CORNELL
UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME
OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT
FUND GIVEN IN 1891 By

HENRY WILLIAMS SAGE

 
LIFE’S LITTLE. IRONIES
foe's Bittle Ironivs

A SET OF TALES

WITH

SOME COLLOQUIAL SKETCHES COS
ENTITLED CED)

   

A FEW CRUSTED CHARACTERS

BY

Chamas Hardy

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NEW YORK AND LONDON
HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS ¢
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Copyright, 1894, by Harrzer & Broruers.

 

All rights reserved,
CONTENTS

THE SON’S VETO. . . ... 1... gs ina See 3

FOR CONSCIENCE’ SAKE. : 2 we we 22

A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS . Be geass ey

ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT .. . fine caer Wel oad, NG

TO PLEASE HIS WIFE . ....... . . » . 107

THE MELANCHOLY HUSSAR OF THE GERMAN LEGION . . 129

THE FIDDLER OF THE REELS ......... . 152

A TRADITION OF 18044 . . . . . 6 we ee ew we LB

A FEW CRUSTED CHARACTERS ...., ... ~~. . 187

TONY KYTES, THE ARCH-DECEIVER ... . . . 193

THE HISTORY OF THE HARDCOMES ... . . . 205

THE SUPERSTITIOUS MAN’S STORY + & = w » 218

ANDREY SATCHEL AND THE PARSON AND CLERK . 223

OLD ANDREY’S EXPERIENCE AS A MUSICIAN . . . 204

ABSENT-MINDEDNESS IN A PARISH CHOIR . . . . 238

THE WINTERS AND THE PALMLEYS . ... . . 243
INCIDENT IN THE LIFE OF MR. GEORGE CROOK-

HILL . Sk ‘i 3 254

NETTY SARGENT’S COPYHOLD . . 260
THE SON’S VETO

I

To the eyes of a man viewing it from behind, the
nut-brown hair was a wonder and a mystery. Under
the black beaver hat, surmounted by its tuft of black
feathers, the long locks, braided and twisted and coiled
like the rushes of a basket, composed a rare, if some-
what barbaric, example of ingenious art. One could
understand such weavings and coilings being wrought
to last intact for a year, or even a calendar month ;
but that they should be all demolished regularly at
bedtime, after a single day of permanence, seemed a
reckless waste of successful fabrication.

And she had done it all herself, poor thing. She
had no maid, and it was almost the only accomplish-
ment she could boast of. Hence the unstinted pains.

She was a young invalid lady—not so very much
of an invalid—sitting in a wheeled chair, which had
been pulled up in the front part of a green enclosure,
close to a band-stand, where a concert was going on,
during a warm June afternoon. It had place in one
of the minor parks or private gardens that are to be
found in the suburbs of London, and was the effort of
a local association to raise money for some charity.
There are worlds within worlds in the great city, and
though nobody outside the immediate district had
ever heard of the charity, or the band, or the garden,
4 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

the enclosure was filled with an interested audience
sufficiently informed on all these.

As the strains proceeded many of the listeners ob-
served the chaired lady, whose back hair, by reason
of her prominent position, so challenged inspection.
Her face was not easily discernible, but the aforesaid
cunning tress-weavings, the white ear and poll, and
the curve of a cheek which was neither flaccid nor
sallow, were signals that led to the expectation of
good beauty in front. Such expectations are not in-
frequently disappointed as soon as the disclosure
comes; and in the present case, when the lady, by
a turn of the head, at length revealed herself, she was
not so handsome as the people behind her had sup-
posed, and even hoped—they did not know why.

For one thing (alas! the commonness of this com-
plaint), she was less young than they had fancied her
to be. Yet attractive her face unquestionably was,
and not at all sickly. The revelation of its details
came each time she turned to talk to a boy of twelve
or thirteen who stood beside her, and the shape of
whose hat and jacket implied that he belonged to a
well-known public school. The immediate by-stand-
ers could hear that he called her “ Mother.”

When the end of the programme was reached, and
the audience withdrew, many chose to find their way
out by passing at her elbow. Almost all turned their
heads to take a full and near look at the interesting
woman, who remained stationary in the chair till the
way should be clear enough for her to be wheeled
out without obstruction. As if she expected their
glances, and did not mind gratifying their curiosity,
she met the eyes of several of her observers by lift-
ing her own, showing these to be soft, brown, and af-
fectionate orbs, a little plaintive in their regard.

She was conducted out of the garden, and passed
THE SON’S VETO 5

along the pavement till she disappeared from view, the
school-boy walking beside her. To inquiries made by
some persons who watched her away, the answer came
that she was the second wife of the incumbent of a
neighboring parish, and that she was lame. She was
generally believed to be a woman with a story—an in-
nocent one, but a story of some sort or other.

In conversing with her on their way home the boy
who walked at her elbow said that he hoped his father
had not missed them.

** He have been so comfortable these last few hours
that I am sure he cannot have missed us,” she replied.

“ Has, dear mother—not have /” exclaimed the pub-
lic-school boy, with an impatient fastidiousness that
was almost harsh. ‘Surely you know that by this
time !” :

His mother hastily adopted the correction, and did
not resent his making it, or retaliate, as she might
well have done, by bidding him to wipe that crumby
mouth of his, whose condition had been caused by sur-
reptitious attempts to eat a piece of cake without tak-
ing it out of the pocket wherein it lay concealed.
After this the pretty woman and the boy went on-
ward in silence.

That question of grammar bore upon her history,
and she fell into reverie, of a somewhat sad kind to
all appearance. It might have been assumed that she
was wondering if she had done wisely in shaping her
life as she had shaped it, to bring out such a result as
this.

In a remote nook in North Wessex, forty miles
from London, near the thriving county-town of Ald-
brickham, there stood a pretty village with its church
and parsonage, which she knew well enough, but her
son had never seen. It was her native village, Gay-
mead, and the first event bearing upon her present sit-
6 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

uation had occurred at that place when she was only
a girl of nineteen.

How well she remembered it, that first act in her lit-
tle tragi-comedy, the death of her reverend husband’s
first wife. It happened on a spring evening, and she
who now and for many years had filled that first wife’s
place was then parlor-maid in the parson’s house.

When everything had been done that could be
done, and the death was announced, she had gone out
in the dusk to visit her parents, who were living
in the same village, to tell them the sad news. As
she opened the white swing-gate and looked towards
the trees which rose westward, shutting out the pale
light of the evening sky, she discerned, without much
surprise, the figure of a man standing in the hedge,
though she roguishly exclaimed, as a matter of form,
“Oh; Sam, how you frightened me !”

He was a young gardener of her acquaintance. She
told him the particulars of the late event, and they
stood silent, these two young people, in that elevated,
calmly philosophic mind which is engendered when a
tragedy has happened close at hand, and has not hap-
pened to the philosophers themselves, But it had its
bearings upon their relations.

“ And will you stay on now at the Vicarage, just
the same?” asked he.

She had hardly thought of that. “Oh yes—I sup-
pose,” she said. “Everything will be just as usual, I
imagine.”

He walked beside her towards her mother’s. Pres-
ently his arm stole round her waist. She gently re-
moved it; but he placed it there again, and she
yielded the point. “You see, dear Sophy, you don’t
know that you'll stay on; you may want a home ; and
I shall be ready to offer one some day, though I may
not be ready just yet.”
THE SON’S VETO 4

“Why, Sam, how can you be so fast? I’ve never
even said I liked ’ee ; and it is all your own doing,
coming after me.”

“Still, it is nonsense to say I am not to havea try at
you, like the rest.” He stooped to kiss her a farewell,
for they had reached her mother’s door.

“No, 8am; you sha’n’t !” she cried, putting her
hand over his mouth. “You ought to be more serious
on such a night as this.” And she bade him adieu
without allowing him to kiss her or to come indoors.

The vicar just left a widower was at this time a
man about forty years of age, of good family, and
childless. He had led a secluded existence in this col-
lege living, partly because there were no resident land-
owners ; and his loss now intensified his habit of with-
drawal from outward observation. He was still less
seen than heretofore, kept himself still less in time
with the rhythm and racket of the movements called
progress in the world without. For many months
after his wife’s decease the economy of his household
remained as before ; the cook, the house-maid, the par-
lor-maid, and the man out-of-doors performed their
duties or left them undone, just as nature prompted
them—the vicar knew not which. It was then repre-
sented to him that his servants seemed to have noth-
ing to do in his small family of one. He was struck
with the truth of this representation, and decided to
cut down his establishment. But he was forestalled
by Sophy, the parlor-maid, who said one evening that
she wished to leave him.

“ And why ?” said the parson.

“Sam Hobson has asked me to marry him, sir.”

“ Well—do you want to marry ?”

“Not much. But it would be a home for me. And
we have heard that one of us will have to leave.”

A day or two after she said: “I don’t want to
8 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

leave just yet, sir, if you don’t wish it. Sam and I
have quarrelled.”

He looked up at her. He had hardly ever observed
her before, though he had been frequently conscious
of her soft presence in the room. What a kitten-like,
flexuous, tender creature she was! She was the only
one of the servants with whom he came into immedi-
ate and continuous relation. What should he do if
Sophy were gone?

Sophy did not go, but one of the others did, and
things proceeded quietly again.

When Mr. Twycott, the vicar, was ill, Sophy
brought up his meals to him, and she had no sooner
left the room one day than he heard a noise on the
stairs. She had slipped down with the tray, and so
twisted her foot that she could not stand. The vil-
lage surgeon was called in ; the vicar got better, but
Sophy was incapacitated for a long time ; and she was
informed that she must never again walk much or en-
gage in any occupation which required her to stand
long on her feet. As soon as she was comparatively
well she spoke to him alone. Since she was forbidden
to walk and bustle about, and, indeed, could not do
so, it became her duty to leave. She could very well
work at something’ sitting down, and she had an aunt
a seamstress,

The parson had been very greatly moved by what
she had suffered on his account, and he exclaimed,
“No, Sophy ; lame or not lame, I cannot let you go.
You must never leave me again.”

He came close to her, and, though she could never
exactly tell how it happened, she became conscious of
his lips upon her cheek. He then asked her to marry
him. Sophy did not exactly love him, but she had a
respect for him which almost amounted to veneration.
Even if she had wished to get away from him she hard-
THE SON’S VETO 9

ly dared refuse a personage so reverend and august in
her eyes, and she asseuted forthwith to be his wife.

Thus it happened that one fine morning, when the
doors of the church were naturally open for ventila-
tion, and the singing birds fluttered in and alighted
on the tie-beams of the roof, there was a marriage-
service at the communion rails which hardly a soul
knew of. The parson and a neighboring curate had
entered at one door, and Sophy at another, followed by
two necessary persons, whereupon in a short time there
emerged a newly-made husband and wife.

Mr. Twycott knew perfectly well that he had com-
mitted social suicide by this step, despite Sophy’s
spotless character, and he had taken his measures ac-
cordingly. An exchange of livings had been arranged
with an acquaintance who was incumbent of a church
in the south of London, and as soon as possible the
couple removed thither, abandoning their pretty coun-
try home with trees and shrubs and glebe for a nar-
row, dusty house in a long, straight street, and their
fine peal of bells for the wretchedest one-tongued
clangor that ever tortured mortal ears, It was all on
her account. They were, however, away from every one
who had known her former position, and also under
less observation from without than they would have
had to put up with in any country parish.

Sophy the woman was as charming a partner as a
man could possess, though Sophy the lady had her
deficiencies. She showed a natural aptitude for little
domestic refinements, so far as related to things and
manners ; but in what is called culture she was less
intuitive. She had now been married more than four-
teen years, and her husband had taken much trouble
with her education; but she still held confused ideas
on the use of “ was” and “ were,” which did not beget a
respect for her among the few acquaintances she made.
10 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

Her great grief in this relation was that her only child,
on whose education no expense had been or would be
spared, was now old enough to perceive these deficien-
cies in his mother, and not only to see them but to feel
irritated at their existence,

Thus she lived on in the city, and wasted hours in
braiding her beautiful hair, till her once apple cheeks
waned to pink of the very faintest. Her foot had
never regained its natural strength after the accident,
and she was mostly obliged to avoid walking alto-
gether. Her husband had grown to like London for
its freedom and its domestic privacy; but he was
twenty years his Sophy’s senior, and had latterly been
seized with a serious illness. On this day, however,
he had seemed to be well enough to justify her accom-
panying her son Randolph to the concert.

II

The next time we get a glimpse of her is when she
appears in the mournful attire of a widow.

Mr. Twycott had never rallied, and now lay in a
well-packed cemetery to the south of the great city,
where, if all the dead it contained had stood erect and
alive, not one would have known him or recognized
his name. The boy had dutifully followed him to the
grave, and was now again at school.

Throughout these changes Sophy had been treated
like the child she was in nature though not in years.
She was left with no control over anything that had
been her husband’s beyond her modest personal in-
come. In his anxiety lest her inexperience should be
overreached he had safeguarded with trustees all he
possibly could. The completion of the boy’s course
THE SON’S VETO 11

at the public school, to be followed in due time by
Oxford and ordination, had been all previsioned and
arranged, and she really had nothing to occupy her
in the world but to eat and drink, and make a business
of indolence, and go on weaving and coiling the nut-
brown hair, merely keeping a home open for the son
whenever he came to her during vacations.

Foreseeing his probable decease long years before
her, her husband in his lifetime had purchased for her
use a semi-detached villa in the same long, straight
road whereon the church and parsonage faced, which
was to be hers as long as she chose to live init. Here
she now resided, looking out upon the fragment of
lawn in front, and through the railings at the ever-flow-
ing traffic; or, bending forward over the window-sill
on the first floor, stretching her eyes far up and down
the vista of sooty trees, hazy air, and drab house
fagades, along which echoed the noises common to a
suburban main thoroughfare.

Somehow, her boy, with his aristocratic school-
knowledge, his grammars, and his aversions, was los-
ing those wide infantine sympathies, extending as far
as to the sun and moon themselves, with which he, like
other children, had been born, and which his mother,
a child of nature herself, had loved in him; he was
reducing their compass to a population of a few thou-
sand wealthy and titled people, the mere veneer of a
thousand million or so of others who did not interest
him at all. He drifted further and further away from
her. Sophy’s milieu being a suburb of minor trades-
men and under-clerks, and her almost only compan-
ions the two servants of her own house, it was not
surprising that after her husband’s death she soon lost
the little artificial tastes she had acquired from him,
and became—in her son’s eyes—a mother whose mis-
takes and origin it was his painful lot as a gentleman
12 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

to blush for. As yet he was far from being man
enough—if he ever would be—to rate these sins of
hers at their true infinitesimal value beside the yearn-
ing fondness that welled up and remained penned in
her heart till it should be more fully accepted by him,
or by some other person or thing. If he had lived at
home with her he would have had all of it; but he
seemed to require so very little in present circum-
stances, and it remained stored.

Her life became insupportably dreary ; she could
not take walks, and had no interest in going for
drives, or, indeed, in travelling anywhere. Nearly
two years passed without an event, and still she looked
on that suburban road, thinking of the village in
which she had been born, and whither she would have
gone back—oh, how gladly !—even to work in the fields.

Taking no exercise, she often could not sleep, and
would rise in the night or early morning and look out
upon the then vacant thoroughfare, where the lamps
stood like sentinels waiting for some procession to go
by. An approximation to such a procession was in-
deed made every early morning about one o’clock,
when the country vehicles passed up with loads of
vegetables for Covent Garden market. She often saw
them creeping along at this silent and dusky hour—
wagon after wagon, bearing green bastions of cab-
bages nodding to their fall, yet never falling; walls of
baskets enclosing masses of beans and pease; pyramids
of snow-white turnips, swaying howdahs of mixed
produce —creeping along behind aged night-horses,
who seemed ever patiently wondering between their
hollow coughs why they had always to work at that
still hour when all other sentient creatures were priv-
ileged to rest. Wrapped in a cloak, it was soothing to
watch and sympathize with them when depression and
nervousness hindered sleep, and to see how the fresh
THE SON’S VETO 18

green-stuff brightened to life as it came opposite the
lamp, and how the sweating animals steamed and
shone with their miles of travel.

They had an interest, almost a charm, for Sophy,
these semi-rural people and vehicles moving in an
urban atmosphere, leading a life quite distinct from
that of the daytime toilers on the same road. One
morning a man who accompanied a wagon - load of po-
tatoes gazed rather hard at the house fronts as he
passed, and with a curious emotion she thought his
form was familiar to her. She looked out for him
again. His being an old-fashioned conveyance with
a yellow front, it was easily recognizable, and on the
third night after she saw it a second time. The man
alongside was, as she had fancied, Sam Hobson, form-
erly gardener at Gaymead, who would at one time
have married her.

She had occasionally thought of him, and wondered
if life in a cottage with him would not have been a
happier lot than the life she had accepted. She had
not thought of him passionately, but her now dismal
situation lent an interest to his resurrection—a tender
interest which it is impossible to exaggerate. She
went back to bed, and began thinking. When did
these market-gardeners, who travelled up to town so
regularly at one or two in the morning, come back?
She dimly recollected seeing their empty wagons,
hardly noticeable among the ordinary day-traffic, pass-
ing down at some hour before noon.

It was only April, but that morning, after breakfast,
she had the window opened, and sat looking out, the
feeble sun shining full upon her. She affected to
sew, but her eyes never left the street. Between ten
and eleven the desired wagon, now unladen, reap-
peared on its return journey. But Sam was not look-
ing round him then, and drove on in a reverie.

B
14 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“Sam !” cried she,

Turning with a start, his face lighted up. He called
to him a little boy to hold the horse, alighted, and
came and stood under her window.

“T can’t come down easily, Sam, or I would!” she
said. “Did you know I lived here ?”

“ Well, Mrs. Twycott, I knew you lived along here
somewhere. I have often looked out for ’ee.”

He briefly explained his own presence on the scene.
He had long since given up his gardening in the vil-
lage near Aldbrickham, and was now manager at a
market-gardener’s on the south side of London, it be-
ing part of his duty to go up to Covent Garden with
wagon-loads of produce two or three times a week.
In answer to her curious inquiry, he admitted that he
had come to this particular district because he had
seen in the Aldbrickham paper a year or two before
the announcement of the death in South London of
the aforetime vicar of Gaymead, which had revived
an interest in her dwelling-place that he could not ex-
tinguish, leading him to hover about the locality till
his present post had been secured.

They spoke of their native village in dear old North
Wessex, the spots in which they had played together
as children. She tried to feel that she was a dignified
personage now, that she must not be too confidential
with Sam. But she could not keep it up, and the tears
hanging in her eyes were indicated in her voice.

“You are not happy, Mrs. Twycott, I’m afraid,” he
said.

“Oh, of course not! I lost my husband only the
year before last.”

“Ab! I meant in another way. You'd like to be
home again ?”

“This is my home—for life. The house belongs
to me. But I understand”— She let it out then,
THE SON’S VETO 15

“Yes, Sam. I long for home—our home! I should
like to be there, and never leave it, and die there.”
But she remembered herself. ‘“That’s only a mo-
mentary feeling. I have a son, you know, a dear boy.
He’s at school now.”

‘Somewhere handy, I suppose? I see there’s lots
on ’em along this road.”

“Ohno! Not in one of these wretched holes! At
a public school—one of the most distinguished in Eng-
land.”

“Chok it all! of course! I forget, ma’am, that
you’ve been a lady for so many years.”

“No, I am not a lady,” she said, sadly. “I never
shall be. But he’s a gentleman, and that—makes it—
oh, how difficult for me!”

III

The acquaintance thus oddly reopened proceeded
apace. She often looked out to get a few words with
him, by night or by day. Her sorrow was that she
could not accompany her one old friend on foot a lit-
tle way, and talk more freely than she could do while
he paused before the house. One night, at the begin-
ning of June, when she was again on the watch after
an absence of some days from the window, he entered
the gate and said, softly, ““ Now, wouldn’t some air do
you good? I’ve only half a load this morning. Why
not ride up to Covent Garden with me? There’s a
nice seat on the cabbages, where I’ve spread a sack.
You can be home again ina cab before anybody is up.”

She refused at first, and then, trembling with ex-
citement, hastily finished her dressing, and wrapped
herself up in cloak and veil, afterwards sidling down-
16 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

stairs by the aid of the handrail, in a way she could
adopt on an emergency. When she had opened the
door she found Sam on the step, and he lifted her
bodily on his strong arm across the little forecourt
into his vehicle. Not a soul was visible or audible in
the infinite length of the straight, flat highway, with
its ever-waiting lamps converging to points in each
direction. The air was fresh as country air at this
hour, and the stars shone, except to the north-eastward,
where there was a whitish light—the dawn. Sam
carefully placed her in the seat and drove on.

They talked as they had talked in old days, Sam
pulling himself up now and then, when he thought
himself too familiar. More than once she said with
misgiving that she wondered if she ought to have in-
dulged in the freak. “But I am so lonely in my
house,” she added, “and this makes me so happy!”

“You must come again, dear Mrs. Twycott. There
is no time o’ day for taking the air like this.”

It grew lighter and lighter. The sparrows became
busy in the streets, and the city waxed denser around
them. When they approached the river it was day,
and on the bridge they beheld the full blaze of morn-
ing sunlight in the direction of St. Paul’s, the river
glistening towards it, and not a craft stirring.

Near Covent Garden he put her into a cab, and they
parted, looking into each other’s faces like the very
old friends they were. She reached home without ad-
venture, limped to the door, and let herself in with
her latch-key unseen,

The air and Sam’s presence had revived her; her
cheeks were quite pink—almost beautiful. She had
something to live for in addition to her son. A wom-
an of pure instincts, she knew there had been nothing
really wrong in the journey, but supposed it conven-
tionally to be very wrong indeed.
THE SON’S VETO 17

Soon, however, she gave way to the temptation of
going with him again, and on this occasion their con-
versation was distinctly tender, and Sam said he never
should forget her, notwithstanding that she had served
him rather badly at one time. After much hesitation
be told her of a plan it was in his power to carry
out, and one he should like to take in hand, since he
did not care for London work ; it was to set up as
a master greengrocer down at Aldbrickham, the
county-town of their native place. He knew of an
opening—a shop kept by aged people who wished to
retire.

“ And why don’t you do it, then, Sam ?” she asked,
with a slight heart-sinking.

“ Because I’m not sure if—you’d join me. I know
you wouldn’t—couldn’t! Such a lady as ye’ve been
so long, you couldn’t be a wife to a man like me.”

“T hardly suppose I could!” she assented, also
frightened at the idea.

“If you could,” he said, eagerly, “you'd on’y have
to sit in the back parlor and look through the glass
partition when I was away sometimes—just to keep
an eye on things. The lameness wouldn’t hinder
that. I'd keep you as genteel as ever I could, dear
Sophy—if I might think of it,” he pleaded.

“Sam, I'll be frank,” she said, putting her hand on
his. “If it were only myself I would do it, and
gladly, though everything I possess would be lost to
me by marrying again.”

“JT don’t mind that. It’s more independent.”

“That’s good of you, dear, dear Sam. But there’s
something else. I have ason. I almost fancy when
I am miserable sometimes that he is not really mine,
but one I hold in trust for my late husband. He
seems to belong so little to me personally, so entirely
to his dead father. He is so much educated and I so

o
18 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

little that I do not feel dignified enough to be his
mother. Well, he would have to be told.”

“Yes. Unquestionably.” Sam saw her thought
and her fear. “Still, you can do as you like, Sophy
—Mrs. Twycott,” he added. “It is not you who are
the child, but he.”

“ Ab, you don’t know! Sam, if I could, I would
marry you, someday. But you must wait awhile, and
let me think.”

It was enough for him, and he was blithe at their
parting. Not so she. To tell Randolph seemed im-
possible. She could wait till he had gone up to Ox-
ford, when what she did would affect his life but little.
But would he ever tolerate the idea? And if not,
could she defy him?

She had not told him a word when the yearly
cricket-match came on at Lord’s between the public
schools, though Sam had already gone back to Ald-
brickham. Mrs. Twycott felt stronger than usual.
She went to the match with Randolph, and was able
to leave her chair and walk about occasionally. The
bright idea occurred to her that she could casually
broach the subject while moving round among the
spectators, when the boy’s spirits were high with in-
terest in the game, and he would weigh domestic
matters as feathers in the scale beside the day’s vic-
tory. They promenaded under the lurid July sun,
this pair, so wide apart, yet so near, and Sophy saw
the large proportion of boys like her own, in their
broad white collars and dwarf hats, and all around the
rows of great coaches under which was jumbled the
débris of luxurious luncheons—bones, pie-crusts, cham-
pagne-bottles, glasses, plates, napkins, and the family
silver ; while on the coaches sat the proud fathers and
mothers ; but never a poor mother like her. If Ran-
dolph had not appertained to these, had not centred
THE SON’S VETO 19

all his interests in them, had not cared exclusively for
the class they belonged to, how happy would things
have been! A great huzza at some small performance
with the bat burst from the multitude of relatives,
and Randolph jumped wildly into the air to see what
had happened. Sophy fetched up the sentence that
had been already shaped; but she could not get it
out. The occasion was, perhaps, an inopportune one.
The contrast between her story and the display of
fashion to which Randolph had grown to regard him-
self as akin would be fatal. She awaited a better
time.

It was on an evening when they were alone in their
plain suburban residence, where life was not blue but
brown, that she ultimately broke silence, qualifying
her announcement of a probable second marriage by
assuring him that it would not take place for a long
time to come, when he would be living quite inde-
pendently of her.

The boy thought the idea a very reasonable one,
and asked if she had chosen anybody. She hesitated;
and he seemed to have a misgiving. He hoped his
step-father would be a gentleman, he said.

“Not what you call a gentleman,” she answered,
timidly. ‘“ He’ll be much as I was before I knew your
father ;” and by degrees she acquainted him with the
whole. The youth’s face remained fixed for a moment;
then he flushed, leaned on the table, and burst into pas-
sionate tears.

His mother went up to him, kissed all of his face
that she could get at, and patted bis back as if he
were still the baby he once had been, crying herself
the while. When he had somewhat recovered from
his paroxysm he went hastily to his own room and
fastened the door. :

Parleyings were attempted through the key-hole,
20 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

outside which she waited and listened. It was long
before he would reply, and when he did it was to say
sternly at her from within: “I am ashamed of you!
It will ruin me! A miserable boor! a churl! a clown!
It will degrade me in the eyes of all the gentlemen of
England!”

“‘Say no more—perhaps Iam wrong! I will struggle
against it!” she cried, miserably.

Before Randolph left her that summer a letter ar-
rived from Sam to inform her that he had been unex-
pectedly fortunate in obtaining the shop. He was in
possession; it was the largest in the town, combining
fruit with vegetables, and he thought it would form a
home worthy even of her some day. Might he not
run up to town to see her ?

She met him by stealth, and said he must still wait

for her final answer. The autumn dragged on, and
when Randolph was home at Christmas for the holi-
days she broached the matter again. But the young
gentleman was inexorable.
' It was dropped for months; renewed again; aban-
doned under his repugnance; again attempted, and
thus the gentle creature reasoned and pleaded till four
or five long years had passed. Then the faithful Sam
revived his suit with some peremptoriness. Sophy’s
son, now an undergraduate, was down from Oxford
one Easter, when she again opened the subject. As
soon as he was ordained, she argued, he would have a
home of his own, wherein she, with her bad grammar
and her ignorance, would be an encumbrance to him.
Better obliterate her as much as possible.

He showed a more manly anger now, but would not
agree. She on her side was more persistent, and he
had doubts whether she could be trusted in his ab-
sence. But by indignation and contempt for her taste
he completely maintained his ascendency; and finally
THE SON’S VETO 21

taking her before a little cross and shrine that he had
erected in his bedroom for his private devotions,
there bade her kneel, and swear that she would not
wed Samuel Hobson without his consent. “I owe
this to my father!” he said.

The poor woman swore, thinking he would soften
as soon as he was ordained and in full swing of clerical
work. But he did not. His education had by this
time sufficiently ousted his humanity to keep him
quite firm; though his mother might have led an idyl-
lic life with her faithful fruiterer and green-grocer,
and nobody have been anything the worse in the
world.

Her lameness became more confirmed as time went
on, and she seldom or never left the house in the long
southern thoroughfare, where she seemed to be pining
her heart away. “ Why mayn’t I say to Sam that Pil
marry him? Why mayn’t I?” she would murmur
plaintively to herself when nobody was near.

Some four years after this date a middle-aged man
was standing at the door of the largest fruiterer’s shop
in Aldbrickham. He was the proprietor, but to-day,
instead of his usual business attire, he wore a neat
suit of black; and his window was partly shuttered.
From the railway -station a funeral procession was
seen approaching: it passed his door and went out of
the town towards the village of Gaymead. The man,
whose eyes were wet, held his hat in his hand as the
vehicles moved by; while from the mourning coach a
young smooth-shaven priest in a high waistcoat looked
black as a cloud at the shopkeeper standing there.

December, 1891.
FOR CONSCIENCE’ SAKE

I

Wueruer the utilitarian or the intuitive theory of
the moral sense be upheld, it is beyond question that
there are a few subtle-souled persons with whom the
absolute gratuitousness of an act of reparation is an
inducement to perform it; while exhortation as to its
necessity would breed excuses for leaving it undone.
The case of Mr. Millborne and Mrs. Frankland partic-
ularly illustrated this, and perhaps something more.

There were few figures better known to the local
crossing - sweeper than Mr. Millborne’s, in his daily
comings and goings along a familiar and quiet Lon-
don street, where he lived inside the door marked
eleven, though not as householder. Jn age he was
fifty at least, and his habits were as regular as those
of a person can be who has no occupation but the
study of how to keep himself employed. He turned
almost always to the right on getting to the end of
his street, then he went onward down Bond Street to
his club, whence he returned by precisely the same
course about six o’clock, on foot; or, if he went to
dine, later on in a cab. He was known to be a man of
some means, though apparently not wealthy. Being
a bachelor he seemed to prefer his present’ mode of
living as a lodger in Mrs. Towney’s best rooms, with
FOR CONSCIENCE’ SAKE 23

the use of furniture which he had bought ten times
over in rent during his tenancy, to having a house of
his own.

None among his acquaintance tried to know him
well, for his manner and moods did not excite curi-
osity or deep friendship. He was not a man who
seemed to have anything on his mind, anything to
conceal, anything to impart. From his casual re-
marks it was generally understood that he was coun-
try- born, a native of some place in Wessex; that
he had come to London as a young man in a bank-
ing-house, and had risen to a post of responsibility ;
when, by the death of his father, who had heen fort-
unate in his investments, the son succeeded to an in-
come which led him to retire from a business life
somewhat early.

One evening, when he had been unwell for several
days, Dr. Bindon came in after dinner from the ad-
joining medical quarter, and smoked with him over
the fire. The patient’s ailment was not such as to re-
quire much thought, and they talked together on in-
different subjects.

“T am a lonely man, Bindon—a lonely man,” Mill-
borne took occasion to say, shaking his head gloomi-
ly. “You don’t know such loneliness as mine... . And
the older I get the more I am dissatisfied with my-
self, And to-day I have been, through an accident,
more than usually haunted by what, above all other
events of my life, causes that dissatisfaction—the rec-
ollection of an unfulfilled promise made some twenty
years ago. In ordinary affairs I have always been
considered a man of my word; and perhaps it is on
that account that a particular vow I once made and
did not keep comes back to me with a magnitude out
of all proportion (I dare say) to its real gravity, es-
pecially at this time of day. You know the discom-
24 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

fort caused at night by the half-sleeping sense that
a door or window has been left unfastened, or in the
day by the remembrance of unanswered letters. So
does that promise haunt me from time to time, and
has done to-day particularly.”

There was a pause, and they smoked on. Mill-
borne’s eyes, though fixed on the fire, were really re-
garding attentively a town in the West of England.

“Yes,” he continued, “I have never quite forgot-
ten it, though during the busy years of my life it
was shelved and buried under the pressure of my
pursuits. And, as I say, to-day in particular an in-
cident in the law report of a somewhat similar kind
has brought it back again vividly. However, what it
was I can tell you in a few words, though no doubt
you, as a man of the world, will smile at the thinness
of my skin when you hear it....I came up to town at
one-and-twenty, from Toneborough, in Outer Wes-
sex, where I was born, and where, before I left, I had
won the heart of a young woman of my own age. I
promised her marriage, took advantage of my prom-
ise, and—am a bachelor.”

“The old story.”

The other nodded.

“T left the place, and thought at the time I had
done a very clever thing in getting so easily out of
an entanglement. But I have lived long enough for
that promise to return to bother me—to be honest,
not altogether as a pricking of the conscience, but as
a dissatisfaction with myself as a specimen of the
heap of flesh called humanity. If I were to ask you
to lend me fifty pounds, which I would repay you
next midsummer, and I did not repay you, I should
consider myself a shabby sort of fellow, especially if
you wanted the money badly. Yet I promised that
girl just as distinctly, and then coolly broke my word,
FOR CONSCIENCE’ SAKE 25

as if doing so were rather smart conduct than a mean
action, for which the poor victim herself, encumbered
with a child, and not I, bad really to pay the penalty,
in spite of certain pecuniary aid that was given....
There, that’s the retrospective trouble that I am al-
ways unearthing ; and you may hardly believe that
though so many years have elapsed, and it is all gone
by and done with, and she must be getting on for an
old woman now, as I am for an old man, it really often
destroys my sense of self-respect still.”

“Oh, I can understand it. All depends upon the
temperament. Thousands of men would have forgot-
ten all about it; so would you, perhaps, if you had
married and had a family. Did she ever marry ?”

“T don’t think so. Oh no—she never did. She
left Toneborough, and later on appeared under an-
other name at Exonbury, in the next county, where
she was not known. It is very seldom that I go
down into that part of the country, but in passing
through Exonbury on one occasion I learned that she
was quite a settled resident there, as a teacher of mu-
sic or something of the kind. That much I casually
heard when I was there two or three years ago. But
I have never set eyes on her since our original ac-
quaintance, and should not know her if I met her.”

“ Did the child live ?” asked the doctor.

“For several years, certainly,” replied his friend.
“T cannot say if she is living now. It was a little
girl. She might be married by this time as far as
years go.”

“ And the mother—was she a decent, worthy young
woman ?”

“Oh yes; a sensible, quiet girl, neither attractive
nor unattractive to the ordinary observer; simply
commonplace. Her position at the time of our ac-
quaintance was not so good as mine. My father was
26 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

a solicitor, as I think I have told you. She was a
young girl in a music-shop ; and it was represented
to me that it would be beneath my position to marry
her. Hence the result.”

“Well, all I can say is that after twenty years it is
probably too late to think of mending such a matter.
It has doubtless by this time mended itself. You had
better dismiss it from your mind as an evil past your
control. Of course, if mother and daughter are alive,
or either, you might settle something upon them, if
you were inclined, and had it to spare.”

“Well, I haven’t much to spare, and I have rela-
tions in narrow circumstances — perhaps narrower
than theirs. But that is not the point. Were I ever
so rich I feel I could not rectify the past by money.
I did not promise to enrich her. On the contrary,
I told her it would probably be dire poverty for both
of us. But I did promise to make her my wife.”

“Then find her and do it,” said the doctor, jocularly,
as he rose to leave.

“Ah, Bindon. That, of course, is the obvious jest.
But I haven’t the slightest desire for marriage ; I am
quite content to live as I have lived. I am a bache-
lor by nature and instinct and habit and everything.
Besides, though I respect her still (for she was not
an atom to blame), I haven’t any shadow of love for
her. In my mind she exists as one of those women
you think well of, but find uninteresting. It would
be purely with the idea of putting wrong right that
I should hunt her up, and propose to do it off-hand.”

“You don’t think of it seriously ?” said his surprised
friend.

“JT sometimes think that I would, if it were prac-
ticable; simply, as I say, to recover my sense of being
a man of honor.”

“TI wish you luck in the enterprise,” said Dr. Bin-
FOR CONSCIENCE’ SAKE 27

don. “ You'll soon be out of that chair, and then you
can put your impulse to the test. But—after twenty
years of silence—I should say, don’t !”

II

The doctor’s advice remained counterpoised in
Millborne’s mind by the aforesaid mood of serious-
ness and sense of principle, approximating often to
religious sentiment, which had been evolving itself
in his breast for months, and even years.

The feeling, however, had no immediate effect upon
Mr. Millborne’s actions. He soon got over his trifling
illness, and was vexed with himself for having, in a
moment of impulse, confided such a case of conscience
to anybody.

But the force which had prompted it, though la-
tent, remained with him, and ultimately grew strong-
er. The upshot was that about four months after the
date of his illness and disclosure, Millborne found
himself on a mild spring morning at Paddington Sta-
tion, in a train that was starting for the west. His
many intermittent thoughts on his broken promise
from time to time, in those hours when loneliness
brought him face to face with his own personality,
had at last resulted in this course.

The decisive stimulus had been given when, a day
or two earlier, on looking into a post-office directory,
he learned that the woman he had not met for twenty
years was still living on at Exonbury under the name
she had assumed when, a year or two after her dis-
appearance from her native town and his, she had
returned from abroad as a young widow with a child,
and taken up her residence at the former city. Her
28 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

condition was apparently but little changed, and her
daughter seemed to be with her, their names standing
in the directory as ‘“ Mrs. Leonora Frankland and
Miss Frankland, Teachers of Music and Dancing.”
Mr. Millborne reached Exonbury in the afternoon,
and his first business, before even taking his luggage
into the town, was to find the house occupied by the
teachers. Standing in a central and open place it
was not difficult to discover, a well-burnished brass
door - plate bearing their names prominently. He
hesitated to enter without further knowledge, and
ultimately took ledgings over a toy-shop opposite,
securing a sitting-room which faced a similar draw-
ing or sitting room at the Franklands’, where the
dancing lessons were given. Installed here he was
enabled to make indirectly, and without suspicion, in-
quiries and observations on the character of the ladies
over the way, which he did with much deliberateness.
He learned that the widow, Mrs. Frankland, with
her one daughter, Frances, was of cheerful and ex-
cellent repute, energetic and painstaking with her
pupils, of whom she had a good many, and in whose
tuition her daughter assisted her. She was quite
a recognized townswoman, and though the dancing
branch of her profession was perhaps a trifle world-
ly, she was really a serious-minded lady who, being
obliged to live by what she knew how to teach, bal-
anced matters by lending a hand at charitable bazaars,
assisting at sacred concerts, and giving musical ree-
itations in aid of funds for bewildering happy sav-
ages, and other such enthusiasms of this enlight-
ened country. Her daughter was one of the foremost
of the bevy of young women who decorated the
churches at Easter and Christmas, was organist in
one of those edifices, and had subscribed to the testi-
monial of a silver broth-basin that was presented to
3

FOR CONSCIENCE’ SAKE 39

the Rev. Mr. Walker as a token of gratitude for his
faithful and arduous intonations of six months as
sub-precentor in the cathedral. Altogether, mother
and daughter appeared to be a typical and innocent
pair among the genteel citizens of Exonbury.

As a natural and simple way of advertising their
profession they allowed the windows of the music-
room to be a little open, so that you had the pleasure
of hearing all along the street at any hour between
sunrise and sunset fragmentary gems of classical
music as interpreted by the young people of twelve
or fourteen who took lessons there. But it was said
that Mrs. Frankland made most of her income by
letting out pianos on hire, and by selling them as
agent for the makers.

The report pleased Millborne ; 1t was highly credit-
able, and far better than he had hoped. He was cu-
rious to get a view of the two women who led such
blameless lives.

He had not long to wait to gain a glimpse of Leo-
nora. It was when she was standing on her own
door-step, opening her parasol, on the morning after
his arrival. She was thin, though not gaunt; and a
good, well- wearing, thoughtful face had taken the
place of the one which had temporarily attracted him
in the days of his nonage. She wore black, and it
became her in her character of widow. The daugh-
ter next appeared; she was a smoothed and rounded
copy of her mother, with the same decision in her mien
that Leonora had, and a bounding gait in which he
traced a faint resemblance to his own at her age.

For the first time he absolutely made up his mind
to call on them. But his antecedent step was to send
Leonora a note the next morning, stating his proposal
to visit her, and suggesting the evening as the time,

because she seemed to be so greatly occupied in her
c
30 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

professional capacity during the day. He purposely
worded his note in such a form as not to require an
answer from her which would be possibly awkward to
write.

No answer came. Naturally he should not have
been surprised at this; and yet he felt a little checked,
even though she had only refrained from volunteering
a reply that was not demanded.

At eight, the hour fixed by himself, he crossed over
and was passively admitted by the servant. Mrs.
Frankland, as she called herself, received him in the
large music and dancing room on the first floor front,
and not in any private little parlor as he had expected.
This cast a distressingly business-like color over their
first meeting after so many years of severance. The
woman he had wronged stood before him, well-dressed,
even to his metropolitan eyes, and her manner as she
came up to him was dignified even to hardness. She
certainly was not glad to see him. But what could
he expect after a neglect of twenty years !

‘How do you do, Mr. Millborne ?” she said, cheer-
fully, as to any chance caller. “I am obliged to re-
ceive you here because my daughter has a friend down-
stairs.”

“Your daughter—and mine.”

“ Ah—yes, yes,” she replied, hastily, as if the addi-
tion had escaped her memory. “ But perhaps the less
said about that the better, in fairnessto me. You will
consider me a widow, please.”

“Certainly, Leonora—” He could not get on, her
manner was so cold and indifferent. The expected
scene of sad reproach, subdued to delicacy by the run
of years, was absent altogether. He was obliged to
come to the point without preamble.

“You are quite free, Leonora—I mean as to mar-
riage? There is nobody who has your promise, or—”
FOR CONSCIENCE’ SAKE 31

“Oh yes; quite free, Mr. Millborne,” she said, some-
what surprised.

“Then I will tell you why I have come. Twenty
years ago I promised to make you my wife, and I am
here to fulfil that promise. Heaven forgive my tardi-
ness!”

Her surprise was increased, but she was not agi-
tated. She seemed to become gloomy, disapproving.
“T could not entertain such an idea at this time of
life,” she said, after a moment or two. “It would
complicate matters too greatly. I have a very fair
income, and require no help of any sort. I have no
wish to marry,... What could have induced you to
come on such an errand now? It seems quite ex-
traordinary, if I may say so.”

“Jt must—I dare say it does,” Millborne replied,
vaguely; “and I must tell you that impulse—I mean
in the sense of passion—has little to do with it. I wish
to marry you, Leonora; I much desire to marry you.
But it is an affair of conscience, a case of fulfilment.
I promised you, and it was dishonorable of me to go
away. I want to remove that sense of dishonor before
Idie. No doubt we might get to love each other as
warmly as we did in old times.”

She dubiously shook her head. “TI appreciate your
motives, Mr. Millborne ; but you must consider my
position, and you will see that, short of the personal
wish to marry, which I don’t feel, there is no reason
why I should change my state, even though by so do-
ing I should ease your conscience. My position in
this town is a respected one; I have built it up by my
own hard labors, and, in short, I don’t wish to alter it.
My daughter, too, is just on the verge of an engage-
ment to be married to a young man who will make
her an excellent husband. It will be in every way a
desirable match for her. He is down-stairs now.”
88 iIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“Does she know—anything about me ?”

“Oh no, no; God forbid! Her father is dead and
buried to her. So that, you see, things are going on
smoothly, and I don’t want to disturb their progress.”

He nodded. “Very well,” he said, and rose to go.
At the door, however, he came back again.

“S$till, Leonora,” he urged, “I have come on pur-
pose, and I don’t see what disturbance would be
caused. You would simply marry an old friend.
Won’t you reconsider? It is no more than right
that we should be united, remembering the girl.”

She shook her head, and patted with her foot ner-
vously.

“Well, I won’t detain you,” he added. “I shall
not be leaving Exonbury yet. You will allow me to
see you again ?”

“Yes; I don’t mind,” she said, reluctantly.

‘The obstacles he had encountered, though they did
not reanimate his dead passion for Leonora, did cer-
tainly make it appear indispensable to his peace of
mind to overcome her coldness. He called frequent-
ly. The first meeting with the daughter was a trying
ordeal, though he did not feel drawn towards her as he
had expected to be; she did not excite his sympathies.
Her mother confided to Frances the errand of “her
old friend,” which was viewed by the daughter with
strong disfavor. His desire being thus uncongenial
to both, for a long time Millborne made not the least
impression upon Mrs. Frankland. His attentions pes-
tered her rather than pleased her. He was surprised
at her firmness, and it was only when he hinted at
moral reasons for their union that she was ever shaken.
“Strictly speaking,” he would say, “we ought, as honest
persons, to marry; and that’s the truth of it, Leonora.”

“T have looked at it in that light,” she said, quick-
ly. “It struck me at the very first. But I don’t see
FOR CONSCIENCE’ SAKE 33

the force of the argument. I totally deny that after
this interval of time I am bound to marry you for
honor’s sake. I would have married you, as you know
well enough, at the proper time. But what is the use
of remedies now ?”

They were standing at the window. A scantily-
whiskered young man in clerical attire called at the
door below. Leonora flushed with interest.

“Who is he?” asked Mr. Millborne.

“My Frances’s lover. Iam so sorry—she is not at
home! Ah! they have told him where she is, and he
has gone to find her. I hope that suit will prosper,
at any rate !”

“Why shouldn’t it ?”

“Well, he cannot marry yet; and Frances sees but
little of him now he has left Exonbury. He was for-
merly doing duty here, but now he is curate of St.
John’s, Ivell, fifty miles up the line. There is a tacit
agreement between them, but—there have been friends
of his who object, because of our vocation. However,
he sees the absurdity of such an objection as that, and
is not influenced by it.”

“Your marriage with me would help the match, in-
stead of hindering it, as you have said.”

“Do you think it would 2”

“It certainly would, by taking you out of this busi-
ness altogether.”

By chance he had found the way to move her some-
what, and he followed it up. This view was imparted
to Mrs, Frankland’s daughter, and it led her to soften
her opposition. Millborne, who had given up his lodg-
ing in Exonbury, journeyed to and fro regularly, till
at last he overcame her negations, and she expressed a
reluctant assent.

They were married at the nearest church ; and the
good- will— whatever that was—of the music - and-

3
34 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

dancing connection was sold to a successor only too
ready to jump into the place, the Millbornes having
decided to live in London.

Ill

Millborne was a householder in his old district,
though not in his old street, and Mrs. Millborne and
their daughter had turned themselves into Londoners,
Frances was well reconciled to the removal by her
lover’s satisfaction at the change. It suited him bet-
ter to travel from Ivell a hundred miles to see her in
London, where he frequently had other engagements,
than fifty in the opposite direction where nothing but
herself required his presence. So here they were, fur-
nished up to the attics, in one of the small but popu-
lar streets of the West district, in a house whose
front, till lately of the complexion of a chimney-
sweep, had been scraped to show to the surprised way-
farer the bright yellow and red brick that had lain
lurking beneath the soot of fifty years.

The social lift that the two women had derived
from the alliance was considerable ; but when the ex-
hilaration which accompanies a first residence in Lon-
don, the sensation of standing on a pivot of the world,
had passed, their lives promised to be somewhat duller
than when, at despised Exonbury, they had enjoyed a
nodding acquaintance with three-fourths of the town.
Mr. Millborne did not criticise his wife; he could not.
Whatever defects of hardness and acidity his original
treatment and the lapse of years might have developed
in her, his sense of a realized idea, of a re-established
self-satisfaction, was always thrown into the scale on
her side, and outweighed all objections.
FOR CONSCIENCE’ SAKE 35

It was about a month after their settlement in town
that the household decided to spend a week at a
watering-place in the Isle of Wight, and while there
the Rev. Percival Cope (the young curate aforesaid)
came to see them, Frances in particular. No formal
engagement of the young pair had been announced as
yet, but it was clear that their mutual understanding
could not end in anything but marriage without griev-
ous disappointment to one of the parties at least. Not
that Frances was sentimental. She was rather of the
imperious sort, indeed ; and, to say all, the young girl
had not fulfilled her father’s expectations of her. But
he hoped and worked for her welfare as sincerely as
any father could do.

Mr. Cope was introduced to the new head of the
family, and stayed with them in the island two or
three days. On the last day of his visit they decided
to venture on a two hours’ sail in one of the small
yachts which lay there for hire. The trip had not
progressed far before all except the curate found
that sailing in a breeze did not quite agree with
them ; but as he seemed to enjoy the experience, the
other three bore their condition as well as they could
without grimace or complaint, till the young man, ob-
serving their discomfort, gave immediate directions to
tack about. On the way back to port they sat silent,
facing each other.

Nausea in such circumstances, like midnight watch-
ing, fatigue, trouble, fright, has this marked effect
upon the countenance—that it often brings out strong-
ly the divergences of the individual from the norm of
his race, accentuating superficial peculiarities to rad-
ical distinctions. Unexpected physiognomies will un-
cover themselves at these times in well-known faces;
the aspect becomes invested with the spectral presence
of entombed and forgotten ancestors ; and family lin-
36 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

eaments of special or exclusive cast, which in ordinary
moments are masked by a stereotyped expression and
mien, start up with crude insistence to the view.

Frances, sitting beside her mother’s husband, with
Mr. Cope opposite, was naturally enough much re-
garded by the curate during the tedious sail home ;
at first with sympathetic smiles. Then, as the middle-
aged father and his child grew each gray-faced, as
the pretty blush of Frances disintegrated into spotty
stains, and the soft rotundities of her features diverged
from their familiar and reposeful beauty into elemen-
tal lines, Cope was gradually struck with the resem-
blance between a pair in their discomfort who in their
ease presented nothing to the eye in common, Mr.
Millborne and Frances in their indisposition were
strangely, startlingly alike.

The inexplicable fact absorbed Cope’s attention
quite. He forgot to smile at Frances, to hold her
hand; and when they touched the shore he remained
sitting for some moments like a man in a trance.

As they went homeward, and recovered their com-
plexions and contours, the similarities one by one dis-
appeared, and Frances and Mr. Millborne were again
masked by the commonplace differences of sex and
age. It was as if, during the voyage, a mysterious
veil had been lifted, temporarily revealing a strange
pantomime of the past.

During the evening he said to her, casually: “Is
your step-father a cousin of your mother, dear Fran-
ces ?”

“Oh no,” said she ; “there is no relationship. He
was only an old friend of hers. Why did ae suppose
such a thing ?”

He did not explain, and the next morning started to
resume his duties at Ivell.

Cope was an honest young fellow, and shrewd
FOR CONSCIENCE’ SAKE at

withal. At home in his quiet rooms in St. Peter’s Street,
Ivell, he pondered long and unpleasantly on the reve-
lations of the cruise. The tale it told was distinct
enough, and for the first time his position was an un-
comfortable one. He had met the Franklands at Ex-
onbury as parishioners, had been attracted by Frances,
and had floated thus far into an engagement which
was indefinite only because of his inability to marry
just yet. The Franklands’ past had apparently con-
tained mysteries, and it did not coincide with his
judgment to marry into a family whose mystery was
of the sort suggested. So he sat and sighed between
his reluctance to lose Frances and his natural dislike
of forming a connection with people whose antece-
dents would not bear the strictest investigation.

A passionate lover of the old-fashioned sort might
possibly never have halted to weigh these doubts; but
though he was in the Church, Cope’s affections were
fastidious—distinctly tempered with the alloys of the
century’s decadence. He delayed writing to Frances
for some while, simply because he could not tune him-
self up to enthusiasm when worried by suspicions of
such a kind.

Meanwhile the Millbornes had returned to London,
and Frances was growing anxious. In talking to her
mother of Cope she bad innocently alluded to his curi-
ous inquiry if her mother and her step-father were
connected by any tie of cousinship. Mrs, Millborne
made her repeat the words. Frances did so, and
watched with inquisitive eyes their effect upon her
elder.

“‘ What is there so startling in his inquiry, then?”
she asked. “Can it have anything to do with his not
writing to me?”

Her mother flinched, but did not inform her, and
Frances also was now drawn within the atmosphere of
38 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

suspicion, That night, when standing by chance out-
side the chamber of her parents, she heard for the first
time their voices engaged in a sharp altercation.

The apple of discord had, indeed, been dropped into
the house of the Millbornes. The scene within the
chamber door was Mrs. Millborne standing before her
dressing-table, looking across to her husband in the
dressing-room adjoining, where he was sitting down,
his eyes fixed on the floor.

“Why did you come and disturb my life a second
time?” she harshly asked. ‘‘ Why did you pester me
with your conscience till I was driven to accept you
to get rid of your importunity ? Frances and I were
doing well: the one desire of my life was that she
should marry that good young man. And now the
match is broken off by your cruel interference! Why
did you show yourself in my world again, and raise
this scandal upon my hard-won respectability —won
by such weary years of labor as none will ever know!”
She bent her face upon the table and wept passionately.

There was no reply from Mr. Millborne. Frances
lay awake nearly all that night, and when at breakfast-
time the next morning still no letter appeared from
Mr. Cope, she entreated her mother to go to Ivell and
see if the young man were ill.

Mrs. Millborne went, returning the same day. Fran-
ces, anxious and haggard, met her at the station.

Was all well? Her mother could not say it was;
though he was not ill.

One thing she had found out—that it was a mistake
to hunt up a man when his inclinations were to hold
aloof. Returning with her mother in the cab, Frances
insisted upon knowing what the mystery was which
plainly had alienated her lover. The precise words
which had been spoken at the interview with him that
day at Ivell Mrs. Millborne could not be induced to
FOR CONSCIENCE’ SAKE 39

repeat; but thus far she admitted—that the estrange-
ment was fundamentally owing to Mr. Millborne hay-
ing sought her out and married her.

“ And why did he seek you out—and why were you
obliged to marry him?” asked the distressed girl.
Then the evidences pieced themselves together in her
acute mind, and, her color gradually rising, she asked
her mother if what they pointed to was indeed the
fact. Her mother admitted that it was.

A flush of mortification succeeded to the flush of
shame upon the young woman’s face. How could a
scrupulously correct clergyman and lover like Mr.
Cope ask her to be his wife after this discovery of her
irregular birth? She covered her eyes with her hands
in a silent despair.

In the presence of Mr. Millborne they at first sup-
pressed their anguish. But by-and-by their feelings
got the better of them, and when he was asleep in his
chair after dinner, Mrs. Millborne’s irritation broke
out. The imbittered Frances joined her in reproach-
ing the man who had come as the spectre to their in-
tended feast of Hymen, and turned its promise to
ghastly failure.

“Why were you so weak, mother, as to admit such
an enemy to your house—one so obviously your evil
genius— much less accept him as a husband, after
so long? If you had only told me all, I could have
advised you better! But I suppose I have no right to
reproach him, bitter as I feel, and even though he has
blighted my life forever !”

“Frances, I did hold out; I saw it was a mistake to
have any more to say to a man who had been such an
unmitigated curse tome. But he would not listen;
he kept on about his conscience and mine till I was
bewildered, and said, ‘Yes.’... Bringing us away from
a quiet town where we were known and respected—
40 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

what an ill-considered thing it was! Oh, the content
of those days! We had society there, people in our
own position, who did not expect more of us than we
expected of them. Here, where there is so much, there
is nothing! He said London society was so bright
and brilliant that it would be like a new world. It
may be to those who are in it; but what is that to us
two lonely women? we only see it flashing past!...
Oh, the fool, the fool that I was !”

Now Millborne was not so soundly asleep as to pre-
vent his hearing these animadversions that were almost
execrations, and many more of the same sort. As
there was no peace for him at home, he went again to
his club, where, since his reunion with Leonora, he had
seldom if ever been seen. But the shadow of the
troubles in his household interfered with his comfort
here also; he could not, as formerly, settle down into
his favorite chair with the evening paper, reposeful in
the celibate’s sense that where he was his world’s cen-
tre had its fixture. His world was now an ellipse,
with a dual centrality, of which his own was not the
major.

The young curate of Ivell still held aloof, tantaliz-
ing Frances by his elusiveness. Plainly he was wait-
ing upon events. Millborne bore the reproaches of
his wife and daughter almost in silence, but by de-
grees he grew meditative, as if revolving a new idea.
The bitter cry about blighting their existence at
length became so impassioned that one day Millborne
calmly proposed to return again to the country; not
necessarily to Exonbury, but, if they were willing, to
a little old manor-house which he had found was to
be let, standing a mile from Mr. Cope’s town of Ivell.

They were surprised, and, despite their view of
him as the bringer of ill, were disposed to accede.
“Though I suppose,” said Mrs. Millborne to him, “it
3 sae 44

FOR CONSCIENCE
will end in Mr. Cope’s asking you flatly about the
past, and your being compelled to tell him, which may
dash all my hopes for Frances. She gets more and
more like you every day, particularly when she is in
a bad temper. People will see you together and no-
tice it, and I don’t know what may come of it !”

“T don’t think they will see us together,” he said;
but he entered into no argument when she insisted
otherwise. The removal was eventually resolved on;
the town - house was disposed of, and again came the
invasion by furniture-men and vans, till all the mova-
bles and servants were whisked away. He sent his
wife and daughter to a hotel while this was going on,
taking two or three journeys himself to Ivell to su-
perintend the refixing, and the improvement of the
grounds. When all was done he returned to them in
town.

The house was ready for their reception, he told
them, and there only remained the journey. He ac-
companied them and their personal luggage to the
station only, having, he said, to remain in town a short
time on business with his lawyer. They went, dubi-
ous and discontented, for the much-loved Cope had
made no sign.

“If we were going down to live here alone,” said
Mrs, Millborne to her daughter in the train; “and
there was no intrusive telltale presence! But let it
be!”

The house was a lovely little place in a grove of
elms, and they liked it much. The first person to call
upon them as new residents was Mr. Cope. He was
delighted to find that they had come so near, and
(though he did not say this) meant to live in such
excellent style. He had not, however, resumed the
manner of a lover.

“Your father spoils all!’ murmured Mrs. Millborne.
42 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

But three days later she received a letter from her
husband which caused her no small degree of aston-
ishment. It was written from Boulogne.

It began with a long explanation of settlements of
his property, in which he had been engaged since
their departure. The chief feature in the business
was that Mrs. Millbourne found herself the absolute
owner of a comfortable sum in personal estate, and
Frances of a life-interest in a larger sum, the princi-
pal to be afterwards divided among her children, if
she had any. The remainder of his letter ran as here-
under :

“IT have learned that there are some derelictions of duty
which cannot be blotted out by tardy accomplishment. Our
evil actions do not remain isolated in the past, waiting only to
be reversed; like locomotive plants they spread and reroot,
till to destroy the original stem has no material effect in killing
them. I made a mistake in searching you out; I admit it ;
whatever the remedy may be in such cases it is not marriage,
and the best thing for you and me is that you do not see me
more. You had better not seek me, for you will not be likely
to find me; you are well provided for, and we may do our-
selves more harm than good by meeting again. F. M.”

Millborne, in short, disappeared from that day for-
ward. But a searching inquiry would have revealed
that, soon after the Millbornes went to Ivell, an Eng-
lishman who did not give the name of Millborne
took up his residence in Brussels ; a man who might
have been recognized by Mrs. Millborne if she had
met him. One afternoon in the ensuing summer,
when this gentleman was looking over the English
papers, he saw the announcement of Miss Frances
Frankland’s marriage. She had become the Rev. Mrs.
Cope.

“Thank God !” said the gentleman.

But his momentary satisfaction was far from being
FOR CONSCIENCE SAKE 48

happiness. As he formerly had been weighted with
a bad conscience, so now was he burdened with the
heavy thought which oppressed Antigone, that by
honorable observance of a rite he had obtained for
himself the reward of dishonorable laxity. Occa-
sionally he had to be helped to his lodgings by his
servant from the cercle he frequented, through having
imbibed a little too much liquor to be able to take
care of himself. But he was harmless, and even when
he had been drinking said little.

March, 1891.
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS

I

Tue shouts of the village-boys came in at the win-
dow, accompanied by broken laughter from loungers at
the inn door ; but the brothers Halborough worked on.

They were sitting in a bedroom of the master-mill-
wright’s house, engaged in the untutored reading of
Greek and Latin. It was no tale of Homeric blows
and knocks, Argonautic voyaging, or Theban family
woe that inflamed their imaginations and spurred them
onward. They were plodding away at the Greek Tes-
tament, immersed in a chapter of the idiomatic and
difficult Epistle to the Hebrews.

The dog-day sun in its decline reached the low
ceiling with slanting sides, and the shadows of the
great goat’s-willow swayed and interchanged upon the
walls like a spectral army maneuvring. The open
casement which admitted the remoter sounds now
brought the voice of some one close at hand. It was
their sister, a pretty girl of fourteen, who stood in the
court below. e

“T can see the tops of your heads! What’s the
use of staying up there? I like you not to go out
with the street-boys; but do come and play with
me!”

They treated her as an inadequate interlocutor, and
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS 45

put her off with some slight word. She went away dis-
appointed. Presently there was a dull noise of heavy
footsteps at the side of the house, and one of the
brothers sat up. “I fancy I hear him coming,” he
murmured, his eyes on the window.

A man in the light drab clothes of an old-fashioned
country tradesman approached from round the corner,
reeling as he came. The elder son flushed with anger,
rose from his books, and descended the stairs. The
younger sat on, till, after the lapse of a few minutes,
his brother re-entered the room.

“Did Rosa see him ?”

“No.”

“Nor anybody ?”

“cc No.”

“ What have you done with him ?”

“ Te’s in the straw-shed. I got him in with some
trouble, and he has fallen asleep. I thought this would
be the explanation of his absence! No stones dressed
for Miller Kench, the great wheel of the saw- mill
waiting for new float-boards, even the poor folk not
able to get their wagons wheeled.”

“What zs the use of poring over this!” said the
younger, shutting up Donnegan’s Lexicon with a slap.
“Oh, if we had only been able to keep mother’s seven
hundred pounds, what we could have done !”

“ How well she had estimated the sum necessary!
Three hundred and fifty each, she thought. And I
have no doubt that we could have done it on that with
care.”

This loss of the seven hundred pounds was the sharp
thorn of their crown. It was a sum which their mother
had amassed with great exertion and self-denial, by
adding to a chance legacy such other small amounts
as she could lay hands on from time to time ; and she
had intended with the hoard to indulge the dear wish

D
46 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

ef her heart—that of sending her sons, Joshua and
Cornelius, to one of the universities, having been in-
formed that from three hundred to three hundred and
fifty each might carry them through their terms with
such great economy as she knew she could trust them
to practise. But she had died a year or two before
this time, worn out by too keen a strain towards these
ends; and the money, coming unreservedly into the
hands of their father, had been nearly dissipated.
With its exhaustion went all opportunity and hope of
a university degree for the sons.

“Tt drives me mad when I think of it,” said J oshua,
the elder. “And here we work and work in our own
bungling way, and the utmost we can hope for is a
term of years as national school-masters, and possible
admission to a theological college, and ordination as
despised licentiates.”

The anger of the elder was reflected as simple sad-
ness in the face of the other. “We can preach the
gospel as well without a hood on our surplices as with
one,” he said, with feeble consolation.

“Preach the gospel—true,” said Joshua, with a slight
pursing of mouth. “But we can’t rise.”

“Let us make the best of it, and grind on.”

The other was silent, and they drearily bent over
their books again.

The cause of all this gloom, the millwright Hal-
borough, now snoring in the shed, had been a thriving
master-machinist, notwithstanding his free and careless
disposition, till a taste for a more than adequate quan-
tity of strong liquor took hold of him; since when his
habits had interfered with his business sadly. Already
millers went elsewhere for their gear, and only one
set of hands was now kept going, though there were
formerly two. Already he found a difficulty in meet-
ing his men at the week’s end, and though they had
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS 4%

been reduced in number, there was barely enough work
to do for those who remained.

The sun dropped lower and vanished, the shouts
of the village children ceased to resound, darkness
cloaked the students’ bedroom, and all the scene out-
wardly breathed peace. None knew of the fevered
youthful ambitions that throbbed in two breasts with-
in the quiet creeper-covered walls of the millwright’s
house.

In a few months the brothers left the village of their
birth to enter themselves as students in a training
college for school-masters ; first having placed their
young sister Rosa under as efficient a tuition at a
fashionable watering-place as the means at their dis-
posal could command.

II

A man in semi-clerical dress was walking along
the road which led from the railway station into a
provincial town. As he walked he read persistently,
only looking up once now and then to see that he was
keeping on the foot-track and to avoid other passen-
gers. At those moments, whoever had known the
former students at the millwright’s would have per-
ceived that one of them, Joshua Halborough, was the
peripatetic reader here.

What had been simple force in the youth’s face was
energized judgment in the man’s. His character was
gradually writing itself out in his countenance. That
he was watching his own career with deeper and
deeper interest, that he continually “heard his days
before him,” and cared to hear little else, might have
been hazarded from what was seen there. His ambi-
48 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

tions were, in truth, passionate, yet controlled; so
that the germs of many more plans than ever blos-
somed to maturity had place in him; and forward
visions were kept purposely in twilight to avoid dis-
traction.

Events so far had been encouraging. Shortly after
assuming the mastership of his first school he had ob-
tained an introduction to the bishop of a diocese far
from his native county, who had looked upon him as a
promising young man and taken him in hand. He was
now in the second year of his residence at the theo-
logical college of the cathedral town, and would soon
be presented for ordination.

He entered the town, turned into a back street,
and then into a yard, keeping his book before him
till he set foot under the arch of the latter place.
Round the arch was written ‘“‘ National School,” and
the stone-work of the jambs was worn away as nothing
but boys and the waves of the ocean will wear it. He
was soon amid the sing-song accents of the scholars.

His brother Cornelius, who was the school-master
here, laid down the pointer with which he was directing
attention to the capes of Europe, and came forward.

“That's his brother Jos!” whispered one of the
sixth-standard boys. ‘“He’s going to be a pa’son.
He’s now at college.”

“Corney is going to be one, too, when he’s saved
enough money,” said another.

After greeting his brother, whom he had not seen
for several months, the junior began to explain his
system of teaching geography.

But Halborough the elder took no interest in the
subject. “ How about your own studies?” he asked.
“Did you get the books I sent ?”

Cornelius had received them, and he related what
he was doing.
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS 49

“Mind you work in the morning. What time do
you get up ?”

The younger replied: “ Half-past five.”

“ Half-past four is not a minute too soon this time
of the year. There is no time like the morning for
construing. I don’t know why, but when I feel even
too dreary to read a novel I can translate—there is
something mechanical about it, I suppose. Now, Cor-
nelius, you are rather behindhand, and have some heavy
reading before you if you mean to get out of this next
Christmas.”

“T am afraid I have.”

“We must soon sound the bishop. I am sure you
will get a title without difficulty when he has heard
all. The subdean, the principal of my college, says
that the best plan will be for you to come there when
his lordship is present at an examination, and he’ll get
you a personal interview with him. Mind you make
a good impression upon him. I found in my case that
that was everything, and doctrine almost nothing.
You'll do for a deacon, Corney, if not for a priest.”

The younger remained thoughtful. “Have you
heard from Rosa lately ?” he asked; “I had a letter
this morning.”

“Yes. The little minx writes rather too often.
She is homesick — though Brussels must be an attrac-
tive place enough. But she must make the most of
her time over there. I thought a year would be
enough for her, after that high-class school at Sand-
bourne; but I have decided to give her two, and make
a good job of it, expensive as the establishment is.”

Their two rather harsh faces had softened directly
they began to speak of their sister, whom they loved
more ambitiously than they loved themselves.

“But where is the money to come from, Joshua ?”

“T have already got it.” He looked round, and

4
50 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

finding that some boys were near withdrew a few
steps. “I have borrowed it at five per cent. from the
farmer who used to occupy the farm next our field.
You remember him.”

“But about paying him?”

“T shall pay him by degrees out of my stipend.
No, Cornelius, it was no use to do the thing by halves.
She promises to be a most attractive, not to say beau-
tiful, girl. I have seen that for years; and if her face
is not her fortune, her face and her brains together
will be, if I observe and contrive aright. That she
should be, every inch of her, an accomplished and
refined woman, was indispensable for the fulfilment
of her destiny, and for moving onward and upward
with us; and she’ll do it, you will see. Id half starve
myself rather than take her away from that school
now.”

They looked round the school they were in. To
Cornelius it was natural and familiar enough; but to
Joshua, with his limited human sympathies, who had
just dropped in from a superior sort of place, the sight
jarred unpleasantly, as being that of something he
had left behind. “TI shall be glad when you are out
of this,” he said, “and in your pulpit, and well through
your first sermon.”

“You may as well say, inducted into my fat living,
while you are about it.”

“Ah, well; don’t think lightly of the Church.
There’s a fine work for any man of energy in the
Church, as you'll find,” he said, fervidly. ‘Torrents
of infidelity to be stemmed, new views of old sub-
jects to be expounded, truths in spirit to be substitu-
ted for truths in the letter... .” He lapsed into rev-
erie with the vision of his career, persuading himself
that it was ardor for Christianity which spurred him
on, and not pride of place. He had shouldered a body
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS 51

of doctrine, and was prepared to defend it tooth and
nail, solely for the honor and glory that warriors
win.

“Tf the Church is elastic, and stretches to the shape
of the time, she’ll last, I suppose,” said Cornelius. “If
not— Only think, I bought a copy of Paley’s Avi-
dences, best edition, broad margins, excellent preserva-
tion, at a book-stall the other day for—ninepence; and
I thought that at this rate Christianity must be in
rather a bad way.”

“No, no!” said the other, almost angrily. “It only
shows that such defences are no longer necessary.
Men’s eyes can see the truth without extraneous as-
sistance. Besides, we are in for Christianity, and must
stick to her, whether or no. I am just now going
right through Pusey’s Library of the Fathers.”

“You'll be a bishop, Joshua, before you have done!”

“Ah!” said the other, bitterly, shaking his head.
“Perhaps I might have been—I might have been!
But where is my D.D. or LL.D.? and how be a bish-
op without that kind of appendage? Archbishop Til-
lotson was the son of a Sowerby clothier, but he was
sent to Clare College. To hail Oxford or Cambridge
as alma mater is not for me—for us! My God! when
I think of what we sbould have been—what fair prom-
ise has been blighted by that cursed, worthless—”

“Hush, hush!... But I feel it, too, as much as you.
I have seen it more forcibly lately. You would have
obtained your degree long before this time—possibly
fellowship — and I should have been on my way to
mine.”

“Don’t talk of it,” said the other. “We must do
the best we can.”

They looked out of the window sadly through the
dusty panes, so high up that only the sky was visible.
By degrees the haunting trouble loomed again, and
52 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

Cornelius broke the silence with a whisper: “He has
called on me!”

The living pulses died on Joshua’s face, which grew
arid asaclinker. “When was that?” he asked, quickly.

“Last week.”

“How did he get here—so many miles?” \

“Came by railway. He came to ask for money.”

ce Ah ie

“He says he will call on you.”

- Joshua replied resignedly. The theme of their con-
versation spoiled his buoyancy for that afternoon. He
returned in the evening, Cornelius accompanying him
to the station; but he did not read in the train which
took him back to the Fountall Theological College, as
he had done on the way out. That ineradicable trouble
still remained as a squalid spot in the expanse of his
life. He sat with the other students in the cathedral
choir next day ; and the recollection of the trouble
obscured the purple splendor thrown by the panes
upon the floor.

It was afternoon. All was as still in the close as a
cathedral green can be between the Sunday services,
and the incessant cawing of the rooks was the only
sound. Joshua Halborough had finished his ascetic
lunch, and had gone into the library, where he stood
for a few moments looking out of the large window
facing the green. He saw walking slowly across it a
man in a fustian coat and a battered white hat with a
much-ruffled nap, having upon his arm a tall gypsy
Woman wearing long brass ear-rings. The man was
staring quizzically at the west front of the cathedral,
and Halborough recognized in him the form and feat-
ures of his father. Who the woman was he knew not.
Almost as soon as Joshua became conscious of these
things, the subdean, who was also the principal of the
college, and of whom the young man stood in more
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS 53

awe than of the bishop himself, emerged from the
gate and entered a path across the close. The pair
met the dignitary, and to Joshua’s horror his father
turned and addressed the subdean.

What passed between them he could not tell. But
as he stood in a cold sweat he saw his father place his
hand familiarly on the subdean’s shoulder; the shrink-
ing response of the latter, and his quick withdrawal,
told his feeling. The woman seemed to say nothing,
but when the subdean had passed by they came on
towards the college gate.

Halborough flew along the corridor and out at a
side door, so as to intercept them before they could
reach the front entrance, for which they were making.
He caught them behind a clump of laurel.

“By Jerry, here’s the very chap! Well, you’re a
fine fellow, Jos, never to send your father as much as
a twist o’ baccy on such an occasion, and to leave him
to travel all these miles to find ye out!”

“First, who is this?” said Joshua Halborough, with
pale dignity, waving his hand towards the buxom
woman with the great ear-rings.

“Dammy, the mis’ess! Your step-mother. Didn’t
you know I'd married? She helped me home from
market one night, and we came to terms, and struck
the bargain. Didn’t we, Selinar ?”

“Oi, by the great Lord an’ we did!” simpered the
lady.

“Well, what sort of a place is this you are living
in?” asked the millwright. “A kind of house of cor-
rection, apparently.”

Joshua listened abstractedly, his features set to res-
ignation. Sick at heart he was going to ask them if
they were in want of any necessary, any meal, when
his father cut him short by saying, “ Why, we’ve called
to ask ye to come round and take pot-luck with us at
54 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

the Cock and Bottle, where we’ve put up for the day,
on our way to see mis’ess’s friends at Binegar Fair,
where they’ll be lying under canvas for a night or
two. As for the victuals at the Cock I can’t testify
to ’em at all; but for the drink, they’ve the rarest
drop of Old Tom that I’ve tasted for many a year.”

“Thanks; but I am a teetotaler, and I have
lunched,” said Joshua, who could fully believe his
father’s testimony to the gin from the odor of his
breath. ‘You see we have to observe regular habits
here, and I couldn’t be seen at the Cock and Bottle
just now.”

“Oh, dammy, then don’t come, your reverence. Per-
haps you won’t mind standing treat for those who can
be seen there.”

“Not a penny,” said the younger, firmly. ‘“ You’ve
had enough already.”

“Thank you for nothing. By-the- bye, who was
that spindle - legged, shoe-buckled parson feller we
met by now? He seemed to think we should poison
him.”

Joshua remarked coldly that it was the principal of
his college, guardedly inquiring, “Did you tell him
whom you were come to see ?”

His father did not reply. He and his strapping
gypsy wife—if she were his wife —stayed no longer,
and disappeared in the direction of the High Street.
Joshua Halborough went back to the library. De-
termined as was his nature, he wept hot tears upon
the books, and was immeasurably more wretched that
afternoon than the unwelcome millwright. In the
evening he sat down and wrote a letter to his brother,
in which, after stating what had happened, and expa-
tiating upon this new disgrace in the gypsy wife, he
propounded a plan for raising money sufficient to in-
duce the couple to emigrate to Canada, “It is our
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS 55

only chance,” he said. “ The case as it stands is mad-
dening. For a successful painter, sculptor, musician,
author, who takes society by storm, it is no drawback;
it is sometimes even a romantic recommendation to
hail from outcasts and profligates. But for a clergy-
man of the Church of England! Cornelius, it is fatal!
To succeed in the Church, people must believe in you,
first of all, as a gentleman, secondly as a man of means,
thirdly as a scholar, fourthly as a preacher, fifthly
perhaps as a Christian—but always first as a gentle-
man, with all their heart and soul and strength. I
would have faced the fact of being a small machinist’s
son, and have taken my chance, if he’d been in any
sense respectable and decent. The essence of Chris-
tianity is humility, and by the help of God I would
have brazened it out. But this terrible vagabondage
and disreputable connection! If he does not accept
my terms and leave the country, it will extinguish us
and kill me. For how can we live and relinquish our
high aim and bring down our dear sister Rosa to the
level of a gypsy’s step-daughter ?”

III

There was excitement in the parish of Narrobourne
one day. The congregation had just come out from
morning service, and the whole conversation was of
the new curate, Mr. Halborough, who had officiated
for the first time, in the absence of the rector.

Never before had the feeling of the. villagers ap-
proached a level which could be called excitement on
such a matter as this. The droning which had been
the rule in that quiet old place for a century seemed
ended at last. They repeated the text to each other
56 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

as a refrain: “O Lord, be thou my helper!” Not
within living memory till to-day had the subject of
the sermon formed the topic of conversation from the
church door to church-yard gate, to the exclusion of
personal remarks on those who had been present, and
on the week’s news in general.

The thrilling periods of the preacher hung about
their minds all that day. The parish being steeped
in indifferentism, it happened that when the youths
and maidens, middle-aged and old people, who had
attended church that morning, recurred as by a fas-
cination to what Halborough had said, they did so
more or less indirectly, and even with the subterfuge
of a light laugh that was not real, so great was their
shyness under the novelty of their sensations.

What was more curious than that these unconven-
tional villagers should have been excited by a preacher
of a new school after forty years of familiarity with
the old hand who had had charge of their souls, was
the effect of Halborough’s address upon the occupants
of the manor-house pew, including the owner of the
estate. These thought they knew how to discount
the mere sensational sermon, how to minimize flash
oratory to its bare proportions ; but they had yielded
like the rest of the assembly to the charm of the new-
comer.

Mr. Fellmer, the land-owner, was a young widower
whose mother, still in the prime of life, had returned
to her old position in the family mansion since the
death of her son’s wife in the year after her marriage,
at the birth of a fragile little girl. From the date of
his loss to the present time, Fellmer had led an inac-
tive existence in the seclusion of the parish ; a lack of
motive seemed to leave him listless. He had gladly
reinstated his mother in the gloomy house, and his
main occupation now lay in stewarding his estate,
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS 57

which was not large. Mrs. Fellmer, who had sat be-
side him under Halborough this morning, was a cheer-
ful, straightforward woman, who did her marketing
and her alms-giving in person; was fond of old-fash-
ioned flowers, and walked about the village on very
wet days visiting the parishioners. These, the only
two great ones of Narrobourne, were impressed by
Joshua’s eloquence as much as the cottagers.

Halborough had been briefly introduced to them on
his arrival some days before, and, their interest being
kindled, they waited a few moments till he came out
of the vestry, to waik down the church-yard path with
him. Mrs. Fellmer spoke warmly of the sermon, of
the good-fortune of the parish in his advent, and
hoped he had found comfortable quarters.

Halborough, faintly flushing, said that he had ob-
tained very fair lodgings in the roomy house of a
farmer, whom he named.

She feared he would find it very lonely, especially
in the evenings, and hoped they would see a good
deal of him. When would he dine with them? Could
he not come that day—it must be so dull for him the
first Sunday evening in country lodgings ?

Halborough replied that it would give him much
pleasure, but that he feared he must decline. “I am
not altogether alone,” he said, “My sister, who has
just returned from Brussels, and who felt, as you do,
that I should be rather dismal by myself, has accom-
panied me hither to stay a few days till sbe has put
my rooms in order and set me going. She was too
fatigued to come to church, and is waiting for me
now at the farm.”

“Oh, but bring your sister—that will be still bet-
ter! Ishall be delighted to know her. How I wish
I had been aware! Do tell her, please, that we had
no idea of her presence.”
58 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

Halborough assured Mrs. Fellmer that he would
certainly bear the message; but as to her coming he
was not so sure. The real truth was, however, that
the matter would be decided by him, Rosa having an
almost filial respect for his wishes. But he was un-
certain as to the state of her wardrobe, and had de-
termined that she should not enter the manor-house at
a disadvantage that evening, when there would prob-
ably be plenty of opportunities in the future of her
doing so becomingly.

He walked to the farm in long strides. This, then,
was the outcome of his first morning’s work as curate
here. Things had gone fairly well with him. He had
been ordained; he was in a comfortable parish, where
he would exercise almost sole supervision, the rector
being infirm. He had made a deep impression at
starting, and the absence of a hood seemed to have
done him no harm. Moreover, by considerable per-
suasion and payment, his father and the dark woman
had been shipped off to Canada, where they were not
likely to interfere greatly with his interests.

Rosa came out to meet him. “Ah! you should
have gone to church like a good girl,” he said.

“Yes—I wished I had afterwards. But I do so
hate church as a rule that even your preaching was
underestimated in my mind. It was too bad of me!”

The girl who spoke thus playfully was fair, tall,
and sylph-like, in a muslin dress, and with just the
coquettish désinvolture which an English girl brings
home from abroad, and loses again after a few months
of native life. Joshua was the reverse of playful; the
world was too important a concern for him to indulge
in light moods. He told her in decided, practical
phraseology of the invitation.

“Now, Rosa, we must go—that’s settled—if you’ve
a dress that can be made fit to wear all on the hop like
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS 59

this. You didn’t, of course, think of bringing an
evening dress to such an out-of-the-way place ?”

But Rosa had come from the wrong city to be
caught napping in those matters. “Yes, I did,” said
she. “One never knows what may turn up.”

“Well done! Then off we go at seven.”

The evening drew on, and at dusk they started on
foot, Rosa pulling up the edge of her skirt under her
cloak out of the way of the dews, so that it formed a
great wind-bag all round her, and carrying her satin
shoes under her arm. Joshua would not let her wait
till she got in-doors before changing them, as she pro-
posed, but insisted on her performing that operation
under a tree, so that they might enter as if they had
not walked. He was nervously formal about such
trifles, while Rosa took the whole proceeding—walk,
dressing, dinncr, and all—as a pastime. To Joshua it
was a serious step in life.

A more unexpected kind of person for a curate’s
sister was never presented at a dinner. The surprise
of Mrs. Fellmer was unconcealed. She had looked
forward to a Dorcas, or Martha, or Rhoda at the out-
side, and a shade of misgiving crossed her face. It
was possible that, had the young lady accompanied
her brother to church, there would have been no din-
ing at Narrobourne House that day.

Not so with the young widower, her son. He re-
sembled a sleeper who had awaked in a summer noon
expecting to find it only dawn. He could scarcely
help stretching his arms and yawning in their faces,
so strong was his sense of being suddenly aroused to
an unforeseen thing. When they had sat down to table
he at first talked to Rosa somewhat with the air of a
ruler in the land; but the woman lurking in the ac-
quaintance soon brought him to his level, and the girl
from Brussels saw him looking at her mouth, her
60 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

hands, her contour, as if he could not quite compre-
hend how they got created ; then he dropped into the
more satisfactory stage which discerns no particulars.

He talked but little; she said much. The homeli-
ness of the Fellmers, to her view, though they were
regarded with such awe down here, quite disembar-
rassed her. The squire had become so unpractised,
bad dropped so far into the shade during the last year
or so of his life, that he had almost forgotten what
the world contained till this evening reminded him,
His mother, after her first moments of doubt, appeared
to think that he must be left to his own guidance, and
gave her attention to Joshua.

With all his foresight and doggedness of aim, the
result of that dinner exceeded Halborough’s expecta-
tions. In weaving his ambitions he had viewed his
sister Rosa as a slight, bright thing to be helped into
notice by his abilities; but it now began to dawn upon
him that the physical gifts of nature to her might do
more for them both than nature’s intellectual gifts to
himself. While he was patiently boring the tunnel
Rosa seemed about to fly over the mountain.

He wrote the next day to his brother, now occupy-
ing his own old rooms in the theological college, tell-
ing him exultingly of the unanticipated début of Rosa
at the manor-house. The next post brought him a
reply of congratulation, dashed with the counteract-
ing intelligence that his father did not like Canada—
that his wife had deserted him, which made him feel
so dreary that he thought of returning home.

In his recent satisfaction at his own successes Joshua
Halborough had wellnigh forgotten his chronic trou-
ble —latterly screened by distance. But it now re-
turned upon him ; he saw more in this brief announce-
ment than his brother seemed to see. It was the cloud
no bigger than a man’s hand.
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS 61

IV

The following December, a day or two before
Christmas, Mrs, Fellmer and her son were walking up
and down the broad gravel path which bordered the
east front of the house. Till within the last half-hour
the morning had been a drizzling one, and they had
just emerged for a short turn before luncheon.

“You see, dear mother,” the son was saying, “it is
the peculiarity of my position which makes her appear
to me in such a desirable light. When you consider
how I have been crippled at starting, how my life has
been maimed ; that I feel anything like publicity dis-
tasteful, that [ have no political ambition, and that
my chief aim and hope lie in the education of the lit-
tle thing Annie has left me, you must see how desira-
ble a wife like Miss Halborough would be, to prevent
my becoming a mere vegetable.”

“Tf you adore her, I suppose you must have her,”
replied his mother, with dry indirectness. “ But you'll
find that she will not be content to live on here as
you do, giving her whole mind to a young child.”

“'That’s just where we differ. Her very disquali-
fication, that of being a nobody, as you call it, is her
recommendation in my eyes. Her lack of influential
connections limits her ambition. From what I know
of her, a life in this place is all that she would wish
for. She would never care to go outside the park
gates if it were necessary to stay within.”

“Being in love with her, Albert, and meaning to
marry her, you invent your practical reasons to make
the case respectable. Well, do as you will; I have
no authority over you, so why should you consult me?
You mean to propose on this very occasion, no doubt.
Don’t you, now ?”

E
62 Liru’s LITTLE IRONIKS

“By no means. JI am merely revolving the idea in
my mind. If on further acquaintance she turns out
to be as good as she has hitherto seemed—well, I shall
see. Admit now, that you like her.”

“JT readily admit it. She is very captivating at first
sight. But as a step-mother to your child! You seem
mighty anxious, Albert, to get rid of me!”

“Not at all. And I am not so reckless as you
think. I don’t make up my mind in a hurry. But
the thought having occurred to me, I mention it to
you at once, mother. If you dislike it, say so.”

“T don’t say anything. I will try to make the best
of it if you are determined. When does she come ?”

“To-morrow.”

All this time there were great preparations in train
at the curate’s, who was now a householder. Rosa,
whose two or three weeks’ stay on two occasions ear-
lier in the year had so affected the squire, was coming
again, and at the same time her younger brother Cor-
nelius, to make up a family party. Rosa, who jour-
neyed from the Midlands, could not arrive till late in
the evening, but Cornelius was to get there in the af-
ternoon, Joshua going out to meet him in his walk
across the fields from the railway.

Everything being ready in Joshua’s modest abode
he started on his way, his heart buoyant and thank-
ful, if ever it was in his life. He was of such good
report himself that his brother’s path into holy orders
promised to be unexpectedly easy ; and he longed to
compare experiences with him, even though there was
on hand a more exciting matter still. From his youth
he had held that, in old-fashioned country places, the
Church conferred social prestige up to a certain point
at a cheaper price than any other profession or pur-
suit ; and events seemed to be proving him right.

He had walked about half an hour when he saw
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS 63

Cornelius coming along the path, and in a few min-
utes the two brothers met. The experiences of Cor-
nelius had been less immediately interesting than
those of Joshua, but his personal position was satis-
factory, and there was nothing to account for the
singularly subdued manner that he exhibited, which
at first Joshua set down to the fatigue of over-
study; and he proceeded to the subject of Rosa’s
arrival in the evening, and the probable consequences
of this her third visit. “Before next Easter she'll
be his wife, my boy,” said Joshua, with grave exulta-
tion.

Cornelius shook his head. “She comes too late,”
he returned.

“ What do you mean ?”

“Look here.” He produced the Fountall paper,
and placed his finger on a paragraph, which Joshua
read. It appeared under the report of Petty Sessions,
and was a commonplace case of disorderly conduct, in
which a man was sent to prison for seven days for
breaking windows in that town.

“Well?” said Joshua.

“Jt happened during an evening that I was in the
street ; and the offender is our father.”

“ Not—how—I sent him more money on his prom-
ising to stay in Canada?”

“He is home, safe enough.” Cornelius in the same
gloomy tone gave the remainder of his information.
He had witnessed the scene, unobserved of his father,
and had heard him say that he was on his way to see
his daughter, who was going to marry a rich gentle-
man. The only good-fortune attending the untoward
incident was that the millwright’s name had been
printed as Joshua Alborough.

“Beaten! We are to be beaten on the eve of our
expected victory!” said the elder brother. “How
64 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

did he guess that Rosa was likely to marry? Good
Heaven! Cornelius, you seem doomed to bring bad
news always, do you not ?”

“JT do,” said Cornelius. “Poor Rosa !”

It was almost in tears, so great was their heart-sick-
ness and shame, that the brothers walked the remain-
der of the way to Joshua’s dwelling. In the evening
they set out to meet Rosa, bringing her to the village
in a fly; and when she had come into the house, and
was sitting down with them, they almost forgot their
secret anxiety in contemplating her, who knew nothing
about it.

Next day the Fellmers came, and the two or three
days after that were a lively time. That the squire
was yielding to his impulses—making up his mind—
there could be no doubt, On Sunday Cornelius read
the lessons and Joshua preached. Mrs. Fellmer was
quite maternal towards Rosa, and it appeared that
she had decided to welcome the inevitable with a good,
grace. The pretty girl was to spend yet another after-
noon with the elder lady, superintending some parish
treat at the house in observance of Christmas, and
afterwards to stay on to dinner, her brothers to fetch
her in the evening. They were also invited to dine,
but they could not accept owing to an engagement.

The engagement was of a sombre sort. They were
going to meet their father, who would that day be re-
leased from Fountall Jail, and try to persuade him
to keep away from Narrobourne. Every exertion was
to be made to get him back to Canada, to his old home
in the Midlands—anywhere, so that he would not im-
pinge disastrously upon their courses, and blast their
sister’s prospect of the auspicious marriage which was
just then hanging in the balance.

As soon as Rosa had been fetched away by her
friends at the manor-house her brothers started on
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS 65

their expedition, without waiting for dinner or tea.
Cornelius, to whom the millwright always addressed
his letters when he wrote any, drew from his pocket
and reread as he walked the curt note which had led
to this journey being undertaken ; it was despatched
by their father the night before, immediately upon his
liberation, and stated that he was setting out for Narro-
bourne at the moment of writing; that having no
money he would be obliged to walk all the way; that
he calculated on passing through the intervening town
of Ivell about six on the following day, where he
should sup at the Castle Inn, and where he hoped they
would meet him with a carriage-and-pair, or some other
such conveyance, that he might not disgrace them by
arriving like a tramp.

“That sounds as if he gave a thought to our posi-
tion,” said Cornelius.

Joshua knew the satire that lurked in the paternal
words, and said nothing. Silence prevailed during
the greater part of their journey. The lamps were
lighted in Ivell when they entered the streets, and
Cornelius, who was quite unknown in this neighbor-
hood, and who, moreover, was not in clerical attire,
decided that he should be the one to call at the Castle
Inn. Here, in answer to his inquiry under the dark-
ness of the archway, they told him that such a man as
he had described left the house about a quarter of an
hour earlier, after making a meal in the kitchen settle.
He was rather the worse for liquor.

“Then,” said Joshua, when Cornelius joined him
outside with this intelligence, “‘we must have met and
passed him. And now that I think of it, we did meet
some one who was unsteady in his gait under the trees
on the other side of Hendcome Hill, where it was too
dark to see him.”

They rapidly retraced their steps; but for a long

5
66 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

stretch of the way home could discern nobody. When,
however, they had gone about three-quarters of the
distance, they became conscious of an irregular foot-
fall in front of them, and could see a whitish figure in
the gloom. They followed dubiously. The figure met
another wayfarer—the single one that had been en-
countered upon this lonely road—and they distinctly
heard him ask the way to Narrobourne. The stranger
replied—what was quite true—that the nearest way
was by turning in at the stile by the next bridge, and
following the foot-path which branched thence across
the meadows.

When the brothers reached the stile they also en-
tered the path, but did not overtake the subject of their
worry till they had crossed two or three meads, and
the lights from Narrobourne manor-house were visible
before them through the trees. Their father was no
longer walking ; he was seated against the wet bank
of an adjoining hedge. Observing their forms he
shouted, “I’m going to Narrobourne; who may you
be 2”

They went up to him, and revealed themselves,
reminding him of the plan which he had himself

‘proposed in his note, that they should meet him at
Ivell.

“By Jerry, ’'d forgot it!” he said. “Well, what
do you want me to do?” His tone was distinctly
quarrelsome.

A long conversation followed, which became im-
bittered at the first hint from them that he should not
come to the village. The millwright drew a quart
bottle from his pocket, and challenged them to drink
if they meant friendly and called themselves men.
Neither of the two had touched alcohol for years, but
for once they thought it best to accept, so as not to
needlessly provoke him.
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS - 67

“What’s in it?” said Joshua.

“A drop of weak gin-and-water. It won’t hurt ye.
Drink from the bottle.” Joshua did so, and his father
pushed up the bottom of the vessel so as to make him
swallow a good deal in spite of himself. It went down
into his stomach like molten lead.

“ Ha, ha, that’s right!” said old Halborough. “But
twas raw spirit—ha, ha!”

“ Why should you take me in so!” said Joshua, los-
ing his self-command, try as he would to keep calm.

“Because you took me in, my lad, in banishing me
to that cursed country under pretence that it was for
my good. You were a pair of hypocrites to say so.
It was done to get rid of me—no more nor less. But,
by Jerry, ’m a match for ye now! Tl spoil your
souls for preaching. My daughter is going to be mar-
ried to the squire here. I’ve heard the news—I saw
it in a paper !”

“Tt is premature—”

“JT know it is true; and I’m her father, and I shall
give her away, or there'll be a hell of a row, I can as-
sure ye! Is that where the gennleman lives?”

Joshua Halborough writhed in impotent despair.
Fellmer had not yet positively declared himself, his
mother was hardly won round; a scene with their fa-
ther in the parish would demolish as fair a palace of
hopes as was ever builded. The millwright rose. “If
that’s where the squire lives I’m going to call. Just
arrived from Canady with her fortune—ha, ha! I wish
no harm to the gennleman, and the gennleman will
wish no harm to me. But I like to take my place in
the family, and stand upon my rights, and lower peo-
ple’s pride !”

“You’ve succeeded already! Where’s that woman
you took with you—”

“Woman! She was my wife as lawful as the Con-
68 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

stitution—a sight more lawful than your mother was
till some time after you were born !”

Joshua had for many years before heard whispers
that his father had cajoled his mother in their early
acquaintance, and had made somewhat tardy amends ;
but never from his father’s lips till now. It was the
last stroke, and he could not bear it. He sank back
against the hedge. “It is over!” he said. ‘ He ruins
us all!”

The millwright moved on, waving his stick tri-
umphantly, and the two brothers stood still) They
could see his drab figure stalking along the path, and
over his head the lights from the conservatory of Nar-
robourne House, inside which Albert Fellmer might
possibly be sitting with Rosa at that moment, holdin
her hand, and asking her to share his home with him.

The staggering whitey- brown form, advancing to
put a blot on all this, had been diminishing in the
shade ; and now suddenly disappeared beside a wear.
There was the noise of a flounce in the water.

“He has fallen in!” said Cornelius, starting for-
ward to run for the place at which his father had van-
ished.

Joshua, awaking from the stupefied reverie into
which he had sunk, rushed to the other’s side before
he had taken ten steps. ‘Stop, stop, what are you
thinking of ?” he whispered, hoarsely, grasping Cor-
nelius’s arm.

“Pulling him out !”

“Yes, yes—so am I. But—wait a moment—”

“But, Joshua !”

“Her life and happiness, you know — Cornelius—
and your reputation and mine—and our chance of ris-
ing together, all three—”

He clutched his brother’s arm to the bone; and as
they stood breathless the splashing and floundering in
4 TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS 69

the wear continued; over it they saw the hopeful
lights from the manor-house conservatory winking
through the trees as their bare branches waved to
and fro.

The floundering and splashing grew weaker, and
they could hear gurgling words: ‘“ Help—I’m drown-
ded! Rosie—Rosie !”

“We'll go—we must save him. Oh, Joshua!”

“Yes, yes, we must!”

Still they did not move, but waited, holding each
other, each thinking the same thought. Weights of
lead seemed to be affixed to their feet, which would
no longer obey their wills. The mead became silent.
Over it they fancied they could see figures moving in
the conservatory. The air up there seemed to emit
gentle kisses.

Cornelius started forward at last,and Joshua almost
simultaneously. ‘Two or three minutes brought them
to the brink of the stream. At first they could see
nothing in the water, though it was not so deep nor
the night so dark but that their father’s light kersey-
mere coat would have been visible if he had lain at
the bottom. Joshua looked this way and that.

“He has drifted into the culvert,” he said.

Below the foot-bridge of the wear the stream sud-
denly narrowed to half its width, to pass under a bar-
rel arch or culvert constructed for wagons to cross
into the middle of the mead in hay-making time. It
being at present the season of high water the arch was
full to the crown, against which the ripples clucked
every now and then. At this point he had just
caught sight of a pale object slipping under. In a
moment it was gone.

They went to the lower end, but nothing emerged.
For a long time they tried at both ends to effect some
communication with the interior, but to no purpose.
"0 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“We ought to have come sooner!” said the con-
science-stricken Cornelius, when they were quite ex-
hausted, and dripping wet.

“‘T suppose we ought,” replied Joshua, heavily. He
perceived his father’s walking -stick on the bank ;
hastily picking it up he stuck it into the mud among
the sedge. Then they went on.

“Shall we—say anything about this accident?”
whispered Cornelius as they approached the door of
Joshua’s house.

“What’s the use? It can do no good. We must
wait until he is found.”

They went in-doors and changed their clothes; after
which they started for the manor-house, reaching it
about ten o’clock. Besides their sister there were
only three guests: an adjoining land-owner and his
wife, and the infirm old rector.

Rosa, although she had parted from them so re-
cently, grasped their hands in an ecstatic, brimming,
joyful manner, as if she had not seen them for years.
“You look pale,” she said.

The brothers answered that they had had a long
walk, and were somewhat tired. Everybody in the
room seemed charged full with some sort of interest-
ing knowledge; the squire’s neighbor and his wife
looked wisely around, and Fellmer himself played
the part of host with a preoccupied bearing which ap-
proached fervor. They left at eleven, not accepting
the carriage offered, the distance being so short and
the roads dry. The squire came rather farther into
the dark with them than he need have done, and
wished Rosa good-night in a mysterious manner,
slightly apart from the rest.

When they were walking along Joshua said, with a
desperate attempt at joviality, “Rosa, what’s going
on?”
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS V1

“Oh, I—” she began, between a gasp and a bound,
ee He—”

‘Never mind—if it disturbs you.”

She was so excited that she could not speak con-
nectedly at first, the practised air which she had
brought home with her having disappeared. Calming
herself she added, “I am not disturbed, and nothing
has happened. Only he said he wanted to ask me
something, some day; and I said never mind that
now. He hasn’t asked yet, and is coming to speak to
you about it. He would have done so to-night, only
I asked him not to be inahurry. But he will come
to-morrow, I am sure!”

Vv

It was summer-time, six month’s later, and mowers
and hay-makers were at work in the meads. The
manor-house, being opposite them, frequently formed
a peg for conversation during these operations; and
the doings of the squire, and the squire’s young wife,
the curate’s sister —who was at present the admired
of most of them, and the interest of all—met with
their due amount of criticism.

Rosa was happy, if ever woman could be said to be
so. She had not learned the fate of her father, and
sometimes wondered—perhaps with a sense of relief—
why he did not write to her from his supposed home
in Canada. Her brother Joshua had been presented
to a living in a small town, shortly after her marriage,
and Cornelius had thereupon succeeded to the vacant
curacy of Narrobourne.

These two had awaited in deep suspense the dis-
covery of their father’s body, and yet the discovery
72 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

had not been made. Every day they expected a man
or a boy to run up from the meads with the intelli-
gence; but he had never come. Days had accumu-
lated to weeks and months; the wedding had come
and gone; Joshua had tolled and read himself in at
his new parish, and never a shout of amazement over
the millwright’s remains.

But now, in June, when they were mowing the
meads, the hatches had to be drawn and the water
let out of its channels for the convenience of the
mowers. It was thus that the discovery was made.
A man, stooping low with his scythe, caught a view
of the culvert lengthwise, and saw something entan-
gled in the recently bared weeds of its bed. A day
or two after there was an inquest; but the body was
unrecognizable. Fish and flood had been busy with
the millwright; he had no watch or marked article
which could be identified, and a verdict of the ac-
cidental drowning of a person unknown settled the
matter.

As the body was found in Narrobourne parish, there
it had to be buried. Cornelius wrote to Joshua, beg-
ging him to come and read the service, or to send
some one; he himself could not do it. Rather than
let in a stranger Joshua came, and silently scanned
the coroner’s order handed him by the undertaker:

“JT, Henry Giles, Coroner for the Mid-Division of
Outer Wessex, do hereby order the Burial of the Body
now shown to the Inquest Jury as the Body of an
Adult Male Person Unknown...” ete.

Joshua Halborough got through the service in some
way, and rejoined his brother Cornelius at his house.
Neither accepted an invitation to lunch at their sis-
ter’s; they wished to discuss parish matters together,
In the afternoon she came down, though they had al-
ready called on her, and had not expected to see her
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS %3

again. Her bright eyes, brown hair, flowery bonnet,
lemon-colored gloves, and flush beauty were like an
irradiation into the apartment, which they in their
gloom could hardly bear.

“T forgot to tell you,” she said, “of a curious thing
which happened to me a month or two before my mar-
riage—something which I have thought may have had
a connection with the accident to the poor man you
have buried to-day. It was on that evening I was at
the manor-house waiting for you to fetch me; I was
in the winter-garden with Albert, and we were sitting
silent together, when we fancied we heard a cry. We
opened the door, and while Albert ran to fetch his hat,
leaving me standing there, the cry was repeated, and
my excited senses made me think I heard my own
name. When Albert came back all was silent, and we
decided that it was only a drunken shout, and not a
cry for help. We both forgot the incident, and it
never has occurred to me till since the funeral to-day
that it might have been this stranger’s cry. The name
of course was only fancy, or he might have had a wife
or child with a name something like mine, poor man!”

When she was gone the brothers were silent till
Cornelius said, “Now mark this, Joshua, Sooner or
later she'll know.”

“How ?”

“From one of us. Do you think human hearts are
iron-cased safes, that you suppose we can keep this
secret forever ?”

“Yes, I think they are, sometimes,” said Joshua.

“No. It will out. We shall tell.”

“ What, and ruin her—kill her? Disgrace her chil-
dren, and pull down the whole auspicious house of
Fellmer about our ears? No! May I—drown where
he was drowned before I do it! Never, never. Sure-
ly you can say the same, Cornelius?”
94 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

Cornelius seemed fortified, and no more was said.
For a long time after that day he did not see Joshua,
and before the next year was out a son and heir was
born to the Fellmers. The villagers rang the three
bells every evening for a week and more, and were
made merry by Mr. Fellmer’s ale; and when the chris-
tening came on Joshua paid Narrobourne another
visit.

Among all the people who assembled on that day
the brother clergymen were the least interested. Their
minds were haunted by a spirit in kerseymere. In the
evening they walked together in the fields.

“She’s all right,” said Joshua. ‘ But here are you
doing journey-work, Cornelius, and likely to continue
at it till the end of the day, as far as I can see. I,
too, with my petty living—what am I, after all?...To
tell the truth, the Church is a poor forlorn hope for
people without influence, particularly when their en-
thusiasm begins to flag. A social regenerator has a
better chance outside, where he is unhampered by
dogma and tradition. As for me, I would rather have
gone on mending mills, with my crust of bread and
liberty.”

Almost automatically they had bent their steps
along the margin of the river; they now paused.
They were standing on the brink of the well-known
wear. There were the hatches, there was the culvert;
they could see the pebbly bed of the stream through
the pellucid water. The notes of the church- bells
were audible, still jangled by the enthusiastic vil-
lagers.

“Tt was there I hid his walking-stick,” said Joshua,
looking towards the sedge. The next moment, dur-
ing a passing breeze, something flashed white on the
spot they regarded.

From the sedge rose a straight little silver-poplar,
A TRAGEDY OF TWO AMBITIONS "5

and it was the leaves of this sapling which caused the
flicker of whiteness.

“His walking-stick has grown!” said Cornelius. “It
was a rough one—cut from the hedge, I remember.”

At every puff of wind the tree turned white, till
they could not bear to look at it; and they walked
away.

“T see him every night,” Cornelius murmured. ...
“ Ah, we read our Hebrews to little account, Jos! “Yré-
petve oravpéy, aisxbync Karagpovicac. To have endured
the cross, despising the shame—there lay greatness!
But now I often feel that I should like to put an end
to trouble here in this self-same spot.”

“T have thought of it myself,” said Joshua.

“Perhaps we shall, some day,” murmured his
brother.

“ Perhaps,” said Joshua, moodily.

With that contingency to consider in the silence
of their nights and days they bent their steps home-
ward.

December, 1888.
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT

I

TuE man who played the disturbing part in the two
quiet lives hereafter depicted—no great man, in any
sense, by-the-way—first had knowledge of them on an
October evening in the city of Melchester. He had
been standing in the close, vainly endeavoring to gain
amid the darkness a glimpse of the most homogeneous
pile of medieval architecture in England, which tow-
ered and tapered from the damp and level sward in
front of him. While he stood the presence of the
cathedral walls was revealed rather by the ear than
by the eyes; he could not see them, but they reflected
sharply a roar of sound which entered the close by a
street leading from the city square, and, falling upon
the building, was flung back upon him.

He postponed till the morrow his attempt to exam-
ine the deserted edifice, and turned his attention to
the noise. It was compounded of steam barrel-organs,
the clanging of gongs, the ringing of hand-bells, the
clack of rattles, and the undistinguishable shouts of
men. A lurid light hung in the air in the direction of
the tumult. Thitherward he went, passing under the
arched gateway, along a straight street, and into the
square.

He might have searched Europe over for a greater
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT "Y

contrast between juxtaposed scenes. The spectacle
was that of the eighth chasm of the Inferno as to color
and flame, and, as to mirth, a development of the Ho-
meric heaven. A smoky glare, of the complexion of
brass filings, ascended from the fiery tongues of innu-
merable naphtha lamps affixed to booths, stalls, and
other temporary erections which crowded the spacious
market-square. In front of this irradiation scores of
human figures, more or less in profile, were darting
athwart and across, up, down, and around, like gnats
against a sunset.

Their motions were so rhythmical that they seemed
to be moved by machinery. And it presently ap-
peared that they were moved by machinery indeed,
the figures being those of the patrons of swings, see-
saws, flying-leaps, above all of the three steam round-
abouts which occupied the centre of the position. It
was from the latter that the din of steam-organs came.

Throbbing humanity in full light was, on second
thoughts, better than ecclesiology in the dark. The
young man, lighting a short pipe, and putting his
hat on one side and one hand in his pocket, to throw
himself into harmony with his new environment, drew
near to the largest and most patronized of the steam
circuses, as the roundabouts were called by their own-
ers. This was one of brilliant finish, and it was now
in full revolution, The musical instrument around
which and to whose tones the riders revolved, directed
its trumpet-mouths of brass upon the young man, and
the long plate-glass mirrors set at angles, which re-
volved with the machine, flashed the gyrating person-
ages and hobby-horses kaleidoscopically into his eyes.

It could now be seen that he was unlike the major-
ity of the crowd. A gentlemanly young fellow, one
of the species found in large towns only, and London
particularly, built on delicate lines, well, though not

e
%8 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

fashionably dressed, he appeared to belong to the pro-
fessional class; he had nothing square or practical
about his look, much that was curvilinear and sen-
suous. Indeed, some would have called him a man
not altogether typical of the middle-class male of a
century wherein sordid ambition is the master - pas-
sion that seems to be taking the time - honored place
of love.

The revolving figures passed before his eyes with
an unexpected and quiet grace in a throng whose
natural movements did not suggest gracefulness or
quietude as a rule. By some contrivance there was
imparted to each of the hobby-horses a motion which
was really the triumph and perfection of roundabout
inventiveness—a galloping rise and fall, so timed
that, of each pair of steeds, one was on the spring
while the other was on the pitch. The riders were
quite fascinated by these equine undulations in this
most delightful holiday game of our times. There
were riders as young as six, and as old as sixty years,
with every age between. At first it was difficult to
catch a personality, but by-and-by the observer’s eyes
centred on the prettiest girl out of the several pretty
ones revolving.

It was not that one with the light frock and light
hat whom he had been at first attracted by; no, it
was the one with the black cape, gray skirt, light
gloves, and—no, not even she, but the one behind
her ; she with the crimson skirt, dark jacket, brown
hat, and brown gloves. Unmistakably that was the
prettiest girl.

Having finally selected her, this idle spectator stud-
ied her as well as he was able during each of her
brief transits across his visual field. She was abso-
lutely unconscious of everything save the act of rid-
ing: her features were rapt in an ecstatic dreami-
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT 79

ness ; for the moment she did not know her age or
her history or her lineaments, much less her troubles.
He himself was full of vague latter-day glooms and
popular melancholies, and it was: a refreshing sensa-
tion to behold this young thing, then and there, abso-
lutely as happy as if she were in a Paradise.

Dreading the moment when the inexorable stoker,
grimly lurking behind the glittering rococo - work,
should decide that this set of riders had had their
pennyworth, and bring the whole concern of steam-
engine, horses, mirrors, trumpets, drums, cymbals,
and such like to pause and silence, he waited for her
every reappearance, glancing indifferently over the
intervening forms, including the two plainer girls, the
old woman and child, the two youngsters, the newly-
married couple, the old man with a clay pipe, the
sparkish youth with a ring, the young ladies in the
chariot, the pair of journeyman carpenters, and others,
till his select country beauty followed on again in her
place. He had never seen a fairer product of nature,
and at each round she made a deeper mark in his sen-
timents. ‘The stoppage then came, and the sighs of
the riders were audible.

He moved round to the place at which he reckoned
she would alight ; but she retained her seat. The
empty saddles began to refill, and she plainly was
deciding to have another turn. The young man drew
up to the side of her steed, and pleasantly asked her
if she had enjoyed her ride.

“Oh yes!” she said, with dancing eyes. “It has
been quite unlike anything I have ever felt in my life
before !”

It was not difficult to fall into conversation with
her. Unreserved — too unreserved — by nature, she
was not experienced enough to be reserved by art,
and after a little coaxing she answered his remarks
80 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

readily. She had come to live in Melchester from a
village on the Great Plain, and this was the first time
that she had ever seen a steam-circus ; she could not
understand how such wonderful machines were made.
She had come to the city on the invitation of Mrs. Harn-
ham, who had taken her into her household to train
her as a servant if she showed any aptitude. Mrs.
Harnham was a young lady who before she married
had been Miss Edith White, living in the country near
the speaker’s cottage ; she was now very kind to her
through knowing her in childhood so well. She was
‘even taking the trouble to educate her. Mrs. Harn-
ham was the only friend she had in the world, and
being without children had wished to have her near
her in preference to anybody else, though she had
only lately come; allowed her to do almost as she
liked, and to have a holiday whenever she asked for
it. The husband of this kind young lady was a rich
wine- merchant of the town, but Mrs. Harnham did
not care much about him. In the daytime you could
see the house from where they were talking. She,
the speaker, liked Melchester better than the lonely
country, and she was going to have a new hat for
next Sunday that was to cost fifteen and ninepence.

Then she inquired of her acquaintance where he
lived, and he told her in London, that ancient and
smoky city, where everybody lived who lived at all,
and died because they could not live there. He came
into Wessex two or three times a year for profes-
sional reasons ; he had arrived from Wintoncester
yesterday, and was going on into the next county in
a day or two, For one thing he did like the country
better than the town, and it was because it contained
such girls as she.

Then the pleasure- machine started again, and, to
the light-hearted girl, the figure of the handsome
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT 81

young man, the market - square with its lights and
crowd, the houses beyond, and the world at large,
began moving round as before, countermoving in the
revolving mirrors on her right hand, she being as it
were the fixed point in an undulating, dazzling, lurid
universe, in which loomed forward most prominently
of all the form of her late interlocutor. Each time
that she approached the half of her orbit that lay
nearest him they gazed at each other with smiles, and
with that unmistakable expression which means so
little at the moment, yet so often leads up to passion,
heartache, union, disunion, devotion, overpopulation,
drudgery, content, resignation, despair.

When the horses slowed anew he stepped to her
side and proposed another heat. ‘‘ Hang the expense
for once,” be said. ‘T’ll pay !”

She laughed till the tears came.

“Why do you laugh, dear ?” said he.

“ Because—you are so genteel that you must have
plenty of money, and only say that for fun!” she
returned.

“ Ha-ha !” laughed the young man in unison, and
gallantly producing his money she was enabled to
whirl on. again.

As he stood smiling there in the motley crowd, with
his pipe in his hand, and clad in the rough pea-jacket
and wide-awake that he had put on for his stroll, who
would have supposed him to be Charles Bradford
Raye, Esquire, stuff-gownsman, educated at Winton-
cester, called to the bar at Lincoln’s Inn, now going
the Western Circuit, merely detained in Melchester
by a small arbitration after his brethren had moved on
to the next county-town ?

6
82 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

il

The square was overlooked from its remoter corner
by the house of which the young girl had spoken, a
dignified residence of considerable size, having several
windows on each floor. Inside one of these, on the
first floor, the apartment being a large drawing-room,
sat a lady, in appearance from twenty-eight t6 thirty
years of age. The blinds were still undrawn, and the
lady was absently surveying the weird scene without,
her cheek resting on her hand. The room was unlit
from within, but enough of the glare from the market-
place entered it to reveal the lady’s face. She was
what is called an interesting creature rather than a
handsome woman; dark-eyed, thoughtful, and with
sensitive lips.

A man sauntered into the room from behind and
came forward.

“Oh, Edith, I didn’t see you,” he said. “ Why are
you sitting here in the dark ?”

“T am looking at the fair,” replied the lady, in a
languid voice.

“Oh? Horrid nuisance every year! I wish it
could be put a stop to.”

“7 like it.”

“Tm. There’s no accounting for taste.”

For a moment he gazed from the window with her,
for politeness’ sake, and then went out again.

In a few minutes she rang.

““Hasn’t Anna come in ?” asked Mrs. Harnham.

“No, m’m.”

“She ought to be in by this time. I meant her to
go for ten minutes only.”

Shall I go and look for her, m’m ?” said the house-
maid, alertly.
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT 83

“No. It is not necessary: she is a good girl and
will come soon.”

However, when the servant had gone Mrs. Harn-
ham arose, went up to her room, cloaked and bonneted
herself, and proceeded down-stairs, where she found
her husband.

“T want to see the fair,” she said, “and I am going
to look for Anna. I have made myself responsible for
her, and must see she comes to no harm. She ought
to be in-doors. Will you come with me ?”

“Oh, she’s all right. I saw her on one of those
whirligig things, talking to her young man as I came
in. But Vl go if you wish, though I’d rather goa
hundred miles the other way.”

“Then please do so. I shall come to no harm
alone.”

She left the house and entered the crowd which
thronged the market-place, where she soon discovered
Anna, seated on the revolving horse. As soon as it
stopped Mrs. Harnham advanced and said, severely,
“ Anna, how can you be such a wild girl? You were
only to be out for ten minutes.”

Anna looked blank, and the young man, who had
dropped into the background, came to her assistance.

“ Please don’t blame her,” he said, politely. “It is
my fault that she has stayed. She looked so graceful
on the horse that I induced her to go round again. I
assure you that she has been quite safe.”

“In that case I'll leave her in your hands,” said
Mrs. Harnham, turning to retrace her steps.

But this for the moment it was not so easy to do.
Something had attracted the crowd to a spot in their
rear, and the wine-merchant’s wife, caught by its
sway, found herself pressed against Anna’s acquaint-
ance without power to move away. Their faces were
within’ a few inches of each other, his breath fanned
84 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

her cheek as well as Anna’s. They could do no other
than smile at the accident ; but neither spoke, and
each waited passively. Mrs. Harnham then felt a
man’s hand clasping her fingers, and from the look of
consciousness on the young fellow’s face she knew the
hand to be his ; she also knew that from the position
of the girl he had no other thought than that the im-
prisoned hand was Anna’s. What prompted her to
refrain from undeceiving him she could hardly tell.
Not content with holding the hand, he playfully
slipped two of his fingers inside her glove, against her
palm. Thus matters continued till the pressure les-
sened ; but several minutes passed before the crowd
thinned sufficiently to allow Mrs. Harnham to with-
draw.

“ How did they get to know each other, I wonder ?”
she mused as she retreated. ‘‘ Anna is really very
forward—and he very wicked and nice.”

She was so gently stirred with the stranger’s man-
ner and voice, with the tenderness of his idle touch,
that instead of re-entering the house she turned back
again and observed the pair from a screened nook.
Really, she argued (being little less impulsive than
Anna herself), it was very excusable in Anna to en-
courage him, however she might have contrived to
make his acquaintance ; he was so gentlemanly, so
fascinating, had such beautiful eyes. The thought
that he was several years her junior produced a rea-
sonless sigh.

At length the couple turned from the roundabout
towards the door of Mrs. Harnham’s house, and the
young man could be heard saying that he would ac-
company her home. Anna, then, had found a lover,
apparently a very devoted one. Mrs. Harnham was
quite interested in him. When they drew near the
door of the wine-merchant’s house, a comparatively
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT 85

deserted spot by this time, they stood invisible for a
little while in the shadow of a wall, where they sepa-
rated, Anna going on to the entrance, and her acquaint-
ance returning across the square.

“Anna,” said Mrs. Harnham, coming up. “Ive
been looking at you! That young man kissed you at
parting, I am almost sure.”

“Well,” stammered Anna, “he said if I didn’t mind,
it would do me no harm, and—and—him a great deal
of good !”

“Ah, I thought so! And he was a stranger till to-
night ?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Yet I warrant you told him your name and every-
thing about yourself ?”

“He asked me.”

“ But he didn’t tell you his ?”

“Yes, ma’am, he did!” cried Anna, victoriously. “It
is Charles Bradford, of London.”

““Well, if he’s respectable, of course I’ve nothing to
say against your knowing him,” remarked her mis-
tress, prepossessed, in spite of general principles, in
the young man’s favor. “But I must reconsider all
that if he attempts to renew your acquaintance. A
country-bred girl like you, who has never lived in
Melchester till this month, who had hardly ever seen a
black-coated man till you came here, to be so sharp as
to capture a young Londoner like him !”

“JT didn’t capture him. I didn’t do anything,” said
Anna, in confusion.

When she was in-doors and alone Mrs. Harnham
thought what a well-bred and chivalrous young man
Anna’s companion had seemed. There had been a
magic in his wooing touch of her hand, and she won-
dered how he had come to be attracted by the girl.

The next morning the emotional Edith Harnham
86 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

went to the usual week-day service in Melchester ca-
thedral. In crossing the close through the fog she
again perceived him who had interested her the pre-
vious evening, gazing up thoughtfully at the high-
piled architecture of the nave; and as soon as she had
taken her seat he entered and sat down in a stall op-
posite hers.

He did not particularly heed her; but Mrs Harnham
was continually occupying her eyes with him, and won-
dered more than ever what had attracted him in her un-
fledged maid-servant. The mistress was almost as un-
accustomed as the maiden herself to the end-of-the-age
young man, or she might have wondered less. Raye,
having looked about him awhile, left abruptly, with-
out regard to the service that was proceeding; and
Mrs. Harnham — lonely, impressionable creature that
she was—took no further interest in praising the Lord.
She wished she had married a London man who knew
the subtleties of love-making as they were evidently
known to him who had mistakenly caressed her hand.

III

The calendar at Melchester had been light, occupy-
ing the court only a few hours; and the assizes at
Casterbridge, the next county-town on the Western
Circuit, having no business for Raye, he had not gone
thither. At the next town after that they did not
open till the following Monday, trials to begin on
Tuesday morning. In the natural order of things
Raye would have arrived at the latter place on
Monday afternoon; but it was not till the middle of
Wednesday that his gown and gray wig, curled in
tiers, in the best fashion of Assyrian bass-reliefs, were
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT 87

seen blowing and bobbing behind him as he hastily
walked up the High Street from his lodgings. But
though he entered the assize building, there was noth-
ing for him to do; and sitting at the blue baize table
in the well of the court, he mended pens with a mind
far away from the case in progress. Thoughts of
unpremeditated conduct, of which a week earlier he
would not have believed himself capable, threw him
into a mood of dissatisfied depression.

He had contrived to see again the pretty rural maid-
en Anna the day after the fair, had walked out of the
city with her to the earthworks of Old Melchester,
and, feeling a violent fancy for her, had remained in
Melchester all Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday ; by per-
suasion obtaining walks and meetings with the young
girl six or seven times during the interval; had in brief
won her, body and soul.

He supposed it must have been owing to the seclu-
sion in which he had lived of late in town that he had
given way so unrestrainedly to a passion for an artless
creature whose inexperience had, from the first, led
her to place herself unreservedly in his hands. Much
he deplored trifling with her feelings for the sake of a
passing desire; and he could only hope that she might
not live to suffer on his account.

She had begged him to come to her again; entreat-
ed him; wept. He had promised that he would do so,
and he meant to carry out that promise. He could
not desert her now. Awkward as such’ unintentional
connections were, the interspace of a hundred miles—
which to a girl of her limited capabilities was like a
thousand—would effectually hinder this summer fancy
from greatly encumbering his life; while thought of
her simple love might do him the negative good of
keeping him from idle pleasures in town when he
wished to work hard. His circuit journeys would
88 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

take him to Melchester three or four times a year,
and then he could always see her.

The pseudonym, or rather partial name, that he had
given her as his before knowing how far the acquaint-
ance was going to carry him, had been spoken on the
spur of the moment, without any ulterior intention
whatever. He had not afterwards disturbed Anna’s
error, but on leaving her he had felt bound to give
her an address at a stationer’s not far from his cham-
bers, at which she might write to him under the ini-
tials “C. B.”

In due time Raye returned to his London abode,
having called at Melchester on his way and spent a
few additional hours with his fascinating child of
nature. In town he lived monotonously every day.
Often he and his rooms were enclosed by a tawny fog
from all the world besides, and when he lighted the
gas to read or write by, his situation seemed so un-
natural that he would look into the fire and think
of that trusting girl at Melchester again and again.
Often, oppressed by absurd fondness for her, he would
enter the dim religious nave of the Law Courts by the
north door, elbow other juniors habited like himself,
and like him unretained; edge himself into this or that
crowded court where a sensational case was going on,
just as if he were in it, though the police officers at
the door knew as well as he knew himself that he had
no more concern with the business in hand than the pa-
tient idlers at the gallery door outside, who had waited
to enter since eight in the morning because, like him,
they belonged to the classes that live without work-
ing. But he would do these things to no purpose, and
think how greatly the characters in such scenes con-
trasted with the pink and breezy Anna.

An unexpected feature in that peasant maiden’s
conduct was that she had not as yet written to him,
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT 89

though he had told her she might do so if she wished.
Surely a young creature had never before been so ret-
icent in such circumstances. At length he sent her a
brief line, positively requesting her to write. There
was no answer by the return post, but the day after a
letter in a neat feminine hand, and bearing the Mel-
chester postmark, was handed to him by the stationer.

The fact alone of its arrival was sufficient to satis-
fy his imaginative sentiment. He was not anxious
to open the epistle, and in truth did not begin to
read it for nearly half an hour, anticipating readily its
terms of affectionate retrospect and tender adjuration.
When at last he turned his feet to the fireplace and
unfolded the sheet, he was surprised and pleased to
find that neither extravagance nor vulgarity were
there. It was the most charming little missive he
had ever received from woman. To be sure the lan-
guage was simple, and the ideas were slight; but it
was so self - possessed, so purely that of a young girl
who felt her womanhood to be enough for her dignity
that he read it through twice. Four sides were filled,
and a few lines written across, after the fashion of
former days; the paper, too, was common, and not of
the latest shade and surface. But what of those
things? He had received letters from women who
were fairly called ladies, but never so sensible, so
human a letter as this. He could not single out any
one sentence and say it was at all remarkable or
clever ; the ensemble of the letter it was which won
him ; and beyond the one request that he would write
or come to her again soon there was nothing to show
her sense of a claim upon him.

To write again and develop a correspondence was
the last thing Raye would have preconceived as his
conduct in such a situation; yet he did send a short,
encouraging line or two, signed with his pseudonym,
90 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

in which he asked for another letter, and cheeringly
promised that he would try to see her again on some
near day, and would never forget how much they had
been to each other during their short acquaintance.

IV

To return now to the moment at which Anna, at
Melchester, had received Raye’s letter.

It had been put into her own hand by the postman
on his morning rounds. She flushed down to her neck
on receipt of it, and turned it over and over. ‘It is
mine ?” she said.

“Why, yes, can’t you see it is?” said the postman,
smiling as he guessed the nature of the document and
the cause of the confusion.

“Oh yes, of course!” replied Anna, looking at the
letter, forcedly tittering, and blushing still more.

Her look of embarrassment did not leave her with
the postman’s departure. She opened the envelope,
kissed its contents, put away the letter in her pocket,
and remained musing till her eyes filled with tears.

A few minutes later she carried up a cup of tea to
Mrs. Harnham in her bed-chamber. Anna’s mistress
looked at her, and said : “ How dismal you seem this
morning, Anna. What’s the matter ?”

“Tm not dismal, I’m glad; only I—” She stopped
to stifle a sob.

“Well 2”

“T’ve got a letter—and what good is it to me if I
can’t read a word in it ?”

“Why, Ill read it, child, if necessary.”

“But this is from somebody—I don’t want anybody
to read it but myself!” Anna murmured.
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT 91

“T shall not tell anybody. Is it from that young
man ?”

“TI think so.” Anna slowly produced the letter,
saying : “Then will you read it to me, ma’am ?”

This was the secret of Anna’s embarrassment and
flutterings. She could neither read nor write. She
had grown up under the care of an aunt by marriage,
at one of the lonely hamlets on the Great Mid-Wessex
Plain where, even in days of national education,
there had been no school within a distance of two
miles. Her aunt was an ignorant woman ; there had
been nobody to investigate Anna’s circumstances,
nobody to care about her learning the rudiments,
though, as often in such cases, she had been well fed
and clothed and not unkindly treated. Since she had
come to live at Melchester with Mrs. Harnham, the
latter, who took a kindly interest in the girl, had
taught her to speak correctly, in which accomplish-
ment Anna showed considerable readiness, as is not
unusual with the illiterate; and soon became quite
fluent in the use of her mistress’s phraseology. Mrs.
Harnham also insisted upon her getting a spelling
and copy book, and beginning to practise in these.
Anna was slower in this branch of her education, and
meanwhile here was the letter.

Edith Harnham’s large dark eyes expressed some
interest in the contents, though, in her character of
mere interpreter, she threw into her tone as much as
she could of mechanical passiveness. She read the
short epistle on to its concluding sentence, which idly
requested Anna to send him a tender answer.

“Now — you'll do it for me, won’t you, dear mis-
tress ?” said Anna, eagerly. “And you'll do it as well
as ever you can, please? Because I couldn’t bear him
to think I am not able to do it myself. I should sink
into the earth with shame if he knew that !”
92 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

From some words in the letter Mrs. Harnham was
led to ask questions, and the answers she received
confirmed her suspicions. Deep concern filled Edith’s
heart at perceiving how the girl had committed her
happiness to the issue of this new-sprung attachment.
She blamed herself for not interfering in a flirtation
which had resulted so seriously for the poor little
creature in her charge; though at the time of seeing
the pair together she had a feeling that it was hardly
within her province to nip young affection in the bud.
However, what was done could not be undone, and it
behooved her now, as Anna’s only protector, to help
her as much as she could. To Anna’s eager request
that she, Mrs. Harnham, should compose and write the
answer to this young London man’s letter, she felt
bound to accede, to keep alive his attachment to the
girl if possible; though in other circumstances she
might have suggested the cook as an amanuensis,

A tender reply was thereupon concocted, and set
down in Edith Harnham’s hand. This letter it had
been which Raye had received and delighted in.
Written in the presence of Anna it certainly was, and
on Anna’s humble note-paper, and in a measure indited
by the young girl; but the life, the spirit, the individ-
uality, were Edith Harnham’s,

“ Won’t you at least put your name yourself?” she
said. “You can manage to write that by this time ?”

“No, no,” said Anna, shrinking back. “I should do
it so bad. He’d be ashamed of me, and never see me
again !”

The note, so prettily requesting another from him,
had, as we have seen, power enough in its pages to
bring one. He declared it to be such a pleasure to
hear from her that she must write every week. The
same process of manufacture was accordingly repeated
by Anna and her mistress, and continued for several
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT 93

weeks in succession, each letter being penned and
suggested by Edith, the girl standing by; the answer
read and commented on by Edith, Anna standing by
and listening again.

Late on a winter evening, after the despatch of the
sixth letter, Mrs. Harnham was sitting alone by the
remains of her fire. Her husband had retired to bed,
and she had fallen into that fixity of musing which takes
no count of hour or temperature. The state of mind
had been brought about in Edith by a strange thing
which she had done that day. For the first time since
Raye’s visit Anna had gone to stay over a night or
two with her cottage friends on the Plain, and in her
absence had arrived, out of its time, a letter from Raye.
To this Edith had replied on her own responsibility,
from the depths of her own heart, without waiting for
her maid’s collaboration. The luxury of writing to
him what would be known to no consciousness but his
was great, and she had indulged herself therein.

Why was it a luxury?

Edith Harnham led a lonely life. Influenced by the
belief of the British parent that a bad marriage with
its aversions is better than free womanhood with its
interests, dignity, and leisure, she had consented to
marry the elderly wine-merchant as a pis aller, at the
age of seven-and-twenty—some three years before this
date—to find afterwards that she had made a mistake.
That contract had left her still a woman whose deeper
nature had never been stirred.

She was now clearly realizing that she had become
possessed to the bottom of her soul with the image of
a man to whom she was hardly so much as a shape.
From the first he had attracted her by his looks and
voice, by his tender touch; and, with these as genera-
tors, the writing of letter after letter and the reading
of their soft answers had insensibly developed on her

G
94 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

side an emotion which fanned his; till there had re-
sulted a magnetic reciprocity between the correspond-
ents, notwithstanding that one of them wrote in a
character not her own.

They were her own impassioned and pent-up ideas—
lowered to monosyllabic phraseology in order to keep
up the disguise—that Edith put into letters signed
with another name, much to the shallow Anna’s de-
light, who, unassisted, could not for the world have
conceived such pretty fancies for winning him, even
had she been able to write them. Edith found that it
was these, her own foisted-in sentiments, to which the
young barrister mainly responded. The few sentences
occasionally added from Anna’s own lips made appar-
ently no impression upon him.

The letter-writing in her absence Anna never dis-
covered; but on her return the next morning she de-
clared she wished to see her lover about something at
once, and begged Mrs. Harnham to ask him to come.

There was a strange anxiety in her manner which
did not escape Mrs. Harnham, and ultimately resolved
itself into a flood of tears. Sinking down at Edith’s
knees, she made confession that the result of her rela-
tions with her lover it would soon become necessary to
disclose.

Edith Harnham was generous enough to be very far
from inclined to cast Anna adrift at this conjuncture.
No true woman is ever so inclined from her own per-
sonal point of view, however prompt she may be in
taking such steps to safeguard those dear to her. Al-
though she had written to Raye so short a time pre-
viously, she instantly penned another Anna-note hint-
ing clearly though delicately the state of affairs,

Raye replied by a hasty line to say how much he was
affected by her news: he felt that he must run down
to see her almost immediately.
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT 95

But a week later the girl came to her mistress’s
room with another note, which on being read informed
her that, after all, he could not find time for the
journey. Anna was broken with grief; but by Mrs.
Harnham’s counsel strictly refrained from hurling at
him the reproaches and bitterness customary from
young women so situated. One thing was imperative:
to keep the young man’s romantic interest in her alive,
Rather therefore did Edith, in the name of her pro-
tégée, request him on no account to be distressed about
the looming event, and not to inconvenience himself
to hasten down. She desired above everything to be
no weight upon him in his career, no clog upon his
high activities. She had wished him to know what
had befallen; he was to dismiss it again from his mind.
Only he must write tenderly as ever, and when he
should come again on the spring circuit it would be
time enough to discuss what had better be done.

It may well be supposed that Anna’s own feelings
had not been quite in accord with these generous ex-
pressions; but the mistress’s judgment had ruled, and
Anna had acquiesced. “All I want is that niceness
you can so well put into your letters, my dear, dear
mistress, and that I can’t for the life o? me make up
out of my own head; though I mean the same thing
and feel it exactly when you’ve written it down !”

When the letter had been sent off, and Edith Harn-
ham was left alone, she bowed herself on the back
of her chair and wept.

“J wish it was mine—I wish it was!” she murmured,
“Yet how can I say such a wicked thing !”
96 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

Vv

The letter moved Raye considerably when it reached
him. The intelligence itself had affected him less than
her unexpected manner of treating him in relation to
it. The absence of any word of reproach, the devotion
to his interests, the self-sacrifice apparent in every
line, all made up a nobility of character that he had
never dreamed of finding in womankind.

“God forgive me !” he said, tremulously. “I have
been a wicked wretch. I did not know she was such
a treasure as this !”

He reassured her instantly; declaring that he would
not of course desert her, that he would provide a
home for her somewhere. Meanwhile she was to stay
where she was as long as her mistress would allow
her.

But a misfortune supervened in this direction.
Whether an inkling of Anna’s circumstances reached
the knowledge of Mrs. Harnham’s husband or not can-
not be said, but the girl was compelled, in spite of
Edith’s entreaties, to leave the house. By her own
choice she decided to go back for a while to the cot-
tage on the Plain. This arrangement led to a consul-
tation as to how the correspondence should be carried
on; and in the girl’s inability to continue personally
what had been begun in her name, and in the difficulty
of their acting in concert as heretofore, she requested
Mrs. Harnham—the only well-to-do friend she had in
the world—to receive the letters and reply to them
off-hand, sending them on afterwards to herself on the
Plain, where she might at least get some neighbor to
read them to her, though disqualified from replying
for her because of the hand. Anna and her box then
departed for the Plain.
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT 97

Thus it befell that Edith Harnham found herself in
the strange position of having to correspond, under no
supervision by the real woman, with a man not her
husband, in terms which were virtually those of a
wife, concerning a condition that was not Edith’s at
all; the man being one for whom, mainly through the
sympathies involved in playing this part, she secretly
cherished a predilection, subtle and imaginative truly,
but strong and absorbing. She opened each letter,
read it as if intended for herself, and replied from the
promptings of her own heart and no other.

Throughout this correspondence, carried on in the'
girl’s absence, the high-strung Edith Harnbam lived
in the ecstasy of fancy; the vicarious intimacy engen-
dered such a flow of passionateness as was never ex-
ceeded. For conscience’ sake Edith at first sent on
each of his letters to Anna, and even rough copies of
her replies ; but later on these so-called copies were
much abridged, and many letters on both sides were
not sent on at all.

Though selfish, and, superficially at least, infested
with the self-indulgent vices of artificial society, there
was a substratum of honesty and fairness in Raye’s
character. He had really a tender regard for the coun-
try girl, and it grew more tender than ever when he
found her apparently capable of expressing the deep-
est sensibilities in the simplest words. He meditated,
he wavered; and finally resolved to consult his sister,
a maiden lady much older than himself, of lively sym-
pathies and good intent. In making this confidence
he showed her some of the letters.

“She seems fairly educated,” Miss Raye observed,
‘and bright in ideas. She expresses herself with a
taste that must be innate.”

“Yes. She writes very prettily, doesn’t she, thanks
to these elementary schools.”

7
98 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“One is drawn out towards her, in spite of one’s
self, poor thing!”

The upshot of the discussion was that though he
had not been directly advised to do it, Raye wrote, in
his real name, what he would never have decided to
write on his own responsibility—namely, that he could
not live without her, and would come down in the
spring and shelve her looming difficulty by marrying
her.

This bold acceptance of the situation was made
known to Anna by Mrs, Harnham driving out imme-
diately to the cottage on the Plain. Anna jumped
for joy like a little child ; and poor, crude directions
for answering appropriately were given to Edith Harn-
ham, who on her return to the city carried them out
with warm intensifications.

“Oh!” she groaned, as she threw down the pen.
“ Anna—poor good little fool—hasn’t intelligence
enough to appreciate him. How should she? While
I—don’t bear his child !”

It was now February. The correspondence had
continued altogether for four months, and the next
letter from Raye contained incidentally a statement
of his position and prospects. He said that in offer-
ing to wed her he had at first contemplated the
step of retiring from a profession which hitherto had
brought him very slight emolument, and which, to
speak plainly, he had thought might be difficult of

_practice after his union with her. But the unexpect-
ed mines of brightness and warmth that her letters
had disclosed to be lurking in her sweet nature had
led him to abandon that somewhat sad prospect. He
felt sure that with her powers of development, after
a little private training in the social forms of London
under his supervision, and a little help from a govern-
ess if necessary, she would make as good a profes-
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT 99

sional man’s wife as could be desired, even if he should
rise to the woolsack. Many a lord-chancellor’s wife
had been less intuitively a lady than she had shown
herself to be in her lines to him.

“Oh, poor fellow, poor fellow !” mourned Edith
Harnham.

Her distress now raged as high as her infatuation.
It was she who had wrought him to this pitch—to a
marriage which meant his ruin; yet she could not, in
mercy to her maid, do anything to hinder his plan.
Anna was coming to Melchester that week, but she
could hardly show the girl this last reply from the
young man; it told too much of the second individu-
ality that had usurped the place of the first.

Anna came, and her mistress took her into her own
room for privacy. Anna began by saying with some
anxiety that she was very glad the wedding was so
near.

“Oh, Anna!” replied Mrs. Harnham. “TI think we
must tell him all—that I have been doing your writing
for you—lest be should not know it till after you be-
come his wife, and it might lead to dissension and
recriminations—”

“Oh, mis’ess, dear mis’ess—please don’t tell him
now!” cried Anna, in distress. “If you were to do it,
perhaps he would not marry me, and what should I
do then? It would be terrible what would come to
me! And I am getting on with my writing, too. I
have brought with me the copybook you were so good
as to give me, and I practise every day, and though
it is so, so hard, I shall do it well at last, I believe, if
I keep on trying.”

Edith looked at the copybook. The copies had
been set by herself, and such progress as the girl had
made was in the way of grotesque fac-simile of her
mistress’s hand. But even if Edith’s flowing calig-
100 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

raphy were reproduced the inspiration would be an-
other thing.

“You do it so beautifully,” continued Anna, “and
say all that I want to say so much better than I could
say it, that I do hope you won’t leave me in the lurch
just now!”

“Very well,” replied the other. “But I—but I
thought I ought not to go on.”

“cc Why 9?

Her strong desire to confide her sentiments led Edith
to answer truly:

“ Because of its effect upon me.”

“ But it can’t have any!”

“Why, child?”

‘Because you are married already!” said Anna,
with lucid simplicity.

“Of course it can’t,” said her mistress, hastily ; yet
glad, despite her conscience, that two or three out-
pourings still remained to her. “But you must con-
centrate your attention on writing your name as I
write it here.”

VI

Soon Raye wrote about the wedding. Having de-
cided to make the best of what he feared was a piece
of romantic folly, he had acquired more zest for the
grand experiment. He wished the ceremony to be in
London, for greater privacy. Edith Harnham would
have preferred it at Melchester ; Anna was passive.
His reasoning prevailed, and Mrs. Harnham threw
herself with mournful zeal into the preparations for
Anna’s departure. Ina last desperate feeling that she
must at every hazard be in at the death of her dream,
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT 101

and see once again the man who by a species of tel-
epathy had exercised such an influence on her, she of-
fered to go up with Anna and be with her through the
ceremony—“ to see the end of her,” as her mistress
put it with forced gayety; an offer which the girl
gratefully accepted ; for she had no other friend ca-
pable of playing the part of companion and witness, in
the presence of a gentlemanly bridegroom, in such a
way as not to hasten an opinion that he had made an
irremediable social blunder.

It was a muddy morning in March when Raye
alighted from a four-wheel cab at the door of a
registry - office in the 8. W. district of London, and
carefully handed down Anna and her companion Mrs.
Harnham. Anna looked attractive in the somewhat
fashionable clothes which Mrs. Harnham had helped
her to buy, though not quite so attractive as, an inno-
cent child, she had appeared in her country gown on
the back of the wooden horse at Melchester Fair.

Mrs. Harnham had come up this morning by an
early train, and a young man —a friend of Raye’s—
having met them at the door, all four entered the
registry-office together. ‘Till an hour before this time
Raye had never known the wine-merchant’s wife, ex-
cept at that first casual encounter, and in the flutter
of the performance before them he had little oppor-
tunity for more than a brief acquaintance. The con-
tract of marriage at a registry is soon got through;
but somehow, during its progress, Raye discovered a
strange and secret gravitation between himself and
Anna’s friend.

The formalities of the wedding—or rather ratifica-
tion of a previous union—being concluded, the four
went in one cab-to Raye’s lodgings, newly taken in a
new suburb in preference to a house, the rent of which
he could ill afford just then. Here Anna cut the little
102 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

cake which Raye had bought at a pastry-cook’s on his
way home from Lincoln’s Inn the night before. But
she did not do much besides. Raye’s friend was
obliged to depart almost immediately, and when he
had left the only ones virtually present were Edith
and Raye, who exchanged ideas with much animation.
The conversation was indeed theirs only, Anna being
as a domestic animal who humbly heard but under-
stood not. Raye seemed startled in awakening to this
fact, and began to feel dissatisfied with her inade-
quacy.

At last, more disappointed than he cared to own, he
said, “Mrs. Harnham, my darling is so flurried that
she doesn’t know what she is doing or saying. I see
that after this event a little quietude will be neces-
sary before she gives tongue to that tender philosophy
which she used to treat me to in her letters,”

They had planned to start early that afternoon for
Knollsea, to spend the few opening days of their mar-
ried life there, and as the hour for departure was
drawing near Raye asked his wife if she would go to
the writing-desk in the next room and scribble a little
note to his sister, who had been unable to attend
through indisposition, informing her that the cere-
mony was over, thanking her for her little present, and
hoping to know her well now that she was the writer’s
sister as well as Charles’s.

“Say it in the pretty poetical way you know so well
how to adopt,” he added, “for I want you particularly
to win her, and both of you to be dear friends.”

Anna looked uneasy, but departed to her task, Raye
remaining to talk to their guest. Anna was a long
while absent, and her husband suddenly rose and went
to her.

He found her still bending over the writing-table,
with tears brimming up in her eyes; and he looked
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT 103

down upon the sheet of note-paper with some interest,
to discover with what tact she had expressed her good-
will in the delicate circumstances. To his surprise
she had progressed but a few lines, in the characters
and spelling of a child of eight, and with the ideas of
@ goose.

“ Anna,” he said, staring ; “ what’s this ?”

“Tt only means—that I can’t do it any better !” she
answered, through her tears. ,

“Eh? Nonsense !”

“T can’t!” she insisted, with miserable, sobbing
hardihood. “I—I—didn’t write those letters, Charles ;
I only told her what to write, and not always that!
But I am learning, oh, so fast, my dear, dear husband!
And you'll forgive me, won’t you, for not telling you
before ?” She slid to her knees, abjectly clasped his
waist, and laid her face against him.

He stood a few moments, raised her, abruptly
turned, and shut the door upon her, rejoining Edith
in the drawing-room. She saw that something untow-
ard had been discovered, and their eyes remained
fixed on each other.

“Do I guess rightly ?” he asked, with wan quietude,
‘* You were her scribe through all this ?”

“Tt was necessary,” said Edith.

“Did she dictate every word you ever wrote to me?”

“Not every word.”

“Tn fact, very little ?”

“Very little.”

“You wrote a great part of those pages every week
from your own conceptions, though in her name?”

“Yes,”

“Perhaps you wrote many of the letters when you
were alone, without communication with her ?”

“T did.”

He turned to the bookcase, and leaned with his
104 LIFE’S LITTLE 1R0NIES

hand over his face ; and Edith, seeing his distress, be-
came white as a sheet.

“You have deceived me—ruined me!” he mur-
mured.

“ Oh, don’t say it!” she cried in her anguish, jump-
ing up and putting her hand on his shoulder. “I can’t
bear that !”

“Delighting me deceptively. Why did you do it
—why did you?”

“T began doing it in kindness to her. How could I
do otherwise than try to save such a simple girl from
misery? But I admit that I continued it for pleasure
to myself.”

Raye looked up. “ Why did it give you pleasure?”
he asked.

“T must not tell,” said she.

He continued to regard her, and saw that her lips
suddenly began to quiver under his scrutiny, and her
eyes to fill and droop. She started aside, and said that
she must go to the station to catch the return train ;
could a cab be called immediately ?

But Raye went up to her, and took her unresisting
hand. “Well, to think of such a thing as this !” he
said. ‘“ Why, you and I are friends—lovers—devoted
lovers—by correspondence !’”

“Yes; I suppose.”

“ More.”

“ More ?”

“Plainly more. It is no use blinking that. Legally
I have married her—God help us both !—in soul and
spirit I have married you, and no other woman in the
world !”

“ Hush !”

“But I will not hush! Why should you try to dis-
guise the full truth,when you have already owned half
of it? Yes, it is between you and me that the bond
ON THE WESTERN CIRCUIT 105

is—not between me and her! Now I'll say no more.
But, oh, my cruel one, I think I have one claim upon
you!”

She did not say what, and he drew her towards him,
and bent over her. “If it was all pure invention in
those letters,” he said, emphatically, ‘give me your
cheek only. If you meant what you said, let it be
lips. It is for the first and last time, remember !”

She put up her mouth, and he kissed her long. “You
forgive me?” she said, crying.

cc Yes.”

“ But you are ruined !”

“What matter!” he said, shrugging his shoulders.
“Tt serves me right !”

She withdrew, wiped her eyes, entered and bade
good-bye to Anna, who had not expected her to go so
soon, and was still wrestling with the letter. Raye
followed Edith down-stairs, and in three minutes she
was in a hansom driving to the Waterloo station.

He went back to his wife. ‘Never mind the letter,
Anna, to-day,” he said, gently. ‘“ Put on your things;
we, too, must be off shortly.”

The simple girl, upheld by the sense that she was
indeed married, showed her delight at finding that he
was as kind as ever after the disclosure. She did not
know that before his eyes he beheld as it were a gal-
ley, in which he, the fastidious urban, was chained to
work for the remainder of his life, with her, the unlet-
tered peasant chained to his side.

Edith travelled back to Melchester that day with a
face that showed the very stupor of grief. The end
of her impassioned dream had come. When at dusk
she reached the Melchester station her husband was
there to meet her, but in his perfunctoriness and her
preoccupation they did not see each other, and she
went out of the station alone.
106 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

She walked mechanically homeward without call-
ing a fly. Entering, she could not bear the silence of
the house, and went up in the dark to where Anna had
slept, where she remained thinking awhile. She then
returned to the drawing-room, and not knowing what
she did, crouched down upon the floor.

“T have ruined him!” she kept repeating—“I have
ruined him; because I would not deal treacherously
towards her!”

In the course of half an hour a figure opened the
door of the apartment.

“ Ah—who’s that ?” she said, starting up, for it was
dark.

“Your husband. Who should it be?” said the wor-
thy merchant.

“ Ah—my husband !—I forgot I had a husband!”
she whispered to herself.

“JT missed you at the station,” he continued. “Did
you see Anna safely tied up? I hope so, for ’twas
time.”

“Yes—Anna is married.”

Simultaneously with Edith’s journey home, Anna
and her husband were sitting at the opposite windows
of a second-class carriage which sped along to Knoll-
sea. In his hand was a pocket-book full of creased
sheets closely written over. Unfolding them one after
another he read them in silence and sighed.

“What are you doing, dear Charles ?” she said, tim-
idly, from the other window, and drew nearer to him
as if he were a god.

“ Reading over all those sweet letters to me signed
‘ Anna,’” he replied, with dreary resignation.

Autumn, 1891,
TO PLEASE HIS WIFE

I

Tux interior of St. James’s Church, in Havenpool
Town, was slowly darkening under the close clouds of
a winter afternoon. It was Sunday—service had just
ended, the face of the parson in the pulpit was buried
in his hands, and the congregation, with a cheerful
sigh of release, were rising from their knees to de-
part.

For the moment the stillness was so complete that
the surging of the sea could be heard outside the
harbor-bar. Then it was broken by the footsteps of
the clerk going towards the west door to open it in
the usual manner for the exit of the assembly. Before,
however, he had reached the doorway, the latch was
lifted from without, and the dark figure of a man in a
sailor’s garb appeared against the light.

The clerk stepped aside, the sailor closed the door
gently behind him, and advanced up the nave till he
stood at the chancel-step. The parson looked up from
the private little prayer which, after so many for the
parish, he quite fairly took for himself, rose to his
feet, and stared at the intruder.

“T beg your pardon, sir,” said the sailor, addressing
the minister in a voice distinctly audible to all the
congregation. “I have come here to offer thanks for
108 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

my narrow escape from shipwreck. I am given to
understand that it is a proper thing to do, if you have
no objection ?”

The parson, after a moment’s pause, said, hesitat-
ingly, “I have no objection; certainly. It is usual to
mention any such wish before service, so that the
proper words may be used in the General Thanks-
giving. But, if you wish, we can read from the form
for use after a storm at sea.”

“ Aye, sure ; I ain’t particular,” said the sailor.

The clerk thereupon directed the sailor to the page
in the prayer-book where the collect of thanksgiving
would be found, and the rector began reading it, the
sailor kneeling where he stood, and repeating it after
him word by word in a distinct voice. The people,
who had remained agape and motionless at the pro-
ceeding, mechanically knelt down likewise; but they
continued to regard the isolated form of the sailor
who, in the precise middle of the chancel-step, re-
mained fixed on his knees, facing the east, his hat be-
side him, his hands joined, and he quite unconscious
of his appearance in their regard.

When his thanksgiving had come to an end, he
arose; the people arose also, and all went out of church
together. As soon as the sailor emerged, so that the
remaining daylight fell upon his face, old inhabitants
began to recognize him as no other than Shadrach
Jolliffe, a young man who had not been seen at Haven-
pool for several years. A son of the town, his parents
had died when he was quite young, on which account
he had early gone to sea, in the Newfoundland trade.

He talked with this and that townsman as he walked,
informing them that, since leaving his native place
years before, he had become captain and owner of
a small coasting-ketch, which had providentially been
saved from the gale as well as himself. Presently he
TO PLEASE HIS WIFE 109

drew near to two girls who were going out of the
charch-yard in front of him; they had been sitting in
the nave at his entry, and had watched his doings with
deep interest, afterwards discussing him as they moved
out of church together. One was a slight and gentle
creature, the other a tall, large-framed, deliberative
girl. Captain Jolliffe regarded the loose curls of their
hair, their backs and shoulders, down to their heels, for
some time.

“Who may them two maids be?” he whispered to
his neighbor.

“ The little one is Emily Hanning ; the tall one, Jo-
anna Phippard.”

“Ah! I recollect ’em now, to be sure.”

He advanced to their elbow, and genially stole a
gaze at them.

“Emily, you don’t know me ?” said the sailor, turn:
ing his beaming brown eyes on her.

“JT think I do, Mr. Jolliffe,” said Emily, shyly.

The other girl looked straight at him with her dark
eyes.

“The face of Miss Joanna I don’t call to mind so
well,” he continued. “But I know her beginnings and
kindred.”

They walked and talked together, Jolliffe narrating
particulars of his late narrow escape, till they reached
the corner of Sloop Lane, in which Emily Hanning
dwelt, when, with a nod and smile, she left them. Soon
the sailor parted also from Joanna, and, having no es-
pecial errand or appointment, turned back towards
Emily’s house. She lived with her father, who called
himself an accountant, the daughter, however, keeping
a little stationery-shop as a supplemental provision for
the gaps of his somewhat uncertain business. On
entering, Jolliffe found father and daughter about to
begin tea.

H
110 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“Oh, I didn’t know it was tea-time,” he said. “Aye,
Pll have a cup with much pleasure.”

He remained to tea and long afterwards, telling
more tales of his seafaring life. Several neighbors
called to listen, and were asked to comein. Somehow,
Emily Hanning lost her heart to the sailor that Sun-
day night, and in the course of a week or two there
was a tender understanding between them.

One moonlight evening in the next month Shadrach
was ascending out of the town by the long straight
road eastward, to an elevated suburb where the more
fashionable houses stood—if anything near this ancient
port could be called fashionable—when he saw a figure
before him whom, from her manner of glancing back,
he took to be Emily; but, on coming up, he found she
was Joanna Phippard. He gave a gallant greeting,
and walked beside her.

“ Go along,” she said, “or Emily will be jealous!”

He seemed not to like the suggestion, and remained.

What was said and what was done on that walk
never could be clearly recollected by Shadrach; but
in some way or other Joanna contrived to wean him
away from her gentler and younger rival. From that
week onward, Jolliffe was seen more and more in the
wake of Joanna Phippard and less in the company of
Emily; and it was soon rumored about the quay that
old Jolliffe’s son, who had come home from sea, was
going to be married to the former young woman, to
the great disappointment of the latter.

Just after this report had gone about, Joanna dressed
herself for a walk one morning, and started for Emily’s
house in the little cross-street. Intelligence of the
deep sorrow of her friend on account of the loss of
Shadrach had reached her ears also, and her conscience
reproached her for winning him away.

Joanna was not altogether satisfied with the sailor.
TO PLEASE HIS WIFE 111

She liked his attentions, and she coveted the dignity
of matrimony; but she had never been deeply in love
with Jolliffe. For one thing, she was ambitious, and
socially his position was hardly so good as her own,
and there was always the chance of an attractive wom-
an mating considerably above her. It had long been
in her mind that she would not strongly object to give
him back again to Emily if her friend felt so very
badly about him. To this end she had written a letter
of renunciation to Shadrach, which letter she carried in
her hand, intending to post it if personal observation
of Emily convinced her that her friend was suffering.

Joanna entered Sloop Lane and stepped down into
the stationery-shop, which was below the pavement
level. Emily’s father was never at home at this hour
of the day, and it seemed as though Emily were not
at home either, for the visitor could make nobody
hear. Customers came so seldom hither that a‘five
minutes’ absence of the proprietor counted for little.
Joanna waited in the little shop, where Emily had
tastefully set out—as women can—articles in them-
selves of slight value, so as to obscure the meagreness
of the stock-in-trade, till she saw a figure pausing
without the window apparently absorbed in the con-
templation of the sixpenny books, packets of paper,
and prints hung on a string. It was Captain Shadrach
Jolliffe, peering in to ascertain if Emily were there
alone. Moved by an impulse of reluctance to meet
him in a spot which breathed of Emily, she slipped
through the door that communicated with the parlor
at the back. Joanna had frequently done so before, for
in her friendship with Emily she had the freedom of
the house without ceremony.

Jolliffe entered the shop. Through the thin blind
which screened the glass partition she could see that
he was disappointed at not finding Emily there. He
112 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

was about to go out again, when Emily’s form dark-
ened the doorway, hastening home from some errand.
At sight of Jolliffe she started back as if she would
have gone out again.

“ Don’t run away, Emily; don’t!” said he. “ What
can make ye afraid ?”

“T’m not afraid, Captain Jolliffe. Only—only I saw
you all of a sudden, and—it made me jump!” Her
voice showed that her heart had jumped even more
than the rest of her.

“J just called as I was passing,” he said.

“For some paper?” She hastened behind the
counter.

“No, no, Emily; why do ye get behind there? Why
not stay by me? You seem to hate me.”

“T don’t hate you. How can 1?”

“Then come out, so that we can talk like Christians.”

Emily obeyed with a fitful laugh, till she stood again
beside him in the open part of the shop.

“There’s a dear,” he said.

“You mustu’t say that, Captain Jolliffe; because
the words belong to somebody else.”

“Ah! I know what you mean. But, Emily, upon
my life I didn’t know till this morning that you cared
one bit about me, or I should not have done as I
have done. I have the best of feelings for Joanna,
but I know that from the beginning she hasn’t cared
for me more than in a friendly way; and I see now
the one I ought to have asked to be my wife. You
know, Emily, when a man comes home from sea after
a long voyage he’s as blind as a bat—he can’t see
who’s who in women. They are all alike to him,
beautiful creatures, and he takes the first that comes
easy, without thinking if she loves him, or if he might
not soon love another better than her. From the first
T inclined to you most, but you were so backward and
TO PLEASE HIS WIFE 118

shy that I thought you didn’t want me to bother ’ee,
and so I went to Joanna.”

“Don’t say any more, Mr. Jolliffe, don’t !” said she,
choking. “You are going to marry Joanna next
month, and it is wrong to—to—”

“ Oh, Emily, my darling !” he cried, and clasped her
little figure in his arms before she was aware.

Joanna, behind the curtain, turned pale, tried to
withdraw her eyes, but could not.

“Jt is only you I love as a man ought to love the
woman he is going to marry; and I know this from
what Joanna has said—that she will willingly let me
off! She wants to marry higher, I know, and only
said ‘Yes’ to me out of kindness. <A fine, tall girl
like her isn’t the sort for a plain sailor’s wife; you be
the best suited for that.”

He kissed her and kissed her again, her flexible
form quivering in the agitation of his embrace.

‘“‘T wonder—are you sure—Joanna is going to break
off with you? Oh, are you sure? Because—”

“JT know she would not wish to make us miserable.
She will release me.”

“Oh, I hope—I hope she will! Don’t stay any
longer, Captain Jolliffe !”

He lingered, however, till a customer came for a
penny stick of sealing-wax, and then he withdrew.

Green envy had overspread Joanna at the scene.
She looked about for a way of escape. To get out
without Emily’s knowledge of her visit was indispen-
sable. She crept from the parlor into the passage, and
thence to the front door of the house, where she let
herself noiselessly into the street.

The sight of that caress had reversed all her reso-
lutions. She could not let Shadrach go. Reaching
home, she burned the letter, and told her mother that if
Captain Jolliffe called she was too unwell to see him.

8
114 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

Shadrach, however, did not call. He sent her a note
expressing in simple language the state of his feelings;
and asked to be allowed to take advantage of the
hints she had given him that her affection, too, was lit-
tle more than friendly, by cancelling the engagement.

Looking out upon the harbor and the island beyond,
he waited and waited in his lodgings for an answer
that did not come. The suspense grew to be so in-
tolerable that after dark he went up the high street.
He could not resist calling at Joanna’s to learn his
fate. ‘

Her mother said her daughter was too unwell to see
him, and to his questioning admitted that it was in
consequence of a letter received from himself, which
had distressed her deeply.

“You know what it was about, perhaps, Mrs. Phip-
pard ?” he said.

Mrs. Phippard owned that she did, adding that it
put them in a very painful position. Thereupon Sha-
drach, fearing that he had been guilty of an enormity,
explained that if his letter had pained Joanna it must
be owing to a misunderstanding, since he had thought
it would be a relief to her. If otherwise, he would
hold himself bound by his word, and she was to think
of the letter as never having been written.

Next morning he received an oral message from the
young woman, asking him to fetch her home from a
meeting that evening. This he did, and while walk-
ing from the Town-hall to her door, with her hand in
his arm, she said :

“It is all the same as before between us, isn’t it,
Shadrach ? Your letter was sent in mistake?”

“It is all the same as before,” he answered, “if you
_ say it must be.”

“T wish it to be,” she murmured, with hard linea-
ments, as she thought of Emily.
TO PLEASE HIS WIFE 115

Shadrach was a religious and scrupulous man, who
respected his word as his life. Shortly afterwards the
wedding took place, Jolliffe having conveyed to Emily
as gently as possible the error he had fallen into when
estimating Joanna’s mood as one of indifference.

II

A month after the marriage Joanna’s mother died,
and the couple were obliged to turn their attention to
very practical matters. Now that she was left with-
out a parent, Joanna could not bear the notion of her
husband going to sea again; but the question was,
What could he do at home? They finally decided
to take on a grocer’s shop in the high street, the good-
will and stock of which were waiting to be disposed
of at that time. Shadrach knew nothing of shopkeep-
ing, and Joanna very little, but they hoped to learn.

To the management of this grocery business they
now devoted all their energies, and continued to con-
duct it for many succeeding years, without great suc-
cess. Two sons were born to them, whom their mother
loved to idolatry, although she had never passionately
loved her husband; and she lavished upon them all
her forethought and care. But the shop did not
thrive, and the large dreams she had entertained of
her sons’ education and career became attenuated in
the face of realities. Their schooling was of the
plainest, but, being by the sea, they grew alert in all
such nautical arts and enterprises as were attractive
to their age.

The great interest of the Jolliffes’ married life, out-
side their own immediate household, had lain in the
marriage of Emily. By one of those odd chances
116 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

which lead those that lurk in unexpected corners to be
discovered, while the obvious are passed by, the gentle
girl had been seen and loved by a thriving merchant
of the town, a widower, some years older than herself,
though still in the prime of life. At first Emily had
declared that she never, never could marry any one;
but Mr. Lester had quietly persevered, and had at last
won her reluctant assent. T'wo children also were the
fruits of this union, and, as they grew and prospered,
Emily declared that she had never supposed that she
could live to be so happy.

The worthy merchant’s home, one of those large,
substantial brick mansions frequently jammed up in
old-fashioned towns, faced directly on the high street,
nearly opposite to the grocery-shop of the Jolliffes,
and it now became the pain of Joanna to behold the
woman whose place she had usurped out of pure cov-
etousness looking down from her position of compar-
ative wealth upon the humble shop-window with its
dusty sugar-loaves, heaps of raisins, and canisters of
tea, over which it was her own lot to preside. The
business having so dwindled, Joanna was obliged to
serve in the shop herself, and it galled and mortified
her that Emily Lester, sitting in her large drawing-
room over the way, could witness her own dancings
up and down behind the counter at the beck and call
of wretched twopenny customers, whose patronage
she was driven to welcome gladly; persons to whom
she was compelled to be civil in the street, while
Emily was bounding along with her children and
her governess, and conversing with the genteelest
people of the town and neighborhood. This was
what she had gained by not letting Shadrach Jolliffe,
whom she had so faintly loved, carry his affection
elsewhere.

Shadrach was a good and honest man, and he had
TO PLEASE HIS WIFE 117

been faithful to her in heart and in deed. Time had
clipped the wings of his love for Emily in his devo-
tion to the mother of his boys; he had quite lived
down that impulsive earlier fancy, and Emily had be-
come in his regard nothing more than a friend. It
was the same with Emily’s feelings for him. Possi-
bly, had she found the least cause for jealousy, Joan-
na would almost have been better satisfied. It was
in the absolute acquiescence of Emily and Shadrach
in the results she herself had contrived that her dis-
content found nourishment.

Shadrach was not endowed with the narrow shrewd-
ness necessary for developing a retail business in the
face of many competitors. Did a customer inquire if
the grocer could really recommend the wondrous sub-
stitute for eggs which a persevering bagman had forced
into his stock, he would answer that ‘‘ when you did
not put eggs into a pudding it was difficult to taste
them there”; and when he was asked if his “real
Mocha coffee” was real Mocha, he would say, grimly,
“as understood in small shops.”

One summer day, when the big brick house oppo-
site was reflecting the oppressive sun’s heat into the
shop, and nobody was present but husband and wife,
Joanna looked across at Emily’s door, where a wealthy
visitor’s carriage had drawn up. Traces of patronage
had been visible in Emily’s manner of late.

“Shadrach, the truth is, you are not a business-
man,” his wife sadly murmured. “You were not
brought up to shopkeeping, and it is impossible for a
man to make a fortune at an occupation he has jumped
into, as you did into this.”

Jolliffe agreed with her, in this as in everything else.
“Not that I care a rope’s end about making a fortune,”
he said, cheerfully. “Iam happy enough, and we can
rub on somehow.”
118 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

She looked again at the great house through the
screen of bottled pickles.

“Rub on—yes,” she said, bitterly. ‘“ But see how
well off Emily Lester is, who used to be so poor!
Her boys will go to college, no doubt; and think of
yours—obliged to go to the parish school.”

Shadrach’s thoughts had flown to Emily.

“Nobody,” he said, good-humoredly, “ ever did Em-
ily a better turn than you did, Joanna, when you warned
her off me and put an end to that little simpering non-
sense between us, so as to leave it in her power to say
‘Aye’ to Lester when he came along.”

This almost maddened her.

“Don’t speak of by-gones !” she implored, in stern
sadness. ‘But think, for the boys’ and my sake, if
not for your own, what are we to do to get richer ?”

“Well,” he said, becoming serious, “ to tell the truth,
Thave always felt myself unfit for this business, though
I’ve never liked to say so. Iseem to want more room
for sprawling ; a more open space to strike out in than
here among friends and neighbors. I could get rich
as well as any man, if I tried my own way.”

“T wish you would! What is your way ?”

“To go to sea again.”

She had been the very one to keep him at home,
hating the semi-widowed existence of sailors’ wives.
But her ambition checked her instincts now, and she
said :

“Do you think success really lies that way ?”

“T am sure it lies in no other.”

“Do you want to go, Shadrach ?”

“Not for the pleasure of it, I can tell ’ee. There’s
no such pleasure at sea, Joanna, as I can find in my
back parlor here. To speak honest, I have no love
for the brine. I never had much. But if it comes to
a question of a fortune for you and the lads, it is an-
TO PLEASE HIS WIFE 119

other thing. That’s the only way to it for one born
and bred a seafarer as I.”

“Would it take long to earn ?”

“Well, that depends; perhaps not.”

The next morning Shadrach pulled from a chest of
drawers the nautical jacket he had worn during the
first months of his return, brushed out the moths,
donned it, and walked down to the quay. The port
still did a fair business in the Newfoundland trade,
though not so much as formerly.

It was not long after this that he invested all he
possessed in purchasing a part ownership in a brig, of
which he was appointed captain. A few months were
passed in coast trading, during which interval Sha-
drach wore off the land-rust that had accumulated
upon him in his grocery phase; and in the spring the
brig sailed for Newfoundland.

Joanna lived on at home with her sons, who were
now growing up into strong lads, and occupying them-
selves in various ways about the harbor and quay.

“Never mind, let them work a little,” their fond
mother said to herself. “Our necessities compel it
now, but when Shadrach comes home they will be
only seventeen and eighteen, and they shall be re-
moved from the port, and their education thoroughly
taken in hand by a tutor; and with the money they'll
have they will perhaps be as near to gentlemen as
Emmy Lester’s precious two, with their algebra and
their Latin!”

The date for Shadrach’s return drew near and ar-
rived, and he did not appear. Joanna was assured
that there was no cause for anxiety, sailing-ships be-
ing so uncertain in their coming; which assurance
proved to be well-grounded, for late one wet evening,
about a month after the calculated time, the ship was
announced as at hand, and presently the slip-slop step
120 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

of Shadrach as the sailor sounded in the passage, and
he entered. The boys had gone out and had missed
him, and Joanna was sitting alone.

As soon as the first emotion of reunion between the
couple had passed, Jolliffe explained the delay as ow-
ing toasmall speculative contract,which had produced
good results.

“T was determined not to disappoint ’ee,” he said ;
“and I think you'll own that I haven’t!”

With this he pulled out an enormous canvas bag,
full and rotund as the money-bag of the giant whom
Jack slew, untied it, and shook the contents out into
her lap as she sat in her low chair by the fire. A
mass of guineas (there were guineas on the earth in
those days) fell into her lap with a sudden thud, weigh-
ing down her gown to the floor.

“There!” said Shadrach, complacently. “I told ’ee,
dear, I’d do it; and have I done it or no?”

Somehow her face, after the first excitement of pos-
session, did not retain its glory.

“Tt is a lot of gold, indeed,” she said. ‘“ And—is
this all ?”

“All? Why, dear Joanna, do you know you can
count to three hundred in that heap? It is a fort-
une !”

“Yes—yes. A fortune—judged by sea; but judged
by land—”

However, she banished considerations of the money
for the nonce. Soon the boys came in, and next Sun-
day Shadrach returned thanks to God—this time by
the more ordinary channel of the italics in the Gen-
eral Thanksgiving. But a few days after, when the
question of investing the money arose, he remarked
that she did not seem so satisfied as he had hoped.

“Well, you see, Shadrach,” she answered, “we count
by hundreds; they count by thousands” (nodding tow-
TO PLEASE HIS WIFE 121

ards the other side of the street). “They have set up
a carriage and pair since you left.”

“Oh! have they ?”

“My dear Shadrach, you don’t know how the world
moves. However, we'll do the best we can with it.
But they are rich, and we are poor still !”

The greater part of a year was desultorily spent.
She moved sadly about the house and shop, and the
boys were still occupying themselves in and around
the harbor.

“ Joanna,” he said, one day, “I see by your move-
ments that it is not enough.”

“Tt is not enough,” said she. “My boys will have
to live by steering the ships that the Lesters own; and
I was once above her !”

Jolliffe was not an argumentative man, and he only
murmured that he thought he would make another
voyage. He meditated for several days, and com-
ing home from the quay one afternoon said, sud-
denly :

“T could do it for ’ee, dear, in one more trip, for
certain, if—if—”

“Do what, Shadrach ?”

“Enable ’ee to count by thousands instead of hun-
dreds.”

“Tf what ?”

“Tf I might take the boys.”

She turned pale.

“Don’t say that, Shadrach,” she answered, hastily.

“Why?”

“T don’t like to hear it. There’s danger at sea. I
want them to be something genteel, and no danger to
them. I couldn’t let them risk their lives at sea. Oh,
T couldn’t ever, ever !”

“Very well, dear, it sha’n’t be done.”

Next day, after a silence, she asked a question:
122 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“Tf they were to go with you it would make a great
deal of difference, I suppose, to the profit?”

“°Twould treble what I should get from the vent-
ure single-handed. Under my eye they would be as
good as two more of myself.”

Later on she said: ‘“ Tell me more about this.”

“Well, the boys are almost as clever as master-
mariners in handling a craft, upon my life! There
isn’t a more cranky place in the South Seas than about
the sand-banks of this harbor, and they’ve practised
here from their infancy. And they are so steady. I
couldn’t get their steadiness and their trustworthiness
in half a dozen men twice their age.”

“And is it very dangerous at sea; now, too, there
are rumors of war ?” she asked, uneasily.

“Oh, well, there be risks. Still—”

The idea grew and magnified, and the mother’s heart
was crushed and stifled by it. Emmy was growing
too patronizing ; it could not be borne. Shadrach’s
wife could not help nagging him about their compar-
ative poverty. The young men, amiable as their fa-
ther, when spoken to on the subject of a voyage of
enterprise, were quite willing to embark; and though
they, like their father, had no great love for the sea,
they became quite enthusiastic when the proposal was
detailed.

Everything now hung upon their mother’s assent.
She withheld it long, but at last gave the word: the
young men might accompany their father. Shadrach
was unusually cheerful about it. Heaven had preserved
him hitherto, and he had uttered his thanks. God
would not forsake those who were faithful to him.

All that the Jolliffes possessed in the world was put
into the enterprise. The grocery stock was pared
down to the least that possibly could afford a bare
sustenance to Joanna during the absence, which was
fO PLEASE HIS WIFE 128

to last through the usual “New-f’nland spell.” How
she would endure the weary time she hardly knew, for
the boys had been with her formerly; but she nerved
herself for the trial.

The ship was laden with boots and shoes, ready-
made clothing, fishing-tackle, butter, cheese, cordage,
sail-cloth, and many other commodities; and was to
bring back oil, furs, skins, fish, cranberries, and what
else came to hand. But much trading to other ports
was to be undertaken between the voyages out and
homeward, and thereby much money made.

III

The brig sailed on a Monday morning in spring ;
but Joanna did not witness its departure. She could
not bear the sight that she had been the means of
bringing about. Knowing this, her husband told her
overnight that they were to sail some time before
noon next day; hence when, awakening at five the
next morning, she heard them bustling about down-
stairs, she did not hasten to descend, but lay trying to
nerve herself for the parting, imagining they would
leave about nine, as her husband had done on his
previous voyage. When she did descend she beheld
words chalked upon the sloping face of the bureau ;
but no husband or sons. In the hastily-scrawled lines
Shadrach said they had gone off thus not to pain her
by a leave-taking ; and the sons had chalked under his
words: “Good-bye, mother.”

She rushed to the quay and looked down the harbor
towards the blue rim of the sea, but she could only
see the masts and bulging sails of the Joanna; no
human figures. “’Tis I have sent them!” she said,
124 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

wildly, and burst into tears. In the house the chalked
“Good-bye” nearly broke her heart. But when she
had re-entered the front-room and looked across at
Emily’s, a gleam of triumph lit her thin face at her
anticipated release from the thraldom of subservience.

To do Emily Lester justice, her assumption of su-
periority was mainly a figment of Joanna’s brain.
That the circumstances of the merchant’s wife were
more luxurious than Joanna’s, the former could not
conceal; though whenever the two met, which was
not very often now, Emily endeavored to subdue the
difference by every means in her power.

The first summer lapsed away, and Joanna meagre-
ly maintained herself by the shop, which now con-
sisted of little more than a window and a counter.
Emily was, in truth, her only large customer; and
Mrs. Lester’s kindly readiness to buy anything and
everything without questioning the quality had a sting
of bitterness in it, for it was the uncritical attitude of
a patron, and almost of a donor. The long, dreary
winter moved on; the face of the bureau had been
turned to the wall to protect the chalked words of
farewell, for Joanna could never bring herself to rub
them out, and she often glanced at them with wet
eyes. Emily’s handsome boys came home for the
Christmas holidays; the university was talked of for
them ; and still Joanna subsisted, as it were, with held
breath, like a person submerged. Only one summer
more, and the spell would end. Towards the end of
the time Emily called on her quondam friend. She
had heard that Joanna began to feel anxious; she
had received no letter from husband or sons for some
months. Emily’s silks rustled arrogantly when, in
response to Joanna’s almost dumb invitation, she
squeezed through the opening of the counter and into
the parlor behind the shop.
TO PLEASE HIS WIFE 125

“You are all success, and J am all the other way!”
said Joanna.

“But why do you think so?” said Emily. “They
are to bring back a fortune, I hear.”

“Ah! will they come? The doubt is more than a
woman can bear. All three in one ship —think of
that! And I have not heard of them for months!”

“But the time is not up. You should not meet mis-
fortune half-way.”

“Nothing will repay me for the grief of their ab-
sence.”

“Then why did you let them go? You were do-
ing fairly well.”

“J made them go!” she said, turning vehemently
upon Emily. “And Pll tell you why. I could not
bear that we should be only muddling on, and you so
rich and thriving. Now I have told you, and you
may hate me if you will!”

“J shall never hate you, Joanna.”

And she proved the truth of her words afterwards.
The end of autumn came and the brig should have
been in port, but nothing like the Joanna appeared in
the channel between the sands. It was now really
time to be uneasy. Joanna Jolliffe sat by the fire,
and every gust of wind caused her a cold thrill. She
had always feared and detested the sea ; to her it was
a treacherous, restless, slimy creature, glorying in the
griefs of women. “Still,” she said, “they must come!”

She recalled to her mind that Shadrach had said be-
fore starting that if they returned safe and sound, with
success crowning their enterprise, he would go, as he
had gone after his shipwreck, and kneel with his sons
in the church and offer sincere thanks for their deliv-
erance. She went to church regularly morning and
afternoon, and sat in the most forward pew, nearest
the chancel step. Her eyes were mostly fixed on that

1
126 LiFE’s LITTLE IRONTES

step, where Shadrach had knelt in the bloom of his
young manhood; she knew to an inch the spot which
his knees had pressed twenty winters before—his out-
line as he had knelt, his hat on the step beside him.
God was good. Surely her husband must kneel there
again—a son on each side, as he had said; George
just here, Jim just there. By long watching the spot
as she worshipped, it became as if she saw the three
returned ones there kneeling; the two slim outlines of
her boys, the more bulky form between them; their
hands clasped, their heads shaped against the eastern
wall, The fancy grew almost to an hallucination;
she could never turn her worn eyes to the step with-
out seeing them there.

Nevertheless, they did not come. Heaven was mer-
ciful, but it was not yet pleased to relieve her soul.
This was her purgation for the sin of making them
the slaves of her ambition. But it became more than
purgation soon, and her mood approached despair.
Months had passed since the brig had been due, but
it had not returned,

Joanna was always hearing or seeing evidences of
their arrival. When on the hill behind the port,
whence a view of the open channel could be obtained,
she felt sure that a little speck on the horizon, breaking
the eternally level waste of waters southward, was the
truck of the Joanna’s main-mast. Or when in-doors,
a shout or excitement of any kind at the corner of the
Town Cellar, where the high street joined the quay,
caused her to spring to her feet and cry, “Tis they!”

But it was not. The visionary forms knelt every
Sunday afternoon on the chancel step, but not the real.
Her shop had, as it were, eaten itself hollow. In the
apathy which had resulted from her loneliness and
grief she had ceased to take in the smallest supplies,
and thus had sent away her last customer.
TO PLEASE HIS WIFE 127

In this strait Emily Lester tried by every means in
her power to aid the afflicted woman, but she met with
constant repulses.

“Tdon’t like you! I can’t bear to see you!” Jo-
anna would whisper hoarsely, when Emily came to her
and made advances,

“But I want to help and soothe you, Joanna,” Em-
ily would say.

“You are a lady, with a rich husband and fine sons.
What can you want with a bereaved crone like me 2”

“ Joanna, I want this: I want you to come and live
in my house, and not stay alone in this dismal place
any longer.”

“And suppose they come and don’t find me at
home? You wish to separate me and mine! No, Ill
stay here. I don’t like you, and I can’t thank you, what-
ever kindness you do me !”

However, as time went on Joanna could not afford
to pay the rent of the shop and house without an in-
come. She was assured that all hope of the return of
Shadrach and his sons was vain, and she reluctantly
consented to accept the asylum of the Lesters’ house.
Here she was allotted a room of her own on the second
floor, and went and came as she chose, without contact
with the family. Her hair grayed and whitened, deep
lines channelled her forehead, and her form grew gaunt
and stooping. But she still expected the lost ones, and
when she met Emily on the staircase she would say,
morosely: ‘I know why you’ve got me here! They'll
come, and be disappointed at not finding me at home,
and perhaps go away again; and then you'll be re-
venged for my taking Shadrach away from ’ee !”

Emily Lester bore these reproaches from the grief-
stricken soul. She was sure—all the people of Haven-
pool were sure—that Shadrach and his sons could not
return. For years the vessel had been given up as lost.
128 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

Nevertheless, when awakened at night by any noise,
Joanna would rise from bed and glance at the shop
opposite by the light from the flickering lamp, to make
sure it was not they.

It was a damp and dark December night, six years
after the departure of the brig Joanna. The wind
was from the sea, and brought up a fishy mist which
mopped the face like moist flannel. Joanna had
prayed her usual prayer for the absent ones with
more fervor and confidence than she had felt for
months, and had fallen asleep about eleven. It must
have been between one and two when she suddenly
started up. She had certainly heard steps in the
street, and the voices of Shadrach and her sons calling
at the door of the grocery-shop. She sprang out of
bed, and, hardly knowing what clothing she dragged
on herself, hastened down Emily’s large and carpeted
staircase, put the candle on the hall-table, unfastened
the bolts and chain, and stepped into the street. The
mist, blowing up the street from the quay, hindered
her seeing the shop, although it was so near; but she
had crossed to it in a moment. How was it? No-
body stood there. The wretched woman walked wildly
up and down with her bare feet—there was not a soul.
She returned and knocked with all her might at the
door which had once been her own—they might have
been admitted for the night, unwilling to disturb her
till the morning. It was not till several minutes had
elapsed that the young man who now kept the shop
looked out of an upper window, and saw the skeleton
of something human standing below half-dressed.

‘Has anybody come ?” asked the form.

“Oh, Mrs. Jolliffe, I didn’t know it was you,” said the
young man, kindly, for he was aware how her baseless
expectations moved her. “No, nobody has come.”

June, 1891.
THE MELANCHOLY HUSSAR OF THE
GERMAN LEGION

I

Here stretch the downs, high and breezy and green,
absolutely unchanged since those eventful days. A
plough has never disturbed the turf, and the sod that
was uppermost then is uppermost now. Here stood
the camp; here are distinct traces of the banks thrown
up for the horses of the cavalry, and spots where the
midden-heaps lay are still to be observed. At night,
when I walk across the lonely place, it is impossible
to avoid hearing, amid the scourings of the wind
over the grass-bents and thistles, the old trumpet and
bugle calls, the rattle of the halters; to help seeing
rows of spectral tents and the impedimenta of the
soldiery ; from within the canvases come guttural syl-
lables of foreign tongues, and broken songs of the
fatherland ; for they were mainly regiments of the
King’s German Legion that slept round the tent-poles
hereabout at that time.

It was nearly ninety years ago. The British uni-
form of the period, with its immense epaulettes, queer
cocked - hat, breeches, gaiters, ponderous cartridge-
box, buckled shoes, and what not, would look strange
and barbarous now. Ideas have changed ; invention

9
130 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

has followed invention. Soldiers were monumental
objects then. A divinity still hedged kings here and
there; and war was considered a glorious thing.

Secluded old manor-houses and hamlets lie in the
ravines and hollows among these hills, where a stran-
ger had hardly ever been seen till the king chose to
take the baths yearly at the sea-side watering-place a
few miles to the south; as a consequence of which
battalions descended in a cloud upon the open country
around. Is it necessary to add that the echoes of many
characteristic tales, dating from that picturesque time,
still linger about here in more or less fragmentary
form, to be caught by the attentive ear? Some of
them I have repeated; most of them I have forgotten ;
one I have never repeated, and assuredly can never
forget.

Phyllis told me the story with her own lips. She
was then an old lady of seventy-five, and her auditor
a lad of fifteen. She enjoined silence as to her share
in the incident till she should be “dead, buried, and
forgotten.” Her life was prolonged twelve years after
the day of her narration, and she has now been dead
nearly twenty. The oblivion which in her modesty
and humility she courted for herself has only partially
fallen on her, with the unfortunate result of inflicting
an injustice upon her memory; since such fragments
of her story as got abroad at the time, and have been
kept alive ever since, are precisely those which are
most unfavorable to her character.

It all began with the arrival of the York Hussars,
one of the foreign regiments above alluded to. Before
that day scarcely a soul had been seen near her father’s
house for weeks, When a noise like the brushing
skirt of a visitor was heard on the door-step it proved
to be a scudding leaf; when a carriage seemed to be
nearing the door, it was her father grinding his sickle
MELANCHOLY HUSSAR OF THE GERMAN LEGION 181

on the stone in the garden for his favorite relaxation
of trimming the box-tree borders to the plots. A
sound like luggage thrown down from the coach was
a gun far away at sea; and what looked like a tall
man by the gate at dusk was a yew bush cut into a
quaint and attenuated shape. There is no such soli-
tude in country places now as there was in those old
days.

Yet all the while King George and his court were
at his favorite sea-side resort, not more than five
miles off.

The daughter’s seclusion was great, but beyond the
seclusion of the girl lay the seclusion of the father.
If her social condition was twilight, his was darkness.
Yet he enjoyed his darkness, while her twilight op-
pressed her. Dr. Grove had been a professional man
whose taste for lonely meditation over metaphysical
questions had diminished his practice till it no longer
paid him to keep it going; after which he had re-
linquished it and hired at a nominal rent the small,
dilapidated half-farm half-manor-house of this ob-
scure inland nook, to make a sufficiency of an income
which in a town would have been inadequate for their
maintenance. He stayed in his garden the greater
part of the day, growing more and more irritable with
the lapse of time and the increasing perception that
he had wasted his life in the pursuit of illusions. He
saw his friends less and less frequently. Phyllis be-
came so shy that if she met a stranger anywhere in her
short rambles she felt ashamed at his gaze, walked
awkwardly, and blushed to her shoulders.

Yet Phyllis was discovered even here by an ad-
mirer, and her hand most unexpectedly asked in
marriage.

The king, as aforesaid, was at the neighboring town,
where he had taken up his abode at Gloucester Lodge ;
132 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

and his presence in the town naturally brought many
county people thither. Among these idlers—many
of whom professed to have connections and interests
with the court—was one Humphrey Gould, a bachelor ;
a personage neither young nor old; neither good-
looking nor positively plain. Too steady-going to
be “a buck” (as fast and unmarried men were then
called), he was an approximately fashionable man of a
mild type. This bachelor of thirty found his way to
the village on the down; beheld Phyllis; made her
father’s acquaintance in order to make hers, and by
some means or other she sufficiently inflamed his heart
to lead him in that direction almost daily, till he be-
came engaged to marry her.

As he was of an old local family, some of whose
members were held in respect in the county, Phyllis, in
bringing him to her feet, had accomplished what was
considered a brilliant move for one in her constrained
position, How she had done it was not quite known to
Phyllis herself. In those days unequal marriages were
regarded rather as a violation of the laws of nature
than as a mere infringement of convention, the more
modern view, and hence when Phyllis, of the watering-
place bourgeoisie, was chosen by such a gentlemanly
fellow, it was as if she were going to be taken to
heaven, though perhaps the uninformed would have
seen no great difference in the respective positions of
the pair, the said Gould being as poor as a crow.

This pecuniary condition was his excuse—probably
a true one—for postponing their union, and as the
winter drew nearer, and the king departed for the
season, Mr. Humphrey Gould set out for Bath, prom-
ising to return to Phyllis in a few weeks, The win-
ter arrived, the date of his promise passed, yet Gould
postponed his coming, on the ground that he could
not very easily leave his father in the city of their
MELANCHOLY HUSSAR OF THE GERMAN LEGION 133

sojourn, the elder having no other relative near him.
Phyllis, though lonely in the extreme, was content.
The man who had asked her in marriage was a desira-
ble husband for her in many ways; her father highly
approved of his suit; but this neglect of her was awk-
ward, if not painful, for Phyllis. Love him in the
true sense of the word she assured me she never did,
but she had a genuine regard for him; admired a
certain methodical and dogged way in which he some-
times took his pleasure; valued his knowledge of
what the court was doing, had done, or was about to
do; and she was not without a feeling of pride that
he had chosen her when he might have exercised a
more ambitious choice.

But he did not come, and the spring developed.
His letters were regular though formal; and it is not
to be wondered that the uncertainty of her position,
linked with the fact that there was not much passion
in her thoughts of Humphrey, bred an indescribable
dreariness in the heart of Phyllis Grove. The spring
was soon summer, and the summer brought the king ;
but still no Humphrey Gould. All this while the en-
gagement by letter was maintained intact.

At this point of time a golden radiance flashed in
upon the lives of people here, and charged all youth-
ful thought with emotional interest. This radiance
was the York Hussars.

II

The present generation has probably but a very
dim notion of the celebrated York Hussars of ninety
years ago. They were one of the regiments of the
King’s German Legion, and (though they somewhat
134 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONTES

degenerated later on) their brilliant uniforms, their
splendid horses, and, above all, their foreign air and
mustaches (rare appendages then), drew crowds of ad-
mirers of both sexes wherever they went. These with
other regiments had come to encamp on the downs
and pastures, because of the presence of the king in
the neighboring town.

The spot was high and airy, and the view extensive,
commanding the Isle of Portland in front, and reach-
ing to St. Aldhelm’s Head eastward, and almost to the
Start on the west.

Phyllis, though not precisely a girl of the village,
was as interested as any of them in this military in-
vestment. Her father’s home stood somewhat apart,
and on the highest point of ground to which the lane
ascended, so that it was almost level with the top of
the church-tower in the lower part of the parish. Im-
mediately from the outside of the garden- wall the
grass spread away to a great distance, and it was
crossed by a path which came close to the wall.
Ever since her childhood it had been Phyllis’s pleas-
ure to clamber up this fence and sit on the top—a feat
not so difficult as it may seem, the walls in this district
being built of rubble, without mortar, so that there
were plenty of crevices for small toes.

She was sitting up here one day, listlessly surveying
the pasture without, when her attention was arrested
by a solitary figure walking along the path. It was
one of the renowned German Hussars, and he moved
onward with his eyes on the ground, and with the
manner of one who wished to escape company. His
head would probably have been bent like his eyes but
for his stiff neck-gear. On nearer view she perceived
that his face was marked with deep sadness, With-
out observing her, he advanced by the foot-path till it
brought him almost immediately under the wall.
MELANCHOLY HUSSAR OF THE GERMAN LEGION 135

Phyllis was much surprised to see a fine, tall soldier
in such a mood as this. Her theory of the military,
and of the York Hussars in particular (derived entire-
ly from hearsay, for she had never talked to a soldier
in her life), was that their hearts were as gay as their
accoutrements.

At this moment the Hussar lifted his eyes and no-
ticed her on her perch, the white muslin neckerchief
which covered her shoulders and neck where left bare
by her low gown, and her white raiment in general,
showing conspicuously in the bright sunlight of this
summer day. He blushed a little at the suddenness
of the encounter, and without halting a moment from
his pace passed on.

All that day the foreigner’s face haunted Phyllis ;
its aspect was so striking, so handsome, and his eyes
were so bluc and sad and abstracted. It was perhaps
only natural that on some following day at the same
hour she should look over that wall again, and wait
till he had passed a second time. On this occasion
he was reading a letter, and at the sight of her his man-
ner was that of one who had half expected or hoped
to discover her. He almost stopped, smiled, and made
a courteous salute. The end of the meeting was that
they exchanged a few words. She asked him what
he was reading, and he readily informed her that he
was reperusing letters from his mother in Germany ;
he did not get them often, he said, and was forced to
read the old ones a great many times. This was all
that passed at the present interview, but others of the
same kind followed.

Phyllis used to say that his English, though not
good, was quite intelligible to her, so that their ac-
quaintance was never hindered by difficulties of speech.
‘Whenever the subject became too delicate, subtle, or
tender, for such words of English as were at his com-
186 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

mand, the eyes no doubt helped out the tongue, and—
though this was later on—the lips helped out the
eyes. In short, this acquaintance, unguardedly made,
and rash enough on her part, developed and ripened.
Like Desdemona, she pitied him, and learned his history.

His name was Matthius Tina, and Saarbriick his
native town, where his mother was still living. His
age was twenty-two, and he had already risen to the
grade of corporal, though he had not long been in the
army. Phyllis used to assert that no such refined or
well-educated young man could have been found in
the ranks of the purely English regiments, some of
these foreign soldiers having rather the graceful man-
ner and presence of our native officers than of our
rank and file.

She by degrees learned from her foreign friend a
circumstance about himself and his comrades which
Phyllis would least have expected of the York Hus-
sars. So far from being as gay as its uniform, the
regiment was pervaded by a dreadful melancholy, a
chronic homesickness, which depressed many of the
men to such an extent that they could hardly attend
to their drill. The worst sufferers were the younger
soldiers who had not been over here long. They
hated England and English life; they took no inter-
est whatever in King George and his island kingdom,
and they only wished to be out of it and never to see
it any more. Their bodies were here, but their hearts
and minds were always far away in their dear father-
land, of which—brave men and stoical as they were
in many ways—they would speak with tears in their
eyes. One of the worst of the sufferers from this home-
woe, as he called it in his own tongue, was Matthaus
Tina, whose dreamy musing nature felt the gloom of
exile still more intensely from the fact that he had
left a lonely mother at home with nobody to cheer her,
MELANCHOLY HUSSAR OF THE GERMAN LEGION 187

Though Phyllis, touched by all this, and interested
in his history, did not disdain her soldier acquaint-
ance, she declined (according to her own account, at
least) to permit the young man to overstep the line of
mere friendship for a long while—as long, indeed, as
she considered herself likely to become the possession
of another; though it is probable that she had lost her
heart to Matthius before she was herself aware. The
stone wall of necessity made anything like intimacy
difficult ; and he had never ventured to come, or to ask
to come, inside the garden, so that all their conversa-
tion had been overtly conducted across this boundary.

Mil

But news reached the village from a friend of
Phyllis’s father concerning Mr. Humphrey Gould, her
remarkably cool and patient betrothed. This gentle-
man had been heard to say in Bath that he considered
his overtures to Miss Phyllis Grove to have reached
only the stage of a half-understanding ; and in view
of his enforced absence on his father’s account, who
was too great an invalid now to attend to his affairs,
he thought it best that there should be no definite
promise as yet on either side. He was not sure, in-
deed, that he might not cast his eyes elsewhere.

This account—though only a piece of hearsay, and
as such entitled to no absolute credit—tallied so well
with the infrequency of his letters and their lack of
warmth, that Phyllis did not doubt its truth for one
moment ; and from that hour she felt herself free to
bestow her heart as she should choose. Not so her
father; he declared the whole story to be a fabri-
cation. He had known Mr. Gould’s family from his
188 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

boyhood ; and if there was one proverb which ex-
pressed the matrimonial aspect of that family well, it
was “Love me little, love me long.” Humphrey was
an honorable man, who would not think of treating
his engagement so lightly. “Do you wait in patience,”
he said; “all will be right enough in time.”

From these words Phyllis at first imagined that her
father was in correspondence with Mr. Gould, and
her heart sank within her ; for in spite of her original
intentions she had been relieved to hear that her en-
gagement had come to nothing. But she presently
learned that her father had heard no more of Hum-
phrey Gould than she herself had done; while he
would not write and address her affianced directly on
the subject, lest it should be deemed an imputation
on that bachelor’s honor.

“You want an excuse for encouraging one or other
of those foreign fellows to flatter you with his un-
meaning attentions,” her father exclaimed, his mood
having of late been a very unkind one towards her.
“T see more than I say. Don’t you ever set foot out-
side that garden-fence without my permission. If you
want to see the camp I’ll take you myself some Sun-
day afternoon.”

Phyllis had not the smallest intention of disobeying
him as to her actions, but she assumed herself to be in-
dependent with respect to her feelings. She no longer
checked her fancy for the Hussar, though she was far
from regarding him as her lover in the serious sense
in which an Englishman might have been regarded as
such. The young foreign soldier was almost an ideal
being to her, with none of the appurtenances of an
ordinary house-dweller ; one who had descended she
knew not whence, and would disappear she knew not
whither; the subject of a fascinating dream —no
more.
MELANCHOLY HUSSAR OF THE GERMAN LEGION 139

They met continually now—mostly at dusk—during
the brief interval between the going down of the sun
and the minute at which the last trumpet-call sum-
moned him to his tent. Perhaps her manner had be-
come less restrained latterly ; at any rate that of the
Hussar was so; he had grown more tender every day,
and at parting after these hurried interviews, she
reached down her hand from the top of the wall that
he might press it. One evening he held it so long that
she exclaimed “The wall is white, and somebody in
the field may see your shape against it !”

He lingered so long that night that it was with the
greatest difficulty that he could run across the inter-
vening stretch of ground and enter the camp in time.
On the next occasion of his awaiting her she did not
appear in her usual place at the usual hour. His dis-
appointment was unspeakably keen; he remained star-
ing blankly at the wall, like a man in a trance. The
trumpets and tattoo sounded, and still he did not go.

She had been delayed purely by an accident. When
she arrived she was anxious because of the lateness of
the hour, having heard the sounds denoting the clos-
ing of the camp as well as he. She implored him to
leave immediately.

“No,” he said, gloomily. “I shall not go in yet—
the moment you come—I have thought of your com-
ing all day.”

“But you may be disgraced at being after time?”

“T don’t mind that. I should have disappeared from
the world some time ago if it had not been for two
persons—my beloved, here, and my mother in Saar-
briick. I hate the army. I care more for a minute
of your company than for all the promotion in the
world.”

Thus he stayed and talked to her, and told her inter-
esting details of his native place, and incidents of his
140 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

childhood, till she was in a simmer of distress at his
recklessness in remaining. It was only because she in-
sisted on bidding him good-night and leaving the wall
that he returned to his quarters.

The next time that she saw him he was without the
stripes that had adorned his sleeve. He had been
broken to the level of private for his lateness that
night; and as Phyllis considered herself to be the
cause of his disgrace her sorrow was deep. But the
position was now reversed ; it was his turn to cheer
her.

“Don’t grieve, meine Liebliche!” he said. “Ihave
got a remedy for whatever comes. First, even sup-
posing I regain my stripes, would your father allow
you to marry a non-commissioned officer in the York
Hussars ?” j

She flushed. This practical step had not been in
her mind in relation to such an unrealistic person as
he was, and a moment’s reflection was enough for it.
“My father would not—certainly would not,” she an-
swered, unflinchingly. ‘It cannot be thought of!
My dear friend, please do forget me; I fear I am ru-
ining you and your prospects!”

“Not at all,” said he. ‘You are giving this coun-
try of yours just sufficient interest to me to make
me care to keep alive in it. If my dear land were
here also, and my old parent with you, I could be
happy as I am, and would do my best as a soldier.
But it is not so. And now listen. This is my plan.
That you go with me to my own country, and be my
wife there, and live there with my mother and me. I
am not a Hanoverian, as you know, though I entered
the army as such; my country is by the Saar, and is
at peace with France, and if I were once in it I should
be free.”

“ But how get there?” she asked. Phyllis had been
MELANCHOLY HUSSAR OF THE GERMAN LEGION 141

rather amazed than shocked at his proposition. Her
position in her father’s house was growing irksome
and painful in the extreme; his parental affection
seemed to be quite dried up. She was not a native of
the village, like all the joyous girls around her; and
in some way Matthaus Tina had infected her with his
own passionate longing for his country and mother
and home.

“But how ?” she repeated, finding that he did not
answer. ‘‘ Will you buy your discharge ?”

“ Ah, no,” he said. “That’s impossible, in these
times. No; I came here against my will; why should
I not escape? Now is the time, as we shall soon be
leaving here, and I might see you no more. This is
my scheme. I will ask you to meet me on the highway
two miles off, on some calm night next week that may
be appointed. There will be nothing unbecoming in
it, or to cause you shame; you will not fly alone with
me, for I will bring with me my devoted young friend
Christoph, an Alsatian, who has lately joined the reg-
iment, and who has agreed to assist in this enterprise.
We shall have come from yonder harbor, where we
shall have examined the boats, and found one suited
to our purpose. Christoph has already a chart of the
Channel, and we will then go to the harbor, and at
midnight cut the boat from her moorings, and row
away round the point out of sight; and by the next
morning we are on the coast of France, near Cherbourg.
The rest is easy, for I have saved money for the land
journey, and can get a change of clothes. I will write
to my mother, who will meet us on the way.”

He added details in reply to her inquiries, which
left no doubt in Phyllis’s mind of the feasibility of the
undertaking. But its magnitude almost appalled her;
and it is questionable if she would ever have gone fur-

ther in the wild adventure if, on entering the house
K
142 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

that night, her father had not accosted her in the most
significant terms.

“How about the York Hussars ?” he said.

“They are still at the camp; but they are soon go-
ing away, I believe.”

“Tt is useless for you to attempt to cloak your ac-
tions in that way. You have been meeting one of
those fellows; you have been seen walking with him—
foreign barbarians, not much better than the French
themselves! I have made up my mind—don’t speak
a word till I have done, please—I have made up my
mind that you shall stay here no longer while they
are on the spot. You shall go to your aunt’s.”

It was useless for her to protest that she had never
taken a walk with any soldier or man under the sun
except himself. Her protestations were feeble, too,
for though he was not literally correct in his asser-
tion, he was virtually only half in error.

The house of her father’s sister was a prison to
Phyllis. She had quite recently undergone experi-
ence of its gloom; and when her father went on to
direct her to pack what would be necessary for her to
take, her heart died within her. In after-years she
never attempted to excuse her conduct during this
week of agitation; but the result of her self-com-
muning was that she decided to join in the scheme of
her lover and his friend, and fly to the country which
he had colored with such lovely hues in her imagina-
tion. She always said that the one feature in his
proposal which overcame her hesitation was the ob-
vious purity and straightforwardness of his intentions.
He showed himself to be so virtuous and kind, he
treated her with a respect to which she had never be-
fore been accustomed, and she was braced to the ob-
vious risks of the voyage by her confidence in him.
MELANCHOLY HUSSAR OF THE GERMAN LEGION 148

IV

It was on a soft, dark evening of the following week
that they engaged in the adventure. Tina was to
meet her at a point in the highway at which the lane
to the village branched off. Christoph was to go
ahead of them to the harbor where the boat lay, row
it round the Nothe—or Lookout as it was called in
those days—and pick them up on the other side of
the promontory, which they were to reach by crossing
the harbor bridge on foot, and climbing over the
Lookout hill.

As soon as her father had ascended to his room she
left the house, and, bundle in hand, proceeded at a
trot along the lane. At such an hour not a soul was
afoot anywhere in the village, and she reached the
junction of the lane with the highway unobserved.
Here she took up her position in the obscurity formed
by the angle of a fence, whence she could discern
every one who approached along the turnpike-road
without being herself seen.

She had not remained thus waiting for her lover
longer than a minute—though from the tension of her
nerves the lapse of even that short time was trying—
when, instead of the expected footsteps, the stage-
coach could be heard descending the hill. She knew
that Tina would not show himself till the road was
clear, and waited impatiently for the coach to pass.
Nearing the corner where she was it slackened speed,
and, instead of going by as usual, drew up within
afew yards of her. <A passenger alighted, and she
heard his voice. It was Humphrey Gould’s.

He had brought a friend with him, and luggage.
The luggage was deposited on the grass, and the coach
went on its route to the royal watering-place.
144 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“JT wonder where that young man is with the horse
and trap?” said her former admirer to his companion.
“T hope we sha’n’t have to wait here long. I told him
ten o’clock precisely.”

“Have you got her present safe ?”

“Phyllis’s? Ob yes. It is in this trunk. I hope
it will please her.”

“Of course it will, What woman would not be
pleased with such a handsome peace-offering ?”

“Well—she deserves it. I’ve treated her rather
badly. But she has been in my mind these last two
days much more than I should care to confess to
everybody. Ah, well; Pll say no more about that.
It cannot be that she is so bad as they make out. I
am quite sure that a girl of her good wit would know
better than to get entangled with any of those Han-
overian soldiers. I won’t believe it of her, and there’s
an end on’t.”

More words in the same strain were casually dropped
as the two men waited; words which revealed to her,
as by a sudden illumination, the enormity of her con-
duct. The conversation was at length cut off by the
arrival of the man with the vehicle. The luggage
was placed in it, and they mounted and were driven
on in the direction from which she had just come.

Phyllis was so conscience-stricken that she was at
first inclined to follow them; but a moment’s reflec-
tion led her to feel that it would only be bare justice
to Matthius to wait till he arrived, and explain can-
didly that she had changed her mind—difficult as the
struggle would be when she stood face to face with
him. She bitterly reproached herself for having be-
lieved reports which represented Humphrey Gould as
false to his engagement, when, from what she now
heard from his own lips, she gathered that he had
been living full of trust in her. But she knew well
MELANCHOLY HUSSAR OF THE GERMAN LEGION 145

enough who had won her love. Without him her life
seemed a dreary prospect, yet the more she looked at
his proposal the more she feared to accept it—so wild
as it was, so vague, so venturesome. She had promised
Humphrey Gould, and it was only his assumed faith-
lessness which had led her to treat that promise as
naught. His solicitude in bringing her these gifts
touched her; her promise must be kept, and esteem
must take the place of love. She would preserve her
self-respect. She would stay at home, and marry him,
and suffer.

Phyllis had thus braced herself to an exceptional
fortitude when, a few minutes later, the outline of
Matthaius Tina appeared behind a field-gate, over which
he lightly leaped as she stepped forward. There was
no evading it, he pressed her to his breast.

“Tt is the first and last time!” she wildly thought,
as she stood encircled by his arms.

How Phyllis got through the terrible ordeal of that
night she could never clearly recollect. She always
attributed her success in carrying out her resolve to
her lover’s honor, for as soon as she declared to him
in feeble words that she had changed her mind, and
felt that she could not, dared not, fly with him, he
forbore to urge her, grieved as he was at her decision.
Unscrupulous pressure on his part, seeing bow ro-
mantically she had become attached to him, would no
doubt have turned the balance in his favor. But he
did nothing to tempt her unduly or unfairly.

On her side, fearing for his safety, she begged him
to remain. This, he declared, could not be. “I can-
not break faith with my friend,” said he. Had he
stood alone he would have abandoned his plan. But
Christoph, with the boat and compass and chart, was
waiting on the shore; the tide would soon turn; his
mother had been warned of his coming; go he must,

10
146 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

Many precious minutes were lost while he tarried,
unable to tear himself away. Phyllis held to her re-
solve, though it cost her many a bitter pang. At last
they parted, and he went down the hill. Before his
footsteps had quite died away, she felt a desire to be-
hold at least his outline once more, and running noise-
lessly after him, regained view of his diminishing
figure. For one moment she was sufficiently excited
to be on the point of rushing forward and linking
her fate with his. But she could not. The courage
which at the critical instant failed Cleopatra of Egypt
could scarcely be expected of Phyllis Grove.

A dark shape, similar to his own, joined him in the
highway. It was Christoph, his friend. She could
see no more; they had hastened on in the direction of
the harbor four miles ahead. With a feeling akin to
despair she turned and slowly pursued her way home-
ward.

Tattoo sounded in the camp; but there was no camp
for her now. It was as dead as the camp of the As-
syrians after the passage of the Destroying Angel.

She noiselessly entered the house, seeing nobody,
and went to bed. Grief, which kept her awake at
first, ultimately wrapped her in a heavy sleep. The
next moruing her father met her at the foot of the
stairs.

“Mr. Gould is come!” he said, triumphantly.

Humphrey was staying at the inn, and had already
called to inquire for her. He had brought her a pres-
ent of a very handsome looking-glass in a frame of
repoussé silverwork, which her father held in his hand.
He had promised to call again in the course of an
hour, to ask Phyllis to walk with him.

Pretty mirrors were rarer in country-houses at that
day than they are now, and the one before her won
Phyllis’s admiration. She looked into it, saw how
MELANCHOLY HUSSAR OF THE GERMAN LEGION 147

heavy her eyes were, and endeavored to brighten
them. She was in that wretched state of mind which
leads a woman to move mechanically onward in what
she conceives to be her allotted path. Mr. Humphrey
had, in his undemonstrative way, been adhering all
along to the old understanding; it was for her to do
the same, and to say not a word of her own lapse.
She put on her bonnet and tippet, and when he arrived
at the hour named she was at the door awaiting him.

Vv

Phyllis thanked him for his beautiful gift; but the
talking was soon entirely on Humphrey’s side as they
walked along. He told her of the latest movements
of the world of fashion—a subject which she willingly
discussed to the exclusion of anything more personal
—and his measured language helped to still her dis-
quieted heart and brain. Had not her own sadness been
what it was she must have observed his embarrass-
ment. At last he abruptly changed the subject.

“T am glad you are pleased with my little present,”
he said. “The truth is that I brought it to propitiate
’ee, and to get you to help me out of a mighty diffi-
culty.”

It was inconceivable to Phyllis that this indepen-
dent bachelor, whom she admired in some respects,
could have a difficulty.

“ Phyllis, P’ll tell you my secret at once; for I have
a monstrous secret to confide before I can ask your
counsel. The case is, then, that I am married: yes,
I have privately married a dear young belle; and if
you knew her, and I hope you will, you would say
everything in her praise. But she is not quite the one
148 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

that my father would have chosen for me—you know
the paternal idea as well as I—and I have kept it se-
cret. There will be a terrible noise, no doubt; but I
think that with your help I may get over it. If you
would only do me this good turn—when I have told
my father, I mean—say that you never could have
married me, you know, or something of that sort ;
’pon my life it will help to smooth the way mightily.
I am so anxious to win him round to my point of
view, and not to cause any estrangement.”

What Phyllis replied she scarcely knew, or how she
counselled him as to his unexpected situation. Yet
the relief that his announcement brought her was per-
ceptible. To have confided her trouble in return was
what her aching heart longed to do; and had Hum-
phrey been a woman she would instantly have poured
out her tale. But to him she feared to confess ; and
there was a real reason for silence, till a sufficient time
had elapsed to allow her lover and his comrade to get
out of harm’s way.

As soon as she reached home again she sought a sol-
itary place, and spent the time in half regretting that
she had not gone away, and in dreaming over the
meetings with Matthius Tina from their beginning to
their end. In his own country, among his own coun-
trywomen, he would possibly soon forget her, even to
her very name.

Her listlessness was such that she did not go out of
the house for several days. There came a morning
which broke in fog and mist, behind which the dawn
could be discerned in greenish gray, and the outlines
of the tents, and the rows of horses at the ropes. The
smoke from the canteen fires drooped heavily.

The spot at the bottom of the garden where she had
been accustomed to climb the wall to meet Matthius
was the only inch of English ground in which she took
MELANCHOLY HUSSAR OF THE GERMAN LEGION 149

any interest; and in spite of the disagreeable haze
prevailing, she walked out there till she reached the
well-known corner. Every blade of grass was weight-
ed with little liquid globes, and slugs and snails had
crept out upon the plots. Sbe could hear the usual
faint noises from the camp, and in the other direction
the trot of farmers on the road to the town, for it was
market-day. She observed that her frequent visits to
this corner had quite trodden down the grass in the
angle of the wall, and left marks of garden soil on the
stepping-stones by which she had mounted to look
over the top. Seldom having gone there till dusk, she
had not considered that her traces might be visible by
day. Perhaps it was these which had revealed her
trysts to her father.

While she paused in melancholy regard, she fan-
cied that the customary sounds from the tents were
changing their character. Indifferent as Phyllis was
to camp doings now, she mounted by the steps to the
old place. What she beheld at first awed and per-
plexed her ; then she stood rigid, her fingers hooked
to the wall, her eyes staring out of her head, and her
face as if hardened to stone.

On the open green stretching before her all the reg-
iments in the camp were drawn up in line, in the mid-
front of which two empty coffins lay on the ground.
The unwonted sounds which she had noticed came
from an advancing procession. It consisted of the
band of the York Hussars playing a dead march; next
two soldiers of that regiment in a mourning- coach,
guarded on each side, and accompanied by two priests.
Behind came a crowd of rustics who had been attract-
ed by the event. The melancholy procession marched
along the front of the line, returned to the centre, and
halted beside the coffins, where the two condemned
men were blindfolded, and each placed kneeling on
150 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

his coffin; a few minutes’ pause was now given, while
they prayed.

A firing party of twenty-four men stood ready with
levelled carbines. The commanding officer, who had
his sword drawn, waved it through some cuts of the
sword-exercise till he reached the downward stroke,
whereat the firing party discharged their volley. The
two victims fell, one, upon his face across his coffin,
the other backward.

As the volley resounded there arose a shriek from
the wall of Dr. Grove’s garden, and some one fell down
inside ; but nobody among the spectators without no-
ticed it at the time. The two executed hussars were
Matthius Tina and his friend Christoph. The soldiers
on guard placed the bodies in the coffins almost in-
stantly ; but the colonel of the regiment, an English-
man, rode up and exclaimed, in a stern voice, “Turn
them out—as an example to the men !”

The coffins were lifted endwise, and the dead Ger-
mans flung out upon their faces on the grass. Then
all the regiments wheeled in sections and marched
past the spot in slow time. When the survey was
over the corpses were again coffined and borne away.

Meanwhile Dr. Grove, attracted by the noise of the
volley, had rushed out into,his garden, where he saw
his wretched daughter lying motionless against the
wall. She was taken in-doors, but it was long before
she recovered consciousness, and for weeks they de-
spaired of her reason.

It transpired that the luckless deserters from the
York Hussars had cut the boat from her moorings in
the adjacent harbor, according to their plan, and, with
two other comrades, who were smarting under ill-
treatment from their colonel, had sailed in safety
across the Channel; but mistaking their bearings,
they steered into Jersey, thinking that island the
MELANCHOLY HUSSAR OF THE GERMAN LEGION 151

French coast. Here they were perceived to be de-
serters, and delivered up to the authorities. Matthius
and Christoph interceded for the other two at the
court-martial, saying that it was entirely by the for-
mer’s representations that these were induced to go.
Their sentence was accordingly commuted to flogging,
the death punishment being reserved for their leaders.

The visitor to the old Georgian watering-place who
may care to ramble to the neighboring village under
the hills and examine the register of burials, will there
find two entries in these words:

“Matth: Tina (Corpl.) in His Majesty's Regmt. of
York Hussars, and Shot for Desertion, was Buried
June 30th, 1801, aged 22 years. Born in the town of
Sarsbruk, Germany.

“Christoph Bless, belonging to His Majesty’s Regmt.
of York Hussars, who was Shot for Desertion, was
Buried June 80th, 1801, aged 22 years. Born at
Lothaargen, Alsatia.”

Their graves were dug at the back of the little
church, near the wall. There is no memorial to mark
the spot, but Phyllis pointed it out tome. While she
lived she used to keep their mounds neat; but now
they are overgrown with nettles, and sunk nearly flat.
The older villagers, however, who know of the episode
from their parents, still recollect the place where the
soldiers lie. Phyllis lies near.

October, 1889.
THE FIDDLER OF THE REELS

“Tartkine of Exhibitions, World’s Fairs, and what
not,” said the old gentleman, “I would not go round
the corner to see a dozen of them nowadays. The
ouly exhibition that ever made, or ever will make,
any impression upon my imagination was the first of
the series, the parent of them all, and now a thing of
old times —the Great Exhibition of 1851, in Hyde
Park, London. None of the younger generation can
realize the sense of novelty it produced in us who
were then in our prime. A noun substantive went so
far as to become an adjective in honor of the occa-
sion. It was ‘exhibition’ hat, ‘exhibition’ razor-strop,
‘exhibition’ watch ; nay, even ‘exhibition’ weather,
‘exhibition’ spirits, sweethearts, babies, wives—for the
time.

“For South Wessex, the year formed in many ways
an extraordinary chronological frontier or transit-line,
at which there occurred what one might call a preci-
pice in Time. As in a geological ‘fault,’ we had pre-
sented to us a sudden bringing of ancient and modern
into absolute contact, such as probably in no other
single year since the Conquest was ever witnessed in
this part of the country.”

These observations led us onward to talk of the dif-
ferent personages, gentle and simple, who lived and
moved within our narrow and peaceful horizon at that
THE FIDDLER OF THE REELS 153

time ; and of three people in particular, whose queer
little history was oddly touched at points by the Ex-
hibition, more concerned with it than that of anybody
else who dwelt in those outlying shades of the world,
Stickleford, Mellstock, and Egdon. First in promi-
nence among these three came Wat Ollamoor—if that
were his real name.

He was a woman’s man—supremely so—and exter-
nally very little else. T'o men he was not attractive ;
perhaps a little repulsive at times. Musician, dandy,
and company-man in practice; veterinary surgeon in
theory, he lodged awhile in Mellstock village, coming
from nobody knew where ; though some said his first
appearance in this neighborhood had been as fiddle-
player in a show at Greenhill Fair.

Many a worthy villager envied him his power over
unsophisticated maidenhood—a power which seemed
sometimes to have a touch of the weird and wizardly
in it. Personally he was not ill-favored, though rather
un-English, his complexion being a rich olive, his rank
hair dark and rather clammy—made still clammier by
secret ointments, which, when he came fresh to a party,
caused him to smell like “boys’-love” (southern wood)
steeped in lamp-oil. On occasion he wore curls—a
double row—running almost horizontally around his
head. But as these were sometimes noticeably absent,
it was concluded that they were not altogether of
Nature’s making. By girls whose love for him had
turned to hatred he had been nicknamed “ Mop,”
from this abundance of hair, which was long enough
to rest upon his shoulders ; as time passed, the name
more and more prevailed.

His fiddling, possibly, had the most to do with the
fascination he exercised, for, to speak fairly, it could
claim for itself a most peculiar and personal quality,
like that in a moving preacher. There were tones in
154 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

it which bred the immediate conviction that indolence
and averseness to systematic application were all that
lay between “ Mop” and the career of a second Paga-
nini.

While playing he invariably closed his eyes ; using
no notes, and, as it were, allowing the violin to wander
on at will into the most plaintive passages ever heard
by rustic man. There was a certain lingual character
in the supplicatory expressions he produced, which
would wellnigh have drawn an ache from the heart of
a gate-post. He could make any child in the parish,
who was at all sensitive to music, burst into tears in a
few minutes by simply fiddling one of the old dance-
tunes he almost entirely affected—country jigs, reels,
and “Favorite Quick-Steps” of the last century —
some mutilated remains of which even now reappear
as nameless phantoms in new quadrilles and gallops,
where they are recognized only by the curious, or by
such old-fashioned and far-between people as have
been thrown with men like Wat Ollamoor in their
early life.

His date was a little later than that of the old Mell-
stock choir-band, which comprised the Dewys, Mail,
and the rest—in fact, he did not rise above the hori-
zon thereabout till those well-known musicians were
disbanded as ecclesiastical functionaries, In their
honest love of thoroughness they despised the new
man’s style. Theophilus Dewy (Reuben the tranter’s
younger brother) used to say there was no “ plum-
ness” in it—no bowing, no solidity—it was all fantas-
tical. And probably this was true. Anyhow, Mop
had, very obviously, never bowed a note of church-
music from his birth ; he never once sat in the gallery
of Mellstock church, where the others had tuned their
venerable psalmody so many hundreds of times ; had
never, in all likelihood, entered a church at all. All
THE FIDDLER OF THE REELS 155

were devil’s tunes in his repertory. “He could no
more play the ‘Wold Hundredth’ to his true time than
he could play the brazen serpent,” the tranter would
say. (The brazen serpent was supposed in Mellstock
to be a musical instrument particularly hard to blow.)

Occasionally Mop could produce the aforesaid moy-
ing effect upon the souls of grown-up persons, especial-
ly young women of fragile and responsive organiza-
tion. Such a one was Car’line Aspent. Though she
was already engaged to be married before she met
him, Car’line, of them all, was the most influenced by
Mop Ollamoor’s heart-stealing melodies, to her dis-
comfort, nay, positive pain and ultimate injury. She
was a pretty, invocating, weak-mouthed girl, whose
chief defect as a companion with her sex was a ten-
dency to peevishness now and then. At this time she
was not a resident in Mellstock parish, where Mop
lodged, but lived some miles off at Stickleford, farther
down the river.

How and where she first made acquaintance with
him and his fiddling is not truly known, but the story
was that it either began or was developed on one
spring evening, when, in passing through Lower Mell-
stock, she chanced to pause on the bridge near his
house to rest herself, and languidly leaned over the
parapet. Mop was standing on his door-step, as was
his custom, spinning the insidious thread of semi- and
demi-semi-quavers from the E string of his fiddle for
the benefit of passers-by, and laughing as the tears
rolled down the cheeks of the little children hanging
around him. Car’line pretended to be engrossed with
the rippling of the stream under the arches, but in
reality she was listening, as he knew. Presently the
aching of the heart seized her simultaneously with a
wild desire to glide airily in the mazes of an infinite
dance. To shake off the fascination she resolved to go
156 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

on, although it would be necessary to pass him as he
played. On stealthily glancing ahead at the per-
former, she found to her relief that his eyes were
closed in abandonment to instrumentation, and she
strode on boldly. But when closer her step grew
timid, her tread convulsed itself more and more ac-
cordantly with the time of the melody, till she very
nearly danced along. Gaining another glance at him
when immediately opposite, she saw that one of his
eyes was open, quizzing her as he smiled at her emo-
tional state. Her gait could not divest itself of its
compelled capers till she had gone a long way past
the house; and Car’line was unable to shake off the
strange infatuation for hours.

After that day, whenever there was to be in the
neighborhood a dance to which she could get an in-
vitation, and where Mop Ollamoor was to be the mu-
sician, Car’line contrived to be present, though it
sometimes involved a walk of several miles ; for he
did not play so often in Stickleford as elsewhere.

The next evidences of his influence over her were
singular enough, and it would require a neurologist
to fully explain them. She would be sitting quietly,
any evening after dark, in the house of her father,
the parish-clerk, which stood in the middle of Stickle-
ford village street, this being the high-road between
Lower Mellstock and Moreford, six miles eastward.
Here, without a moment’s warning, and in the midst
of a general conversation between her father, sister,
and the young man before alluded to, who devotedly
wooed her in ignorance of her infatuation, she would
start from her seat in the chimney-corner as if she
had received a galvanic shock, and spring convul-
sively towards the ceiling ; then she would burst into
tears, and it was not till some half-hour had passed
that she grew calm as usual. Her father, knowing
THE FIDDLER OF THE REELS 157

her hysterical tendencies, was always excessively anx-
ious about this trait in his youngest girl, and feared
the attack to be a species of epileptic fit. Not so her
sister Julia. Julia had found out what was the cause.
At the moment before the jumping, only an excep-
tionally sensitive ear situated in the chimney- nook
could have caught from down the flue the beat of a
man’s footstep along the highway without. But it
was in that foot-fall, for which she had been waiting,
that the origin of Car’line’s involuntary springing lay.
The pedestrian was Mop Ollamoor, as the girl well
knew; but his business that way was not to visit
her ; he sought another woman, whom he spoke of as
his Intended, and who lived at Moreford, two miles
farther on. On one, and only one, occasion did it
happen that Car’line could not control her utterance ;
it was when her sister alone chanced to be present.
“ Oh—oh—oh— !” she cried. “He’s going to her,
and not coming to me!”

To do the fiddler justice, he had not at first thought
greatly of, or spoken much to, this girl of impression-
able mould. But he had soon found out her secret,
and could not resist a little by-play with her too easily
hurt heart, as an interlude between his more serious
performances at Moreford. The two became well ac-
quainted, though only by stealth, hardly a soul in
Stickleford except her sister, and her lover Ned Hip-
croft, being aware of the attachment. Her father
disapproved of her coldness to Ned ; her sister, too,
hoped she might get over this nervous passion for a
man of whom so little was known. The ultimate
result was that Car’line’s manly and simple wooer
Edward found his suit becoming practically hopeless.
He was a respectable mechanic, in a far sounder po-
sition than Mop the nominal horse-doctor ; but when,
before leaving her, Ned put his flat and final ques-

L
158 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

tion, would she marry him, then and there, now or
never, it was with little expectation of obtaining more
than the negative she gave him. Though her father
supported him and her sister supported him, he could
not play the fiddle so as to draw your soul out of your
body like a spider’s thread; as Mop did, till you felt
as limp as withy-wind and yearned for something to
cling to. Indeed, Hipcroft had not the slightest ear
for music ; could not sing two notes in tune, much
less play them.

The No he had expected and got from her, in spite
of a preliminary encouragement, gave Ned a new
start in life. It had been uttered in such a tone of
sad entreaty that he resolved to persecute her no
more ; she should not even be distressed by a sight
of his form in the distant perspective of the street
and lane. He left the place, and his natural course
was to London.

The railway to South Wessex was in process of
construction, but it was not as yet opened for traffic;
and Hipcroft reached the capital by a six days’ trudge
on foot, as many a better man had done before him.
He was one of the last of the artisan class who used
that now extinct method of travel to the great cen-
tres of labor, so customary then from time imme-
morial.

In London he lived and worked regularly at his
trade. More fortunate than many, his disinterested
willingness recommended him from the first. Dur-
ing the ensuing four years he was never out of em-
ployment. He neither advanced nor receded in the
modern sense ; he improved as a workman, but he did
not shift one jot in social position. About his love
for Car’line he maintained a rigid silence. No doubt
he often thought of her; but being always occupied,
and having no relations at Stickleford, he held no
THE FIDDLER OF THE REELS 159

communication with that part of the country, and
showed no desire to return. In his quiet lodging in
Lambeth he moved about after working-hours with
the facility of a woman, doing his own cooking, at-
tending to his stocking-heels, and shaping himself by
degrees to a life-long bachelorhood. For this con-
duct one is bound to advance the canonical reason
that time could not efface from his heart the image
of little Car’line Aspent—and it may be in part true;
but there was also the inference that his was a nature
not greatly dependent upon the ministrations of the
other sex for its comforts.

The fourth year of his residence as a mechanic in
London was the year of the Hyde-Park Exhibition
already mentioned, and at the construction of this
huge glass-house, then unexampled in the world’s his-
tory, he worked daily. It was an era of great hope
and activity among the nations and industries. Though
Hipcroft was, in his small way, a central man in the
movement, he plodded on with his usual outward
placidity. Yet for him, too, the year was destined
to have its surprises, for when the bustle of getting
the building ready for the opening day was past, the
ceremonies had been witnessed, and people were flock-
ing thither from all parts of the globe, he received
a letter from Car’line. Till that day the silence of
four years between himself and Stickleford had never
been broken.

She informed her old lover, in an uncertain penman-
ship which suggested a trembling hand, of the trouble
she had been put to in ascertaining his address, and
then broached the subject which had prompted her to
write. Four years ago, she said, with the greatest del-
icacy of which she was capable, she had been so fool-
ish as to refuse him. Her wilful wrongheadedness
had since been a grief to her many times, and of late
160 LIFE’s LITTLE IRONIES

particularly. As for Mr. Ollamoor, he had been ab-
sent almost as long as Ned—she did not know where.
She would gladly marry Ned now if he were to ask
her again, and be a tender little wife to him till her
life’s end.

A tide of warm feeling must have surged through
Ned Hipcroft’s frame on receipt of this news, if we
may judge by the issue. Unquestionably he loved
her still, even if not to the exclusion of every other
happiness. This from his Car’line, she who had been
dead to him these many years, alive to him again as of
old, was in itself a pleasant, gratifying thing. Ned
had grown so resigned to, or satisfied with, his lonely
lot, that he probably would not have shown much ju-
bilation at anything. Still, a certain ardor of preoc-
cupation, after his first surprise, revealed how deeply
her confession of faith in him had stirred him. Meas-
ured and methodical in his ways, he did not answer
the letter that day, nor the next, nor the next. He
was having “a good think.” When he did answer it,
there was a great deal of sound reasoning mixed in
with the unmistakable tenderness of his reply; but
the tenderness itself was sufficient to reveal that he
was pleased with her straightforward frankness; that
the anchorage she had once obtained in his heart was
renewable, if it had not been continuously firm.

He told her—and as he wrote his lips twitched hu-
morously over the few gentle words of raillery he
indited among the rest of his sentences—that it was
all very well for her to come round at this time of day.
Why wouldn’t she have him when he wanted her?
She had no doubt learned that he was not married, but
suppose his affections had since been fixed on another ?
She ought to beg his pardon. Still, he was not the man to
forget her. But, considering how he had been used, and
what he had suffered, she could not quite expect him to
THE FIDDLER OF THE REELS 161

go down to Stickleford and fetch her. But if she
would come to him, and say she was sorry, as was
only fair; why, yes, he would marry her, knowing
what a good little woman she was to the core. He
added that the request for her to come to him. was a
less one to make than it would have been when he first
left Stickleford, or even a few months ago; for the
new railway into South Wessex was now open,.and
there had just begun to be run wonderfully contrived
special trains, called excursion-trains, on account of
the Great Exhibition; so that she could come up easily
alone.

She said in her reply how good it was of him to
treat her so generously, after her hot-and-cold treat-
ment of him; that though she felt frightened at the
magnitude of the journey, and was never as yet in a
railway-train, having only seen one pass at a distance,
she embraced his offer with all her heart; and would,
indeed, own to him how sorry she was, and beg his
pardon, and try to be a good wife always, and make
up for lost time.

The remaining details of when and where were soon
settled, Car’line informing him, for her ready identifi-
cation in the crowd, that she would be wearing “my
new sprigged-laylock cotton gown,” and Ned gayly
responding that, having married her the morning after
her arrival, he would make a day of it by taking her
to the Exhibition. One early summer afternoon, ac-
cordingly, he came from his place of work, and hast-
ened towards Waterloo Station to meet her. It was
as wet and chilly as an English June day can occasion-
ally be, but as he waited on the platform in the drizzle
he glowed inwardly, and seemed to have something to
live for again.

The “excursion-train ”’—an absolutely new depart-
ure in the history of travel — was still a novelty on

11
162 LIFE’S LITILE IRONIES

the Wessex line, and probably everywhere. Crowds
of people had flocked to all the stations on the way up
to witness the unwonted sight of so long a train’s pas-
sage, even where they did not take advantage of the
opportunity it offered. The seats for the humbler class
of travellers in these early experiments in steam-loco-
motion were open trucks, without any protection what-
ever from the wind and rain; and damp weather having
set in with the afternoon, the unfortunate occupants
of these vehicles were, on the train drawing up at the
London terminus, found to be in a pitiable condition
from their Jong journey ; blue-faced, stiff - necked,
sneezing, rain-beaten, chilled to the marrow, many of
the men being hatless; in fact, they resembled people
who had been out all night in an open boat on a rough
sea, rather than inland excursionists for pleasure. The
women had in some degree protected themselves by
turning up the skirts of their gowns over their heads,
but as by this arrangement they were additionally ex-
posed about the hips, they were all more or less in a
sorry plight.

In the bustle and crush of alighting forms of both
sexes which followed the entry of the huge concate-
nation into the station, Ned Hipcroft soon discerned
the slim little figure his eye was in search of in the
sprigged lilac, as described. She came up to bim with
a frightened smile—still pretty, though so damp,
weather-beaten, and shivering from long exposure to
the wind.

“Oh, Ned!” she sputtered, “I—I—” He clasped
her in his arms and kissed her, whereupon she burst
into a flood of tears.

“You are wet, my poor dear! I hope you’ll not get
cold,” he said. And surveying her and her multifari-
ous surrounding packages, he noticed that by the hand
she led a toddling child—a little girl of three or so—
THE FIDDLER OF THE REELS 163

whose hood was as clammy and tender face as blue as
those of the other travellers.

“Who is this—somebody you know ?” asked Ned,
curiously.

“Yes, Ned. She’s mine.”

“Yours ?”

“Yes—my own!”

“Your own child?”

ce Yes yp

* Well—as God’s in—”

“Ned, I didn’t name it in my letter, because, you
see, it would have been so hard to explain. I thought
that when we met I could tell you how she happened
to be born, so much better than in writing. I hope
you'll excuse it this once, dear Ned, and not scold me,
now I’ve come so many, many miles !”

“This means Mr. Mop Ollamoor, I reckon !” said
Hipcroft, gazing palely at them from the distance of
the yard or two to which he had withdrawn with a
start.

Car’line gasped. “But he’s been gone away for
years!” she supplicated. “And I never had a young
man before! And I was so onlucky to be catched
the first time, though some of the girls down there
go on like anything !”

Ned remained in silence, pondering.

“You'll forgive me, dear Ned ?” she added, begin-
ning to sob outright. “I haven’t taken ’ee in after
all, because you can pack us back again, if you want
to; though ’tis hundreds o’ miles, and so wet, and
night a-coming on, and I with no money !”

“What the devil can I do?” Hipcroft groaned.

A more pitiable picture than the pair of helpless
creatures presented was never seen on a rainy day, as
they stood on the great, gaunt, puddled platform, a
whiff of drizzle blowing under the roof upon them
164 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

now and then; the pretty attire in which they had
started from Stickleford in the early morning bemud-
dled and sodden, weariness on their faces, and fear of
him in their eyes ; for the child began to look as if
she thought she too had done some wrong, remaining
in an appalled silence till the tears rolled down her
chubby cheeks.

‘““What’s the matter, my little maid?” said Ned,
mechanically.

“T do want to go home !” she let out, in tones that
told of a bursting heart. “And my totties be cold,
an’ I sha’n’t have no bread-an’-butter no more !”

“T don’t know what to say to it all!” declared
Ned, his own eye moist as he turned and walked a
few steps with his head down; then regarded them
again point-blank. From the child escaped troubled
breaths and silently welling tears.

“Want some bread-and-butter, do ’ee?” he said,
with factitious hardness,

“Ye-e-s !”

“Well, I dare say Ican get ’ee a bit. Naturally,
you must want some. And you, too, for that matter,
Car’line.”

“T do feel a little hungered. But I can keep it off,”
she murmured.

“Folk shouldn’t do that,” he said, gruffly....
“There, come along!” He caught up the child as
he added, “You must bide here to-night, anyhow, I
spose! What can you do otherwise? Ill get ’ee
some tea and victuals ; and as for this job, I’m sure I
don’t know what to say. This is the way out.”

They pursued their way, without speaking, to Ned’s
lodgings, which were not far off. There he dried
them and made them comfortable, and prepared tea;
they thankfully sat down. The ready-made household
of which he suddenly found himself the head imparted
THE FIDDLER OF THE REELS 165

@ cosey aspect to his room, and a paternal one to him-
self. Presently he turned to the child and kissed her
now blooming cheeks ; and, looking wistfully at Car’-
line, kissed her also.

“T don’t see how I can send ’ee back all them
miles,” he growled, “now you’ve come all the way 0’
purpose to join me. But you must trust me, Car’line,
and show you've real faith in me. Well, do you feel
better now, my little woman ?”

The child nodded, her mouth being otherwise occu-
pied.

“JT did trust you, Ned, in coming; and I shall al-
ways!”

Thus, without any definite agreement to forgive
her, he tacitly acquiesced in the fate that Heaven had
sent him; and on the day of their marriage (which
was not quite so soon as he had expected it could be,
on account of the time necessary for banns) he took
her to the Exhibition when they came back from
church, as he had promised. While standing near a
large mirror in one of the courts devoted to furniture,
Car’line started, for in the glass appeared the reflec-
tion of a form exactly resembling Mop Ollamoor’s—so
exactly that it seemed impossible to believe anybody
but that artist in person to be the original. On pass-
ing round the objects which hemmed in Ned, her, and
the child from a direct view, no Mop was to be seen.
Whether he were really in London or not at that time
was never known ; and Car’line always stoutly denied
that her readiness to go and meet Ned in town arose
from any rumor that Mop had also gone thither ;
which denial there was no reasonable ground for
doubting.

And then the year glided away, and the Exhibition
folded itself up and became a thing of the past. The
park trees that had been enclosed for six months were
166 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

again exposed to the winds and storms, and the sod
grew green anew. Ned found that Car’line resolved
herself into a very good wife and companion, though
she had made herself what is called cheap to him; but
in that she was like another domestic article, a cheap
teapot, which often brews better tea than a dear one.
One autumn Hipcroft found himself with but little
work to do, and a prospect of less for the winter.
Both being country born and bred, they fancied they
would like to live again in their natural atmosphere.
It was accordingly decided between them that they
should leave the pent-up London lodging, and that Ned
should seek out employment near his native place, his
wife and her daughter staying with Car’line’s father
during the search for occupation and an abode of their
own.

Tinglings of pleasure pervaded Car’line’s spasmodic
little frame as she journeyed down with Ned to the
place she had left two or three years before in silence
and under a cloud. To return to where she had once
been despised, a smiling London wife with a distinct
London accent, was a triumph which the world did
not witness every day.

The train did not stop at the petty road-side station
that lay nearest to Stickleford, and the trio went on
to Casterbridge. Ned thought it a good opportunity
to make a few preliminary inquiries for employment
at workshops in the borough where he had been
known; and feeling cold from her journey, and it being
dry underfoot and only dusk as yet, with 4 moon on
the point of rising, Car’line and her little girl walked
on towards Stickleford, leaving Ned to follow at a
quicker pace, and pick her up at a certain half-way
house, widely known as an inn.

The woman and child pursued the well-remembered
way comfortably enough, though they were both be-
THE FIDDLER OF THE REELS 167

coming wearied. In the course of three miles they
had passed Heedless William’s Pond, the familiar
landmark by Bloom’s End, and were drawing near
the Quiet Woman Inn, a lone road-side hostel on the
lower verge of the Egdon Heath, since and for many
years abolished. In stepping up towards it Car’line
heard more voices within than had formerly been cus-
tomary at such an hour, and she learned that an auc-
tion of fat stock had been held near the spot that af-
ternoon. The child would be the better for a rest as
well as herself, she thought, and she entered.

The guests and customers overflowed into the pas-
sage, and Car’line had no sooner crossed the threshold
than a man whom she remembered by sight came for-
ward with a glass and mug in his hands towards a
friend leaning against the wall; but, seeing her, very
gallantly offered her a drink of the liquor, which was
gin-and-beer hot, pouring her out a tumblerful and
saying, in a moment or two: “Surely, ’tis little Car’-
line Aspent that was—down at Stickleford ?”

She assented, and, though she did not exactly want
this beverage, she drank it since it was offered, and
her entertainer begged her to come in farther and sit
down. Once within the room she found that all the
persons present were seated close against the walls,
and there being a chair vacant she did the same. An
explanation of their position occurred the next mo-
ment. In the opposite corner stood Mop, rosining his
bow and looking just the same as ever. The company
had cleared the middle of the room for dancing, and
they were about to dance again. As she wore a veil
to keep off the wind she did not think he had recog-
nized her, or could possibly guess the identity of the
child; and to her satisfied surprise she found that she
could confront him quite calmly—mistress of herself
in the dignity her London life had given her. Before
168 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

she had quite emptied her glass the dance was.called,
the dancers formed in two lines, the music sounded,
and the figure began.

Then matters changed for Car’line. A tremor quick-
ened itself to life in her, and her hand so shook that
she could hardly set.down her glass. It was not the
dance nor the dancers, but the notes of that old violin
which thrilled the London wife, these having still all
the witchery that she had so well known of yore, and
under which she had used to lose her power of inde-
pendent will. Howit all came back! There was the
fiddling figure against the wall; the large, oily, mop-
like head of him, and beneath the mop the face with
closed eyes.

After the first moments of paralyzed reverie the fa-
miliar tune in the familiar rendering made her laugh
and shed tears simultaneously. Then a man at the
bottom of the dance, whose partner had dropped away,
stretched out his hand and beckoned to her to take the
place. She did not want to dance; she entreated by
signs to be left where she was, but she was entreating
of the tune and its player rather than of the dancing
man. The saltatory tendency which the fiddler and
his cunning instrument had ever been able to start in
her was seizing Car’line just as it had done in earlier
years, possibly assisted by the gin-and-beer hot. Tired
as she was she grasped her little girl by the hand, and,
plunging in at the bottom of the figure, whirled about
with the rest. She found that her companions were
mostly people of the neighboring hamlets and farms
—Bloom’s End, Mellstock, Lewgate, and elsewhere ;
and by degrees she was recognized as she convulsive-
ly danced on, wishing that Mop would cease and let
her heart rest from the aching he caused, and her feet
also.

After long and many minutes the dance ended, when
THE FIDDLER OF THE REELS 169

she was urged to fortify herself with more gin-and-
beer; which she did, feeling very weak and overpow-
ered with hysteric emotion. She refrained from un-
veiling, to keep Mop in ignorance of her presence, if
possible. Several of the guests having left, Car’line
hastily wiped her lips and also turned to go; but, ac-
cording to the account of some who remained, at that
very moment a five-handed reel was proposed, in which
two or three begged her to join.

She declined on the plea of being tired and having
to walk to Stickleford, when Mop began aggressively
tweedling “‘My Fancy Lad,” in D major, as the air to
which the reel was to be footed. He must have rec-
ognized her, though she did not know it, for it was
the strain of all seductive strains which she was least
able to resist—the one he had played when she was
leaning over the bridge at the date of their first ac-
quaintance. Car’line stepped despairingly into the
middle of the room with the other four.

Reels were resorted to hereabouts at this time by
the more robust spirits for the reduction of superflu-
ous energy which the ordinary figure-dances were not
powerful enough to exhaust. As everybody knows, or
does not know, the five reelers stood in the form of a
cross, the reel being performed by each line of three
alternately, the persons who successively came to the
middle place dancing in both directions. Car’line soon
found herself in this place, the axis of the whole per-
formance, and could not get out of it, the tune turn-
ing into the first part without giving her opportunity.
And now she began to suspect that Mop did know her,
and was doing this on purpose, though whenever she
stole a glance at him his closed eyes betokened obliv-
iousness to everything outside his own brain. She
continued to wend her way through the figure of eight
that was formed by her course, the fiddler introduc-
170 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

ing into his notes the wild and agonizing sweetness of
a living voice in one too highly wrought; its pathos
running high and running low in endless variation,
projecting through her nerves excruciating spasms—a
sort of blissful torture. The room swam, the tune was
endless; and in about a quarter of an hour the only
other woman in the figure dropped out exhausted, and
sank panting on a bench.

The reel instantly resolved itself into a four-hand-
ed one. Car’line would have given anything to leave
off; but she had, or fancied she had, no power, while
Mop played such tunes; and thus another ten minutes
slipped by, a haze of dust now clouding the candles,
the floor being of stone, sanded. Then another dancer
fell out—one of the men—and went into the passage, in
a frantic search for liquor. To turn the figure into a
three-handed reel was the work of a second, Mop mod-
ulating at the same time into “The Fairy Dance,” as
better suited to the contracted movement, and no less
one of those foods of love which, as manufactured by
his bow, had always intoxicated her.

In a reel for three there was no rest whatever, and
four or five minutes were enough to make her remain-
ing two partners, now thoroughly blown, stamp their
last bar, and, like their predecessors, limp off into the
next room to get something to drink. Car’line, half-
stifled inside her veil, was left dancing alone, the apart-
ment now being empty of everybody save herself, Mop,
and their little girl.

She flung up the veil, and cast her eyes upon him,
as if imploring him to withdraw himself and his acous-
tic magnetism from the atmosphere. Mop opened one
of his own orbs, as though for the first time, fixed
it peeringly upon her, and smiling dreamily, threw
into his strains the reserve of expression which he
could not afford to waste on a big and noisy dance.
THE FIDDLER OF THE REELS 171

Crowds of little chromatic subtleties, capable of draw-
ing tears from a statue, proceeded straightway from
the ancient fiddle, as if it were dying of the emotion
which had been pent up within it ever since its ban-
ishment from some Italian city where it first took
shape and sound. There was that in the look of
Mop’s one dark eye which said: ‘You cannot leave
off, dear, whether you would or no,” and it bred in
her a paroxysm of desperation that defied him to tire
her down.

She thus continued to dance alone, defiantly as she
thought, but in truth slavishly and abjectly, subject to
every wave of the melody, and probed by the gimlet-
like gaze of her fascinator’s open eye ; keeping up at
the same time a feeble smile in his face, as a feint to
signify it was still her own pleasure which led her on.
A terrified embarrassment as to what she could say
to him if she were to leave off, had its unrecognized
share in keeping her going. The child, who was be-
ginning to be distressed by the strange situation, came
up and said: “Stop, mother, stop, and let’s go home!”
as she seized Car’line’s hand.

Suddenly Car’line sank staggering to the floor; and
rolling over on her face, prone she remained. Mop’s
fiddle thereupon emitted an elfin shriek of finality ;
stepping quickly down from the nine-gallon beer-cask
which had formed his rostrum, he went to the little
girl, who disconsolately bent over her mother.

The guests who had gone into the backroom for
liquor and change of air, hearing something unusual,
trooped back hitherward, where they endeavored to
revive poor, weak Car’line by blowing her with the
bellows and opening the window. Ned, her husband,
who had been detained in Casterbridge, as aforesaid,
came along the road at this juncture, and hearing ex-
cited voices through the open window, and, to his great
172 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

surprise, the mention of his wife’s name, he entered
amid the rest upon the scene. Car’line was now in
convulsions, weeping violently, and for a long time
nothing could be done with her. While he was send-
ing for a cart to take her onward to Stickleford, Hip-
croft anxiously inquired how it had all happened ;
and then the assembly explained that a fiddler former-
ly known in the locality had lately revisited his old
haunts, and had taken upon himself without invitation
to play that evening at the inn.

Ned demanded the fiddler’s name, and they said
Ollamoor.

“ Ah!” exclaimed Ned, looking round him. ‘“ Where
is he, and where—where’s my little girl ?”

Ollamoor had disappeared, and so had the child.
Hipcroft was in ordinary a quiet and tractable fellow,
but a determination which was to be feared settled in
his face now. “Blast him!” he cried. “Tl beat his
skull in for’n, if I swing for it to-morrow !”

He had rushed to the poker which lay on the hearth,
and hastened down the passage, the people following.
Outside the house, on the other side of the highway, a
mass of dark heath-land rose sullenly upward to its
not easily accessible interior, a ravined plateau, where-
on jutted into the sky, at the distance of a couple of
miles, the fir-woods of Mistover backed by the Yal-
bury coppices—a place of Dantesque gloom at this
hour, which would have afforded secure hiding for a
battery of artillery, much less a man and a child.

Some other men plunged thitherward with him, and
more went along the road. They were gone about
twenty minutes altogether,-returning without result
to the inn. Ned sat down in the settle, and clasped
his forehead with his hands.

“ Well—what a fool the man is, and hev been all
these years, if he thinks the child his, as a’ do seem
THE FIDDLER OF THE REELS 173

to!” they whispered. “And everybody else knowing
otherwise !”

“No, I don’t think ’tis mine !” cried Ned, hoarsely,
as he looked up from his hands. ‘But she is mine,
all the same! Ha’n’t I nussed her? Ha’n’t I fed her
and teached her? Ha’n’t I played wi’ her? Oh, lit-
tle Carry—gone with that rogue—gone !”

“You ha’n’t lost your mis’ess, anyhow,” they said
to console him. ‘“She’s throwed up the sperrits, and
she is feeling better, and she’s more to ’ee than a child
that isn’t yours.”

“She isn’t! She’s not so particular much to me,
especially now she’s lost the little maid! But Carry’s
everything !”

“Well, ver’ like you'll find her to-morrow.”

“ Ah—but shallI? Yet he can’t hurt her—surely
he can’t! Well—how’s Car’line now? I am ready.
Is the cart here ?”

She was lifted into the vehicle, and they sadly lum-
bered on towards Stickleford. Next day she was
calmer ; but the fits were still upon her ; and her will
seemed shattered. For the child she appeared to show
singularly little anxiety, though Ned was nearly dis-
tracted. It was nevertheless quite expected that the
impish Mop would restore the lost one after a freak
of a day or two; but time went on, and neither he
nor she could be heard of, and Hipcroft murmured
that perhaps he was exercising upon her some unholy
musical charm, as he had done upon Car’line herself.
Weeks passed, and still they could obtain no clew
either to the fiddler’s whereabouts or the girl’s ; and
how he could have induced her to go with him re-
mained a mystery.

Then Ned, who had obtained only temporary em-
ployment in the neighborhood, took a sudden hatred
towards his native district, and a rumor reaching his

M
174 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

ears through the police that a somewhat similar man
and child had been seen at a fair near London, he
playing a violin, she dancing on stilts, a new interest
in the capital took possession of Hipcroft with an in-
tensity which would scarcely allow him time to pack
before returning thither. He did not, however, find
the lost one, though he made it the entire business of
his over-hours to stand about in by-streets in the hope
of discovering her, and would start up in the night,
saying, “ That rascal’s torturing her to maintain him!”
To which his wife would answer, peevishly, ‘ Don’t ’ee
raft yourself so, Ned! You prevent my getting a bit
o’ rest! He won’t hurt her !” and fall asleep again.

That Carry and her father had emigrated to America
was the general opinion; Mop, no doubt, finding the
girl a highly desirable companion when he had trained
her to keep him by her earnings as a dancer. There,
for that matter, they may be performing in some
capacity now, though he must be an old scamp verg-
ing on threescore-and-ten, and she a woman of four-
and-forty.

May, 1893.
A TRADITION OF 1804

TuE widely discussed possibility of an invasion of
England through a Channel tunnel has more than
once recalled old Solomon Selby’s story to my mind.

The occasion on which I numbered myself among
his audience was one evening when he was sitting
in the yawning chimney-corner of the inn-kitchen,
with some others who had gathered there, awaiting
the cessation of the rain. Withdrawing the stem of
his pipe from the dental notch in which it habitually
rested, he leaned back in the recess behind him and
smiled into the fire. The smile was neither mirth-
ful nor sad, not precisely humorous nor altogether
thoughtful. We who knew him recognized it in a
moment: it was his narrative smile. Breaking off
our few desultory remarks, we drew up closer, and he
thus began:

“My father, as you mid know, was a shepherd all
his life, and lived out by the Cove, four miles yon-
der, where I was born and lived likewise, till I moved
here shortly afore I wer married. The cottage that
first knew me stood on the top of the down, near the
sea; there was no house within a mile and a half of
it ; it was built o’ purpose for the farm-shepherd, and
had no other use. They tell me that it is now pulled
down, but that you can see where it stood by the
mounds of earth and a few broken bricks that are
176 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

still lying about. It was a bleak and dreary place
in winter-time, but in summer it was well enough,
though the garden never came to much, because we
could not get’ up a good shelter for the vegetables
and currant bushes, and where there is much wind
they don’t thrive.

“Of all them years of my growing up the ones that
bide clearest in my mind were eighteen hundred and
three, four, and five. This was for two reasons: I
had just then grown to an age when a child’s eyes
and ears take in and note down everything about him,
and there was more at that date to bear in mind than
there ever has been since with me. It was, as I need
hardly tell ye, the time after the first peace, when
Bonaparte was scheming his descent upon England.
He had crossed the great Alp mountains, fought in
Egypt, drubbed the Turks, the Austrians, and the
Proossians, and now thought he’d have a slap at us.
On the other side of the Channel, scarce out of sight
and hail of a man standing on our English shore, the
French army of a hundred and sixty thousand men
and fifteen thousand horses had been brought to-
gether from all parts, and were drilling every day.
Bonaparte had been three years a-making his prepa-
rations ; and to ferry these soldiers and cannon and
horses across he had contrived a couple of thousand
flat-bottomed boats. These boats were small things,
but wonderfully built. A good few of ’em were so
made as to have a little stable on board each for the
two horses that were to haul the cannon carried at
the stern. To get in order all these, and other things
required, he had assembled there five or six thousand
fellows that worked at trades—carpenters, black-
smiths, wheelwrights, saddlers, and what not. Oh,
*twas a curious time !

“Every morning neighbor Boney would muster his
A TRADITION OF 1804 177

multitude of soldiers on the beach, draw ’em up in
line, practise ’°em in the mancuvre of embarking,
horses and all, till they could do it without a single
hitch. My father drove a flock of ewes up into Sus-
sex that year, and as he went along the drover’s
track over the high downs thereabout he could see
this drilling actually going on—the accoutrements of
the rank and file glittering in the sun like silver. It
was thought and always said by my uncle Job, ser-
geant of foot (who used to know all about these mat-
ters), that Bonaparte meant to cross with oars on a
calm night. The grand query with us was, Where
would my gentleman land? Many of the common
people thought it would be at Dover; others, who
knew how unlikely it was that any skilful general
would make a business of landing just where he was
expected, said he’d go either east into the river
Thames, or west’ard to some convenient place, most
likely one of the little bays inside the Isle of Port-
land, between the Beal and St. Alban’s Head—and
for choice the three-quarter-round Cove, screened
from every mortal eye, that seemed made o’ purpose,
out by where we lived, and which I’ve climmed up
with two tubs of brandy across my shoulders on
scores 0’ dark nights in my younger days. Some had
heard that a part o’ the French fleet would sail right
round Scotland, and come up the Channel to a suita-
ble haven. However, there was much doubt upon
the matter; and no wonder, for after-years proved
that Bonaparte himself could hardly make up his
mind upon that great and very particular point—
where to land. His uncertainty came about in this
wise: that he could get no news as to where and how
our troops lay in waiting, and that his knowledge of
possible places where flat-bottomed boats might be
quietly run ashore, and the men they brought mar-
12
178 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

shalled in order, was dim to the last degree. Being
flat-bottomed, they didn’t require a harbor for un-
shipping their cargo of men, but a good shelving
beach away from sight, and with a fair open road
towards London. How the question posed that great
Corsican tyrant (as we used to call him), what pains
he took to settle it, and, above all, what a risk he ran
on one particular night in trying to do so, were known
only to one man here and there ; and certainly to no
maker of newspapers or printer of books, or my ac-
count o’t would not have had so many heads shaken
over it as it has by gentry who only believe what
they see in printed lines.

“The flocks my father had charge of fed all about
the downs near our house, overlooking the sea and
shore each way for miles. Jn winter and early spring
father was up a deal at nights, watching and tending
the lambing. Often he’d go to bed early, and turn
out at twelve or one; and, on the other hand, he’d
sometimes stay up till twelve or one, and then turn
in to bed. As soon as I was old enough I used to
help him, mostly in the way of keeping an eye upon
the ewes while he was gone home to rest. This is
what I was doing in a particular month in either the
year four or five—I can’t certainly fix which, but it
was long before I was took away from the sheep-
keeping to be bound prentice to a trade. Every
night at that time I was at the fold, about half a
mile, or it may be a little more, from our cottage,
and no living thing at all with me but the ewes and
young lambs. Afeard? No; I was never afeard of
being alone at these times ; for I had been reared in
such an out-step place that the lack o’ human beings
at night made me less fearful than the sight of ’em.
Directly I saw a man’s shape after dark in a lonely
place I was frightened out of my senses,
A TRADITION OF 1804 179

“One day in that month we were surprised by a
visit from my uncle Job, the sergeant in the Sixty-
first foot, then in camp on the downs above King
George’s watering - place, several miles to the west
yonder. Uncle Job dropped in about dusk, and went
up with my father to the fold for an hour or two.
Then he came home, had a drop to drink from the tub
of sperrits that the smugglers kept us in for housing
their liquor when they’d made a run, and for burning
’em off when there was danger. After that he stretched
himself out on the settle to sleep. I went to bed:
at one o'clock father came home, and waking me to go
and take his place, according to custom, went to bed
himself. On my way out of the house I passed Uncle
Job on the settle. He opened his eyes, and upon my
telling him where I was going he said it was a shame
that such a youngster as I should go up there all alone;
and when he had fastened up his stock and waist-belt
he set off along with me, taking a drop from the sper-
rit-tub in a little flat bottle that stood in the corner
cupboard.

‘“‘ By-and-by we drew up to the fold, saw that all was
right, and then, to keep ourselves warm, curled up in
a heap of straw that lay inside the thatched hurdles
we had set up to break the stroke of the wind when
there was any. To-night, however, there was none. It
was one of those very still nights when, if you stand
on the high hills anywhere within two or three miles
of the sea, you can hear the rise and fall of the tide
along the shore, coming and going every few moments
like a sort of great snore of the sleeping world. Over
the lower ground there was a bit of a mist, but on
the hill where we lay the air was clear, and the moon,
then in her last quarter, flung a fairly good light on
the grass and scattered straw.

“ While we lay there Uncle Job amused me by tell-
180 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

ing me strange stories of the wars he had served in
and the wounds he had got. He had already fought
the French in the Low Countries, and hoped to fight
’em again. His stories lasted so long that at last I was
hardly sure that I was not a soldier myself, and had
seen such service as he told of. The wonders of his
tales quite bewildered my mind, till I fell asleep and
dreamed of battle, smoke, and flying soldiers, all of
a kind with the doings he had been bringing up to
me.

“How long my nap lasted I am not prepared to
say. But some faint sounds over and above the rustle
of the ewes in the straw, the bleat of the lambs, and
the tinkle of the sheep-bell brought me to my waking
senses. Uncle Job was still beside me; but he too
had fallen asleep. I looked out from the straw, and
saw what it was that had aroused me. Two men, in
boat cloaks, cocked hats, and swords, stood by the
hurdles about twenty yards off.

“JT turned my ear thitherward to catch what they
were saying, but though I heard every word o’t, not
one did I understand. They spoke in a tongue that
was not ours—in French, as I afterwards found.
But if I could not gain the meaning of a word, I was
shrewd boy enough to find out a deal of the talkers’
business. By the light o’ the moon I could see that
one of ’em carried a roll of paper in his hand, while
every moment he spoke quick to his comrade, and
pointed right and left with the other hand to spots
along the shore. There was no doubt that he was ex-
plaining to the second gentleman the shapes and feat-
ures of the coast. What happened soon after made
this still clearer to me.

“ All this time I had not waked Uncle Job, but now
I began to be afeard that they might light upon us,
because uncle breathed so heavily through’s nose. I
A TRADITION OF 1804 181

put my mouth to his ear and whispered, ‘Uncle
Job.’

“What is it, my boy ? he said, just as if he hadn’t
been asleep at all.

“¢ Hush!’ says I. ‘Two French generals—

“¢French ? says he.

«Yes, says I. ‘Come to see where to land their
army !

“JT pointed ’em out; but I could say no more, for
the pair were coming at that moment much nearer to
where we lay. As soon as they got as near as eight
or ten yards, the officer with a roll in his hand stooped
down to a slanting hurdle, unfastened his roll upon it,
and spread it out. Then suddenly he sprung a dark-
lantern open on the paper, and showed it to be a
map.

“ «What be they looking at? I whispered to Uncle
Job.

“¢A chart of the Channel,’ says the sergeant (know-
ing about such things).

“The other French officer now stooped likewise,
and over the map they had a long consultation, as
they pointed here and there on the paper, and then
hither and thither at places along the shore beneath
us. I noticed that the manner of one officer was very
respectful towards the other, who seemed much his
superior, the second in rank calling him by a sort
of title that I did not know the sense of. The head
one, on the other hand, was quite familiar with his
friend, and more than once clapped him on the shoul-
der.

“Uncle Job had watched as well as I, but though
the map had been in the lantern-light, their faces had
always been in shade. But when they rose from
stooping over the chart, the light flashed upward, and
fell smart upon one of ’em’s features. No sooner had
182 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

this happened than Uncle Job gasped, and sank down
as if he’d been in a fit.

“¢ What is it—what is it, Uncle Job?’ said I

“¢QO good God!’ says he, under the straw.

“< What?’ says I.

“« Boney !’ he groaned out.

“¢ Who ? says I.

“*Bonaparty,’ he said. ‘The Corsican ogre. O
that I had got but my new-flinted firelock, that there
man should die! But I haven’t got my new-flinted
firelock, and that there man must live. So lie low, as
you value your life!’

“JT did lie low, as you mid suppose. But I couldn't
help peeping. And then I too, lad as I was, knew that
it was the face of Bonaparte. Not know Boney? I
should think I did know Boney. I should have known
him by half the light o’ that lantern. If I had seen a
picture of his features once, I had seen it a hundred
times. There was his bullet head, his short neck, his
round yaller cheeks and chin, his gloomy face, and his
great, glowing eyes. He took off his hat to blow him-
self a bit, and there was the forelock in the middle
of his forehead, as in all the draughts of him. In
moving, his cloak fell a little open, and I could see
for a moment his white-fronted jacket and one of his
epaulets.

“But none of this lasted long. In a minute he and
his general had rolled up the map, shut the lantern,
and turned to go down towards the shore.

“Then Uncle Job came to himself a bit. ‘Slipped
across in the night-time to see how to put his men
ashore,’ he said. ‘The like o’ that man’s coolness
eyes will never again see! Nephew,I must act in
this, and immediate, or England’s lost!’

“When they were over the brow, we crope out,
and went seme little way to look after them. Half-
A TRADITION OF 1804 183

way down they were joined by two others, and six or
seven minutes brought them to the shore. Then,
from behind a rock, a boat came out into the weak
moonlight of the Cove, and they jumped in; it put
off instantly, and vanished in a few minutes between
the two rocks that stand at the mouth of the Cove as
we all know. We climmed back to where we had
been before, and I could see, a little way out, a larger
vessel, though still not very large. The little boat
drew up alongside, was made fast at the stern as I
suppose, for the largest sailed away, and we saw no
more.

“My uncle Job told his officers as soon as he got
back to camp; but what they thought of it I never
heard—neither did he. Boney’s army never came, and
a good job for me; for the Cove below my father’s
house was where he meant to land, as this secret visit
showed. We coast-folk should have been cut down
one and all, and I should not have sat here to tell this
tale.”

We who listened to old Selby that night have been
familiar with his simple gravestone for these ten years
past. Thanks to the incredulity of the age, his tale
has been seldom repeated. But if anything short of
the direct testimony of his own eyes could persuade
an auditor that Bonaparte had examined these shores
for himself with a view to a practicable landing-place,
it would have been Solomon Selby’s manner of nar-
rating the adventure which befell him on the down.

Christmas, 1882.
A FEW CRUSTED CHARACTERS
A FEW CRUSTED CHARACTERS

Ir is a Saturday afternoon of blue-and-yellow au-
tumn-time, and the scene is the high street of a well-
known market-town. <A large carrier’s van stands in
the quadrangular fore-court of the White Hart Inn,
upon the sides of its spacious tilt being painted, in
weather - beaten letters: “‘Burthen, Carrier to Long-
puddle.” These vans, so numerous hereabout, are a
respectable, if somewhat lumbering, class of convey-
ance, much resorted to by decent travellers not over-
stocked with money, the better among them roughly
corresponding to the old French diligences.

The present one is timed to leave the town at four
in the afternoon precisely, and it is now half- past
three by the clock in the turret at the top of the
street. In a few seconds errand-boys from the shops
begin to arrive with packages which they fling into
the vehicle, and turn away whistling, and care for
the packages no more. At twenty minutes to four
an elderly woman places her basket upon the shafts,
slowly mounts, takes up a seat inside, and folds her
bands and her lips. She has secured her corner for
the journey, though there is as yet no sign of a horse
being put in, nor of a carrier. At the three-quarters,
two other women arrive, in whom the first recognizes
the postmistress of Upper Longpuddle and the regis-
trar’s wife, they recognizing her as the aged groceress
188 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

of the same village. At five minutes to the hour
there approach Mr. Profitt, the school-master, in a
soft felt hat, and Christopher Twink, the master-
thatcher ; and as the hour strikes there rapidly drop
in the parish-clerk and his wife, the seedsman and his
aged father, the registrar ; also Mr. Day, the world-
ignored local landscape-painter, an elderly man who
resides in his native place, and has never sold a pict-
ure outside it, though his pretensions to art have been
nobly supported by his fellow-villagers, whose confi-
dence in his genius has been as remarkable as the
outer neglect of it, leading them to buy his paintings
so extensively (at the price of a few shillings each, it
is true) that every dwelling in the parish exhibits
three or four of those admired productions on its
walls,

Burthen, the carrier, is by this time seen bustling
round the vehicle ; the horses are put in, the propri-
etor arranges the reins and springs up into his seat as
if he were used to it—which he is.

“Is everybody here ?” he asks, preparatorily, over
his shoulder to the passengers within.

As those who were not there did not reply in the
negative the muster was assumed to be complete, and
after a few hitches and hinderances the van with its
human freight was got under way. It jogged on at
an easy pace till it reached the bridge which formed
the last outpost of the town. The carrier pulled up
suddenly

“ Bless my soul!” he said, “T’ve forgot the curate !”

All who could do so gazed from the little back win-
dow of the van, but the curate was not in sight.

“Now I wonder where that there man is?” contin-
ued the carrier.

“Poor man, he ought to have a living at his time
of life.”
A FEW CRUSTED CHARACTERS 189

“And he ought to be punctual,” said the carrier.
*«¢Four o'clock sharp is my time for starting,’ I said
to ’en. And he said, ‘I’ll be there.’ Now he’s not
here ; and as a serious old Church minister he ought
to be as good as his word. Perhaps Mr. Flaxton
knows, being in the same line of life?” He turned to
the parish-clerk.

“T was talking an immense deal with him, that’s
true, half an hour ago,” replied that ecclesiastic, as
one of whom it was no erroneous supposition that he
should be on intimate terms with another of the cloth.
“ But he didn’t say he would be late.”

The discussion was cut off by the appearance round
the corner of the van of rays from the curate’s spec-
tacles, followed hastily by his face and a few white
whiskers, and the swinging tails of his long gaunt
coat. Nobody reproached him, seeing how he was
reproaching himself ; and he entered breathlessly and
took his seat.

“Now be we all here?” said the carrier again.
They started a second time, and moved on till they
were about three hundred yards out of the town, and
had nearly reached the second bridge, behind which,
as every native remembers, the road takes a turn and
travellers by this highway disappear finally from the
view of gazing burghers.

“Well, as I’m alive!” cried the postmistress from
the interior of the conveyance, peering through the
little square back window along the road townward.

“What ?” said the carrier.

«A man hailing us !”

Another sudden stoppage. “Somebody else?” the
carrier asked.

“Aye, sure!” All waited silently, while those who
could gaze out did so.

“‘ Now, who can that be?” Burthen continued. “I

Ww
190 LIFh’s LITTLE IRONIES

just put it to ye, neighbors, can any man keep time
with such hinderances? Bain’t we full a’ready ? Who
in the world can the man be?”

“He’s a sort of gentleman,” said the school-master,
his position commanding the road more comfortably
than that of his comrades.

The stranger, who had been holding up his umbrella
to attract their notice, was walking forward leisurely
enough, now that he found, by their stopping, that
it had been secured. His clothes were decidedly not
of a local cut, though it was difficult to point out
any particular mark of difference. In his left hand he
carried a small leather travelling-bag. As soon as he
had overtaken the van he glanced at the inscription
on its side, as if to assure himself that he had hailed
the right conveyance, and asked if they had room.

The carrier replied that though they were pretty
well laden he supposed they could carry one more,
whereupon the stranger mounted, and took the seat
cleared for him within. And then the horses made
another move, this time for good, and swung along
with their burden of fourteen souls all told.

“You bain’t one of these parts, sir?” said the car-
rier. “I could tell that as far as I could see ’ee.”

“Yes, I am one of these parts,” said the stranger.

“Oh? Hm.”

The silence which followed seemed to imply a
doubt of the truth of the new-comer’s assertion. “TI
was speaking of Upper Longpuddle more particular,”
continued the carrier, hardily, “and I think I know
most faces of that valley.”

“TI was born at Longpuddle, and nursed at Long-
puddle, and my father and grandfather before me,”
said the passenger, quietly.

“Why, to be sure,” said the aged groceress in the
background, “it isn’t John Lackland’s son—never—
A FEW CRUSTED CHARACTERS 191

it can’t be—he who went to foreign parts five-and-
thirty years ago with his wife and family? Yet—
what do I hear ?—that’s his father’s voice !”

“That’s the man,” replied the stranger. “John
Lackland was my father, and I am John Lackland’s
son. Five-and-thirty years ago, when I was a boy of
eleven, my parents emigrated across the seas, taking
me and my sister with them. Kytes’s boy Tony was
the one who drove us and our belongings to Caster-
bridge on the morning we left; and his was the last
Longpuddle face I saw. We sailed the same week
across the ocean, and there we’ve been ever since, and
there I’ve left those I went with—all three.”

“ Alive or dead ?”

“Dead,” he replied in a low voice. “And I have
come back to the old place, having nourished a thought
—not a definite intention, but just a thought—that I
should like to return here in a year or two, to spend
the remainder of my days.”

“Married man, Mr. Lackland ?”

ce No.”

“And have the world used ’ee well, sir—or rather
John, knowing ’ee asachild? In these rich new coun-
tries that we hear of so much, you’ve got rich with the
rest ?”

“T am not very rich,” Mr. Lackland said. “Even
in new countries, you know, there are failures. The
race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the
strong; and even if it sometimes is, you may be nei-
ther swift nor strong. However, that’s enough about
me. Now, having answered your inquiries, you must
answer mine; for, being in London, I have come down
here entirely to discover what Longpuddle is looking
like, and who are living there. That was why I pre-
ferred a seat in your van to hiring a carriage for driv-
ing across.”
192 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“Well, as for Longpuddle, we rub on there much as
usual. Old figures have dropped out o’ their frames,
so to speak it, and new ones have been put in their
places. You mentioned Tony Kytes as having been
the one to drive your family and your goods to Cas-
terbridge in his father’s wagon when you left. Tony
is, I believe, living still, but not at Longpuddle. He
went away and settled at Lewgate, near Mellstock,
after his marriage. Ah, Tony was a sort o’ man !”

“His character had hardly come out when I knew
him.”

“No. But ’twas well enough, as far as that goes—
except as to women. I shall never forget his courting
—never!”

The returned villager waited silently, and the car-
rier went on:
TONY KYTES, THE ARCH-DECEIVER

“T sHau never forget Tony’s face. "Twas a little,
round, firm, tight face, with a seam here and there left
by the small-pox, but not enough to burt his looks in a
woman’s eye, though he’d had it badish when he was a
boy. So very serious looking and unsmiling ’a was,
that young man, that it really seemed as if he couldn’t
laugh at all without great pain to his conscience. He
looked very hard at a small speck in your eye when
talking to ’ee. And there was no more sign of a whis-
ker or beard on Tony Kytes’s face than on the palm.
of my hand. He used to sing ‘The Tailor’s Breeches’
with a réligious manner, as if it were a hymn:

““O the petticoats went off, and the breeches they went on;’

and all the rest of the scandalous stuff. He was quite
the women’s favorite, and in return for their likings he
loved ’em in shoals.

“ But in course of time Tony got fixed down to one
in particular, Milly Richards—a nice, light, small, ten-
der little thing; and it was soon said that they were
engaged to be married. One Saturday he had been
to market to do business for his father, and was driv-
ing home the wagon in the afternoon, When he
reached the foot of the very hill we shall be going
over in ten minutes, who should he see waiting for
him at the top but Unity Sallet, a handsome girl, one
of the young women he’d been very tender towards
before he’d got engaged to Milly.

13
194 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“As soon as Tony came up to her she said, ‘My
dear Tony, will you give me a lift home?”

“<That I will, darling,’ said Tony. ‘You don’t
suppose I could refuse ’ee ?”

‘She smiled a smile, and up she hopped, and on
drove Tony.

“¢Tony,’ she says, in a sort of tender chide, ‘why
did ye desert me for that other one? In what is she
better thanI? I should have made ’ee a finer wife,
and a more loving one, too. ’Tisn’t girls that are so
easily won at first that are the best. Think how long
we’ve known each other—ever since we were children
almost—now haven’t we, Tony ?”

“Yes, that we have,’ says Tony, a-struck with the
truth o’t.

“And you’ve never seen anything in me to com-
plain of, have ye, Tony? Now tell the truth to me.’

“¢T never have, upon my life,’ says Tony.

“¢ And—can you say I’m not pretty, Tony? Now
look at me !’

“He let his eyes light upon her for a long while.
‘I really can’t,’ says he. ‘In fact, I never knowed
you was so pretty before !’

“«¢Prettier than she ?

“ What Tony would have said to that nobody knows,
for before he could speak, what should he see ahead,
over the hedge past the turning, but a feather he knew
well—the feather in Milly’s hat—she to whom he had
been thinking of putting the question as to giving out
the banns that very week.

“¢ Unity,’ says he, as mild as he could, ‘ here’s Milly
coming. NowI shall catch it mightily if she sees ’ee
riding here with me; and if you get down she’ll be
turning the corner in a moment, and, seeing ’ee in the
road, she’ll know we’ve been coming on together.
Now, dearest Unity, will ye, to avoid all unpleasant-
TONY KYTES, THE ARCH-DECEIVER 195

ness, which I know ye can’t bear any more than I, will
ye lie down in the back part of the wagon, and let me
cover you over with the tarpaulin till Milly has passed ?
It will all be done in a minute. Do!—and Pll think
over what we've said; and perhaps I shall put a loving
question to you after all, instead of to Milly. °Tisn’t
true that it is all settled between her and me.’

“Well, Unity Sallet agreed, and lay down at the
back end of the wagon, and Tony covered her over,
so that the wagon seemed to be empty but for the
loose tarpaulin ; and then he drove on to meet Milly.

“*My dear Tony! cries Milly, looking up with a
little pout at him as he came near. ‘How long you’ve
been coming home! Just as if I didn’t live at Upper
Longpuddle at all! And I’ve come to meet you as
you asked me to do, and to ride back with you, and
talk over our future home—since you asked me, and
I promised. But I shouldn’t have come else, Mr.
Tony !

“¢ Ay, my dear, I did ask ye—to be sure I did, now
I think of it—but I had quite forgot it. To ride back
with me, did you say, dear Milly ”

“¢Well, of course! What can I do else? Surely
you don’t want me to walk, now I’ve come all this
way ?

“<QOh no, no! I was thinking you might be go-
ing on to town to meet your mother. I saw her
there—and she looked as if she might be expect-
ing ’ee.’

“¢Oh no; she’s just home. She came across the
fields, and so got back before you.’

«“¢ Ah! I didn’t know that,’ says Tony. And there
was no help for it but to take her up beside him.

“They talked on very pleasantly, and looked at the
trees and beasts and birds and insects, and at the
ploughmen at work in the fields, till presently who
196 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

should they see looking out of the upper window of a
house that stood beside the road they were following
but Hannah Jolliver, another young beauty of the
place at that time, and the very first woman that Tony
had fallen in love with—before Milly and before
Unity, in fact—the one that he had almost arranged
to marry instead of Milly. She was a much more
dashing girl than Milly Richards, though he’d not
thought much of her of late. The house Hannah was
looking from was her aunt’s.

“ «My dear Milly—my coming wife, as I may call
’ee,’ says Tony in his modest way, and not so loud
that Unity could overhear ‘I see a young woman look-
ing out of window who I think may accost me. The
fact is, Milly, she had a notion that I was wishing to
marry her, and since she’s discovered I’ve promised
another, and prettier than she, I’m rather afeared
of her temper if she sees us together. Now, Milly,
would you do me a favor—-my coming wife, as I may
say?’

“< Certainly, dearest Tony,’ says she.

««Then would ye creep under the tarpaulin just
here in the front of the wagon, and hide there out of
sight till we’ve passed the house? She hasn’t seen us
yet. Yousee, we ought to live in peace and good-will
since ‘tis almost Christmas, and ’twill prevent angry
passions rising, which we always should do.’

“<J don’t mind, to oblige you, Tony,’ Milly said ;
and though she didn’t care much about doing it, she
crept under, and crouched down just behind the seat,
Unity being snug at the other end. So they drove on
till they got near the road-side cottage. Hannah had
soon seen him coming, and waited at the window,
looking down upon him. She tossed her head a little
disdainful and smiled off-hand.

“Well, aren’t you going to be civil enough to ask
TONY KYTES, THE ARCH-DECEIVER 197

me to ride home with you? she says, seeing that he
was for driving past with a nod and a smile.

“* Ah, to be sure! What was I thinking of ? said
Tony, in a flutter. ‘But you seem as if you was stay-
ing at your aunt’s?’

“*No, I am not,’ she said. ‘Don’t you see I have
my bonnet and jacket on? I have only called to see
her on my way home. How can you be so stupid,
Tony ?

«Tn that case—ah—of course you must come along
wi’ me,’ says Tony, feeling a dim sort of sweat rising
up inside his clothes. And he reined in the horse, and
waited till she’d come down-stairs, and then helped
her up beside him. He drove on again, his face as
long as a face that was a round one by nature well
could be.

“ Hannah looked round sideways into his eyes.
‘This is nice, isn’t it, Tony?’ she says. ‘I like riding
with you.’

“Tony looked back into her eyes. ‘And I with
you,’ he said, after a while. In short, having consid-
ered her, he warmed up, and the more he looked at
her the more he liked her, till he couldn’t for the life
of him think why he had ever said a word about mar-
riage to Milly or Unity while Hannah Joiliver was in
question. So they sat a little closer and closer, their
feet upon the foot-board and their shoulders touching,
and Tony thought over and over again how handsome
Hannah was. He spoke tenderer and tenderer, and
called her ‘dear Hannah’ in a whisper at last.

“ «You've settled it with Milly by this time, I sup-
pose,’ said she.

« ¢N—no, not exactly.’

“¢What? How low you talk, Tony.’

“¢Veg—lI’ve a kind of hoarseness. I said, not ex-
actly.’
198 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“¢T suppose you mean to?”

“<Well, as to that— His eyes rested on her face,
and hers on his. He wondered how he could have
been such a fool as not to follow up Hannah. ‘My
sweet Hannah! he bursts out, taking her hand, not
being really able to help it, and forgetting Milly and
Unity and all the world besides. ‘Settled it? I
don’t think I have!’

“¢Hark! says Hannah.

“ «What? says Tony, letting go her hand.

“¢Surely I heard a sort of little screaming squeak
under that tar-cloth? Why, you’ve been carrying
corn, and there’s mice in this wagon, I declare!’ She
began to haul up the tails of her gown.

“*Oh no; ’tis the axle,’ said Tony, in an assuring
way. ‘It do go like that sometimes in dry weather.’

“¢ Perhaps it was. . . . Well, now, to be quite honest,
dear Tony, do you like her better than me? Because
—because, although I’ve held off so independent, I'll
own at last that I do like ’ee, Tony, to tell the truth ;
and I wouldn’t say no if you asked me— you know
what.’

“Tony was so won over by this pretty offering
mood of a girl who had been quite the reverse (Han-
nah had a backward way with her at times, if you can
mind) that he just glanced behind, and then whispered
very soft, ‘I haven’t quite promised her, and I think
I can get out of it, and ask you that question you
speak of.’

“ «Throw over Milly ?—all to marry me! How de-
lightful!’ broke out Hannah, quite loud, clapping her
hands.

“ At this there was a real squeak—an angry, spite-
ful squeak, and afterwards along moan, as if something
had broke its heart, and a movement of the wagon
cloth.
TONY KYTES, THE ARCH-DECEIVER 199

“¢Something’s there !’ said Hannah, starting up.

“<Tt’s nothing, really,’ says Tony, in a soothing
voice, and praying inwardly for a way out of this.
‘I wouldn’t tell ’ee at first, because I wouldn’t fright-
en ’ee. But, Hannah, I’ve really a couple of ferrets
in a bag under there, for rabbiting, and they quarrel
sometimes, I don’t wish it knowed, as ’twould be
called poaching. Oh, they can’t get out, bless ye !—
you are quite safe. And—and—what a fine day it is,
isn’t it, Hannah, for this time of year? Be you going
to market next Saturday? How is your aunt now?
And so on, says Tony, to keep her from talking any
more about love in Milly’s hearing.

“But he found his work cut out for him, and won-
dering again how he should get out of this ticklish
business, he looked about fora chance. Nearing home
he saw his father in a field not far off, holding up his
hand as if he wished to speak to Tony.

“¢ Would you mind taking the reins a moment,
Hannah,’ he said, much relieved, ‘ while I go and find
out what father wants ?’

“‘ She consented, and away he hastened into the field,
only too glad to get breathing-time. He found that
his father was looking at him with rather a stern eye.

“ “Come, come, Tony,’ says old Mr. Kytes, as soon as
his son was alongside him, ‘this won’t do, you know.’

“¢ What ? says Tony.

“¢ Why, if you mean to marry Milly Richards, do
it, and there’s an end o’t. But don’t go driving about
the country with Jolliver’s daughter and making a
scandal. I won’t have such things done.’

“¢T only asked her—that is, she asked me—to ride
home.’

“She? Why, now, if it had been Milly, ’twould
have been quite proper; but you and Hannah Jolliver
going about by yourselves—
200 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“¢Milly’s there, too, father.’

“*Milly? Where?”

“¢Under the tarpaulin! Yes; the truth is, father,
I’ve got rather into a nunny-watch, I’m afeard! Unity
Sallet is there, too—yes, under the other end of the
tarpaulin. All three are in that wagon, and what to
do with ’em I know no more than the dead. The best
plan is, as I’m thinking, to speak out loud and plain
to one of ’em before the rest, and that will settle it ;
not but what ’twill cause ’em to kick up a bit of a
miff, for certain. Now, which would you marry, fa-
ther, if you was in my place ?”

“¢ Whichever of ’em did not ask to ride with thee.’

“¢That was Milly, ’m bound to say, as she only
mounted by my invitation. But Milly—

“ «Then stick to Milly, she’s the best... . But look at
that!

“ His father pointed towards the wagon. ‘She can’t
hold that horse in. You shouldn’t have left the reins
in her hands. Run on and take the horse’s head, or
there’ll be some accident to them maids !’

“ Tony’s horse, in fact, in spite of Hannah’s tugging
at the reins, had started on his way at a brisk walking
pace, being very anxious to get back to the stable, for
he had had a long day out. Without another word,
Tony rushed away from his father to overtake the
horse.

“Now, of all things that could have happened to
wean him from Milly, there was nothing so powerful
as his father’s recommending her. No; it could not
be Milly, after all. Hannah must be the one, since he
could not marry all three. This he thought while
running after the wagon. But queer things were hap-
pening inside it.

“Tt was, of course, Milly who had screamed under
the tarpaulin, being obliged to let off her bitter rage
TONY KYTES, THE ARCH-DECEIVER 201

and shame in that way at what Tony was saying, and
never daring to show, for very pride and dread o’ be-
ing laughed at, that she was in hiding. She became
more and more restless, and in twisting herself about,
what did she see but another woman’s foot and white
stocking close to her head. It quite frightened her,
not knowing that Unity Sallet was in the wagon like-
wise. But after the fright was over she determined
to get to the bottom of all ‘this, and she crept and
crept along the bed of the wagon, under the cloth,
like a snake, when lo and behold she came face to face
with Unity.

“¢Well, if this isn’t disgraceful!’ says Milly, in a
raging whisper, to Unity.

“<oTis,” says Unity, ‘to see you hiding in a young
man’s wagon like this, and no great character belong-
ing to either of ye!’

“¢Mind what you are saying! replied Milly, get-
ting louder. ‘I am engaged to be married to him,
and haven’t I a right to be here? What right have
you, I should like to know? What has he been prom-
ising you? A pretty lot of nonsense, I expect! But
what Tony says to other women is all mere wind, and
no concern to me!’

“¢Don’t you be too sure!’ says Unity. ‘He’s go-
ing to have Hannah, and not you, nor me either; I
could hear that.’

“Now, at these strange voices sounding from under
the cloth Hannah was thunderstruck a’most into a
swound ; and it was just at this time that the horse
moved on. Hannah tugged away wildly, not know-
ing what she was doing; and as the quarrel rose
louder and louder Hannah got so horrified that she let
go the reins altogether. The horse went on at his
own pace, and coming to the corner where we turn
round to drop down the hill to Lower Longpuddle
202 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

he turned too quick, the off-wheels went up the bank,
the wagon rose sideways till it was quite on edge
upon the near axles, and out rolled the three maidens
into the road in a heap.

“When Tony came up, frightened and breathless,
he was relieved enough to see that neither of his dar-
lings was hurt, beyond a few scratches from the bram-
bles of the hedge. But he was rather alarmed when
he heard how they were going on at one another.

“<«Don’t ye quarrel, my dears—don’t ye !’ says he,
taking off his hat out of respect to em. And then he
would have kissed them all round, as fair and square
as a man could, but they were in too much of a taking
to let him, and screeched and sobbed till they was
quite spent.

“Now, I'll speak out honest, because I ought to,’
says Tony, as soon as he could get heard. ‘And this
is the truth,’ says he: ‘I’ve asked Hannah to be mine,
and she is willing, and we are going to put up the
banns next—’

“Tony had not noticed that Hannah’s father was
coming up behind, nor had he noticed that Hannah’s
face was beginning to bleed from the scratch of a
bramble. Hannah had seen her father, and had run
to him, crying worse than ever.

“ «My daughter is not willing, sir,’ says Mr. Jolliver,
hot and strong. ‘Be you willing, Hannah? I ask ye
to have spirit enough to refuse him, if yer virtue is
left to ’ee and you run no risk ?”

“¢She’s as sound as a bell for me, that I'll swear!’
says Tony, flaring up. ‘And so’s the others, come to
that, though you may think it an onusual thing!’

“*T have spirit, and I do refuse him!’ says Hannah,
partly because her father was there, and partly, too,
in a tantrum because of the discovery and the scratch
on her face. ‘ Little did I think when I was so soft
TONY KYTES, THE ARCH-DECEIVER 2038

with him just now that I was talking to such a false
deceiver !’

“ «What, you won’t have me, Hannah?’ says Tony,
his jaw hanging down like a dead man’s.

“*Never; I would sooner marry no—nobody at all!’
she gasped out, though with her heart in her throat,
for she would not have refused Tony if he bad asked
her quietly, and her father had not been there, and
her face had not been scratched by the bramble. And
having said that, away she walked upon her father’s
arm, thinking and hoping he would ask her again.

“Tony didn’t know what to say next. Milly was
sobbing her heart out; but as his father had strongly
recommended her he couldn’t feel inclined that way.
So he turned to Unity.

“¢ Well, will you, Unity dear, be mine? he says.

“«Take her leavings? Not I!’ says Unity. ‘Td
scorn it!’ And away walks Unity Sallet likewise,
though she looked back when she’d gone some way,
to see if he was following her.

“So there at last were left Milly and Tony by them-
selves, she crying in watery streams, and Tony looking
like a tree struck by lightning.

“Well, Milly,’ he says at last, going up to her, ‘it
do seem as if fate had ordained that it should be you
and I, or nobody. And what must be must be, I sup-
pose. Hey, Milly?

“ «Tf you like, Tony. You didn’t really mean what
you said to them?”

‘““*Not a word of it,’ declares Tony, bringing down
his fist upon his palm.

“And then he kissed her, and put the wagon to
rights, and they mounted together; and their banns
were put up the very next Sunday. I was not able to
go to their wedding, but it was a rare party they had,
by all account. Everybody in Longpuddle was there
204 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

almost; you among the rest, I think, Mr. Flaxton?”
The speaker turned to the parish-clerk.

“T was,” said Mr. Flaxton. ‘And that party was
the cause of a very curious change in some other peo-
ple’s affairs; I mean in Steve Hardcome’s and his
cousin James’s.”

“Ah! the Hardcomes,” said the stranger. “ How
familiar that name is to me! What of them?”

The clerk cleared his throat and began:
THE HISTORY OF THE HARDCOMES

“ Yes, Tony’s was the very best wedding-randy that
ever I was at; and I’ve been at a good many, as you
may suppose”—turning to the newly-arrived one—
“having, as a Church officer, the privilege to attend all
christening, wedding, and funeral parties—such being
our Wessex custom.

“*Pwas on a frosty night in Christmas week, and
among the folk invited were the said Hardcomes 0’
Climmerston—Steve and James—first cousins, both of
them small farmers, just entering into business on their
own account. With them came, as a matter of course,
their intended wives, two young women of the neigh-
borhood, both very pretty and sprightly maidens, and
numbers of friends from Abbot’s-Cernel and Weather-
bury and Mellstock and I don’t know where—a regu-
lar houseful.

“The kitchen was cleared of furniture for dancing,
and the old folk played at ‘ Put’ and ‘ All-fours’ in
the parlor, though at last they gave that up to join in
the dance. The top of the figure was by the large
front window of the room, and there were so many
couples that the lower part of the figure reached
through the door at the back, and into the darkness
of the out-house; in fact, you couldn’t see the end of
the row at all, and ’twas never known exactly how
long that dance was, the lowest couples being lost
among the fagots and brushwood in the out-house.

“When we had danced a few hours, and the crowns

of we taller men were swelling into lumps with bump-
oO
206 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

ing the beams of the ceiling, the first fiddler laid down
his fiddle-bow, and said he should play no more, for he
wished to dance. And in another hour the second
fiddler laid down his, and said he wanted to dance,
too; so there was only the third fiddler left, and he
was a’ old, aged man, very weak in the wrist. How-
ever, he managed to keep up a feeble tweedle-dee;
put there being no chair in the room, and his knees
being as weak as his wrists, he was obliged to sit upon
as much of the little corner-table as projected beyond
the corner cupboard fixed over it, which was not a very
wide seat for a man advanced in years.

“Among those who danced most continually were
the two engaged couples, as was natural to their situ-
ation. Each pair was very well matched, and very
unlike the other. James Hardcome’s intended was
called Emily Darth, and both she and James were
gentle, nice-minded, in-door people, fond of a quiet
life. Steve and his chosen, named Olive Pawle, were
different ; they were of a more bustling nature, fond
of racketing about and seeing what was going on
in the world. The two couples had arranged to get
married on the same day, and that not long thence ;
Tony’s wedding being a sort of stimulant, as is often
the case; I’ve noticed it professionally many times.

‘They danced with such a will as only young peo-
ple in that stage of courtship can dance; and it hap-
pened that as the evening wore on James had for his’
partner Stephen’s plighted one, Olive, at the same time
that Stephen was dancing with James’s Emily. It was
noticed that in spite o’ the exchange the young men
seemed to enjoy the dance no less than before. By-
and-by they were treading another tune in the same
changed order as we had noticed earlier, and though
at first each one had held the other’s mistress strictly
at half-arm’s length, lest there should be shown any
THE HISTORY OF THE HARDCOMES 207

objection to too close quarters by the lady’s proper
man, as time passed there was a little more closeness
between ’em; and presently a little more closeness
still.

“The later it got the more did each of the two
cousins dance with the wrong young girl, and the
tighter did he hold her to his side as he whirled her
round; and, what was very remarkable, neither seemed
to mind what the other was doing. The party began
to draw towards its end, and I saw no more that night,
being one of the first to leave, on account of my serious
calling. But I learned the rest of it from those that
knew.

“After finishing a particularly warming dance
with the changed partners, as I’ve mentioned, the
two young men looked at one another, and in a mo-
ment or two went out into the porch together.

«¢ James,’ says Steve, ‘what were you thinking of
when you were dancing with my Olive?’

“<Well,’ said James, ‘perhaps what you were
thinking of when you were dancing with my Emily.’

“¢]T was thinking,’ said Steve, with some hesita-
tion, ‘that I wouldn’t mind changing for good and
all !

“<Tt was what I was feeling likewise,’ said James.

“JT willingly agree to it, if you think we could
manage it.’

“¢So doI. But what would the girls say ?”

“Tis my belief, said Steve, ‘that they wouldn’t
particularly object. Your Emily clung as close to me
as if she already belonged to me, dear girl.’

“¢ And your Olive to me,’ says James. ‘I could
feel her heart beating like a clock.’

“Well, they agreed to put it to the girls when they
were all four walking home together. And they did
so. When they parted that night the exchange was
208 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

decided on—all having been done under the hot ex-
citement of that evening’s dancing. Thus it happened
that on the following Sunday morning, when the
people were sitting in church with mouths wide open
to hear the names published as they had expected,
there was no small amazement to hear them coupled
the wrong way, as it seemed. The congregation whis-
pered, and thought the parson had made a mistake,
till they discovered that his reading of the names was
verily the true way. As they had decided, so they
were married, each one to the other’s original prop-
erty. :

“Well, the two couples lived on for a year or two
ordinarily enough, till the time came when these
young people began to grow a little less warm to
their respective spouses, as is the rule of married life;
and the two cousins wondered more and more in their
hearts what had made ’em so mad at the last moment
to marry crosswise as they did, when they might have
married straight, as was planned by nature, and as
they had fallen in love. "T'was Tony’s party that had
done it, plain enough, and they half wished they had
never gone there. James, being a quiet, fireside, pe-
rusing man, felt at times a wide gap between himself
and Olive, his wife, who loved riding and driving and
out-door jaunts to a degree ; while Steve, who was
always knocking about hither and thither, had a
very domestic wife, who worked samplers, and made
hearth-rugs, scarcely ever wished to cross the thresh-
old, and only drove out with him to please him.

“ However, they said very little about this mis-
mating to any of their acquaintances, though some-
times Steve would look at James’s wife and sigh, and
James would look at Steve’s wife and do the same.
Indeed, at last the two men were frank enough tow-
ards each other not to mind mentioning it quietly
THE HISTORY OF THE HARDCOMES 209

to themselves, in a long- faced, sorry - smiling, whim-
sical sort of way, and would shake their heads to-
gether over their foolishness in upsetting a well-con-
sidered choice on the strength of an hour’s fancy in
the whirl and wildness of a dance. Still, they were
sensible and honest young fellows enough, and did
their best to make shift with their lot as they had ar-
ranged it, and not to repine at what could not now
be altered or mended.

“So things remained till one fine summer day they
went for their yearly little outing together, as they
had made it their custom to do for a long while past.
This year they chose Budmouth-Regis as the place to
spend their holiday in; and off they went in their
best clothes at nine o’clock in the morning.

“When they had reached Budmouth - Regis they
walked two and two along the shore—their new boots
going squeakity-squash upon the clammy velvet sands.
I can seem to see ’em now! Then they looked at the
ships in the harbor ; and then went up to the Look-
out; and then had dinner at an inn; and then again
walked two and two, squeakity-squash, upon the vel-
vet sands. As evening drew on they sat on one of
the public seats upon the Esplanade, and listened to
the band; and then they said “ What shall we do
next ?”

“Of all things,’ said Olive (Mrs. James Hardcome,
that is), ‘I should like to row in the bay! We could
listen to the music from the water as well as from
here, and have the fun of rowing besides.’

“<The very thing ; so should I,’ says Stephen, his
tastes being always like hers.

Here the clerk turned to the curate.

“But you, sir, know the rest of the strange partic-
ulars of that strange evening of their lives better
than anybody else, having had much of it from their

14
210 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

own lips, which I had not; and perhaps you'll oblige
the gentleman ?”

“ Certainly, if it is wished,” said the curate. And
he took up the clerk’s tale :

“Stephen’s wife hated the sea, except from land,
and couldn’t bear the thought of going into a boat.
James, too, disliked the water, and said that for his
part he would much sooner stay on and listen to the
band in the seat they occupied, though he did not
wish to stand in his wife’s way if she desired a row.
The end of the discussion was that James and his
cousin’s wife Emily agreed to remain where they
were sitting and enjoy the music, while they watched
the other two hire a boat just beneath, and take their
water excursion of half an hour or so, till they should
choose to come back and join the sitters on the Ks-
planade, when they would all start homeward together.

“Nothing could have pleased the other two restless
ones better than this arrangement; and Emily and
James watched them go down to the boatman be-
low and choose one of the little yellow skiffs, and
walk carefully out upon the little plank that was
laid on trestles to enable them to get alongside the
craft. They saw Stephen hand Olive in, and take
his seat facing her ; when they were settled they
waved their hands to the couple watching them, and
then Stephen took the pair of sculls and pulled off
to the tune beat by the band, she steering through
the other boats skimming about, for the sea was as
smooth as glass that evening, and pleasure-seekers
were rowing everywhere.

““« How pretty they look moving on, don’t they ?
said Emily to James (as I’ve been assured). ‘They
both enjoy it equally. In everything their likings are
the same.’
THE HISTORY OF THE HARDCOMES 211

“<«That’s true,’ said James.

““«They, would have made a handsome pair if they
had married,’ said she.

““Yes,’ said he. ‘’Tis a pity we should have part-
ed ’em.’

**¢ Don’t talk of that, James,’ said she. ‘For better
or for worse we decided to do as we did, and there’s
an end of it.’

“They sat on after that without speaking, side by
side, and the band played as before; the people strolled
up and down, and Stephen and Olive shrank smaller
and smaller as they shot straight out to sea. The two
on shore used to relate how they saw Stephen stop
rowing a moment, and take off his coat to get at his
work better; but James’s wife sat quite still in the
stern, holding the tiller-ropes by which she steered
the boat. When they had got very small indeed she
turned her head to shore.

“¢She is waving her handkerchief to us,’ said Ste-
phen’s wife, who thereupon pulled out her own, and
waved it as a return signal.

“The boat’s course had been a little awry while
Mrs. James neglected her steering to wave her hand-
kerchief to her husband and Mrs. Stephen; but now
the light skiff went straight onward again, and they
could soon see nothing more of the two figures it con-
tained than Olive’s light mantle and Stephen’s white
shirt-sleeves behind.

“The two on the shore talked on. ‘’I'was very
curious—our changing partners at Tony Kytes’s wed-
ding,’ Emily declared. ‘Tony was of a fickle nature
by all account, and it really seemed as if his character
had infected us that night. Which of you two was
it that first proposed not to marry as we were en-
gaged ?

“¢F?m—I can’t remember at this moment,’ says
212 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

James. ‘We talked it over, you know, and no sooner
said than done.’

“Twas the dancing,’ said she. ‘People get quite
crazy sometimes in a dance.’

“«They do,’ he owned.

“¢ James—do you think they care for one another
still ? asks Mrs. Stephen.

“ James Hardcome mused, and admitted that per-
haps a little tender feeling might flicker up in their
hearts for a moment now and then. ‘Still, nothing of
any account,’ he said.

“<T sometimes think that Olive is in Steve’s mind
a good deal,’ murmurs Mrs. Stephen; ‘particularly
when she pleases his fancy by riding past our window
at a gallop on one of the draught-horses. . . . I never
could do anything of that sort; I could never get over
my fear of a horse.’

«<¢ And I am no horseman, though I pretend to be
on her account,’ murmured James Hardcome. ‘ But
isn’t it almost time for them to turn and sweep round
to the shore, as the other boating folk have done? I
wonder what Olive means by steering away straight
to the horizon like that? She has hardly swerved from
a direct line seaward since they started.’

“No doubt they are talking, and don’t think of
where they are going,’ suggests Stephen’s wife.

“Perhaps so,’ said James. ‘I didn’t know Steve
could row like that.’

“Oh yes,’ says she. ‘He often comes here on busi-
ness, and generally has a pull round the bay.’

“*T can hardly see the boat or them,’ says James
again; ‘and it is getting dark.’

“The heedless pair afloat now formed a mere speck
in the films of the coming night, which thickened apace,
till it completely swallowed up their distant shapes,
They had disappeared while still following the same
THE HISTORY OF THE HARDCOMES 218

straight course away from the world of land-livers, as
if they were intending to drop over the sea-edge into
space, and never return to earth again.

“The two on the shore continued to sit on, punctu-
ally abiding by their agreement to remain on the same
spot till the others returned. The Esplanade lamps
were lit one by one, the bandsmen folded up their
stands and departed, the yachts in the bay hung out
their riding lights, and the little boats came back to
shore one after another, their hirers walking on to the
sands by the plank they had climbed to go afloat; but
among these Stephen and Olive did not appear.

“<< What a time they are!’ said Emily. ‘I am get-
ting quite chilly. I did not expect to have to sit so
long in the evening air.’

“Thereupon James Hardcome said that he did not
require his overcoat, and insisted on lending it to her.

“He wrapped it round Emily’s shoulders.

“¢«Thank you, James,’ she said. ‘How cold Olive
must be in that thin jacket!’

“He said he was thinking so, too. ‘ Well, they are
sure to be quite close at hand by this time, though we
can’t see ’em. The boats are not all in yet. Some of
the rowers are fond of paddling along the shore to
finish out their hour of hiring.’

“¢Shall we walk by the edge of the water,’ said she,
“to see if we can discover them ?”

“He assented, reminding her that they must not
lose sight of the seat, lest the belated pair should re-
turn and miss them, and be vexed that they had not
kept the appointment.

“They walked a sentry beat up and down the sands
immediately opposite the seat; and still the others did
not come. James Hardcome at last went to the boat-
man, thinking that after all his wife and cousin might
have come in under shadow of the dusk without being
214 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

perceived, and might have forgotten the appointment
at the bench.

“¢ Allin? asked James.

“« All but one boat,’ said the lessor. ‘I can’t think
where that couple is keeping to. They might run foul
of something or other in the dark.’

“ Again Stephen’s wife and Olive’s husband waited,
with more and more anxiety. But no little yellow
boat returned. Was it possible they could have land-
ed farther down the Esplanade ?

“*Tt may have been done to escape paying,’ said
the boat-owner. ‘But they didn’t look like people
who would do that.’ -

“ James Hardcome knew that he could found no
hope on such a reason as that. But now, remember-
ing what had been casually discussed between Steve
and himself about their wives from time to time, he
admitted for the first time the possibility that their
old tenderness had been revived by their face-to-face
position more strongly than either had anticipated at
starting—the excursion having been so obviously un-
dertaken for the pleasure of the performance only—
and that they had landed at some steps he knew of
farther down towards the pier, to be longer alone
together.

Still he disliked to harbor the thought, and would
not mention its existence to his companion. He merely
said to her, ‘ Let us walk farther on.’

“They did so, and lingered between the boat-stage
and the pier till Stephen Hardcome’s wife was uneasy,
and was obliged to accept James’s offered arm. Thus
the night advanced. Emily was presently so worn out
by fatigue that James felt it necessary to conduct her
home; there was, too, a remote chance that the truants
had landed in the harbor on the other side of the town,
or elsewhere, and hastened home in some unexpected
THE HISTORY OF THE HARDCOMES 215

way, in the belief that their spouses would not have
waited so long.

“However, he left a direction in the town that a
lookout should be kept, though this was arranged
privately, the bare possibility of an elopement being
enough to make him reticent ; and, full of misgivings,
the two remaining ones hastened to catch the last train
out of Budmouth-Regis ; and when they got to Castel-
bridge drove back to Upper Longpuddle.”

“ Along this very road as we do now,” remarked the
parish-clerk.

“To be sure—along this very road,” said the cu-
rate. ‘“ However, Stephen and Olive were not at their
homes; neither had entered the village since leaving it
in the morning. Emily and James Hardcome went to
their respective dwellings to snatch a hasty night’s
rest, and at daylight the next morning they drove
again to Casterbridge and entered the Budmouth train.

“Nothing had been heard of the couple there dur-
ing this brief absence. In the course of a few hours
some young men testified to having seen such a man
and woman rowing in a frail hired craft, the head of
the boat kept straight to sea; they had sat looking in
each other’s face as if they were in a dream, with no
consciousness of what they were doing, or whither
they were steering. It was not till late that day that
more tidings reached James’s ears. The boat had
been found drifting bottom upward a long way from
land. In the evening the sea rose somewhat, and a cry
spread through the town that two bodies were cast
ashore in Lullstead Bay, several miles to the east-
ward. They were brought to Budmouth, and inspec-
tion revealed them to be the missing pair. It was said
that they had been found tightly locked in each
other’s arms, his lips upon hers, their features still
wrapt in the same calm and dream-like repose which
216 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

had been observed in their demeanor as they had
glided along.

“Neither James nor Emily questioned the original
motives of the unfortunate man and woman in put-
ting to sea. They were both above suspicion as to in-
tention. Whatever their mutual feelings might have
led them on to, underhand behavior was foreign to the
nature of either. Conjecture pictured that they might
have fallen into tender reverie while gazing each into
a pair of eyes that had formerly flashed for him and
her alone, and, unwilling to avow what their mutual
sentiments were, they had continued thus, oblivious of
time and space, till darkness suddenly overtook them
far from land. But nothing was truly known. It had
been their destiny to die thus. The two halves, in-
tended by Nature to make the perfect whole, had failed
in that result during their lives, though ‘ in their death
they were not divided.’ Their bodies were brought
home, and buried on one day. I remember that, on
looking round the church-yard while reading the ser-
vice, I observed nearly all the parish at their funeral.”

“Tt was so, sir,” said the clerk.

“The remaining two,” continued the curate (whose
voice had grown husky while relating the lovers’ sad
fate), “were a more thoughtful and far-seeing, though
less romantic, couple than the first. They were now
mutually bereft of a companion, and found themselves
by this accident in a position to fulfil their destiny
according to Nature’s plan and their own original
and calmly-formed intention. James Hardcome took
Emily to wife in the course of a year and a half; and
the marriage proved in every respect a happy one. I
solemnized the service, Hardcome having told me,
when he came to give notice of the proposed wedding,
the story of his first wife’s loss almost word for word
as I have told it to you.”
THE HISTORY OF THE HARDCOMES 217

‘And are they living in Longpuddle still?” asked
the new-comer.

“Oh no, sir,” interposed the clerk. “James has been
dead these dozen years, and his mis’ess about six or
seven. They bad no children. William Privett used
to be their odd man till he died.”

“Ah—William Privett ! He, dead too?—dear me!”
said the other. “ All passed away !”

“Yes, sir. William was much older than I. He’d
ha’ been over eighty if he had lived till now.”

“There was something very strange about William’s
death—very strange indeed !” sighed amelancholy man
in the back of the van. It was the seedsman’s father,
who had hitherto kept silence.

“And what might that have been?” asked Mr. Lack-
land.
THE SUPERSTITIOUS MAN’S STORY

“William, as you may know, was a curious, silent
man ; you could feel when he came near ye; and if he
was in the house or anywhere behind your back with-
out your seeing him, there seemed to be something
clammy in the air, asif a cellar door was opened close
by your elbow. Well, one Sunday, at a time that
William was in very good health to all appearance,
the bell that was ringing for church went very heavy
all of a sudden; the sexton, who told me o’t, said he’d
not known the bell go so heavy in his hand for years—it
was just asif the gudgeons wanted oiling. That was on
the Sunday, asI say. During the week after, it chanced
that William’s wife was staying up late one night to
finish her ironing, she doing the washing for Mr.
and Mrs. Hardcome. Her husband had finished his
supper and gone to bed as usual some hour or two be-
fore. While she ironed she heard him coming down-
stairs ; he stopped to put on his boots at the stair-foot,
where he always left them, and then came on into the
living-room where she was ironing, passing through it
towards the door, this being the only way from the
staircase to the outside of the house. No word was
said on either side, William not being a man given to
much speaking, and his wife being occupied with her
work. He went out and closed the door behind him.
As her husband had now and then gone out in this way
at night before when unwell, or unable to sleep for
want of a pipe, she took no particular notice, and con-
tinued at her ironing. This she finished shortly after,
THE SUPERSTITIOUS MAN’S STORY 219

and as he had not come in she waited awhile for him,
putting away the irons and things, and preparing the
table for his breakfast in the morning. Still he did not
return, but supposing him not far off, and wanting to
get to bed herself, tired as she was, she left the door
unbarred and went to the stairs, after writing on the
back of the door with chalk: Mind and do the door
(because he was a forgetful man).

“To her great surprise, I might say alarm, on reach-
ing the foot of the stairs his boots were standing there
as they always stood when he had gone to rest ; going
up to their chamber she found him in bed sleeping as
sound as a rock. How he could have got back again
without her seeing or hearing him was beyond her
comprehension. It could only have been by passing
behind her very quietly while she was bumping with
the iron. But this notion did not satisfy her; it was
surely impossible that she should not have seen him
come in through a room so small. She could not un-
ravel the mystery, and felt very queer and uncom-
fortable about it. However, she would not disturb
him to question him then, and went to bed herself.

“He rose and left for his work very early the next
morning, before she was awake, and she waited his
return to breakfast with much anxiety for an expla-
nation, for thinking over the matter by daylight made
it seem only the more startling. When he came in
to the meal he said, before she could put her question,
“ What’s the meaning of them words chalked on the
door ?”

“She told him, and asked him about his going out
the night before. William declared that he had never
left the bedroom after entering it, having in fact un-
dressed, lain down, and fallen asleep directly, never
once waking till the clock struck five, and he rose up
to go to his labor.
220 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“ Betty Privett was as certain in her own mind
that he did go out as she was of her own existence,
and was little less certain that he did not return. She
felt too disturbed to argue with him, and let the sub-
ject drop as though she must have been mistaken.
When she was walking down Longpuddle Street, later
in the day, she met Jim Weedle’s daughter Nancy,
and said, ‘ Well, Nancy, you do look sleepy to-day !’

“¢ Yes, Mrs. Privett,” says Nancy. “Now don’t
tell anybody, but I don’t mind letting you know what
the reason o’t is. Last night being Old Midsummer
Eve, some of us went to church porch, and didn’t get
home till near one.’

“«Did ye? says Mrs. Privett. ‘Old Midsummer
yesterday, was it? Faith, I didn’t think whe’r ’twas
Midsummer or Michaelmas; I’d too much work to do.’

“<«Yes. And we were frightened enough, I can tell
’ee, by what we saw.’

“«What did ye see?”

(“You may not remember, sir, having gone off to
foreign parts so young, that on Midsummer Night it
is believed hereabout that the faint shapes of all the
folk in the parish who are going to be at death’s door
within the year can be seen entering the church.
Those who get over their illness come out again after
a while ; those that are doomed to die do not return.)

«What did you see?’ asked William’s wife.

“¢ Well, says Nancy, backwardly—‘ we needn’t tell
what we saw, or who we saw.’

“*You saw my husband,’ says Betty Privett, in a
quiet way.

«Well, since you put it so,’ says Nancy, hanging
fire, ‘ we—thought we did see him; but it was dark-
ish, and we was frightened, and of course it might not
have been he.’

“Nancy, you needn’t mind letting it out, though
THE SUPERSTITIOUS MAN’S STORY 221

*tis kept back in kindness. And he didn’t come out
of church again ; I know it as well as you.’

“Nancy did not answer yes or no to that, and no
more was said. But three days after, William Privett
was mowing with John Chiles in Mr. Hardcome’s
meadow, and in the heat of the day they sat down to
eat their bit o’ lunch under a tree, and empty their
flagon. Afterwards both of ’em fell asleep as they
sat. Jobn Chiles was the first to wake, and as he
looked towards his fellow-mower he saw one of those
great white miller’s-souls as we call ’em—that is to
say, a miller-moth—come from William’s open mouth
while he slept, and fly straight away. John thought
it odd enough, as William had worked in a mill for
several years when he was a boy. He then looked at
the sun, and found by the place o’t that they had
slept a long while, and as William did not wake, John
called to him and said it was high time to begin work
again. He took no notice, and then John went up
and shook him, and found he was dead.

“Now on that very day old Philip Hookhorn was
down at Longpuddle Spring dipping up a pitcher of
water ; and as he turned away, who should he see
coming down to the spring on the other side but Will-
iam, looking very pale andodd. This surprised Philip
Hookhorn very much, for years before that time Will-
iam’s little son—his only child—had been drowned in
that spring while at play there, and this had so preyed
upon William’s mind that he’d never been seen near
the spring afterwards, and had been known to go half
a mile out of his way to avoid the place. On inquiry,
it was found that William in body could not have
stood by the spring, being in the mead two miles
off ; and it also came out that the time at which he
was seen at the spring was the very time when he
died.”

P
222 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“ A rather melancholy story,” observed the emigrant
after a minute’s silence.

“Yes, yes. Well, we must take ups and downs
together,” said the seedsman’s father.

“You don’t know, Mr. Lackland, I suppose, what a
rum start that was between Andrey Satchel and Jane
Vallens and the pa’son and clerk o’ Scrimpton ?” said
the master-thatcher, a man with a spark of subdued
liveliness in his eye, who had hitherto kept his atten-
tion mainly upon small objects a long way ahead,
as he sat in front of the van with his feet outside.
“Theirs was a queerer experience of a pa’son and
clerk than some folks get, and may cheer ’ee up a little
after this dampness that’s been flung over yer soul.

The returned one replied that he knew nothing of
the history, and should be happy to hear it, quite rec-
ollecting the personality of the man Satchel.

“Ah, no; this Andrey Satchel is the son of the
Satchel that you knew ; this one has not been married
more than two or three years, and ’twas at the time o’
the wedding that the accident happened that I could
tell ’ee of, or anybody else here, for that matter.”

“No, no; you must tell it, neighbor, if anybody,”
said several; a request in which Mr. Lackland joined,
adding that the Satchel family was one he had known
well before leaving home.

“Tl just mention, as you be a stranger,” whispered
the carrier to Lackland, “that Christopher’s stories will
bear pruning.”

The emigrant nodded.

“Well, I can soon tell it,” said the master-thatcher,
schooling himself to a tone of actuality. ‘Though as
it has more to do with the pa’son and clerk than with
Andrey himself, it ought to be told by a better church-
man than I,”
ANDREY SATCHEL AND THE PARSON AND
CLERK

“Tr all arose, you must know, from Andrey being
fond of a drop of drink at that time—though he’s a
sober enough man now by all account, so much the
better for him. Jane, his bride, you see, was some-
what older than Andrey; how much older I don’t pre-
tend to say; she was not one of our parish, and the reg-
ister alone may be able to tell that. But, at any rate,
her being a little ahead of her young man in mortal
years, coupled with other bodily circumstances—”

(“ Ah, poor thing!” sighed the women.)

“—made her very anxious to get the thing done
before he changed his mind; and ’twas with a joyful
countenance (they say) that she, with Andrey and his
brother and sister-in-law, marched off to church one
November morning as soon as ’twas day a’most, to be
made one with Andrey for the rest of her life. He had
left our place long before it was light, and the folks
that were up all waved their lanterns at him, and flung
up their hats as he went.

“The church of her parish was a mile and more
from the houses, and, as it was a wonderful fine day for
the time of year, the plan was that as soon as they
were married they would make out a holiday by driv-
ing straight off to Port Bredy, to see the ships and the
sea and the sojers, instead of coming back to a meal
at the house of the distant relation she lived wi’, and
moping about there all the afternoon.
904 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“ Well, some folks noticed that Andrey walked with
rather wambling steps to church that morning; the
truth o’t was that his nearest’ neighbor’s child had
been christened the day before, and Andrey, having
stood godfather, had stayed all night keeping up the
christening, for he had said to himself, ‘ Not if I live
to be a thousand shall I again be made a godfather
one day and a husband the next and perhaps a father
the next, and therefore I'll make the most of the bless-
ing.’ So that when he started from home in the morn-
ing he had not been in bed at all. The result was, as
I say, that when he and his bride-to-be walked up the
church to get married, the pa’son (who was a very
strict man inside the church, whatever he was outside)
looked hard at Andrey, and said, very sharp:

“¢How’s this, my man? You are in liquor. And
so early, too. I’m ashamed of you!’

“* Well, that’s true, sir,’ says Andrey. ‘But I can
walk straight enough for practical purposes. I can
walk a chalk-line,’ he says (meaning no offence), ‘as
well as some other folk: and’— (getting hotter)—‘I
reckon that if you, Pa’son Billy Toogood, had kept up
a christening all night so thoroughly as I have done,
you wouldn’t be able to stand at all; damn me if you
would!’

“This answer made Pa’son Billy—as they used to
call him—rather spitish, not to say hot, for he was a
warm -tempered man if provoked, and he said, very
decidedly: ‘Well, I cannot marry you in this state ;
and I will not! Go home and get sober!’ And he
slapped the book together like a rat-trap.

“Then the bride burst out crying as if her heart
would break, for very fear that she would lose An-
drey after all her hard work to get him, and begged
and implored the pa’son to go on with the ceremony.
But no.
ANDREY SATCHEL AND THE PARSON AND CLERK 225

“<*T won’t be a party to your solemnizing matri-
mony with a tipsy man,’ says Mr. Toogood. ‘It is
not right and decent. I am sorry for you, my young
woman, but you’d better go home again. I wonder
how you could think of bringing him here drunk like
this.’

“¢ But if—if he don’t come drunk he won’t come at
all, sir she says, through her sobs.

““«T can’t help that,’ says the pa’son; and plead as
she might, it did not move him. Then she tried him
another way.

“Well, then, if you’ll go home, sir, and leave us
here, and come back to the church in an hour or two,
I'll undertake to say that he shall be as sober as a
judge,’ she cries. ‘ We'll bide here, with your per-
mission ; for if he once goes out of this here church
unmarried, all Van Amburgh’s horses won’t drag him
back again !’

“Very well, says the pa’son. ‘I’ll give you two
hours, and then I'll return.’

““« And please, sir, lock the door, so that we can’t
escape !’ says she.

“<* Yes,’ says the pa’son.

“« And let nobody know that we are here.’

“The pa’son then took off his clane white surplice,
and went away; and the others consulted upon the
best means for keeping the matter a secret, which it
was not a very hard thing to do, the place being so
lonely, and the hour so early. The witnesses—An-
drey’s brother and brother’s wife, neither one o’ which
cared about Andrey’s marrying Jane, and had come
rather against their will—said they couldn’t wait two
hours in that hole of a place, wishing to get home
to Longpuddle before dinner-time. They were alto-
gether so crusty that the clerk said there was no dif-
ficulty in their doing as they wished. They could go

15
226 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

home as if their brother’s wedding had actually taken
place, and the married couple had gone onward for
their day’s pleasure jaunt to Port Bredy as intended.
He, the clerk, and any casual passer-by would act as
witnesses when the pa’son came back.

“This was agreed to, and away Andrey’s relations
went, nothing loath, and the clerk shut the church '
door and prepared to lock in the couple. The bride
went up and whispered to him, with her eyes a-stream-
ing still.

“<“My dear good clerk,’ she says, ‘if we bide here
in the church, folk may see us through the winders,
and find out what has happened; and ’twould cause
such a talk and scandal that I never should get over
it; and perhaps, too, dear Andrey might try to get
out and leave me! Will ye lock us up in the tower,
my dear good clerk? she says. ‘I'll tole him in there
if you will.’

“The clerk had no objection to do this to oblige the
poor young woman, and they toled Andrey into the
tower, and the clerk locked ’em both up straightway,
and then went home, to return at the end of the two
hours.

“Pa’son Toogood had not been long in his house
after leaving the church when he saw a gentleman in
pink and top-boots ride past his windows, and with a
sudden flash of heat he called to mind that the hounds
met that day just on the edge of his parish. The
pa’son was one who dearly loved sport, and much he
longed to be there.

“In short, except o’ Sundays and at tide-times in
the week, Pa’son Billy was the life o’ the hunt. ’Tis
true that he was poor, and that he rode all of a heap,
and that his black mare was rat-tailed and old, and
his tops older, and all over of one color, whity-brown,
and full o’ cracks. But he’d been in at the death of
ANDREY SATCHEL AND THE PARSON AND CLERK 227

three thousand foxes. And—being a bachelor man—
every time he went to bed in summer he used to open
the bed at bottom and crawl up head-foremost, to
mind en of the coming winter and the good sport he’d
have, and the foxes going to earth, And whenever
there was a christening at the squire’s, and he had din-
ner there afterwards, as he always did, he never failed
to christen the chiel over again in a bottle of port-wine.

““Now the clerk was the pa’son’s groom and gar-
dener and jineral manager, and had just got back to
his work in the garden when he, too, saw the hunting
man pass, and presently saw lots more of ’em, noble-
men and gentry, and then he saw the hounds, the
huntsman, Jim Treadhedge, the whipper-in, and I
don’t know who besides. The clerk loved going to
cover as frantical as the pa’son, so much so that, when-
ever he saw or heard the pack, he could no more rule
his feelings than if they were the winds of heaven.
He might be bedding, or he might be sowing—all was
forgot. So he throws down his spade and rushes in
to the pa’son, who was by this time as frantical to go
as he.

“<«That there mare of yours, sir, do want exercise
bad, very bad, this morning !’ the clerk says, all of a
tremble. ‘Don’t ye think I’d better trot her round
the downs for an hour, sir?’

“<To be sure, she does want exercise badly. Ill
trot her round myself,’ says the pa’son.

“¢Oh!—you’ll trot her yerself? Well, there’s the
cob, sir. Really that cob is getting oncontrollable
through biding in a stable so long! If you wouldn’t
mind my putting on the saddle—’

“Very well. Take him out, certainly,’ says the
pa’son, never caring what the clerk did so long as he
himself could get off immediately. So, scrambling
into his riding-boots and breeches as quick as he could,
228 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

he rode off towards the meet, intending to be back
in an hour. No sooner was he gone than the clerk
mounted the cob, and was off after him. When the
pa’son got to the meet, he found a lot of friends, and
was as jolly as he could be; the hounds found a’most
as soon as they threw off, and there was great excite-
ment. So, forgetting that he had meant to go back at
once, away rides the pa’son with the rest o’ the hunt,
all across the fallow ground that lies between Lippet
Wood and Green’s Copse; and as he galloped he looked
behind for a moment, and there was the clerk close to
his heels.

“«Wa, ha, clerk—you here ?’ he says.

“ «Yes, sir, here be I,’ says t’other.

“¢ Fine exercise for the horses !’

“*¢ Aye, sir—hee, hee!’ says the clerk.

“So they went on and on, into Green’s Copse, then
across to Higher Jirton; then on across this very turn-
pike road to Climmerston Ridge, then away towards
Yalbury Wood; up hill and down dale, like the very
wind, the clerk close to the pa’son, and the pa’son not
far from the hounds. Never was there a finer run
knowed with that pack than they had that day; and
neither pa’son nor clerk thought one word about the
unmarried couple locked up in the church-tower wait-
ing to get j’ined.

“<«These hosses of yours, sir, will be much improved
by this,’ says the clerk as he rode along, just a neck
behind the pa’son. ‘’I'was a happy thought of your
reverent mind to bring ’em out to-day. Why, it may
be frosty in a day or two, and then the poor things
mid not be able to leave the stable for weeks.’

“They may not, they may not, it is true. A mer-
ciful man is merciful to his beast,’ says the pa’son.

“*Hee, hee!’ says the clerk, glancing sly into the
pa’son’s eye.
ANDREY SATCHEL AND THE PARSON AND CLERK 229

“«Ha, ha!’ says the pa’son, a-glancing back into the
clerk’s. ‘Halloo!’ he shouts, as he sees the fox break
cover at that moment.

**Halloo! cries the clerk. ‘There he goes! Why,
dammy, there’s two foxes—’

“<«Ffush, clerk, hush! Don’t let me hear that word
again! Remember our calling.’

“<True, sir, true. But really, good sport do carry
away a man so that he’s apt to forget his high persua-
sion!’ And the next minute the corner of the clerk’s
eye shot again into the corner of the pa’son’s, and the
pa’son’s back again to the clerk’s. ‘Hee, hee!’ said
the clerk.

“« Ha, hal’ said Pa’son Toogood.

“«¢ Ah, sir,’ says the clerk again, ‘this is better than
crying Amen to your Ever-and-ever on a winter’s morn-
ing!

“¢ Yes, indeed, clerk! To everything there’s a sea-
son,’ says Pa’son Toogood, quite pat, for he was a
learned Christian man when he liked, and had chap-
ter and ve’se at his tongue’s end, as a pa’son should.

“ At last, late in the day, the hunting came to an
end by the fox running into a’ old woman’s cottage,
under her table, and up the clock-case. The pa’son and
clerk were among the first in at the death, their faces
a-staring in at the old woman’s winder, and the clock
striking as he’d never been heard to strik’ before.
Then came the question of finding their way home.

“Neither the pa’son nor the clerk knowed how they
were going to do this, for their beasts were wellnigh
tired down to the ground. But they started back
along as well as they could, though they were so done
up that they could only drag along at a’ amble, and
not much of that at a time.

““¢We shall never, never get there!’ groaned Mr.
Toogood, quite bowed down.
230 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“‘¢ Never!’ groans the clerk. ‘’Tis a judgment upon
us for our iniquities!’

“<T fear it is,’ murmurs the pa’son.

“Well, twas quite dark afore they entered the
pa’sonage gate, having crept into the parish as quiet
as if they’d stole a hammer, little wishing their con-
gregation to know what they’d been up to all day
long. And as they were so dog-tired, and so anxious
about the horses, never once did they think of the un-
married couple. As soon as ever the horses had been
stabled and fed, and the pa’son and clerk had had a
bit and a sup theirselves, they went to bed.

“ Next morning when Pa’son Toogood was at break-
fast, thinking of the glorious sport he’d had the day
before, the clerk came in a hurry to the door and asked
to see him.

“<¢Tt has just come into my mind, sir, that we’ve
forgot all about the couple that we was to have mar-
ried yesterday !

“The half-chawed victuals dropped from the pa’son’s
mouth as if he’d been shot. ‘Bless my soul,’ says he,
‘so we have! How very awkward !

“<«It is, sir; very. Perhaps we’ve ruined the
?ooman!’

““¢ Ah—to be sure—I remember! She ought to
have been married before.’

“¢Tf anything has happened to her up in that there
tower, and no doctor or nuss—

(“ Ab—poor thing!” sighed the women.)

«<¢_ twill be a quarter-sessions matter for us, not
to speak of the disgrace to the Church

“<Good God, clerk, don’t drive me wild!’ says the
pa’son. ‘Why the hell didn’t I marry ’em, drunk or
sober!’ (Pa’sons used to cuss in them days like plain
honest men.) ‘Have you been to the church to see
what happened to them, or inquired in the village ?
ANDREY SATCHEL AND THE PARSON AND CLERK 231

“<*Not I, sir! It only came into my head a moment
ago, and I always like to be second to you in Church
matters. You could have knocked me down with a
sparrer’s feather when I thought o’t, sir ; I assure ’ee
you could !’

“Well, the pa’son jumped up from his breakfast,
and together they went off to the church.

“Tt is not at all likely that they are there now,’
says Mr. Toogood, as they went ; ‘and indeed I hope
they are not. They be pretty sure to have ’scaped
and gone home.’

“ However, they opened the church- hatch, entered
the church- yard, and, looking up at the tower, there
they seed a little small white face at the belfry
winder, and a little small hand waving. °T'was the
bride.

““God my life, clerk,’ says Mr. Toogood, ‘I don’t
know how to face ’em!’ And he sank down upon a
tombstone. ‘How I wish I hadn’t been so cussed
particular !

“<«Ves—'twas a pity we didn’t finish it when we’d
begun,’ the clerk said. ‘Still, since the feelings of
your holy priestcraft wouldn’t let ye, the couple must
put up with it.’

“«True, clerk, true! Does she look as if anything
premature had took place ?

““*T can’t see her no lower down than her armpits,
sir.’

“¢ Well—how do her face look ?’

“<Tt do look mighty white!’

“¢ Well, we must know the worst! Dear me, how
the small of my back do ache from that ride yester-
day!... But to more godly business.’

“They went on into the church, and unlocked the
tower stairs, and immediately poor Jane and Andrey
busted out like starved mice from a cupboard, Andrey
232 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

limp and sober enough now, and his bride pale and
cold, but otherwise as usual.

“‘¢ What,’ says the pa’son, with a great breath of re-
lief, ‘ you haven’t been here ever since ?”

“Yes, we have, sir!’ says the bride, sinking down
upon a seat in her weakness. “Not a morsel, wet or
dry, have we had since! It was impossible to get out
without help, and here we’ve stayed.’

«But why didn’t you shout, good souls? said the
pa’son.

“<She wouldn’t let me,’ says Andrey.

““< Because we were so ashamed at what had led to
it,’ sobs Jane. ‘We felt that if it were noised abroad
it would cling to us all our lives! Once or twice An-
drey had a good mind to toll the bell, but then he
said: “No; Dll starve first. I won’t bring disgrace
on my name and yours, my dear.” And so we waited,
and waited, and walked round and round; but never
did you come till now !

“<To my regret! says the pa’son. ‘Now, then,
we will soon get it over.’

“<J—_T should like some victuals,’ said Andrey;
“twould gie me courage if it is only a crust o’ bread
and a’ onion ; for I am that leery that I can feel my
stomach rubbing against my backbone.’

“*T think we had better get it done,’ said the bride,
a bit anxious in manner ; ‘since we are all here con-
venient, too.’

“ Andrey gave way about the victuals, and the
clerk called in a second witness who wouldn’t be
likely to gossip about it, and soon the knot was tied,
and the bride looked smiling and calm forthwith, and
Andrey limper than ever.

“* Now,’ said Pa’son Toogood, ‘you two must come
to my house, and have a good lining put to your in-
sides before you go a step farther.’
ANDREY SATCHEL AND THE PARSON AND CLERK 238

“They were very glad of the offer, and went out of
the church-yard by one path while the pa’son and
clerk went out by the other, and so did not attract
notice, it being still early. They entered the rectory
as if they’d just come back from their trip to Port
Bredy ; and then they knocked in the victuals and
drink till they could hold no more.

“Tt was a long while before the story of what they
had gone through was known, but it was talked of in
time, and they themselves laugh over it now; though
what Jane got for her pains was no great bargain af-
ter all. °Tis true she saved her name.”

“Was that the same Andrey who went to the
squire’s house as one of the Christmas fiddlers?” asked
the seedsman.

‘No, no,” replied Mr. Profitt, the school-master. “It
was his father did that. Aye, it was all owing to his
being such a man for eating and drinking.” Finding
that he had the ear of the audience, the school-master
continued without delay :
OLD ANDREY’S EXPERIENCE AS A MUSICIAN

“T was one of the choir-boys at that time, and we
and the players were to appear at the manor-house as
usual that Christmas week to play and sing in the
hall to the squire’s people and visitors (among’em be-
ing the archdeacon, Lord and Lady Baxby, and I don’t
know who) ; afterwards going, as we always did, to
have a good supper in the servants’ hall. Andrew
knew this was the custom, and meeting us when we
we were starting to go, he said to us: ‘Lord, how I
should like to join in that meal of beef and turkey
and plum-pudding and ale that you happy ones be
going to just now! One more or less will make no
difference to the squire. I am too old to pass as a
singing boy, and too bearded to pass as a singing girl;
can ye lend me a fiddle, neighbors, that I may come
with ye as a bandsman ?”

“Well, we didn’t like to be hard upon him, and
lent him an old one, though Andrew knew no more
of music than the Cerne Giant ; and armed with the
instrument he walked up to the squire’s house with
the others of us at the time appointed, and went in
boldly, his fiddle under his arm. He made himself
as natural as he could in opening the music-books and
moving the candles to the best points for throwing
light upon the notes; and all went well till we had
played and sung ‘While shepherds watch,’ and ‘Star,
arise,’ and ‘Hark the glad sound.’ Then the squire’s
mother, a tall, gruff old lady, who was much inter-
ested in Church music, said quite unexpectedly to An-
OLD ANDREY’S EXPERIENCE AS A MUSICIAN 235

drew: ‘My man,I see you don’t play your instru-
ment with the rest. How is that?

“Every one of the choir was ready to sink into
the earth with concern at the fix Andrew was in.
We could see that he had fallen into a cold sweat,
and how he would get out of it we did not know.

“*Pve had a misfortune, mem,’ he says, bowing
as meek as a child. ‘Coming along the road I fell
down and broke my bow.’

“¢Oh, I am sorry to hear that, says she. ‘Can’t
it be mended ?”

“¢QOh no, mem,’ says Andrew. ‘’I'was broke all
to splinters.’

“ «Pl see what I can do for you,’ says she.

“And then it seemed all over, and we played ‘ Re-
joice, ye drowsy mortals all,’ in D and two sharps.
But no sooner had we got through it than she says
to Andrew :

“¢Pve sent up into the attic, where we have some
old musical instruments, and found a bow for you.’
And she hands the bow to poor wretched Andrew,
who didn’t even know which end to take hold of.
‘Now we shall have the full accompaniment,’ says
she.

“ Andrew’s face looked as if it were made of rotten
apple as he stood in the circle of players in front of
his book ; for if there was one person in the parish
that everybody was afraid of ’twas this hook-nosed
old lady. However, by keeping a little behind the
next man he managed to make pretence of beginning,
sawing away with his bow without letting it touch
the strings, so that it looked as if he were driving
into the tune with heart and soul. °Tis a question if
he wouldn’t have got through all right if one of the
squire’s visitors, no other than the archdeacon, hadn’t
noticed that he held the fiddle upside-down, the nut
236 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

under his chin, and the tail-piece in his hand, and
they began to crowd round him, thinking ’twas some
new way of performing.

“This revealed everything; the squire’s mother
had Andrew turned out of the house as a vile impos-
tor, and there was great interruption to the harmony
of the proceedings, the squire declaring he should
have notice to leave his cottage that day fortnight.
However, when we got to the servants’ hall there sat
Andrew, who had been let in at the back door by the
orders of the squire’s wife, after being turned out at
the front by the orders of the squire, and nothing
more was heard about his leaving his cottage. But
Andrew never performed in public as a musician after
that night ; and now he’s dead and gone, poor man,
as we all shall be.”

“T had quite forgotten the old choir, with their
fiddles and bass-viols,” said the home-comer, musing-
ly. “Are they still going on the same as of old ?”

“Bless the man?’ said Christopher Twink, the
master-thatcher ; “ why, they’ve been done away with
these twenty year. A young teetotaler plays the
organ in church now, and plays it very well; though
’tis not quite such good music as in old times, be-
cause the organ is one of them that go with a winch,
and the young teetotaler says he can’t always throw
the proper feeling into the tune without wellnigh
working his arms off.”

“Why did they make the change, then ?”

“Well, partly because of fashion, partly because
the old musicians got into a sort of scrape. A terri-
ble scrape ’twas, too—wasn’t it, John? I shall never
forget it—never! They lost their character as officers
of the church as complete as if they’d never had any
character at all.”
OLD ANDREY’S EXPERIENCE AS A MUSICIAN 237

“That was very bad for them.”

“Yes.” The master-thatcher attentively regarded
past times as if they lay about a mile off, and went
on:

Q
ABSENT-MINDEDNESS IN A PARISH CHOIR

“Tr happened on Sunday after Christmas—the last
Sunday they ever played in Longpuddle church gal-
lery, as it turned out, though they didn’t know it then.
As you may know, sir, the players formed a very
good band—almost as good as the Mellstock parish
players that were led by the Dewys; and that’s say-
ing a great deal. There was Nicholas Puddingcome,
the leader, with the first fiddle ; there was Timothy
Thomas, the bass-viol man; John Biles, the tenor
fiddler ; Dan’l Hornhead, with the serpent; Robert
Dowdle, with the clarionet ; and Mr. Nicks, with the
oboe—all sound and powerful musicians, and strong-
winded men—they that blowed. For that reason
they were very much in demand Christmas week for
little reels and dancing-parties ; for they could turn
a jig or a hornpipe out of hand as well as ever they
could turn out a psalm, and perhaps better, not to
speak irreverent. In short, one half-hour they could
be playing a Christmas carol in the squire’s hall to
the ladies and gentlemen, and drinking tay and coffee
with ’em as modest as saints; and the next, at the
Tinker’s Arms, blazing away like wild horses with the
‘Dashing White Sergeant’ to nine couple of dancers
and more, and swallowing rum-and-cider hot as flame.

“ Well, this Christmas they’d been out to one rat-
tling randy after another every night, and had got
next to no sleep at all. Then came the Sunday after
Christmas, their fatal day. "T'was so mortal cold
that year that they could hardly sit in the gallery ;
ABSENT-MINDEDNESS IN A PARISH CHOIR 239

for though the congregation down in the body of the
church had a stove to keep off the frost, the players
in the gallery had nothing at all. So Nicholas said
at morning service, when ’twas freezing an inch an
hour, ‘Please the Lord I won’t stand this numbing
weather no longer; this afternoon we’ll have some-
thing in our insides to make us warm if it cost a
king’s ransom.’

“So he brought a gallon of hot brandy and beer,
ready mixed, to church with him in the afternoon,
and by keeping the jar well wrapped up in Timothy
Thomas’s bass- viol bag it kept drinkably warm till
they wanted it, which was just a thimbleful in the
Absolution, and another after the Creed, and the re-
mainder at the beginning o’ the sermon. When
they’d had the last pull they felt quite comfortable
and warm, and as the sermon went on—most unfortu-
nately for ’em it was a long one that afternoon—they
fell asleep, every man jack of ’em; and there they
slept on as sound as rocks.

“°Twas a very dark afternoon, and by the end of
the sermon all you could see of the inside of the church
were the pa’son’s two candles alongside of him in the
pulpit, and his spaking face behind ’em. The sermon
being ended at last, the pa’son gie’d out the Evening
Hymn. But no choir set about sounding up the tune,
and the people began to turn their heads to learn the
reason why, and then Levi Limpet, a boy who sat in
the gallery, nudged Timothy and Nicholas, and said,
‘Begin! begin?’

““Hey, what? says Nicholas, starting up; and
the church being so dark and his head so muddled he
thought he was at the party they had played at all
the night before, and away he went, bow and fiddle,
at ‘The Devil among the Tailors,’ the favorite jig of
our neighborhood at that time. The rest of the band,
240 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

being in the same state of mind and nothing doubt-
ing, followed their leader with all their strength, ac-
cording to custom. They poured out that there tune
till the lower bass notes of ‘The Devil among the
Tailors’ made the cobwebs in the roof shiver like
ghosts ; then Nicholas, seeing nobody moved, shouted
out as he scraped (in his usual commanding way at
dances when the folk didn’t know the figures), ‘ Top
couples cross hands! And when I make the fiddle
squeak at the end, every man kiss his pardner under
the mistletoe!’

“The boy Levi was so frightened that he bolted
down the gallery stairs and out homeward like light-
ning. The pa’son’s hair fairly stood on end when he
heard the evil tune raging through the church; and
thinking the choir had gone crazy, he held up his hand
and said: ‘Stop, stop, stop! Stop, stop! What's
this?? But they didn’t hear ’n for the noise of their
own playing, and the more he called the louder they
played.

“Then the folks came out of their pews, wondering
down to the ground, and saying: ‘ What do they mean
by such wickedness? We shall be consumed like
Sodom and Gomorrah !’

“Then the squire came out of his pew lined wi’
green baize, where lots of lords and ladies visiting at
the house were worshipping along with him, and went
and stood in front of the gallery, and shook his fist in
the musicians’ faces, saying,‘ What! In this reverent
edifice! What!’

“And at last they heard ’n through their playing,
and stopped.

«Never such an insulting, disgraceful thing—nev-
er!’ says the squire, who couldn’t rule his passion.

“Never !’ says the pa’son, who had come down and
stood beside him.
ABSENT-MINDEDNESS IN A PARISH CHOIR 241

“*Not if the angels of Heaven,’ says the squire,
(he was a wickedish man, the squire was, though now
for once he happened to be on the Lord’s side)—‘ not
if the angels of Heaven come down,’ he says, ‘shall
one of you villanous players ever sound a note in this
church again ; for the insult to me, and my family,
and my visitors, and God Almighty, that you’ve a-per-
petrated this afternoon!’

“Then the unfortunate church band came to their
senses, and remembered where they, were; and ’twas
a sight to see Nicholas Puddingcome and Timothy
Thomas and John Biles creep down the gallery stairs
with their fiddles under their arms, and poor Dan’l
Hornhead with his serpent, and Robert Dowdle with
his clarionet, all looking as little as ninepins ; and out
they went. The pa’son might have forgi’ed em when
he learned the truth o’t, but the squire would not.
That very week he sent for a barrel-organ that would
play two-and-twenty new psalm tunes, so exact and
particular that, however sinful inclined you was, you
could play nothing but psalm tunes whatsomever. He
had a really respectable man to turn the winch, as I
said, and the old players played no more.”

“And, of course, my old acquaintance, the annui-
tant, Mrs. Winter, who always seemed to have some-
thing on her mind, is dead and gone?” said the home-
comer, after a long silence.

Nobody in the van seemed to recollect the name.

“Oh yes, she must be dead long since ; she was
seventy when I as a child knew her,” he added.

“TJ can recollect Mrs. Winter very well, if nobody
else can,” said the aged groceress. “ Yes, she’s been
dead these five-and-twenty year at least. You knew
what it was upon her mind, sir, that gave her that
hollow-eyed look, I suppose ?”

16
242 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“Tt had something to do with a son of hers, I think
I once was told. But I was too young to know par-
ticulars.”

The groceress sighed as she conjured up a vision
of days long past. “Yes,” she murmured, “it had all
to do with a son.” Finding that the van was still in
a listening mood, she spoke on:
THE WINTERS AND THE PALMLEYS

“To go back to the beginning—if one must—there
were two women in the parish when I was a child who
were to a certain extent rivals in good looks. Never
mind particulars, but in consequence of this they
were at daggers - drawn, and they did not love each
other any better when one of them tempted the other’s
lover away from her and married him. He was a
young man of the name of Winter, and in due time
they had a son.

“The other woman did not marry for many years;
but when she was about thirty a quiet man named
Palmley asked her to be his wife, and she accepted
him. You don’t mind when the Palmleys were Long-
puddle folk, but Ido well. She had a son also, who
was, of course, nine or ten years younger than the son
of the first. The child proved to be of rather weak
intellect, though his mother loved him as the apple of
her eye.

“This woman’s husband died when the child was
eight years old, and left his widow and boy in pov-
erty. Her former rival, also a widow now, but fairly
well provided for, offered for pity’s sake to take the
child as errand - boy, small as he was, her own son,
Jack, being hard upon seventeen. Her poor neighbor
could do no better than let the child go there. And
to the richer woman’s house little Palmley straight-
way went.

“Well, in some way or other—how, it was never
exactly known —the thriving woman, Mrs. Winter,
244 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

sent the little boy with a message to the next village
one December day, much against his will. It was get-
ting dark, and the child prayed to be allowed not to
go, because he would be afraid coming home. But
the mistress insisted, more out of thoughtlessness than
cruelty, and the child went. On his way back he had
to pass through Yalbury Wood, and something came
out from behind a tree and frightened him into fits.
The child was quite ruined by it ; he became quite a
drivelling idiot, and soon afterwards died.

“Then the other woman had nothing left to live
for, and vowed vengeance against that rival who had
first won away her lover, and now had been the cause
of her bereavement. This last affliction was certainly
not intended by her thriving acquaintance, though it
must be owned that when it was done she seemed
but little concerned. Whatever vengeance poor Mrs.
Palmley felt, she had no opportunity of carrying it
out, and time might have softened her feelings into
forgetfulness of her supposed wrongs as she dragged
on her lonely life. So matters stood when, a year
after the death of the child, Mrs. Palmley’s niece, who
had been born and bred in the city of Exonbury, came
to live with her.

“This young woman—Miss Harriet Palmley—was
a proud and handsome girl, very well brought up, and
more stylish and genteel than the people of our vil-
lage, as was natural, considering where she came from.
She regarded herself as much above Mrs. Winter and
her son in position as Mrs. Winter and her son consid-
ered themselves above poor Mrs. Palmley. But love
is an unceremonious thing, and what in the world
should happen but that young Jack Winter must fall
wofully and wildly in love with Harriet Palmley al-
most as soon as he saw her.

“She, being better educated than he, and caring
THE WINTERS AND THE PALMLEYS 245

nothing for the village notion of his mother’s superior-
ity to her aunt, did not give him much encourage-
ment. But Longpuddle being no very large world,
the two could not help seeing a good deal of each
other while she was staying there, and, disdainful
young woman as she was, she did seem to take a lit-
tle pleasure in his attentions and advances.

“One day, when they were picking apples together,
he asked her to marry him. She had not expected
anything so practical as that at so early a time, and
was led by her surprise into a half-promise; at any
rate, she did not absolutely refuse him, and accepted
some little presents that he made her.

“But he saw that her view of him was rather as a
simple village lad than as a young man to look up to,
and he felt that he must do something bold to secure
her. So he said one day, ‘I am going away, to try to
get into a better position than I can get here.’ In two
or three weeks he wished her good-bye, and went away
to Monksbury to superintend a farm, with a view to
start as a farmer himself; and from there he wrote
regularly to her, as if their marriage were an under-
stood thing.

“Now, Harriet liked the young man’s presents and
the admiration of his eyes, but on paper he was less
attractive to her. Her mother had been a school-mis-
tress, and Harriet had besides a natural aptitude for
pen-and-ink work, in days when to be a ready writer
was not such a common thing as it is now, and when
actual handwriting was valued as an accomplishment
in itself. Jack Winter’s performances in the shape of
love-letters quite jarred her city nerves and her finer
taste, and when she answered one of them, in the
lovely running hand that she took such pride in, she
very strictly and loftily bade him to practise with a
pen and spelling -book if he wished to please her.
246 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

Whether he listened to her request or not nobody
knows, but his letters did not improve. He ventured
to tell her in his clumsy way that if her heart were
more warm towards him she would not be so nice
about bis handwriting and spelling; which indeed
was true enough.

“Well, in Jack’s absence the weak flame that had
been set alight in Harriet’s heart soon sank low, and
at last went out altogether. He wrote and wrote, and
begged and prayed her to give a reason for her cold-
ness ; and then she told him plainly that she was town
born, and he was not sufficiently well educated to
please her.

“Jack Winter’s want of pen-and-ink training did
not make him less thin-skinned than others ; in fact,
he was terribly tender and touchy about anything.
This reason that she gave for finally throwing him
over grieved him, shamed him, and mortified him
more than can be told in these times, the pride of
that day in being able to write with beautiful flour-
ishes, and the sorrow at not being able to do so, raging
so high. Jack replied to her with an angry note, and
then she hit back with smart little stings, telling him
how many words he had misspelled in his last letter,
and declaring again that this alone was sufficient justi-
fication for any woman to put an end to an understand-
ing with him. Her husband must be a better scholar.

“He bore her rejection of him in silence, but his
suffering was sharp—all the sharper in being untold.
She communicated with Jack no more; and as his
reason for going out into the world had been only to
provide a home worthy of her, he had no further ob-
ject in planning such a home, now that she was lost to
him. He therefore gave up the farming occupation by
which he had hoped to make himself a master-farmer,
and left the spot to return to his mother.
THE WINTERS AND THE PALMLEYS 247

“As soon as he got back to Longpuddle he found
that Harriet had already looked wi’ favor upon an-
other lover. He was a young road- contractor, and
Jack could not but admit that his rival was, both in
manners and scholarship, much ahead of him. Indeed,
a more sensible match for the beauty who had been
dropped into the village by fate could hardly have
been found than this man, who could offer her so much
better a chance than Jack could have done, with his
uncertain future and narrow abilities for grappling
with the world. The fact was so clear to him that he
could hardly blame her.

“One day by accident Jack saw on a scrap of paper
the handwriting of Harriet’s new beloved. It was
flowing like a stream, well spelled, the work of a man
accustomed to the ink-bottle and the dictionary—of a
man already called in the parish a good scholar. And
then it struck all of a sudden into Jack’s mind what a
contrast the letters of this young man must make to
his own miserable old letters, and how ridiculous they
must make his lines appear. He groaned and wished
he had never written to her, and wondered if she had
ever kept his poor performances. Possibly she had
kept them, for women are in the habit of doing that,
he thought; and while they were in her hands there
was always a chance of his honest, stupid love assur-
ances to her being joked over by Harriet with her
present lover, or by anybody who should accidentally
uncover them.

“The nervous, moody young man could not bear
the thought of it, and at length decided to ask her to
return them, as was proper when engagements were
broken off. He was some hours in framing, copying,
and recopying the short note in which he made his
request, and having finished it, he sent it to her
house. His messenger came back with the answer,
248 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

by word of mouth, that Miss Palmley bade him say
she should not part with what was hers, and wondered
at his boldness in troubling her.

“ Jack was much affronted at this, and determined
to go for his letters himself. He chose a time when
he knew she was at home, and knocked and went in
without much ceremony; for though Harriet was so
high and mighty, Jack had small respect for her aunt,
Mrs. Palmley, whose little child had been his boot-
cleaner in earlier days. Harriet was in the room, this
being the first time they had met since she had jilted
him. He asked for his letters with a stern and bitter
look at her.

“ At first she said he might have them for all that
she cared, and took them out of the bureau where she
kept them. Then she glanced over the outside one
of the packet, and, suddenly altering her mind, she
told him shortly that his request was a silly one, and
slipped the letters into her aunt’s work- box, which
stood open on the table, locking it, and saying with a
bantering laugh that of course she thought it best to
keep ’em, since they might be useful to produce as
evidence that she had good cause for declining to
marry him.

“He blazed up hot. ‘Give me those letters!’ he
said. ‘They are mine!’

«No, they are not,’ she replied; ‘they are mine.’

«¢ Whos’ever they are I want them back,’ says he.
“I don’t want to be made sport of for my penman-
ship: you’ve another young man now! He has your
confidence, and you pour all your tales into his ear.
You'll be showing them to him?’

“¢ Perhaps,’ said my lady Harriet, with calm cool-
ness, like the heartless woman that she was.

“Her manner so maddened him that he made a
step towards the work-box, but she snatched it up,
THE WINTERS AND THE PALMLEYS 249

locked it in the bureau, and turned upon him trium-
phant. For a moment he seemed to be going to
wrench the key of the bureau out of her hand; but
he stopped himself, and swung round upon his heel
and went away.

““ When he was out-of-doors alone, and it got night,
he walked about restless, and stinging with the sense
of being beaten at all points by her. He could not
help fancying her telling her new lover or her ac-
quaintances of this scene with himself, and laughing
with them over those poor blotted, crooked lines of
his that he had been so anxious to obtain. As the
evening passed on he worked himself into a dogged
resolution to have them back at any price, come what
might.

“ At the dead of night he came out of his mother’s
house by the back door, and creeping through the
garden hedge went along the field adjoining till he
reached the back of her aunt’s dwelling. The moon
struck bright and flat upon the walls, twas said, and
every shiny leaf of the creepers was like a little
looking - glass in the rays. From long acquaintance
Jack knew the arrangement and position of every-
thing in Mrs. Palmley’s house as well as in his own
mother’s. The back window close to him was a case-
ment with little leaded squares, as it is to this day,
and was, as now, one of two lighting the sitting-
room. The other, being in front, was closed up with
shutters, but this back one had not even a blind, and
the moonlight as it streamed in showed every article
of the furniture to him outside. To the right of the
room is the fireplace, as you may remember ; to the
left was the bureau at that time; inside the bureau
was Harriet’s work - box, as he supposed (though it
was really her aunt’s), and inside the work - box were
his letters. Well, he took out his pocket -knife, and
250 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

without noise lifted the leading of one of the panes,
so that he could take out the glass, and putting his
hand through the hole he unfastened the casement,
and climbed in through the opening. All the house-
hold —that is to say, Mrs. Palmley, Harriet, and the
little maid-servant—were asleep. Jack went straight
to the bureau, so he said, hoping it might have been
unfastened again — it not being kept locked in ordi-
nary —but Harriet had never unfastened it since she
secured her letters there the day before. Jack told
afterwards how he thought of her asleep up-stairs,
caring nothing for him, and of the way she had made
sport of him and of his letters; and having advanced
so far, he was not to be hindered now. By forcing
the large blade of his knife under the flap of the
bureau he burst the weak lock ; within was the rose-
wood work-box just as she had placed it in her hurry
to keep it from him. There being no time to spare for
getting the letters out of it then, he took it under his
arm, shut the bureau, and made the best of his way
out of the house, latching the casement behind him,
and refixing the pane of glass in its place.

‘‘ Winter found his way back to his mother’s as he
had come, and being dog-tired, crept up-stairs to bed,
hiding the box till he could destroy its contents. The
next morning early he set about doing this, and car-
ried it to the linhay at the back of his mother’s dwell-
ing. Here by the hearth he opened the box, and
began burning one by one the letters that had cost
him so much labor to write and shame to think of,
meaning to return the box to Harriet, after repairing
the slight damage he had caused it by opening it
without a key, with a note—the last she would ever
receive from him—telling her triumphantly that in re-
fusing to return what he had asked for she had calcu-
lated too surely upon his submission to her whims.
THE WINTERS AND THE PALMLEYS 251

“But on removing the last letter from the box he
received a shock ; for underneath it, at the very bot-
tom, lay money—several golden guineas—‘ Doubtless
Harriet’s pocket - money,’ he said to himself; though
it was not, but Mrs. Palmley’s. Before he had got
over his qualms at this discovery he heard footsteps
coming through the house - passage to where he was.
In haste he pushed the box and what was in it under
some brushwood which lay in the linhay ; but Jack
had been already seen. Two constables entered the
out-house, and seized him as he knelt before the fire-
place, securing the work - box and all it contained at
the same moment. They had come to apprehend him
on a charge of breaking into the dwelling - house of
Mrs. Palmley on the night preceding ; and almost be-
fore the lad knew what had happened to him they
were leading him along the lane that connects that
end of the village with this turnpike-road, and along
they marched him between ’em all the way to Caster-
bridge jail.

“ Jack’s act amounted to night burglary—though he
had never thought of it—and burglary was felony, and
a capital offence in those days. His figure had been
seen by some one against the bright wall as he came
away from Mrs. Palmley’s back window, and the box
and money were found in his possession, while the evi-
dence of the broken bureau lock and tinkered window-
pane was more than enough for circumstantial detail.
Whether his protestation that he went only for his let-
ters, which he believed to be wrongfully kept from
him, would have availed him anything if supported by
other evidence I do not know; but the one person who
could have borne it out was Harriet, and she acted
entirely under the sway of her aunt. That aunt was
deadly towards Jack Winter. Mrs. Palmley’s time had
come, Here was her revenge upon the woman who
252 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

first won away her lover, and next ruined and deprived
her of her one heart’s treasure—her little son. When
the assize week drew on, and Jack had to stand his trial,
Harriet did not appear in the case at all, which was
allowed to take its course, Mrs. Palmley testifying to
the general facts of the burglary. Whether Harriet
would have come forward if Jack had appealed to her
is not known; possibly she would have done it for
pity’s sake ; but Jack was too proud to ask a single
favor of a girl who had jilted him, and he let her alone.
The trial was a short one, and the death sentence was
passed.

“The day o’ young Jack’s execution was a cold,
dusty Saturday in March. He was so boyish and slim
that they were obliged in mercy to hang him in the
heaviest fetters kept in the jail, lest his heft should
not break his neck, and they weighed so upon him that
he could hardly drag himself up tothe drop. At that
time the gover’ment was not strict about burying the
body of an executed person within the precincts of the
prison, and at the earnest prayer of his poor mother
his body was allowed to be brought home. All the
parish waited at their cottage doors in the evening
for its arrival ; I remember how, as a very little girl, I
stood by my mother’s side. About eight o’clock, as we
hearkened on our door-stones in the cold, bright star-
light, we could hear the faint crackle of a wagon from
the direction of the turnpike-road. The noise was lost
as the wagon dropped into a hollow, then it was plain
again as it lumbered down the next long incline, and
presently it entered Longpuddle. The coffin was laid
in the belfry for the night, and the next day, Sun-
day, between the services, we buried him. A funeral
sermon was preached the same afternoon, the text
chosen being, ‘He was the only son of his mother, and
she was a widow.’... Yes, they were cruel times!
THE WINTERS AND THE PALMLEYS | 253

“ As for Harriet, she and her lover were married in
due time ; but by all account her life was no jocund
one. She and her good-man found that they could not
live comfortably at Longpuddle by reason of her con-
nection with Jack’s misfortunes, and they settled in a
distant town, and were no more heard of by us; Mrs.
Palmley, too, found it advisable to join ’em shortly
after. The dark-eyed, gaunt old Mrs. Winter, remem-
bered by the emigrant gentleman here, was, as you
will have foreseen, the Mrs. Winter of this story ;
and I can well call to mind how lonely she was, how
afraid the children were of her, and how she kept
herself as a stranger among us, though she lived so
long.”

“Longpuddle has had her sad experiences as well as
her sunny ones,” said Mr. Lackland.

“Yes, yes. But I am thankful to say not many like
that, though good and bad have lived among us.”

“There was Georgy Crookhill—he was one of the
shady sort, as I have reason to know,” observed the
registrar, with the manner of a man who would like to
have his say also.

“T used to hear what he was as a boy at school.”

“Well, as he began so he went on. It never got so
far as a hanging matter with him, to be sure; but he
had some narrow escapes of penal servitude, and once
it was a case of the biter bit.”

R
INCIDENT IN THE LIFE OF MR. GEORGE
CROOKHILL

“One day,” the registrar continued, “Georgy was
ambling out of Melchester on a miserable screw, the
fair being just over, when he saw in front of him a
fine-looking young farmer riding out of the town in
the same direction. He was mounted on a good, strong,
handsome animal, worth fifty guineas if worth a crown.
When they were going up Bissett Hill, Georgy made
it his business to overtake the young farmer. They
passed the time o’ day to one another ; Georgy spoke
of the state of the roads, and jogged alongside the well-
mounted stranger in very friendly conversation. The
farmer had not been inclined to say much to Georgy
at first, but by degrees he grew quite affable, too—as
friendly as Georgy was towards him. He told Crook-
hill that he had been doing business at Melchester fair,
and was going on as far as Shottsford-Forum that night,
so as to reach Casterbridge market the nextday. When
they came to Woodyates Inn they stopped to bait their
horses, and agreed to drink together ; with this they
got more friendly than ever, and on they went again.
Before they had nearly reached Shottsford it came on
to rain, and as they were now passing through the vil-
lage of Trantridge, and it was quite dark, Georgy per-
suaded the young farmer to go no farther that night;
the rain would most likely give them a chill. For his
part he had heard that the little inn here was com-
fortable, and he meant to stay. At last the young
INCIDENT IN THE LIFE OF MR. CROOKHILL 255

farmer agreed to put up there also; and they dis-
mounted and entered, and had a good supper to-
gether, and talked over their affairs like men who had
known and proved each other a long time. When it
was the hour for retiring they went up-stairs to a
double-bedded room which Georgy Crookhill had
asked the landlord to let them oe so sociable were
they.

“ Before they fell asleep fies talked across the room
about one thing and another, running from this to
that till the conversation turned upon disguises, and
changing clothes for particular ends. The farmer
told Georgy that he had often heard tales of people
doing it, but Crookhill professed to be very ignorant
of all such tricks ; and soon the young farmer sank
into slumber.

‘arly in the morning, while the tall young farmer
was still asleep (I tell the story as ’twas told me), hon-
est Georgy crept out of his bed by stealth, and dressed
himself in the farmer’s clothes, in the pockets of the said
clothes being the farmer’smoney. Now though Georgy
particularly wanted the farmer’s nice clothes and nice
horse, owing to a little transaction at the fair which
made it desirable that he should not be too easily
recognized, his desires had their bounds ; he did not
wish to take his young friend’s money, at any rate
more of it than was necessary for paying his bill.
This he abstracted, and leaving the farmer’s purse
containing the rest on the bedroom table, went down-
stairs. The inn folks had not particularly noticed the
faces of their customers, and the one or two who were
up at this hour had no thought but that Georgy was
the farmer ; so when he had paid the bill very lib-
erally, and said he must be off, no objection was made
to his getting the farmer’s horse saddled for himself;
and he rode away upon it as if it were his own.
256 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“‘ About half an hour after the young farmer awoke,
and looking across the room saw that his friend Georgy
had gone away in clothes which didn’t belong to him,
and had kindly left for himself the seedy ones worn
by Georgy. At this he sat up in a deep thought
for some time, instead of hastening to give an alarm,
‘The money, the money is gone,’ he said to himself,
‘and that’s bad. But so are the clothes.’

“He then looked upon the table and saw that the
money, or most of it, had been left behind.

“<¢ Wa, ha, ha!’ he cried, and began to dance about
the room. ‘Ha, ha, ha! he said again, and made
beautiful smiles to himself in the shaving-glass and in
the brass candlestick ; and then swung about his arms
for all the world as if he were going through the
sword exercise.

“When he had dressed himself in Georgy’s clothes
and gone down-stairs, he did not seem to mind at all
that they took him for the other; and even when he
saw that he had been left a bad horse for a good one,
he was not inclined to cry out. They told him his
friend had paid the bill, at which he seemed much
pleased, and without waiting for breakfast he mounted
Georgy’s horse and rode away likewise, choosing the
nearest by-lane in preference to the high-road, without
knowing that Georgy had chosen that by-lane also.

“He had not trotted more than two miles in the
personal character of Georgy Crookhill when, sudden-
ly rounding a bend that the lane made thereabout, he
came upon a man struggling in the hands of two vil-
lage constables. It was his friend Georgy, the bor-
rower of his clothes and horse. But so far was the
young farmer from showing any alacrity in rushing
forward to claim his property that he would have
turned the poor beast he rode into the wood adjoining,
if he had not been already perceived.
INCIDENT IN THE LIFE OF MR. CROOKHILL 257

“<¢ Help, help, help !’ cried the constables. ‘ Assist-
ance in the name of the Crown !’

““The young farmer could do nothing but ride for-
ward. ‘What’s the matter ? he inquired, as coolly as
he could.

“« A deserter—a deserter !’ said they. ‘One who's
to be tried by court-martial and shot without parley.
He deserted from the Dragoons at Cheltenham some
days ago, and was tracked ; but the search-party can’t
find him anywhere, and we told ‘em if we met him
we'd hand him on to ’em forthwith. The day after
he left the barracks the rascal met a respectable farmer
and made him drunk at an inn, and told him what a
fine soldier he would make, and coaxed him to change
clothes, to see how well a military uniform would be-
come him, This the simple farmer did; when our
deserter said that for a joke he would leave the room
and go to the landlady, to see if she would know him
in that dress. He never came back, and Farmer Jol-
lice found himself in soldier’s clothes, the money in
his pockets gone, and, when he got to the stable, his
horse gone too.’

“<¢ A scoundrel ! says the young man in Georgy’s
clothes. ‘And is this the wretched caitiff? (pointing
to Georgy).

“*No, no!’ cries Georgy, as innocent as a babe of
this matter of the soldier’s desertion. ‘He’s the man!
He was wearing Farmer Jollice’s suit o’ clothes, and
he slept in the same room wi’ me, and brought up the
subject of changing clothes, which put it into my
head to dress myself in his suit before he was awake.
He’s got on mine!’

“¢T)’ve hear the villain ? groans the tall young man
to the constables. ‘Trying to get out of his crime
by charging the first innocent man with it that he
sees! No, master soldier—that won’t do!’

17
258 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“¢No,no! That won’t do!’ the constables chimed
in. ‘To have the impudence to say such as that,
when we caught him in the act almost! But, thank
God, we’ve got the handcuffs on him at last.’

“<«We have, thank God,’ said the tall young man.
‘Well, I must move on. Good-luck to ye with your
prisoner!’ And off he went as fast as his poor jade
would carry him.

“The constables then, with Georgy handcuffed be-
tween ’em, and leading the horse, marched off in the
other direction, towards the village where they had
been accosted by the escort of soldiers sent to bring
the deserter back, Georgy groaning : ‘I shall be shot,
I shall be shot!’ They had not gone more than a
mile before they met them.

“* Foi, there !’ says the head constable.

“¢ Hoi, yerself !’ says the corporal in charge.

«We've got your man,’ says the constable.

“Where? says the corporal.

“Here, between us,’ said the constable. ‘Only you
don’t recognize him out o’ uniform.’

“The corporal looked at Georgy hard enough; then
shook his head and said he was not the absconder.

“¢But the absconder changed clothes with Farmer
Jollice, and took his horse; and this man has ‘em,
d’ye see!’

«<©Tis not our man,’ said the soldiers. ‘ He’s a tall
young fellow with a mole on his right cheek, and a
military bearing, which this man decidedly has not.’

“¢T told the servants of the Crown that ’twas the
other ! pleaded Georgy. ‘But they wouldn’t believe
me.’

“ And so it became clear that the missing dragoon
was the tall young farmer, and not Georgy Crookhill
—a fact which Farmer Jollice himself corroborated
when he arrived on the scene. As Georgy had only
INCIDENT IN THE LIFE OF MR. CROOKHILL 259

robbed the robber, his sentence was comparatively
light. The deserter from the Dragoons was never
traced; his double shift of clothing having been of
the greatest advantage to him in getting off, though
he left Georgy’s horse behind him a few miles ahead,
having found the poor creature more hinderance than
aid.”

The man from abroad seemed to be less interested
in the questionable characters of Longpuddle and their
strange adventures than in the ordinary inhabitants
and the ordinary events, though his local fellow-trav-
ellers preferred the former as subjects of discussion.
He now for the first time asked concerning young
persons of the opposite sex—or rather those who had
been young when he left his native land. His inform-
ants, adhering to their own opinion that the remark-
able was better worth telling than the ordinary, would
not allow him to dwell upon the simple chronicles of
those who had merely come and gone. They asked
him if he remembered Netty Sargent.

“Netty Sargent—I do, just remember her. She was
a young woman living with her uncle when I left, if
my childish recollection may be trusted.”

“That was the maid. She was a oneyer, if you like,
sir. Not any harm in her, you know, but up to every-
thing. You ought to hear how she got the copyhold
of her house extended. Oughtn’t he, Mr. Day?”

“ He ought,” replied the world-ignored old painter.

“Tell him, Mr. Day. Nobody can do it better than
you, and you know the legal part better than some
of us.”

Day apologized, and began:
NETTY SARGENT’S COPYHOLD

“ Sx continued to live with her uncle, in the lonely
house by the copse, just as at the time you knew her;
a tall, spry young woman. Ah, how well one can re-
member her black hair and dancing eyes at that time,
and her sly way of screwing up her mouth when she
meant to tease ye! Well, she was hardly out of short
frocks before the chaps were after her, and by long
and by late she was courted by a young man whom
perhaps you did not know—Jasper Cliff was his name
—and, though she might have had many a better fel-
low, he so greatly took her fancy that ’twas Jasper or
nobody for her. He was a selfish customer, always
thinking less of what he was going to do than of what
he was going to gain by his doings. Jasper’s eyes
might have been fixed upon Netty, but his mind was
upon her uncle’s house; though he was fond of her in
his way—I admit that.

“This house, built by her great-great-grandfather,
with its garden and little field, was copyhold—granted
upon lives in the old way, and had been so granted
for generations. Her uncle’s was the last life upon
the property, so that at his death, if there was no ad-
mittance of new lives, it would all fall into the hands
of the lord of the manor. But ’twas easy to admit—
a slight ‘fine,’ as twas called, of a few pounds, was
enough to entitle him to a new deed o’ grant by the
custom of the manor; and the lord could not hin-
der it.

“Now, there could be no better provision for his
NETTY SARGENT’S COPYHOLD 261

niece and only relative than a sure house over her
head, and Netty’s uncle should have seen to the re-
newal in time, owing to the peculiar custom of forfeit-
ure by the dropping of the last life before the new
fine was paid ; for the squire was very anxious to get
hold of the house and land ; and every Sunday when
the old man came into the church and passed the
squire’s pew, the squire would say, ‘A little weaker
in his knees, a little crookeder in his back—and the
readmittance not applied for, ha! ha! I shall be able
to make a complete clearing of that corner of the
manor some day !’

“Twas extraordinary, now we look back upon it,
that old Sargent should have been so dilatory; yet
some people are like it, and he put off calling at the
squire’s agent’s office with the fine week after week,
saying to himself, ‘I shall have more time next mar-
ket-day than I have now.’ One unfortunate hinderance
was that he didn’t very well like Jasper Cliff, and as
Jasper kept urging Netty, and Netty on that account
kept urging her uncle, the old man was inclined to
postpone the reliveing as long as he could, to spite the
selfish young lover. At last old Mr. Sargent fell ill,
and then Jasper could bear it no longer: he produced
the fine money himself, and handed it to Netty, and
spoke to her plainly.

“You and your uncle ought to know better. You
should press him more, There’s the money. If you
let the house and ground slip between ye, I won’t
marry; hang me if I will! For folks won’t deserve
a husband that can do such things.’

“The worried girl took the money and went home,
and told her uncle that it was no house no husband
for her. Old Mr. Sargent pooh-poohed the money, for
the amount was not worth consideration, but he did
now bestir himself, for he saw she was bent upon mar-
262 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

rying Jasper, and he did not wish to make her unhap-
py, since she was so determined. It was much to the
squire’s annoyance that he found Sargent had moved
in the matter at last; but he could not gainsay it,
and the documents were prepared (for on this manor
the copyholders had writings with their holdings,
though on some manors they had none). Old Sargent
being now too feeble to go to the agent’s house, the
deed was to be brought to his house signed, and hand-
ed over as a receipt for the money; the counterpart
to be signed by Sargent, and sent back to the squire.

“The agent had promised to call on old Sargent for
this purpose at five o’clock, and Netty put the money
into her desk to have it close at hand. While doing
this she heard a slight cry from her uncle, and turn-
ing round, saw that he had fallen forward in his chair.
She went and lifted him, but he was unconscious, and
unconscious he remained. Neither medicine nor stim-
ulants would bring him to himself. She had been told
that he might possibly go off in that way, and it seemed
as if the end had come. Before she had started for a
doctor his face and extremities grew quite cold and
white, and she saw that help would be useless. He
was stone-dead.

“Netty’s situation rose upon her distracted mind in
all its seriousness. The house, garden, and field were
lost—by a few hours—and with them a home for her-
self and her lover. She would not think so meanly of
Jasper as to suppose that he would adhere to the reso-
lution declared in a moment of impatience; but she
trembled, nevertheless. Why could not her uncle have
lived a couple of hours longer, since he had lived so
long? It was now past three o’clock ; at five the agent
was to call, and, if all had gone well, by ten minutes
past five the house and holding would have been se-
curely hers for her own and Jasper’s lives, these being
NETTY SARGENT’S COPYHOLD 263

two of the three proposed to be added by paying the
fine. How that wretched old squire would rejoice at
getting the little tenancy into his hands! He did not
really require it, but constitutionally hated these tiny
copyholds and leaseholds and freeholds, which made
islands of independence in the fair, smooth ocean of
his estates.

“Then an idea struck into the head of Netty how
to accomplish her object in spite of her uncle’s negli-
gence. It was a dull December afternoon, and the
first step in her scheme—so the story goes, and I see
no reason to doubt it—”

“Tis true as the light,” affirmed Christopher Twink.
“T was just passing by.”

“The first step in her scheme was to fasten the
outer door, to make sure of not being interrupted.
Then she set to work by placing her uncle’s small,
heavy oak table before the fire; then she went to her
uncle’s corpse, sitting in the chair as he had died—a
stuffed arm-chair, on castors, and rather high in the
seat, so it was told me—and wheeled the chair, uncle
and all, to the table, placing him with his back tow-
ards the window, in the attitude of bending over the
said oak table, which I knew as a boy as well as I know
any piece of furniture in my own house. On the table
she laid the large family Bible open before him, and
placed his forefinger on the page; and then she opened
his eyelids a bit, and put on him his spectacles, so that
from behind he appeared for all the world as if he
were reading the Scriptures. Then she unfastened
the door and sat down, and when it grew dark she
lit a candle, and put it on the table beside her uncle’s
book.

“Folk may well guess how the time passed with her
till the agent came, and how, when his knock sounded
upon the door, she nearly started out of her skin—at
264 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

least, that’s as it was told me. ~ Netty promptly went
to the door.

“<¢T am sorry, sir,’ she says, under her breath ; ‘my
uncle is not so well to-night, and I’m afraid he can’t
see you.’ ,

“¢F’m!—that’s a pretty tale,’ says the steward. ‘So
I’ve come all this way about this trumpery little job
for nothing !’

“¢Oh no, sir—I hope not,’ says Netty. ‘J suppose
the business of granting the new deed can be done just
the same ?”

“«Done? Certainly not. He must pay the renewal
money, and sign the parchment in my presence.’

“She looked dubious. ‘Uncle is so dreadful nervous
about law business,’ says she, ‘that, as you know, he’s
put it off and put it off for years; and now to-day real-
ly I’ve feared it would verily drive him out of his mind.
His poor three teeth quite chattered when I said to him
that you would be here soon with the parchment writ-
ing. He always was afraid of agents, and folks that
come for rent, and such like.’

“¢Poor old fellow—I’m sorry for him. Well, the
thing can’t be done unless I see him and witness his
signature.’

“«¢ Suppose, sir, that you see him sign, and he don’t
see you looking at him? Id soothe his nerves by
saying you weren’t strict about the form of witness-
ing, and didn’t wish to come in. So that it was done
in your bare presence it would be sufficient, would it
not? As he’s such an old, shrinking, shivering man, it
would be a great considerateness on your part if that
would do.’

“*In my bare presence would do, of course—that’s
all I come for. But how can I be a witness without
his seeing me ?”

“« Why, in this way, sir; if you'll oblige me by just
NETTY SARGENT’S COPYHOLD 265

stepping here.’ She conducted him a few yards to the
left, till they were opposite the parlor window. The
blind had been left up purposely, and the candle-light
shone out upon the garden bushes. Within the agent
could see, at the other end of the room, the back and
side of the old man’s head, and his shoulders and arm,
sitting with the book and candle before him, and his
spectacles on his nose, as she had placed him.

“«Hfe’s reading his Bible, as you see, sir,’ she says,
quite in her meekest way.

““YVes. I thought he was a careless sort of man in
matters of religion.’

“¢He always was fond of his Bible,’ Netty assured
him. ‘Though I think he’s nodding over it just at
this moment. However, that’s natural in an old man,
and unwell. Now you could stand here and see him
sign, couldn’t you, sir, as he’s such an invalid ?”

“*Very well,’ said the agent, lighting a cigar.
‘You have ready by you the merely nominal sum
you'll have to pay for the admittance, of course ?”

“¢ Ves, said Netty. ‘I'll bring it out.’ She fetched
the cash, wrapped in paper, and handed it to him, and
when he had counted it the steward took from his
breast-pocket the precious parchments and gave one
to her to be signed.

“¢Uncle’s hand is a little paralyzed,’ she said.
‘And what with bis being half asleep, too, really I
don’t know what sort of a signature he’ll be able to
make.’

“¢Doesn’t matter, so that he signs.’

“<¢ Might I hold his hand ?”

“« Aye, hold his hand, my young woman—that will
be near enough.’

“Netty re-entered the house, and the agent contin-
ued smoking outside the window. Now came the
ticklish part of Netty’s performance, The steward
266 LIFE’s LITTLE IRONIES

saw her put the inkhorn— horn,’ says I, in my old-
fashioned way—the inkstand, before her uncle, and
touch his elbow as if to arouse him, and speak to him,
and spread out the deed; when she had pointed to
show him where to sign she dipped the pen and put it
into his hand. To hold his hand she artfully stepped
behind him, so that the agent could only see a little
bit of his head and the hand she held; but he saw the
old man’s hand trace his name on the document. As
soon as ’twas done she came out to the steward with
the parchment in her hand, and the steward signed as
witness by the light from the parlor window. Then
he gave her the deed signed by the squire, and left;
and next morning Netty told the neighbors that her
uncle was dead in his bed.”

“She must have undressed him and put him there.”

“She must. Oh, that girl had a nerve, I can tell
ye! Well, to cut a long story short, that’s how she
got back the house and field that were, strictly speak-
ing, gone from her; and by getting them, got her a
husband. When the old squire was dead, and his
son came into the property, what Netty had done be-
gan to be whispered about, for she had told a friend
or two. But Netty was a pretty young woman, and
the squire’s son was a pretty young man at that time,
and wider-minded than his father, having no objection
to little holdings; and he never took any proceedings
against her.”

There was now a lull in the discourse, and soon the
van descended the hill leading into the long straggling
village. When the houses were reached the passen-
gers dropped off one by one, each at his or her own
door. Arrived at the inn, the returned emigrant se-
cured a bed, and, having eaten a light meal, sallied
forth upon the scene he had known so well in his early
NETTY SARGENT’S COPYHOLD 264

days. Though flooded with the light of the rising
moon, none of the objects wore the attractiveness in
this their real presentation that had ever accompanied
their images in the field of his imagination when he
was more than two thousand miles removed from them.
The peculiar charm attaching to an old village in an
old country, as seen by the eyes of an absolute for-
eigner, was lowered in his case by magnified expecta-
tions from infantine memories. He walked on, look-
ing at this chimney and that old wall, till he came to
the church-yard, which he entered.

The headstones, whitened by the moon, were easily
decipherable; and now for the first time Lackland be-
gan to feel himself amid the village community that
he had left behind him five-and-thirty years before.
Here, besides the Sallets, the Darths, the Pawles, the
Privetts, the Sargents, and others of whom he had
just heard, were names he remembered even better
than those: the Jickses, and the Crosses, and the
Knights, and the Olds. Doubtless representatives of
these families, or some of them, were yet among the
living; but to him they would all be as strangers.
Far from finding his heart ready supplied with roots
and tendrils here, he perceived that in returning to
this spot it would be incumbent upon him to re-es-
tablish himself from the beginning, precisely as though
he had never known the place nor it him. Time had
not condescended to wait his pleasure, nor local life
his greeting.

The figure of Mr. Lackland was seen at the inn, and
in the village street, and in the fields and Janes about
Upper Longpuddle for a few days after his arrival,
and then, ghost-like, it silently disappeared. He had
told some of the villagers that his immediate purpose
in coming had been fulfilled by a sight of the place,
and by conversation with its inhabitants; but that his
268 LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

ulterior purpose—of coming to spend his latter days
among them—would probably never be carried out. It
is now a dozen or fifteen years since his visit was paid,
and his face has not again been seen.

March, 1891.

THE END
‘ornell University Libra

“TT