the revenge which the ministers had taken for their overthrow. Several large wagons were procured, and the dead, artistically arranged so as to display, to the most imposing effect, their bloods and wounds, were placed in it. Torches were attached to the wagons so as to exhibit, very conspicuously, the bodies of the slain. A ~voman was among the victims. Her lifeless body, half naked, occupied a very conspicuous position. A man stood by her side, occa- sionally raising the corpse that it might be more distinctly seen. Thus, in the gloom of a dark and clouded night, this ghastly procession traversed all the leading streets of Paris, the whole population of a city of a million and a half of inhabitants being then in the streets. The rage excited, and the cries for vengeance, were deep and almost universal. Louis Philippe had no personal popularity to sustain him. Legitimis ts and Republicans alike ignored his claims to the throne. He was regarded as intensely avaricious, not- withstanding his immense ~vealth, and as ever ready to degrade Frahce in sub- serviency to the policy of foreign courts, that he might gain the co-operation of these courts in the maintenance of his crown, and secure exalted matrimonial alliances for his children. There have probably been few, if any kings, upon the throne of France, who have had fewer friends or more bitter enemies than Louis Philippe. The following statement from the North American Review correctly expresses the sentiment of most thoughtful men upon the character of his administration Durino- a reign in which his real authority and influence were immense, he did little for his country, little for the moral and intellectual elevation of his peo- ple, and nothing for the gradual improvement of the political institutions of his kingdom ; because his time and attention were absorbed in seeking splendid foreign alliances for his children, and in manceuvring to maintain a supple majority in the Chambers, and to keep those ministers at the head of affairs who would second, more heartily, his private designs. While these scenes were transpiring, the King, though greatly chagrined at the compulsory dismissal of his ministers, yet supposed that he had thus ap- peased the populace, and that there was no longer danger of lawless violence. Helen, Duchess of Orleans, widow of the Kings eldest son, a woman of much in- telligence, had been greatly alarmed in apprehension that the dynasty was about to be overthrown. Her little son, the Count de Paris, was heir to the crown. Relieved of her apprehensions by the dismissal of the obnoxious ministers, and not aware of what was transpiring in the streets, she pressed her child to 40 THE GALAXY. [JULY, her bosom, saying: Poor child! your crown has been indeed compromised; but now heaven has restored it to you. M. Guizot, at the time the untoward event occurred in front of his hotel, chanced to be at the residence of M. Duchatel, the ex-Minister of the Interior. As they were conversing, the brother of M. Duchatel entered, breathless and in the highest state of agitation, to communicate the tidings that the troops had fired upon the people, that the whole populace of Paris was in a ferment of in- dignation, and that there was imminent danger that the streets of the metropolis were about to be the theatre of the most fearful carnage. Should either of these ministers fall into the hands of the exasperated populace their instant death was certain. They both hastened to the Tuileries. It was midnight. The terrible news had already reached the ears of the King. They found him in his cabinet with his son, the Duke de Montpensier, and other important personages. All were in a state of great consternation. M. Thiers was immediately sent for. The crisis demanded the most decisive measures, and yet the councils were divided. There was a very energetic veteran general in Paris, Marshal Bugeaud, who had acquired renown in the war in Algeria. 1-le was popular with the soldiers, but very unpopular with the people. Inured to the horrors of the battle field, he would, without the slightest hesitation, mow down the people mercilessly with grape-shot. The King ~vas appalled, in view of his own peril and that of his family. He well knew how numerous and bitter were his enemies. He had not forgotten the doom of his predecessors in that palace, Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette. For years assassins had dogged his path. All varieties of ingenious machines of destruction had been constructed to secure his death. He was appropriately called the Target King. so constantly were the bullets of his foes aimed at his life. Even a brave man may be excused for being terrified when his wife and his chil- dren are exposed to every conceivable indignity and to a bloody death. Under these circumstances the King consented to place the command of the army in the hands of the energetic Marshal Bugeaud. It was now two oclock in the morning. The veteran marshal, invested with almost dictatorial powers, left the Tuileries in company with one of the sons of the King, the Duke de Nemours, to take possession of the troops, and to arrange them for the conflict which was inevitable on the morro~v. The impulse of a master mind was immediately felt. Aided by the obscurity of the night, messengers ~vere dispatched in every direction, and by five oclock in the morning four immense columns of troops were advancing to occupy im- portant strategic points, which would command the city. These arrangements being completed, the Duke de Nemours anxiously inquired of the Marshal what he thought of the morrow. M. Bugeaud replied, Monseigneur, it will be rough; but the victory will be ours. I have never yet been beaten and I am not going to commence to-morrow. Certainly it would have been better not to have lost so much time ; but no matter, I will an- s~ver for the result, if I am left alone. It must not be imagined that I can man- age without bloodshed. Perhaps there will be much, for I begin with cannon. But do not be uneasy. To-morrow evening the authority of the King and of the law shall be re-established. ln the meantime the King formed a new and liberal ministry, consisting of MM. Thiers, Odillon Barrot and Duvergier de Hauranne, hoping thus to con- ciliate the populace. This fact was placarded, at six oclock in the morning, all over Paris. But the act of appointing Marshal Bugeaud to command the troops 1869.] THE THRONE OF LOUIS PHILIPPE. 4 was a declaration of ~var; the formation of this ministry was a supplication for peace. The one act was defiance, the other capitulat[n. Thus while General Bugeaud ~vas loading his cannon to the muzzle and marshalling his troops for battle, he received an order, to his inexpressible chagrin, from the new minis- try, directing him to cease the combat and to withdraw the troops, while at the same time an announcement was made by a proclamation to the people, that the new ministry had ordered the troops, everywhere, to cease firing, and to with- lraw from the menacing positions which they occupied. The indignant Marshal for a time refused to obey the order, until it should be ratified by the sign man- ual of the King. He soon, however, received a dispatch from the Duke de Nemours, which rendered it necessary to submit. Thus the new ministry re- jected the policy of resistance and inaugurated that of conciliation. The King, worn out by excitement and fatigue, at four oclock in the morn- ing retired to his chamber for a few hours of sleep. He was so far deceived as to flatter himself that, through the measures which had been adopted, all serious trouble was at an end. He slept soundly, and did not rise until eleven o~Aock, when he came down to the breakfast room in morning gown and slippers, and with a smiling countenance. Here appalling tidings met him. The exasperat- ed populace were tearing down and trampling under foot the conciliatory proc- lamation of M. Thiers. The national troops, disgusted with the contradictory orders which had been issued, were loud in their clamor against the King. The National Guard was everywhere fraternizing with the people. The fienzy of in- surrection was surging through all the thoroughfares of Paris. The King was silent in consternation. Immediately repairing to his cham- ber, he dressed himself in the uniform of the National Guard, and returned to his cabinet, where he was joined by two of his sons, the Duke de Nemours and the Duke de Montpensier. All night long the dismal clang of the tocsin had summoned the fighting portion of the population tQ important points of defence. Nearly all the churches were in the hands of the insurgents. Under cover of the darkness barricades had been rising in many of the s& eets. The national troops had retired, humiliated, to the vicinity of the Tuileries and Palais Royal. Many of the soldiers, in their disgust, had thrown away their muskets, while some of the officers, under similar feelings, had broken their swords and cast them away upon the pavement. Affairs made such rapid progress that by ten oclock M. Thiers became fully convinced that he had no longer influence with the people. He accordingly re- signed the ministry, and M. Odillon Barrot, a man far more democratic in his principles, was appointed prime minister in his stead. The Palais Royal, the magnificent ancestral abode of the Duke of Orleans, being left unguarded, the mob burst in, rioted through all its princely saloons, plundering and destroying. Its paintings, statuary, gorgeous furniture and priceless ~vorks of art were pierced with bayonets, slashed with sabre strokes, thrown into the streets and consumed with flames. In less than half an hour the magnificent apartments of this renowned palace presented but a revolting spectacle of destruction and ruin. The King, the Queen, the Duchess of Orleans and the Duke of Montpensier, ~vith several distinguished friends, were still in the breakfast room, the gallery of Diana, in the Tuileries. The mob, their hands filled with the plunder of the Palais Royal, were already entering the Carrousel. Loud shouts announced their triumph to the trembling inmates of the royal palace, and appalled them with fears of the doom which they might soon be called to encounter. Two of 42 THE GALAXY. [JuLY, the gentlemen, M. Remusat and M. de Hauranne, stepped out into the court- yard of the Tuileries to ascertain the posture of affairs. Speedily they returned pale and with features expressive of intense anxiety. Sire, said M. Remusat to the King, it is necessary that your majesty should know the truth. To conceal it, at this moment, would be to render our- selves implicated in all that may follow. Your feelings of security prove that you are deceived. Three hundred feet from here the dragoons are exchanging their sabres and the soldiers their muskets with the people. It is impossible exclaimed the King, recoiling ~vith astonishment. Sire ! added an officer, M. de lAubosp~re, who was present, it is tnie. I have seen it. The Queen, re-enacting the heroism of Marie Antoinette on a similar occa- sion, said to her faint-hearted husband, Go, show yourself to the discouraged troops, to the wavering National Guard. I will come out on the balcony with my grandchildren and the princesses; and I will see you die worthy of yourself, of your throne, and of your misfortunes. The King descended the stairs, while the Queen and the princesses went upon the balcony. I-fe passed through the court-yard of the Tuileries into the Carrousel. If any shouts were uttered of vive le rol, they were drowned in the cry which seemed to burst from all lips, ~ive la rejorme / ~i bas les mi;zistres / All hope was now gone. The King, in despair, returned to the royal family. The panic ~vas heartrending, the ladies weeping aloud. The shouts which filled the air announced that the mob was approaching, triumphant, from all directions, while a rattling fire of musketry was heard ever drawing nearer. Marshal Bu. geaud did what he could to arrest the advance of the insurgents, but his troops were sullen, and but feebly responded to any of his orders. In the midst of this terrible scene the King took his pen to appoint another ministry, still more radically democratic than Barrot and Hauranne. As he was writing out the list, M. de Girardin entered the apartment. He was editor of the Times newspaper, and one of the most uncompromising Republicans in the city. Approaching the King, he said to him firmly yet respectfully, Sire, it is now too late to attempt to form a new ministry. The l)ublic mind cannot be tranquillizecl by such a measure. The hood of insurrection, now rcsistless, threatens to sweep away the throne itself. Nothing short of abdica- lion will now suffice. Upon the utterance of that fatal word, the King inquired anxiously, Is there no other alternative ? M. Girardin replied, Sire, within an hour, perhaps, there will be no such thing as a monarchy in France. The crisis admits of no third alternative. The King must abdicate or the monarchy is lost. The Duke of Montpensier. fully comprehending the peril of the hour, ear- nestly entreated his father to sim the abdication. But on the other hand there were those who entreated the King, with equal fervor, not to sign it. M. Pisca- tory and Marshal Bugeaud urged that abdication would inflict a r~~ublic upon France, with no end to anarchy and civil war; that the only way to meet the insurrection was to crush it by military power. The King hesitated. The clamor and the rattle of musketry increased and drew nearer. Messengers came in breathless, announcing that all was lost. The Duke of Montpensier, trembling in view of the irruption of the mob, and of the dreadful consequent doom of the royal family, with renewed earnestness, 1869.] THE THRONE OF LOUIS PHILIPPE. 43 entreated his father to abdicate. Thus influenced, the King took his pen and wrote: I abdicate this crown, which I received from the voice of the nation, and which I accepted only that I might promote the peace and harmony of the French. Finding it impossible to accomplish this endeavor, I bequeath it to my grands~m, the Count de Paris. May he be more happy than I have been. It is said that the excitement and hurry of the occasion were so great that the King neglected to sign the abdication. Girardin, however, took the paper and went out into the stormy streets to announce the important event. But Paris was now in a state of ferment which nothing could immediately appease. The rush and roar of the storm of human passion in the streets seemed still to increase, and to approach nearer to the doors of the palace. Danger of violence antI death was imminent. Nearly all had withdrawn from the Tuileries except the royal family. Louis Philippe now thought only of escape. Surrounded as the palace ~vas by the mob, this was no easy task to accomplish. The King dis- guised himself in citizens dress. The Queen was almost frantic with terror. The King having abdicated in favor of his grandson, the Count de Paris, was disposed to leave the child monarch with his mother in the palace. He flattered himself that the innocence of the child and the helplessness of the mother would prove their protection. But when the Duchess of Orleans perceived that no arrangements were being made for her escape and that of her children, she ex- claimed, in anguish: Are you going to leave me here alone, without parents, friends, or any to advise me. What will become of me? The King sadly replied: My dear Helen, the dynasty must be saved, and the crown preserved to your son. Remain here, then, for his sake. It is a sac- rifice you owe your son. Seldom has a woman and a mother been called to pass through a more severe ordeal than this. The peril was awful. In a few moments a mob of countless thousands, composed of the dregs of the populace of Paris, inflamed with intoxi- cation and rage, might be surging through all the apartments of the Tuileries, while the Duchess and her children were entirely at their mercy. No ordinary Iseroism could be adequate to such a trial. The Duchess threw herself at the feet of the King, and entreated permission to accompany him in his flight. The King was firm, cruelly firm. Leaving the widow of his son, with her two children, all unprotected behind him, he withdrew to effect his own escape with the Queen and the princesses, under the guidance of his son, the Duke de Nemours, who displayed the utmost heroism during all the scenes of that eventful day. As the party ~vas in disguise, and the whole city was in a state of indescribable tumult, the fugitives succeeded in traversing, without being recognised, the broad central ave- nue of the garden of the Tuileries. Emerging by the gate of the Pont Tournant, they reached the foot of the obelisk, in the Place de la Concorde. It was one oclock in the afternoon; the Duke had ordered the carriages to be ready for them there. But the mob, recognizing the carriages as belonging to the royal family, had dashed them to pieces. The embarrassment and peril were terrible. There was momentary danger of being recognized. Then death and being trampled beneath the feet of the mob were almost inevitable. An agitated throng of countless thousands was sttrging through the Place. Already some began to suspect them as belonging to the court, and they were rudely jostled. But providentially there were two hackney coaches near by. These were hurriedly engaged, the royal family thrust 44 THE GALAXY. [JULY, into them, and a guard of cuirassiers, previously stationed near for the occasion, by the Duke of Nemours ,gath ered around the carriages as an escort, and at a quick trot, swept along the banks of the Seine by the Quai de Billi, and escaped from Paris. That night they reached Dreux, one of the country seats of the King. Their peril still was great. The small escort at their disposal was by no means sufficient to protect them, should there be any uprising of the people to arrest their progress. It was, therefore, deemed best to dismiss their guard, and proceed to the sea-coast in disguise, by unfrequented routes, as simple travellers. They were, however, in great want of money. The King, in the confusion of his departure, had left seventy thousand dollars, in bank notes, upon his bureau. He had but a small supply in his pocket. Resuming their journey the next morning, they reached Evreux, and were entertained for the night by a farmer in the royal forest, who had no idea of the distinguished character of the guests to whose wants lie was ministering. Early in the morning of the third day, they set out again, in a rude cart, called a Ber- lin, drawn by two cart-horses. They had many strange adventures and narrow escapes, even performing a portion of their journey on foot. At length they reached the sea-coast, at Honfleur, near the mouth of the Seine, on the south- ern bank. Here they embarked, still under the assumed name of Mr. and Mrs. Smith, for Havre, from which port they crossed over to New Haven, on the southern coast of Enoland leaving behind them their crown and their country forever. They reached this land of refuge for dethroned kings on the 4th of March, and took up their abode at Claremont, formerly the residence, and per- haps then the property of their son-in-law, Leopold, King of Belgium. And now let us return to the Princess Helen, who was left with her two chil- dren in one of the apartments of the palace. Immediately upon the withdrawal of the King, the troops in the Carrousel, who were then retreating into the court-yard of the Tuileries, retired through the palace into the garden. The princess, a very heroic ~voman, had entirely recovered her self-possession, and awaited her doom with the serenity of a martyr. As the shouting mob rushed into the Carrousel, and the windo~vs of the palace were rattling from the explo- sions of the artillery, M. Dupin, President of the Chamber of Deputies, entered the room and, much agitated with both fear and hope, said: Madame, I have come to tell you that perhaps the re5le of Maria Theresa is reserved for you. Lead the way, replied the heroic woman, my life belongs to France and to my children. There is not a moment to lose, M. Dupin rejoined. Let us go instantly to the Chambe~ of Deputies. As he was speaking these words, the Duke de Nemours returned. Peril was, indeed, imminent. The mob was already surging in at the court of the Tuileries, and thundering against the gates of the palace. The Princess and her few companions immediately set out on foot, to pass the garden of the Tuileries, the Place de Ia Concorde, and to cross the river, to obtain the protection of the Chamber of Deputies. Scarcely had they emerged from the portals into the garden, ere the roaring mob burst from the court-yard into the palace, and surged through the saloons with the destruction of consum- ing flame. Shouts seemed to burst from all lips, Down with the Throne, Lonct live the Republic. Every vestige of royalty was torn to shreds. The 1869.] THE THRONE OF LOUIS PHILIPPE. 45 rich drapery which canopied the throne, was rent into scarfs or formed into cock- ades, with which the mob decorated their persons. With hurried steps and anxious hearts the royal party pressed on through the throng which choked all the avenues to the palace. They seem to have been partially recognized, for a noisy crowd followed their footsteps. The Princess led her eldest son, the Count de Paris, by the hand. The youngest, the Duke de Chartres, was carried in the arms of an aide-de-camp. M. Dupin walked upon one side of the Princess and the Duke de Nemours upon the other. Safely they crossed the bridge and entered the hotel of the Deputies. All was agita- tion and confusion there. M. Dupin repaired to the hall of session, and, ascend- ing the tribune, announced that the King had abdicated in favor of his grandson. In a brief; earnest speech he urged the claims of the Count de Paris as King, under the regency of the Duchess of Orleans, his mother. This speech created a momentary enthusiasm. By acclamation it was voted that the resignation of the King should be accepted, and that the Count de Paris should be recognized as la~vful sovereign, under the regency of the Duchess. Just then Lamartine came in. Lamartine, notwithstanding the brilliance of his talents and the purity of his character, was by no means insensible to flattery, or to the suggestions of ambition. It is said that a group of Republicans bad but a moment before met him at the entrance of the building, with the assurance that a Republic was in- evitable, and that all the Republicans were looking to him as their leader and future President. These assurances may not have swayed his judgment. But many who had supposed that his strong predilections were for royalty, were not a little surprised when he ascended the tribune, and in the presence of the Duch- ess of Orleans and her son, said, There is but one way to save the people from the danger which a revolu- tion, in our present social state, threatens instantly to introduce, and that is to trust ourselves to the force of the l)eOple themselvesto their reason, their in- terests, their aims. It is a republic which we require. Yes, it is a republic which alone can save us from anarchy, civil war, foreign war, spoliation, the scaffold, destruction of property, the overthrow of society, the invasion of for- eigners. The remedy is heroic. I know it. But there are occasions, such as those in which we live, when the only safe policy is that which is grand and au- dacious as the crisis itself. As Lamartine left the tribune M. Thiers entered, flushed with excitement. All eyes were anxiously fixed upon him. Taking his place in the tribune, he simply remarked, The tide is rising, at the same time, with dramatic gesture, lifting his hat above his head. As he again disappeared in the crowd there was a general increase of alarm. It was manifest to all that affairs were now sweep- ing along in a swollen current which human sagacity could but feebly control. The roar of the throng surging around the hall filied the air. The strongest minds were appalled. Just then the folding doors of the chamber were thrown open and the Duch- ess of Orleans, leading the Count de Paris by one hand, and the Duke de Char- tres by the other, was ushered in. Lamartine, an eye-witness, gives the follow- ing account of the scene A respectful silence immediately ensued. The Dep- uties, in deep anxiety, crowded around the august princess, and the strangers in the gallery leaned over, hoping to catch some words which might fall from her lips. She was dressed in mourning. Her veil, partially raised, disclosed a counte- nance, the emotion and melancholy of which enhanced the charms of youth and 1869.] THE THRONE OF LOUIS PHILIPPE. 47 sional government, as the first step toward the establishment of a republic. This call was made, not only by the mob, but by that large portion of the Deputies, who thought that a republic alone could save France from anarchy, and restore to the people their long withheld rights. Lamartine succeeded in obtaining the tribune. For a moment he was popu- lar, the representative of Republicanism. There was a brief lull in the tempest as the throng listened to what he had to say. The follo~ving list of names of those proposed to constitute the Provisional Government was then read off: Lamartine, Marie, Ledru Rollin, Cremieux, Dupont de lEure, Arago and Gamier Pagis. Some of these names were received with cheers, others with hisses. It was impossible to take any formal vote. The voices of the Deputies were lost in the clamor of the mob. Still the general assent seemed to be in their favor. These were all good men. They were deemed Moderate Republicans. But there was another portion of the Republican party, the Radical, so called, who would, by no means, be satisfied with such an administration, as these calm, deliberate men would inaugurate, with their lingering adhesion to the rights of wealth and the dignity of rank. There might have been possibly a thousand people crowded into the hall of the Chamber of Deputies, who thus, self-appointed, were forming a government for a nation numbering thirty-five millions. The more Radical party, perhaps equal in number, and no less tumultuous, composed also of the stoutest muscle and most determined will, who could elbow their way through the throng, gathered in the great hall of the Hotel de Ville, proclaimed an antagonistic~provisional government, more in accordance with their views. Their list consisted of Marrast, Flocon, Louis Blanc and Albert. The danger of a conflict, leading to hopeless anarchy, was imminent, as the par- tisans of each should rally around its own choice. The first Provisional Government accordingly immediately repaired to the Hotel de Ville, followed by a tumultuous crowd, which no man could number. The leaders of the two parties soon met upon the stairs of the Hotel de Ville, and a violent altercation ensued which came near to blows. The Place de Grave, in front of the hotel, was like a storm-tossed ocean of agitated men, A living sea, madly heaving and tossing about beneath the tempest of revolution. Both parties were terrified by the menacing aspect of affairs. A compro- mtse was huriedly agreed to, by adding to the six chosen at the Chamber of Deputies, six more, chosen from the party at the Hotel de Ville. Lamartine, from the head of the stairs, read off the list to the masses surging below. In the mean time, the Duchess of Orleans, having escaped from the Chamber of Deputies, and surrounded by friends who were ready to sacrifice their own lives in her defence, was, with difficulty, rescued from the crowd. Prominent among Iter protectors was M. de Morny. As the Duchess was veiled, her little party was soon lost in the heaving masses, and unrecognized. The terrors of thehour caused fugitives to be struggling wildly through the throng in all direc- tions. The pressure was so great and so resistless that the Duchess was torn from the side of her brother, the Duke cle Nemours, and fl-nm both of her chil- dren. A moment after the separation, as the mother, frantic with terror, ~vas groping around in search of her sons, a brutal wretch, of gigantic stature, recog- nized the Count de Paris ; and, seizing him by the throat, endeavored to strangle him. One of the National Guard, who chanced to be near, rescued the child, and succeeded in placing him in the hands of his mother. But the younger child, the Duke de Chartres, could nowhere be found. In vain the distracted 48 THE GALAXY. [JULY, mother called aloud for her child. The close-packed throng swayed to and fro, and her feeble voice was unheard in the deafening clamor. She was swept along by the flow of a torrent which it was impossible to resist. With exceed- ing difficulty her friends succeeded in forcing her into a house. She ran to the window of one of the chambers to look down upon the scene of tumult for her lost child. Soon, to her inexpressible joy, she saw him in the arms of a friend. The poor child was faint and almost lifeless. He had been thrown down and trampled under the feet of the crowd. The day was now far spent. As soon as it was dark, the royal party, all in disguise, engaged a hack; and passing through the Champs Elys6es, escaped from the city. After a short journey of many perils and great mental suffering they were reunited with the exiled King and court at Claremont. The night succeeding these scenes in Paris was appalling beyond imagina- tion. There was no recognized law in the metropolis. A population of a mil- lion and a half of people was in the streets. The timid and the virtuous were terror-stricken. The drunken, the degraded, the ferocious, held the city at their mercy. Radical as was the party which had assembled at the Hotel de Ville, there was another party, composed of the dregs of the Parisian populace, more radical still. This party was ripe for plunder, and for unlimited license in every outrage. About midnight, in a desperately armed and howling band, they made an attack upon the Provisional Government at the Hotel de Ville ; after a severe struggle the assailants were repelled. The next morning the Moniteur an- nounced to the citizens of Paris, and the telegraph announced to Europe, that the throne of Louis Philippe had crumbled and that a Republic was established in France. We must not forget, in our stern condemnation of the brutality, the igno- rance, the ferocity of the mob, that it was composed of menhusbands, brothers, fathersmany of whom had been defrauded of their rights and maddened by oppression. If governments will sow the wind by trampling upon the rights of the people, they must expect to reap the whirlwind when their exasperated vic- tims rise in the blindness of their rage. JOHN S. C. ABBOTT. A LIGHT MAN. And Iwhat I seem to my friend, you see What I soon shall seem to his love, you guess. What I seem to myself, do you ask of me? No hero, I confess. A LIGHT WOMAN. BnowNINGs MEN AND WOMEW. APRIL 4, 1857.I have changed my sky without changing my mind. I resume these old notes in a new world. I hardly know of what use they are; but its easier to preserve the habit than to break it. I have been at home now a weekat home, forsooth! And yet after all, it is home. Im dejected, Im bored, Im blue. How can a man be more at home than that? Nevertheless, im the citizen of a great country, and for that matter, of a great city. I walked to-day some ten miles or so along Broadway, and on the whole I dont blush for my native land. Were a capable race and a good-looking withal; and I dont see ~vhy we shouldnt prosper as well as another. This, by the way, ought to be a very encouraging reflection. A capable fellow and a good looking withal ; I dont see why he shouldnt die a millionnaire. At all events he must set bravely to work. When a man has, at thirty-two, a net income of considerably less than nothing, he can scarcely hope to overtake a fortune before he himself is over- taken by age and philosophytwo deplorable obstructions. Im afraid that one of them has already planted itself in my path. What am I ? What do I wish? Whither do I tend? What do I believe? I am constantly beset by these im- pertinent whisperings. Formerly it was enough that I was Maximus Austin that I was endowed with a cheerful mind and a good digestion ; that one day or another, when I had come to the end, I should return to America and begin at the beginnino; that, meanwhile, existence was sweet inin the Rue Tranchet. But now! Has the sweetness really passed out of life? Have I eaten the plums and left nothing but the bread and milk and corn-starch, or whatever the horrible concoction is ?we had it to-day for dinner. Pleasure, at least, I imaginepleasure pure and simple, pleasure crude, brutal and vulgarthis poor flimsy delusion has lost all its prettiness. I shall never again care for certain thingsand indeed for certain persons. Of such things, of such persons, I firmly maintain, however, that I was never an enthusiastic votary. It would be more to my credit, I suppose, if I had been. More would be forgiven me if I had loved a little more, if into all my folly and egotism I had put a little more naivete! and sincerity. Well, I did the best I could, I was at once too bad and too good for it all. At present, its far enough off; Ive put the sea between us. Im stranded. I sit high and dry, scanning the horizon for a friendly sail, or waiting for a high tide to set me afloat. The wave of pleasure has planted me here in the sand. Shall I owe my rescue to the wave of pain? At moments my heart throbs with a sort of ecstatic longing to expiate my stupid peccadil- loes. I see, as through a glass, darkly, the beauty of labor and love. Decidedly, Im willing to work. Its written. yth.My sail is in sight; its at hand; Ive all but boarded the vessel. I received this morning a letter from the best man in the world. Here it is: DEAR MAX: I see this very moment, in the old newspaper which had already passed through my hands without yielding up its most precious item, the announcement of your arrival in New York. To think of your having perhaps missed the grasp of my hand. Here it is, dear Maxto rap on the knuckles, if yc,n like. When I say I have just read of your arrival, I mean that twenty minutes have elapsed by the A LIGHT MAN. And Iwhat I seem to my friend, you see What I soon shati seem to his love, you guess. What I seem to myself do you ask of me? No hero, I confess. A LIGHT WOMAN. BROWNINGS MEN AND WOMEN. APRIL 4, 1857.I have changed my sky without changing my mind. I resume these old notes in a new world. I hardly know of what use they are; but its easier to preserve the habit than to break it. I have been at home now a weekat home, forsooth! And yet after all, it is home. Im dejected, In-i bored, Im blue. How can a man be more at home than that? Nevertheless, im the citizen of a great country, and for that matter, of a great city. I walked to-day some ten miles or so along Broadway, and on the whole I dont blush for my native land. Were a capable race and a good-looking withal; and I dont see why we shouldnt prosper as well as another. This, by the way, ought to be a very encouraging reflection. A capable fellow and a good looking withal ; I dont see why he shouldnt die a millionnaire. At all events he must set bravely to work. When a man has, at thirty-two, a net income of considerably less than nothing, he can scarcely hope to overtake a fortune before he himself is over- taken by age and philosophytwo deplorable obstructions. Im afraid that one of them has already planted itself in my path. What am I ? What do I wish? Whither do I tend? What do I believe? I am constantly beset by these im- pertinent ~vhisperings. Formerly it was enough that I was Maximus Austin that I was endowed with a cheerful mind and a good digestion ; that one day or another, when I had come to the end, I should return to America and begin at the beginnino; that, meanwhile, existence was sweet inin the Rue Tranchet. But now! Has the sweetness really passed out of life? Have I eaten the plums and left nothing but the bread and milk and corn-starch, or whatever the horrible concoction is ?we had it to-day for dinner. Pleasure, at least, I imaginepleasure pure and simple, pleasure crude, brutal and vulgarthis poor flimsy delusion has lost all its prettiness. I shall never again care for certain thingsand indeed for certain persons. Of such things, of such persons, I firmly maintain, however, that I was never an enthusiastic votary. It would be more to my credit, I suppose, if I had been. More would be forgiven me if I had loved a little more, if into all my folly and egotism I had put a little more naivetd and sincerity. Well, I did the best I could, I was at once too bad and too good for it all. At present, its far enough off; Ive put the sea between us. Im stranded. I sit high and dry, scanning the horizon for a friendly sail, or waiting for a high tide to set me afloat. The wave of pleasure has planted me here in the sand. Shall I owe my rescue to the wave of pain? At moments my heart throbs with a sort of ecstatic longing to expiate my stupid peccadil- loes. I see, as through a glass, darkly, the beauty of labor and love. Decidedly, Im willing to work. Its written. 7th.My sail is in sight; its at hand; Ive all but boarded the vessel. I received this morning a letter from the best man in the world. Here it is: DEAR MAX: I see this very moment, in the old newspaper which had already passed through my hands without yielding up its most precious item, the announcement of your arrival in New York. To think of your having perhaps missed the grasp of my hand. Here it is, dear Maxto rap on the knuckles, if ~OIt like. When I say I have just read of your arrival, I mean that twenty minutes have elapsed hy the

A LIGHT MAN. And Iwhat I seem to my friend, you see What I soon shati seem to his love, you guess. What I seem to myself do you ask of me? No hero, I confess. A LIGHT WOMAN. BROWNINGS MEN AND WOMEN. APRIL 4, 1857.I have changed my sky without changing my mind. I resume these old notes in a new world. I hardly know of what use they are; but its easier to preserve the habit than to break it. I have been at home now a weekat home, forsooth! And yet after all, it is home. Im dejected, In-i bored, Im blue. How can a man be more at home than that? Nevertheless, im the citizen of a great country, and for that matter, of a great city. I walked to-day some ten miles or so along Broadway, and on the whole I dont blush for my native land. Were a capable race and a good-looking withal; and I dont see why we shouldnt prosper as well as another. This, by the way, ought to be a very encouraging reflection. A capable fellow and a good looking withal ; I dont see why he shouldnt die a millionnaire. At all events he must set bravely to work. When a man has, at thirty-two, a net income of considerably less than nothing, he can scarcely hope to overtake a fortune before he himself is over- taken by age and philosophytwo deplorable obstructions. Im afraid that one of them has already planted itself in my path. What am I ? What do I wish? Whither do I tend? What do I believe? I am constantly beset by these im- pertinent ~vhisperings. Formerly it was enough that I was Maximus Austin that I was endowed with a cheerful mind and a good digestion ; that one day or another, when I had come to the end, I should return to America and begin at the beginnino; that, meanwhile, existence was sweet inin the Rue Tranchet. But now! Has the sweetness really passed out of life? Have I eaten the plums and left nothing but the bread and milk and corn-starch, or whatever the horrible concoction is ?we had it to-day for dinner. Pleasure, at least, I imaginepleasure pure and simple, pleasure crude, brutal and vulgarthis poor flimsy delusion has lost all its prettiness. I shall never again care for certain thingsand indeed for certain persons. Of such things, of such persons, I firmly maintain, however, that I was never an enthusiastic votary. It would be more to my credit, I suppose, if I had been. More would be forgiven me if I had loved a little more, if into all my folly and egotism I had put a little more naivetd and sincerity. Well, I did the best I could, I was at once too bad and too good for it all. At present, its far enough off; Ive put the sea between us. Im stranded. I sit high and dry, scanning the horizon for a friendly sail, or waiting for a high tide to set me afloat. The wave of pleasure has planted me here in the sand. Shall I owe my rescue to the wave of pain? At moments my heart throbs with a sort of ecstatic longing to expiate my stupid peccadil- loes. I see, as through a glass, darkly, the beauty of labor and love. Decidedly, Im willing to work. Its written. 7th.My sail is in sight; its at hand; Ive all but boarded the vessel. I received this morning a letter from the best man in the world. Here it is: DEAR MAX: I see this very moment, in the old newspaper which had already passed through my hands without yielding up its most precious item, the announcement of your arrival in New York. To think of your having perhaps missed the grasp of my hand. Here it is, dear Maxto rap on the knuckles, if ~OIt like. When I say I have just read of your arrival, I mean that twenty minutes have elapsed hy the so THE GALAXY. [JULY, clock. These have been spent in conversation with my excellent friend Mr. Frederick Sloaneyour excel- lent self being the subject. I havent time to say more about Mr. Sloane than that he ts very anxious to make your acquaintance, and that, if your time is not otherwise predestined, ise would esteem it a particular favor to have you pass a month under his roofthe ample roof whicit covers my own devoted head It appears that he knesv yotir motiser very intimately, and he has a taste for visiting the amenities of the parents upon tise children; the original ground of my own connection with him was tisat he had been a particular friend of toy father. You ntay have heard your mother speak of hima perfect eccentric, but a charoting one. He wil make you most svelcome. But whether or no you come for his sake, come for mine. I have a humsdred questions no the end of my pen, but I cant drop them, lest I should lose tIme mail. Youll not refuse me Without an excellent reason, and I shant excuse you, even then. So time sooner tlse better. Yours more than ever, TImEonomeE LtsLE. Theodores letter is of course very kind, but its perfectly obscure. My mother may have had the highest regards for Mr. Sloane, but she never mentioned his name in my hearing. Who is he, what is he, and what is the nature of his relations with Theodore? I shall learn betimes. I have written to Theodore that I gladly accept (I believe I suppressed the gladly though) his friends invitation, and that I shall immediately present myself. What better can I do? I shall, at the narrowest calculation, obtain food and lodging while I invoke the fates. I shall have a basis of operations. D., it appears, is a long days journey, but delicious when you reach it. Im curious to see a delicious American town. And a months stay Mr. Frederick Sloane, who- ever you are, vousfaites bien les ckoses, and the little that I know of you is very much to your credit. You enjoyed the friendship of my dear mother, you possess the esteem of my incomparable Theodore, you commend yourself to my own affection. At this rate, I shant grudge it. D, 14thI have been here since Thursday eveningthree days. As we rattled up to the tavern in the village, I perceived from the top of the coach, in the twilight, Theodore beneath the porch, scanning the vehicle, with all his affectionate soul in his eyes. I made hardly more than two downward strides into his armsor, at all events, into his hands. He has grown older, of course, in these five years, but less so than I had expected. His is one of those smooth unwrinkled souls that infuse a perennial fairness and freshness into the body. As tall as ever, more over, and as lean and clean. How short and fat and dark and debauched he makes one feel! By nothing he says or means, of course, but merely by his old unconscious purity and simplicitythat slender aspiring rectitude which makes him remind you of the tower of an English abbey. He greeted me with smiles, and stares, and formidable blushes. He assures me that he never would have known me, and that five years have quite transformed my physiognomy. I asked him if it was for the better? 1-le looked at me hard for a moment, with his eyes of blue, and then, for all answer, he blushed again. On my arrival we agreed to walk over from the village. He dismissed his ~vago n with my trunk, and we xvent arm-in-arm through the dusk. The town is seated at the foot of certain mountains, whose names I have yet to learn, and at the head of a vast sheet of water which, as yet, too, I know only as The Lake. The road hitherward soon leaves the village and ~vanders in rural love- liness by the lake side. Sometimes the water is hidden by clumps of trees, be- hind which we heard it lapping and gurgling in the darkness ; sometimes it stretches out from your feet in unspotted beauty, offering its broad white bosom to the embrace of the dark fraternal hills. The walk from the tavern takes some half an hour, in which space Theodore had explained his position to my comparative satisfaction. Mr. Sloane is old, widowed and rich ; his age is seventy-two, and as his health is thoroughly broken, is practically even greater; 1869.] A LIGHT MAN. 5 and his fortuneTheodore, characteristically, doesnt know its numerical for- mula. Its probably a round million. He has lived much abroad, and in the thick of things; he has had adventures and passions and all that sort of thing; and now, in the evening of his days, like an old French diplomat, he takes it into his head to write his memoirs. To this end he has taken poor Theodore to his generous side, to serve as his guide, philosopher and friend. He has been a great scribbler, says Theodore, all his days, and he proposes to incorporate a large amount of promiscuous literary matter into this singular record of his existence. Theodores principal function seems to be to get him to leave things out. In fact, the poor boy seems troubled in conscience. His patrons lucubra- tions have taken the turn of all memoirs, and become foul bonnement immoraL On the whole, he declares they are a very odd mixturea jumble of pretentious trash and of excellent good sense. I can readily understand it. The old man bores me, puzzles me, and amuses me. He was in waiting to receive me. We found him in his librarywhich, by the way, is simply the most delightful apartment that I ever smoked a cigar in a room for a lifetime. At one end stands a great fireplace, with a florid, fan- tastic mantel-piece in carved white marblean importation, of course, and as one may say, an interpolation; the groundwork of the house, the fixtures, be- ing throughout plain, solid and domestic. Over the mantel-shelf is a large landscape painting, a sol-disani Gainsborough, full of the mellow glory of an English summer. Beneath it stands a fantastic litter of French bronzes and outlandish cllinoiseries. Facing the door, as you enter, is a vast window set in a recess, with cushioned seats and large clear panes, stationed as it were at the very apex of the lake (which forms an almost perfect oval) and commanding a view of its whole extent. At the other end, opposite the fire-place, the wall is studded, from floor to ceiling, with choice foreign paintings, placed in relief against the orthodox crimson screen. Elsewhere the walls are covered with books, arranged neither in formal regularity nor quite helter-skelter, but in a sort of genial mutual incongruity, which tells that sooner or later each volume feels sure of leaving the ranks and returning into different company. Mr. Sloane uses his books. His two passions, according to Theodore, are reading and talk- mo; but to talk he must have a book in his hand. The charm of the room lies in the absence of the portentous sobernessthe browns, and blacks, and greys which distinguish most rooms of its class. Its a sort of female study. There are half a dozen light colors scattered aboutpink in the carpet, tender blue in the curtains, yellow in the chairs. The result is a general look of brightness, and lightness, and unpedantic elegance. You perceive the place to be the home, not of a man of learning, but of a man of fancy. He rose from his chairthe man of fancy, to greet methe man of fact. As I looked upon him, in the lamp-light, it seemed to me, for the first five min- utes, that I had seldom seen a worse-favored human creature. It took me then five minutes to get the point of view; then I began to admire. He is under- sized, or at best of my own moderate stature, bent and contracted with years; thin, however, where I am stout, and light where I am heavy. In color were about equally dark. Mr. Sloane, however, is curiously pale, with a dead opaque yellow pallor. Literally, its a magnificent yellow. His skin is of just the hue and apparent texture of some old crumpled Oriental scroll. I know a dozen painters who would give more than they have to arrive at the exact tone of his thick-veined saffi-on-colored handshis polished ivory knuckles. His eyes are circled with red, but within their unhealthy orbits they scintillate like black 52 THE GALAXY. [JULY, diamonds. His nose, owing to the falling away of other portions of his face, has assumed a grotesque, unnatural prominence; it describes an immense arch, gleaming like parchment stretched on ivory. He has kept his teeth, but re- placed his hair by a dead black wig; of course hes clean shaven. In his dress he has a muffled, wadded look, and an apparent aversion to linen, inasmuch as none is visible on his person. He seems neat enough, but not fastidious. At first, as I say, I fancied him monstrously ugly; but on further acquaintance I perceived that what I had taken for ugliness is nothing but the incomplete re- mains of remarkable good looks. The lines of his features are delicate; his nose, ceteris~aribus, would be extremely handsome; his eyes are the eyes of a mind, not of a body. There is intelligence on his brow and sweetness on his lips. He offered his two hands, as Theodore introduced me; I gave him my own, and he stood smiling upon me like some quaint old image in ivory and ebony, scanning my face with the sombre sparkle of his gaze. Good heaven! he said, at last, how much you look like your father. I sat down, and for half an hour we talked of many things; of my journey, of my impressions of home, of my reminiscences of Europe, and, by implication, of my prospects. His voice is aged and cracked, but he uses it with immense energy. Mr. Sloane is not yet in his dotage, by a long shot. He nevertheless makes himself out a wofully old man. In reply to an inquiry I made about his health, he favored me with a long list of his infirmities (some of ~vhich are very trying, certainly) and assured me that he had but a mere pinch of vitality left. I live, he said, out of mere curiosity. I have heard of people dying, I answered, from the same motive. He looked at me a moment, as if to ascertain whether I was making light of his statement. And then, after a pause, Perhaps you dont know, said he, with a certain vague pomposity, that I disbelieve in a future life. Poor Theodore! at these words he got up and walked to the fire. Well, we shant quarrel about that, said I. Theodore turned round, staring. Do you mean that you agree with me ?the old man asked. I certainly havent come here to talk theology. Dear me, Mr. Sloane, I said, dont ask me to disbelieve, and Ill never ask you to believe. Come, cried Mr. Sloane, rubbing his hands, youll not persuade me youre a Christianlike your friend Theodore there. Like Theodoreassuredly not. And then, somehow, I dont know why, at the thought of Theodores Christianism, I burst into a laugh. Excuse me, my dear fellow, I said, you know, for the last ten years I have lived in Catho- lic countries. Good, good, good! cried Mr. Sloane, rubbing his hands and clapping them together, and laughing with high relish. Dear me, said Theodore, smiling, but vaguely apprehensive, tooand a little touched, perhaps, by my involuntary reflection upon the quality of his faith, I hope youre not a Roman Catholic. I saw the old man, with his hands locked, eyeing me shrewdly, and waiting for my answer. I pondered a moment in mock gravity. I shall make my con- fession, I said. Ive been in the East, you know. Im a Mohammedan! Hereupon Mr. Sloane broke out into a wheezy ecstasy of glee. Verily, I thought, if he lives for curiosity, hes easily satisfied. We went into dinner, in the constitution of ~vhich I should have been at loss 1869.] A LIGHT MAN. 53 to suggest the shadow of an improvement. I observed, by the way, that for a victim of paralysis, neuralgia, dyspepsia, and a thousand other ills, Mr. Sloane plies a most inconsequential knife and fork. S~veets, and spices, anti condiments seem to be the chief of his diet. After dinner he dismissed us, in consideration of my natural desire to see my friend in private. Theodore has capital quar- tersa chamber and sitting-room as luxurious as a man (or as a woman, for that matter) could possibly wish. We talked till near midnightof ourselves and of our lemon-colored host below. That is, I spoke of myself, and Theodore listened; and then Theodore told of Mr. Sloane and I listened. His commerce with the old man has sharpened his wits. Sloane has taught him to observe and judge, and Theodore turns around, observes, judgeshim! He has be- come quite the critic and analyst. There is something very pleasant in the sagacity of virtue, in discernment without bitterness, penetration without spite. Theodore has all these unalloyed graces, to say nothing of an angelic charity. At midnight we repaired to the library to take leave of our host till the morrow an attention which, under all circumstances, he formally exacts. As I gave him my hand he held it again and looked at me as he had done on my arrival. Good heaven, he said, at last, how much you look like your mother! ro night, at the end of my third day, I begin to feel decidedly at home. The fact is, Im supremely comfortable. The house is pervaded by an indefin- able, irresistible air of luxury and privacy. Mr. Frederick Sloane must be a horribly corrupt old mortal. Already in his hateful, delightful presence I have become heartily reconciled to doing nothing. But with Theodore on one side, I honestly believe I can defy Mr. Sloane on the other. The former asked me this morning, with real solicitude, in allusion to the bit of dialogue I have quoted above on matters of faith, if I had actually ceased fo care for divine things. I assured him that I would rather utterly lose my sense of the picturesque, than do anything to detract from the splendor of religious worship. Some of the happiest hours of my life, I told him, have been spent in cathe- drals. He looked at me awhile, in friendly sadness. 1 hardly know, he said, whether you are worse than Mr. Sloane, or better. But Theodore is, after all, in duty bound to give a man a long rope in these matters. 1-us own rope is one of the lonoest. He reads Voltaire with Mr. Sloane, and Emerson in his own room. lies the stronger man of the two; he has the bigger stomach. Mr. Sb-me delights, of course, in Voltaire, but he cant read a line of Emerson. Theodore delights in Emerson, and has excellent taste in the matter of Voltaire. It appears that since we parted in Paris, five years ago, his conscience has dwelt in manylands. Ces/ toute une Izistoirewhich he tells very nicely. He left college determined to enter the ministry, and came abroad to lay the basis of his theological greatness in some German repository of science. He appears to have studied, not wisely but too well. Instead of faith full-armed and serene, there sprang from the labor of his brain a myriad abortive doubts, piping for sustenance. He went for a winter to Italy, where, I take it, he was not quite so much afflicted as he ought to have been, at the sight of the beautiful spiritual repose which he had missed. It was after this that we spent those three months together in Brittanythe best-spent three months of my whole ten years abroad. Theodore inoculated me, I think, with a little of his sacred fermentation, and I infused into his conscience something of my vulgar indifference; and we agreed together that there were a few good things left health, friendship, a summer sky, and the lovely by-~vays of an old French province. He came home, returned to theology, accepted a call, and made an 4. 54 THE GALAXY. [JULY, attempt to respond to it. But the inner voice failed him. His outlook was cheerless enough. During his absence his married sister, the elder one, had taken the other to live with her, relieving Theodore of the charge of contribu- tion to her support. But suddenly, behold the husband, the brother-in-law, dies, leaving a mere fragment of proper(y; and the two ladies, with their two little girls, are afloat in the wide world. Theodore finds himself at twenty-six without an income, without a profession, and with a family of four females to support. XVell, in his quiet way, he draws on his courage. The hi story of the two years which preceded his initiation here is a simple record of practical manly devotion. He rescued his sisters and nieces from the deep ~vaters, placed them high and dry, established them somewhere in decent gentilityand then found at last that his strength had left himhad dropped dead like an over- ridden horse. In short, he had worked himself ill. It was now his sisters turn. They nursed him ~vith all the added tenderness of gratitude for the past and terror of the future, and brought him safely through a grievous malady. Meanwhile Mr. Sloane, having decided to treat himself to a private secretary and suffered dreadful mischance in three successive experiments, had heard of Theodores situation and his merits ; had furthermore recognized in him the son of an early and intimate friend, and had finally offered him the very comfortable position which he now occupies. There is a decided incongruity between Theodore as a manas Theodore, in fineand the dear fellow as the intellectual agent, confidant, complaisant, purveyor, panderwhat you willof a battered old cynic and worldly dilettante. There seems at first sight a perfect want of agreement between his character and his function. One is gold and the other brass, or something very like it. But on reflection I perfectly conceive that he should, under the circnmstances, have accepted Mr. Sloanes offer and been content to do his duties. Just heaven! Theodores contentment in such a case is a theme for the moralista better moralist than I. The best and purest mortals are an odd mixture, and in none of us does honesty exist to/us, teres, aique rotundus. Ideally, Theodore hasnt the smalIest business ~Zans cette gal?re. It offends my sense of. propriety to find him here. I feel like admon- isbing him as a friend that he has knocked at the wrong door, and that he had better retreat before he is brought to the blush. Really, as I say, I suppose he might as well be here, as reading Emerson evenings, in the back parlor, to those two very plain sistersjudging from their photographs. Practically it hurts no one to compromise with his tendencies. Poor Theodore was weak, depressed, out of work. Mr. Sloane offers him a lodging and a salary in return forafter all, merely a little forbearance. All he has to do is to read to the old man, lay down the book awhile, with his finger in the place, and let him talk; take it up again~ read another dozen pages and submit to another com- mentary. Then to write a dozen pages under his dictationto suggest a word, polish off a period, or help him out with a reluctant idea or a half-remembered fact. This is all, I say; and yet this is much. Theodores apparent success proves it to be much, as well as the old mans satisfaction. Its a part; he plays it. He uses tact; he has taken a reef in his pride; he has clipped the sting of his conscience, he listens, he talks, conciliates, accommodates, flattersdoes it as well as many a worse mandoes it far better than I. I might dominate Mr. Sloane, but I doubt that I could serve him. But after all, its not a matter of better and worse. In every son of woman there are two menthe practical man and the dreamer. We live for our dreams but, meanwhile, we live by our wits. When the dreamer is a poet, his brother is an artist. Theodore is essentially a man 1869.] A LIGHT MAN. 55 of taste. If he were not destined to become a high priest among moralists, he might be a prince among connoisseurs. He plays his part then, artistically, with taste, with relishwith all the fi;iesse of his delicate fancy. How can Mr. Sloane fail to believe that he possesses a paragon? He is no such fool as to misconceive a belle duze when a belle dine comes in his way. He confidentially assured me this morning that Theodore has the most beautiful mind in the world, but that its a pity hes so simple as not to suspect it. If he only doesnt ruin him with his flattery 19thIm certainly fortunate among men. This morning when, tentatively, I spoke of understaying my month, Mr. Sloane rose from his seat in horror, and declared that for the present I must regard his house as my home. Come, come, he said, when you leave this place where do you intend to go ? Where, indeed? I graciously allowed Mr. Sloane to have the best of the argu- ment. Theodore assures me that he appreciates these and other affabilities, and that I have made what he calls a conquest of his venerable heart. Poor, battered, bamboozled old organ he would have one believe that it has a most tragical record of capture and recapture. At all events, it appears that Im master of the citadel. For the present I have no wish to evacuate. I feel, nev- ertheless, in some far-off corner of my soul~ that I ought to shoulder my victo- rious banner and advance to more fruitful triumphs. I blush for my slothful inaction. It isnt that Im willing to stay here a month, but that Im ~villing to stay here six. Such is the charming, disgusting truth. Have I actually outlived the age of energy? Have I survived my ambition, my integrity, my self-respect? Verily I ought to have survived the habit of ask- ing myself silly questions. I made up my mind long a go that I care deeply for nothing save my o~vn personal comfort, and I dont care for that sufficiently to secure it at the cost of acute temporary suffering. I have a passion for nothing not even for life. I know very well the appearance I make in the world. I pass for intelligent, well-informed, accomplished, amiable, strong. Im supposed to have a keen relish for letters, for music, for science, for art. There was a time when I fancied I cared for scientific research ; but I know now that I care for it as little as I really do for Shakespeare, for Rubens, for Rossini. When I was younger, I used to find a certain entertainment in the contemplation of men and women. I liked to see them hurryin~, on each others heels across the stage. But Im sick and tired of them now; not that Im a misanthrope, God forbid. Theyre not worth hating. I never knew but one creature who was, and her I went and loved. To be consistent, I ought to have hated my mother and now I ought to hate Theodore. But I donttruly, on the whole, I dont any more than I love him. I firmly believe that a large portion of his happi- ness rests upon his devout conviction that I really care for him. He be- lieves in that, as he believes in all the rest of itin my knowledge, my music, my underlying earnestness, my sense of beauty and love of truth. Oh, for a ;;zan among them alla fellow with eyes in his headeyes that would look me through and through, and flash out in scorn of my nothingness. Then, perhaps, I might answer him with rage ; Ilien, perhaps, I might feel a simple, healthy emotion. In the name of bare nutritionin the fear of starvationwhat am I to do? (I was obliged this morning to borrow ten dollars from Theodore, who remem- bered gleefully that he has been owing me no less th~in twenty five dollars for the past four years, and in fact has preserved a note to this effect). Within the last week I have hatched a desperate scheme. I have deliberately conceived THE GALAXY. [JULY, the idea of marrying money. Why not accept and utiliize the goods of the gods ? It is not my fault, after all, if I pass for a superior fello~v. Why not ad- mit that practically, mechanicallyas I may saymaritally, I may be a supe.. nor fellow? I warrant myself, at least, thoroughly gentle. I should never beat my wife I doubt that I should ever snub her. Assume that her fortune has the proper number of zeros and that she herself is one of them, and I can actually imagine her adoring me. Its not impossible that Ive hit the nail and solved my riddle. Curiously, as I look back upon my brief career, it all seems to tend in a certain way to this consummation, It has its graceful curves and crooks, indeed and here and there a passionate tangent; but on the whole, if I were to unfold it here ci Za Hogarth, what better legend could I scrax~l beneath the series of pictures than So-and-Sos Progress to a Mercenary Marriage? Coming events do what we all know with their shadows. My glorious des- tiny is, perhaps, not far off. I already feel throughout my person a magnificent languoras from the possession of past opulence. Or is it simply my sense of perfect well-being in this perfectly appointed home ? Is it simply the absolute- ly comfortable life I lead in this delicious old house? At all events, the house is delicious, and my only complaint of Mr. Sloane is, that instead of an old widower, hes not an old widow (or I a young maid), so that I might marry him, survive him, and dwell forever in this rich and mellow home. As I write here, at my bedroom table, I have only to stretch out an arm and raise the window curtain, to see the thick-planted garden budding and breathing, and growing in the moonshine. Far above, in the liquid darkness, sails the glory-freighted orb of the moon; beneath, in its light, lies the lake, in murmuring, troubled sleep around stand the gentle mountains, wearing the cold reflection on their shoul- ders, or hiding it away in their glens. So much for midnight. To-morrow the sun will be lovely with the beauty of day. Under one aspect or another I have it always before me. At the end of the garden is moored a boat, in which Theo- dore and I have repeatedly explored the surface of the lake, and visited the mild wilderness of its shores. What lovely landward caves and bayswhat al- der-smothered creekswhat lily-sheeted poolswhat sheer steep hill-sides, darkening the water with the downward image of their earthy greenness. I confess that in these excursions Theodore does the rowing and I the contem- plation. Mr. Sloane avoids the wateron account of the dampness, he says; but because hes afraid of drowning, I suspect. 221Theodore is rioht. The bonliomme has taken me into his favor. I protest I dont see how he was to escape it. I doubt that there has ever been a better flattered man. I dont blush for it. In one coin or another I must repay his hospitalitywhich is certainly very liberal. Theodore advises him, helps him, comforts him ; I amuse him, surprise him, deprave hiLL This is speaking vast- ly well for my power. He pretends to be surprised at nothing, and to pOS5~55 in perfectionpoor, pitiable old fopthe art nil admirari; but repeatedly, I know, I have clear outskipped his fancy. As for his depravity, its a very pretty piece of wickedness, but it strikes me as a purely intellectual matter. I imag- ine him never to have had any downright senses. He may have been unclean; morally, hes not over savory now; but he never can have been what the French call a viveur. Hes too, delicate, hes of a feminine turn ; and what woman was ever a viveur? He likes to sit in his chair, and read scandal, talk scandal, make scandal, so far as he may without catching a cold or incurring a headache. I already feel as if I had known him a lifetime. I read him as clearly, I think, as if I had. I know the type to which he belongs ; I have encountered, first and 1869.] A LIGHT MAN. 57 last, a round dozen of specimens. Hes neither more nor less than a gossipa gossip flanked by a coxcomb and an egotist. Hes shallow, vain, cold, supersti- tious, timid, pretentious, capricious; a pretty jumble of virtues! And yet, for all this, he has his good points. His caprices are sometimes generous, I imag- irie; and his aversion to the harsh, cruel, and hideous, frequently takes the form of positive kindness and charity. His memory (for trifles) is remarkable, and (where his own performances are not involved) his taste is excellent. He has no will for evil more than for good. He is the victim, however, of more illusions ~vith regard to himself than I ever knew a human heart to find lodging for. At the age of twenty, poor, ignorant and remarkably handsome, he married a wo- man of immense ~vealth, many years his senior. At the end of three years she very considerately ~vent out of the world, and left him to the enjoyment of his freedom and riches. If he had remained poor, he might from time to time have rubbed at random against the truth, and ~vould still be wearing a few of its sa- crecl smutches on his sleeve. But he wraps himself in his money as in a wad- ded dressing gown, and goes trundling through life on his little gold wheels, as warm and close as an unweaned baby. The greater part of his career, from his marriage to within fifteen years ago, was spent in Europe, ~vhich, superficially, he knows very well. He has lived in fifty places, known hundreds of people, and spent thousands of dollars. At one time, I believe, he spent a few thou- sands too many, trembled for an instant on the verge of a pecuniary crash; but recovered himself; and found himself more frightened than hurt, but loudly ad- monished to lower his pitch. He passed five years in a species of penitent seclusion on the lake ofI forget what (his genius seems to be partial to lakes), and formed the rudiments of his present magnificent taste for literature I cant call it anything but magnificent, so long as it must needs have Theodore Lisle as a ministrant. At the close of this period, by economy, he had become a rich man again. The control and discipline exercised during these years upon his desires and his natural love of luxury, must have been the sole act of real resolution in the history of Mr. Sloanes life. It was rendered possible by his morbid, his actually pusillanimous dread of poverty; he doesnt feel safe with- out half a million between him and starvation. Meanwhile he had turned from a young man into an old man; his health was broken, his spirit was jaded, and I imagine, to do him justice, that he began to feel certain natural, filial longings for this dear American mother of us all. They say the most hopeless truants and triflers have come to it. He came to it, at all events ; he packed up his hooks and pictures and gim cracks, and bade farewell to Europe. This house ~vhich he now occupies belonged to his wifes estate. She had, for sentimental reasons of her own, commended it to his particular regard. On his return he came to see it, fancied it, turned a parcel of carpenters and upholsterers into it, and by inhabiting it for twelve years, transformed it into the perfect dwelling which I find it. Here he has spent all his time, with the exception of a regular winters visit to New Yorka practice recently discontinued, owing to the ag- gravation of his physical condition and the projection of these famous memoirs. His life has finally come to be passed in comparative solitude. He tells of va- rious distant relatives, as well as intimate friends of both sexes, who used for- merly to be largely entertained at his cost, but with each of them, in the course of time, he seems to have clipped the thread of intercourse. Throughout life, evidently, he has shown great delicacy of tact in keeping himself clean of para- sites. Rich, lonely and vain, he must have been fair game for the race of social sycophants and cormorants; and its richly to the credit of his shrewdness and 58 THE GALAXY. [JULY, good sense, that he has suffered so little havoc in substance and happiness. Ap- parently theyve been a sad lot of bunglers. I maintain that hes to behow shall I say it ?possessed. But you must work in obedience to certain definite laws. Doctor Jones, his physician, tells me that in point of fact he has had for the past ten years an unbroken series of favorites, ~rotcgJs, and heirs presump- tive; but that each, in turn, by some fatally false movement, has fairly unjointed his nose. The doctor declares, moreover, that they were, at best, a wofully common set of people. Gradually the old man seems to have developed a pref- erence for two or three strictly exquisite intimates, over a throng of your vulgar charmers. His tardy literary schemes, toofruit of his all but sapless senility have absorbed more and more of his time and attention. The end of it all is, therefore, that Theodore and I have him quite to ourselves, and that it behooves us to keep our noses on our faces, and our heads on our shoulders. Poor, pretentious old simpleton! Its not his fault, after all, thaA he fancies himself a great little man. Ho~v are you to judge of the stature of mankind when men have forever addressed you on their knees? Peace and joy to his innocent fatuity ! He believes himself the most rational of men ; in fact, hes the most vapidly sentimental. He fancies himself a philosopher, a thinker, a student. His philosophy and his erudition are quite of a piece ; they would lie at case in the palm of Theodores hand. He prides himself on his good man- ners, his urbanity, his unvarying observance of the becoming. My private im- pression is, that his cramped old bosom contains unsuspected treasures of cun- ning impertinence. He takes his stand on his speculative audacityhis direct, undaunted gaze at the universe ; in truth, his mind is haunted by a hundred dingy old-~vorld spectres and theological phantasms. lie fancies himself one of the weightiest of men; he is essentially one of the lightest. He deems himself ardent, impulsive, passionate, magnanimouscapable of boundless enthusiasm for an idea or a sentiment. It is clear to me that, on no occasion of pure, disin- terested action can he ever have taken a timely, positive second step. He fan- cies, finally, that he has drained the cup of life to the dregs ; that he has known, in its bitterest intensity, every emotion of which the human spirit is capable that he has loved, struggled, and suffered. Stuff and nonsense, all of it. He has never loved any one but himself; he has never suffered from anything but an undigested supper or an exploded pretension; he has never touched with the end of his lips the vulgar bowl from which the mass of mankind quaffs its great floods of joy and sorrow. Well, the long and short of it all is, that I honestly pity him. He may have given sly knocks in his life, but he cant hurt me. I pity his ignorance, his weakness, his timidity. He has tasted the real sweetness of life no more than its bitterness ; he has never dreamed, or wandered, or dared; he has never known any but mercenary affection; neither men nor women have risked aught for kimfor his good spirits, his good looks, and his poverty. How I should like to give him, for once, a real sensation 26th.I took a row this morning with Theodore a couple of miles along the lake, to a point where we went ashore and lounged away an hour in the sun- shine, which is still very comfortable. Poor Theodore seems troubled about many things. For one, he is troubled about me; he is actually more anxious about my future than I myself; he thinks better of me than I do of myself; he is so deucedly conscientious, so scrupulous, so averse to giving offence or to brusquer any situation before it has played itself out, that he shrinks from be- traying his apprehensions or asking any direct questions. But I know that, he is dying to extort from me some positive profession of practical interest and 1869.] A LIGHT MAN. 59 faith. I catch myself in the act of takingheaven forgive me !a half-malicious joy in confounding his expectationsleading his generous sympathies off the scent by various extravagant protestations of mock cynicism and malignity. But in Theodore I have so firm a friend that I shall have a long row to hoe if I ever find it needful to make him forswear his devotionabjure his admiration. He admires methats absolute; he takes my moral infirmities for the eccentricities of genius, and they only impart an extra flavora kant goi2/to the richness of my charms. Nevertheless, I can see that he is disappointed. I have even less to show, after this lapse of years, than he had hoped. Heaven help us ! little enough it must strike him as being. What an essential absurdity there is in our being friends at all. I honestly believe we shall end with hating each other. They are all very well nowour diversity, our oppugnancy, our cross pur- poses ; now that we are at play together they serve as a theme for jollity. But when we settle down to workah me for the tug of war. I wonder, as it is, that Theodore keeps his patience ~vith me. His education since we parted should tend logically to make him despise me. He has studied, thought, suf- fered, lovedloved those very plain sisters and nieces. Poor me! how should I be virtuous ? I have no sisters, plain or pretty nothing to love, work for, live for. Friend Theodore, if you are going one of these days to despise me and drop mein the sacred name of comfort, come to the point at once, and make an end of our common agony! He is troubled, too, about Mr. Sloane. His attitude toward the bonliomme quite passes my comprehension. Its the queerest jumble of contraries. He penetrates him, contemns himyet respects and admires him. It all comes of the poor boys shrinking New England conscience. Hes afraid to give his per- ceptions a fair chance, lest, forsooth, they should look over his neighbors wall. Hell not understand that he may as well sacrifite the old man for a lamb as for a sheep. His view of the gentleman, therefore, is a perfect tissue of cobwebsa jumble of half-way sorrows, and wide-drawn charities, and hair-breadth scapes fi-om utter damnation, and sudden platitudes of generosity; fit, all of it, to make an angel curse The mans a perfect egotist and fool, ~ay I, but I like him. Now Theo- dore likes himor rather wants to like him ; but he cant reconcile it to his self-respectfastidious deity !to like a fool. Why the deuce cant he leave it alone altogether? Its a purely practical matter. He ought to do the duties of his place all the better for having his head clear of officious sentiment. I dont believe in disinterested service; and Theodore is too desperately bent on pre- serving his disinterestedness. With me, its different. Im perfectly free to love the bon/iommefor a fool. Im neither a scribe nor a Pharisee ; Imah me, what am I? And then, Theodore is troubled about his sisters. Hes afraid hes not do- ing his duty by them. He thinks he ought to be with themto be getting a larger salaryto be teaching his nieces. Im not versed in such questions. Perhaps he ought. MAy 3dThis morning Theodore sent me word that he was ill and unable to get up ; upon which I immediately repaired to his bedside. He had caught cold, was sick and a little feverish. I urged him to make no attempt to leave his room, and assured him that I would do what I could to reconcile Mr. Sloane to his non-attendance. This I found an easy matter. I read to him for a couple of hours, wrote four lettersone in Frenchand then talked a good two hours more. I have done more talking, by the way, in the last fortnight, than in any 6o THE GALAXY. [JULY, previous twelve monthsmuch of it, too, none of the wisest, nor, I may add, of the most fastidiously veracious. In a little discussion, two or three days ago, with Theodore, I came to the point and roundly proclaimed that in gossiping with Mr. Sloane I made no scruple, for our common satisfaction, of discreetly using the embellishments of fiction. Ivly confession gave him that turn, as Mrs. Gamp would say, that his present illness may be the result of it. Nevertheless, poor, dear fellow, I trust hell be on his legs to-morrow. This afternoon, some- ho~v, I found myself really in the humor of talking. There was something pro- pitious in the circumstances; a hard, cold rain without, a wood-fire in the library, the bonkomme puffing cigarettes in his arm-chair, beside him a portfolio of newly imported prints and photographs, andTheodore tucked safely away in bed. Finally, when I brought our /~te-ci-tt~fe to a close (taking good care to understay my welcome) Mr. Sloane seized me by both hands and honored me with one of his venerable grins. Max, he said you must let me call you Maxyoure the most delightful man I ever knew. Verily, theres some virtue left in me yet. I believe I fairly blushed. Why didnt I know you ten years ago ?the old man went on. Here are ten years lost. Ten years ago, my dear Mr. Sloane, quoth Max, I was hardly worth your knowing. But I did know you! cried the bonhom;ne. I knew you in knowing your mother. Ah! my mother again. When the old man begins that chapter I feel like telling him to blow out his candle and go to bed. At all events, he continued, we must make the most of the years that remain. Im a poor sick old fellow, but Ive no notion of dying. Youll not get tired of me and want to go away? Im devoted to you, sir, I said. But I must be looking up some xvork, you know. Work! Bah! Ill give you work. Ill give you wages. Im afraid, I said, with a smile, that youll want to give me the wages without the work. And then I declared that I must go up and look at poor Theodore. The bonhomme still kept my hands. I wish very much, he said, that I could get you to love me as well as you do poor Theodore. Ah, dont talk about love, Mr. Sloane. Im no lover. Dont you love your friend ? Not as he deserves. Nor as lie loves you, perhaps ? He loves me, Im afraid, far more than I deserve. Well, Max, my host pursued, ~ve can be good friends, all the same. We dont need a hocus-pocus of false sentiment. We are men, arent we ?.men of sublime good sense. And just here, as the old man looked at me, the pressure of his hands deepened to a convulsive grasp, and the bloodless mask of his countenance was suddenly distorted with a nameless fear. Ah, my dear young man ! he cried, come and be a son to methe son of my age and deso- lation! For Gods sake dont leave me to pine and die alone! I was amazedand I may say I was moved. Is it true, then, that this poor old heart contains such measureless depths of horror and longing? I take it that hes mortally afraid of death. I assured him on my honor that he may henceforth call upon me for any service. 1869.] A LIGHT MAN. 6r 8th.Theodores indisposition turned out more serious than I expected. He has been confined to his room till to-day. This evening he came down to the library in his dressing gown. Decidedly, Mr. Sloane is an eccentric, but hardly, as Theodore thinks, a charming one. There is something extremely curious in the exhibition of his capricesthe incongruous fits and starts, as it were, of his taste. For some reason, best known to himself he took it into his head to deem it a want of delicacy, of respect, of savoir-vivrcof heaven knows whatthat poor Theodore, ~vho is still weak and languid, should enter the sacred precinct of his study in the vulgar drapery of a dressing-gown. The sovereign trouble with the bonlioutme is an absolute lack of the instinct of justice. Hes of the real feminine turnI believe I have written it beforewithout a ray of womans virtues. I honestly believe that I might come into his study in my night-shirt and he would smile upon itas a picturesque dtfsIiabilld. But for poor Theodore to-night there was nothing but scowls and frowns, and barely a civil inquiry about his health. But poor Theodore is not such a fool, either hell not die of a snubbing; I never said he was a weakling. Once he fairly saw from what quarter the wind blew, he bore the masters brutality with the utmost coolness and gallantry. Can it be that Mr. Sloane really wishes to drop him? The delicious old brute! He understands favor and friendship only as a selfish rapturea reaction, an infatuation, an act of aggressive, exclusive pat- ronage. Its not a bestowal with him, but a transfer, and half his pleasure in causing his sun to shine is thatbeing wofully near its settingit will produce a number of delectable shadows. He wants to cast my shadow, I suppose, on Theodore; fortunately Im not altogether an opaque body. Since Theodore was taken ill he has been into his room but once, and has sent him none but the scantiest messages. I, too, have been much less attentive than I should have wished to be; but my time has not been my own. It has been, every moment of it, at Mr. Sloanes disposal. He actually runs after me; he devours me; he makes a fool of himself; and is trying hard to make one of me. I find that he will standthat, in fact, he actually enjoysa certain kind of humorous snubbing. He likes anything that ~vill tickle his fancy, impart a flavor to our relations, remind him of his old odds and ends of novels and memoirs. I have fairly stepped into Theo- dores shoes, and donewith what I feel in my bones to be vastly inferior skill and tasteall the reading, writing, condensing, expounding, transcribing and advising that he has been accustomed to do. I have driven with the bonhomme; played chess and cribbage with him; and beaten him, bullied him, contradicted him; and forced him into going out on the ~vater under my charge.. Who shall say, after this, that I havent done my best to discourage his advances, confound his benevolence? As yet, my efforts are vain; in fact they quite turn to my own confusion. Mr. Sloane is so vastly thankful at having escaped from the lake with his life that he seems actually to look upon me as a kind of romantic preserver and protector. Faugh! what tiresome nonsense it all is! But one thing is certain, it cant last forever. Admit that he has cast Theodore out and taken me in. He will speedily discover that he has made a pretty mess of it, aiid that he had much better have left well enough alone. He likes my reading and ~vriting now, but ma month hell begin to hate them. Hell miss Theo- dores healthy, unerring, impersonal judgment. What an advantage that pure and luminous nature has over mine, after all. Im for days, hes for years ; he for the long run, I for the short. I, perhaps, am intended for success, but he alone for happiness. He holds in his heart a tiny sacred particle, ~vhich leavens his whole being and keeps it pure and sounda faculty of admiration and re 62 THE GALAXY. [JULY, spect. For him human nature is still a wonder and a mystery; it bears a divine stampMr. Sloanes tawdry organism as well as the best. 13thI have refused, of course, to supplant Theodore further, in the exer- cise of his functions, and he has resumed his morning labors with Mr. Sloane. I, on my side, have spent these morning hours in scouring the country on that capital black mare, the use of which is one of the perquisites of Theodores place. The days have been magnificentthe heat of the sun tempered by a murmuring, wandering wind, the whole north a mighty ecstasy of sound and ver- dure, the sky a far-away vault of bended blue. Not far from the mill at M., the other end of the lake, I met, for the third time, that very pretty young girl, ~vho reminds me so forcibly of A. L. She makes so very frank and fearless a use of her eyes that I ventured to stop and bid her good-morning. She seems nothing loth to an acquaintance. Shes an out-and-out barbarian in speech, but her eyes look as if they had drained the noon-day heavens of their lustre. These rides do me good ; I had got into a sadly worrying, brooding habit of thought. XVhat has got into Theodore I know not; his illness seems to have left him strangely affected. He has fits of sombre reserve, alternating with spasms of ex- travagant gayety. He avoids me at times for hours together, and then he comes and looks at me with an inscri~ttable smile, as if he were on the verge of a burst of confidencewhich again is swallowed up in the darkness of his silence. Is he hatching some astounding benefit to his species ? Is he working to bring about my removal to a higher sphere of action ? Nous verrons bien. i8th.Theodore threatens departure. He received this morning a letter from one of his sistersthe young widowannouncing her engagement to a minister whose acquaintance she has recently made, and intimating her expecta- tion of an immediate union with the gentlemana ceremony which ~vould re- quire Theodores attendance. Theodore, in high good hui~or, read the letter aloud at breakfastand to tell the truth a charming letter it was. He then spoke of his having to go on to the wedding ; a proposition to which Mr. Sloane graciously assentedbut with truly startling amplitude. I shall be sorry to lose you after so happy a connection, said the old man. Theodore turned pale, stared a moment, and then, recovering his color and his composure, declared that he should have no objection in life to coming back. Bless your soul ! cried the bonlionime, you dont mean to say youll leave your little sister all alone To which Thcodore replied that he would arrange for her to live with his brother-in-law. Its the only proper thing, he declared, in a tone which was not to be gainsaid. It has come to this, then, that Mr. Sloane actually wants to turn him out of the house. Oh, the precious old fool He keeps smiling an uncanny smile, which means, as I read it, that if the poor boy once departs he shall never return on the old footingfor all his impudence zothThis morning, at breakfast, we had a terrific scene. A letter arrives for Theodore he opens it, turns white and red, frowns, falters, and then in- forms us that the clever widow has broken off her engagement. No wedding, therefore, and no departure for Theodore. The bonhomme was furious. In his fury he took the liberty of calling poor Mrs. Parker (me sister) a very impolite name. Theodore rebuked him, with perfect good taste, and kept his temper. If my opinions dont suit you, Mr. Lisle, the old man broke out, and my mode of expressing them displeases you, you know you can easily remove your- self from within my jurisdiction. IvIy dear Mr. Sloane, said Theodore, your opinions, as a general rule, 1869.] A LIGHT MAN. 63 interest me deeply, and have never ceased to act most beneficially upon the formation of my own. Your mode of expressing them is charming, and I wouldnt for the world, after all our pleasant intercourse, separate from you in bit- terness. Only, I repeat, your qualification of my sisters conduct was perfectly uncalled for. If you knew her, you would be the first to admit it. There was something in Theodores aspect and manner, as he said these words, which puzzled me all the morning. After dinner, finding myself alone with him, I told him I was glad he was not obliged to go away. He looked at me with the mysterious smile I have mentioneda smile which actually makes him handsomethanked me. and fell into meditation. As this bescribbled chron- icle is the record of my follies, as ~vell as of my lzau/fii/s, I neednt hesitate to s~y that, for a moment, I was keenly exasperated. What business has poor, transparent Theodore to put on the stony mask of the sphinx and play the in- scrutable ? What right has he to do so with me especially, in whom he has al- ways professed an absolute confidence ? Just as I was about to cry out, Come, my dear box, this affectation of mystery has lasted quite long enoughfavor me at last with the result of )our cogitation as I was on the point of thus ex- pressing my impatience of his continued solemnity of demeanor, the oracle at last addressed itself to utterance. You see, my dear Max, he said, I cant, in justice to myself; go away in obedience to any such intimation as that vouchsafed to me this morning. What do you think of my actual footing here ? Theodores actual footing here seemed to me essentially uncomfortable; of course I said so. Na), I assure you its not, he answered. I should feel, on the contrary, very uncomfortable to think that Id come away, except by my own choice. You see a man cant afford to cheapen himself. What are you laughing at ? Im laughing, in the first place, my dear fellow, to hear on your lips the lan- guage of cold calculation ; and in the second place, at your odd notion of the process by which a man keeps himself up in the market. I assure you that its the correct notion. I came here as a favor to Mr. Sloane ; it was expressly understood so. The occupation was distasteful to me. I had from top to bottom to accommodate myself to my duties. I had to coin- promise with a dozen convictions, preferences, prejudices. I dont take such things easily ; I take them hard; and when once the labor is achieved I cant consent to have it thrown away. If Mr. Sloane needed me then, he needs me still. I am ignorant of any change having taken place in his intentions, or in his means of satisfying them. I came not to amuse him, but to do a certain ~vork; I hope to remain until the work is completed. To go away sooner is to make a confession of incapacity which, I protest, costs too great a sacrifice to my vanity. Theodore spoke these words with a face ~vhich I have never seen him wear; a fixed, mechanical smile ; a hard, dry glitter in his eyes ; a harsh, strident tone in his voicein his whole physiognomy a gleam, as it were, a note of defiance. Now I confess that for defiance I have never been conscious of an especial rel- ish. When Im defied, Im ugly. My dear man, I replied, your sentiments do you prodigious credit. Your very ingenious theory of your present situation, as well as your extremely pronounced sense of your personal value, are calcula- ted to insure you a degree of practical success which can very well dispense with the furtherance of my poor good wishes. Oh, the grimness of his listen- ing smileand I suppose I may add of my own physiognomy! But I have 64 THE GALAXY. [JULY, ceased to be puzzled. Theodores conduct for the past ten days is suddenly il- lumined with a backward, lurid ray. Here are a few plain truths, which it be- hooves me to take to heartcommit to memory. Theodore is jealous of me. Theodore hates me. Theodore has been seeking for the past three months to see his name written, last but not least, in a certain testamentary document: Finally, I bequeath to my dear young friend, Theodore Lisle, in return for in- valuable services and unfailing devotion, the bulk of my property, real and per- sonal, consisting of (hereupon follows an exhaustive enumeration of houses, lands, public securities, books, pictures, horses, and dogs). It is for this that he has toiled, and watched, and prayed; submitted to intellectual weariness and spiritual torture ; made his terms with levity, blasphemy. and insult. For this he sets his teeth and tightens his grasp; for this hell fight. Merciful powers its an immense weight off ones mind. There are nothing, then, hut vulgar, common laws; no sublime exceptions, no transcendent anomalies. Theodores a knave, a hyponay, nay; stay, irreverent hand Theodores a man / Well, thats all I want. He ~vants fighthe shall have it. Have I got, at last, my simple, natural emotion? 21stI have lost no time. This eyening, late, after I had heard Theodore go to his room (I had left the library early, on the pretext of having letters to ~vrite), I repaired to Mr. Sloane, who had not yet gone to bed, and informed him that it is necessary I shall at once leave him, and seek some occupation in New York. He felt the blo~v; it brought him straight down on his marrow-bones. He xvent through the whole gamut of his arts and graces ; he blustered, whim- pered, entreated, flattered. He tried to drag in Theodores name; but this I, of course, prevented. But, finally, why, why, WHY, after all my promises of fidelity, must I thus cruelly desert him? Then came my supreme avowal: I have spent my last penny; while I stay, Im a beggar. The remainder of this extraordinary scene I have no power to describe : how the bonhiomuze, touched, inflamed, inspired, by the thought of my destitution, and at the same time an- noyed, perplexed, be~vildered at having to commit himself to any practical alle- viation of it, worked himself into a nervous frenzy which deprived him of a clear sense of the value of his words and his actions; how I, prompted by the irresistible spirit of my desire to leap astride of his weakness, and ride it hard into the goal of my dreams, cunningly contrived to keep his spirit at the fever point, so that strength, and reason, and resistance should burn themselves out. I shall probably never again have such a sensation as I enjoyed to-night actually feel a heated human heart throbbing, and turning, and struggling in my grasp; know its pants, its spasms, its convulsions, and its final senseless quies- cence. At half-past one oclock, Mr. Sloane got out of his chair, went to his secretary, opened a private drawer, and took out a folded paper. This is my will, he said, made some seven weeks ago. If youll stay with me, Ill destroy it. Really, Mr. Sloane, I said, if you think my purpose is to exert any pres- sure upon your testamentary inclinations Ill tear it in pieces, he cried ; Ill burn it up. I shall be as sick as a dog to-morrow ; but Ill do it. A-a-h ! He clapped his hand to his side, as if in sudden, overwhelming pain, and sank back fainting into his chair. A single glance assured me that he ~vas un- conscious. I possessed myself of the paper, opened it, and perceived that the will is almost exclusively in Theodores favor. For an instant, a savage, puerile feeling of hate sprang erect in my bosom, and I came within an ace of obeying 1869.] A LIGHT MAN. 65 my foremost impulsethat of casting the document into the fire. Fortunately, my reason overtook my passion, though for a moment twas an even race. I re- placed the paper in the secretary, closed it, and rang the bell for Robert (the old man s servant). Before he came I stood watching the poor, pale remnant of mortality before me, and wondering whether those feeble life-gasps were num- bered. He was as white as a sheet , grimacing with painhorribly ugly. Sud- denly, he opened his eyes ; they met my own; I fell on my knees and took his hands. They closed on mine with a grasp strangely akin to the rigidity of death. Nevertheless, since then he has revived, and has relapsed again into a comparatively healthy sleep. Robert seems to know how to deal with him. 22d.Mr. Sloane is seriously illout of his mind and unconscious of peo- ples identity. The doctor has been here, off and on, all day, but this evening reports improvement. I have kept out of the old mans room, and confined myself to my own, reflecting largely upon the odd contingency of his immediate death. Does Theodore know of the will? Would it occur to him to divide the property? Would it occur to me, in his place? We met at dinner, and talked in a grave, desultory, friendly fashion. After all, hes an excellent fel- low. I dont hate him. I dont even djslike him. He jars on me, ii magace; but thats no reason why I should do him an evil turn. Nor shall I. The prop- erty is a fixed idea, thats all. I shall get it if I can. Were fairly matched. Before heaven, no, were not fairly matched Theodore has a conscience. 23d.Im restless and nervousand for good reasons. Scribbling here keeps me quiet. This morning Mr. Sloane is better; feeble and uncertain in mind, but unmistakably on the mend. I may confess now that I feel relieved of a weighty burden. Last night I hardly slept a wink. I lay awake listening to the pendulum of my clock. It seemed to say He liveshe dies. I fully ex- pected to have it stop suddenly at dies. But it kept going all the morning, and to a decidedly more lively tune. In the afternoon the old mm sent for me. I found him in his great muffled bed, with his face the color of clamp chalk, and his eyes glowing faintly, like torches half-stamped out. I was forcibly struck with the utter loneliness of his lot. For all human attendance, my villainous self grinning at his bedside, and old Robert without, listening, doubtless, at the keyhole. The bon/zomme stared at me stupidly; then seemed to know me, and greeted me with a sickly smile. It was some moments before he was able to speak. At last he faintly bade me to descend into the library, open the secret drawer of the secre- tary (which he contrived to direct me how to do), possess myself of his will, and burn it up. He appears to have forgotten his having removed it, night before last. I told him that I had an insurmountable aversion to any personal dealings with the document. He smiled, patted the back of my hand, and requested me, in that case, to get it, at least, and bring it to him. I couldnt deny him that favor ? No, I couldnt, indeed. I went down to the library, therefore, and on entering the room found Theodore standing by the fireplace with a bundle of papers. The secretary was open. I stood still, looking from the ruptured cabi- net to the documents in his hand. Among them I recognized, by its shape and size, the paper of which I had intended to possess myself. Without delay I walked straight up to him. He looked surprised, but not confused. Im afi-aid I shall have to trouble you, I said, to surrender one of those papers. Surrender, Max? To anything of your own you are perfectly welcome. I didnt know, however, that you made use of Mr. Sloanes secretary. I was look- ing up some notes of my own making, in which I conceive I have a property. This is what I want, Theodore, I said; and I drew the will, unfolded, 66 THE GALAXY. [JULY, from between his hands. As I did so his eyes fell upon the superscription, Last \Vill and Testament. March. F. S. He flushed a splendid furious crimson. Our eyes met. SomehowI dont how or why, or for that matter why notI burst into a violent peal of laughter. Theodore stood staring, with two hot, bitter tears in his eyes. Of course you think, he said, that I came to ferret out that thing. I shrugged my shoulders those of my body only. I confess, morally, I was on my knees with contrition, but there was a fascination in ita fatality. I remembered that in the hurry of my movements, the other evening, I had re- placed the will simply in one of the outer drawers of the cabinet, among Theo- dores own papers; doubtless where he had taken it up. Mr. Sloane sent me for it, I said. Very good, Im glad to hear hes well enough to think of such things. He means to destroy it. I hope, then, he has another made. Mentally, I suppose he has. Unfortunately, his weakness isnt mentalor exclusively so. Oh, hell live to make a dozen more, I said. Do you know the purport of this one ? Theodores color, by this time, had died away into a sombre paleness. He shook his head. The doggedness of the movement provoked me. I wished to arouse his curiosity. I have his commission, I rejoined, to destroy it. Theodore smiled superbly. Its not a task I envy you, he said. I should think notespecially if you knew the import of the will. He stood with folded arms, regarding me with the remote contempt of his rich blue eyes. I couldnt stand it. Come, its your property, I cried. Youre sole legatee. I give it up to you. And I thrust the paper into his hand. He received it mechanically; but after a pause, bethinking himself; he un- folded it and cast his eyes over the contents. Then he slowly refolded it and held it a moment with a tremulous hand. You say that Mr. Sloane directed you to destroy it? he finally asked. I say so. And that you know the contents? Exactly. And that you were about to comply? On the contrary, I declined. Theodore fixed his eyes, for a moment, on the superscription, and then raised them again to my face. Thank you, Max, he said. Youve left me a real satisfaction. He tore the sheet across and threw the bits into the fire. We stood watching them burn. Now he can make another, said Theodore. T~venty others, I replied. No, said Theodore, youll take care of that. Upon my soul, I cried, youre bitter! No, not now. I worked off all my bitterness in these few words. Well, in consideration of that, I excuse them. Just as you please. Ah, said I, theres a little bitterness left ! No, nothing but indifference. Farewell. And he put out his hand. Are you going away? Of course I am. Farewell. Fare~vell, then. But isnt your departure rather sudden ? 1869.] A LIGHT MAN. 67 I ought to have gone three weeks agothree weeks ago. I had t~ken his hand, he pulled it away, covered his face, and suddenly burst into tears. Is tirni indifference? I asked. Its something youll never know, he cried. Its shame Im not sorry you should see it. It ~vill suggest to you, perhaps, that my heart has never been in this filthy contest. Let me assure you, at any rate, that it hasnt ; that it has had nothing but scorn for the base perversion of my pride and my ambition. These tears are tears of joy at their returnthe return of the prodigals! Tears of sorro~vsorrow He was unable to go on. He sank into a chair, burying his face in his hand- kerchief. For Gods sake, Theodore, I said, stick to the joy. He rose to his feet again. Well, he said, it ~vas for your sake that I parted with my self-respect; with your assistance I recover it. How for my sake? For whom but you would I have gone as far as I did? For what other pur- pose than that of keeping our friendship whole would I have borne you company into this narrow pass ? A man whom I loved less I would long since have parted with. You were neededyou and your incomparable giftsto bring me to this. You ennobled, exalted, enchanted the struggle. I did value my pros- pects of coming into Mr. Sloanes property. I valued them for my poor sisters sake, as well as for my own, so long as they were the natural reward of consci- entious service, and not the prize of hypocrisy and cunning. With another man than you I never would have contested such a prize. But I loved you, even as my rival. You played with me, deceived me, betrayed me. I held my ground, hoping and longing to purge you of your error by the touch of your old pledges of affection. I carried them in my heart. For Mr. Sloane, from the moment that, under your magical influence, he revealed his extraordinary foibles, I had nothing but contempt. And for me now? Dont ask me. I dont trust myself. Hate, I suppose. Is that the best you can imagine? Farewell. Is it a serious farewellfarewell forever? How can there be any other? Im sorry that such should be your point of view. Its characteristic. All the more reason then that I should say a word in self-defence. You accuse me of having played with you, deceived you, betrayed you. It seems to me that you re quite off the track. You say you loved me. If so ,you ought to love me still. It wasnt for my virtue; for I never had any, or pretended to any. In any- thing I have done recently, therefore, there has been no inconsistency. I never pretended to love you. I dont understand the word, in the sense you attach to it. I dont understand the feeling, between men. To me, love means quite another thing. You give it a meaning of your own; you enjoy the profit of your invention; its no more than just that you should pay the penalty. Only, it seems to me rather hard that I should pay it. Theodore remained silent; but his brow slowly contracted into an inexorable frown. Is it still a serious fare- well ? I ~vent on. It seems a pity. After this clearing tip, it actually seems to me that I shall be on better terms with you. No man can have a deeper ap- preciation of your excellent faculties, a keener enjoyment of your society, your talk. I should very much regret the loss of them. 68 THE GALAXY. [JULY, Have we, then, all this while, said Theodore, understood each other so little? Dont say we and each other. I think I have understood you. Very likely. Its not for want of my having confessed myself. Well, Theodore, I do you justice. To me youve always been over generous. Try now, and be just. Still he stood silent, with his cold, hard frown. It was plain that, if he was to come back to me, it would be from a vast distance. What he was going to an- swer I know not. The door opened, and Robert appeared, pale, trembling, his eyes starting in his head. I verily believe, gentlemen, he cried, that poor Mr. Sloane is dead in his bed. There was a moments perfect silence. Amen, said I. Yes, Theodore, try and be just. Mr. Sloane had quietly died in my absence. 24thTheodore went up to town this morning, having shaken hands with me in silence before he started. Doctor Jones, and Brookes the attorney, have been very officious; and, by their advice, I have telegraphed to a certain Miss Meredith, a maiden lady, by their account the nearest of kin; or, in other words, simply a discarded half-niece of the defunct. She telegraphs back that she will arrive in person for the funeral. I shall remain till she comes. I have lost a fortune; but have I irretrievably lost a friend? Im sure I cant say. HENRY JAMES, JR. MATINS. R IC HARD, the Lion-hearted, Parting for Palestine, In lone St. Marys Abbey, Knelt at Our Ladys shrine And begged that the Abbots blessing, And the monks prevailing prayer, Might follow him over the waters, And the deserts hot and bare. God be praised! quoth the Abbot, By Holy Rood I swear That at matins and sext and compline, Through the churchs sacred air, Petitions shall rise to Heaven That the wave and the shore may be Safe for our Sovereign, Richard, Till Conqueror home comes he! The moon of another April Shone on the Eastern sea; And sailing by rocky Cyprus, The Holy Land to free, Were the King and his Norman nobles When out of the South there blew The blast of the dread sirocco And away the good ship flew! Into the blinding darkness, Into the howling storm, While the salt spray wreathed before her A beckoning, demon form.

68 THE GALAXY. [JULY, Have we, then, all this while, said Theodore, understood each other so little? Dont say we and each other. I think I have understood you. Very likely. Its not for want of my having confessed myself. Well, Theodore, I do you justice. To me youve always been over generous. Try now, and be just. Still he stood silent, with his cold, hard frown. It was plain that, if he was to come back to me, it would be from a vast distance. What he was going to an- swer I know not. The door opened, and Robert appeared, pale, trembling, his eyes starting in his head. I verily believe, gentlemen, he cried, that poor Mr. Sloane is dead in his bed. There was a moments perfect silence. Amen, said I. Yes, Theodore, try and be just. Mr. Sloane had quietly died in my absence. 24thTheodore went up to town this morning, having shaken hands with me in silence before he started. Doctor Jones, and Brookes the attorney, have been very officious; and, by their advice, I have telegraphed to a certain Miss Meredith, a maiden lady, by their account the nearest of kin; or, in other words, simply a discarded half-niece of the defunct. She telegraphs back that she will arrive in person for the funeral. I shall remain till she comes. I have lost a fortune; but have I irretrievably lost a friend? Im sure I cant say. HENRY JAMES, JR. MATINS. R IC HARD, the Lion-hearted, Parting for Palestine, In lone St. Marys Abbey, Knelt at Our Ladys shrine And begged that the Abbots blessing, And the monks prevailing prayer, Might follow him over the waters, And the deserts hot and bare. God be praised! quoth the Abbot, By Holy Rood I swear That at matins and sext and compline, Through the churchs sacred air, Petitions shall rise to Heaven That the wave and the shore may be Safe for our Sovereign, Richard, Till Conqueror home comes he! The moon of another April Shone on the Eastern sea; And sailing by rocky Cyprus, The Holy Land to free, Were the King and his Norman nobles When out of the South there blew The blast of the dread sirocco And away the good ship flew! Into the blinding darkness, Into the howling storm, While the salt spray wreathed before her A beckoning, demon form. 1869.) MATINS. \fary, have mercy! the sailors Shrieked as the masts went down; Bitter is death, sighed the nobles, So near to our glorys crown! Leaning over the bulwarks, Richard risen from rest, With his white brow bared to the tempest, And his blue eyes turned to the West, Cried, in a voice of anguish That rung oer the foaming sea, ~ God it were time for matins, And the grey monks prayed for me! Meanwhile, on the fields of England The dew distilled its balm, And the lone Cistercian Abbey Slept in the midnight calm Till the moon had passed the zenith, And the watch of morning fell, When, over the wood and the moorland, Rung clear the matin bell. Then, through the silent cloisters, And under the arches dim, Abbot, and monk, and friar, Chanting a solemn hymn (While the flame of the stone-hewn cressets Flared with its rise and fall, And the Virgin smiled serenely From her niche in the lofty wall), Entered the aisle to the altar, And knelt with the fervent prayer That still, for thcir Sovereign, Richard, The winds might he soft and fair. Bless him, 0 Lord, quoth the Abbot, And bring him in peace again With the sign of our faith triumphant! And the monks said low, Amen! That moment, over the tempest, A lull stole out of the West, And the ship rocked, light as a sea-bird Asleep on the oceans breast. Lord of my life, cried Richard, Thine shall the glory Le! I know tis the hour for matins, And the grey monks pray for me! happy were we, still sailing, Some blessed shore to gain, If Abbot and holy brother Yearned for our souls in pain. But ever the wild storm rages, And our cry is lost in the sea Would God it were time for matins, And the grey monks prayed for me! EDNA DEAN Pitoc-roL OUR GREAT FARMERS. THE POULTRY LOVERS. To eat is the greatest and most universal pleasure of life, if not the most intense. All mankind enjoy this great pleasure three times a day their lives through, and indeed without it life would not be possible. It is a pleas- ure,therefore, which may be termed vital and cardinalessential to human life and society. Philosophers, therefore, will not despise it ; and while not becom- ing gluttonous, let us remember an expression of the Bible, to enjoy the fruits of the earth. Of these fruits of the earth which we are to enjoy, of all the myriad things, the one which conveys the most supreme and widespread pleas- ure, is a young, tender and succulent chicken, properly broiled, in the early days of June, sitting at your own table with open windows, and in the midst of a small and appreciable circle of family and friends. This is a pleasure, indeed, confined to no clime, creed, or nation, but is common alike to the peer and the cottager, to the savage and the civilized man. If, therefore, to eat be indeed the greatest and most universal pleasure of existence, and if, of all the things to eat the chicken be the most admirable, then I say let us stand by the poultry, and make much of it. I sing, therefore, not of arms, as Virgil did, but of the chicken and his delights. I sing not of fame but of feathers, not of glory but of grace, not of brains but of breast, not of generals but of game-cocks, not of princesses but of pullets. I glory then in Dorkings not Dickens, in Cochins not Confucius, in Brahmas not bishops, in Polands not politicians. For while these may be mitigated blessings, those are unmistakable goods. All hail then to the cock that crows in the morn ! All hail to the hen who lays the matutinal egg ! All hail to the chicken who offers himself a delicious sacrifice on the household shrine Thou art small and weak, and in deed most foolish, thou cackling hen; but in thy own way most beautiful and good. An idea never entered thy small brain, but into thy mouth what myriads of bugs and worms ! And with what indefatigable assiduity dost thou convert these and all kinds of black and wasting things into beautiful white eggs and delicious white meat ! I bless and praise thee, thou small bird, and through thee I magnify him that created thee for the delectation of man! I praise God and proceed. My title seems to demand that I should introduce the great Poultry Farmers, as well as the Horse Growers and Milk Makers. Are there any great poultry farmers? The answer must benone, or almost none, so far as I can discover, in America or in Europe. In Egypt they may possibly exist, for there it has been and is the practice to produce chickens by artificial hatching by the thou- sand. But we are interested in what is done or may be done here. What may be done here is only shadowed forth by what is done elsewhere. In France there is an annual production of poultry food to the amount of some two hun- dred and fifty million of francs, while with us the annual product is estimated at about double that sum. But there as well as here, nearly all the poultry pro- ducedand their eggsare accidental or subordinate to other branches of farm- ing; a few hens, more or less, being kept on every farm, which are cared for, if at all, without system, and without a clear eye to results or profit. They do as well as they can, no doubt, but in many cases do badly. So much uncertainty hangs about it that some farmers, and some who have examined the matter, as-

OUR GREAT FARMERS. THE POULTRY LOVERS. To eat is the greatest and most universal pleasure of life, if not the most intense. All mankind enjoy this great pleasure three times a day their lives through, and indeed without it life would not be possible. It is a pleas- ure,therefore, which may be termed vital and cardinalessential to human life and society. Philosophers, therefore, will not despise it ; and while not becom- ing gluttonous, let us remember an expression of the Bible, to enjoy the fruits of the earth. Of these fruits of the earth which we are to enjoy, of all the myriad things, the one which conveys the most supreme and widespread pleas- ure, is a young, tender and succulent chicken, properly broiled, in the early days of June, sitting at your own table with open windows, and in the midst of a small and appreciable circle of family and friends. This is a pleasure, indeed, confined to no clime, creed, or nation, but is common alike to the peer and the cottager, to the savage and the civilized man. If, therefore, to eat be indeed the greatest and most universal pleasure of existence, and if, of all the things to eat the chicken be the most admirable, then I say let us stand by the poultry, and make much of it. I sing, therefore, not of arms, as Virgil did, but of the chicken and his delights. I sing not of fame but of feathers, not of glory but of grace, not of brains but of breast, not of generals but of game-cocks, not of princesses but of pullets. I glory then in Dorkings not Dickens, in Cochins not Confucius, in Brahmas not bishops, in Polands not politicians. For while these may be mitigated blessings, those are unmistakable goods. All hail then to the cock that crows in the morn ! All hail to the hen who lays the matutinal egg ! All hail to the chicken who offers himself a delicious sacrifice on the household shrine Thou art small and weak, and in deed most foolish, thou cackling hen; but in thy own way most beautiful and good. An idea never entered thy small brain, but into thy mouth what myriads of bugs and worms ! And with what indefatigable assiduity dost thou convert these and all kinds of black and wasting things into beautiful white eggs and delicious white meat ! I bless and praise thee, thou small bird, and through thee I magnify him that created thee for the delectation of man! I praise God and proceed. My title seems to demand that I should introduce the great Poultry Farmers, as well as the Horse Growers and Milk Makers. Are there any great poultry farmers? The answer must benone, or almost none, so far as I can discover, in America or in Europe. In Egypt they may possibly exist, for there it has been and is the practice to produce chickens by artificial hatching by the thou- sand. But we are interested in what is done or may be done here. What may be done here is only shadowed forth by what is done elsewhere. In France there is an annual production of poultry food to the amount of some two hun- dred and fifty million of francs, while with us the annual product is estimated at about double that sum. But there as well as here, nearly all the poultry pro- ducedand their eggsare accidental or subordinate to other branches of farm- ing; a few hens, more or less, being kept on every farm, which are cared for, if at all, without system, and without a clear eye to results or profit. They do as well as they can, no doubt, but in many cases do badly. So much uncertainty hangs about it that some farmers, and some who have examined the matter, as-

OUR GREAT FARMERS. THE POULTRY LOVERS. To eat is the greatest and most universal pleasure of life, if not the most intense. All mankind enjoy this great pleasure three times a day their lives through, and indeed without it life would not be possible. It is a pleas- ure,therefore, which may be termed vital and cardinalessential to human life and society. Philosophers, therefore, will not despise it ; and while not becom- ing gluttonous, let us remember an expression of the Bible, to enjoy the fruits of the earth. Of these fruits of the earth which we are to enjoy, of all the myriad things, the one which conveys the most supreme and widespread pleas- ure, is a young, tender and succulent chicken, properly broiled, in the early days of June, sitting at your own table with open windows, and in the midst of a small and appreciable circle of family and friends. This is a pleasure, indeed, confined to no clime, creed, or nation, but is common alike to the peer and the cottager, to the savage and the civilized man. If, therefore, to eat be indeed the greatest and most universal pleasure of existence, and if, of all the things to eat the chicken be the most admirable, then I say let us stand by the poultry, and make much of it. I sing, therefore, not of arms, as Virgil did, but of the chicken and his delights. I sing not of fame but of feathers, not of glory but of grace, not of brains but of breast, not of generals but of game-cocks, not of princesses but of pullets. I glory then in Dorkings not Dickens, in Cochins not Confucius, in Brahmas not bishops, in Polands not politicians. For while these may be mitigated blessings, those are unmistakable goods. All hail then to the cock that crows in the morn ! All hail to the hen who lays the matutinal egg ! All hail to the chicken who offers himself a delicious sacrifice on the household shrine Thou art small and weak, and in deed most foolish, thou cackling hen; but in thy own way most beautiful and good. An idea never entered thy small brain, but into thy mouth what myriads of bugs and worms ! And with what indefatigable assiduity dost thou convert these and all kinds of black and wasting things into beautiful white eggs and delicious white meat ! I bless and praise thee, thou small bird, and through thee I magnify him that created thee for the delectation of man! I praise God and proceed. My title seems to demand that I should introduce the great Poultry Farmers, as well as the Horse Growers and Milk Makers. Are there any great poultry farmers? The answer must benone, or almost none, so far as I can discover, in America or in Europe. In Egypt they may possibly exist, for there it has been and is the practice to produce chickens by artificial hatching by the thou- sand. But we are interested in what is done or may be done here. What may be done here is only shadowed forth by what is done elsewhere. In France there is an annual production of poultry food to the amount of some two hun- dred and fifty million of francs, while with us the annual product is estimated at about double that sum. But there as well as here, nearly all the poultry pro- ducedand their eggsare accidental or subordinate to other branches of farm- ing; a few hens, more or less, being kept on every farm, which are cared for, if at all, without system, and without a clear eye to results or profit. They do as well as they can, no doubt, but in many cases do badly. So much uncertainty hangs about it that some farmers, and some who have examined the matter, as- 1869.] OUR GREAT FARMERS. 7 sert roundly that it cannot be made a great business, and that hens cannot be kept and raised in large numbersby the thousand ; that twenty may do well, but two or twenty thousand will not. It must be admitted that the fact that no one has ever kept ten thousand hens together on a farm in countries like this and France, where men are eager to make money, is strongly in favor of the theory above stated. Let us see into this a little, and try to solve it by a con- sideration of JrI;zcz~?es rather than by a review of an experience which, as a rule, has been most limited, imperfect and careless. XVhat does animal life need to secure growth and health ? Clearly good air, good food, and sufficient exercise. There may be some animals so wild that domestication is impracticable, but in almost all cases it is not so. Even the lion, the tiger, and the leopard are and have long been domesticated; and badly as it has been done, it has proved practicable. It has been found not only practicable but profitable, to keep cows and cattle in stalls, in a state of health and growth. It is a fact also, that men kept in a good prison, such as the Peni- tentiary at Columbus, Ohio, are healthier than when left to their own sweet wills. Why is this ? Simply that they are cut off from noxious articles; are forbidden reckless or careless exposure; are secured good food, good ventila- tion and good exercise, at regular times, and thus are kept in a condition of re- markable sanity. A curious commentary this is, indeed, upon our idea of per- fect liherty ; better to be in a jail than to be a dyspeptic Apply these principles to the case of poultry or of any animals, and I do not doubt the same resultperfect success. It is unquestionably true that a dozen or twenty fowls can be kept upon any farm in a healthy and productive state; antI in ninety-nine to the hundred cases they maintain health in spite of bad and irregular feeding, of dirty houses, and of a careless treatment which is sim- ply ridiculous or exasperating. I venture to say that not on one farm of the hundred in all these United States, are fowls fed at regular times, with any re- gard to change of food ; nor are they provided ~vith comfortable houses in cold weather, nor are those houses cleaned out from years end to years end, nor are they whitewashed, nor are any precautions taken against lice, nor is clean water provided; indeed, they have been handled preposterously, and yet they have produced to this nation something like a million of dollars of yearly wealth If they have done this in spite of ignorance and neglect, what may they not do if knowledge and care can be applied to them? This is one of the most inter- esting questions of all farming at the present day. Bad ventilation and cold wet weather, I assume to be the causes of nearly all the diseases to which fo~vls are subject. A dozen hens may manage to thrive in a dirty fowl-house; but if fifty or a hundred are huddled into the same house they will die od, because the air becomes insupportable; hence the notion that large numbers will not do well together. Now the fact that a thousand hens kept in such a filthy way die off, does not prove that a thousand hens will not do well if kept in a decent way, any more than the fact that a tenement house in New York, being clisas trous to life, proves that men will not thrive penned up by the thousand in the Ohio Penitentiary. The truth is they do thrive ~vhen so cared for, and the truth also is, that hens by the thousand will also thrive if kept in the same way. They do not require the universe for a range; they need a clean and well ventilated house, a small yard for a range, good and varied food, and then they will thrive. I state my belief that any good, practicable man who goes to making eggs and poultry as a business, can, on ten acres of land, make more money by it than he can make in raising cattle, sheep or pigs. But he 72 THE GALAXY. [JULY, must do it ~vell and see to it himself. I believe further, that five thousand hens can be kept in a state of health on ten acres of land, and that they xviii pay at market prices a net profit per hen of one dollar, or five thousand dollars per year. I believe that this may be not only a profitable business, but a respecta- ble one and a pleasant one. And yet I cannot discover in the history of this world that any one has ever done it. Now, at this present writing our women are mad for work (so they say), are eager to test their powers out of the ball- room; here, then, is a sphere, and here they can not only find work but make money. Oh, that God would move their hearts, and strengthen their hands to take hold of this matter, and leave the business of voting to future agessuch is my devout prayer; for I have more faith in a pullet than a ballot to assuage the evils of life, and a fresh egg is more consoling to the inward aspiration than a wild and windy speechmuch. As no woman, ho~vever, has been known to take the advice of any man, I must be content that my wheat shall fall on barren and stony ground; and proceed humbly, if not hopefully. I have tried to discover a great poultry farmer in Bucks County, Pa., whence such great quantities of good birds come, and cannot find that there is one who does it largely as a business. Mr. Geyelin, an English engineer, in the interest of a company, visited France in x866 or 67, to discover the great poultry grow- ers there, and failed to find one. He had heard of a Mr. Soras, near Paris, who fed thousands of fowls on horse meat, and made $70,000 per year out of it; but there was no such man in all France. He then visited the districts where the Houdan, Cr~vecceur, and La Fleche fowls are raised; there he did dis- cover some subdivisions of the business, and some attempts at a large and wholesale production. In this way: He found men engaged in the trade of cou- vrers, or hatchers, who hatched for farmers or for themselves, selling the young chicks at from threepence to sixpence each, according to the season. The hatch- ing rooms were kept dark, and at an even temperature, and the hatchers were live turkeys. He says, At any time of year, turkeys, whether broody or not, are taught to hatch in the following manner: Some addled eggs are emptied, then filled with plaster of Paris, then placed in a nest; after xvhich, a turkey is fetched from the yard and placed on the eggs, and covered over with lattice for the first forty-eight hours, she will endeavor to get out of her confinement, but soon becomes reconciled to it, when fresh eggs are substituted for the plaster of Paris ones; they will then continue to hatch without intermission from three to six months, and even longer the chickens being withdrawn as soon as as hatched, and fresh eggs substituted. After the third day the eggs are exam- ined, and the clear eggs withd ra~vn, which are then sold in the market for new- laid, etc. The turkeys are taken off once a day to be fed, and to have the nests cleaned. After they have been sitting for a long time they will not feed them- selves, but must be crammed. He found one hatcher who employed from sixty to one hundred turkeys in this way. When a turkey shows signs of getting tired of sitting, they give her a glass of wine in the evening, and put under her some chickens in place of the eggs; when she recovers from her inebriation, she ac- cepts her new vocation and leads her chicks about with great care and just pride. He found their system of feeding most judicious, the food being composed of bran, buckwheat or barley, or oatmeal, usually mixednever the whole grain; and when the chickens have not the run of fields, some green food, such as chopped cabbage, and some meat are given. Buckwheat they found the best food for pro- ducing eggs. The fattening is a distinct business, and is done by cramming with liquid food. At the kiihng and dressing they are most expert. The fowl is 1869.] OUR GREAT FARMERS. 73 bled in the back of the mouth, and is at once stripped of the feathers, which are assorted. A man kills and plucks at the rate of one fowl a minute, at a cost of one to one and a half cents each. They are dry-picked, of course. Three-quar- ters of the poultry which come to our markets is damaged three to five cents a pound, by being picked and dressed so badly. While upon this branch, let me state what Mr. Geyelin learned as to the French fowls now being introduced to usthe Houdan, Cr~vecceur, and La Fleche. All of them are difficult to procure pure, for the breeds are there much mixed. The Houdan is black and white spangled, has a crest, triple comb, and whiskers and beards. They are good layers, bad sitters, and are excellent for the table, weighing from seven to eight pounds at maturity. The Cr~vec~urs are black, the cocks have a peculiar horned crest. They are good layers and of large eggs, and the chickens mature early. The La Fleche are jet black, with plumage which lies close to the hod)~. They are heavier than either of the two others, and much handsomer. They are good layers, have fine flesh, but are slow in arriving at maturity; weigh from eight to ten pounds. All these are valuable as non-sitters, and are being tried here. My exami- nation leads to the belief that the Cr~vecceurs are delicate and may not stand our climate well. But none of them have, as yet, been fully tested. The two largest producers of eggs and poultry I have been able to discover, are Leland of Rye, and McIntosh of Worcester. Each keeps fowls by the hun- dred, and produces chickens and eggs by the thousand; but their purposes and methods are entirely different. Lelands plan is to keep close to nature, to give his fowls great range, plenty of liberty, and to trust to their own instincts. Of course he can keep but one variety or he must keep mixed breeds. Tie keeps but one variety, and that the Brabma. He gets many eggs, but believes his greatest profit is in raising chickens ; he expects to have one brood from each of his three hundred hens; they may thus count some three thousand a year. He states that the eggs will pay for the keep, and the chickens are profit, and he asserts that he can make a thousand pounds of poultry cheaper than a thou- sand pounds of beef or pork. Why not? What is the secret of his success ? He employs a competent man to devote his whole time to them. This man sees that they are fed properly, watered properly, that the chicks do not get wet, that the houses are carefully cleaned at least once a week, and that diseased fowls, if any, are removed. He has two great houses for them, which are somewhat warmed in winter, and then his early spring chickens give him plenty of eggs. These houses are whitewashed from time to time, ashes and dry dirt are provided for the hens to wash themselves, and the fowls have a range of some fifteen acres of broken ground. They seem to prefer to be out even in cold weather, unless it is very stormy. H~ changes the cocks every spring, and by attention to cleanliness keeps up his stock, strong and healthy. For some eight years Mr. Leland has been at this, and although he has kept no accurate account, he is, himself, sure that the business, done as he does it and in even a larger way, is hi~hly profitable. Observe that the fowls are not closely confined, so that fresh air and plenty of it is secured out of doors; by cleanliness it is also secured indoors; no nest is used long with- out being emptied and washed, thus lice are avoided; and then by regularity of feeding he secures strength and health, and in the end a good profit. Mr. McIntoshs s)-stem is quite the reverse of this. As he breeds some forty or fifty varieties of domestic fowl, which must be kept separate to insure 74 THE GALAXY. [JULY, purity of blood, it is absolutely necessary that each variety should be penned up and kept in a restricted range. He breeds fancy fowls of the finer kinds, and does not make poultry for the market as Mr. Leland does. it is thus quite another kind of business. How does he secure purity of blood and health to his large stock? Four houses, one hundred feet long, face the south. The in- terior is divided by wire netting into pens about six feet by eight, each of which is sunned by a good window, and out of which the hens have a run into a small yard. The floor of these houses is covered with fine gravel, the perches are but two feet high, and the droppings from these are raked away every morning; ventilation is attended to, and the fowls are thus provided with good air in their houses. A box two feet square is kept in each pen, filled with ashes and sul- phur, in which the hens ~vash and wallow, and thus secure themselves against lice and skin diseases. To each of these pens a cock and some eight hens is allotted. Mr. McIntosh informed me that when he kept t~venty hens in this space they became diseased, but since he had reduced the number to about eight he had had no trouble. The stock appeared healthy and sprightly. The hens need not be confined to these small yards beyond the season when the eggs are to be used for hatching. But it must be understood that you cannot be absolutely sure of purity of breed, if the hens are allowed ever to run with cocks of other breeds. The careful breeder, therefore, will keep the hens strictly with cocks of their own kind, and thus secure purity. It is also im- portant that there should be one cock to about eight hens to insure strong chicks; and that the cocks should be changed every year. To improve breeds these things are imperative. It must also be understood that these yards must be kept sweet by having the top spaded up from time to time, and by sprinkling with lime or plaster. Whenever men or animals are kept for a long time on the same piece of ground, the sensible and insensible sloughings will produce disease, unless the effect is counteracted by great cleanliness or by some other means. A gre at city thus becomes inevitably a source of disease to men as a foul yard or house does to other animals. As to profit, Mr. Mcintosh says, I kept one hundred and twenty hens one year, commenced January i, i866, to January i, 1867, and found each hen had given me ~7, besides her keep through this year, selling eggs throuo-h the hatch- ing season for $2 53 per dozen. The stock consisted of Golden hamburg, Black Spanish, Sicilian, Black Poland, Golden Poland, Grey Dorking, White Dorking, Brown Leghorn, White Leghorn, Duckwing Game and Blackbreasted Red Game. I had a lady to care for them, and never used to look after them or feed them in the least. The cost was about $x 65, all told. Mr. McIntosh has no doubt he can keep a thousand hens under the same roof in health. So much as to the question of keeping fowls in large numbers. As to l)rices, it is of course not to be expected that these fancy prices can be got for indefinite quantities of eggs or chickens, but it is, and always will be true, that whoever takes pains to have the best breeds, and of pure blood, can com- mand large prices, which will al~vays be remunerative. The prices of the very best breeds are now high, ranging from six to twenty dollars per pair, ~vith a very considerable demand ; so that breeders of established character are able to sell all their stock. The finest imported fowls sell at from fifty to one hundred dollars the pair, and some prize fowls have recently been sold in England at three hundred dollars the trio. The prices of eggs for these fine van eties range from two dollars and a half to twelve dollars the dozen. 1869.] OUR GREAT FARMERS. At these prices, of course, no great business can be done and continued, and we need not base our calculations upon them as a permanency; but for a long time to come, with the growing taste and recognized pecuniary advantages of pure breed fowls, we may expect much more than mere market or meat prices. And what are the profits of these last? There are hundreds of statements on record showing the profit of fowls kept in a small way; but I will only quote two, one that of a neighbor who has kept accurate accounts. He states: Cost of feed, seventy five fowls, one year - - - $soo Eggs collected, 5,141. These were not sold; but if we count them at three cents each, it will he - $s5~ 23 The second statement is from the page of the Rural New Yorker, as follows: I herewith send y~u my account with my poultry-yard for the year ending February ist. I commenced with thirty hens: Gatlsered four hundred and thirty-five dozen eggs, which, at tlse average market price, 24 cents, amounts to - - $104 40 Fowls sold - - - - - - - - - 26 oo Twenty-five fowls kijled for family use, at fifty cents each - - as 50 Increase of fowls on baud - - - - - - 37 00 Amounting to - $179 90 Deducting cost of feed (z6 bushels of corn, at $e 25) - - 32 to Leaves clear profit - - - - - - $147 40 My actual profits vary somewhat from the above figures, as I advertised and sold some eggs for setting, at higher rates. My fowls are pure Silver Plseasants. I claim that the mauure, if saved and properly applied to tlse corn field, iucrea~es the crop sufficiently to feed the fowls. It- will be observed that the cost of keeping a fowl is, in round figures, about one dollar a year. Now, as to the profits of making eggs or chickens, there are different views. Mr. Leland has no doubt that he makes most by chickenshe brings them in early, is near a city, and commands high prices. From 250 hens he proposes to have, at least, one brood a year each; suppose they average ten to eacla (and they can be made to) it reaches 2,500, which will reach two pounds each at the end of two months and a half. Each hen will thus produce from five to ten dollars, according to the price of spring chickens. As to egg production, I find, in Mr. Geyelins work, the following statement: That the ovarium of a fowl contains above 6oo eggs, and that she lays them in this way: First year x~ to 20 Fourth year 100 to 115 Seventh year - 35 to 40 Second year aoo to 120 Fifth year - 6o to So Eighth year - - a~ to 20 Third year - 120 to 135 Sixth year ~o to 6o Ninth year - . a to so The second, third and fourth years only, are the profitable ones for eggs. In those years there is clearly a profit of over one dollar from each hen, and near a market it may reach two dollars. Against the profit of chicken raising is to be counted the food for the chicks for the two and a half months. There is no doubt that the hatching by means of turkeys, as before described, is most profitable; the hens being kept at laying. The only question which comes in here is, whether it is not injurious to the hen, and cruel, too; whether, indeed, she is not entitled to the pleasure of scratching for her brood, and perfecting her nature by maternity. Hens, I take it, have rights, and if this be not one of them, what is ? But I believe the law of human society is to do whatever will produce mo6t profit, even to the sacrifice of hen or of human nature. If this be so, hens must be sacrificed and must be made to lay eggs, even to the tramplin~ of t,heir ri~hti uz~iler foot. They must go into another state of existence, with- 76 THE GALAXY. [JULY, out having reached their possible here. Thus it is too hens but human. , , with most who are not Ari~ficial IZatc~h~ng.We come now to another branch of the subject; and there is nothing new under the sun. From the days of Father Abraham the Egyptians have hatched eggs in ovens by artificial heat, and they do so to this day. The purpose, of course, is an economical oneto produce chicks from the eggs without the sitting of the mother. Ovens some eleven feet square and nine feet high, are built of bricks, in which the eggs are placed and kept close; are heated by lamps to the temperature of 36 to 83 degrees. After six days they are examined, by being placed to the eye in a strong light, and the clear eggs are removed, those being left which show that the germ is vitalized. They are placed on mats, and are moved and turned often, and are hatched out at the end of from eighteen to twenty-one days. Great quantities of eggs are collected from the surrounding farmers by the oven proprietors, who receive one-half for their work; about two-thirds of the eggs produce chicks. This hatching extends from February 24th to April 24th. Many machines for hatching with artificial heat have been contrived, both here and in Europe; and it seems that most of them have proved successful, producing from seventy to ei~hty chicks from one hundred eggs. On eof the 5ilflplest forms may be thus described: It is provided with a lamp, a tin tank or pan for water, in which is placed the vessel, partly filled with sand, to receive the eggs. The top and bottom of the box are perforated, to allow air to enter and escape. The conditions necessary are, first, a regular and steady temperature of about 102 degrees ; ~ and, second, a moist atmosphere, which the water secures. Some hold that the heat should be above the eggs, and not below; but either method seems to have done the work. XVhoever will give the necessary attention to the matter of temperature can hatch eggs artificially, though probably not so profitably as with turkeys. The greatest difficulty is in raising the chicks after they leave the shell. They must be kept warm. The artificial mother is an inclined board lined with sheep- skin, under which the chicks can nestle, and which seems to answer every end; of course, they must be kept for a while in a warmed room, whose heat must be near that of the heat of the mothers body. The usual method with good managers ~vho hatch in the natural way is to bring off three or four broods the same day, and give all the chicks to one hen, who contrives to take good care of them. In France, as before stated, the sitting turkeys are put to this work of nurs- ing mothers, and do it ~ve~l. The hatching and raising of chicks by artificial means has been demonstrated; but it has not yet been proved that it can be done economically and as a business. Mr. Geyelin believes he can do it as a business, and I understand he is now test- ing it in England, where the consumption of both eggs and poultry is immense. It has been a saying, Hens time isnt worth much; but it is worth one hundred millions of dollars a year here; so that axiom of history is disposed of. The hens time is so valuable as an egg producer that all these inventions have grown out of that fact. Now, mans ingenuity has been able to produce the chicken by artificial means; but never the egg: the bird alone can do that. And what a marvellous thing it is! Out of bugs and worms, and garbage and seeds, and what it can pick and scratch from the waste of Natures laboratory, the hen produces the fair white egg, one of the most delicious morsels to the human palate, one which fills the heart of man with loving kindness. Con- The temperature of the hen is about soS degreus. 1869.] OUR GREAT FARMERS. 77 demned to everlasting redemption must he be who rises from his breakfast of two fresh eggs without a placated stom~ch and an expanded soul. And the good hen makes not one egg, but one hundred or more in the year, and at times one each day. Is she not a wonderful little creature to do this? The ovary which contains the small yellow yolks, in which is contained the germ of the chick, when sufficiently developed, passes into the oviduct; here the albu- men, secreted by this oviduct, rapidly envelops it in a glairy fluid, called the white, in the centre of which is suspended the yolk; the whole is inclosed by a thin parchment-like layer, and around all is the hard, calcareous shell. Now that all this (or nearly all) can be done in twenty-four hours, and that black, unsightly food can be transmuted into this wonderful delicacy, is almost a miracleincredi- Me; but the good hen does it. Base is the wight who laughs at hensbase and ungrateful! Give no more fresh eggs to him! As to evils, the main dangers are from roup and lice. Many resolve all dis- eases into roup, which is a sort of cold or consumption; and is attributed to bad air, and cold, wet houses. It seems contagious or infectious, and will often sweep off whole flocks. It should be prevented by good air and good care. But if it appears, remove the affected birds at once, and kill them. Lice will not appear in houses which are kept clean; and if the birds are allowed plenty of dry ashes and sulphur in which to ~vash themselves they will keep themselves free. One of the very best preventives to lice is to make the bottom of the nests with tobacco stems, ~vhich is offensive, of course, to all vermin. Familiarity breeds contempt, used to be written in our copy-books. It may be true as to mankind, it is not true as to hen-kind. Of them, the more we know, the better we like them; and the more they know of us the more eggs they will lay for us. This is shown in that the hens of the poor Irishwoman, which roost on her chair, and warm themselves by her firewhich talk ~vith her familiarlyare given to laying daily eggs, when neglected liens are likely to be barren. What variety shall you keep? It is a serious question; but if you cannot suit yourself from among the more than a hundred varieties of domestic poultry, you are hard to please. If you wish to make eggs alone, you ~vill choose from amon6 the non-sitters, such as the Leghorns, the Black Spanish, the Sicilians; if for eggs and the table, the French fowls are recommended, the Houdan, Crave- c~ur, and La Fleche. If you propose to yourself eggs, meat and chickens, you may choose from the Brahmas and Cochins; if beautyand fancy combine with your love for eggs, the crested Polands have claims; if you want beauty and are bent on cockfighting, the game fowls ~vill meet your wants; and there are some who assert that the Dominiques and the Dorkings cannot be surpassed. The Dorking has long been a favorite variety, and some hold it to be the one which Justice Shallow offered for the delectation of his guests long, long ago. As an indication of the popular estimation, or at least of the prevailing taste, the fol- lowing report of the coops of each represented at the late show at Worcester may serve: l3rahmas, 41 entries; Spanish, 26; Game, 23; Bantams, 20; Leg- horns, 17; Hamburgs, 17; Dorkings, 12; Cr~vecccur, 12; Cochin China, ii Polands, io; Dominique, a; Houdans, 8; La Fleche, 3; miscellaneous, 23; ducks, lo; geese, ~ turkeys, 7; pigeons, 36; rabbits, 3. It will be noticed that the Brahma leads o11 and the light variety, not the dark, is the one now in general use. The dark Brahma some hold to be the coming fowl. Both are handsome, both hardy, both good for eggs and for the 78 THE GALAXY. [JULY, table, and both are gentle. As winter layers this variety stands high, and its friends say it is good for everything. But I find even the Brabma is not perfect; for H., in the Rural New Yorker, March 6th, says roundly: The Brahmas are splendid winter layers. In summer they are not worth shucks. They are forever wanting to sit. They will sit anywhere and at all times. You break them up, or think you do, and they will lay from half a dozen to a dozen eggs and sit again. Take them off the nest and pen them up alone, and down they will squat on the floor and sit there, apparently as well contented as if on a neat full of eggs. The second assertion, that their eggs average larger and richer than those of any other breed, we deny jeg tote. The Black Spanish are far ahead on both points, and else Cr~vecvurs and Itoudans are as much iirther ahead of the Spanish. There are no fowls in the world that will lay a greater weight of eggs in the year than the Houdans, and the Cr~vec~urs are nearly if not quite their equals in tlsis respect. For rich- ness nothing will equal a Crkvecceur egg. They are the n~ p/ac ultra of excellence. But no variety of fowl has ever come so rapidly and so surely into favor as this. Where it came from is a mystery, and will most likely remain so. It ap- peared first in New York, about 1850, having been purchased from a sailor, who reported that he brought the birds from Asia; and there is some testimony to support the claim that they caine from the banks of the Brabmapootra River. From this country there were sent to England, where they have grown into great favor, and are widely spread. Some of the English say they are a Yankee in- vention, which they beg of us to repeat. Burnham, who was great in the days of the hen fever, says they are nothing but grey Shanghais ; but he is alone in his opinion. That they are a distinct variety, perpetuating themselves, is generally admitted. There is certainly a general likeness among the Shang- hais, Cochin Chinas, and Brabmas, and some hold that they are but varieties of one and the same Asiatic stock. Let the dispute stand unsettled. Bement sums up: \Vhat are they then? They are Brahmas, large, heavy birds, sym- metrical, prolific, and hardy; living where Shanghais would starve; growing in frost and snow when hatched in winter months: and without seeking to christen a mania, they are standing on their own merits with the conviction they will deserve well of the public. The hens are certainly very handsome birds, being a clear, creamy white, marked with black pencillings on the neck, and ~vith some black in the tail. The light Brahmas are certainly beautiful in contrast with the green of the lawn, and in this respect are more attractive than the dark Brab- mas. The chicks mature early, and when full-grown these fowls will often reach to twenty to twenty-four pounds the pair. But it is not true that a fowl of ten pounds can be raised as cheaply as one of five; this is a mistake that many make. From nothing comes nothing, and ten pounds requires more food than five pounds does. XVe may say a word here about feeding. A gill of grain a day is considered a fair allo~vance; some, of course, eat more, some less. Those which have free range of pastures and fields require less. But it is well to change their food from day to day. Feeding-troughs and boxes are done away with among the best farmers, and the food is sown on the surface so that the fowls run for it, and work for it; thus securing a degree of exercise. In winter boiled potatoes are found useful, and raw cabbage and turnips are agreeable and healthful. Chopped onions, too, they enjoy, but they are apt to impart a flavor to the eggs. Fresh water is indispensable daily. As preventives of disease and promoters of health, it has been found desir- able to supply fowls with three things: First, lime water; which is prepared by simply pouring water upon quicklime, and when cool pouring into a trough for the fowls. Second and third, oxide and sulphate of iron. These can be bought at the shops, but may be made, by pouring over old nails or bits of iron some 1369.] OUR GREAT FARMERS. 79 sulphuric acid diluted with waterthe liquid will be converted to sulphate of iron. The oxide or rust may be made by mixing diluted soda with the sulphate of iron; the liquid thus formed, as well as the sulphate, may be used very weak to mix their food. It is found that they tend to purify the blood, and to promote digestion. Powdered charcoal and a little of the flowers of sulphur may be occasionally used with the food to advantage. Fowls confined and fed artificially need these aids ; while, if left at liberty, they would not be needed. Powdered oyster shells, or chalk, or old lime, should be always accessible, to supply the material for the shell. Many furnish, also, a little ground bone for this purpose. Buff Cochin Chinas are a most beautiful fowl, and can hardly fail to strike the eye. In shape and habit they generally resemble the light Brabma, and in color are more beautiful. This variety has its warm advocates, who say, For all pur- poses of a really good domestic fowl, whether I speak of productiveness, easy keeping, laying qualities, size, disposition, beauty of form and plumage or hardi- ness (in this climate), after a comparative trial, I deem the Cochin the best. Of course there are long, ho ny, scraggy varieties of these birds ~vhich no one should keep. Like the Brabmas they are feather-legged. But I find a variety of Cochins described by Bement as belonging to Queen Victorias collections, which are clean legged, and indeed it appears that in China there exist the clean and feather-legged of the same general pattern. Why we have got the feather legs, which are so unsightly, is not explained. Give us Brahmas and Buff Cochins with clean legs, and there can be no finer, more matronly fowl. Among the older and still most admired varieties are the Dorkingsspeckled and white. These are an old English fowl, and though not often found pure, are very fine, and are much prized in some localities. They have the advantage over the Brabmas and Cochins of being finer in form and full in the breast. One who has tried them says, I have yct to find one their equal in all respects. A breeder of great experience wiites, For a quiet domestic fowl my choice would be Brabmapootras; for number of eggs Hamburgs or Leghorns; for size of eggs and great numbers, Black Spanish. He says, As to the Hou- dans, I am satisfied they are great layers. There is a class who have no love for the heavy and more useful breeds. Like those who love the race-horse, and despise the cart-horse, so there are some who turn their backs upon the barn-door fowls and admire the clean and mettlesome gamecock. Of all the varieties these are the most beautiful, if we demand shape, color, and spirit. The cock is a proud, high-bred creature; he will fight till he dies, to maintain his supremacy, and he has been for ages the symbol of courage. But it is not only as a fighter that this breed is noticeable; it yields to none in the whiteness and fineness of its flesh, and the hens are lay- ers of small, but most delicious eggs. But they are difficult to raise; not only do the young cocks ~ght and kill one another, but the hen birds, too, plunge into the m~ZJe. Cock-fighting was in vogue among the Romans, and the Greeks had famous breeds. We may conclude that the passion dates back as far as Cain, and that the monotony of the Deluge was relieved by an ocdasional fight in the Ark. Be- yond all doubt, C~esar brought fighting cocks in his train into England; for we do not know when a good fight would not attract a crowd in that insular kingdom. The most famous breed is that in possession of the Earls of Derby for so many generations, known as Lord Derbys breed. The cocks are thus described: They are a good round shape, well put together; have a fine, long head; daw 8o THE GALAXY. [JULY, eyes; long and strong neck; hackle well feathered, touching the shoulders wings large and well quilled; back short; belly round and black; tail long and sickled, being well tufted at the rootthick, short, and stiff; legs rather long, with white feet and nails, the latter being free from all coarseness. The required daw eyeis that which resembles the grey eye of the jackdaw. Their distinc- tive features are the white feet, beak, and claws essential to every bird claiming descent from this illustrious stock. The cockpit is no longer in fashion in civilized countries, and is now found in perfection only among the Malay races, and in Cuba and Mexico, where it still flourishes. To those who have not examined the matter, it may be interesting to know that this love for fine birds is not only widespread already in this country and in England, but it is extending to all classes and conditions. And it is a good, a healthy, and a delightful taste, one which ought to be encouraged; and especially in girls and women, who so rarely have any resources beyond what is called society. Whoever is an enthusiast as to the feathers of a hen will not be likely to be infatuated about her own; and she who enjoys the charms of Nature will not demand the fascinations of artifice. This is a moral reflection in the style of the Spectator. The poultry-shows have done much to develop and extend a taste for fine birds; and it is marvellous to see the numbers of well-dressed and cultivated men and women who throng to these exhibitions. And not from curiosity alone, but from a real interest and desire to see and know more of their feathered fellow-creatures. The first poultry show I find recorded was held at Regents Park, London, in the year 1846. It was small and weak, and it encountered the jeers and sneers of sensible people. Harmless whim, idle caprice, foolish idlers, were terms quite freely applied then and since. But in 1849 the Birmingham Show was held, and the great Cochin-Chinas began to attract attention, to incite de- sire, and to inspire enthusiasm. Since then these shows have been held often; they have brought together one to two thousand cages from all quarters of Eng- land and even from America; the prizes have been valuable and the company large, intelligent, and enthusiastic. The facts being, that the love of country life is still strong in England; that there are many persons in good circumstances who have made poultry-raising a hobby, and among them many most cultivated women. These have given the subject a prominence in England greater than elsewhere. But our own shows are remarkably thronged, and have proved most attractive. The sales of birds have been large, mostly to amateurs; yet farmers and business poultry raisers have been fairly represented. Our farmers are dis- covering that it pays better to raise a first-rate thing than a second rate; and are beginning to act upon it. Whether these shows will again create such a mania as followed the introduc- tion to Europe and America of the Asiatic fowls remains to be seen. I think not. That was one of those curious excitements which now and then sweep over the world. It raged in England and with us, and enlisted all classes. Choice fowls brought five hundred dollars each, and men went hundreds of miles in search of something rarer and better than their neighbors could show. This was in 185354. Mr. Burnham, who was then deep in poultry speculations, afterward made a book, exposing and ridiculing the hen fever, in which he states: I have sent into the Southern and Western States, through Adams & Co.s Express alone, from January 1st to December 27 1353, a little rising of t ,ooo worth of Chinese fowls and faiscy pigs. By Edwards, San- 1869.] OUR GREAT FARMERS. 8r ford & Co.s Transatlantic Express, in the same period, I have sent to England and the Continent about $a,ooo worth of my grey Shanghais. By Thompson & Co. and the American Western Express Co. I have sent West and South-west in the same time over $z,aoo worth, and my minor cash sales (directly at my yards in Meirose) have been over $z,ooomaking the entire sales from my establishment for the past year nearly or quite $22,000 in value. The Shanghais were then the great fancy fowl, and commanded fabulous prices; and created great disappointment and, in the end, disgust. Many squibs and paper pellets were shot off by the disappointed purchasers, most of which, if exaggerated, were good-natured. Here is one which enthusiasts will read and ponder: SHANGHAIS .~xo THEIR VALUEThe editor of the Albany Knickerbocker has had some experience in raising Shanghais, and narrates it as follows: The Shanghai fever was one of the most expensive hum- bugs that our people ever embarked in. It was supposed that if we could get chickens to become as large as jackasses, a great boon would be conferred on the country, and the price of .turkey stews reduced to one cent each. People forget that, if we have great size we must have great feeding also. A Shanghai will grow till he weighs twelve pounds. By the time he does this, however, he will have consumed corn enough to have kept the famine out of Egypt and Joseph from becoming first lieutenant to Pharaoh. The Shanghai does not begin to fatten till he is done growing, and does not begin to think of that before he enters his third yearby which time Ise is so tough that you have to cut him up with a saw and buck, and carve him with a broad-axe. The Shanghai appears to have but one mission, and it consists in putting Indian meal out of sight. The fe- male seems to have very singular taste; she will eat old boots, door-mats, and dials-cloths, but she is totally opposed to laying eggs, that duty being too confining, we suppose. We bought a pair in 5853, for fifteen dol- lars; we kept them three months, with the following results: First cost - - - - - - - - - - $~5 00 Corn, one bushel a day for ~o days, 90 bushels at $i per bushel - - - - 90 00 Attendance of a boy to keep Shanghais from undermining the feiice, three months, $~ per month - z~ 00 Three shifts torn up by male Shanghai, because he could not get at cock next door - - s 00 Oyster-shell lime, gravel, etc., etc. 2 30 Chain, to tie up the male Shanghai with on wash days 5 25 Whole cost - - - $ia8 55 Credited by eight eggs - - - - - - - - - - - $o So By taventy-tisree bushels guano, at eighty cents - - - - - - iS 40 Whole receipts - - - - - - - - - - $i~ 20 We sold the eggs to a nillkinan back of Paths at ten cents each; but as he ran away without paying the bill, we suppose die amount of that sale should be deducted from the gross receipts. If we do this, our Shanghai operations will foot up as follows: XVhoe expense - - - - . - - - - - $123 ~ Whole rereipis, less the eggs - - - - iS 50 Dead loss - - . - - - - - - $i,o s~ If anybody has done better than this, he will please drop us a note, and we will lay the sanie before an inquiring world. The Shanghai has given place to finer and better breeds, which now enlist the attention of cultivators. The nicest care and attention are paid to colors and combs, and legs and wings; and the greatest pleasure is experienced and ex- pressed by those who study the matter. As much interest may grow up about three cocks as three kingdoms, and where wisdom ends and folly begins in all these things no one knows. Men who pay five thousand dollars for a diamond may think a woman a fool vho pays five hundred for a hen. I cannot see it so. The hen is valuable, for she does make eggs; the diamond is actually worthless. Christian people will not indulge invituperation, but will let other Christian people indulge their tastes. Such a mania as came over us in 1853 is to be avoided by all sensible people. But the urgent character of modern society, and the exhausting demands of modern business, are leading thoughtful men and women back to some of the soothing ~vays of nature; and they are finding, in the company of domestic ani- mals, a quiet pleasure which the nervous excitements of modern life deny them. As a sanative influence, then, I commend a good poultry-yard. CHARLES W. ELLIOTT. SUSAN FIELDING. B~ MRS. EDWARDS, Author of Archie Lovell, Steven Lawrence, Yeoman, etc. CHAPTER XXI. MISS COLLINSON entered the room, saw Susans blushing, bewildered face; saw Toms exultantly happy one; and knew, before either of them spoke, what had happened. You have done with accounts at last? stammered Susan, vaguely hoping that Tom would keep his own counsel, that the love-scene she had gone thr6ugh would remain a secret between themselvesthe first act in a charade that was to have no sequel. Ive got good news to tell you, Eliza, cried Tom, running up to his sister, and in his ~vild excitement actually kissing her. Susan and me have found out our own minds at last. Now what have you got to say to us? Us. The monosyllable fell with a singularly grating on Susans ear. I hope you wont think badly of me, Miss Collinson. Indeed it was not my fault, but But, before she could finish, Tom was at her side; Tom, right before his sisters eyes, with his arm round her as though he already looked upon her as his own possession No, it was no ones faultexcept Susans, for having the prettiest face in the world, a face that did my business for me the first time I saw it. If I felt apology was wanted, all I should say would be this: Look at Susan. The prettiest face in the world Not a dear little irregular English face, whose irregularities were charms in artistic eyes, but pretty sweetest word that can be spoken to a girl of seventeen I Susans eyes fell, the dimples showed in her cheeks. You are both very young, said Miss Collinson, in a depressed voice. Im sure I hope you know your own minds. Seventeen and twenty-threedear, dear, your ages together scarce come up to forty. Tom burst into one of his loud laughs. And what the dickens does that signify? why add up anything? We are not talking of scrapers and door-mats, now. I thought you ~vere an advocate of early marria~es, Eliza? You have told me, times enough, nothing would steady me like a wife. But Im not old enough to be any ones wife, cried Susan. Miss Col- linson is right. We dont know our own minds. The thing is ridiculous. I know my mind, said Tom Collinson, almost fiercely, and still holding Susaa by the waist. It isnt only during the last ten minutes Ive begun to think of all this, as you know, Eliza. I determined long ago to give up every- thing, here and elsewhere, for Susan, if Susan would have me; and to work for her and become an altered sort of fellow altogether. Where the is the good of talking about age? I shall make a deuced deal steadier husband now than I should five year hence, going on leading such a life as mine has been! Miss Collinson ranged herself at once on Toms side, as she always did when his voice waxed loud, and oaths began to fly about. I said nothing against early marriages, Tom. I only said I hoped you knew your own minds,

SUSAN FIELDING. B~ MRS. EDWARDS, Author of Archie Lovell, Steven Lawrence, Yeoman, etc. CHAPTER XXI. MISS COLLINSON entered the room, saw Susans blushing, bewildered face; saw Toms exultantly happy one; and knew, before either of them spoke, what had happened. You have done with accounts at last? stammered Susan, vaguely hoping that Tom would keep his own counsel, that the love-scene she had gone thr6ugh would remain a secret between themselvesthe first act in a charade that was to have no sequel. Ive got good news to tell you, Eliza, cried Tom, running up to his sister, and in his ~vild excitement actually kissing her. Susan and me have found out our own minds at last. Now what have you got to say to us? Us. The monosyllable fell with a singularly grating on Susans ear. I hope you wont think badly of me, Miss Collinson. Indeed it was not my fault, but But, before she could finish, Tom was at her side; Tom, right before his sisters eyes, with his arm round her as though he already looked upon her as his own possession No, it was no ones faultexcept Susans, for having the prettiest face in the world, a face that did my business for me the first time I saw it. If I felt apology was wanted, all I should say would be this: Look at Susan. The prettiest face in the world Not a dear little irregular English face, whose irregularities were charms in artistic eyes, but pretty sweetest word that can be spoken to a girl of seventeen I Susans eyes fell, the dimples showed in her cheeks. You are both very young, said Miss Collinson, in a depressed voice. Im sure I hope you know your own minds. Seventeen and twenty-threedear, dear, your ages together scarce come up to forty. Tom burst into one of his loud laughs. And what the dickens does that signify? why add up anything? We are not talking of scrapers and door-mats, now. I thought you ~vere an advocate of early marria~es, Eliza? You have told me, times enough, nothing would steady me like a wife. But Im not old enough to be any ones wife, cried Susan. Miss Col- linson is right. We dont know our own minds. The thing is ridiculous. I know my mind, said Tom Collinson, almost fiercely, and still holding Susaa by the waist. It isnt only during the last ten minutes Ive begun to think of all this, as you know, Eliza. I determined long ago to give up every- thing, here and elsewhere, for Susan, if Susan would have me; and to work for her and become an altered sort of fellow altogether. Where the is the good of talking about age? I shall make a deuced deal steadier husband now than I should five year hence, going on leading such a life as mine has been! Miss Collinson ranged herself at once on Toms side, as she always did when his voice waxed loud, and oaths began to fly about. I said nothing against early marriages, Tom. I only said I hoped you knew your own minds, 1869.] SUSAN FIELDING. 33 and alluded, as a matter of curiosity, to the rather low figure of your united ages. If Susans guardian will consent, and if you succeed in getting employment, Im sure I dont even see why your courtship should be a long one. You might make your home here, if it was any use to you, at first. Their courtship. It was considered a matter of settled fact then, already! Susans spirits sank to zero when they all sat down, Tom close beside her on the sofa, and the brother and sister began to talk over the business part of this engagement into which she had allowed herself to be entrapped. Toms plan, it seemed, was to set about investigating the advertisement at once, and if the afihir promised well, to invest in it the required eight hundred pounds. He did not happen to have the requisite cash in hand, for the moment; but Susans guardian, no doubt, would advance it to him on his own personal security, and the proceeds of the Addison Lodge sale would suffice to furnish them a small house in whatever part of London his duties should require him to live. The eight hundred pounds were, according to the advertisement, to yield twenty per cent.; that made a hundred and sixty; his salary would be three hundred pounds, the interest of Susans remaining money, say ten pounds. Altogether here he produced a little horsey looking book and jotted down the different itemsaltogether four hundred and seventy pounds a year. And if young people, with modest ideas, cant get along comfortably on four hundred and seventy pounds a year, the devils in it! said Tom. Especially when the wife is a dear little domestic home-loving girl, like my Susan. All his taciturnity, all his diffidence had fled. He was again the self-confi- dent, odiously-familiar Tom Collinson from whom Susan used to recoil in the early days of their acquaintance; and with a sinking heart she realizedas a ~ood ,., many women have done beforehow easy it is to feel sorry for a man as long as he continues your friend, and sorry for yourself the minute he becomes your lover! Inch by inch she managed to edge away out of his reach; at last, pretending that she must look for her work, escaped from the sofa altogether, and when she re-seated herself took a chair the other side of Miss Collinson. She kept close there for the rest of the evening, and when ten oclock came and Eliza quitted the room, quitted it with her; yes, clinging tight to her arm, so horribly afraid was the poor little child of being left alone, even for a moment, with the man she had engaged herself to marry. He fidgetted and fumed, at last told Eliza point blank to go away; he had something very particular indeed to say to Susan. But Susan was not to be conquered. And so all the parting salutation he got, in his new character of accepted lover, was a faltering good-night, Tom; through sheer importunity he forced her into calling him by his Christian name: a still more faltering touch of her little cold hand. It was treatment that did not in the smallest degree check Toms ardor. A man either of finer sensibility or acuter judgment would have been sure to read aright the coldness of such a child of nature as Susan. Tom viewed it as the mere natural coyness or coquetry any decorously brought-up girl would be sure to show at first to a lover; coyness, coquetry, which every days courtship would infallibly wear away. He had no chill misgivings as to the reality of Susans affection for him and yet, when he was left to the companionship of his own thoughts, Tom Col- linson found himself in far less assured spirits than he would have wished. Glad though he was, there had already, as I have hinted, been room in his life for a love episodeon one side a tragically real one ! Sitting alone by the open par- lor window, his senses full of Susans fair pure face, of Susans girlish voice, 84 THE GALAXY. [JULY, memory importunately thrusts before him the reproachful vision of another face, less fair, less pure, but overflowing with honest tenderness for him! he remem- bers, as he has not done for months past, his own solemnly-plighted oaths, all broken now; remembers his outburst of cowardly anger against the woman he had sworn to love and cherish eternally, when her brother betrayed them both; remembers his last cruel parting from herher sobs, her violent language, her despair. Dash it allI was a boy, Im little better than a boy now ! thought Tom, getting up uneasily, and walking about the room, and she was a woman, old enough and knowing enough to take care of herself. Havent I decided what was right long ago? Why, a woman with passions like Mattys would bring a mans neck to the halter, here in England. Compare her to Susan, my little shy, cold Susan, with her dimples and her blushes. God, if she should hear of my marriage thoughit must never be put in the papersbut, if she should hear of it! I may be on the safe side, as far as law goes, but fromfrom the other way of looking at it, what am I ? And I did love poor Matty once. She was as fine a girl as any in the provinceand what pluck, by Jove ! that time she rode away to Mackenzies station for a surgeon for methat night ~vhen she and her brother alone defended the hut against a gang I She shot down two men with her own handshed shoot me as soon as look at me, I believe, if she was here now. A female figure just at this moment passing along the road (one of the mild old village ladies returning from a tea party) made Tom start with all the cow- ardice of conscious guilt. He shut down the windo~v, and drew together the curtains with an oath; and, getting out the spirit bottle, mixed himself a glass, stiff enough he made the small joke to himself but did not feel much amused by it to set six mens consciences at rest. Then took himself off, the first time for a good many nights that he had done so, to the Rose. Susan, keeping her first love vigil in her own room, a little dressing closet within Miss Collinsons, was sensible. of intense relief when she heard the loud slam of the front door. As long as Tom was in the house it seemed to her now that her very thoughts were scarce her own. She listened to the sound of his retreating steps down the street, then quietly slipped the bolt that insured her against intrusion from Eliza, and took out from the breast of her flockbe len- ient to her reader !a relic ; something that during the past week had rested upon her heart and kept it warm ; a three-inch bit of lead pencil that had once been Blakes. On her last morning at Addison Lodge, she had run to bid good- by, child fashion, to every square foot of the garden and river bank, and down close to the water where George Blake had sat when he took the memorable sketch, had lighted upon this priceless treasure. Ah, well, he was going to have Portia for his wife, and she ~vas engaged to Tom Collinson. She must never think of any one but Tom now! And she held the pencil with jealous fondness between her little hands, and ~vondered if it was a positive moral obligation to destroy it? And then broke out crying noiselessly, kissed it, and hid it away in the pocket of the same memorandum book in which her first impressions of Blake and Teddy Josselin were recorded. On the day when fate brought Blake to read the one, he found the other; and knew from what tenderest love his passionno, by that time he termed it his madnessfor Portia had kept him Thus, in different ways, the lovers spent the first hour or so after their en gagement. Next morning, however, with its cheerful sunshine and every-day 1869.] SUSAN FIELDING. influences, had the usual dispelling effect of most next mornings upon the clouds of over night. Tom Collinsons sensitive conscience was pursued by chiding memories no longer; Susan Fieldings vain regrets were put away, if not out of mind out of sight, like the relic that she no longer dared ~vear upon her heart. They were openly engaged. By seven in the morning Betsy, with delicious sense of importance. had told the news to the servant next door. By noon every soul in the village knew it. Later in the day they walked down the street, by special command, leaning on Toms arm, and were congratulated by twenty dif- ferent tongues on their happiness. These congratulations seemed to Susan to rivet her fate. The seal of the inevitable was surely upon her projected marriage, now that Miss Budd and Mrs. Bott, and the vicar himself had wished her joy I She was going to spend her life with Tom Collinson ; to share his thoughts, his pleasures ; to have him for her highest, wisest friend. This she realized; with her very strength tried to love him; recoiled, shuddering, from the effort; when night came opened the hidden place where her bit of lead pencil lay, and cried over itaccurately gauging her want of love for Collinson by the knowledge of how she could have loved George Blake. And next day came the same thing over again; and the next. And after this she began to be, at least accustomed to her position and her lover; ac- customed word that has no place in love I If he would never, never try to kiss her, she thought, and if Eliza would always keep in the room when he was by, what should hinder her from growing fond of him in time? Every wife must be fond of her own husband, Susan was certain. When they were mar- ried, had been married a year, she would be used to him, surely; used toberga- mot and stale tobacco smoke and demonstrative affection alike; and then his fun and good spirits would amuse her again, as in the days before their engage- ment, and life flow on smooth and quiet as she could remember the life of her own father and mother had done when she was a child. So Susan reasoned, so acquiesced ; had she worried, then and there, ~vould probably have passed through life acquiescent; not altogether igiiorant that nobler, more passionate love was possible, yet making the best, ~vomanlike, of her bargain, and atoning to a coarse, inferior husband largely, by patient gentlest submission for what she lacked toward him of love. Fate, however, held a deliveranceI mean a reprievein store for her. One fine morning, the engagement about a week old, Tom Collinson got a letter from his first forsaken love in New Zealand, and by its contents was thrown into such a fever of jealousy, remorse and cupidity combined, as ended in his de- ciding to stick to duty, cost him what it might. The letter, directed in an uned- ucated but not characterless female hand, to an agent in London, from thence sent on to Halfont, lay by his plate one morning when he came down to break- fast, and Toni had to read it with his sisters eyes and the eyes of his betrothed reading his own face. LONG HATTON, OTAGO PRovINcE. Mv DEAREST TOM: I hope you are well and comfortable, and have thought better of all you said when you left. You promised to write, but I have had no letter from you yet. My dear Tom, this has been the Wretchedest time of my life. I have thought of you day and night, and every one turning from me, along of Phil (for he robbed others besides you), and little Mat sick, and once I had scarcely bread to put between her lips lut thank God, the ~vorst is past, for as you will see, I have a Great News to tell you. I nope you have had no return of the fever, and wear your f~uznels, cons/Lint. Dear lad, I 6 86 THE GALAXY. [JULY, hope all your anger against me is gone, and have got no new sweetheart. I was never to blame. Phil was as Big a blackguard as ever walked, and tried all he knew to ruin you, and me too, but I had no more to do with it than little Mat. You had no call to visit it on me. Dear Tom, this is to ask you to come back home. Uncle William is dead at last, down at Dunedin, and has left me three thousand pounds, the share that was to have been Phils and mine too, to make up, he said in hIs will, for all I had been in- juredof course he meant by Phil. If you are not in any good situation in England, I say you had best return at once. Theres a tidy little farm down St. Peters way for sale, that Ive a mind would suit us, and can be bought cheapbut if you choose, the child and me 11 come to England instead. Any way, theres the money, safe and sure in the Gov- ernment securities, paying over six per cent. Why, only to let it lie there we could live retired and comfortable, if we chose; only I dont think I could be happy without a bit of land to look alter. Folks say now Im an Airess, and (if I was free) thered be many a young/el/ow glad to court me, I can tell you. You know this is only to make you jealous. Some way it dont seem I shall have a letter from you at all. I think directly you get this youll put up your traps, and I shall see you walk in before Christmas. Mat will say a fine lot of words by then. Shes well on her feet again, and a stout bold Maid of her age. She can say Dada plain, and takes your picture and kisses itthat I taught her. Now, my dear lad, I have told you my News, and will finish. There has been a dearth of water, but things are looking up pretty promising for the cold weather. Jasons Run is let at last, to a Scotchman, Im glad to saya staid well to do young man, about thirty, and unmarried. Mats kisses (here followed five or six scrawling crosses) and the same from your True and loving till death. MArrY. This letter, I say, Tom Collinson had to read through, with his sister and Susan Fielding sitting at the table with him. His face kept its color tolerably for a face that was not by constitution the face of a hypocrite. He drank his two cups of tea, managed to swallow sufficient food for appearances sake, then rose and walked away, not into the street, where it was his habit to smoke his after- breakfast pipe, but into the narrow slip of garden that lay at the back of Miss Collinsons house. His legs felt unsteady under him, like those of a man recovering from sick- ness; his hand shook as he tried, making more than one failure over it, to strike a vesuvian; the taste of his pipe seemed noxious, unconsoling, as in his school- boy days, when the ultimate object of tobacco had been, not consolation, but to anger Eliza. Three thousand pounds, paying six per cent., in government se- curities. An estate, that meant, of his own, a trusty overseerpoor Matty to manage it, horses to ride, good animal comfort and plenty of every kind till his lifes end. To the forbearance, the generosity, the womanly unselfishness of the letter he had received, Toms soul was not insensible. He was really touched by this full, frank pardon, accorded to him in her hour of success, by the woman he had ~vronged (though, if one considered it, what more natural than that Matty, that any ~voman, should wish for the return of a handsome young fellow like him- self?) Neither to little Mats scrawled kisses, to the account of Mats walking and talking, was he indifferent. If he had received the same letter, minus the news of Uncle Williams legacy, it would have made him thoroughly out of sorts for the remainder of the day; have required a thoroughly stiff conscience quieter before he could have got comfortably to sleep at night. But three thousand pounds hisif he stretched his hand out for them; his in very fact at that momentwhat a quickener of natural affection, of remorse, of all a mans better sentiment, was here! Upon the one hand he saw inclination, the woman he loved and for whom he would have to workpoverty; upon the other, duty, the woman who loved 1369.] SUSAN FIELDING. 87 and who would work for himand plenty. Was ever moral dilemma so nicely equipoised? During the first five minutes that he paced up and dox~n the garden path, one unvacillating resolve possessed Toms mindhe ~vould ~ict like a man of hOnor break off his engagement; return to Matty and her child, and do his duty by them to his lifes end. Then, chancing to look up, he saw Susans figure for a minute at the stair windowthe girlish figure, the soft, curled head that he loved to desperationand with a great oath swore that he ~vould never lose her, never give her the chance of becoming another mans ~vife. Dutywhich was duty? Did not his word bind him to Susan Fielding as much as to Matty? Ifhe were to write to Matty, telling her frankly, nobly, that as he had discarded her in her time of trouble, so now in her time of pros- perity she might discard him, ~vould not some other man be sure to make the poor girl happy in time? She was looked upon as an heiress already; there was many a smart young fellow ready to court her. A well-to-do unmarried Scotchman, she was glad to say, had taken Jasons Run Tom Collinson turned short on his heel, clenched his hand with a more hitter sense of jealousy than all his love for Susao had had power to awaken in him. Mat- ty, his Matty, untrue a girl who se rough fidelity had been a by-word through the province ; a girl to whom no man who didnt want to have a bullet through him would ever have spoken a word of light love. And he was going, cowardly, to abandon her, to leave her to the temptation that riches must be to any young and handsome woman in such a position as hers. Riches, yes, and by heaven, that were his; his as much as though he had a check for the money in his pocket at this moment. Money for moneys sake was no passion with Tom Collinson; but he was essentially, practically meycenary, as every human being, coarse or refined, must be to whom present personal ease is the main object of existeuce. A man who regards the acquisition of money as a final end will often be raised above the temptation of momentary gains; the hal)py-go-lucky pleasure-lover is forever to be bought. And so, at this crisis of his life, it really was not so much greed in the abstract as immediate visions of good eating and drinking, horses, abstinence from work, that lured Tom back to the path of duty. He could make up his mind to no final severance from Susan, could not indeed see, when he thought it calmly over, what harm could be wrought by holding her pledged to him. Noth- ing sin~pler than for him to be engaged to one girl in England, yet return to New Zealand and see how matters stood there ~vith the otherwho knows ? possibly arrange some division of property with Matty (considering the amount to which her brother had robbed him, would this be more than rightful restitution ?) then come back and redeem his word to Susan. Life was uncertain; some one of the three might die. No need, at all events, to make himself miserable about cruel contingences until they were actually forced upon him. Kee1) quiet all round, decided Tom, when an hours pacing up and down had enabled him so far to collect his thoughts. Inflict no premature suffering upon either of the women who loved him, and trust to Providence to bring everything straight in the end. And he ran into the house, his face almost cheerful again, and called up the stairs to Susan to come out and have a talk with him. He had received a letter of importance on business, and wanted to ask her advice. 88 THE GALAXY. [JULY, CHAPTER XXII. - THE morning sun warmed Susans cheek with livelier color than its wont, as she tripped at Tom Collinsons side along the garden path. She smiled up at him more brightly, he thought, than she had ever smiled before since their engage- ment. If I part with her Ill be shot I resolved Tom. XVhat is a paltry three thousand poundswhat would five thousand pounds, what would the world be to me without Susan? You wanted to ask my advice; you have got something very important to say to me, Tom ? What is it ? Im all curiosity. Tom had led her into what Miss Collinson called the harbor worthy of its name, as far as insects went, when the scarlet runners and nasturtiums grew higher; at present a bare damp corner of the garden, fenced round with trellis. work that screened it artfully from nothing, and containing a bolt-upright rustic chair, a cast of the First Napoleon and a ricketty rustic table. Tom was sitting on the table, Susan on the chair, when she spoke. Oh ~vell, its nothing so very particular, he answered, kicking his feet up and down in the air, to seem at his ease. You seethe fact isIve got a let- ter From New Zealand, interrupted Susan. Eliza wants the stamp for little Willy Smithitt. Oh, she was fingering my letter before I came down, was she? cried Tom. Eliza will get more than she wants some day, preying this was Toms own expression preying into other peoples letters. What further information did Eliza give you about my affairs, I should like to know? She said, we both said, the hand looked like a ladys hand, said Susan, demurely. At least, not a ladys exactly, butnot a man~ s. The blood rose to Tom Collinsons very temples. We dont talk so much about ladies out in the Colonies, said he. A woman is content there to be called a woman, and to do a womans duties, too. S lisan felt her spirits rise higher at his tone. It was so delightful to find Tom sulky, sarcastic, anything but demonstratively loving to herself. And its about this lady who is not ashamed to be called a woman that you want my ad- vice? she asked. Better give me the letter to read, holding out her hand. I will put myself in your place and judge for you. Tom looked at her hard. Upon her soft, childish face he detected, or his conscience made him believe he detected, an expression he had never seen there before, and from which he slunk ashamed. Something of the absolute white truth of Susans soul had, perhaps, at that moment pierced to his, and enabled him to realize what this scheme was which ten minutes ago had seemed so easy of accomplishment; had enabled him to realize the abhorrence Susan would have of him if, by any evil chance, poor Mattys story should become known to her. I never show any one my lettersits a principle of mineand you and Eliza were both wrong. The letter is from a man, an old mate of mine in Ota- go; tis about money. I have come into money, Susan, indirectly, andI dont know but what it will be wise for ~you to stay here with Eliza while I go back to the colony to see after my own interest. Susans heart leaped. It ~vould certainly be very foolish not to see after it, she cried, without a moments hesitation. 1869.] SUSAN FIELDING. 89 Flatterino remarked Tom, a choking feeling at his throat. You take kindly to the thought of separation. And he remembered Matty! I only agreed with you, Tom. You said it would be wise to see after your own interest, and I say so, too. We have very little money to begin upon, you know. Eliza says no one can keep house well on less than a hundred and fifty pounds a year, and we have not got that. The secretaryship had proved the veriest flash in the pan of a bubble company, and Susans guardian had treated the proposal of her money being made available to a husbands benefit, with the natural contempt of an Englishman and a lawyer. We have only forty pounds a year, certain, and I am so young If you are young you are deucedly prudent, exclaimed Tom, with bitter- ness. So much excellent sense may ~vell take the place of years. Ah, a girl who loved a man wouldnt calculate about money, and age, and prudence the very moment she heard that he was to go to the Antipodes ! susan bent down her face. You would only have to leave me for a bit, I dare say, Tom. But her voice resolutely refused to take a melancholy tone, try what she would. Well, I dont know that it would be for very longnot more than a year, as far as I can see now, said Tom; still, when two people have once got the world between them there are a hundred chances as to their ever coming togeth- er again. One of us might die. So we might if we were together, said Susan, persistently hopeful. Oror marry some one else. Tom Collinson could not bring his eyes to look at hers as he said this. Oh, if you feel that, it is good to put your fidelity to the proof; said Susan, with a small laugh. I know that I would keep my word to any one in New Zealand just the same as if they were in Halfont. Tom Collinson jumped down from the table; he caught her hand with vehe- rnence. Will you swear all that? he exclaimed; will you take your oath to be true to me if I go away? I will have nothing to do with swearing, said Susan. Oh, you hurt me, shrinking from him; let my hand go! Dont you know that Im half a Qua- ker, and that Quakers never swear? If I took an oath I should feel I was doing something wicked, and it would mean no more to my conscience than simple Yes or No. Well, simple Yes, then. If I go abroad, if Im away a year, or two years, will you keep faithful to our engagement? Must all this be settled in a minute, Tom? I should like to ask Eliza. And I should like you not to ask Eliza. More wisdom to be got out of the old cockatoo; you can teach her beforehand what to answer. You know your own heart, surely, without wanting any other woman to read it for you. If 1 go away, will you hold faithfully to your engagement to me? You must have an answer now? Now, directly; and if I dont get it, and in the very words I wish, the money may take care of itself. Never fear Ill give up the certainty of you for the chance of a wretched three or four thousand pounds, Miss Fielding. XVell, Ill say what you wish, then. What is it? I promise to remain true to you, and to our engagement I promise to remain true to you, and to our engagement Until the day when you set me free. 90 THE GALAXY. [JULY, This also she repeated, not without a little paling of the lips. She was gaining an enormous gain in present liberty; but the words that bound her to Tom Collinson for life could not be spoken without an effort. That is good, said Tom, with an air of intense relief. I can talk matters over with a better heart now. Theres only one thing more. Im a fool, a jeal- ous fool, Susan, where you are concerned ; but I cant help it. Promise me youll never care for any other man ~vhile Im gone ? A flash of indignant light shot from Susans eyes. You ask me this when I have promised to keep engaged to you! she cried, all the eagerness of half- conscious guilt in her voice. I only mentioned it, said Tom, humbly. I cant help being jealous; its my nature. I was jealous, and I dont mind saying so, at the thought of that singing fellow, Blake, Miss Ffrenchs present lover. Promise me youll never have another word to say to him? Indeed, Ill promise nothing of the sort, sir! If Mr. Blake is engaged to Portia, I shall certainly have to meet him and becivil to him. You are not reasonable. No, said Tom, humbly still, I kno~v Im not, where you are concerned, Susan, the tears rose to his eyes ; how shall I live without you? You have managed to live without me a good many years already. Dont flirt with Blake. Im talking like a fool, but I cant help it. Dont flirt with Blake. Have you quite lost your senses, Tom? Likelier than not I shall never see Mr. Blake again. Yet a minute ago you said you would certainly have to meet him and be civil to him. You are prevaricatingI insist upon your not prevaricating. Promise me never to write a letter to that man. Tom! Promise, seizing her hand. Now, this moment, or Oh, I promise, I promise! Ill never flirt with any one. Ill never write a letter to Mr. Blake. Nor sing with him? With a dart like a bird Susan flew from Toms grasp to the path, where the back windows of the whole row of houses protected her. Ill promise nothing more, thank you, Mr. Collinson, making him a little curtsy. Im to be en- gaged to you till the day you set me free, and Im to flirt with no one and Im not to write letters to Mr. Blake. There my obligations end. Come back here, my dear, and let me put a ring on your finger. What ring? Elizas diamond? No indeed, I think it very selfish of you to take that diamond from your sister. I dont mean the diamond, Tom glanced at it as it shone, many colored, on his broad short hand. That goes with me abroad for poor Elizas sake. Ive a ring of my own that will just fit your biggest fingerthis blood-stone that I wear on my chain. Comet you must have it, you know. All engaged girls wear rings. Susan, on hearing this, advanced, but not out of sight of the houses, then stretched out a little white hand. You are never to take it off, mind! It must stay here till I replace it with a plain gold one, said Tom, his voice was positively pathetic, so much in ear- nest was he as he unfastened the ring (Mattys love-gift once) from his chain and put it upon Susans finger. Promise me you 11 never take it off? 1869.] SUSAN FIELDING. 9 What, not when I wash my hands, Tom? You are so silly to-day. He let loose her hand and turned impatiently away. Was the girl half fool- ish after all, incapable of head and heart as he used to think when he first knew her, or was this childish lightness of manner a simple honest token that she was glad to be rid of him ? Tom Collinson asked himself these questions pretty often during the next two days, as he ~vatched the irrepressible brightness of Susans facethrown out in strong relief by the constantly red eyes and tear- stained cheeks of Eliza, upon whom the news of her brothers projected absence had fallen like a thunderbolt. She was friendlier toward him, far, than she had been yet since their engagement ; was ready to help Eliza in preparing his things for the voyage ; did not fly, a~ she used, from being alone with him; morning and night submitted her forehead to him with tolerably good grace to be kissed; ~vas generosity itself in forcing him to accept all the little money over which she had control toward the expenses of his journey. Yet still-still she was in better spirits than she had been for weeks I once or twice cried, may-be, at seeing Eliza cry, and laughed before the tears were dry upon her cheeks ran with a lighter step than Tom had ever heard her about the house; got a heightened color, ate better, showed the truth, in shortthat she was, and felt herself to be, reprieved. Tom Collinsons jealous heart got heavier and heavier as the hour drew nigh when he must lose her out of his sight. When the astonishing news of his New Zealand legacy had first been told, with discreet reservations, to Eliza, it was decided, not a little against Susans inclination, that the future sisters-in- law should live together till his return. But the more Tom Collinson thought over this scheme the less he liked it. Elizas house was too near the Ffrenches for Toms taste. He did not want his little modest Susan to be intimate with people so much above their own rank in life. And then there were the chances of meeting that singing fellow again, and the certainty of the Hounslow cavalry barracks. I-low could a girl like Susan walk about unprotected in the neighbor- hood of cavalry barracks? for Eliza, poor pious goose, had no more knowledge of the world than Susan herself. Wiser, when one thought it over, that she should go to her Uncle Adam, in France, as had been decided; lead the se- cludedi life fitted for a young woman in her position; dream of him ; live upon the excitement of getting his letters till his return. And Susan accepted the change of plans with suspicious cheerfulness. She ~vas no longer a child, shrinking with childish dread from leaving the scenes amid which her Un- stirred seventeen years of existence had hitherto flowed. Her short, too-sweet friendship with George Blake, her ten days engagement to Tom Collinson, seemed to have broken all the old threads of her life sharply in twain. She had fathomed disappointment, jealousy, vain hope, passionate regret over lost free- domfeelings that change a child rapidly enough into a womansince that after- noon when Collinson found her crying, because the world was too big for her, upon the bridge. Now the prospect of leaving Halfont was not only bearable but welcome to her. She would better enjoy her years reprieve, she felt, apart from all old associations; would at least not be perpetually reminded of Tom Collinson by his sisters presence; would be spared witnessing the progress of Portia Efrenchs new engagement. Whatever you think best for me, Tom. As I never wrote to Uncle Adam aboutabout our meaning to be married, perhaps it would be best to carry out the old plan ; and I shall learn French, and take singing lessons, and be quite an accomplished lady by the time you return. 92 THE GALAXY. [JULY, Then I hope youil learn from women, not men, cried Tom. This conver- sation took place on the evening before his departure; and-they ~vere sitting to- geth er, all three, in the dusk. Eliza, I leave this charge to you. XVrite to Mrs. Byng and desire that Susan may never take a lesson of any kind from a Frenchman. I dont want you to be accomplished, Susan. I want you to be nothing but what you areonly fonder of me. At seven next morning he started, the vessel in which his passage was taken sailing from Liverpool that night; so the whole little household had to be up at daybreakEliza, indeed, did not go to her bed at all. As the hour for parting approached, Tom Collinson cried like a child. Susan had never seen a man shed tears in her life before, and Toms shocked her beyond measure. If he had been her brother she would, no doubt, have thrown her arms round his neck, and cried with him, and thought his tears the most natural weakness in the world. But he was not her brother and at the sight of his swollen eyes and red nose she felt half-disgusted, half- inclined to run out of the room and laugh. Girls of her age judge men so heartlessly in these small matters. And then not Tom only, hut Miss Collinson, and the small servant cried! If she had been offered a fortune for a tear, Susan could not have shed one. She busied herself in every way she could think of; to concealthat she had no emotion to conceal ; would scarcely trust herself to speak for contrition at the steadiness of her voice; when the final moment of leave-taking came, tried with her very might to look and feel agitated, and failed signally. Susan Field- ing could no more feign than she could hide emotion. Tom, all this time, ~vatch- ing her with jealous anguish through his tears. Do go away for one minute, Eliza, he said, as poor Miss Collinson con- tinued to cling wistfully to his side, babbling in a choking voice about the sand- wiches and the brandy-flask, and how he must promise to write regularly, and how she would think of him and pray for him. Not say good-by to you affec- tionately? of course Ill say good-by to you affectionatelyat the door. Dont you see that Susan and I ~vant to have a few last words together? Eliza, on this, went out obediently into the passage and sobbed there, giving broken orders to the driver about luggao~e as she sobbed: the lovers were left alone, face to face. Tom opened his arms. Come here, my lovetell me youre sorry Im going, Susan? I may never see you again, you know. Genuine feeling shook his voice as he pleaded, but Susans heart kept ice cold. Please dont talk like that, Tom. Of course Im sorry, of course youll come back; why shouldnt you ? God knows! A hundred things may happen to keep me. Theres not much good in me, my dear, never has beenif, some day, I turn out a worse blackguard even than you expected, would you forgive me and love me still, I wonder? You know I should forgive you. Forgive, yes ! Would you love medo you love me now? Say yes, Su- san. Come and kiss me once of your own free will. God knows you have kept me at arms length enough hitherto ! She came a step nearer when he said this ; she looked tip at his face, his flushed wet cheeks, his swollen, quivering lips, and all the little girls honest soul revolted against doing what he claimed a~ a right. I do likewell, love you, Tom; I mean Ill try, and Ill be quite true to what I promised. Dont ask me any more 1869.] SUSAN FIELDING 93 Miss Collinsons knuckles here sounded a tremulous warning at the door receiving no answer she opened it a couple of inches and coughed. Jim Sim- mons says youll miss the train if you dont hurry, Tom. You are late as it is. And then Susan found herself locked in a passionate last embrace, heard a broken God bless you, felt tears fall hot and thick upon her face ; a moment more and Tom had rushed off from the house, breaking impatiently past his sis- ters outstretched arms on his way. And he has my diamond on his finger, said Eliza, as they stood and watched the fly drive down the village street. Poor boy, I had not the heart to remind him of it at last ! All through the remainder of that day Susan felt a wonderful lightness at her heart. She was her own mistress once more. No haunting dread of find- ing herself alone in a room with Tom Collinson, of seeing Tom Collitisons eyes gazing at her with an affection that made her shudder ; nothing but the blood- stone ring on her finger to remind her that her liberty ~vas forfeited. Miss Col- linson could not restrain a little natural acrimony at the sight of the girls tear- less face. I am glad to see you have your feelings under such fine control, Susan. When Iwhen I had a lover I was not so philosophical. But the girls of this generation are more luckily constituted Far happier for oneself to be over- blunt than over-sensitive in feeling. I dont think my feelings are blunt always, answered Susan. The evening post brought her a note from Tom ; a few lines scrawled in pen- cil in his schoolboy hand, and posted at some station on the way to Liverpool. My own dear love, he wrote, Ive been gone from you four hours, and it seems an Eturnuty. This was Toms style of spelling. If it wasnt for shames sake Id turn back and let the money go to the dickens. Love me, my little Susan. Dont forget to think of me every hour in the day, and believe al- ways in the affection of your fond lover, T. C. And then in a postscript, writ- ten very big and clear, this reminder Dont Flirt with Blake. I am glad you can smile, Susan, said Eliza, as she watched first some telltale dimples, then a blush mantle over Susans face. Pray what message does my poor brother send me Your brother wishes himself back already, said Susan. Its a very nice little note. I suppose I maynt see it? Well, dont be vexed, Elizabut I think Tom wrote it for me only. This, of course, was as it ought to be. Miss Collinson felt better satisfied. For the first time since her engagement, Susan did not open her pocket-book that night. When Tom was here to guard his own interests, she had never con- sidered it a duty to abandon the pleasureexquisitely keen like all the pleasures of first love of touching, gazing at, shedding tears over her treasure. She felt herself like a prisoner on parole now; free, delightfully free from her lovers presence, but bound more stringently than his presence had bound her to be faith- ful to him. Before putting out her candle she read his note once more. Dont flirt with Blake. Oh, unnecessary command Would she ever see George Blake again; or,if she did see him, would it not be as Portias lover? The first tears that she had shed to-day xvetted her pillow at the thought. 94 THE GALAXY. [JULY, CHAPTER XXIII. IT had been arranged that Susan should reach her uncles house within a week from the present time. She was, however, to stay with her guardian in London before starting on her journey, and so the day succeeding Toms de- parture was also her last day in Halfont. The wrench of leave taking had come at last. Summer during the past fortnight had ripened into full warmth and glory, and when Susan, late in the afternoon, called to say good-by at the Manor House, she found Colonel Ffrench and his sister sunning themselves, on the sheltered western lawn beneath the cedars. Colonel Ffrenchs handsome old face was just then looking its wickedest and its blackest (when he turned it round suddenly at the sound of Susans footsteps, it required all the little girls self-command not to run, like the village children, from his presence), for Miss Jemima, relying upon the genial influences of open air and sunshine, had just broken to him the news of Portias rupture with her cousin. He took off his hat to Susan with the air of high-bred gallantry that it had been the habit of his life to pay to all women (save those of his own household), then beckoned his valet, who was in waiting at some yards distance, and leaning on the mans arm, walked feebly toward the house. Portia has not returned, my dear, said Miss Jemima, with a sigh of thank- fulness at the interruption to the scene. A scene with her brother was the one thing on earth that quelled the brave old soldiers spirit; and no wonder. Who that had seen Colonel Ffrenchs courtier-like salutation of Susan would have guessed at the kind of epithets which a minute before he had been lavishing on Teddy Josselin, on Lady Erroll, on Jemima herselfon any one, every one who had involved him in the expense of a futile trousseau, and left his granddaugh- ter upon his hands still! You have come to say good-by, I fear, Susan, but Portia is in London still. And I am going there to-morrowI am to stay a day or two with my guardian before I start for France. Perhaps Portia will let me say good by to her in London, unless, unless Susan did not like to add, unless living in the house of a countess Portia will be tco grand to acknowledge me ! I will write to her to-night and bid her call on you, my dear. What is your friends address ? a hundred and eight Tavistock square ; I shall not for- get. I knew Tavistock square well in old days ; a hundred and eight must be the corner house. It will do Portia good to see you. She returned from her different visits yesterday, and wrote me a letter half in wild spirits, half misera- bleone of those letters of hers that make me so unhappy. How I wish Por- tia was married, Susan ! Whea last you spoke to me about Portia, you were thinking she would very soon be married, said Susan, hiding her face. Ab, to Mr. Blake. That was all a dream of mine, I begin to fearhowev- er, I dare say you will see them together in London, and then you will be able to judge for yourself. Susans heart gave a throb of sudden hope. Nothing but new names were in the letter I got from Portia to-day. Lord This, Sir John Thatheaven knows where she has met all these people! Not a word of Mr. Blake; not a word even of Teddy Josselin. Now that the engagement is broken ofl you ~vould not have Portia speak 1869.1 SUSAN FIELDING. 95 of her cousin as she used, rnaam? Why, I suppose they are scarcely allowed to be in each others company. XVho shall say? XVho shall tell, when Portia is among her Dysart asso- ciates, into what company she goes and how much liberty she takes? One thing in her letter certainly strikes me as suspiciousto say the least of it. Af- ter running on with the names of all these new acquaintance, and telling me about her different visits, and what she has worn every day for dinner, she adds Miss Jemima drew a letter from her pocket and after never mentioning Teddys name, mind, Grandmamma is looking dreadfully healthy, and is icier in her North Pole of an old heart than ever. She tried to make me swear to- day that I would never marry a first cousin. I almost believe I did swear it Oh, Aunt Jem, if a nice little house in Park Lane could be kept up, and a brough- am as well, and if two extravagant people could dress and amuse themselves on seven and fourpence a day, how happy one might be! Now, seven and four- pence a day happens to be the exact amount of Mr. Josselins pay, Susan. Susan walked back across the heath to Miss Collinsons with the sensation of treading on air. She had been a fool to put such blind faith in one of good Miss Jemimas romantic fancies, a fool. in the pique of the moment, with suspi- cion all unratified, to accept Tom Collinson. But George Blake was free, and there was a possibility that she might see him in London. Not flirt with him, of course ( Dont flirt with Blake ! clear as the yellow-lettered deca- logue above the altar in Halfont church these words stood out before Susans mental vision). But see him ! perhaps steal her hand within his arm, hear the pleasant whispers, half-joking, half-tender, of the voice she knew so well, once more. The long exile in France, the prospect of being Tom Collinsons wife eventually, were certainties still. But meanwhile George Blake was not engaged to Portia; and there was a chance, no matter how remote, of seeing him. Who that has loved but knows with what a sublime disregard of all future years the prospect of some present ten minutes, some present foolish joy, ever so furtively snatched, has power to fill one. Miss Collinson thought Susans spirits unnaturally good, considering that this was her last evening in Halfont. No one would guess you had parted from a lover six-and-thirty hours ago, and that you will part from everything else that should be dear to you to-morrow, Susan, glancing with meaning at Mr. Fieldings portrait, which now hung, and ~vas to hang until Susans wedding-day, above her own chimney-piece. I should be sorry to say you were growing heartless Heartless! exclaimed Susan, guiltily conscious that one new, supreme feeling was absorbing every joy, every sorrow of her old life. Ah, Eliza, not that. Somethings a little wrong with me, I think. Im like a person in a trance; everything goes on round me in the world as usual, and, though I hear and see, I feel nothing. My heart seems asleep. People have to awaken out of such sleep sooner or later, said Miss Col- linson, tartly. Suppose, instead of this kind of light talk, we read a chapter in the Testament together for the last time. Next day found Susan in her guardians house in Tavistock square. Mr. Goldney was a bachelor of between fifty and sixty; a man with one of those in- distinguishable sort of business faces which you may always see in masses, hurry- ing eastward along the Strand at ten or eleven oclock in the morning; a man who, dressed in professional black, breakfasted at eight, dined at six, dozed till nine; then roused up and looked over law papers till bed-time. Few people ever get 96 THE GALAXY [JULY, nearer to Mr. Golclney than this. You must make yourself comfortable, my dear young lady, he said, as he was wishing his guest good-night the first even- ing of her arrival. Mrs. White, my housekeeper, has lived with me for twenty years; ask her for everything you want. If I had more time I would have taken you to the playI mean, suddenly remembering her black frock, to the Poly- technic. You have no friends in London? Susan answered that she had one friend, a granddaughter of Colonel Ffrenchs, who was now staving with the Countess of Erroll, in Eaton square; and Mr. Goldneys face brightened; English faces that brighten at nothing else will often be found to do so at the sound of a title connected, by ever such slender or devious links, with themselves. Your father was one of my oldest friends, my dear Miss Fielding. You must nevei let me lose sight ofyou. It was not every one who could get on with Thomas Fielding; but I got on with him. I recog- nized the real kernel under that outside husk of eccentricity. Yes, yes ; I recog- nized the kernel. Eaton squaresome way distant from us; I dont suppose you know the town? but you have only to tell Mrs. White, and she will order round the brougham for you whenever you wish to go out. Next morning Susan was sitting alone at the window of Mr. Goldneys dining- room, thinking to herself that London was a considerably bigger place than Hal- font, and that it might be possible to stay here for a couple of days without run- ning across any particular acquaintance one hadwhen a Hansom cab stopped before the house. Could it be George Blake? She put up her glasses in breath. less haste, and saw the figure of a lady veiled and plainly dressed, coming up the steps. After knocking and ascertaining that Miss Fielding had arrived and was at home, the visitor dismissed her cab (what kotous would not Susans London friends have lost had Mr. Goldney known that they drove in cabs), then was ushered up-stairs into the lawyers grand drawing-room, all green dam- ask and stiff rosewood, and heavy chandeliers, and pictures swathed in yellow gauze. Here, a minute later, she was joined by SusanSusan crimson to the temples, at the thought of encountering a stranger alone. I was determined to frighten you, cried Portia Ffrenchs voice, so would not give up my name. I got Aunt Jemimas note this morning, and ran off at once to look you upfor, alas, I return to Halfont to-morrow. Grandmamma invites you to dine with us to-day in Eaton square. Will you come ? Susans face dimpled all over. XVho but George Blake could be asked to meet her? I should like to come very much, if you thought my plain black frock would do ? To be sure your plain black frock would do, better than anything you could wear. I have a little plan of spending the evening out of doors as soon as we have got rid of grandmamma and Miss Condy. There will be no l)arty, only ourselves and the color rose on Portias cheek. Susan felt sure that George Blakes name was coming and my cousin, Teddy. Susan looked as she felt, a blank. I came back from my visits the day before yesterday, went on Portia, and this is the first time poor Ted and I meet as strangers. We went about together by grandmammas orders when the engagement was first broken off, and hardly realized then that the whole thing was not play. Now we have to meet as indifferent acquaintance in earnest. She sat down on the sofa, the only easy resting place the room possessed; took off her hat, and thre~v it on the floor beside her. My head aches, she said, passing her hand wearily across her forehead. I was going to say my 1869.] SUSAN FIELDING. he~irt aches, only I know I havent got a heart. Susan, my dearI have made the same remark to you a dozen times before, but I repeat it nowWhat a mistake a womans life is ! She was looking pale and harassed; her eyes heavy, the set lines that fore- tell ~vhen a young face is going to age early only too plainly visible around her mouth. Miss Jemima tells me you have been enjoying your different visits, began Susan Oh, good, dear, single-hearted Aunt Jem, interrupted Portia, quickly. Susan, I hope you will never have to deceive any one who loves you. It is not, believe meeven I, who have no conscience, say thisit is not pleasant work ! Talkino of loving, what is all this absurd story about you and young Collinson ? II am engaged to Tom Collinson, said Susan, burning with shame, as she made the confession. I was to have been married to him at once, hut something about money has taken him back to New Zealand, and so You are free to change your mind! cried Portia. What a little goose you must have beenfor I need hardly ask if you like such a person? He is very good-hearted, stammered Susan, and it was very kind of him to ask me. And still kinder to return from whence he came, said Portia. I can see exactly how it happenedMr. Collinson proposed because you chanced to be under the same roof one wet day, and you accepted him for the same reason. You dont write to him I hope ? I havent written yet ; I shall, of course. Then, of course, do nothing of the kind, my dear. As long as people write nothing they are committed to nothing. I am experienced in such mat- ters, little Susan. But no writing could bind me faster than I am bound, said Susan. I have promised to marry Tom Collinson. Whenever he comes back and claims me I shall marry him. XVhy? I have promised. And you like him ? Oh, I dont know, blushing furiously, and looking do~vn, please dont ask me. II shall be sure to like him some day. Ah, I see. After a minute. I had a kind of fancy once that you were getting to care for George Blake, said Portia, carelessly. At this direct accusation a sudden desperate courage seemed to enter Su- san s heart. And I, and Miss Jemima, too, rather thought that you had got to care for George Blake, she exclaimed. That last evening that I saw you and him together on the river bank When he drew our portraits, Susan? When he drew our portraits and when I was so angryon that evening I felt sure that you and Mr. Blake understood each other. It looked like it, you must allow, Portia? Ah, answered Portia with a smile, but then things so often look like what they are not. Now I wonder when you see us together whether you will say Mr. Josselin and I look like understanding each other? Ill tell you that to-morrow. After all that is past, doesnt it go against your heart sometimes to have to call your cousin Mr. Josselin? A great many things go against ones he~irt, was Portias answer. When 98 THE GALAXY. [JULY, I look forward, as far as I can look, I see nothing else but trouble and weariness and vexation of spirit. Do you know grandmammas age? Seventy-nine. \Vell, I was looking at her this morning and I decided she ~vould keep above ground another ten years at least. She is fearfully and wonderfully vital. And you wish her in her grave ? Susan, my dear, that is the kind of incisive question never asked between people of delicate feeling. Yes, then ! To you, reading me through and through with those big eyes and asking the honest truth, I will give, for the only time on record, an honest answer. I do wish her in her grave, devoutly. Susan looked perplexed rather than shocked. It doesnt seem right to wish anyone dead, said she, with the ready casuistry of her age. Yet what can people have to live for at seventy-nine ? Loving matters more than living~ and if Lady Errolls death would enable you and Mr. Josselin to be happy Ah, but ~ou must know I have given a solemn promise not to be happy with Mr. Josselin, interrupted Portia, gayly. I see Aunt Jem has been telling you part of my secrets, so I may as well tell you the rest, imagine my position, Susan. I came back from myfrom my round of visits the day before yester- day, and almost the first words grandmamma greeted me with were theseoh, the expression of her face as she spoke You and Ted are seeing each other still. Now I know all. I insist ui~on )-our confessing. You and Ted are see- ing each other still? I lookedas I am sure I feltthe embodiment of simplicity. And if we do see each other still , grandmamma ! Did my cousin and I ever promise to shut our eyes ~vhen we met each other in the street? I will have none of this flippancy, Portia. You and your cousin meet clan- destinelyclandestinely! Grandmamma evidently enjoyed the flavor of that naughty word. During the last ten days that you have been paying these visits, where has Teddy Josselin been? Answer me that? I should think Teddy Josselin had better be made to account for himself said I, with the most delicious good-temper. (Grandmammas face and voice of conviction were a whole comedy in one act, Susan. Nothing diverts me more than to see people who have got hold of a corner, just a poor little corner, of the truth, hug themselves over their own sharpsightedness). If you suspect that Teddy has been running after me, write, please, to any one of the l)eol)le I have been staying with, and make inquiries, as one does about a housemaid, as to the number of my followers. And did your grandmamma write? asked Susan, full of eager interest. XVelI, no, said Portia. Grandmamma, on thinking matters over, grew pacifiedfor that time, as she took pains to impress on me, only that time! A comic expression came into Portias black eyes. To set her mind at rest for the future, however, and relying, she was pleased to say, upon my not break- ing a solemnly-given word, she extracted from me, on the spot, a promise that I would neverIt ~vas a promise she had no right to demand, you know, Susan! And Portia stopped ; the least in the world disconcerted, it may be, by the crystal-clear eyes that watched her so earnestly. And if the promise required you to be untrue to your own heart you did not make it? cried Susan. I need not ask you that ! Oh, said Portia, with a bitter little curl of the lip. I had no choice. If I did not promise, I knew I should never have a chance of meeting Mr. Josse- un, even as an acquaintance. I was to be banished from graudmammas house 1869.] SUSAN FIELDING. 99 as likely as not should have ruined all poor Teddys prospects for the future. As well try to get a promise from a butterfly as from my grand-nephew, Josse- lin, said grandmamma. You have sense, the sense of worldly interest at least; and for his sake, as xvell as your own, you had best do as I bid you. And so I promised; life is too short to ~vaste it in contests over trifles, and after all it was but a trifle that I promised! Grandmammas horrible old companion was called inimagine if that made my feelings softeras a witness, and You promised never to marry Mr. Josselin? cried Susan. Oh Portia, and yet in your heart I know you like him ! Like him! repeated Portia. Her whole face softened, for a moment she looked quite another woman to Portia Ffrench. XVeIl, )es, I dont mind con- fessing so much to you, Susan. These things cant be forgotten in a day. Ido like Teddya very little, and for that precise reason had no choice left me but to take the oath grandmamma chose to administer. I repeated the words after herthat horrible old hypocrite .Condy pretending to cry, as if she had been witnessing a touching religious ceremony. I swear, promise, grandmamma said, was not strong enough, I swear that I will never, directly or indirectly, renew my engagement with my cousin, Edward Josselin, without the consent of his grandmother, Lady Erroll! The wording was grandmammas own, I proposed no alteration. I simply repeated, in a perfectly firm voice, what I was told to say. Grandmamma looked relieved. You will not object to my acquainting Teddy with this ? she asked. Not in the least, said I, the promise is made. Let the whole world know of it, if you choose. And so then, as a child gets a spoonful of jam after its powder, I was told that Ted should actually be invited to dinner once before I left town. He dines with us to day, Susan. You will see with what kind of nerve we manage to meet. Susan asked at what hour she should come. Oh dont be a minute later than half-past seven, said Portia. XVe dine at eight, V~~t I particularly want you to be there when Teddy Josselin arrives. Grandmammas eves fixed on us when we meet ~vould be more than I could stand, unless supported by some fourth persons presence. And come in your bonnet and morning dress. I told youdid I not ?that I had a l)lan for going toto some gardens that they say are pleasant of a summers night. As soon as we can dispatch grandmamma to her own evenings dissipation we mean to be off. Gardens! repeated Susan, opening her eyes. Why, I never knew that there were gardens in London. Oh, yes there arenumbers. As she spoke, Portia turned her face ~aside, then rose and busied herself in putting on her hat. These particular ones aredown Chelsea way, I believe, and every one in London goes there. Why should they not? You hear good bands of music and stroll about by lamplight or moonlight (we shall have moonlight tonight) and see crowds of people more or less well-dressed, and come home when we choose. We are to go in a party, undeniably chaperoned, and mean to amuse ourselves if we can. At least it will be a change, an evening spent not quite upon the usual humdrum pattern of London pleasure. And you are sure it is not too gay a place for me to go to in my deep black? 100 THE GALAXY. [JULY, Oh, as for that, the gayety or seriousness of any amusement depends upon the spirit in which one enters on it! said Portia, evasively. Susan, my dear, I want you to come! Dont put difficulties in the way. It is a chance you may never have again of seeing life. Are you your own mistress? Is any one look- ing after you ? Only my guardian, and he is engaged to dine out to-day. Unless you had invited me I should have spent the evening alone. Then I look upon everything as settled, cried Portia, moving across to the door. Be at grandmamrnas house at half-past seven, and dont order a carriage to coin e for you. I will promise to see you home. We shall not be late. And are you going to walk to Eaton square now? asked Susan. I thought from what Mr. Goidney said, young ladies could never walk alone in London. Oh, all those old canons of propriety belong to a fossil age, answered Portia. There are no Lovelaces to run away with anybody nowtis Love- lace, in these days, who dreads being run a~vay with ! Thickly veiled, as she spoke, she drew a little mask of black lace from her pocket, thickly veiled and plainly dressed, a young lady with co~nrnon-sense in her head can go ~vherever she thinks fit. I dont know the neighborhood, but I suppose I shall find a cab- stand somewhere near, and if I make haste I shall be home just in time for lunch. Be sure to come early, and mind, she returned a step or two to ~vhis- per this, not a word about the Chelsea Gardens before grandmamma. A WOMANS LAST GIFT. C OM E here. I know while it was May My mouth was your most precious rose, My eyes your violets, as you say Fair words, as old as Love, are those. I gave my flowers while they were sweet, And sweetly you have kept them, all Through my slow Summers great last heat Into the lonely mist of Fall. Once more I give them. Put them by, Back in your memorys faded years Yet look at them, sometimes; and try, Sometimes, to kiss them through your tears. Ive dimly known, afraid to know, That you should have new flowers to wear: Well, buds of rose and violets blow Before you in the unfolding air. So take from other hands, I pray, Such gifts of flowers as mine once gave~: I go into the dust, since they Can only blossom from my grave. SARAH M. B. Pixrr.

100 THE GALAXY. [JULY, Oh, as for that, the gayety or seriousness of any amusement depends upon the spirit in which one enters on it! said Portia, evasively. Susan, my dear, I want you to come! Dont put difficulties in the way. It is a chance you may never have again of seeing life. Are you your own mistress? Is any one look- ing after you ? Only my guardian, and he is engaged to dine out to-day. Unless you had invited me I should have spent the evening alone. Then I look upon everything as settled, cried Portia, moving across to the door. Be at grandmamrnas house at half-past seven, and dont order a carriage to coin e for you. I will promise to see you home. We shall not be late. And are you going to walk to Eaton square now? asked Susan. I thought from what Mr. Goidney said, young ladies could never walk alone in London. Oh, all those old canons of propriety belong to a fossil age, answered Portia. There are no Lovelaces to run away with anybody nowtis Love- lace, in these days, who dreads being run a~vay with ! Thickly veiled, as she spoke, she drew a little mask of black lace from her pocket, thickly veiled and plainly dressed, a young lady with co~nrnon-sense in her head can go ~vherever she thinks fit. I dont know the neighborhood, but I suppose I shall find a cab- stand somewhere near, and if I make haste I shall be home just in time for lunch. Be sure to come early, and mind, she returned a step or two to ~vhis- per this, not a word about the Chelsea Gardens before grandmamma. A WOMANS LAST GIFT. C OM E here. I know while it was May My mouth was your most precious rose, My eyes your violets, as you say Fair words, as old as Love, are those. I gave my flowers while they were sweet, And sweetly you have kept them, all Through my slow Summers great last heat Into the lonely mist of Fall. Once more I give them. Put them by, Back in your memorys faded years Yet look at them, sometimes; and try, Sometimes, to kiss them through your tears. Ive dimly known, afraid to know, That you should have new flowers to wear: Well, buds of rose and violets blow Before you in the unfolding air. So take from other hands, I pray, Such gifts of flowers as mine once gave~: I go into the dust, since they Can only blossom from my grave. SARAH M. B. Pixrr. THE PRACTICAL VIEW OF SPIDERS SILK. 1 HERE are three classes of minds among men, and three groups of objecU ~ in the worldthe curious, the scientific, and the practical. Not that any one mind or any single object is either of these to the entire exclusion of the other two; but in every mind and in every object one or another of these char- acteristics prevails; and this fact should be recognized in all discussion of a subject, and its three several aspects be presented separately, in order that each may produce its greatest impression. To pass from generals to particulars, some of my readers may have been in- terested in the discovery of the Neplilla plu;nzpes (the so-called silk spider of South Carolina), in its habits, and in the rather comical process by which its silk may be reeled from its body, as milk is drawn from a cow; some of them, too, may have been impressed by what is already known of its structure, its develop. ment, its geographical distribution, and the peculiarities of its web; all which have been more or less fully treated of elsewhere.* But there may have been others who cared for all these things only so far as they looked toward making some practical use of the silk; and who, admitting that the spiders habits are quite curious, and that ~vhat is already known of its structure and development render it a worthy subject of further investigation, nevertheless demand that some more explicit statement shall be made respecting the value of spiders silk; who want to know whether a spider is or is not as good as a silk-worm; whether it costs more or less to keep; whether its silk is more or less desirable; and, finally, how many of them will be required to pro- duce a yard of fabric of a given weight and price. To these questions, the pertinence of which is fully admitted, will now be made such answers as are furnished by our present information; but it must be first distinctly understood that these answers are based upon experiments made for scientific purposes, and upon a very small scale; and that they are, therefore, at best, only approximate. Those who ask the questions must decide for them- selves whether or no they justify trying the experiments upon a larger scale and vith a direct view to pecuniary advantage. What, then, are the advantages and the disadvantages of spiders and of spi- ders silk, as compared ~vith silk worms and with ordinary silk or other fabrics. There are three ways of approaching the subject, first, through the spider itselfthe physiological way; second, through the silkthe physical way; third, through the apparatus with which it is to be obtainedthe mechanical way. As a man of science, I would prefer the first of these; but as that privilege has always been allowed me in the previous presentation of the subject, and as this is understood to be a practical article for practical men, we ought to prove, first, that the silk is worth having, and that it can be used, before alluding to the means of obtaining it, or the source of its production. 1.ADVANTAGES OF SPIDERS SILK Perhaps its greatest, and cert~tinly its most obvious advantage over all other known fabrics, is one which it is impossible to represent, and which even words * Proceedings American Acad. Arts and Sciences: Nov., 1865. Proceedings Boston Soc. Nat. His- tory: Oct. 4, sS6~. How My New Acquaintances Spin: Atlantic Monthly, August, x866. Memoirs cC a Cripple: Our Young Folks, September, s866. Two Hundred Thousand Spiders: Harpers Magazi,i~ blarch, sS6~. 7

THE PRACTICAL VIEW OF SPIDERS SILK. 1 HERE are three classes of minds among men, and three groups of objecU ~ in the worldthe curious, the scientific, and the practical. Not that any one mind or any single object is either of these to the entire exclusion of the other two; but in every mind and in every object one or another of these char- acteristics prevails; and this fact should be recognized in all discussion of a subject, and its three several aspects be presented separately, in order that each may produce its greatest impression. To pass from generals to particulars, some of my readers may have been in- terested in the discovery of the Neplilla plu;nzpes (the so-called silk spider of South Carolina), in its habits, and in the rather comical process by which its silk may be reeled from its body, as milk is drawn from a cow; some of them, too, may have been impressed by what is already known of its structure, its develop. ment, its geographical distribution, and the peculiarities of its web; all which have been more or less fully treated of elsewhere.* But there may have been others who cared for all these things only so far as they looked toward making some practical use of the silk; and who, admitting that the spiders habits are quite curious, and that ~vhat is already known of its structure and development render it a worthy subject of further investigation, nevertheless demand that some more explicit statement shall be made respecting the value of spiders silk; who want to know whether a spider is or is not as good as a silk-worm; whether it costs more or less to keep; whether its silk is more or less desirable; and, finally, how many of them will be required to pro- duce a yard of fabric of a given weight and price. To these questions, the pertinence of which is fully admitted, will now be made such answers as are furnished by our present information; but it must be first distinctly understood that these answers are based upon experiments made for scientific purposes, and upon a very small scale; and that they are, therefore, at best, only approximate. Those who ask the questions must decide for them- selves whether or no they justify trying the experiments upon a larger scale and vith a direct view to pecuniary advantage. What, then, are the advantages and the disadvantages of spiders and of spi- ders silk, as compared ~vith silk worms and with ordinary silk or other fabrics. There are three ways of approaching the subject, first, through the spider itselfthe physiological way; second, through the silkthe physical way; third, through the apparatus with which it is to be obtainedthe mechanical way. As a man of science, I would prefer the first of these; but as that privilege has always been allowed me in the previous presentation of the subject, and as this is understood to be a practical article for practical men, we ought to prove, first, that the silk is worth having, and that it can be used, before alluding to the means of obtaining it, or the source of its production. 1.ADVANTAGES OF SPIDERS SILK Perhaps its greatest, and cert~tinly its most obvious advantage over all other known fabrics, is one which it is impossible to represent, and which even words * Proceedings American Acad. Arts and Sciences: Nov., 1865. Proceedings Boston Soc. Nat. His- tory: Oct. 4, sS6~. How My New Acquaintances Spin: Atlantic Monthly, August, x866. Memoirs cC a Cripple: Our Young Folks, September, s866. Two Hundred Thousand Spiders: Harpers Magazi,i~ blarch, sS6~. 7 102 THE GALAXY. [JULY, fail to describe; its peculiar and exceeding beauty. If you can picture to your- self a mass of pure and yellow gold, which not only reflects the light as from a smooth and polished surface, but which has all the depth and softness of liquid amber, you may realize in some degree the wonderful appearance of a sheet of spiders silk as seen in the sunshine; and even in the shade its lustre is greater than that of gold. But to compare the silk to gold is to tell only one-half of the story; for the same spider yields silver as ~vell, so that you may draw from its body a thread of gold or a thread of silver, or both threads together; their union giving silk of a light yellow color. These two differently-colored silks are drawn from two different parts of the spinning organ, which ~vill be described hereafter; and not only are their colors thus distinct, but also their other physical properties; for the yellow is elastic, and may be stretched slightly and regain its former length, while the white is inelastic, and at once crinkles up when tension is removed during the process of drawing it from the spider. The two kinds of silk are employed also in the con- struction of different parts of the web; but that has been sufficiently described elsewhere. Beauty and strength are natural partners, and we do not look in vain for the latter quality in spiders silk. It is indeed something prodigious as compared with even the strength of metals. A bar of iron one inch in diameter will sus- tain a weight of twenty-eight tons; a bar of steel fifty-eight tons, and, accord- ing to computation based upon the fact that a fibre only one four-thousandth of an inch in diameter will sustain fifty-four grains, a bar of spiders silk an inch in diameter would support a weight of seventy-four tons. I do not know how this compares with the strength of ordinary silk; but it is natural to suppose the spiders to be the stronger, since each fibre is composed of a large number of still smaller fibrilke, whereas that of the worm is a single, or, at most, a double fibre. It is, doubtless, the extreme delicacy of the ultimate fibrilke of the silk that gives its surface the softness and depth already alluded to; and even the ordinary fibres are only one seven-thousandth to one four-thousandth of an inch in diameter, and perfectly round and smooth, while that of the worm is about one two thousandth of an inch in diameter, and apt to be flattened and ir- regular. This very delicacy may be urged as an objection to spiders silk; but it is only a real objection to those who do not desire a fine and delicate fabric, and the same could be brought up against ordinary silk as compared with cotton and wool. It is true that it is impossible to un~vind a single fibre of spiders silk after it has once been wound upon a reel; but it would be quite as impracticable to unwind the thread of a single cocoon; the fibres of several cocoons must be combined so as to form a thread of manageable size, and the same method is applicable to the spider; we have only to draw the silk from a number of spi- ders at once, and arrange the reel so as also to twist them into one thread, and the apparent difficulty wholly disappears. It is quite possible, too, that there are other and larger tropical species of spiders, especially of this genus Nephila, which will be found to yield silk of larger fibre and in greater abundance. It is useless to look for this among our common species, for they are small, or their silk is scanty in amount, and pale grey or white in color. I may here allude to some previous statements concerning the rarity of the Nephila plumipes, which rarity might be considered an objection in a business point of view, as implying an ability to exist in any other than its natural habitat. Since the first specimens were found upon Folly and Long Islands, south of 1869.] THE PRACTICAL VIEW OF SPIDERS SILK. 103 Charleston harbor, specimens or accurate descriptions have been sent from islands near Port Royal, from St. Simonds Island, Georgia, and from Louisiana, where, indeed, the single specimen formerly described by Koch, was found. In no case, however, have they been found away from the coast, and as I have reared them from the eggs to maturity in a Northern winter, by keeping them in closed cases with a humid atmosphere like that of their native swamps, we must conclude that moisture is the only real necessity in its acclimatization. The relative humidity was indicated as 70 upon the hygrodeik (Edsons). 11.DISADVANTAGES OF SPIDERS SILK. Aside from its excessive fineness, the only thing to be said against the silk is the small quantity which a single spider will yield, as compared with the pro- duction of a silk-worm. And when it is admitted that the latter spins a big cocoon which yields, upon an average, three hundred yards of silk, weighing about three grains, while the average length which can be reeled from a spider at one time is only one hundred and fifty yards, which is so much finer as to weigh but one-twentieth of a grain, our quantitative comparison looks rather discouraging and lessens the satisfaction we had derived from the previous com- parison of quality. But there are several other facts to be considered which tend to greatly re- duce this discrepancy between the productiveness of the two insects; some of these relate directly to the one and some to the other. Let us first reduce the silk furnished by the worm from its apparent to its true amount. Three grains represents the average gross weight of silk yielded by one cocoon; but the fibre is so covered with gum which would materially interfere with its manufacture that it has to be cleansed by prolonged boiling in soap and water, which process costs each cocoon one-quarter of its weight, leav- ing the real amount of available silk supplied by each worm, two and a quarter grains ; but even this is forty-five times the yield of a single spider, and any practical inquirer will not gain much comfort from the comparison. Having now placed the worms production in its true light, what can we say of the spider to increase the statement of its yield? So far from being destroyed, as is the worm, for the sake of one cocoon, and thereby being prevented from doing further service in way of laying its eggs, the spider is not at all injured by the reeling process and, after a day or two of rest, is ready to )ield us a second hun- dred and fifty yards, more or less, and then a third and a fourth, until it has been reeled from, say twenty times in the course of a month, nor is this probably the limit of their capacity, under favorable conditions, but it will seen that, even granting it to be so, and its season to be limited to a month, the spider of a whole season is twenty times as valuable as the spider of a single day, and the total yield would be abOut three thousand yards, weighing just one grain. Now, the worm yields only two and a quarter times as much as this, and that is the end of it. Like the swan, it expends all its life in a last effort; but the spi- der, like the canary, does something every day, and when no longer able to pro- duce silk, can provide for future generations by laying five hundred or more eggs. Admitting then that a worm yields two and a quarter times as much as a spider. what is the number of each required for a piece of woven silk? A yard of silk varies greatly in weight, and somewhat too in quality, and of course in cost; the quality we cannot here consider, but as to weight and cost, a cheap silk at two dollars and fifty cents weighs from one half to three fourths of an ounce per 104 THE GALAXY. [JULY, yard. A rich silk at from six dollars to ten dollars weighs two ounces or a little over. And between these two, the ordinary grades in which the majority of people are interested cost from three dollars to five dollars per yard, and weigh from one to one and a quarter ounces. An ounce is four hundred and thirty-seven and a half grains (avoirdupois), and as each spider yields one grain, it will require, in round numbers, four hun- dred and fifty to produce a yard of silk; or fifty-four hundred for an ordinary dress-pattern of twelve yards. The number of worms required for the same is to be ascertained by dividing those figures by two and a quarter, which makes, in round numbers, two hundred worms for a yard, and twenty-four hundred for a dress. And now supposing (for the sake of comparison) that each spider costs as much time and trouble and money as a worm, and that, therefore, a fabric of spiders silk costs two and a quarter times as much as one of ordinary silk, that fact by no means indicates that the former is not worth having. Honey costs more than molasses, but every body of taste thinks it worth the difference ; a steel knife is all very ~vell, but a silver one is worth the difference in cost to all who can afford to pay it. A cotton or woollen dress is not to be despised by any one, but every women prefers a silken gown, and counts the in- creased price as small compared to the greater satisfaction it affords; and now, so far at least, as we can judge, as honey is to molasses, as silver to steel, as silk to cotton, so is the product of our spider to that of the worm ; and the superior beauty, and elegance, and delicacy of the fabric will, no doubt, more than compensate for the difference in its cost. There is still a third disadvantage of spiders silk, which is apparent to all, but which I hope to prove real to but very few. It is drawn from the body of what sensitive ladies call a horrid spider. It may seem rash to enumerate beauty among the advantages of our spider; but the instinctive denial of such a quality is, in great measure, due to the ex- treme ugliness of its more common relatives ; and I think very fe~v unprejudiced people would be willing to say the Nephila plumipes is positively ugly; it has been compared to a passion-flower; and, indeed, its graceful outlines, the slen- der tufted legs, and the combinations of black and orange and white and olive- brown, together with the golden web flashing in the sunlight as the breeze sways it to and fro upon its supporting boughs, all this is really beautiful. But supposing it to be one of the ugly black poisonous fellows that lurk in our cellars, or in the fields, yet Handsome is that handsome does ; and un- less the fair objectors are prepared to esche~v white sugar because in its reun- ing are used blood and other disagreeable matters, and to give up letter-writing because ink has for its basis an ugly excrescence from an oak, and even to leave unworn their silks and satins because they certainly are produced by the fat, sluggish and, as Dickens would say, demmed damp, disagreeable body of a caterpillaruntil I repeat they are ready to make all these not-to-be-thought-of concessions to sentiment, they must not try to resist the temptation which will surely assail the~m some day in the shape of a dress, or veil, or ribbon of spi- ders silk. 111.MACHINERY. Having now, I trust, become convinced that spiders silk is worth having, the next question of the practical man will be, how do you get it and how is it to be manufactured? First catch your spider, is a necessary preliminary, and although this matter 1369.] THE PRACTICAL VIEW OF SPIDERS SILK. 105 properly belongs to the last division of our subject, it may be well to quiet the apprehensions of any one who suddenly recollects the big body, and long legs, and sharp jaws of the Nephila plumipes, as elsewhere figured, and fears that it is an untamable creature which will resist an attempt to abstract its silken stores. I will leave the complete removal of this apparent obstacle until we come to consider the spider itself in all its relations, and merely say now that it seldom tries to escape or to bite; that you have only to get its body between thumb and finger so that two legs are turned backward, to be perfectly safe from injury by its jaws; and that all you have then to do is to secure it in such a manner as to accomplish the following objects: First.To render its escape impossible. Second.To avoid injuring it. ThirdTo prevent the legs from reaching the thread. FourthTo give the legs some occupation. Fifth. To invert the body. Sixth.To make this inverted position comfortable. The importance of the first object is obvious ; and it is hardly necessary to dwell upon the extreme vexation caused by your spider getting loose, and either escaping entirely or entangling itself inextricably ~vith others, so as to spoil what you are doing and perhaps lose a leg or two in the fray. But while its confine- ment must be secure, great care must be taken not to inflict an injury upon either body or legs; for a very slight wound of the former will prove fatal, and every leg has its own use, although the spider may get along after a fashion with less than the proper number. These precautions are necessary if you care to wind from the same spider more than once. \Vhile making its web, and while running upon the ground, the spider al~vays allows its thread to run between the claws of its hinder feet, which it em- ploys as guides, alternately ; and such is the force of the instinct which leads it thus to hold on to its line of retreat, that when surprised or interfered with in any way, the first movement is of one hind foot to grasp the thread; and by this means it will effectually prevent your drawing the thread from its body. But, as may be expected, its eight legs are not idle when its body is con- fined; and as their length and strength enable it to reach and to pull upon the adjoining parts of the confining apparatus, and thereby either derange that, or twist its own body, it is quite important that some smooth and rounded body should be accessible which it may grasp, yet not be able to fix its claws upon too firmly. The inversion of the whole body is desirable, in view of the shape of the abdomen and the position of the FIGURE z. spinning organs (Fig. 1, 5), for the thread sometimes breaks near the body, and we must then be able to seize the end which projects from the spinners. And as this inversion is not the natural position of the insect, (for I refer here, not to its attitude in the ~veb, where it hangs head downward, but to its being placed in the apparatus upon the back instead of the belly). we are bound, for its own comfort and for our con- venience in winding, to make that position comfortable. And finally, after care- fully providing for its bodily comfort, we may recognize its excited mental con- dition, and its wrath at being fastened ignominiously in the stocks, in order that xo6 THE GALAXY. [JULY, its precious silken store may be stolen with impunity; and may do what we can to calm its nerves by offering it a fly or a bit of chickens liver, which it gener- ally accepts and devours with relish. In the figure above, the legs of the spider are removed. P represents the palpi or feelers ; A, the projecting shoulders of the abdomen; S, two pair of large spinners; I, papilla, through which opens the intestine. As may be imagined, an apparatus which should fulfil all the above condi- tions and be, at the same time, simple and compact, ~vas not contrived without many experiments and failures, and long study of the form and disposition of of the spider. It so happened that the first from which I wound~ silk, on the 19th August, 1863, was either so stupid or so anxious to promote scientific in- vestigations as to remain perfectly quiet for an hour and a quarter; but its suc- cessors were less considerate ; I tried to fasten them by pins stuck in a sheet of cork and crossed over their backs ; but they pulled the pins out and got into great confusion ; a contrivance was adopted by which all the legs were grasped between a rubber band and a strip of metal; but as the third leg on each side is much smaller than the others, these would soon be extricated, and then one by one the rest would follow; and if they vere so tightly held as not to escape themselves, the spider was very apt to cast them loose. I tried a card with a long slot cut into one side, down which the body of the inverted spicIer was dropped so as to rest the pedicle connecting the two parts of the body upon the bottom of the slot; another card was then let into slits cut on both sides of the slot and pressed down so as to press gently upon the pedicle ; by this means the head and jaws and legs were left upon one side of the card partition and the abdomen upon the other; but aside from the flimsy nature of the materials, and the ease with which the spider could disengage itself there was the great dis- advantage of its requiring both hands to work it; still it was with this that most of my specimens of silk were obtained. The device of Termever,* which came to my notice in the spring of i866, was very ingenious and quite well adapted to the shape of the spiders he employed; but it did not at all fulfil the last three conditions, and was wholly inapplicable to the peculiar form of the Nephila plum ipes. After many trials, the contrivance which I have FIGURE 2. adopted consists of two large corks, a bent hair-pin, two large common pins, a bit of card and a bit of lead. One cork serves as a base, (Fig. 2). Its bottom is loaded with the lead, and one half its top is bevelled off at an angle of forty-five degrees; upon the oblique surface so formed is fixed the piece of card, its upper edge projecting an eighth of an inch (Fig. 2, C); into the remaining half of the upper end is cut a broad and shallow groove (Fig. 2, G), and upon each sjde of this groove, at the middle of its length, the two pins are stuck into the cork, so as to be about an inch apart (Fig. 2, P P); and now when the insect is held with the legs behind the back and laid upside down into the groove, the projecting shoulders of the abdomen (A, Fig. I) bring up against the edge of the card, and the legs are kept in front of the two pins. But the spider ~vill not stay in that position unless the rest of the apparatus is used. The second cork (Fig. 3) is rounded and * Two Hundred Thousand Spiders. 1869.] THE PRACTICAL VIEW OF SPIDERS SILK. 107 smoothed at its smaller end, and a hair-pin is pushed ob- FIGURE 3. liquely through the lower corner of the larger end so as to form an angle of forty-five degrees ~~ith the lower side; one or t~vo tacks will retain the pin in its place ; at the distance of a quarter or third of an inch from the cork, the pin is bent outward on both sides so as to double its width, and then straightened. Now push the ends of the pin down be- tween the card and the first cork, with the rounded end of the second cork projecting over the card. (Fig. 4.) This may be done with the left forefinger while the first cork is held between the second finger and thumb; the spiders abdomen is now put through the opening formed by the pin on each side, the cork above, and the cork below; its abdomen rests in the oroove, the shoulders come agairst the card, the up- per cork is pressed down so that the narrow part of the pin embraces the pedicle; the legs being set free, fly up and FIGURE 4. embrace the rounded upper cork, the lower one is fixed upon ~ screw, turned around so that the abdo- men of the spider points to the right; and ~ve are ready to begin the reeling process. (Fig. 5.) This is simple enough so far as mere experiment and scientific investigation are concerned ; the reel is either a cylinder or ring of some smooth substance as hard rubber, or consists of a set of radii set into an axle, and having their ends bent at a right angle and enamelled so as to present an even surface to the delicate silk. The reel I used had radii about three inches in length ; this made the whole diameter six inches, and of course at every revolution eighteen inches of silk were reeled upon it; the motion could be quite rapid, and if steady, one or even two feet of silk could be drawn each second, so that a very few minutes would suffice to exhaust the days supply of a spider. Figure 5 represents the spider secured in the apparatus, and the thread passing through the spinners. As said above, the thread of a single spider cannot be unwound, and the only way of using it when thus drawn upon the reel, is to cut the band at one point and twist it up in the fingers so as to form a thread composed of two or three hundred strands, according to the number of revolutions made. This thread is very strong, and by tying a number of such pieces together a long thread was obtained, which was doubled once or twice, and then put into a power loom and woven as a woof upon a warp of black silk; thus simply demonstrating the feasibility of using spiders silk in manufacture. Now, in order to obtain a compound thread of such size as to permit us to unwind it from the reel, we have only to arrange a large number of spiders, and carry their combined threads upon the reel ; by well-known mechanical contriv- ances the reel itself (which must not be a slender spindle) may be made to re- volve in two directions, so as to twist the thread properly, and then there seems to be nothing to hinder carrying the silk directly from the spiders body to the sewing machine or the loom, for there is no gum to be removed, and its natural colors are beyond the capability of art. xo8 THE GALAXY. [juLr Before 1earnh~g that the spin- FIGURE 4. die itself could be made to revolve, so as to twist the silk of several spiders into a single thread, I had adopted a suggestion to attach the spiders themselves to the periphery of a disc, the revolution of which would accomplish the same ob- ject ; the small size of spiders brains and the constant position of this species head downward, re- lieved this plan from the charge of bringing on vertigo in the insects thus made to revolve; but a more serious and indeed a fatal objec- tion was that when once the appa- ratus was in motion, they were lost sight of; the operator could not see when any thread broke, and if be could the spider could not be removed, or even its thread regained, without stopping the whole. My practical reader may now inquire, Why is not the same process applica- ble to the silk-worm as well ? I wish it were. For although the spiders silk would still be, in my opinion, far superior in many respects, yet there are some purposes for which ordinary silk is not only good enough, but better; and espe- cially would it prove an advantage in dealing with the so-called American silk worm (Zella Polyphemus) the cocoon of which it is impossible to unwind ex- cept by a process invented by Mr. Trouvelot.* But although some of this, and of other species of silk-producing larwe wei~e obtained, it was at once found that the worm has the power of controlling the flow of silk through its mouth-tube, and of oourse speedily shut off the supply ~vhen we tried to reel it off; chloroform was tried, but without success; and so the experiment failed, although I still hope that an an~esthetic may be found which shall suspend the worms control over the orifice. The spider can retard the flow of silk from its spinners by strongly pressing them against each other, but if the reeling is regular it cannot wholly prevent it. IV.ORIGIN OF THE SILK. We have seen what the silk is; we have learned how to obtain it; and now we inquire whence does it come? The spinning organs are located at the posterior extremity of the body and not upon the head, as in the worm ; and the difference in the mode of life of the two insects is a sufficient reason for the change without calling in the aid of the old proverb, The spider lost her distaff and was ever after obliged to spin through her tail. But the limits of this article make it impossible to enter fully into the struc- ture of the internal and external silk-producing organs, for there are many points yet little understood, and what is known of them in this species has been told elsewhere. Were everything certain a few words would suffice here, but a de- tailed expression of various opinions would be out of place * American Naturalist. 1869.] THE PRACTICAL VIEW OF SPIDERS SILK. 109 V.DISADVANTAGES OF THE SPIDER. But the Nephila plumipes is not merely a manufactory of silk, it is also a catcher of flies ; it is not merely an abdomen, but a head and chest, and legs and eyes, and even poison fangs, which are big enough and sharp enough to warrant us in a careful inquiry as to its disposition to use them. For if the spi- der is ferocious and intractable, our information concerning its silk and the means of getting and using it is of little value. But while admitting the fact that spiders have a very poor reputation for docility, and a very unenviable one as to poisonous qualities, let us be fair and impartial. Give a dog a bad name and then hang him, is a rule adopted too often with other animals as well as ~vith dogs and men. Every Judas is not a traitor; all serpents are not venom- ous ; and because one spider bites and poisons its prey. This by no means proves that all spiders would or could be guilty of the same thing. Indeed, the comparison with the serpents is strictly correct, for the boa constrictor and the black snake and many others need no fangs, because the strength of their bodies enables them to crush their preM to death ; and so although the short-legged, thick-bodied and dark-colored spiders which make no web, but lurk in holes or wander in the fields, or run upon the fences, and take their prey by leaping like a tiger, must have the means of killing it soon, in the shape of jaws furnished FiGURE 6. ~vith virulent poison, ~vhich has no doubt often proved fatal to men, yet we ought not to look for such powers in the brighter-colored garden and forest spiders, whose broad and strong net is often able to entangle the most powerful insects and even young birds ; no doubt they all have venom, but the experiment of Mr. Blackwell upon the largest English garden spiders, which he forced to bite him in several places without any injury whatever, confirm the trial made with a full-grown and vigorous Nephila plumipes upon a little kitten. The spider was squeezed until it snapped its jaws fiercely; the kittens leg was then held so as to be deeply bitten in several places, but the little thing only mewed, and never gave any sign of permanent injury. But even if no real harm could result, it is not pleasant to be snapped at by such jaws as the spiders, and two precautions may be followed. 1st. To wear thick kid gloves. 2d. To handle the spiders very gently, and avoid irritating them, for ordinarily they may be allowed to run over our clothes and even upon the hands, although occasionally if a heavy one finds itself in danger of falling, the jaws offer to assist the legs. Under the head of disadvantages we must include two very unpleasant facts. ist, that the young devour each other to such an extent that, as a rule, only a very few out of the several hundred hatched in every cocoon ever reach the age when they separate and build isolated webs; and, 2d, that the female spider is apt to devour her partner sometimes before, but more often after the impregna- tion of the eggs. This latter fact is not of so much consequence; for the females are the spin- ners, and are always in the majority, not only in the number but also in the size of the individuals (the female being about one hundred and twenty-five times as large as the male), and the males can be easily protected. But the terrible destruction which, in a state of nature, seems necessary in order that a portion shall grow at all, is a very serious obstacle in the way of any increase of the species. This killing of each other, however, is not, apparently, from malice but from hunger, and both experiment and inference indicate that it may be almost entirely prevented by supplying the young and growing spiders hO THE GALAXY. [JULY, with suitable food. Each cocoon spun by the parent spider contains from five hundred to .a thousand eggs, all of which hatch, generally in the course of a month. For several days, or even weeks, they remain huddled together in the cocoon, and whatever growth they have during that time, aside from absorption of moisture from the air, must be at the expense of the community; nor can it be well prevented. But after this time has passed, and they begin to come forth, either singly or in parties, and spin their little lines over the leaf to which the cocoon is attached, they may be in great measure prevented from further canni- balism by putting in their reach drops of blood or crushed flies, or very minute flies, or bugs of almost any kind. If large numbers of them are to be reared, a special apartment should be arranged for them; each cocoon should be attached t~ the top of a wire frame of say a foot in height and nearly the same diameter, which must stand in a shallow dish of water, lest the spiders travel about the room and collect in great numbers at the top, where they could not be cared for. They will spin at first an irregular common web, and eat together from whatever food falls upon it. As they grow larger they may be separated by inverting another frame over the first; for they always ascend. After several weeks, they suddenly change their instincts; and from living together in some sort of fellowship, which really does not seem to be incompati- ble with their peculiar style of eating each other up, they attempt to isolate them- selves, and to make each for itself its own web, which is now geometrical, like that of the full-grown spiders; and as they now need more room, and will jeal- ously resent any trespassing upon their particular territory, it is time to remove them to the frames, which will be described in the following section. It is impossible to say ho~v large a percentage may by this plan be reared from one cocoon; but the fact that two or three out of every hundred have been saved at a first trial, under very unfavorable conditions, shows what may be ex- pected of a plan like the above systematically conducted upon a large scale. As to the food of the young, there are some sub stances which breed the smaller kinds of flies, and which could be kept in a place communicating with the outer air and another room; but covered with fine wire netting. This would exclude the larger species, but would admit the little ones to deposit their eggs upon the meat, etc.; and the flies produced therefrom could enter the apartment. The growing spider, like the worm, casts its skin several times before reach- ing its full size, and in both the operation is attended by some danger. It is, no doubt, a disadvantage, that the spider, in moulting, is obliged to draw eight such very long legs from their old skins; but although the legs may be occasionally pulled off in the process, yet they generally separate at the sec- ond joint from the body, and thereby no blood is lost; and moreover, although each pair of legs has its appointed office, they may act vicariously. To offset the liability to injury in consequence of their more complicated structure, the spiders are not known to be subject to diseases, such as have so terribly de- stroyed the worms of late years; but we cannot be sure that some maladies will not follow their domestication. VISPAcE REQUIRED flY THE SPIDER. The great obstacle to a final comparison of the worm and the spider in this respect, lies in the difference of opinion among sericu lturists as to what is re- quired by the former; so all I can do is to state as nearly as possible the amount of space needed for a given number of spiders ; this must, of course, be far less than they naturally occupy, for in their native woods, two or three, or at most III 1869.] THE PRACTICAL VIEW OF SPIDERS SILK. half a dozen, spre~d their great nets each three or four feet in diameter among the branches of a tree, and ~vhen left to locate themselves in a room, each spider constructs a web over a window or across a corner; and as they rarely OCCUPY the same spot for many days, they would soon interfere in their wanderings, the rather since their eight eyes do not appear to distinguish objects distinctly, but only light from darkness. But they may be circum- FIGURE 7. scribed in the following manner: Make an incomplete ring one foot in diameter of thick galvan- ized iron ~vire, and set the two ends into a plate of the same metal six inches wide and fifteen long (Fig. 7); set the ring a little obliquely because the spiders will not make their webs upon a vertical frame, and wind a thread spirally around the ~vire to af- ford some support to its claws. By setting the base-plate into water, you completely isolate the spider, which after running around the ring a few times, pro- ceeds to construct a web after the manner fully described elsewhere. A shallow trough of water, ten feet long, would hold eight of these frames placed end to end, and if made a foot wide there would be two such rows, the rings inclining FIGURE 8. away from each other as in Fig. 8. At the height of eighteen inches above the bottom of the trough anoth- er similar one may be placed, and above that a third and a fourth, so that in a space six feet high, ten feet long and one foot wide we have sixty- four spiders; but when more are re- quired we must make some provision for passing among them ;andapas- sage of at least three feet wide is re- quired between each two such dou- ble-rows; which space divided be- tween the two single rows, adds a foot and a half to the practical width of the space required by each spider; and we have now, as the minimum for one individuai, a space two feet wide, eighteen inches high, and fifteen inches long, or three and three-quarters cubic feet; and from this unit it is very easy to estimate the space required for a given number of spiders; for instance, l)y hav- ing floors one above the other so as to give a height of about thirty feet, eight thousand spiders may be accommodated in a room forty feet long and twenty- five feet wide; and eight thousand spiders would yield less than a yard of the medium silk at one reeling, or about eighteen yards in the course of a season after twenty reelings. 112 THE GALAXY. [JULY, There are two other requirements to be observed, in making accommodation for the spiders: First, that the air be both warm and moist; so as to resemble that of their native swamps. Second, That the roof be wholly or in part of glass, so as to let the direct rays of the sun upon them. It is certain that they do not thrive in the dark, but there is also some reason to believe that the yel- low color of the gum in the silk-bags, which we have described as lying just below the skin, is du~ to the action of light; at any rate the colorless gum is contained in the bags which are in the centre of the abdomen. But the spider has one most decided advantage over the worm. Its food costs almost nothing, either in labor or material. As is well known, the feeding of the worm is a matter of great importance; the mulberry tree is not very hardy and needs constant care; and the leaves must be plucked at stated times and chopped, ~speciaUy for the young worms; they also eat all the time and con- sume such a quantity of vegetable food as to require frequent removal of the excrement. The spider, on the contrary, eats but very little, since its food is wholly animal, and not only does very well for days without it, but will catch its own prey if allowed to do so. The arrangement for breeding flies would be similar to that already described, only the netting must have large meshes, so as to admit the largest flies, and yet exclude rats and other depredators from the putrifying meat. In both cases, of course, the opening into the apartment should be small. Many more practical suggestions might be given as to the method of rearing and feeding the spiders; but the limits of this article forbid, and, indeed, the most of them will occur to the careful reader of the accounts given elsewhere of the habits of the Nephila plumipes. I trust to write no more concerning then-k until the question is decided, whether or npt they may contribute toward the comfort or the pleasure of mankind, or until we have materially added to our present knowledge of many points in their structure, their habits and their capacities for improvement. The little we already know suggests numberless paths of inquiry in all directions, and, aside from any question of utility, every scientific question now answered raises ten more, concerning which nothing is known. BURT G. WILDER, M. D. THE LAST CHAPTER IN THE HISTORY OF THE WAR. THE details attending the death-throes of the Southern Confederacy east of the Missisippi have been told, by those who witnessed them on each side, over and over again. The surrender of Lee, which virtually ended the war, was an event of such transcendent importance that every particular incident thereof was portrayed by enterprising correspondents or embodied in official reports. The surrender of Johnston was brought into special prominence by the spicy and trenchant correspondence between Sherman and Stanton, to which the first negotiations gave rise. When those two surrenders had been made, little inter- est ~vas felt, in the East certainly, in regard to the manner in which the outlying hosts of the Confederacy should accept the adverse fate of war. It was merely known that west of the Mississippi there was a large force of organized and un- organized Confederate troops, estimated at from fifty to one hundred thousand men, under the command of General E. Kirby Smith. How formidable was this trans-Mississippi army, what ~vere its resources, what its spirit, and what the purposes of its leaders, were unknown. It held, virtually, the whole of Texas; nearly all of Louisiana west of the Mississippi; all of Southern Arkansas not within a few miles radius of our military posts, and the Indian Territory. Navigation of the White and Arkansas Rivers by Union transports was dangerous; a fleet of eighty-six gunboats, monitors, and others vessels of war was needed to protect transports on the Mississippi from bushwhackers on each side of the river. The Red River was closed, and at its mouth a formidable Union fleet of from six to eight vessels, including a moni- tor, had lain for two years, with steam constantly up, waiting for the expected descent of the ram Webb, known to be the fleetest and thought to have become one of the most formidable war vessels afloat. From Cairo to New Orleans the life of a Union man who should venture on the west side of the Mississippi, out of the immediate protection of a military post or without a sufficient escort of troops, was not worth a farthino From Southern Missouri to the Gulf our hold on the vast country between, enough in extent for a great empire, was merely nominal, that is, we held the spots which our troops actually occupiedno more. To the regularly organized and partisan Confederate forces west of the Mis- sissippi recruits were constantly coming from disbanded and surrendered organ- izations on the east side of the river. In spite of the utmost vigilance of our tin-dads, thousands of the most desperate of Lees, Johnstons, Forrests, and Dick Taylors old soldiers ~vere known to have crossed the river in dug-outs, and by every other conceivable means, ~vith the purpose of carrying on a life- long war against the Union, even if no other style of war than guerilla opera- tions remained for them. The organized Confederate troops ~vest of the Mississippi were more or less confident. Thousands were too ignorant to know the extent of the disasters which had made further resistance hopeless. They did know how Steeles army had been repulsed on its march from Arkansas toward Shreveport, and how utterly disastrous to the Union Army of the West had been Bankss untoward and expensive Red River expedition, and were naturally flushed ~vith the pride of victors. Thousands more were Missourians who had little expectation of being allowed to return safely to their homes, and as many more determined to adopt the nomadic life of the Indians, and live indiscriminately on the loyal and

THE LAST CHAPTER IN THE HISTORY OF THE WAR. THE details attending the death-throes of the Southern Confederacy east of the Missisippi have been told, by those who witnessed them on each side, over and over again. The surrender of Lee, which virtually ended the war, was an event of such transcendent importance that every particular incident thereof was portrayed by enterprising correspondents or embodied in official reports. The surrender of Johnston was brought into special prominence by the spicy and trenchant correspondence between Sherman and Stanton, to which the first negotiations gave rise. When those two surrenders had been made, little inter- est ~vas felt, in the East certainly, in regard to the manner in which the outlying hosts of the Confederacy should accept the adverse fate of war. It was merely known that west of the Mississippi there was a large force of organized and un- organized Confederate troops, estimated at from fifty to one hundred thousand men, under the command of General E. Kirby Smith. How formidable was this trans-Mississippi army, what ~vere its resources, what its spirit, and what the purposes of its leaders, were unknown. It held, virtually, the whole of Texas; nearly all of Louisiana west of the Mississippi; all of Southern Arkansas not within a few miles radius of our military posts, and the Indian Territory. Navigation of the White and Arkansas Rivers by Union transports was dangerous; a fleet of eighty-six gunboats, monitors, and others vessels of war was needed to protect transports on the Mississippi from bushwhackers on each side of the river. The Red River was closed, and at its mouth a formidable Union fleet of from six to eight vessels, including a moni- tor, had lain for two years, with steam constantly up, waiting for the expected descent of the ram Webb, known to be the fleetest and thought to have become one of the most formidable war vessels afloat. From Cairo to New Orleans the life of a Union man who should venture on the west side of the Mississippi, out of the immediate protection of a military post or without a sufficient escort of troops, was not worth a farthino From Southern Missouri to the Gulf our hold on the vast country between, enough in extent for a great empire, was merely nominal, that is, we held the spots which our troops actually occupiedno more. To the regularly organized and partisan Confederate forces west of the Mis- sissippi recruits were constantly coming from disbanded and surrendered organ- izations on the east side of the river. In spite of the utmost vigilance of our tin-dads, thousands of the most desperate of Lees, Johnstons, Forrests, and Dick Taylors old soldiers ~vere known to have crossed the river in dug-outs, and by every other conceivable means, ~vith the purpose of carrying on a life- long war against the Union, even if no other style of war than guerilla opera- tions remained for them. The organized Confederate troops ~vest of the Mississippi were more or less confident. Thousands were too ignorant to know the extent of the disasters which had made further resistance hopeless. They did know how Steeles army had been repulsed on its march from Arkansas toward Shreveport, and how utterly disastrous to the Union Army of the West had been Bankss untoward and expensive Red River expedition, and were naturally flushed ~vith the pride of victors. Thousands more were Missourians who had little expectation of being allowed to return safely to their homes, and as many more determined to adopt the nomadic life of the Indians, and live indiscriminately on the loyal and 114 THE GALAXY. [JULY, disloyal citizens of Texas and Louisiana, rather than return to~homes on the east side of the Mississippi, and confess allegiance to the hated government of the Union. From across the Rio Grande there came constant encouragement to the spirit of resistance. Vague official intimations, nominally from Maximilian, hut really from Napoleon, kept alive the hopes of the leaders, and were greatly magnified by common rumors. Could the Confederates concentrated west of the Mississippi but hold out long and desperately enough, they might he sure of constant aid in secret, and might look for possible exigencies, in whicl~ the open alliance of France could be secured. Such speculations seem visionary enough now, but they had more substance then than most of us might at present believe possible. Moreover, Texas, escaping almost entirely the ravages and desolations of the ~var, had waxed rich iieyond all precedent. It had become, during the decadence of the Confederacy, a place of refuge for timid and ~vealthy men from all parts of the South, who brought as much of their means and as many of their slaves as they could ~vell transport across the country. The negroes were kept in sub- jection by the free use of the revolver and rifle, and raised large crops. Until the capture of Vicksburg, Texas had furnished the bulk of the meat required for the rebel armies. Across the Mexican border a constant and lively overland trade, unsanctioned by custom-house permits, had supplied the soldiers and people with large quantities of gold and silver, with arms and ammunition, and with many comforts and luxuries unknown elsewhere within the rebel lines. All along the rivers of Arkansas and Louisiana small steamers, under the protection of United States Treasury permits, exchanged arms, ammunition, and other supplies for cotton, and enabled guerilla forces to subsist under the very noses of our garri- sons. Supreme over all this region was General E. Kirby Smith, whose final offi- cial relations with the President of the Confederacy constituted one of the most singular anomalies of the war. Originally and necessarily intrusted with a very large discretionary po~ver, the successful movements and hostile operations of Grant and Sherman had gradually rendered it more and more important that he should act ~vithout the advice or orders of the Richmond authorities. Finally, the satrapy became virtually independent. West of the Mississippi no Confeder- ate thought of looking beyond the authority of Kirby Smith. He made and unmade generals. He subsisted his entire command without a single requisition on the Richmond bureaus. Whatever deference he paid to the nominal authority of Davis was merely an act of courtesynothing more. Such ~~as the condition of affairs in the Confederate trans-Mississippi De- partment when Lee surrendered at Appomattox. It was very imperfectly rea ized in the East, but far better in the valley of the Mississippi, which ~vas, as yet, but nominally open for perfectly safe navigation and commerce. Gene- ral Grant, ho~vever, appreciated fully and keenly the whole situation, and at once telegraphed to St. Louis to General Pope, whose command included all the vast region between the Mississippi and the Rocky Mountains down as far as the Northern line of the country held by Kirby Smith. This dispatch directed Gene- ral Pope to send to Kirby Smith an offer of the same terms of surrender as those accepted by Lee. The incidents of the mission intrusted by General Pope to two of his staff officersColonel John T. Sprague and the writer of this articlein the exe- cution of General Grants order, throw so much light on the last chapter of the history of the ~xar that they seem worthy of record in some permanent form. 1869.] THE LAST CHAPTER IN THE HISTORY OF THE XVAR. ii~ Leaving St. Louis on the day of the receipt of the telegram from General Grant, we stopped at Cairo, where, in response to the request of General Pope, Ad- miral Lee had the gunboat Lexington in readiness to convey us to the mouth of Red River, and as far up that river as it might be deemed expedient to go. The Admiral had, also, of his own accord, directed all of the naval commanders in the Mississippi squadron to offer such assistance to the Peace Commissioners as might in any way facilitate the object of their mission, an order which was obeyed with the utmost heartiness and good-will by all who were in any way called on for courtesies or substantial acts of assistance. We arrived at the mouth of Red River about the last of April, x86~. Within a mile or two of this point were seven or eight war vessels, including the moni- tor Manhattan; the captured rebel iron-clad Tennessee; the large and handsome iron-clad Lafayette, the flag-ship of Commodore Foster, and other wooden and tin-clad vessels. The command of Commodore Foster terminated at the mouth of the Red River, at which point that of Commodore Grafton, on the Manhattan, began. I mention this arbitrary division of command, as subsequent events render it important. A mile or two below Red River was the Confede- rate flag-of-truce boat, which made periodical trips up the river and back, on the business of exchange of prisoners, etc. The arrival of the Le~3ngton, whose mission was soon made known through the fleet, relieved the monotony of the weary watchers for the Confederate ram Webb, and caused a genuine excitement. This was increased by orders for a constant patrolling of the river to prevent the possible escape of Jefferson Davis to Texas, and by the news that there had lately been much activity on board the XVebb, ~vhose dangerous presence might be expected at any time. Our first visit to the Confederate officers on their flag-of-truce boat showed a like fever- ishness and anxiety on their part. In command of the boat was Colonel Sky- manski, the agent of exchange for the trans-Mississippi department, a character who deserves special description, even at the risk of delaying my narrative. A Polish gentleman, educated to military life at home, he had long been known at New Orleans as the owner of a cotton press, of fast horses and of a fast yacht, and as a genial, cultivated and liberal sporting man. He became a rebel on general principles. His father was a rebel, and he ~vas brought up as a rebel, and satirically criticised those who were ashamed of the title and insisted on being called Confederates. Over six feet in height, slender, but with abun- dant energy and nervous strength, his courtesy, tact, knowledge of the world, and social qualities eminently fitted him for the diplomatic duties assigned him. Whatever he did was done thoroughly, systematically, and well. His word was always faithfully kept, and I have reason to believe that he used all of his influence to prevent the ill treatment of Union prisoners. At our first interview with Colonel Skymanski he delicately but firmly objected to our going up the Red River on the Lexington. There were mys- terious hints which might be interpreted to refer to torpedoes; at all events we found that we could not go except in a hostile manner, and our instructions did not contemplate a second Red River expedition. The Confederate commission- er told us, however, that he ~vould go up the river and make arrangements with Kirby Smith for an early interview, and accordingly started the next evening, promising to be back in five days. The same evening, on returning to the fleet, there occurred the most notable surprise of the year in that quarter. About eight or nine oclock, while we were talking with Commodore Foster, on the dcck of the Lexington, a shot was heard ix6 THE GALAXY. [JULY, from the howitzer of the Manhattan, which lay just at the mouth of Red River, diagonally opposite, and about a mile and a half from the Lexington. Instantly every one on the decks of that vessel and of the Lafayette, lying next to her, was roused to the most excited attention, and the Webb was in every ones thoughts. Had she really come down at last? and would she try her powers as a ram on our tin-dads and wooden gunboats? were questions which oc- curred to every one in the fleet. After a delay, really short, but apparently of sev- eral minutes, a signal light is shown on the Manhattan, and the signal books are carefully scanned as each light appears. No one can make out its significance. Had Commodore Fosters command extended below the mouth of the Red River he would have started the Lexington, Lafayette and other vessels instantly down river, but he must await the signals of the Manhattan, and himself signalled to her to repeat the blind message. The second time the right signal is given, and Commodore Fosters fleet, already prepared to start at the word, steams rapidly down stream. But the bird had flown. The few minutes start gained by the Webb put her miles below her comparatively slow pursuers, making her first thirty miles in a trifle over an hour. Her untimely fate just below New Orleansthe last conspicuous naval disaster of the Confederacyis well known. It is not so ~vell known, however, that her stoppage was due to a telegraph sent to Ne~v Orleans from Morganza by one of Commodore Fosters subordinates, Captain Lull, over the inland line, that along the river having been cut by the crew of the Webb. I learned, afterward, up the Red River, that it was intended to run the Webb to Havana, sell the cotton with which she was laden and protected, and fit out the Harriet Lane, then lying there, as a privateer. The experiment ~vas a bold one, as one well-directed shot from the big guns of our fleet would have sunk her. Its partial success ~vas clue to the absurd division of our naval com- mands at the mouth of Red River; to the temporary absence of Commodore Grafton from the Manhattan; to the slowness anr1 stupidity of the officer left in charge of her, and to the temporary absence of the fastest vessel in Commo- dore Fosters fleet. What would have been the result had the swift and formi- dable Harriet Lane got to sea with a commander as fearless as the captain of the Webb sho~vecl himself to be, who can tell? His project was so audacious that all of the Confederate authorities at Shreveport advised him not to attempt it, although he had the special permission of Davis to do so. On our second visit to Colonel Skymanskis boat, the morning after the Webb excitement, we found some of the subordinate officers exhilarated over what they then regarded as the successful escape of the ram, but the Colonel was fearful that we might attribute his objection to the ascent of the Red River with a gunboat to wrong motives. He protested that the descent of the XVebb at that time was unexpected by him. The fact that his own boat would have been likely to catch several stray shots from our fleet seemed to confirm his statement, which we after~vard learned was undoubtedly true. The joy of the Confederates was, however, soon dampened by the, news of the collapse of their last naval experiment, and Colonel Skymanski steamed up the Red River with the gloomy news. XVe were not sorry for the delay imposed on us, desiring to receive the ofl3.. cial report of Johnstons surrender, as well as that of Dick Taylorthe moral effect of which latter, west of the Mississippi, we knew would be very great, Dick being considered, in that region, the gamest of generals. Making a flitting trip to Ne~v Orleans we found that everything was in readiness for a 1869.] THE LAST CHAPTER IN THE HISTORY OF THE WAR. 117 strong movement on the Texas coast, in case of Kirby Smiths refusal to sur- render. A force of at least twenty thousand men could have been started with- out delay. I may as well state here that General Pope had transportation and supplies at Little Rock sufficient to move over fifty thousand men at a few days notice, and forty thousand men in his own command at his disposal, and could easily have obtained, from General Washburne, at Memphis, and other com- manders below, ten thousand more. Every preparation, including maps of the lines of march from Little Rock to Shreveport, had been made for an energetic campaign. Colonel Skymanski returned a day ahead of his time, accompanied by Colonel Allston, Inspector-General of the Department, and other officers. We learned afterward that there had been a hurried assemblage of the Confederate leaders, military and civil, at Alexandria, and an excited discussion. The result was an invitation for us to go up the Red River to Shreveport on the Confederate flag- of-truce boat, and there to confer with the rebel authorities. The trip to Shreveport, a distance of four hundred and fifty miles, was one of the most interesting I ever made anywhere. Besides the Confederate offi- cers, there were several exchanged or paroled soldiers on board, a few ladies, and some citizen passengers, who came from mysterious quarters and whose bu- siness no one seeme(l to know. All, save Colonel Skymanski and the other Confederate officers, looked on us with an ill-concealed suspicion and dislike, which we quietly ignored. The Colonel, ho~vever, was supreme and omnipres- ent; preventing unpleasant topics of talk so far as possible; unfailing in his courtesy to his two particular guests ; the devoted cavalier of the ladies ; the thoughtful caterer of (lelicacies for the favored fe~v at his table, and the social inspiration of the mixed circle of Confederates and Unionists on board his steamer. His special delight was in his really fine brass band, which he in- sisted on retaining on his boat as a promoter of diplomatic courtesies, and some of whose members were equally skilful with stringed instruments for dance music in the cabin. The repertory of his musicians was a large one, and needed to be, for the Colonel wanted music morning, noon, and night, daily, and always made a point of serenading every pretty girl who lived upon the river. The approach of Colonel Skys boat was ~vatched from afar and welcomed by ec- static wavings of white handkerchiefs, while white and black, of all ages, would congregate near the bank, and active youngsters would be sent to the boat, has- t:Iy laden with butter, milk, vegetables and other free will offerings. No man so popular as old Sky, who, though seventy or more, knew how to win all the womens hearts Passincr up over the lake-like waste of waters caused by the backing up of the flooded Mississippi ; by the succession of desolate sugar plantations, whose costly buildings had been destroyed by Bankss retreating army, and up, one hundred and fifty miles, to Alexandria, we began to realize at that place the excitement oc- casioned by the news of our mission. A large and not altogether lovely crowd had assembled on the levee and swarmed over the boat, to whose not already good-natured scrutiny the Yankee Commissioners had to submit with at least an air of indifference. We were tnere joined by some important personages. Chief of them was General Buckner, who seemed entirely dejected by the dangerous condition of his wife, who was brought on board in the arms of three or four officers, and appeared to be very near to quiA consumption. Tall, erect as an arrow, and with a most decided military bearing; lookingwith his spare f~ce, shining eyes, prematurely grey hair and general aspectlike a man whose nerves 8 I iS THE GALAXY. [JuLY, and spirits had suffered from misfortunes, exposures and trials, General Buck- ncr still appeared defiant and ready for the next bad throw of Fortunes dice. His assurance and manner enabled me to understand both how he rather fool- ishly complained of Grants unchivalrous terms at Donelson, and how he remained there, soldier-like, and shared with his men the fate from which Floyd and Pillow cowardly ran. From Alexandria to within about twenty miles of Shreveport there was lit- tle to vary the monotony of the journey, save conversation and the music of Colonel Skys band. There were a few incidents, however, characteristic enough to mention. The steamer got out of fuel, and I noticed that the pilot kept a sharp look-out on each side for a wood pile. Finally the last sticks were put in the furnaces, and the nose of the boat was headed directly for the bank. I strove in vain to discover a wood pile, and wondered where the pilot had seen one, until the gang of deck hands began coolly to tear down a rail fence near the river, and tote the rails aboard. This seemed like a rather rough spe- cies of confiscation, as the flag-of-truce boat could easily have carried wood enough for the round trip. Not long after, another fence was torn down, and the same day the hands had begun to appropriate another, when a poor, woebegone, wretched looking old man came rushing down with his children, and, all crying together, plead in vain in behalf of his fence. He had just been able to get his crops started, but was too poor and weak to repair his fence, whose destruction meant starvation for himself and his family. I was touched by the scene, and so was a Confederate staff officer, who stood by my side. I took the liberty of saying what I thought, and he replied excitedly, I have reported such things over and over again. The quartermasters department has had positive orders to provide wood for this steamer, and men enough have been detailed as wood- cutters and haulers to supply forty boats; but it is of no use. Our people only know one part of making war. They know how to fight, and thats all. The Southern men have no business faculty; and while your armies have been abun- dantly supplied in a hostile country, hundreds of miles from their base, our quar- termasters and commissaries have let our soldiers go naked and starving among friends and in their own country. This wood business here is of a piece with our ~~hole management. Having delivered himself pretty emphatically on this point he changed the subject, and ~ve noth tried to forget the poor family whose means of living had virtually been taken away, because a quartermaster had failed to deliver a few cords of wood. Among the several mysterious persons in civilians clothes on hoard was one who soon engaged my special attention. Stoutly built, with a face expressive of indomitable energy and will, but comprehensively bad and suspicious, moving around everywhere, but never seeming to care to talk with any one, evidently striv- ing to appear indifferent to all conversation, but really listening to everything within ear-shot, I soon put him down as a cotton thiefthat is to say, one of those unscrupulous speculators who had managed through influential persons to secure papers from high authority on each side, allowing them to pass from one side of the lines to another. They bought and soldto and from each sidecot- ton, supplies, valuable informationand those who believed their lying reports. I called a Confederate officers attention to this ugly specin~en of a cotton thief, and remarked that I should like to see the whole gang of them lynched, or oth- erwise speedily sent to their future punishment. He agreed with me, and said he would have this fellow put into the district guard-house in Shreveport on our arrival. XVhen, however, he had got ready to caich Mr. Cotton-thief the scoun x869.j THE LAST CHAPTER IN THE HISTORY OF THE WAR. ii~ drel was nowhere to be found; and on my return up the Mississippi I saw him on the main street of Memphis. Asking a staff officer there if he knew the man, he replied, Oh, yes ; I caught him at some of his tricks here, and informed General XVasliburne, who ordered him out of his district, never to return. In ten days thereafter the fellow came back with papers from high authority at Washington, which a mere Major-Genera] could not well get over. Such was one of the peculiar features of the war as carried on in the Mississippi Valley. We had got within about twenty miles of Shreveport, and were steaming up the narrow and tortuous channel as rapidly as possible, when a sudden bend dis- closed a steamer tied up at the left bank, from which we were hailed by one or two revolver shots. We stopped, and found that it had on board no less a person than the chief of what there was left of the Confederacy. Tying up just above, a small party, consisting of General Buckner, General Hayes, Colonel Allston, and the two commissioners, went on board General Smiths steamer. We found him and his Medical Director, Dr. Smith, seated in the rear cabin. The then prevalent stories about Kirby Smith had given me the impression of a man of great executive energy, domineering will, and shrewd business tact. In the slim, tall, stooping, bald, spectacled, mild, amiable, professor-like man before me I could hardly realize any of my preconceptions. He soon, with I3uckner, en- tered into lively and pleasant talk with Colonel S., whom both had long known in the old army, and the business of the evening was deferred until the ice had thus been thoroughly thawed. The proposition of General Grant was handed to him, and retained for consideration; and soon both steamers were on their way to Shreveport. The headquarters of the trans-Mississippi Department may have been well chosen, from a military point of vie~v; but there could have been no other recom- mendation. At the head of navigationexcept during the periodical high water within a few miles of the richest agricultural region of Texas, and on the line of a proposed Pacific railroad from Vicksburgh, Shreveport was an important com- mercial town of its size, and had great expectations; but when we were there the large warehouses were used for military stores, business was almost nothing, and the town seemed inhabited solely by soldiers, gamblers, loafers, desperadoes, and the ugliest of bushwhackers. Murders were of almost daily occurrence, and were seldom, if ever, punished. If the whole of the South-west had been ransacked there could not have been gathered together a more ragged, dirty, desperate, villainous-looking crowd than was congregated on the levee, when we went ashore. Hardly a man of them would have neglected a good opportunity of boring a hole through one of the Yankee Commissioners. The organized soldiers and their officers were our only protection, and the latter more than once showed their uneasiness arid concern for our safety. We remained at Shreveport nearly a week, having daily conversations with the military and civil leaders, and finally returned with a formal refusal to sur- render. Why so long a time was spent; why Kirby Smith then refused to ac- cept General Grants terms ; and why, a few days after we left, General Buckner hastened down to the mouth of Red River and surrendered to General Canby are important features in the last chapter of the history of the war which, to this day, are known to but few persons. I shall endeavor to make the whole matter as plain as possible, not neglecting such incidents as may throw light on the singular situation of affairs then and there. Two very unfortunate difficulties presented themselves at the outset. First, there was a just-issued order from General Banks, which forbade the paroled and 120 THE GALAXY. [JULY, returned soldiers of Lees army from wearing their uniform and from engaging in business pursuits. They were mostly ragged and penniless. If they were to cast off their dirty grey tatters they had no means of covering their nakedness. If debarred from employment they would have to starve, or live on the coun- try, in which latter case a large army of Union soldiers would be needed to keep the peace in the South-west. Secondly, Attorney-General Speed had issued an official opinion to the effect that paroled Confederate soldiers who had come from loyal border Stateslike Missouri, Kentucky, and Tennesseecould not return to their homes. It was held by Kirby Smith that these two official constructions of Grants agreement with Lee were opposed at least to its spirit and fair interpretation. He trusted Grant, and believed in his good faith and sol- dierly fairness, and thought that Grant would insist on a liberal interpretation of the terms of surrender; but he feared that the reaction of Northern sentiment caused by the assassination of Mr. Lincoln, and the supposed personal hostili- ty of Mr. Johnson to nearly every prominent man in the South, would render Grant powerless in the matter. Neither he nor any of the prominent officers at Shreveport expected to obtain any favor at Washington, or, in fact, to be allowed to live in the United States. All of them had made preparations to go to Mexico, Brazil, Cuba, and elsewhere. He wanted, however, for the sake of his soldiers and of the country, to obtain an assurance direct from the new President that the terms offered by Grant would not be construed away by subordinates. He feared that, without this assurance, the fifteen thousand or more soldiers from the border States would extort a living from the people for whom they had fought, and plunge the country into a state of chaotic anarchy inconceivably dangerous. He said that he could not abandon the South-west to such a fate without an effort to avert it, and promised to hold his forces together and make no hostile move- ment until a message could be got from Washington. He was satisfied ~vith Grants offer and wanted peace; but, as I have said, wanted also some un q uali- fled declaration from Washington to the effect which I have mentioned. A formal and immediate reply to the offer of peace was demanded, and given in the negative. Then and there the negotiations would have ended, but for the earnest interposition of Henry W. Allen, the Confederate Governor of Louisi- ana. He was a remarkable man. Self-educated, and having to struggle hard for the means of obtaining an education, he won his way to local distinction by his energy, public spirit, popular manners and stirring style of speech. He was one of the few believers in the code of honor, who retained the really chival- rous spirit of such duellists as Clay and Randolph, and had had several affiuirs of which the most were on account of his friends. Some of these affairs verged closely on the quixotical. Disabled from field service by his wounds, he was elected Governor of Louisiana, and in this capacity became the most popular man in the State. He always stood up stoutly for the rights of the citizens and of the private soldiers. Ardent as he had been for xvar, he had become no less ardent for peace. He knew the military preparations we had made on each side of Kirby Smiths department, and did not want to run the risk of delay in- curred by a refusal to surrender. He proposed a conference of the Confeder- ate Governors of Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas and Missouri, to which Kirby Smith should be invited. This meeting ~~as held at Marshall, Texas, about twenty miles west of Shreveport, and we were delayed three days waiting for the result. This did not materially vary from what had already been arrived at, and we, accordingly, started down the river the next morning. Somehow every one 1869.] THE LAST CHAPTER IN THE HISTORY OF THE WAR. 121 seemed to believe that the mission had failed, and there were many who had fought with stout hearts for four years, whose faces showed a gloomy apprehen- sion of evil in the future, and more than one secretly avowed to me his inten- tion of going back to his State, east of the Mississippi, and of sharing its peaceful though subjugated condition. At the levee there was, if possible, a wilder and worse-looking crowd than greeted our arrival. Hundreds of Shelbys murderous gang were there, hurrahing, yelling, firing off revolvers, and otherwise acting out their riotous natures. It was a wise forethought of Kirby Smith to send down with us a picked escort of a company of Missouri sharpshooters, selected for their excellent discipline and material. To a sergeant of that com- pany the writer is indebted for his escape from the bowie-knives of some of the half-drunken bushwhackers on the levee. Kirby Smith left Shreveport for Houston on the day of our departure. His intention was to collect the forces in that part of Texas, and hold them in order until some definite advices should come from Washington. Buckner was left in temporary command at the headquarters of the department, at Shreveport. No sooner, however, had the soldiers become aware of our departure than they began to desert, appropriating horses, mules, commissary stores, and evervthin gthat came to hand. Before we reached Alexandria we heard reports of a short but some- what sanguinary engagement, in which the small garrison succeeded in repulsing an irregular body of soldiers from an attempt to l)lunder. So rapid and fearful was the process of disintegration, that in three days after our leaving Shreveport Buckner was obliged to make the utmost haste down to the mouth of Red River and surrender his command, while yet he had a command to surrender. His own fine division of Missouri soldiers, over eight thousand men, alone re- tained their discipline to the last, and saved the citizens from utter anarchy. Kirby Smith also surrendered with equal promptness, mdl thus the large army west of the Mississippi accepted its fate by piecemeal. Thousands were never formally surrendered at all, each one of them going to his home on his own hook. And thus singularly ended the last chapter of the war. J. M. BUNDY. A PLEA FOR JACK CADE. THE END OF WORD CONTROVERSY. WHETHER, in my own proper person, I may rightfully claim the distinc- tion of being the Jack Cade of the present day it is not for me to say; but some persons seem inclined so to regard me, and I will confess that on one point I am in lively sympathy with the Cockney rebel, and that the very one as to which he has incurred the most obloquy and ridicule. In his arraignment of Lord Say he says It will be proved to thy face that thou hast men about thee that usually talk of a noun and a verb, and such abominable words as no Chris- tian ear can endure to hear; and for this, among other crimes, Lord Say was put to death. Now I do not declare without qualification, that talking of verbs and nouns should be made a capital crime; but, nevertheless, to slay a person who has men about him who usually talk of a verb and a noun is homicide un- der extenuating circumstances. Jack Cades English, be it observed, is very good ; and it seems that in this speech, as to which he has been for generations so maligned and misrepresented, he merely anticipated me by a few centuries in my valuation of English grammarians. Thus it is ever that the ancients steal all our best ideas. The men who usually talk of a noun and a verb are, some of them at least, beginning to fight in defence of their position, and this they do by attacking me and proving (to their own satisfaction) that, in the words of one of them, my article entitled The Grammarless Tongue, is a tissue of imperti- nence, self-assertion, ignorance, contradiction and downright stupidity. They seem to have been ignorant or to have forgotten that I have had other predeces- sors than Jack Cade, as I shall now proceed to show. And I will say frankly to my readers that this article is to be controversial and nothing else, and that those who are not interested in verbal controversy, had therefore better read no farther than this paragraph. Of those who have attacked me because of the article in question, only two have done so in a manner which makes it worth while, either for my readers sake or for my own, that I should notice their articles. It is quite unnecessary that I should distinguish these writers otherwise than by the admission that they are both scholars ; and by saying that one of them, while with one hand he encouragingly pats me on the head in a manner for which I fear I shall never be properly gmateful, and with the other parcels out and checks off my short-comings with a firstly, secondly, lastly and totally, the prim self-compla- cency of which has perhaps not exactly the effect upon me which it was intended to have, yet never violates decorum, not to say decency ; both of which the other sets at naught, in an article the venom of which so perverts its scholarship as to make it a practical illustration of that obscure passage in Hamlet, The drama of eale Doth all the nobie substance of a doubt To his own scandaL I had heard prophetic mutterings of the coming of this article, and that it was to be something terribleshowing mine to be a series of blunders and mis- statements from beginning to end, and as its writer has ~vritten some criti- cisms which I have read with pleasure, I thought it probable that if his impeach- ment did not destroy me it might at least instruct. The perusal of his article at

A PLEA FOR JACK CADE. THE END OF WORD CONTROVERSY. WHETHER, in my own proper person, I may rightfully claim the distinc- tion of being the Jack Cade of the present day it is not for me to say; but some persons seem inclined so to regard me, and I will confess that on one point I am in lively sympathy with the Cockney rebel, and that the very one as to which he has incurred the most obloquy and ridicule. In his arraignment of Lord Say he says It will be proved to thy face that thou hast men about thee that usually talk of a noun and a verb, and such abominable words as no Chris- tian ear can endure to hear; and for this, among other crimes, Lord Say was put to death. Now I do not declare without qualification, that talking of verbs and nouns should be made a capital crime; but, nevertheless, to slay a person who has men about him who usually talk of a verb and a noun is homicide un- der extenuating circumstances. Jack Cades English, be it observed, is very good ; and it seems that in this speech, as to which he has been for generations so maligned and misrepresented, he merely anticipated me by a few centuries in my valuation of English grammarians. Thus it is ever that the ancients steal all our best ideas. The men who usually talk of a noun and a verb are, some of them at least, beginning to fight in defence of their position, and this they do by attacking me and proving (to their own satisfaction) that, in the words of one of them, my article entitled The Grammarless Tongue, is a tissue of imperti- nence, self-assertion, ignorance, contradiction and downright stupidity. They seem to have been ignorant or to have forgotten that I have had other predeces- sors than Jack Cade, as I shall now proceed to show. And I will say frankly to my readers that this article is to be controversial and nothing else, and that those who are not interested in verbal controversy, had therefore better read no farther than this paragraph. Of those who have attacked me because of the article in question, only two have done so in a manner which makes it worth while, either for my readers sake or for my own, that I should notice their articles. It is quite unnecessary that I should distinguish these writers otherwise than by the admission that they are both scholars ; and by saying that one of them, while with one hand he encouragingly pats me on the head in a manner for which I fear I shall never be properly gmateful, and with the other parcels out and checks off my short-comings with a firstly, secondly, lastly and totally, the prim self-compla- cency of which has perhaps not exactly the effect upon me which it was intended to have, yet never violates decorum, not to say decency ; both of which the other sets at naught, in an article the venom of which so perverts its scholarship as to make it a practical illustration of that obscure passage in Hamlet, The drama of eale Doth all the nobie substance of a doubt To his own scandaL I had heard prophetic mutterings of the coming of this article, and that it was to be something terribleshowing mine to be a series of blunders and mis- statements from beginning to end, and as its writer has ~vritten some criti- cisms which I have read with pleasure, I thought it probable that if his impeach- ment did not destroy me it might at least instruct. The perusal of his article at 1869.] A PLEA FOR JACK CADE. once dissipated my fears and disappointed my hopes. It is of much less signifi- cance as a criticism upon my views of the structure of the English sentence than as a personal attack upon me, as an ignorant charlatan trading upon his reputation, parading knowledge at second hand, instead of bringing forward in the interests of literature the fruits of an honest and painstaking study of my subject. As to this personality, I shall pass it by with as little notice as I am able to nive it while I make it the occasion of an examination and substantia- b tion of the views in my previous article on the relations of words in the English sentence. Upon the threshold I am glad to be able to say that, as far as my observa- tion goes~ such language as that which my censor applies to me, and which I have just quoted~ although not unknown among British writers, is a novelty in literary discussion in this country, where it is left to pot-house politicians, or to those who having emerged from pot-houses, occupy themselves chiefly in show- ing that they should have staid there. If a writer has sho~vn ignorance of his subject, we do not denounce him to his face as a stupid dunce. We may deem a man a cross-grained pedant and an impertinent make-bate and meddler; but among scholars and gentlemen there is a shrinking from the blunt utterance of such a judgment, not only as uncourteous, but as needless, and, in fact, harmful. We think that it does not help the cause of letters so much as it insults the person vituperated. Even if we are compelled to believe the allegation we spise the alligator. It is thought best to show a writers ignorance and stu- pidity, rather than to tell him and the world of it, net. Mv censor, however, un- dertakes the former; not content with the affront, he unwisely goes into argu- ment,givin~ his hard blows first and his lame word afterward. The point of my assailants attack may be found in the following opinions wutch I ventured in passages which he has quoted from my article on the Grammarless Tongue Tint the truth of this matter is this, that of the rules given in the books called English grammar, some are absurd, and most are superfluous. The grammarians have laid down laws directly to the contrary of these assertions ; but the grammarians are wrong, and in the very nature of things can not he right, for their laws have as coaditious precedent, the existence of things which do not exist. In English, the verb is almost with- out distinction of number and person ; the noun is entirely without gender, and has no objective case the adjective and she participle are without number, gender, and case the infinitive is not a mood, it is not an in. flcction of the verb or part of it; and conjunctions are free from all rules but common sense and taste. Upon both these sentences my assailant pours out scorn and wrath, saying ironically for me in the former vein, No doubt all grammarians before the rise of Air. White have been fools and ignoramuses, knoxvino nothinm of their busi- ness ; and no doubt Mr. XVhite is the man, and wisdom will die with himP My censor in my place might think so, but I do not. I do not conclude because a man differs from mediffers widely, by the heavens width, from me, or from those at whose feet I am hardly worthy to sitthat therefore he must be a fool and an ignoramus. That kind of judgment I leave to my learned deemster. Nor do 1 believe, because I have sought the truth diligently and not quite in vain, that wisdom will die with me ; for indeed I know that such as I have on this subject was not born with me, as I shall now sh@w. In so doing I shall not only either enlighten this critics ignorance or expose his misrepresentation, but exhibit to my readers scattered but weighty authority in favor of the views, an expression of ~vhich has been made the occasion of so much remark. As to the general non-agreement of the English verb with its nominative case, which is my assailants first point of attack, is too manifest to need a word of argument. And as to whether a man in taking this position may justly be 124 THE GALAXY. [JULY, held guilty of ignorant and impertinent self-assertion, I cite the following pas- sage from Sir John Stoddarts Universal Grammar: The expression of Nuosber is another accidental property of the verb; and belongs to it only in so far as the verb may be combined witis the expression of person he verb is equally said to be in the sin- gular or plural whetlser it has or has not distinct terosinations appropriated to tlsose different numbers; we call I love singular, and we love, plural; but it is manifest that in all such instances tise expression of number exists only in Ike pronounA. 155. Now, it is the calling of things what they are not, in order that the terminology of English grammar may correspond to that of the Greek and Latin languages, that I think pernicious. It is chiefly, however, upon what I have written in regard to the English and the Anglo-Saxon verb and participle that this critic pours out his vials of vitu- peration. My assertion that the English verb has but t~vo tenses, that it gener- ally does not agree with the nominative in number and person, and the like, bring upon me the charge, not of error, but of blundering, misstatement, and ignor- ance. Upon some of the points in question, I, therefore, cite the following pas- sages from Crombies Etymology and Syntax of the English Language. Dr. Crombie, an LL. D. of Oxford, and a Fellow of the Royal Society, is one of the profoundest, closest, and least pedatitic thinkers who have written on our subject; and his book (from the third and last edition of whichLondon, 1830 I quote) was made a text book for the class of English literature in the London University. Dr. Crombie is examining the argument of an English grammarian, which is to this effect : If that only is a tense which in one inflected word ex- presses an affirmation with time, we should in English have but two tenses, the present and past in the active verb, and in the passive no tenses at all (the very position that I have taken). But, the writer, Dr. Beattie, adds, this is a needless nicety, and, if adopted, would introduce confusion into the grammatical art. If amaveram be a tense, why should not a;;latzesfuerctm ~ If I heard be a tense, I did hear, I have heard; and Is/tail hear must be equally entitled to that appellation. This argument Crombie thus sets aside: Hosv simplicity can introduce confusion, I am unable to comprehend, unless we are to affirm that else introduction of Greek and Latin names, to ex/ress nonentities iv oar language, is necessary to illustrate the grammar and simplify the study of t~e language to else English scholar. . . . Nay, further, if it be a needless nicety to adroit those only as tenses wliicls are formed by infiexion, is it not equally a needless nicety to admit those cases only which are formed by varying the termination. And if confusion be introduced by denying I had heard to be a tense, why does not the learned author simplify the doctrine of English nouns by giving them six casesa king, of a king, to or for a king, a king, 0 king, with, from, iii, or by a king? This surely would be to perplex, not to simplify. In slsort, tlse inconsistency of those grammarians who deny that to be a case which is not fomied by infiexion, yet would load us with moods and tenses not funned by change of termination, is so palpable as to require neither illustration nor argument to oppose it. Why do not these gentlemen favor us with a dual number, wi;ls a osiddle voice, and with an Ol)tative mood Nay, as they are so fo~sd of tenses as to lament that we rob them of all but two, why do they not enrich us with a first and second aorist and a Jan/s Just future? (Pp. miS, 119) Whether amatus fueram be or be not a tense is the very point iii question; and so far am I fl-nm admitting the affirmative as unquestionable, that I contend it has no moore clams to the designation of these than E6ojsaz rervq& ;no more claim than ainandunt est mik4 oman oJortet, or amandas sam have to be called moods. Here I must request the reader to bear in mind the necessamy distinction between the grammar of a language and its caJacity of ex- Aression. . . . Why not give, as English cases, to a king, of a king, wit/c a king, etc.? The mode is certainly applicable, whatever may be the consequences of that application. A case surely is as easily formed by a noun and a preposition as a tense by a participle and an auxiliary. (P. 121). What should we thinle of that persons discernment who should contend that the Latins had an optative mood because nti am legeret signifies, I wish you would read? It is equally absurd to say that we have sit imperfect, preterpiuperfect, or future tense; or that we has-n all the Greek varieties of mood, and two voices, because by the aid ot auxiliary words and definitive terms we contrive to express these accidents, times, or states of being. I consider, there- fore, that we have no more cases, moods, tenses or voices in oar language as far as its gi amnmar, not its capacity of expression, is concerned, than we have variety of termination to denote these different accessary ideas. (Pp. 127, 125.) 1869.] A PLEA FOR JACK CADE. Thus says the eminent English scholar, whose work was made a text-book in the London University, happily not suspecting the nature of the grave charges against his sanity or his honesty, to which he was subjecting himself. But upon this point I cite also the following passage from a yet higher authorityBos- worthin the front rank of the Anglo-Saxon and English scholars of the world, who speaks as follows upon the subject, at p. 189 of the Introduction to his Anglo-Saxon Dictionary. The passage, it will be seen, touches what I have said, and upon voices and cases as well as upon tenses: What is generally termed the passive voice has no existence in Anglo-Saxon, any more than in modem Englisla. TIse Aisglo-Saxons wrote, lie is mmd, he is loved. Here is is the indicative indefinite of tlse neuter verb weson, and lgfod, loved, is the past participle of the verb lofion, to love. In parsing, every ~void should be considered a distinct part of speech. To a king is not called a dative case in English, as 5-egi in Latin, because the Englisla phrase is not formed by inflection, but by tlse auxiliary words to a. If auxiiiaries do not form cases in English nouns, why should tlsey be allowed to form various tenses and a passive voice eltlser its the English, or in its parent, the Saxoms? Thus, Sc rnaeg leon lofod, I may be loved, instead of being called the potential mood passive, moeg is more rationally considered a verb in the imadicative mood, mndeflisise tense, first singular, leon the neuter verb in tlse infinitive mood after the verb anaeg; injod is the perfect participle of the verb lofian. This view is exactly the same, it will be seen, as that which is taken of the subject by Crombie; and, indeed, it is hard for me to understand how any man of common sense, who thinks for himself, can take any other. Bosworth here supports every position that I took in The Grammarless Tongue, which was in effect, to use Bosworths words, that in analyzing the English sentence every word should be considered a distinct part of speech every word, auxiliary verbs as well as auxiliary prepositions, as he does in his analysis of what Eng- lish grammarians call the first person singular, present indicative, potential mood, passive voice of the verb to loveI may be loved. That is the nub of this whole question. But certain of my critics, it seems, do not agree with Bos- worth, and may say that he and Crombie, also, as well as another and a humbler English scholar, are ignorant, impertinent, and downright stupid. Which makes the case very bad for Bosworth and Crombie; but as to the other, he may be excused for running the risk of error in their company. I admit that when I wrote The Grammarless Tongue, I was so far ignorant that I had forgotten this passage in Bosworth. Had I remembered it, I certainly should have built it in as my bulwark and my buttress. One of my criticsthe same whom I have thus far particularly noticedcon- tinuing the attack and directing it to another part, says, in language that leaves no doubt as to his mischievous intent or as to the means to which he descends for its attainment, says I~fr. White knows enough of Anglo-Saxon at second-hand to be able to state that it had only two tenses tlse preseist, or rather the indefinite, and the past. It is Isard to say wisat lie means by indefinite here; certainly tlse tense so styled was so far definite as never to be used as a past. But it is not true that Anglo- Saxon had only two tenses; though it is true that it had inflections only for two. Here we have again the question of the two tenses, and that of the designa- tion of the present as the indefinite, which was brought up in the article of last month on is being done. It is true, I confess it meekly, that what I do know of Anglo-Saxon, I know at second-hand. And as Anglo-Saxon has not been spoken in my family for several centuries, I do not see how it could be otherwise. What I know of the mother language of our English, I have learned from Rask, and Bosworth, and Klipstein, and other scholars of less eminence. In fact I have been to a dame- school in Anglo-Saxon, and have not disdained to learn from good Mary Elstob, faithful mitwerker of her learned and laborious brother. And as my critic is 126 THE GALAXY. [JULY, ignorant, or would seem to be ignorant, what the indefinite tense is in Anglo- Saxon, making the astonishing remark that it was so far definite as never to be used as a past, I xviii tell him that it is called indefinite because (like the corresponding part of the English verb) it was used to express action in any time but the past. Whoever knows anything of Anglo-Saxon must know this, and also that the verb in that language hal absolutely but txvo tenses. And yet, as my would-be-executioner has made these two points in his charge of ignorant presumption against me, I must ask the boys in the first class in Anglo-Saxon to pardon me for quoting the following sentences: There are two tensesthe indefinite and the perfect. The indefinite tense may refer either to the pres- ent period, or to a future, and thus comprehend what are generally termed the present and future tenses. To write, I write now, or I write to-nsorrosv . . . Time future form is the same as time present. I3OSWoRTH, p. 190. The senses are only twothe indefinite and the perfect; the former heing predicated either of a present time or a future period, and the latter of ammy past time, according to the relation in which the sentence con- taining omie or time other stands. KLIPsTEIN, 134. I am very sorry to drag Bosworth and Klipstein into condemnation with me; but perhaps they may be able to bear their lot, and even I may survive. One of the Anglo-Saxon scholars mentioned above does indeed give a third tense. Mary El~tob ( The English-Saxon Grammar, 4to, London, 1755, p. 31) men- tions a future tense or time to come ; of which her example is Ic standd nit ri/tie, or on szunne zi,nan, I shall stand by-and-by or some time or other ; and a very pretty sort of future tense it isone that must commend itself to my critics and all the gentlemen who usually talk of a noun and a verb. For if 1 stand at some titize or of/icr be not as good a tense as I s/tall have stood they may be able to tell the reason why. I regret, for their sakes, that Mistress Listob is not, at the present day, a very high authority on the Anglo-Saxon language. My remark that Anglo-Saxon had not even any seeming auxiliaries, and that its use of liabban, beon, wi/lan, magan, cunizon and znot (it, have, be, will, may, can might), does not convey the notion of time and continuance, but simply predi- cates, possession, existence, volition, necessity, power, havino been received in the same quarter with sneers. I must also cite, although I again apologize for so doing, the following authoritative opinions on that point. The words Ic wiSe, sceeml etc., generally signifies volition, obligation and injunction, rather than time ~ro~- erty of timne. Sometimes, however they have some //earance of denoting time. Boswonrii, 190. AUxILIARy VusesThere are, properly speaking, no verhs in Anglo-Saxon wlsich lay clams. to this pecu- liar cisararter, as those which have been regarded as such do not convey the id-a of time, especia ly future Simon, except in rare instaisces, but rallier oftossession, affirmation or existence, volition, olligot on, command and necessity. KLIPSTEIN, 575. Rask mentions the perfect formed with /zaebbe and the pluperfect xvith /taefde, adding, however, that this tense is often expressed by the simple imper- fect; and saying also on the same page (p. 94, Ed. Copenhagen, 1830), the words ic wi/he, sceat, etc., rather convey an idea of will, obligation, or command, than of time, although they sometimes, by periphrasis, assist in expressing futurity. Now that Bosworth, and Rask, and Klipstein may not be wrong, and even impertinent, ignorant, and self-asserting, and good Mistress Elstob, with her tlarling duck of a future tense, I stand at some tune or ot/zer right, I shall not assert. I shrink from the discussion of so grave and delicate a question, which I shall leave to the decision of the men xvho do not usually talk of a verb and a noun and those other abominable words which no Christian ear can en- dure to hear. 1869.] A PLEA FOR JACK CADE. 127 The views set forth in The Grammarless Tongue as to the force of the so-called auxiliary verbs have met with an opposition which J looked for, and which indeed has been less general and violent than I expected it would be; for the reason, I am inclined to think, that the article in question had the good for- tune to express the opinions which many silent and unprofessional thinkers on Anguageamong whom I was until I began these articleshad been led in- dependently of authority and by the mere forceof right reason. To place the question between us who think thus and our critics properly before my readers, I must quote a passage from my previous article: To express svhat the Roman expressed by amavz an inflection of amo, we use a verb, have, and the per- fect participle of another verb. This participte is an expression of completed action in the abstractloved. It has no relation to person, whether the person is the subject or the object of the actiona point to be re- membered in our consideration of voiceor to specific time or occasion. The only real verb that we use in this instance is one that signifies possession. We say, I havehave what? possess what? Possession implies an object possessed; and us this case it is that completed action which is expressed in the abstract by the parti- ciple. Loced is Isere the object of ttse verb have as muds as money would be in the sentence, I have money; and I hive loved is no more a verb, or a part or tense of a verb, than I have money is, or I have logo. In the first and ttse last of these, loved and logo are as plainly objects of the verb have as money is in tise sec- ond; nor is this relation at all affected by ttse mere verbal origin of the participle and the infinitive. Against this position, impregnable I think to reason, two of my critics have directed the shafts of a feeble ridicule. One says, He, therefore, who has loved, has, in his possession, an abstract completed action bearing the name loved. Such a person may well be excused for inquiring with some anxiety what he shall do with it. Another flouts the pretentious of a man who dared to write about language, and yet t bought that a participle could be the object to a verb. Now, in the first place, Bosworths dictumsay rather his primal law of Eng- lish constructionthat, in parsing, every word should be regarded as a distinct part of speech, covers this ground entirely. The case of a verb followed by a participle is no more than any other excluded from the operation of that law, which indeed, as we have seen, Bosworth himself illustrates by an analysis of the so-called tense I may be loved. What I have written upon this point is there- fore merely an expression and particular enforcement of a general la~v recognized by the facile Jrince~s of British Anglo-Saxon scholars. But I am not left with- out a particular justification of my view of the relation of the auxiliary verb to its participle. Dr. Crombie, explaining the difference between the tenses which some grmamarians have called the preterit~ definite, I have written, and the preterite indefinite, I wrote, furnishes me with the following decision in point: When an action is done in a time continuous to the present instant, we employ the auxiliary verb. Thus on finishing a letter I say, I have writen my letter, I. e. IAossess (nosy) lhefinlshedaclion of wriliog a leller. Again wisen ais action is done in a space of time which she mind assumes as present, or when we express our unmediate tossession of ttsings done in that space, we use the auxiliary verb. I have this week written sev- eral letters, I have now Ihe ~eifeclion of wriling several lellers finished this week. These phraseologies, as the author last quoted justly obserses, are harsh to the ear, and appear exceedingly awkward; but a little atteistion will suffice to show that they correctly exhibit the ideas implied by the tense whicla we have at pres- ent under consideration. ETvMoLoov, etc., p. ififi. But again my critics may not agree with Bosworth and Crombie, which again makes the case bad for them and their yoke-fellow in dull incapacity of the beau- ties of English grammar. Now I do not seek shelter behind others when called upon to defend my position, which has not been attacked in such a manner as to make argument in its support necessary. And, indeed, were I to argue, I could only repeat what I have already said in the two articles of this series on English grammar. And when I am found with two of the greatest 128 THE GALAXY. [JULY, lights of English philology shining full upon my page, it does not become any man, however he may differ from me, were he Whitney or Max Muller, to tax me with a culpable ignorance of the subject on which I undertook to instruct others, or with trading upon my reputation, except as evey man may honorably set a value, or accept tbe v~iue that others set, on what he has honestly earned. I have called English the gr ammarless tongue ; but it merits that distinction only because it excels in its superiority to inflections, and its regard for the log- ical sequence of thought all other languages of civilized Christendom. Com- pared with Greek and Latin, the French, Italian and Spanish languages, and even the German, may be called grammarless. Indeed, the tendency to the lay- ing aside of inflections showed itself early in the Latin tongue, in the very Au- gustan period of which we find in the best writers the germ of our method of expressing action in combination with the idea of time, by the use of the verbs expressing existence and possession, in combination with participles. Cicero said, instead of de C~sare satis dixi, de C~esare satis dictum habeo I have said enough of Caesar; and C~sar himself wrote, copias quas habebat~ara- las, instead of j5avareratthe forces which he had prepared.* Now, will any one pretend that when Cicero said habco dictumI have said, he used the word habeo without the idea of possession, and yet that he used it with that idea when he said habeopomumI have an apple? 1 think no one will do so who is com- petent to write on language at all; and should there be such a person I confess at once that I cannot argue with him. XVe do not approach each other near enough to clash. And as to the questions whether English verbs have real tenses, and what is the force of auxiliary verbs in all cases, I shall leav. them without further discussion, merely giving my readers an example upon which to ruminate. If I shall have followed is a tense, the future perfect tense of the verb to follow, in which the verb shall does not express futurity, and the verb have does not express possession, what becomes of that tense, and what is the meaning of those verbs, when, instead of saying, I shall have followed him so long to-morrow, we say, I shall to-morrow have followed him so long, or, I shall to-morrow have so long followed him, or, I shall have so long followed him to-morrow ? If a tense may be split in pieces and scattered about in this way, and its component parts, each a word in constant and independent use, may retain in their divided condition the same modified meaning or lack of meaning which they have in combination, it would seem that th~ construction of English, according to the grammarians, is so absolved from the laws of reason which hold on all other subjects that any discussion of it in conformity with those laws must be entirely superfluous and from the purpose. RICHARD GRANT WuITE. These examples I find to my hand in Brachets Grainmaire Historique de is Langue Frantaise. THE GALAXY MISCELLANY. XXTHO DISCOVERED THE HUDSON: How shall I admire your heroicke courage, ye marine worthies, reyond all names of worthness! that nevther dread so long esther prescence or absence of the sunne; nor those foggy mysts, tempestuous winds, cold blasts, snowes and Isavie in the ayre nor the unequall seas, whicis might amaze the hearer aud awate the beholder, where the Tritons and Neptunes selfe would quake with chilling feare. PURCHAS, His PILORIMEC. HENRY HUDSON is popularly known as the discoverer of the river which bears his name. Let us therefore inquire if there is any one to dispute his claim. First let us glance at Hudson himself. Of the history of this man we know but little. In connection with his times he appears like some stage effect or myth. That period of his life known to us begins April 19, 1607, and ends June 21, i6ti. Possibly he was the grandson of a ~.ondon alderman, but his lineage is not positively known. He first comes into view at the Church of St. Ethelburge, receiving the Sacrament with his men while he is finally lost to sight in an open boat on the cold North Sea. His voyages were four in number; and during the third he reached and ex- plored that noble stream which, born among the peaks and passes of the Adiron- dacks, flows onward through those lovely scenes that it helps to create, until it loses itself in the sea. On this voyage, as in the two previous, he first sought a passage to China by the way of Nova Zembla; but finding that route impractica- ble, his crew voted to seek a passage on the western coast of America in latitude forty. In this he was encouraged by both Weymouth and Captain John Smith, while to the latter he was indebted for the idea. What hints he may have had direct from Iceland while engaged in this voyage we cannot say, though it is certain that he possessed their ancient sailing directions, which is an interesting fact appreciated by only a few. These directions were contained in an old Ice- landic sea card, translated. as his own indorsement proves, for the vse of me, Henrie Hvdson. Those who have noticed this document, given in Purchas (vol. iii., p. gt8), have given nothing of its history. Hudson himself had no concep- tion of its age or value, though it was really the key to old Greenland, and iden- tical with the sailing directions of the ancient Landanama book, having been used in the voyages of the Northmen four centuries prior to the age of Colum- bus. If he had comprehended the meaning of the document in question, he would probably have sailed on his last vovawe up the west coast of Greenland, where the Northmen found a home, and sought a route to China by Lancaster Sound ; and there, enlightened by the experience of three hundred years, he would have abandoned the delusion of a north-west route, returning perhaps at last to his home, publishing those discoveries concerninw the Northmen which Ecrede afterward gave to the world. But this was not to be. Starvation and hydriotaphia awaited him in that dreary region and, in the meanwhile, he was to rove in the south. Starting from Amsterdam, March 25, 1609. he sailed to Nova Zembla, in search of the Flowery Kingdom; and met an impassable barrier of ice. He there- fore turned the prow of the Half Moon toward the west, and held that course until the heights of Greenland rose above the sea, when he veered southward. In the region of Mount Desert, to which, like all navigators, he was undoubtedly attracted, he delayed for awhile to step a new foremast. From thence he steered down the coast, without making any minute investigations, until he nearly reached Virginia, after which he looked into Delaware Bay. On his re- turn he rounded Sandy Hook and anchored in the lower Bay of New York.

THE GALAXY MISCELLANY. XXTHO DISCOVERED THE HUDSON: How shall I admire your heroicke courage, ye marine worthies, reyond all names of worthness! that nevther dread so long esther prescence or absence of the sunne; nor those foggy mysts, tempestuous winds, cold blasts, snowes and Isavie in the ayre nor the unequall seas, whicis might amaze the hearer aud awate the beholder, where the Tritons and Neptunes selfe would quake with chilling feare. PURCHAS, His PILORIMEC. HENRY HUDSON is popularly known as the discoverer of the river which bears his name. Let us therefore inquire if there is any one to dispute his claim. First let us glance at Hudson himself. Of the history of this man we know but little. In connection with his times he appears like some stage effect or myth. That period of his life known to us begins April 19, 1607, and ends June 21, i6ti. Possibly he was the grandson of a ~.ondon alderman, but his lineage is not positively known. He first comes into view at the Church of St. Ethelburge, receiving the Sacrament with his men while he is finally lost to sight in an open boat on the cold North Sea. His voyages were four in number; and during the third he reached and ex- plored that noble stream which, born among the peaks and passes of the Adiron- dacks, flows onward through those lovely scenes that it helps to create, until it loses itself in the sea. On this voyage, as in the two previous, he first sought a passage to China by the way of Nova Zembla; but finding that route impractica- ble, his crew voted to seek a passage on the western coast of America in latitude forty. In this he was encouraged by both Weymouth and Captain John Smith, while to the latter he was indebted for the idea. What hints he may have had direct from Iceland while engaged in this voyage we cannot say, though it is certain that he possessed their ancient sailing directions, which is an interesting fact appreciated by only a few. These directions were contained in an old Ice- landic sea card, translated. as his own indorsement proves, for the vse of me, Henrie Hvdson. Those who have noticed this document, given in Purchas (vol. iii., p. gt8), have given nothing of its history. Hudson himself had no concep- tion of its age or value, though it was really the key to old Greenland, and iden- tical with the sailing directions of the ancient Landanama book, having been used in the voyages of the Northmen four centuries prior to the age of Colum- bus. If he had comprehended the meaning of the document in question, he would probably have sailed on his last vovawe up the west coast of Greenland, where the Northmen found a home, and sought a route to China by Lancaster Sound ; and there, enlightened by the experience of three hundred years, he would have abandoned the delusion of a north-west route, returning perhaps at last to his home, publishing those discoveries concerninw the Northmen which Ecrede afterward gave to the world. But this was not to be. Starvation and hydriotaphia awaited him in that dreary region and, in the meanwhile, he was to rove in the south. Starting from Amsterdam, March 25, 1609. he sailed to Nova Zembla, in search of the Flowery Kingdom; and met an impassable barrier of ice. He there- fore turned the prow of the Half Moon toward the west, and held that course until the heights of Greenland rose above the sea, when he veered southward. In the region of Mount Desert, to which, like all navigators, he was undoubtedly attracted, he delayed for awhile to step a new foremast. From thence he steered down the coast, without making any minute investigations, until he nearly reached Virginia, after which he looked into Delaware Bay. On his re- turn he rounded Sandy Hook and anchored in the lower Bay of New York. 130 THE GALAXY. [JULY, Here he spent several days, and then entered the rivers mouth, passed the Palisades, sailed through the Highlands, and finally reached the limit of naviga- ble water. It is pleasant to follow him on his voyage and view his progress as seen in Talbots picture. It is the charming month of September, and the birchen trees are beginning to glow with a subdued but regal splendor, while the rich after- noon sky, filled with lazily-floating clouds, is already dreaming of the evening hour. On the bank and in their canoes are the wondering savages, in scanty but picturesque costumes; and up the river, at the left, are the noble Palisades, grandly massed in perspective, and flinging themselves down at full length on the calm, pulseless tide. But the central object is the quaint little yacht Half Moon, which afterward, in i6i6, disappears on the coast of Sumatra. But now, having escaped the bergs of Zembla, she is slowly standing up the stream, borne less by wind than tide, and followed by the savages, paddling their canoes and gazing with wonder upon this white-winged craft, the Manitous great canoe. And what, at this time, were Hudsons thoughts ? H ad he a delightful route to China ? Here, according to Captain John Smith, the route should certainly be. But Hudson kept his own counsels; at least his anticipations are not re- corded in the journal ; while, if he really believed at one time that he was on the right track, the narrowing and the shoaling of the upper reaches must have banished the hope from his breast. This was not, after all, the Pekin Imperial canal, navigable by Freckshuit to the foot of throne. Still the popular notion is that he discovered the Hudson, if not a passage to China ; while historical students of every class are free to acknowledge the debt that we owe to his third voyage. But was he the first navigator to discover this noble stream? Hudson, whatever may have been his merit, was not a man of original con- ceptions. It has indeed been claimed that he first suggested the theory of an open polar sea ; yet all that he really did was to note the mildness of the climate of Nova Zembla when there in 1607, while the navigators who preceded him, in 1594 and 1595, attaining to the same high latitude (8i deg.), not only ob- served the fact but reasoned out a theory, which distinctly condemned the notion that there was an unnavigable region around the pole. So, too, this voyage to America was suggested by Smith, while I-ludson may also have seen the maps of Wyltflief; published in i6o3, upon which Smith doubtless based his own confident opinion. But in conducting the inquiry let us ascertain what were the early opinions in regard to the first discovery of the Hudson. The common representations of our day teach that, according to the traditions of the Indians, Hudson was the first European who visited the river. This exclusive opinion, first purchased from the Indians, for political effect, ~vith Holland gin, has been industriously cir- culated ; yet it gives only one side of the question. The Dutch narrative of a voyage to New Netherlands in 1679, translated by Mr. Murphy, gives us an interesting piece of information. The manuscript, found recently in Holland, was the production of t~vo Labadist brethren who came to America on a religious mission. And on Long Island they were told by the Indians that the first people from abroad seen in these parts were Span- iards or Portuguese, but that they did not remain long; and that afterward the Dutch came. This testimony neutralizes the exclusive tradition of Van Der Donck, who makes the natives depose that they did not know that there were any other people in the world, before the Half Moon arrived (N. Y. Hist. Col., Ser. ii., p. 137.) 1869.] WHO DISCOVERED THE HUDSON? 131 In course of time the Labadists xvent to Albany, where they visited an island on the west side of the river below the town, and saw the ruins of a fort, built as they (the people) say, by the Spaniards (L. I. Hist. Col., vol. i., pp. 273, 318). In regard to the origin of the fort the tradition may be wrong, as it appears probable that this was the fort erected on Castle Island in 1614 by Christiaen- sen.; yet the tradition of the Spaniards remains. Let us then inquire what it is worth, seeking at this time, when American history is endeavoring to free itself from the meshes of fable, to prove the traditions by facts, and not a fact by tra- ditions. First, the priority of Hudsons discovery is denied by the Dutch themselves. In 1644 the Special Committee reported to the States General, that in 1598 the Dt~ch explored the coast between latitude 34 1-2 deg. and 41 1-2 deg. north. The Committee find that they frequented the territory, though with- out making any fixed settlements, only a shelter in the winter; for which pur- pose they erected on the North (Hudson) and South (Delaware) Rivers there, two little forts against the incursions of the Indians (N. Y. Col. Doc., vol. i., p. 149). This is not at all unlikely, considerino the fact that prior to 1598 three b Dutch vova~es had been made within i~ine degrees of the pole. The statement of the Committee sweeps away Hudsons claim, both on the North River and on the Delaware. But there is also Verrazzano, who explored the American coast in the Dal- fina, during 1524. If the record is authentic, it may be conceded that this navi- gator entered the Bay of New York, and discovered the Hudson. The narrative says that, sailing northward they found a very pleasant situation among some steep hills, through which a very large river, deep at its mouth, forced its way to the sea; from the sea to the estuary of the river any ship might pass, with the help of the tide, which rises eight feet. It is further said, We passed up this river about half a league, when we found it formed a most beautiful lake three lcao-ues in circuit, upon which they (the natives) were rowing thirty or more of their small boats. Now, if this account is true, it must be conceded Giovanni Verrazzano dis- covered the Huclson eighty-five years before the Half Moon breasted its tide. Verrazzano was an officer in the privateer service of Francis I., and acquired much fame as Juan Florentin. In 1523 he captured two ships sailing from Mex- ico to Spain, freighted, in part, with the arms and jewels of Montezuma and his lords, which enabled him to make princely presents to the King and the nobility of France. His voyage is accepted as authentic in Broadheads History, and in Bancrofts original edition, though nothing is said about it in his last edition. But the question of the discovery of the Hudson does not rest even on Ver- razzano, or the Dutch of 1598. The year following the voyage of Verrazzano, 1525, Estevan Gomez, a Portuguese in the service of Spain, visited and explored the American coast. And Estevan Gomez is no myth. In 1519 he piloted the expedition of Magellan as far as Magellan Straits. Leaving the expedition there, he returned home, and in 1523 proposed to find a western passage to the Indies. In 1524 he attended the Congress at Badajoz, Sebastian Cabot being present. At this congress Portugal opposed the plan for an expedition; but, soon after, the difficulties between that country and Spain ~vere adjusted, and the King of Spain, in connection with some merchants, fitted out a caravel of fifty tons and gave Gomez the command. He failed to discover an Eastern passage to the Indies, but his voyage was of the highest importance, for the reason that it satisfied several of the governments of the folly of the idea, and turned the attention of navigators to more practical themes. Gomez drew an outline map 132 THE GALAXY. [JULY, of his discoveries, which is embodied in the planisphere of Ribero; and when again, five years after, the most distinguished geographers of Spain and Portu- gal met to settle disputes arising out of Pope Alexanders grants, the outlines of America were fixed, for the first time, from the discoveries of both nations. In Riberos chart the country fi-om Maryland to Rhode Island is called the Land of Estevan Gomez.* In the works of Lopez and Gomara we find accounts of the entire coast be- tween Florida and the Bay of Fundy. In the latitude of New York Gomez found a bay and a great river running northward. The latitude is not fixed with perfect exactness, but it comes so close to the modern calculations that no rea- sonable person doubts the identity of the place. The river is fixed in latitude 41 deg. The bay which lay to the south was called Bahia Saint Chripsto- bel, and the River Rio San Antonio. The Hudson must be meant also from the fact that this great river lay north and south with the bay, which is the case with no other river worth mentioning on the coast. The bay was probably the so-called lower bay, in connection with that of the Raritan. The river was prob- ably discovered on St. Anthonys day, June 13th. Sprengel unites with the learned Dr. A sher, of Amsterdam, in proving that Gomez discovered the Hudson. It is, perhaps, on the whole, absurd to suppose that, after finding the Bay of New York, Gomez failed to ascertain whither the passage led, since it was a passage through the land that was sought ; while Pe- ter Martyr testifies that it was sought with much care. Asher testifies that the river is frequently referred to in the old routiers made at that time for Spanish scdlors who timidly coasted to the West Indies, and who used the Island of Nantucket (Juan Luis or Juan Fernandez) and the mouth of Rio de St. Antonio as stations at which to rest. We now, therefore, see the old tradition of the Labadist brethren in a new light. It also shows that the suspicion raised in Bensons mind by the Was- saeners name, Rio de Montagness, River of the Mountains, (suggestive of Ver- razzanos River of the Steep Hills) was well founded ; and, as if anticipating the ~indication of old Peter Stuyvesants opinion, he concedes that Frenchmen or Spaniards may have sailed along the coast prior to Hudson. How far Estevan Gomez and his Spanish crew ascended the Hudson in his quaint caravel we do not know; but the fact that the Labadists heard the tradi- tion about Spaniards at Albany is significant, now that we are certain the river was frequented by sailors of this nation. The old fort referred to was not the work of Spaniards ; yet with some reason one might l)erhaps suspect that the Spaniards who put the whole river under holy St. Anthonys care, were the first to notice that the grand old cliff in the Highlands which quizzingly symbolizes the saints nose. It is true that Dutch Anthonys innumerable have claimed the honor, but until they settle the disputes among themselves, who shall say that Gomez never saw San Antonios nose ? It is likely, also, that the French xis- ited the river at about this time, and passed up to the Highlands. Benson did not know anything about Gomez, and yet the name troubled him like a veritable handwriting on the wall, cancelling Hudsons claim. It was evident to his mind that the day might dawn when both the Dutch and the English would be found wanting; and yet following the example of many others who find it so hard to yield the fictitious claims of a historic pet, he whistles up his courage, and, in the face of the fact that this was the River of the Mountains, he de * Historia General de las Indios, by Lopez, ed. 1555, cap. 12, 40; 1-listoria de las Indios, by Fernan- dez, ed. ~ torn. ii., lib. xxi., cap. 89; henry Hudson, the Navigator, by Dr. Asher, pp. lxxxvii., cxiv.; Historical Magazine, s566, p. 368. 1869.] THE GASTRONOMICAL ALMANAC. 33 dares that, whoever those early explorers may have been, they could have done no more titan to sail past the sandbanks at the mouth of New York Bay. And why? For this reason, and no other, that Mr. Benson wished it so. Nevertheless, when we speak of the discovery of this river, Henry Hudson must stand aside. Verrazzano, Gomex, and the Dutch of 1598 unquestionably have their claims. The latter, as already observed, rob Hudson of the discov- ery of the Delaware; for even there, as the holland papers affirm, the Dutch built a winter fort. Still, the beautiful Cohotatea of the Indians remains his monument. Hudson is even distinguished above all others; for while the Eng- lishmans name stands in permanent connection with a river, a bay, and a strait, not one of which did he discover, the memory of Estevan Gomez is as obscure as though coffined with Hudson in the cold North Sea. It is simply the old story over again. As Emerson has it, Columbus (re)-discovers America, and Vespucci, the pickle-dealer, comes along and puts his name Upon it. B. F. Dx COSTA. THE GASTRONOMICAL ALMANAC. JULY. F July brings us hot days it brings also excellent vegetables, fruits, and her- ~ ri es. The following articles of food are some of the best that can be had during the month POTAGESWiti, Carrots, Cauliflowers, Lima Beans, Peas, Lettuce, Squash, Sorrel, Tomatoes, Turnips, Bisques of Lobster and of Crabs. HORS utIEUvsEt.Artichokes, Beets (pickled), Cucumbers, Radishes, Prawns, Frogs, Crabs, Shrimps. RELEVESBass, Biackflsh, Bluefish, Cusk, Haddock, Herring, Spanists Mackerel, Perch, Porgy, Ray, Salmon, Scup, Sheepsbead, Sturgeon, Speckled Trout, Turbot, Weakflsh, Lobster. ENTREESBeef, Mutton, Spring Chickens, Lobster, Blackflsh, Bluefish, Salmon, Turbot, Green Turtle, Herring, Porgy. RoTIs.Lapwing, Plover, Woodcock, Duck. SALonSLettuce, Beets, Chervil. ENTieIourTS.Carrots, Cauliflowers, Eggplant, Kohi-rabi, Lima Beans, Peas, Sweet Corn, Sorrel, Rhu- barb, Squash, Tomatoes, Turnips. DesseRTBananas, Blackberries, Blueberries, Cherries, Currants, Gooseberries, Huckleberries, Rasp- berries, Strawberries, Whortleberries, Apricots, Pineapple. I have heard that some of my lady readers have expressed the wish to have a few models of bills of fare for a dinner, and certainly I have no objection to comply with their request, but must tell them that it is very difficult, and often impossible to make a bill of fare that can be followed; and for several reasons. In the first place, some of the articles may not be found in the markets when they are wanted. It may be found too simple, or too complicated, or too expen- sive. The taste of some of the articles may not suit. More meat and less fish (and vice vcrsez) may be desired, or more vegetables and less meat, etc. But in order to help my fair readers, as far as possible, to make their daily bills of fare, I will give them three models, and if, for some of the reasons explained above, they shall not be able to follow them, it will always be easy to add, suppress, or replace, supplying one thing for another in the same course. By referring to page i i6, vol. i. of the THE GALAXY, my readers will find more information on this subject. FIRsT DINNER. PoTAoe.Pur~e Cr& y. HoRs ufEUvREs.Red Radishes and Butter, Sardines. RnLuvsxSpanish Mackerel, Gtinoise Sauce. ENTREELeg of Mutton, Caper Sauce. RoTIDuck, with Water-cress. 9

1869.] THE GASTRONOMICAL ALMANAC. 33 dares that, whoever those early explorers may have been, they could have done no more titan to sail past the sandbanks at the mouth of New York Bay. And why? For this reason, and no other, that Mr. Benson wished it so. Nevertheless, when we speak of the discovery of this river, Henry Hudson must stand aside. Verrazzano, Gomex, and the Dutch of 1598 unquestionably have their claims. The latter, as