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THE FIXED PERIOD 
 
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN 'BLACKWOOD'S MAGAZINE' 
 
THE FIXED PEEIOD 
 
 A NOVEL 
 
 BY 
 
 ANTHONY TEOLLOPE 
 
 IN TWO VOLUMES 
 VOL. I. 
 
 WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS 
 
 EDINBURGH AND LONDON 
 
 MDCCCLXXXII 
 
CONTENTS OF VOL. I. 
 
 rtw^ 
 
 CHAP. 
 
 I. INTRODUCTION, 
 
 II. GABRIEL CRASWELLER, . 
 III. THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN. 
 
 IV. JACK NEVERBEND, 
 
 V. THE CRICKET-MATCH, 
 
 VI. THE COLLEGE, 
 
 1 
 
 27 
 
 55 
 
 86 
 
 123 
 
 169 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2010 with funding from 
 Duke University Libraries 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/fixedperiodnovel01trol 
 
THE FIXED PEKIOD. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 It may be doubted whether a brighter, more 
 prosperous, and specially a more orderly colony 
 than Britannula was ever settled by British 
 colonists. But it had its period of separation 
 from the mother country, though never of re- 
 bellion, — like its elder sister New Zealand. 
 Indeed, in that respect it simply followed the 
 lead given her by the Australias, which, when 
 they set up for themselves, did so with the 
 full co-operation of England. There was, no 
 VOL. I. A 
 
2 " THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 doubt, a special cause witli us which did not 
 exist in Australia, and which was only, in 
 part, understood by the British Government 
 when we Britannulists were allowed to stand 
 by ourselves. The great doctrine of a " Fixed 
 Period" was received by them at first with 
 ridicule, and then with dismay; but it was 
 undoubtedly the strong faith which we of 
 Britannula had in that doctrine which in- 
 duced our separation. Nothing could have 
 been more successful than our efforts to live 
 alone during the thirty years that we remained 
 our own masters. We repudiated no debt, — 
 as have done some of our neighbours ; and no 
 attempts have been made towards communism, 
 — as has been the case with others. We have 
 been laborious, contented, and prosperous ; and 
 if we have been reabsorbed by the mother 
 country, in accordance with what I cannot but 
 call the pusillanimous conduct of certain of 
 our elder Britannulists, it has not been from 
 any failure on the part of the island, but from 
 
INTEODUCTION. * 3 
 
 the opposition with which the Fixed Period 
 has been regarded. 
 
 I think I must begin my story by explaining 
 in moderate language a few of the manifest 
 advantages which would attend the adoption 
 of the Fixed Period in all countries. As far 
 as the law went it was adopted in Britannula. 
 Its adoption was the first thing discussed by 
 our young Assembly, when we found ourselves 
 alone ; and though there were disputes on the 
 subject, in none of them was opposition made 
 to the system. I myself, at the age of thirty, 
 had been elected Speaker of that Parliament. 
 But I was, nevertheless, able to discuss the 
 merits of the bills in committee, and I did 
 so with some enthusiasm. Thirty years have 
 passed since, and my "period" is drawing nigh. 
 But I am still as energetic as ever, and as as- 
 sured that the doctrine will ultimately prevail 
 over the face of the civilised world, though I 
 will acknowledge that men are not as yet ripe 
 for it. 
 
4 THE FIXED TERIOD. 
 
 The Fixed Period has been so far discussed 
 as to make it almost unnecessary for me to 
 explain its tenets, though its advantages may 
 require a few words of argument in a world 
 that is at present dead to its charms. It con- 
 sists altoGjether of the abolition of the miseries, 
 weakness, and faineant imbecility of old age, 
 by the prearranged ceasing to live of those who 
 would otherwise become old. Need I explain 
 to the inhabitants of England, for whom I 
 chiefly write, how extreme are those sufferings, 
 and how great the costliness of that old age 
 which is unable in any degree to supply its 
 own wants ? Such old age should not, we 
 Britannulists maintain, be allowed to be. This 
 should be prevented, in the interests both of 
 the young and of those who do become old 
 when obliged to linger on after their " period " 
 of work is over. Two mistakes have been 
 made by mankind in reference to their own 
 race, — first, in allowing the world to be bur- 
 dened with the continued maintenance of those 
 
INTRODUCTION. 6 
 
 whose cares should have been made to cease, 
 and whose troubles should be at an end. Does 
 not the Psalmist say the same ? — " If by reason 
 of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their 
 strength labour and sorrow." And the second, 
 in requiring those who remain to live a useless 
 and painful life. Both these errors have come 
 from an ill-judged and a thoughtless tender- 
 ness, — a tenderness to the young in not calling 
 upon them to provide for the decent and com- 
 fortable departure of their progenitors ; and 
 a tenderness to the old lest the man, when 
 uninstructed and unconscious of good and evil, 
 should be unwilling to leave the world for 
 which he is not fitted. But such tenderness 
 is no better than unpardonable weakness. 
 Statistics have told us that the sufficient sus- 
 tenance of an old man is more costly than the 
 feeding of a young one, — as is also the care, 
 nourishment, and education of the as yet un- 
 profitable child. Statistics also have told us 
 that the unprofitable young and the no less 
 
6 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 unprofitable old form a third of the population. 
 Let the reader think of the burden with which 
 the labour of the world is thus saddled. To 
 these are to be added all who, because of illness 
 cannot work, and because of idleness will not. 
 How are a people to thrive when so weighted ? 
 And for what good? As for the children, 
 they are clearly necessary. They have to be 
 nourished in order that they may do good 
 work as their time shall come. But for whose 
 good are the old and effete to be maintained 
 amid all these troubles and miseries? Had 
 there been any one in our Parliament capable 
 of showing that they could reasonably desire it, 
 the bill would not have been passed. Though 
 to me the politico - economical view of the 
 subject was always very strong, the relief to 
 be brought to the aged was the one argument 
 to which no reply could be given. 
 
 It was put forward by some who opposed 
 the movement, that the old themselves would 
 not like it. I never felt sure of that, nor do I 
 
INTRODUCTION. 7 
 
 now. When the colony had become used to 
 the Fixed Period system, the old would be- 
 come accustomed as well as the young. It is 
 to be understood that a euthanasia was to be 
 prepared for them ; — and how many, as men 
 now are, does a euthanasia await ? And they 
 would depart with the full respect of all their 
 fellow-citizens. To how many does that lot 
 now fall ? During the last years of their lives 
 they were to be saved from any of the horrors 
 of poverty. How many now lack the comforts 
 they cannot earn for themselves ? And to 
 them there would be no degraded feeling that 
 they were the recipients of charity. They 
 would be prepared for their departure, for the 
 benefit of their country, surrounded by all the 
 comforts to which, at their time of life, they 
 would be susceptible, in a college maintained 
 at the public expense ; and each, as he drew 
 nearer to the happy day, would be treated with 
 still increasing honour. I myself had gone 
 most closely into the question of expense, and 
 
8 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 had found that by the use of machinery the 
 college could almost be made self-supporting. 
 But we should save on an average £50 for 
 each man and woman who had departed. 
 When our population should have become a 
 million, presuming that one only in fifty would 
 have reached the desired age, the sum ac- 
 tually saved to the colony would amount to 
 £1,000,000 a-year. It would keep us out of 
 debt, make for us our railways, render all our 
 rivers navigable, construct our bridges, and 
 leave us shortly the richest people on God's 
 earth ! And this would be effected by a meas- 
 ure doing more good to the aged than to any 
 other class of the community ! 
 
 Many arguments were used against us, but 
 were vain and futile in their conception. In it 
 religion was brought to bear ; and in talking of 
 this the terrible word " murder " was brought 
 into common use. I remember startling the 
 House by forbidding any member to use a 
 phrase so revolting to the majesty of the 
 
INTRODUCTION. 9 
 
 people. Murder ! Did any one who at- 
 tempted to deter us by the use of foul lan- 
 guage, bethink himself that murder, to be 
 murder, must be opposed to the law ? This 
 thing was to be done by the law. There can 
 be no other murder. If a murderer be hanged, 
 — in England, I mean, for in Britannula we 
 have no capital punishment, — is that murder ? 
 It is not so, only because the law enacts it. I 
 and a few others did succeed at last in stop- 
 ping the use of that word. Then they talked 
 to us of Methuselah, and endeavoured to draw 
 an argument from the age of the patriarchs. I 
 asked them in committee whether they were 
 prepared to prove that the 969 years, as spoken 
 of in Genesis, were the same measure of time 
 as 969 years now, and told them that if the 
 sanitary arrangements of the world would again 
 permit men to live as long as the patriarchs, 
 we would gladly change the Fixed Period. 
 
 In fact, there was not a word to be said 
 against us except that which referred to the 
 
10 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 feelings of the young and old. Feelings are 
 changeable, I told them at that great and 
 glorious meeting which we had at Gladston- 
 opolis, and though naturally governed only by 
 instinct, would be taught at last to comply 
 with reason. I had lately read how feelings 
 had been allowed in England to stand in the 
 way of the great work of cremation. A son 
 will not like, you say, to lead his father into 
 the college. But ought he not to like to do 
 so ? and if so, will not reason teach him to like 
 to do what he ought? I can conceive with 
 rapture the pride, the honour, the affection 
 with which, when the Fixed Period had come, 
 I could have led my father into the college, 
 there to enjoy for twelve months that prepara- 
 tion for euthanasia which no cares for this 
 world would be allowed to disturb. All the 
 existing ideas of the grave would be absent. 
 There would be no further struggles to prolong 
 the time of misery which nature had herself 
 produced. That temptation to the young to 
 
INTRODUCTION. 11 
 
 begrudge to the old the costly comforts which 
 they could not earn would be no longer fos- 
 tered. It would be a pride for the young man 
 to feel that his parent's name had been enrolled 
 to all coming time in the bright books of the 
 college which was to be established for the 
 Fixed Period. I have a son of my own, and 
 I have carefully educated him to look forward 
 to the day in which he shall deposit me there 
 as the proudest of his life. Circumstances, as 
 I shall relate in this story, have somewhat in- 
 terfered with him; but he will, I trust, yet 
 come back to the right way of thinking. That 
 I shall never spend that last happy year within 
 the walls of the college, is to me, from a selfish 
 point of view, the saddest part of England's re- 
 assuming our island as a colony. 
 
 My readers will perceive that I am an en- 
 thusiast. But there are reforms so great that 
 a man cannot but be enthusiastic when he has 
 received into his very soul the truth of any 
 human improvement. Alas me ! I shall never 
 
12 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 live to see carried out the glory of this measure 
 to which I have devoted the best years of my 
 existence. The college, which has been built 
 under my auspices as a preparation for the 
 happy departure, is to be made a Chamber of 
 Commerce. Those aged men who were await- 
 ing, as I verily believe, in impatience the com- 
 ing day of their perfected dignity, have been 
 turned loose in the world, and allowed to grovel 
 again with mundane thoughts amidst the idle- 
 ness of years that are useless. Our bridges, 
 our railways, our Government are not provided 
 for. Our young men are again becoming torpid 
 beneath the weight imposed upon them. I 
 was, in truth, wrong to think that so great a 
 reform could be brought to perfection within 
 the days of the first reformers. A divine idea 
 has to be made common to men's minds by fre- 
 quent ventilation before it will be seen to be 
 fit for humanity. Did not the first Christians 
 all suffer affliction, poverty, and martyrdom? 
 How many centuries has it taken in the his- 
 
INTRODUCTION. 13 
 
 tory of the world to induce it to denounce the 
 not yet abolished theory of slavery ? A throne, 
 a lord, and a bishop still remain to encumber 
 the earth ! What right had I, then, as the first 
 of the Fixed-Periodists, to hope that I might 
 live to see my scheme carried out, or that I 
 might be allowed to depart as among the first 
 glorious recipients of its advantages ? 
 
 It would appear absurd to say that had 
 there been such a law in force in England, 
 England would not have prevented its adop- 
 tion in Britannula. That is a matter of course. 
 But it has been because the old men are still 
 alive in England that the young in Britannula 
 are to be afflicted, — the young and the old as 
 well. The Prime Minister in Downing Street 
 was seventy-two when we were debarred from 
 carrying out our project, and the Secretary for 
 the Colonies was sixty-nine. Had they been 
 among us, and had we been allowed to use our 
 wisdom without interference from effete old 
 age, where would they have been ? I wish to 
 
14 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 speak with all respect of Sir William Glad- 
 stone. When we named our metropolis after 
 him, we were aware of his good qualities. He 
 has not the eloquence of his great-grandfather, 
 but he is, they tell us, a safe man. As to the 
 Minister for the Crown Colonies, — of which, 
 alas ! Britannula has again become one, — I do 
 not, I own, look upon him as a great states- 
 man. The present Duke of Hatfield has none 
 of the dash, if he has more than the prudence, 
 of his grandfather. He was elected to the pres- 
 ent Upper Chamber as a strong anti-Church 
 Liberal, but he never has had the spirit to be a 
 true reformer. It is how due to the "feelings" 
 which fill no doubt the bosoms of these two 
 anti-Fixed-Period seniors, that the doctrine of 
 the Fixed Period has for a time been quenched 
 in Britannula. It is sad to think that the 
 strength and intellect and spirit of manhood 
 should thus be conquered by that very imbecility 
 which it is their desire to banish from the world. 
 Two years since I had become the President 
 
INTRODUCTION. 15 
 
 of that which we gloried to call the rising 
 Empire of the South Pacific. And in spite of 
 all internal opposition, the college of the Fixed 
 Period was already completed. I then received 
 violent notice from the British Government 
 that Britannula had ceased to be independent, 
 and had again been absorbed by the mother 
 country among the Crown Colonies. How that 
 information was received, and with what weak- 
 ness on the part of the Britannulists, I now 
 proceed to tell. 
 
 I confess that I for one was not at first pre- 
 pared to obey. We were small, but we were 
 independent, and owed no more of submission 
 to Great Britain than we do to the Salomon 
 Islands or to Otaheite. It was for us to make 
 our own laws, and we had hitherto made them 
 in conformity with the institutions, and, I 
 must say, with the prejudices of so-called civ- 
 ilisation. We had now made a first attempt 
 at progress beyond these limits, and we were 
 immediately stopped by the fatuous darkness 
 
16 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 of the old men whom, had Great Britain 
 known her own interest, she would already 
 have silenced by a Fixed Period law on her 
 own account. No greater instance of uncalled- 
 for tyranny is told of in the history of the 
 world as already written. But my brother 
 Britannulists did not agree with me that, in 
 the interest of the coming races, it was our 
 duty rather to die at our posts than yield to 
 the menaces of the Duke of Hatfield. One 
 British gunboat, they declared, in the harbour 
 of Gladstonopolis, would reduce us — to order. 
 What order ? A 250 - ton steam - swiveller 
 could no doubt crush us, and bring our Fixed 
 Period college in premature ruin about our 
 ears. But, as was said, the captain of the 
 gunboat would never dare to touch the wire 
 that should commit so wide a destruction. An 
 Englishman would hesitate to fire a shot that 
 would send perhaps five thousand of his fel- 
 low-creatures to destruction before their Fixed 
 Period. But even in Britannula fear still 
 
INTRODUCTION. 17 
 
 remaiDS. It was decided, I will confess by the 
 common voice of the island, that we should 
 admit this Governor, and swear fealty again 
 to the British Crown. Sir Ferdinando Brown 
 was allowed to land, and by the rejoicing 
 made at the first Government House ball, as 
 I have already learned since I left the island, 
 it appeared that the Britannulists rejoiced 
 rather than otherwise at their thraldom. 
 
 Two months have passed since that time, 
 and I, being a worn-out old man, and fitted 
 only for the glory of the college, have nothing 
 left me but to write this story, so that coming 
 ages may see how noble were our efforts. But 
 in truth, the difficulties which lay in our way 
 were very stern. The philosophical truth on 
 which the system is founded was too strong, 
 too mighty, too divine, to be adopted by man 
 in the immediate age of its first appearance. 
 But it has appeared ; and I perhaps should be 
 contented and gratified, during the years which 
 I am doomed to linger through impotent im- 
 
 VOL. I. B 
 
18 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 becility, to think that I have been the first 
 reformer of my time, though I shall be doomed 
 to perish without having enjoyed its fruits. 
 
 I must now explain before I begin my story 
 certain details of our plan, which created much 
 schism among ourselves. In the first place, 
 what should be the Fixed Period? When a 
 party of us, three or four hundred in number, 
 first emigrated from New Zealand to Britan- 
 nula, we were, almost all of us, young people. 
 We would not consent to measures in regard 
 to their public debt which the Houses in 
 New Zealand threatened to take ; and as this 
 island had been discovered, and a part of it 
 cultivated, thither we determined to go. Our 
 resolution was very popular, not only with 
 certain parties in New Zealand, but also in 
 the mother country. Others followed us, and 
 we settled ourselves with great prosperity. 
 But we were essentially a young community. 
 There were not above ten among us who had 
 then reached any Fixed Period ; and not above 
 
INTRODUCTION. 19 
 
 twenty others who could be said to be ap- 
 proaching it. There never could arrive a time 
 or a people when, or among whom, the system 
 could be tried with so good a hope of success. 
 It was so long before we had been allowed to 
 stand on our bottom, that the Fixed Period 
 became a matter of common conversation in 
 Britannula. There were many who looked for- 
 ward to it as the creator of a new idea of 
 wealth and comfort ; and it was in those days 
 that the calculation was made as to the rivers 
 and railways. I think that in England they 
 thought that a few, and but a few, among us 
 were dreamers of a dream. Had they believed 
 that the Fixed Period would ever have become 
 law, they would not have permitted us to be 
 law-makers. I acknowledge that. But when 
 we were once independent, then again to re- 
 duce us to submission by a 250- ton steam- 
 swiveller was an act of gross tyranny. 
 
 What should be the Fixed Period? That 
 was the first question which demanded an im- 
 
20 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 mediate answer. Years were named absurd 
 in their intended leniency ; — eighty and even 
 eighty-five! Let us say a hundred, said I, 
 ^loud, turning upon them all the battery of 
 my ridicule. I suggested sixty ; but the term 
 was received with silence. I pointed out that 
 the few old men now on the island might be 
 exempted, and that even those above fifty-five 
 misjht be allowed to dra<? out their existences 
 if they were weak enough to select for them- 
 selves so degrading a position. This latter 
 proposition was accepted at once, and the 
 exempt showed no repugnance even when it 
 was proved to them that they would be left 
 alone in the community and entitled to no 
 honour, and never allowed even to enter the 
 pleasant gardens of the college. I think now 
 that sixty was too early an age, and that sixty- 
 five, to which I gracefully yielded, is the proper 
 Fixed Period for the human race. Let any 
 man look among his friends and see whether 
 men of sixty-five are not in the way of those 
 
INTRODUCTION. 21 
 
 who are still aspiring to rise in the world. 
 A judge shall be deaf on the bench when 
 younger men below him can hear with accur- 
 acy. His voice shall have descended to a poor 
 treble, or his eyesight shall be dim and failing. 
 At any rate, his limbs will have lost all that 
 robust agility which is needed for the adequate 
 performance of the work of the world. It is 
 self-evident that at sixty -five a man has done 
 all that he is fit to do. He should be troubled 
 no longer with labour, and therefore should 
 be troubled no longer with life. " It is all 
 vanity and vexation of spirit," such a one 
 would say, if still brave, and still desirous 
 of honour. " Lead me into the college, and 
 there let me prepare myself for that brighter 
 life w^hich will require no mortal strength." 
 My words did avail with many, and then 
 they demanded that seventy should be the 
 Fixed Period. 
 
 How long we fought over this point need 
 not now be told. But we decided at last to 
 
22 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 divide the interval. Sixty-seven and a half 
 was named by a majority of the Assembly as 
 the Fixed Period. Surely the colony was 
 determined to grow in truth old before it 
 could go into the college. But then there 
 came a further dispute. On which side of 
 the Fixed Period should the year of grace be 
 taken? Our debates even on this subject 
 were long and animated. It was said that 
 the seclusion within the college would be 
 tantamount to penal departure, and that the 
 old men should thus have the last lingering 
 di'ops of breath allowed them, without, in the 
 world at large. It was at last decided that 
 men and* women should be brought into the 
 college at sixty-seven, and that before their 
 sixty-eighth birthday they should have de- 
 parted. Then the bells were rung, and the 
 whole community rejoiced, and banquets were 
 eaten, and the young men and women called 
 each other brother and sister, and it was felt 
 that a great reform had been inaugurated 
 
INTRODUCTION. 23 
 
 among us for the benefit of mankind at 
 large. 
 
 Little was thought about it at home in Eng- 
 land when the bill was passed. There was, I 
 suppose, in the estimation of Englishmen, time 
 enough to think about it. The idea was so 
 strange to them that it was considered im- 
 possible that we should carry it out. They 
 heard of the bill, no doubt ; but I maintain 
 that, as we had been allowed to separate our- 
 selves and stand alone, it was no more their 
 concern than if it had been done in Arizona 
 or Idaho, or any of those Western States of 
 America which have lately formed themselves 
 into a new union. It was from them, no 
 doubt, that we chiefly expected that sympathy 
 which, however, we did not receive. The 
 world was clearly not yet alive to the grand 
 things in store for it. We received, indeed, a 
 violent remonstrance from the old-fashioned 
 Government at Washington ; but in answer to 
 that we stated that we were prepared to stand 
 
24 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 and fall by the new system — that we expected 
 glory rather than ignominy, and to be followed 
 by mankind rather than repudiated. We had 
 a lengthened correspondence also with New 
 Zealand and with Australia ; but England at 
 first did not believe us ; and when she was 
 given to understand that we were in earnest, 
 she brought to bear upon us the one argument 
 that could have force, and sent to our harbour 
 her 250 -ton steam -swiveller. The 250 -ton 
 swiveller, no doubt, was unanswerable — un- 
 less we were prepared to die for our system. 
 I was prepared, but I could not carry the 
 people of my country with me. 
 
 I have now given the necessary prelude to 
 the story which I have to tell. I cannot but 
 think that, in spite of the isolated manners 
 of Great Britain, readers in that country gen- 
 erally must have become acquainted with the 
 views of the Fixed-Periodists. It cannot but 
 be that a scheme with such power to change, 
 — and, I may say, to improve, — the manners 
 
INTRODUCTION. 25 
 
 and habits of mankind, should be known in 
 a country in which a portion of the inhabitants 
 do, at any rate, read and write. They boast, 
 indeed, that not a man or a woman in the 
 British Islands is now ignorant of his letters ; 
 but I am informed that the knowledge seldom 
 approaches to any literary taste. It may be 
 that a portion of the masses should have been 
 ignorant of what was being done within the 
 empire of the South Pacific. I have therefore 
 written this preliminary chapter to explain to 
 them what was the condition of Britannula in 
 regard to the Fixed Period just twelve months 
 before England had taken possession of us, 
 and once more made us her own. Sir Fer- 
 dinando Brown now rules us, I must say, not 
 with a rod of iron, but very much after his 
 own good will. He makes us flowery speeches, 
 and thinks that they will stand in lieu of 
 independence. He collects his revenue, and 
 informs us that to be taxed is the highest 
 privilege of an ornate civilisation. He pointed 
 
26 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 to the gunboat in the bay when it came, and 
 called it the divine depository of beneficent 
 power. For a time, no doubt, British " tender- 
 ness" will prevail. But I shall have wasted 
 my thoughts, and in vain poured out my 
 eloquence as to the Fixed Period, if, in the 
 course of years, it does not again spring to the 
 front, and prove itself to be necessary before 
 man can accomplish all that he is destined to 
 achieve. 
 
27 
 
 CHAPTER 11. 
 
 GABEIEL CRASWELLER. 
 
 I WILL now begin my tale. It is above thirty- 
 years since I commenced my agitation in Brit- 
 annula. We were a small people, and had not 
 then been blessed by separation ; but we were, 
 I think, peculiarly intelligent. We were the 
 very cream, as it were, that had been skimmed 
 from the milk-pail of the people of a wider 
 colony, themselves gifted with more than or- 
 dinary intelligence. We were the elite of the 
 selected population of New Zealand. I think 
 I may say that no race so well informed ever 
 before set itself down to form a new nation. 
 I am now nearly sixty years old, — very nearly 
 fit for the college which, alas ! will never be 
 
28 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 open for me, — and I was nearly thirty when I 
 began to be in earnest as to the Fixed Period. 
 At that time my dearest friend and most 
 trusted coadjutor was Gabriel Crasweller. He 
 was ten years my senior then, and is now 
 therefore fit for deposition in the college were 
 the college there to receive him. He was one 
 of those who brought with them merino sheep 
 into the colony. At great labour and expense 
 he exported from New Zealand a small flock 
 of choice animals, with which he was success- 
 ful from the first. He took possession of the 
 lands of Little Christchurch, five or six miles 
 from Gladstonopolis, and showed great judg- 
 ment in the selection. A prettier spot, as it 
 turned out, for the fattening of both beef and 
 mutton and for the growth of wool, it would 
 have been impossible to have found. Every- 
 thing that human nature wants was there 
 at Little Christchurch. The streams which 
 watered the land were bright and rapid, and 
 always running. The grasses were peculiarly 
 
GABRIEL CRASWELLER. 29 
 
 rich, and the old English fruit-trees, which we 
 had brought with us from New Zealand, throve 
 there with an exuberant fertility, of which the 
 mother country, I am told, knows nothing. 
 He had imported pheasants' eggs, and salmon- 
 spawn, and young deer, and black-cock and 
 grouse, and those beautiful little Alderuey 
 cows no bigger than good-sized dogs, which, 
 when milked, give nothing but cream. All 
 these things throve with him uncommonly, 
 so that it may be declared of him that his 
 lines had fallen in pleasant places. But he 
 had no son; and therefore in discussing with 
 him, as I did daily, the question of the Fixed 
 Period, I promised him that it should be my 
 lot to deposit him in the sacred college when 
 the day of his withdrawal should have come. 
 He had been married before we left New Zea- 
 land, and was childless when he made for 
 himself and his wife his homestead at Little 
 Christchurch. But there, after a few years, 
 a daughter was born to him, and I ought to 
 
30 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 have remembered, when I promised to him 
 that last act of friendship, that it might be- 
 come the duty of that child's husband to do 
 for him with filial reverence the loving work 
 which I had undertaken to perform. 
 
 Many and most interesting were the conver- 
 sations held between Crasweller and myself on 
 the great subject which filled our hearts. He 
 undoubtedly was sympathetic, and took delight 
 in expatiating on all those benefits that would 
 come to the world from the race of mankind 
 which knew nothing of the debility of old age. 
 He saw the beauty of the theory as well as did 
 I myself, and would speak often of the weak- 
 ness of that pretended tenderness which would 
 fear to commence a new operation in regard to 
 the feelings of the men and women of the old 
 world. " Can any man love another better 
 than I do you ? " I would say to him with 
 energy ; " and yet would I scruple for a 
 moment to deposit you in the college when 
 the day had come ? I should lead you in 
 
GABRIEL CRASWELLER. 31 
 
 with that perfect reverence which it is im- 
 possible that the young should feel for the old 
 when they become feeble and incapable." I 
 doubt now whether he relished these allusions 
 to his own seclusion. He would run away 
 from his own individual case, and generalise 
 widely about some future time. And when 
 the time for voting came, he certainly did vote 
 for seventy - five. But I took no offence at 
 his vote. Gabriel Crasweller was almost my 
 dearest friend, and as his girl grew up it was 
 a matter of regret to me that my only son was 
 not quite old enough to be her husband. 
 
 Eva Crasweller was, I think, the most per- 
 fect piece I ever beheld of youthful feminine 
 beauty. I have not yet seen those English 
 beauties of which so much is said in their 
 own romances, but whom the young men from 
 New York and San Erancisco who make their 
 way to Gladstonopolis do not seem to admire 
 very much. Eva was perfect in symmetry, 
 in features, in complexion, and in simplicity 
 
32 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 of manners. All languages are the same to 
 her ; but that accomplishment has become 
 so common in Britannula that but little is 
 thought of it. I do not know whether she 
 ravished our ears most with the old-fashioned 
 piano and the nearly obsolete violin, or with 
 the modern mousometor, or the more perfect 
 melpomeneon. It was wonderful to hear the 
 way with which she expressed herself at the 
 meeting held about the rising buildings of the 
 college when she was only sixteen. But I 
 think she touched me most with just a roly- 
 poly pudding which she made with her own 
 fair hands for our dinner one Sunday at Little 
 Christchurch. And once when I saw her by 
 chance take a kiss from her lover behind the 
 door, I felt that it was a pity indeed that a 
 man should ever become old. Perhaps, however, 
 in the eyes of some her brightest charm lay 
 in the wealth which her father possessed. His 
 sheep had greatly increased in number; the 
 valleys were filled with his cattle ; and he 
 
GABRIEL CRASWELLER. 33 
 
 could always sell his salmon for lialf-a-crown 
 a pound and his pheasants for seven-and-six- 
 pence a brace. Everything had thriven with 
 Crasweller, and everything must belong to Eva 
 as soon as he should have been led into the 
 college. Eva's mother was now dead, and no 
 other child had been born. Crasweller had also 
 embarked his money largely in the wool trade, 
 and had become a sleeping - partner in the 
 house of Grundle & Grabbe. He was an older 
 man by ten years than either of his partners, 
 but yet Grundle's eldest son Abraham was 
 older than Eva when Crasweller lent his money 
 to the firm. It was soon known who was to be 
 the happiest man in the empire. It was young 
 Abraham, by whom Eva was kissed behind the 
 door that Sunday when we ate the roly-poly 
 pudding. Then she came into the room, and, 
 with her eyes raised to heaven, and with a halo 
 of glory almost round her head as she poured 
 forth her voice, she touched the mousometor, 
 and gave us the Old Hundredth psalm. 
 VOL. L c 
 
34 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 She was a fine girl at all points, and had 
 been quite alive to the dawn of the Fixed 
 Period system. But at this time, on the 
 memorable occasion of the eating of that din- 
 ner, it first began to strike me that my friend 
 Crasweller was getting very near his Fixed 
 Period, and it occurred to me to ask myself 
 questions as to what might be the daughter's 
 wishes. It was the state of her feelings rather 
 that would push itself into my mind. Quite 
 lately he had said nothing about it, — nor had 
 she. On that Sunday morning when he and 
 his girl were at church, — for Crasweller had 
 stuck to the old habit of saying his prayers 
 in a special place on a special day, — I had 
 discussed the matter with young Grundle. 
 Nobody had been into the college as yet. 
 Three or four had died naturally, but Cras- 
 weller was about to be the first. We were 
 arranging that he should be attended by pleas- 
 ant visitors till within the last week or two, 
 and I was making special allusion to the law 
 
GABRIEL CRASWELLER. 35 
 
 which required that he should abandon all con- 
 trol of his property immediately on his entering 
 the college. "I suppose he would do that," 
 said Grundle, expressing considerable interest 
 by the tone of his voice. 
 
 " Oh, certainly," said I ; "he must do that 
 in accordance with the law. But he can make 
 his will up to the very moment in which he 
 is deposited." He had then about twelve 
 months to run. I suppose there was not a 
 man or woman in the community who was 
 not accurately aware of the very day of Cras- 
 weller's birth. We had already introduced the 
 habit of tattooing on the backs of the babies 
 the day on which they were born ; and we 
 had succeeded in operating also on many of 
 the children who had come into the world 
 before the great law. Some there were who 
 would not submit on behalf of themselves or 
 their children ; and we did look forward to 
 some little confusion in this matter, A regis- 
 ter had of course been commenced, and there 
 
36 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 were already those who refused to state their 
 exact ages ; but I had been long on the look- 
 out for this, and had a little book of my own in 
 which were inscribed the " periods " of all those 
 who had come to Britannula with us ; and 
 since I had first thought of the Fixed Period 
 I had been very careful to note faithfully 
 the births as they occurred. The reader will 
 see how important, as time went on, it would 
 become to have an accurate record, and I 
 already then feared that there might be some 
 want of fidelity after I myself had been de- 
 posited. But my friend Crasweller was the 
 first on the list, and there was no doubt in 
 the empire as to the exact day on which he 
 was born. All Britannula knew that he 
 would be the first, and that he was to be 
 deposited on the 13th of June 1980. In con- 
 versation with my friend I had frequently 
 alluded to the very day, — to the happy day, 
 as T used to call it before I became acquainted 
 with his actual feelings, — and he never ven- 
 
GABRIEL CKASWELLER. 37 
 
 turecl to deny that on that day he would 
 become sixty-seven. 
 
 I have attempted to describe his daughter 
 Eva, and I must say a word as to the personal 
 qualities of her father. He too was a remark- 
 ably handsome man, and though his hair was 
 beautifully white, had fewer of the symptoms 
 of age than any old man I had before known. 
 He was tall, robust, and broad, and there was 
 no beginning even of a stoop about him. He 
 spoke always clearly and audibly, and he was 
 known for the firm voice with which he would 
 perform occasionally at some of our decimal 
 readings. We had fixed our price at a decimal 
 in order that the sum so raised might be used 
 for the ornamentation of the college. Our 
 population at Gladstonopolis was so thriving 
 that we found it as easy to collect ten pennies 
 as one. At these readings Gabriel Crasweller 
 was the favourite performer, and it had begun 
 to be whispered by some caitiff's who would 
 willingly disarrange the whole starry system 
 
38 THE :F'ixed period. 
 
 for their own immediate gratification, that 
 Crasweller should not be deposited because of 
 the beauty of his voice. And then the dif- 
 liculty was somewhat increased by the care 
 and precision with which he attended to his 
 own business. He was as careful as ever about 
 his flocks, and at shearing-time would stand all 
 day in the wool-shed to see to the packing of 
 his wool and the marking of his bales. 
 
 " It would be a pity," said to me a Britan- 
 nulist one day, — a man younger than myself, — 
 " to lock up old Crasweller, and let the business 
 go into the hands of young Grundle. Young 
 Grundle will never know half as much about 
 sheep, in spite of his conceit ; and Crasweller 
 is a deal fitter for his work than for living idle 
 in the college till you shall put an end to him." 
 
 There was much in these words which made 
 me very angry. According to this man's feel- 
 ings, the whole system was to be made to suit 
 itself to the peculiarities of one individual con- 
 stitution. A man who so spoke could have 
 
GABRIEL CRASWELLEE. 39 
 
 known nothing of the general beauty of the 
 Fixed Period. And he had alluded to the 
 manner of depositing in most disrespectful 
 terms. I had felt it to be essentially necessary 
 so to maintain the dignity of the ceremony as 
 to make it appear as unlike an execution as 
 possible. And this depositing of Crasweller 
 was to be the first, and should — according to 
 my own intentions — be attended with a pecu- 
 liar grace and reverence. " I don't know what 
 you call locking up/' said I, angrily. "Had 
 Mr Crasweller been about to be dragged to a 
 felon's prison, you could not have used more 
 opprobrious language ; and as to putting an 
 end to him, you must, I think, be ignorant of 
 the method proposed for adding honour and 
 glory to the last moments in this world of 
 those dear friends whose happy lot it will be 
 to be withdrawn from the world's troubles 
 amidst the love and veneration of their fellow- 
 subjects." As to the actual mode of transition, 
 there had been many discussions held by the 
 
40 THE FIXED PEEIOD. 
 
 executive in President Square, and it had at 
 last been decided that certain veins should be 
 opened while the departing one should, under 
 the influence of morphine, be gently entranced 
 within a warm bath. I, as president of the 
 empire, had agreed to use the lancet in the 
 first two or three cases, thereby intending to 
 increase the honours conferred. Under these 
 circumstances I did feel the sting bitterly when 
 he spoke of my putting "an end" to him. 
 " But you have not," I said, " at all realised 
 the feeling of the ceremony. A few ill-spoken 
 words, such as these you have just uttered, 
 will do us more harm in the minds of many 
 than all your voting will have done good." 
 In answer to this he merely repeated his ob- 
 servation that Crasweller was a very bad 
 specimen to begin with. " He has got ten 
 years of work in him," said my friend, "and 
 yet you intend to make away with him with- 
 out the slightest compunction." 
 
 Make away with him ! What an expression 
 
GABEIEL CRASWELLER. 41 
 
 to use, — and this from the mouth of one who 
 had been a determined Fixed - Periodist ! It 
 angered me to think that men should be so 
 little reasonable as to draw deductions as to 
 an entire system from a single instance. Cras- 
 weller might in truth be strong and hearty at 
 the Fixed Period. But that period had been 
 chosen with reference to the community at 
 large ; and what though he might have to 
 depart a year or two before he was worn out, 
 still he would do so with everything around 
 him to make him happy, and would depart 
 before he had ever known the agony of a head- 
 ache. Looking at the entire question with the 
 eyes of reason, I could not but tell myself that 
 a better example of a triumphant beginning to 
 our system could not have been found. But 
 yet there was in it something unfortunate. 
 Had our first hero been compelled to abandon 
 his business by old age — had he become doting 
 over its details — parsimonious, or extravagant, 
 or even short - sighted in his speculations — 
 
42 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 public feeling, than which nothing is more 
 ignorant, would have risen in favour of the 
 Fixed Period. " How true is the president's 
 reasoning," the people would have said. " Look 
 at Crasweller ; he would have ruined Little 
 Christchurch had he stayed there much longer." 
 But everything he did seemed to prosper ; and 
 it occurred to me at last that he forced himself 
 into abnormal sprightliness, with a view of 
 bringing disgrace upon the law of the Fixed 
 Period. If there were any such feeling, I regard 
 it as certainly mean. 
 
 On the day after the dinner at which Eva's 
 pudding was eaten, Abraham Grundle came to 
 me at the Executive Hall, and said that he had 
 a few things to discuss with me of importance. 
 Abraham was a good-looking young man, with 
 black hair and bright eyes, and a remarkably 
 handsome moustache ; and he was one well 
 inclined to business, in whose hands the firm 
 of Grundle, Grabbe, & Crasweller was likely to 
 thrive ; but I myself had never liked him 
 
GABEIEL CRASWELLER. 43 
 
 niucli. I had thought him to be a little 
 wanting in that reverence which he owed to 
 his elders, and to be, moreover, somewhat over- 
 fond of money. It had leaked out that though 
 he was no doubt attached to Eva Crasweller, 
 he had thought quite as much of Little Christ- 
 church ; and though he could kiss Eva behind 
 the door, after the ways of young men, still 
 he was more intent on the fleeces than on her 
 lips. "I want to say a word to you, Mr 
 President," he began, " upon a subject that 
 disturbs my conscience very much." 
 
 " Your conscience ? " said I. 
 
 " Yes, Mr President. I believe you're aware 
 that I am engaged to marry Miss Crasweller ? " 
 
 It may be as well to explain here that my 
 own eldest son, as fine a boy as ever delighted a 
 mother's eye, was only two years younger than 
 Eva, and that my wife, Mrs ISTeverbend, had of 
 late got it into her head that he was quite old 
 enough to marry the girl. It was in vain that 
 I told her that all that had been settled while 
 
44 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 Jack was still at the didascalion. He had 
 been Colonel of the Curriculum, tis they now 
 call the head boy ; but Eva had not then cared 
 for Colonels of Curriculums, but had thought 
 more of young Grundle's moustache. My wife 
 declared that all that was altered, — that Jack 
 was, in fact, a much more manly fellow than 
 Abraham with his shiny bit of beard ; and 
 that if one could get at a maiden's heart, we 
 should find that Eva thou£jht so. In answer to 
 this I bade her hold her tongue, and remem- 
 ber that in Britannula a promise was always 
 held to be as good as a bond. " I suppose 
 a young woman may change her mind in Brit- 
 annula as well as elsewhere," said my wife. I 
 turned all this over in my mind, because the 
 slopes of Little Christchurch are very alluring, 
 and they would all belong to Eva so soon. 
 And then it would be well, as I was about to 
 perform for Crasweller so important a portion 
 of his final ceremony, our close intimacy should 
 be drawn still nearer by a family connection. 
 
GABRIEL CRASWELLER. 45 
 
 I did think of it ; but then it occurred 
 to me that the giiTs engagement to young 
 Grundle was an established fact, and it did 
 not behove me to sanction the breach of a 
 contract. " Oh yes," said I to the young man, 
 ^' I am aware that there is an understanding 
 to that effect between you and Eva's father." 
 
 "And between me and Eva, I can assure 
 you." 
 
 Having observed the kiss behind the door on 
 the previous day, I could not deny the truth of 
 this assertion. 
 
 "It is quite understood," continued Abraham, 
 " and I had always thought that it was to take 
 place at once, so that Eva might get used to 
 her new life before her papa was deposited." 
 
 To this I merely bowed my head, as though 
 to signify that it was a matter with which I 
 was not personally concerned. " I had taken 
 it for granted that my old friend would like 
 to see his daughter settled, and Little Christ- 
 church put into his daughter's hands before he 
 
46 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 should bid adieu to his own sublunary affairs," 
 I remarked, when I found that he paused. 
 
 " We all thought so up at the warehouse," 
 said he, — " I and father, and Grabbe, and Post- 
 lecott, our chief clerk. Postlecott is the next 
 but tliree on the books, and is getting very 
 melancholy. Bat he is especially anxious just 
 at present to see how Crasweller bears it." 
 
 "What has all that to do with Eva's 
 marriage ? " 
 
 " I suppose I might marry her. But he 
 hasn't made any will." 
 
 ''What does that matter? There is nobody 
 to interfere with Eva." 
 
 " But he might go off, Mr JSTeverbend," whis- 
 pered Grundle ; " and where should I be Ihen ? 
 If he was to get across to Auckland, or to 
 Sydney, and to leave some one to manage the 
 property for him, what could you do ? That's 
 what I want to know. The law says that he 
 shall be deposited on a certain day." 
 
 " He will become as nobody in the eye of 
 
GABRIEL CRASWELLER. 47 
 
 the law," said I, with all the authority of a 
 President. 
 
 " But if he and his daughter have understood 
 each other ; and if some deed be forthcoming 
 by which Little Christchurch shall have been 
 left to trustees ; and if he goes on living at 
 Sydney, let us say, on the fat of the land, — 
 drawing all the income, and leaving the trustees 
 as legal owners, — where should I be then ? " 
 
 " In that case," said I, having taken two or 
 three minutes for consideration, — " in that case, 
 I presume the property would be confiscated 
 by law, and would go to his natural heir. 
 Now if his natural heir be then your wife, it 
 will be just the same as though the property 
 were yours." Young Grundle shook his head. 
 " I don't know what more you would want. At 
 any rate, there is no more for you to get." I 
 confess that at that moment the idea of my 
 boy's chance of succeeding with the heiress did 
 present itself to my mind. According to what 
 my wife had said. Jack would have jumped at 
 
48 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 the girl with just what she stood up in ; and 
 had sw^orn to his mother, when he had been 
 told that mornin" about the kiss behind the 
 door, that he would knock that brute's head off 
 his shoulders before many days were gone by. 
 Looking at the matter merely on behalf of Jack, 
 it appeared to me that Little Christchurch 
 would, in that case, be quite safe, let Crasweller 
 be deposited, — or run away to Sydney. 
 
 "You do not know for certain about the 
 confiscation of the property," said Abraham. 
 
 " I've told you as much, Mr Grundle, as it 
 is fit that you should know," I replied, with 
 severity. " For the absolute condition of the 
 law you must look in the statute-book, and not 
 come to the President of the empire." 
 
 Abraham Grundle then departed. I had as- 
 sumed an angry air, as though I were offended 
 with him, for troubling me on a matter by 
 referring simply to an individual. But he had 
 in truth given rise to very serious and solemn 
 thoughts. Could it be that Crasweller, my own 
 
GABRIEL CRASWELLER. 49 
 
 confidential friend — the man to whom I had 
 trusted the very secrets of my soul on this im- 
 portant matter, — could it be that he should be 
 unwilling to be deposited when the day had 
 come ? Could it be that he should be anxious 
 to fly from his country and her laws, just as the 
 time had arrived when those laws might operate 
 upon him for the benefit of that country ? I 
 could not think that he was so vain, so greedy, 
 so selfish, and so unpatriotic. But this was 
 not all. Should he attempt to fly, could we 
 prevent his flying ? And if he did fly, what 
 step should we take next? The Government 
 of 'New South Wales was hostile to us on 
 the very matter of the Fixed Period, and cer- 
 tainly would not surrender him in obedience to 
 any law of extradition. And he might leave 
 his property to trustees who would manage it 
 on his behalf; although, as far as Britannula 
 was concerned, he would be beyond the reach 
 of law, and regarded even as being without the 
 pale of life. And if he, the first of the Fixed- 
 VOL. I. D 
 
50 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 Periodists, were to run away, the fashion of so 
 running would become common. We should 
 thus be rid of our old men, and our object 
 would be so far attained. But looking for- 
 ward, I could see at a glance that if one or 
 two wealthy members of our community were 
 thus to escape, it would be almost impossible 
 to carry out the law with reference to those 
 who should have no such means. But that 
 which vexed me most was that Gabriel Cras- 
 weller should desire to escape, — that he should 
 be anxious to throw over the whole system to 
 preserve the poor remnant of his life. If he 
 would do so, who could be expected to ab- 
 stain? If he should prove false when the 
 moment came, who would prove true ? And 
 he, the first, the very first on our list ! Young 
 Grundle had now left me, and as I sat thinking 
 of it I was for a moment tempted to abandon 
 the Fixed Period altogether. But as I remained 
 ./y^ there in silent meditation, better thoughts came 
 
 to me. Had I dared to regard myself as 
 
GABEIEL CRASWELLEE. 51 
 
 the foremost spirit of my age, and should 1 
 thus be turned back by the human weakness 
 of one poor creature who had not sufficiently 
 collected the strength of his heart to be able to 
 look death in the face and to laugh him down. 
 It was a difficulty — a difficulty the more. It 
 might be the crushing difficulty which would 
 put an end to the system as far as my exist- 
 ence was concerned. But I bethought me how 
 many early reformers had perished in their 
 efforts, and how seldom it had been given to 
 the first man to scale the walls of prejudice, 
 and force himself into the citadel of reason. 
 But they had not yielded when things had 
 gone against them; and though they had not 
 brought their visions down to the palpable touch 
 of humanity, still they had persevered, and their 
 efforts had not been altogether lost to the world. 
 " So it shall be with me," said I. " Though 
 I may never live to deposit a human being 
 within that sanctuary, and though I may be 
 doomed by the foolish prejudice of men to 
 
52 THE FIXED PEKIOD. 
 
 dras out a miserable existence amidst the sor- 
 rows aud weakness of old age ; though it may 
 never be given to me to feel the ineffable 
 comforts of a triumphant deposition, — still my 
 name will be handed down to coming ages, 
 and I shall be spoken of as the first who 
 endeavoured to save grey hairs from being 
 brought wdtli sorrow to the grave." 
 
 I am now writing on board H.M. gunboat 
 John Bright, — for the tyrannical slaves of a 
 modern monarch have taken me in the flesh 
 and are carrying me off to England, so that, 
 as they say, all that nonsense of a Fixed 
 Period may die away in Britannula. They 
 think, — poor ignorant fighting men, — that such 
 a theory can be made to perish because one 
 individual shall have been mastered. But no ! 
 The idea will still live, and in ages to come 
 men will prosper and be strong, and thrive, 
 unpolluted by the greed and cowardice of 
 second childhood, because John Neverbend 
 was at one time President of Britannula. 
 
GABRIEL CRASWELLER. 53 
 
 It occurred to me then, as I sat meditating 
 over the tidings conveyed to me by Abraham 
 Grundle, that it would be well that I should 
 see Crasweller, and talk to him freely on the 
 subject. It had sometimes been that by my 
 strencjth I hadreinvigorated his halting courage. 
 This suggestion that he might run away as 
 the day of his deposition drew nigh, — or rather, 
 that others might run away, — had been the 
 subject of some conversation between him and 
 xTie. " How will it be," he had said, " if they 
 mizzle?" He had intended to allude to the 
 possible premature departure of those who were 
 about to be deposited. 
 
 " Men will never be so weak," I said. 
 
 " I suppose you'd take all their property ? " 
 
 " Every stick of it" 
 
 "But property is a thing which can be 
 conveyed away." 
 
 "We should keep a sharp look-out upon 
 themselves. There might be a writ, you know, 
 ne exeant regno. If we are driven to a pinch. 
 
54 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 that will be the last tiling to do. But I should 
 be sorry to be driven to express my fear of 
 human weakness by any general measure of 
 that kind. It would be tantamount to an 
 accusation of cowardice against the whole 
 empire." 
 
 Crasweller had only shaken his head. But 
 I had understood him to shake it on the part 
 of the human race generally, and not on his 
 own behalf. 
 
55 
 
 CHAPTEE III. 
 
 THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN. 
 
 It was now mid- winter, and it wanted just 
 twelve months to that 30th of June on which, 
 in accordance with all our plans, Crasweller 
 was to he deposited. A full year would, no 
 douht, suffice for him to arrange his worldly 
 affairs, and to see his daughter married ; hut 
 it would not more than suffice. He still went 
 ahout his husiness with an alacrity marvellous 
 in one who was so soon about to withdraw 
 himself from the world. The fleeces for hear- 
 ing which he was preparing his flocks, though 
 they might he shorn by him, would never return 
 their prices to his account. They would do so 
 for his daughter and his son-in-law; but in these 
 
56 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 circumstances, it would have been well for him 
 to have left the flocks to his son-in-law, and to 
 have turned his mind to the consideration of 
 other matters. " There should be a year de- 
 voted to that final year to be passed within 
 the college, so that, by degrees, the mind may 
 be weaned from the ignoble art of money- 
 making." I had once so spoken to him ; but 
 there he was, as intent as ever, with his mind 
 fixed on the records of the price of wool as 
 they came back to him from the English 
 and American markets. " It is all for his 
 daughter," I had said to myself. " Had he 
 been blessed with a son, it would have been 
 otherwise with him." So I got on to my 
 steam-tricycle, and in a few minutes I was at 
 Little Christchurch. He was coming in after a 
 hard day's work among the flocks, and seemed 
 to be triumphant and careful at the same time. 
 " I tell you what it is, Neverbend," said 
 he; "we shall have the fluke over here if 
 we don't look after ourselves." 
 
THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN. 57 
 
 " Have you found symptoms of it ? " 
 
 " Well ; not exactly among my own sheep ; 
 but I know the signs of it so well. My 
 grasses are peculiarly dry, and my flocks are 
 remarkably well looked after; but I can see 
 indications of it. Only fancy where we should 
 all be if fluke showed itself in Britannula ! 
 If it once got ahead we should be no better 
 off than the Australians." 
 
 This might be anxiety for his daughter; 
 but it looked strangely like that personal 
 feeling which would have been expected in 
 him twenty years ago. " Crasweller/' said I, 
 ''do you mind coming into the house, and 
 having a little chat ? " and so I got off my 
 tricycle. 
 
 "I was going to be very busy," he said, 
 showing an unwillingness. , " I have fifty 
 young foals in that meadow there ; and I 
 like to see that they get their suppers served 
 to them warm." 
 
 " Bother the young foals 1 " said I. " As if 
 
58 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 you had not men enough about the place to 
 see to feeding your stock without troubling 
 yourself. I have come out from Gladston- 
 opolis, because I want to see you ; and now 
 I am to be sent back in order that you might 
 attend to the administration of hot mashes ! 
 Come into the house." Then I entered in 
 under the verandah, and he followed. "You 
 certainly have got the best-furnished house 
 in the empire," said I, as I threw myself on 
 to a double arm-chair, and lighted my cigar 
 in the inner verandah. 
 
 " Yes, yes," said he ; " it is pretty com- 
 fortable." 
 
 He was evidently melancholy, and knew 
 the purpose for which I had come. " I don't 
 suppose any girl in the old country was ever 
 better provided for than will be Eva." This 
 I said wishing to comfort him, and at the 
 same time to prepare for what was to be said. 
 
 "Eva is a good girl, — a dear girl. But I 
 am not at all so sure about that young fellow 
 
THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN. 59 
 
 Abraham Grundle. It's a pity, President, your 
 son had not been born a few years sooner." 
 At this moment my boy was half a head taller 
 than young Grundle, and a much better speci- 
 men of a Britannulist. " But it is too late now, 
 I suppose, to talk of that. It seems to me that 
 Jack never even thinks of looking at Eva." 
 
 This was a view of the case which certainly 
 was strange to me, and seemed to indicate 
 that Crasweller was gradually becoming fit 
 for the college. If he could not see that Jack 
 was madly in love with Eva, he could see 
 nothing at all. But I had not come out to 
 Little Christchurch at the present moment 
 to talk to him about the love matters of the 
 two children. I was intent on something of 
 infinitely greater importance. "Crasweller," 
 said I, " you and I have always agreed to the 
 letter on this great matter of the Eixed Period." 
 He looked into my face with supplicating, 
 weak eyes, but he said nothing. " Your period 
 now will soon have been reached, and I think 
 
60 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 it well that we, as dear loving friends, should 
 learn to discuss the matter closely as it draws 
 nearer. I do not think that it becomes either 
 of us to be afraid of it." 
 
 " That's all very well for you," he replied. 
 " I am your senior." 
 
 " Ten years, I believe." 
 
 " About nine, I think." 
 
 This might have come from a mistake of 
 his as to my exact age ; and though I was 
 surprised at the error, I did not notice it 
 on this occasion. "You have no objection 
 to the law as it stands now ? " I said. 
 
 " It might have been seventy." 
 
 " That has all been discussed fully, and you 
 have given your assent. Look round on the 
 men whom you can remember, and tell me, 
 on how many of them life has not sat as a 
 burden at seventy years of age ? " 
 
 " Men are so different," said he. " As far 
 as one can judge of his own capacities, I was 
 never better able to manage my business than 
 
THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN. 61 
 
 I am at present. It is more than I can say 
 for that young fellow Grundle, who is so 
 anxious to step into my shoes." 
 
 "My dear Crasweller," I rejoined, "it was 
 out of the question so to arrange the law as to 
 vary the term to suit the peculiarities of one 
 man or another." 
 
 "But in a change of such terrible severity 
 you should have suited the eldest." 
 
 This was dreadful to me, — that he, the first 
 to receive at the hands of his country the great 
 honour intended for him, — that he should have 
 already allowed his mind to have rebelled 
 against it ! If he, who had once been so keen a 
 supporter of the Fixed Period, now turned round 
 and opposed it, how could others who should 
 follow be expected to yield themselves up in a 
 fitting frame of mind ? And then I spoke my 
 thoughts freely to him. " Are you afraid of de- 
 parture?" I said,— " afraid of that which must 
 come; afraid to meet as a friend that which 
 you must meet so soon as friend or enemy ? " I 
 
62 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 paused ; but he sat looking at me without reply. 
 " To fear departure ; — must it not be the greatest 
 evil of all our life, if it be necessary ? Can 
 God have brought us into the world, intending 
 us so to leave it that the very act of doing so 
 shall be regarded by us as a curse so terrible as 
 to neutralise all the blessings of our existence 1 
 Can it be that He who created us should have 
 intended that we should so regard our dismissal 
 from the world ? The teachers of religion have 
 endeavoured to reconcile us to it, and have, in 
 their vain zeal, endeavoured to effect it by 
 picturing to our imaginations a hell-fire into 
 which ninety-nine must fall ; while one shall 
 be allowed to escape to a heaven, which is 
 hardly made more alluring to us ! Is that the 
 way to make a man comfortable at the prospect 
 of leaving this world ? But it is necessary to 
 our dignity as men that we shall find the mode 
 of doing so. To lie quivering and quaking on 
 my bed at the expectation of the Black Angel 
 of Death, does not suit my manhood, — which 
 
THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN. 63 
 
 would fear nothing ; — which does not, and shall 
 not, stand in awe of aught but my own sins. 
 How best shall we prepare ourselves for the 
 day which we know cannot be avoided ? That 
 is the question which I have ever been asking 
 myself, — which you and I have asked ourselves, 
 and which I thought we had answered. Let 
 us turn the inevitable into that which shall in 
 itself be esteemed a glory to us. Let us teach 
 the world so to look forward with longing eyes, 
 and not with a faint heart. I had thought to 
 have touched some few, not by the eloquence 
 of my words, but by the energy of my thoughts; 
 and you, oh my friend, have ever been he whom 
 it has been my greatest joy to have had with 
 me as the sharer of my aspirations." 
 
 " But I am nine years older than you are." 
 I again passed by the one year added to my 
 age. There was nothing now in so trifling an 
 error. " But you still agree with me as to the 
 fundamental truth of our doctrine." 
 " I suppose so," said Crasweller. 
 
64 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 " I suppose so ! " repeated I. " Is that all 
 that can be said for the philosophy to which 
 we have devoted ourselves, and in which noth- 
 ing false can be found ? " 
 
 " It won't teach any one to think it better to 
 live than to die while he is fit to perform all 
 the functions of life. It might be very well 
 if you could arrange that a man should be 
 deposited as soon as he becomes absolutely 
 infirm." 
 
 " Some men are infirm at forty." 
 
 " Then deposit them," said Crasweller. 
 
 " Yes ; but they will not own that they are 
 infirm. If a man be weak at that age, he 
 thinks that with advancing years he will 
 resume the strength of his youth. There 
 must, in fact, be a Fixed Period. We have 
 discussed that fifty times, and have always 
 arrived at the same conclusion." 
 
 He sat still, silent, unhappy, and confused. 
 I saw that there was something on his mind 
 to which he hardly dared to give words. Wish- 
 
THE FIKST BREAK-DOWN. 65 
 
 ing to encourage him, I went on. "After all, 
 you have a full twelve months yet before the 
 day shall have come." 
 
 " Two years," he said, doggedly. 
 
 " Exactly ; two years before your departure, 
 but twelve months before deposition." 
 
 "Two years before deposition," said Cras- 
 weller. 
 
 At this I own I was astonished. Nothing 
 was better known in the empire than the ages 
 of the two or three first inhabitants to be de- 
 posited. I would have undertaken to declare 
 that not a man or a woman in Britannula was 
 in doubt as to Mr Crasweller's exact age. It 
 had been written in the records, and upon the 
 stones belonging to the college. There was no 
 doubt that within twelve months of the present 
 date he was due to be detained there as the 
 first inhabitant. And now I was astounded to 
 hear him claim another year, which could not 
 be allowed him. 
 
 " That impudent fellow Grundle has been 
 
 VOL. I. E 
 
66 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 with me," he continued, " and wishes to make 
 me believe that he can get rid of me in one 
 year. I have, at any rate, two years left of 
 my out-of-door existence, and I do not mean 
 to give up a day of it for Grundle or any one 
 else." 
 
 It was something to see that he still re- 
 cognised the law, though he was so meanly 
 anxious to evade it. There had been some 
 whisperings in the empire among the elderly 
 men and women of a desire to obtain the 
 assistance of Great Britain in setting it aside. 
 Peter Grundle, for instance, Crasweller's senior 
 partner, had been heard to say that England 
 would not allow a deposited man to be slaugh- 
 tered. There was much in that which had 
 angered me. The word slaughter was in itself 
 peculiarly objectionable to my ears, — to me 
 who had undertaken to perform the first cere- 
 mony as an act of grace. And what had 
 England to do with our laws? It was as 
 though Eussia were to turn upon the United 
 
THE FIRST BEEAK-DOWN. 67 
 
 States and declare that their Congress should 
 be put down. What would avail the loudest 
 voice of Great Britain against the smallest 
 spark of a law passed by our Assembly?— 
 unless, indeed, Great Britain should conde- 
 scend to avail herself of her great power, and 
 thus to crush the free voice of those whom 
 she had already recognised as independent. 
 As I now write, this is what she has already 
 done, and history will have to tell the story. 
 But it was especially sad to have to think 
 that there should be a Britannulist so base, 
 such a coward, such a traitor, as himself to 
 propose this expedient for adding a few years 
 to his own wretched life. 
 
 But Crasweller did not, as it seemed, intend 
 to avail himself of these whispers. His mind 
 was intent on devising some falsehood by 
 which he should obtain for himself just one 
 other year of life, and his expectant son-in-law 
 purposed to prevent him. I hardly knew as 
 I turned it all in my mind, which of the two 
 
68 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 was the more sordid ; but I think that my 
 sympathies were rather in accord with the 
 cowardice of the old man than with the greed 
 of the young. After all, I had known from 
 the beginnincj that the fear of death was a 
 human weakness. To obliterate that fear from 
 the human heart, and to build up a perfect 
 manhood that should be liberated from so vile 
 a thraldom, had been one of the chief objects 
 of my scheme. I had no right to be angry 
 with Crasweller, because Crasweller, when 
 tried, proved himself to be no stronger than 
 the world at large. It was a matter to me of 
 infinite regret that it should be so. He was 
 the very man, the very friend, on whom I 
 had relied with confidence ! But his weakness 
 was only a proof that I myself had been mis- 
 taken. In all that Assembly by which the 
 law had been passed, consisting chiefly of 
 young men, was there one on whom I could 
 rest with confidence to carry out the purpose 
 of the law when his own time should come ? 
 
THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN. 69 
 
 Ought I not SO to have arranged matters that 
 I myself should have been the first, — to have 
 postponed the use of the college till such time 
 as I might myself have been deposited ? This 
 had occurred to me often throughout the whole 
 agitation; but then it had occurred also that 
 none might perhaps follow me, when under 
 such circumstances I should have departed ! 
 But in my heart I could forgive Crasweller. 
 For Grundle I felt nothing but personal dislike. 
 He was anxious to hurry on the deposition of 
 his father-in-law, in order that the entire pos- 
 session of Little Christchurch might come into 
 his own hands just one year the earlier! 'No 
 doubt he knew the exact age of the man as 
 well as I did, but it was not for him to have 
 hastened his deposition. And then I could 
 not but think, even in this moment of public 
 misery, how willing Jack would have been to 
 have assisted old Crasweller in his little fraud, 
 so that Eva might have been the reward. My 
 belief is that he would have sworn against his 
 
70 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 own father, perjured himself in the very teeth 
 of truth, to have obtained from Eva that little 
 privilege which I had once seen Grundle en- 
 joying. 
 
 I was sitting there silent in Crasweller's 
 verandah as all this passed through my mind. 
 But before I spoke again I was enabled to see 
 clearly what duty required of me. Eva and 
 Little Christchurch, with Jack's feelings and 
 interests, and all my wife's longings, must be 
 laid on one side, and my whole energy must be 
 devoted to the literal carrying out of the law. 
 It was a great world's movement that had been 
 projected, and if it were to fail now, just at its 
 commencement, when everything had been ar- 
 ranged for the work, when again would there 
 be hope ? It was a matter which required 
 legislative sanction in whatever country might 
 adopt it. No despot could attempt it, let his 
 power be ever so confirmed. The whole coun- 
 try would rise against him when informed, in 
 its ignorance, of the contemplated intention. 
 
THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN. 71 
 
 ISTor could it be effected by any congress of 
 which the large majority were not at any rate 
 under forty years of age. I had seen enough 
 of human nature to understand its weakness in 
 this respect. All circumstances had combined 
 to make it practicable in Britannula, but all 
 these circumstances might never be combined 
 again. And it seemed to me to depend now 
 entirely on the power which I might exert in 
 creating courage in the heart of the poor timid 
 creature who sat before me. I did know that 
 were Britannula to appeal aloud to England, 
 England, with that desire for interference which 
 has always characterised her, would interfere. 
 But if the empire allowed the working of the 
 law to be commenced in silence, then the Eixed 
 Period might perhaps be regarded as a thing 
 settled. How much, then, depended on the 
 words which I might use ! 
 
 "Crasweller," I said, *' my friend, my brother ! " 
 
 " I don't know much about that. A man 
 
 ought not to be so anxious to kill his brother." 
 
72 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 " If I could take your place, as God will be 
 my judge, I would do so with as ready a step 
 as a young man to the arms of his beloved. 
 And if for myself, why not for my brother ? " 
 
 " You do not know," he said. " You have 
 not, in truth, been tried." 
 
 " Would that you could try me ! " 
 
 " And we are not all made of such stuff as 
 you. You have talked about this till you have 
 come to be in love with deposition and depar- 
 ture. But such is not the natural condition of 
 a man. Look back upon all the centuries, and 
 you will perceive that life has ever been dear 
 to the best of men. And you will perceive 
 also that they who have brought themselves to 
 suicide have encountered the contempt of their 
 fellow-creatures." 
 
 I would not tell him of Cato and Brutus, 
 feeling that I could not stir him to grandeur of 
 heart by Eoman instances. He would have 
 told me that in those days, as far as the 
 Romans knew, 
 
THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN. 73 
 
 * ' the Everlasting had not fixed 
 His canon 'gainst self-slaughter. " 
 
 I must reach him by other methods than these, 
 if at all. " Who can be more alive than you," I 
 said, " to the fact that man, by the fear of death, 
 is degraded below the level of the brutes ? " 
 
 " If so, he is degraded," said Crasweller. " It 
 is his condition." 
 
 " But need he remain so ? Is it not for you 
 and me to raise him to a higher level ? " 
 
 " Not for me — not for me, certainl3\ I own 
 that I am no more than man. Little Christ- 
 church is so pleasant to me, and Eva's smiles 
 and happiness ; and the lowing of my flocks 
 and the bleating of my sheep are so gracious in 
 my ears, and it is so sweet to my eyes to see 
 how fairly I have turned this wilderness into a 
 paradise, that I own that I would fain stay 
 here a little longer." 
 
 " But the law, my friend, the law, — the law 
 which you yourself have been so active in 
 creating." 
 
74 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 "The law allows me two years yet," said he ; 
 that look of stubbornness which I had before 
 observed again spreading itself over his face. 
 
 Now this was a lie ; an absolute, ^undoubted, 
 demonstrable lie. And yet it was a lie which, 
 by its mere telling, might be made available for 
 its intended purpose. If it were known through 
 the capital that Crasweller was anxious to ob- 
 tain a year's grace by means of so foul a lie, 
 the year's grace would be accorded to him. 
 And then the Fixed Period would be at an 
 end. 
 
 " I will tell you what it is," said he, anxious 
 to represent his wishes to me in another light. 
 " Grundle wants to get rid of me." 
 
 " Grundle, I fear, has truth on his side," said 
 I, determined to show him that I, at any rate, 
 would not consent to lend myself to the fur- 
 therance of a falsehood. 
 
 "Grundle wants to get rid of me," he re- 
 peated in the same tone. " But he shan't find 
 that I am so easy to deal with. Eva already 
 
THE FIRST BEEAK-DOWN. 75 
 
 does not above half like him. Eva thinks 
 that this depositing plan is abominable. She 
 says that no good Christians ever thought 
 of it." 
 
 "A child— a sweet child— but still only a 
 child ; and brought up by her mother with all 
 the old prejudices." 
 
 "I don't know much about that. I never 
 knew a decent woman who wasn't an Episco- 
 palian. Eva is at any rate a good girl, to en- 
 deavour to save her father; and I'll tell you 
 what— it is not too late yet. As far as my 
 opinion goes, Jack Neverbend is ten to one a 
 better sort of fellow than Abraham Grundle. 
 Of course a promise has been made ; but prom- 
 ises are like pie- crusts. Don't you think that 
 Jack Neverbend is quite old enough to marry 
 a wife, and that he only needs be told to 
 make up his mind to do it? Little Christ- 
 church would do just as well for him as for 
 Grundle. If he don't think much of the girl 
 he must think something of the sheep." 
 
76 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 Not think much of the girl ! Just at this 
 time Jack was talkin^^ to his mother, morning, 
 noon, and night, about Eva, and threatening 
 young Grundle with all kinds of schoolboy- 
 punishments if he should persevere in his suit. 
 Only yesterday he had insulted Abraham 
 grossly, and, as I had reason to suspect, had 
 been more than once out to Christchurch on 
 some clandestine object, as to which it was 
 necessary, he thought, to keep old Crasweller 
 in the dark. And then to be told in this 
 manner that Jack didn't think much of Eva, 
 and should be encouraged in preference to look 
 after the sheep ! He would have sacrificed 
 every sheep on the place for the sake of half 
 an hour with Eva alone in the woods. But 
 he was afraid of Crasweller, whom he knew 
 to have sanctioned an engagement with Abra- 
 ham Grundle. 
 
 "I don't think that we need bring Jack 
 and his love into this dispute," said I. 
 
 " Only that it isn't too late, you know. 
 
THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN. 77 
 
 Do you think that Jack could be brought to 
 lend an ear to it ? " 
 
 Perish Jack ! perish Eva ! perish Jack's 
 mother, before I would allow myself to be 
 bribed in this manner, to abandon the great 
 object of all my life ! This was evidently 
 Crasweller's purpose. He was endeavouring 
 to tempt me with his flocks and herds. The 
 temptation, had he known it, would have been 
 with Eva, — with Eva and the genuine, down- 
 right, honest love of my gallant boy. I knew, 
 too, that at home I should not dare to tell 
 my wife that the offer had been made to me 
 and had been refused. My wife could not 
 understand, — Crasweller could not understand, 
 — how strong may be the passion founded on 
 the conviction of a life. And honesty, simple 
 honesty, would forbid it. Eor me to strike a 
 bargain with one already destined for deposi- 
 tion, — that he should be withdrawn from his 
 glorious, his almost immortal state, on the 
 payment of a bribe to me and my family ! 
 
78 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 I had called this man my friend and brother, 
 but how little had the man known me ! Could 
 I have saved all Gladstonopolis from imminent 
 flames by yielding an inch in my convictions, 
 I would not have done so in my then frame 
 of mind; and yet this man, — my friend and 
 brother, — had supposed that I could be bought 
 to change my purpose by the pretty slopes and 
 fat flocks of Little Christchurch ! 
 
 " Crasweller," said I, " let us keep these two 
 things separate; or rather, in discussing the 
 momentous question of the Fixed Period, let 
 us forget the loves of a boy and a girl." 
 
 " But the sheep, and the oxen, and the pas- 
 tures ! I can still make my will." 
 
 " The sheep, and the oxen, and the pastures 
 must also be forgotten. They can have nothing 
 to do with the settlement of this matter. My 
 boy is dear to me, and Eva is dear also, but 
 not to save even their young lives could I 
 consent to a falsehood in this matter." 
 
 " Falsehood ! There is no falsehood intended." 
 
THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN. 79 
 
 " Then there need be no bargain as to Eva, 
 and no need for discussing the flocks and 
 herds on this occasion. Crasweller, you are 
 sixty-six now, and will be sixty-seven this 
 time next year. Then the period of your de- 
 position will have arrived, and in the year 
 following, — two years hence, mind, — the Fixed 
 Period of your departure will have come. " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Is not such the truth ? " 
 
 " No ; you put it all on a year too far. I 
 was never more than nine years older than you. 
 I remember it all as well as though it were 
 yesterday when we first agreed to come away 
 from New Zealand. When will you have to 
 be deposited?" 
 
 "In 1989," I said carefully. "My Fixed 
 Period is 1990." 
 
 " Exactly ; and mine is nine years earlier. 
 It always was nine years earlier." 
 
 It was all manifestly untrue. He knew it 
 to be untrue. For the sake of one poor year 
 
80 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 he was imploring my assent to a base false- 
 hood, and was endeavouring to add strength to 
 his prayer by a bribe. How could I talk to 
 a man who would so far descend from the dig- 
 nity of manhood ? The law was there to sup- 
 port me, and the definition of the law was in 
 this instance supported by ample evidence. 
 I need only go before the executive of which 
 I myself was the chief, desire that the estab- 
 lished documents should be searched, and de- 
 mand the body of Gabriel Crasweller to be 
 deposited in accordance with the law as en- 
 acted. But there was no one else to whom I 
 could leave the performance of this invidious 
 task, as a matter of course. There were alder- 
 men in Gladstonopolis and magistrates in the 
 country whose duty it would no doubt be to 
 see that the law was carried out. Arrange- 
 ments to this effect had been studiously made 
 by myself. Such arrangements would no 
 doubt be carried out when the working of 
 the Fixed Period had become a thing estab- 
 
THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN. 81 
 
 lished. But I had long foreseen that the first 
 deposition should be effected with some dclat 
 of voluntary glory. It would be very detri- 
 mental to the cause to see my special friend 
 Crasweller hauled away to the college by con- 
 stables through the streets of Gladstonopolis, 
 protesting that he was forced to his doom 
 twelve months before the appointed time. 
 Crasweller was a popular man in Britannula, 
 and the people around would not be so con- 
 versant with the fact as was I, nor would 
 they have the same reasons to be anxious that 
 the law should be accurately followed. And 
 yet how much depended upon the accuracy of 
 following the law ! A willing obedience was 
 especially desired in the first instance, and a 
 willing obedience I had expected from my 
 friend Crasweller. 
 
 "Crasweller," I said, addressing him with 
 great solemnity ; " it is not so." 
 
 " It is — it is ; I say it is." 
 
 "It is not so. The books that have been 
 VOL. I. F 
 
82 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 printed and sworn to, which have had your 
 own assent with that of others, are all against 
 you." 
 
 " It was a mistake. I have got a letter from 
 my old aunt in Hampshire, written to my 
 mother when I was born, which proves the 
 mistake." 
 
 "I remember the letter well," I said, — for 
 we had all gone through such documents in 
 performing the important task of settling the 
 Period. " You were born in New South Wales, 
 and the old lady in England did not write till 
 the following year." 
 
 " Who says so ? How can you prove it ? 
 She wasn't at all the woman to let a year go 
 by before she congratulated her sister." 
 
 " We have your own signature affirming the 
 date." 
 
 " How was I to know when I was born ? All 
 that goes for nothing." 
 
 "And unfortunately," said I, as though 
 clenching the matter, " the Bible exists in 
 
THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN. 83 
 
 which your father entered the date with his 
 usual exemplary accuracy." Then he was 
 silent for a moment as though having no 
 further evidence to offer. " Crasweller," said 
 I, " are you not man enough to do this thing 
 in a straightforward, manly manner ? " 
 
 " One year ! " he exclaimed. " I only ask for 
 one year. I do think that, as the first victim, 
 I have a right to expect that one year should 
 be granted me. Then Jack Neverbend shall 
 have Little Christchurch, and the sheep, and 
 the cattle, and Eva also, as his own for ever 
 and ever, — or at any rate till he too shall be 
 led away to execution I" 
 
 A victim ; and execution ! What language 
 in which to speak of the great system ! For 
 myself I was determined that though I would 
 be gentle with him I would not yield an inch. 
 The law at any rate was with me, and I did 
 not think as yet that Crasweller would lend 
 himself to those who spoke of inviting the 
 interference of England. The law was on my 
 
84 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 side, and so must still be all those who in the 
 Assembly had voted for the Fixed Period. 
 There had been enthusiasm then, and the dif- 
 ferent clauses had been carried by large major- 
 ities. A dozen different clauses had been 
 carried, each referring to various branches of 
 the question. Not only had the period been 
 fixed, but money had been voted for the col- 
 lege ; and the mode of life at the college had 
 been settled ; the very amusements of the old 
 men had been sanctioned ; and last, but not 
 least, the very manner of departure had been 
 fixed. There was the college now, a graceful 
 building surrounded by growing shrubs and 
 broad pleasant walks for the old men, endowed 
 with a kitchen in which their taste should be 
 consulted, and with a chapel for such of those 
 who would require to pray in public ; and all 
 this would be made a laughing-stock to Britan- 
 nula, if this old man Crasweller declined to 
 enter the gates. " It must be done," I said in 
 a tone of firm decision. 
 
THE FIRST BREAK-DOWN. 85 
 
 " No ! " he exclaimed. 
 
 " Crasweller, it must be done. The law de- 
 mands it." 
 
 " No, no ; not by me. You and young 
 Grundle together are in a conspiracy to get 
 rid of me. I am not going to be shut up a 
 whole year before my time." 
 
 With that he stalked into the inner house, 
 leaving me alone on the verandah. I had 
 nothing for it but to turn on the electric lamp 
 of my tricycle and steam back to Government 
 House at Gladstonopolis with a sad heart. 
 
86 
 
 CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 JACK NEVERBEND. 
 
 Six months passed away, which, I must own, 
 to me was a period of great donbt and nn- 
 happiness, though it was relieved by certain 
 moments of triumph. Of course, as the time 
 drew nearer, the question of Crasweller's de- 
 position became generally discussed by the 
 public of Gladstonopolis. And so also did 
 the loves of Abraham Grundle and Eva Cras- 
 weller. There were " Evaites " and " Abraham- 
 ites " in the community ; for though the match 
 had not yet been altogether broken, it was known 
 that the two young people differed altogether 
 on the question of the old man's deposition. 
 It was said by the defendents of Grundle, who 
 
JACK NEVERBEND. 87 
 
 were to be found for the most part among the 
 young men and young women, that Abraham 
 was simply anxious to carry out the laws of 
 his country. It happened that, during this 
 period, he was elected to a vacant seat in the 
 Assembly, so that, when the matter came on 
 for discussion there, he was able to explain 
 publicly his motives; and it must be owned 
 that he did so with good words and with a 
 certain amount of youthful eloquence. As for 
 Eva, she was simply intent on preserving the 
 lees of her father's life, and had been heard to 
 express an opinion that the college was "all 
 humbug," and that people ought to be allowed 
 to live as long as it pleased God to let them. 
 Of course she had with her the elderly ladies 
 of the community, and among them my own 
 wife as the foremost. Mrs iSTeverbend had 
 never made herself prominent before in any 
 public question ; but on this she seemed to 
 entertain a very warm opinion. Whether this 
 arose entirely from her desire to promote Jack's 
 
88 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 welfare, or from a reflection that her own period 
 of deposition was gradually becoming nearer, I 
 never could quite make up my mind. She had, 
 at any rate, ten years to run, and I never heard 
 from her any expressed fear of, — departure. 
 She was, — and is, — a brave, good woman, at- 
 tached to her household duties, anxious for her 
 husband's comfort, but beyond measure solic- 
 itous for all good things to befall that scape- 
 grace Jack Neverbend, for whom she thinks 
 that nothing is sufficiently rich or sufficiently 
 grand. Jack is a handsome boy, I grant, but 
 that is about all that can be said of him ; and 
 in this matter he has been diametrically op- 
 posed to his father from first to last. 
 
 It will be seen that, in such circumstances, 
 none of these moments of triumph to which I 
 have alluded can have come to me within my 
 own home. There Mrs Neverbend and Jack, 
 and after a while Eva, sat together in perpetual 
 council against me. When these meetings first 
 began, Eva still acknowledged herself to be the 
 
JACK NEVERBEND. 89 
 
 promised bride of Abraham Grundle. There 
 were her own vows, and her parent's assent, 
 and something perhaps of remaining love. But 
 presently she whispered to my wife that she 
 could not but feel horror for the man who was 
 anxious to " murder her father ; " and by-and- 
 by she began to own that she thought Jack a 
 fine fellow. We had a wonderful cricket club 
 in Gladstonopolis, and Britannula had chal- 
 lenged the English cricketers to come and play 
 on the Little Christchurch ground, which they 
 declared to be the only cricket ground as yet 
 prepared on the face of the earth which had all 
 the accomplishments possible for the due pro- 
 secution of the game. Now Jack, though very 
 young, was captain of the club, and devoted 
 much more of his time to that occupation than 
 to his more legitimate business as a merchant. 
 Eva, who had not hitherto paid much attention 
 to cricket, became on a sudden passionately 
 devoted to it ; whereas Abraham Grundle, with 
 a steadiness beyond his years, gave himself up 
 
90 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 more than ever to the business of the Assembly, 
 and expressed some contempt for the game, 
 though he was no mean player. 
 
 It had become necessary during this period 
 to bring forward in the Assembly the whole 
 question of the Fixed Period, as it was felt that, 
 in the present state of public opinion, it would 
 not be expedient to carry out the established 
 law without the increased sanction which would 
 be given to it by a further vote in the House. 
 Public opinion would have forbidden us to 
 deposit Crasweller without some such further 
 authority. Therefore it was deemed necessary 
 that a question should be asked, in which Cras- 
 weller's name was not mentioned, but which 
 might lead to some general debate. Young 
 Grundle demanded one morning whether it 
 was the intention of the Government to see 
 that the different clauses as to the new law 
 respecting depositions were at once carried 
 out. " The House is aware, I believe," he said, 
 " that the first operation will soon be needed." 
 
JACK NEVERBEND. 91 
 
 I may as well state here that this was repeated 
 to Eva, and that she pretended to take huff at 
 such a question from her lover. It was most 
 indecent, she said ; and she, after such words, 
 must drop him for ever. It was not for some 
 months after that, that she allowed Jack's 
 name to be mentioned with her own; but I 
 was aware that it was partly settled between 
 her and Jack and Mrs Neverbend. Grundle 
 declared his intention of proceeding against 
 old Crasweller in reference to the breach of 
 contract, according to the laws of Britannula ; 
 but that Jack's party disregarded altogether. 
 In telling this, however, I am advancing a 
 little beyond the point in my story to which I 
 have as yet carried my reader. 
 
 Then there arose a debate upon the whole 
 principle of the measure, which was carried 
 on with great warmth. I, as President, of 
 course took no part in it; but, in accordance 
 with our constitution, I heard it all from 
 the chair which I usually occupied at the 
 
92 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 Speaker's right hand. The arguments on 
 which the greatest stress was laid tended to 
 show that the Fixed Period had been carried 
 chiefly with a view to relieving the miseries of 
 the old. And it was conclusively shown that, 
 in a very great majority of cases, life beyond 
 sixty -eight was all vanity and vexation of 
 spirit. That other argument as to the costli- 
 ness of old men to the state was for the present 
 dropped. Had you listened to young Grundle, 
 insisting with all the vehemence of youth on 
 the absolute wretchedness to which the aged 
 had been condemned by the absence of any 
 such law, — had you heard the miseries of 
 rheumatism, gout, stone, and general debility 
 pictured in the eloquent words of five-and- 
 twenty, — you would have felt that all who 
 could lend themselves to perpetuate such a 
 state of things must be guilty of fiendish 
 cruelty. He really rose to a great height of 
 parliamentary excellence, and altogether carried 
 with him the younger, and luckily the greater. 
 
JACK NEVERBEND. 93 
 
 part of the House. There was really nothing 
 to be said on the other side, except a repetition 
 of the prejudices of the Old World. But, alas ! 
 so strong are the weaknesses of the world, that 
 prejudice can always vanquish truth by the 
 mere strength of its battalions. Not till it 
 had been proved and re-proved ten times over, 
 was it understood that the sun could not have 
 stood still upon Gideon. Crasweller, who was 
 a member, and who took his seat during these 
 debates without venturing to speak, merely 
 whispered to his neighbour that the heartless 
 greedy fellow was unwilling to wait for the 
 wools of Little Christchurch. 
 
 Three divisions were made on the debate, 
 and thrice did the Fixed-Periodists beat the 
 old party by a majority of fifteen in a House 
 consisting of eighty-five members. So strong 
 was the feeling in the empire, that only two 
 members were absent, and the number re- 
 mained the same during the whole week of 
 the debate. This, I did think, was a triumph ; 
 
94 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 and I felt that the old country, which had 
 really nothing on earth to do with the matter, 
 could not interfere with an opinion expressed 
 so strongly. My heart throbbed with pleasure- 
 able emotion as I heard that old age, which 
 I was myself approaching, depicted in terms 
 which made its impotence truly conspicuous, 
 — till I felt that, had it been proposed to 
 deposit all of us who had reached the age of 
 fifty-eight, I really think that I should joyfully 
 have given my assent to such a measure, and 
 have walked off at once and deposited myself 
 in the college. 
 
 But it was only at such moments that I was 
 allowed to experience this feeling of triumph. 
 I was encountered not only in my own house 
 but in society generally, and on the very 
 streets of Gladstonopolis, by the expression of 
 an opinion that Crasweller would not be made 
 to retire to the college at his Fixed Period. 
 " What on earth is there to hinder it ? " I said 
 once to my old friend Euggles. Euggles was 
 
JACK NEVERBEND. 95 
 
 now somewliat over sixty, and was an agent 
 in the town for country wool-growers. He 
 took no part in politics; and though he had 
 never agreed to the principle of the Fixed 
 Period, had not interested himself in opposi- 
 tion to it. He was a man whom I regarded 
 as indifferent to length of life, but one who 
 would, upon the whole, rather face such lot as 
 Nature might intend for him, than seek to 
 improve it by any new reform. 
 
 "Eva Crasweller will hinder it," said Eug- 
 gles. 
 
 " Eva is a mere child. Do you suppose that 
 her opinion will be allowed to interrupt the 
 laws of the whole community, and oppose the 
 progress of civilisation ? " 
 
 " Her feelings will," said Euggles. " Who's 
 to stand a daughter interceding for the life 
 of her father?" 
 
 '' One man cannot, but eighty-five can do 
 so. 
 
 ''The eighty-five will be to the community 
 
96 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 just what the one would be to the eighty-five. 
 I am not saying anything about your law. I 
 am not expressing an opinion whether it would 
 be good or bad. I should like to live out my 
 own time, though I acknowledge that you 
 Assembly men have on your shoulders the 
 responsibility of deciding whether I shall do 
 so or not. You could lead me away and de- 
 posit me without any trouble, because I am 
 not popular. But the people are beginning to 
 talk about Eva Crasweller and Abraham Grun- 
 dle, and I tell you that all the volunteers you 
 have in Britannula will not suffice to take the 
 old man to the college, and to keep him there 
 till you have polished him off. He would be 
 deposited again at Little Christchurch in 
 triumph, and the college would be left a 
 wreck behind him." 
 
 This view of the case was peculiarly dis- 
 tressing to me. As the chief magistrate of 
 the community, nothing is so abhorrent to 
 me as rebellion. Of a populace that are not 
 
JACK NEVERBEND. 97 
 
 law-abiding, nothing but evil can be pre- 
 dicted ; whereas a people who will obey the 
 laws cannot but be prosperous. It grieved 
 me greatly to be told that the inhabitants of 
 Gladstonopolis would rise in tumult and de- 
 stroy the college merely to favour the views 
 of a pretty girl. "Was there any honour, or 
 worse again, could there be any utility, in 
 being the President of a republic in which 
 such things could happen? I left my friend 
 Euggles in the street, and passed on to the 
 executive hall in a very painful frame of 
 mind. 
 
 When there, tidings reached me of a much 
 sadder nature. At the very moment at which 
 I had been talking with Euggles in the street 
 on the subject, a meeting had been held in 
 the market-place with the express purpose of 
 putting down the Fixed Period ; and who had 
 been the chief orator on the occasion but Jack 
 Neverbend ! My own son had taken upon 
 himself this new work of public speechifying 
 
 VOL. I. G 
 
98 THE FIXED PEEIOD. 
 
 in direct opposition to his own father ! And 
 I had reason to believe that he was insticjated 
 to do so by my own wife ! " Your son, sir, 
 has been addressing the multitude about the 
 Fixed Period, and they say that it has been 
 quite beautiful to hear him." It was thus 
 that the matter was told me by one of the 
 clerks in my office, and I own that I did 
 receive some slight pleasure at finding that 
 Jack could do something beyond cricket. But 
 it became immediately necessary to take steps 
 to stop the evil, and I was the more bound to 
 do so because the only delinquent named to 
 me was my own son. 
 
 " If it be so," I said aloud in the office, 
 "Jack Neverbend shall sleep this night in 
 prison." But it did not occur to me at the 
 moment that it would be necessary I should 
 have formal evidence that Jack was conspiring 
 against the laws before I could send him to 
 jail. I had no more power over him in that 
 respect than on any one else. Had I declared 
 
JACK NEVEKBEND. 99 
 
 that he should be sent to bed without his 
 -supper, I should have expressed myself better 
 both as a father and a magistrate. 
 
 I went home, and on entering the house the 
 first person that I saw was Eva. Now, as 
 this matter went on, I became full of wrath 
 with my son, and with my wife, and with 
 poor old Crasweller ; but I never could bring 
 myself to be angry with Eva. There was a 
 coaxing, sweet, feminine way with her which 
 overcame all opposition. And I had already 
 begun to regard her as my daughter-in-law, and 
 to love her dearly in that position, although 
 there were moments in which Jack's impudence 
 and new spirit of opposition almost tempted 
 me to disinherit him. 
 
 "Eva," I said, "what is this that I hear 
 of a public meeting in the streets ? " 
 
 "Oh, Mr Neverbend," she said, taking me 
 by the arm, "there are only a few boys who 
 are talking about papa." Through all the 
 noises and tumults of these times there was 
 
100 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 an evident determination to speak of Jack as 
 a boy. Everything that he did and all that 
 he said were merely the efflux of his high 
 spirits as a schoolboy. Eva always spoke of 
 him as a kind of younger brother. And yet 
 I soon found that the one opponent whom I 
 had most to fear in Britannula was my own 
 son. 
 
 "But why," I asked, "should these foolish 
 boys discuss the serious question respecting 
 your dear father in the public street ? " 
 
 " They don't want to have him — deposited," 
 she said, almost sobbing as she spoke. 
 
 " But, my dear," I began, determined to teach 
 her the whole theory of the Fixed Period with 
 all its advantages from first to last. 
 
 But she interrupted me at once. " Oh, Mr 
 Neverbend, I know what a good thing it is — 
 to talk about. I have no doubt the world will 
 be a great deal the better for it. And if all 
 the papas had been deposited for the last five 
 hundred years, I don't suppose that T should 
 
JACK NEVERBEND. 101 
 
 care so mucli about it. But to be the first 
 that ever it happened to in all the world 1 
 Why should papa be the first ? You ought 
 to begin with some weak, crotchety, poor old 
 cripple, who would be a great deal better out 
 of the way. But papa is in excellent health, 
 and has all his wits about him a great deal 
 better than Mr Grundle. He manages every- 
 thing at Little Christchurch, and manages it 
 very well/' 
 
 "But, my dear " I was going to ex- 
 plain to her that in a question of such enor- 
 mous public interest as this of the Fixed 
 Period it was impossible to consider the 
 merits of individual cases. But she interrup- 
 ted me again before I could'^get out a word. 
 
 " Oh, Mr N'everbend, they'll never be able 
 to do it, and I'm afraid that then you'll be 
 vexed." 
 
 " My dear, if the law be " 
 
 " Oh yes, the law is a very beautiful thing ; 
 but what's the good of laws if they cannot be 
 
102 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 carried out ? There's Jack there ; — of course 
 he is only a boy, but he swears that all the 
 executive, and all the Assembly, and all the 
 volunteers in Britannula, shan't lead my papa 
 into that beastly college." 
 
 " Beastly ! My dear, you cannot have seen 
 the college. It is perfectly beautiful." 
 
 "That's only what Jack says. It's Jack that 
 calls it beastly. Of course he's not much of 
 a man as yet, but he is your own son. And 
 I do think, that for an earnest spirit about a 
 thing. Jack is a very fine fellow." 
 
 "Abraham Grundle, you know, is just as 
 warm on the other side." 
 
 " I hate Abraham Grundle. I don't want 
 ever to hear his name again. I understand 
 very well what it is that Abraham Grundle is 
 after. He never cared a straw for me ; nor I 
 much for him, if you come to that." 
 
 " But you are contracted." 
 
 '' If you think that I am going to marry a 
 man because our names have been written down 
 
JACK NEVEEBEND. 103 
 
 in a book together, you are very much mis- 
 taken. He is a nasty mean fellow, and I will 
 never speak to him again as long as I live. 
 He would deposit papa this very moment if he 
 had the power. Whereas Jack is determined to 
 stand up for him as long as he has got a tongue 
 to shout or hands to fight." These were terrible 
 words, but I had heard the same sentiment 
 myself from Jack's own lips. " Of course Jack 
 is nothing to me," she continued, with that half 
 sob which had become habitual to her when- 
 ever she was forced to speak of her father's 
 deposition. "He is only a boy, bnt we all 
 know that he could thrash Abraham Grundle 
 at once. And to my thinking he is much 
 more fit to be a member of the Assembly." 
 
 As she would not hear a word that I said 
 to her, and was only intent on expressing the 
 warmth of her own feelings, I allowed her to 
 go her way, and retired to the privacy of my 
 own library. There I endeavoured to console 
 myself as best I might by thinking of the 
 
104 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 brilliant nature of Jack's prospects. He him- 
 self was over head and ears in love with Eva, 
 and it was clear to me that Eva was nearly as 
 fond of him. And then the sly rogue had 
 found the certain way to obtain old Cras- 
 weller's consent. Grundle had thought that 
 if he could once see his father-in-law deposited, 
 he would have nothing to do but to walk into 
 Little Christchurch as master. That was the 
 accusation generally made against him in Glad- 
 stonopolis. But Jack, who did not, as far as 
 I could see, care a straw for humanity in the 
 matter, had vehemently taken the side of the 
 Anti-Fixed-Periodists as the safest way to get 
 the father's consent. There was a contract of 
 marriage, no doubt, and Grundle would be 
 entitled to take a quarter of the father's pos- 
 sessions if he could prove that the contract had 
 been broken. Such was the law of Britannula 
 on the subject. But not a shilling had as yet 
 been claimed by any man under that law. 
 And Crasweller no doubt concluded that Grun- 
 
JACK NEVERBEND. 105 
 
 die would be unwilling to bear the odium of 
 being the first. And there were clauses in the 
 law which would make it very difficult for 
 him to prove the validity of the contract. It 
 had been already asserted by many that a girl 
 could not be expected to marry the man who 
 had endeavoured to destroy her father; and 
 although in my mind there could be no doubt 
 that Abraham Grundle had only done his duty 
 as a senator, there was no knowing what view 
 of the case a jury might take in Gladston- 
 opolis. And then, if the worst came to the 
 worst, Crasweller would resign a fourth of 
 his property almost without a pang, and 
 Jack would content himself in making the 
 meanness of Grundle conspicuous to his fel- 
 low-citizens. 
 
 And now I must confess that, as I sat alone 
 in my library, I did hesitate for an hour as 
 to my future conduct. Might it not be better 
 for me to abandon altogether the Fixed Period 
 and all its glories ? Even in Britannula the 
 
lOG THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 world mioht be too stroma for me. Should 
 I not take the good things that were offered, 
 and allow Jack to marry his wife and be 
 happy in his own way? In my very heart 
 I loved him quite as well as did his mother, 
 and thought that he was the finest young 
 fellow that Britannula had produced. And if 
 this kind of thing went on, it might be that 
 I should be driven to quarrel with him alto- 
 gether, and to have him punished under the 
 law, like some old Eoman of old. And I must 
 confess that my relations with Mrs Neverbend 
 made me very unfit to ape the Eoman fater- 
 familias. She never interfered with public 
 business, but she had a way of talking about 
 household matters in which she was always 
 victorious. Lookincj back as I did at this 
 moment on the past, it seemed to me that she 
 and Jack, who were the two persons I loved 
 best in the world, had been the enemies who 
 had always successfully conspired against me. 
 " Do have done with your Fixed Period and 
 
JACK NEVERBEND. 107 
 
 nonsense," she had said to me only yesterday. 
 "It's all very well for the Assembly; but 
 when you come to killing poor Mr Crasweller 
 in real life, it is quite out of the question." 
 And then, when I began to explain to her at 
 length the immense importance of the subject, 
 she only remarked that that would do very 
 well for the Assembly. Should I abandon it 
 all, take the good things with which God had 
 provided me, and retire into private life? I 
 had two sides to my character, and could see 
 myself sitting in luxurious comfort amidst the 
 furniture of Crasweller's verandah while Eva 
 and her children were around, and Jack was 
 standing with a cigar in his mouth outside lay- 
 ing down the law for the cricketers at Glad- 
 stonopolis. "Were not better done as others 
 use," I said to myself over and over again as I 
 sat there wearied with this contest, and thinking 
 of the much more frightful agony I should be 
 called upon to endure when the time had ac- 
 tually come for the departure of old Crasweller. 
 
108 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 And then again if I should fail ! For half 
 an hour or so I did fear that I should fail. I 
 had been always a most popular magistrate, 
 but now, it seemed, had come the time in 
 which all my popularity must be abandoned. 
 Jack, who was quick enough at understanding 
 the aspect of things, had already begun to ask 
 the people whether they would see their old 
 friend Crasweller murdered in cold blood. It 
 Avas a dreadful word, but I was assured that 
 he had used it. How would it be when the 
 time even for depositing had come, and an 
 attempt was made to lead the old man up 
 through the streets of Gladstonopolis ? Should 
 I have strength of character to perform the 
 task in opposition to the loudly expressed 
 wishes of the inhabitants, and to march him 
 along protected by a strong body of volunteers? 
 And how would it be if the volunteers them- 
 selves refused to act on the side of law and 
 order? Should I not absolutely fail; and 
 would it not afterwards be told of me that. 
 
JACK NEVEEBEND. 109 
 
 as President, I had broken down in an attempt 
 to carry out the project with which my name 
 had been so long associated ? 
 
 As I sat there alone I had almost determined 
 to yield. But suddenly there came upon me 
 a memory of Socrates, of Galileo, of Hampden, 
 and of Washington. What great things had 
 these men done by constancy, in opposition to 
 the wills and prejudices of the outside world ! 
 How triumphant they now appeared to have 
 been in fighting against the enormous odds 
 which power had brought against them ! And 
 how pleasant now were the very sounds of 
 their names to all who loved their fellow- 
 creatures 1 In some moments of private 
 thought, anxious as were now my own, they 
 too must have doubted. They must have 
 asked themselves the question, whether they 
 were strong enough to carry their great re- 
 forms against the world. But in these very 
 moments the necessary strength had been 
 given to them. It must have been that, when 
 
110 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 almost despairing, they had been comforted 
 by an inner truth, and had been all but in- 
 spired to trust with confidence in their cause. 
 They, too, had been weak, and had trembled, 
 and had almost feared. But they had found 
 in their own hearts that on which they could 
 rely. Had they been less sorely pressed than 
 was I now at this present moment ? Had not 
 they believed and trusted and been confident ? 
 As I thought of it, I became aware that it was 
 not only necessary for a man to imagine new 
 truths, but to be able to endure, and to suffer, 
 and to bring them to maturity. And how 
 often before a truth was brought to maturity 
 must it be necessary that he who had imagined 
 it, and seen it, and planned it, must give his 
 very life for it, and all in vain ? But not 
 perhaps all in vain as far as the world was 
 concerned; but only in vain in regard to the 
 feelings and knowledge of the man himself. 
 In struggling for the welfare of his fellow- 
 creatures, a man must dare to endure to be 
 
JACK NEVERBEND. Ill 
 
 obliterated, — must be content to go down 
 unheard of, — or, worse still, ridiculed, and 
 perhaps abused by all, — in order that some- 
 thing afterwards may remain of those changes 
 which he has been enabled to see, but not to 
 carry out. How many things are requisite to 
 true greatness! But, first of all, is required 
 that self-negation w^hich is able to plan new 
 blessings, although certain that those blessings 
 will be accounted as curses by the world at 
 large. 
 
 Then I got up, and as I walked about the 
 room I declared to myself aloud my purpose. 
 Though I might perish in the attempt, I would 
 certainly endeavour to carry out the doctrine 
 of the Fixed Period. Though the people might 
 be against me, and regard me as their enemy, 
 — that people for whose welfare T had done 
 it all, — still I w^ould persevere, even though 
 I might be destined to fall in the attempt. 
 Though the wife of my bosom and the son 
 of my loins should turn against me, and em- 
 
112 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 bitter my last moments by their enmity, still 
 would I persevere. When they came to speak 
 of the vices and the virtues of President Never- 
 bend, — to tell of his weakness and his strength, 
 — it should never be said of him that he had 
 been deterred by fear of the people from car- 
 rying out the great measure which he had pro- 
 jected solely for their benefit. 
 
 Comforted by this resolve, I went into Mrs 
 Neverbend's parlour, where I found her son 
 Jack sitting with her. They had evidently 
 been talking about Jack's speech in the mar- 
 ket-place ; and I could see that the young 
 orator's brow was still flushed with the tri- 
 umph of the moment. " Father," said he, im- 
 mediately, " you will never be able to deposit 
 old Crasweller. People won't let you do it." 
 
 "The people of Britannula," I said, "will 
 never interfere to prevent their magistrate 
 from acting in accordance with the law." 
 
 " Bother ! " said Mrs Neverbend. When my 
 wife said " bother," it was, I was aware, of no 
 
JACK NEVERBEND. 113 
 
 use to argue with her. Indeed, Mrs Never- 
 bend is a lady upon whom argument is for 
 the most part thrown away. She forms her 
 opinion from the things around her, and is, 
 in regard to domestic life, and to her neigh- 
 bours, and to the conduct of people with whom 
 she lives, almost invariably right. She has a 
 quick insight, and an affectionate heart, which 
 together keep her from going astray. She 
 knows how to do good, and when to do it. 
 But to abstract argument, and to political 
 truth, she is wilfully blind. I felt it to be 
 necessary that I should select this opportunity 
 for making Jack understand that I would not 
 fear his opposition ; but I own that I could 
 have wished tliat Mrs Neverbend had not 
 been present on the occasion. 
 
 "Won't they?" said Jack. "That's just 
 what I fancy they will do." 
 
 "Do you mean to say that it is what you 
 wish them to do, — that you think it right that 
 they should do it ? " 
 
 VOL. I. H 
 
114 THE FIXED PEKIOD. 
 
 " I don't think Crasweller ought to be depos- 
 ited, if you mean that, father." 
 
 " Not though the law requires it ? " This I 
 said in a tone of authority. " Have you formed 
 any idea in your own mind of the subjection 
 to the law which is demanded from all good 
 citizens ? Have you ever bethought yourself 
 that the law should be in all things " 
 
 " Oh, Mr President, pray do not make a 
 speech here," said my wife. " I shall never 
 understand it, and I do not think that Jack 
 is much wiser than I am." 
 
 " I do not know what you mean by a speech, 
 Sarah." My wife's name is Sarah. " But it is 
 necessary that Jack should be instructed that 
 he, at any rate, must obey the law. He is my 
 son, and, as such, it is essentially necessary 
 that he should be amenable to it. The law 
 demands " 
 
 " You can't do it, and there's an end of it," 
 said Mrs Neverbend. " You and all your laws 
 will never be able to put an end to poor Mr 
 
JACK NEVEKBEND. 115 
 
 Crasweller, — and it would be a great shame 
 if you did. You don't see it; but the feeling 
 here in the city is becoming very strong. The 
 people won't have it ; and I must say that it 
 is only rational that Jack should be on the 
 same side. He is a man now, and has a right 
 to his own opinion as well as another." 
 
 " Jack," said I, with much solemnity, " do 
 you value your father's blessing ? " 
 
 " Well ; sir, yes," said he. " A blessing, I 
 suppose, means something of an allowance paid 
 quarterly." 
 
 I turned away my face that he might not 
 see the smile which I felt was involuntarily 
 creeping across it. " Sir," said I, " a father's 
 blessing has much more than a pecuniary 
 value. It includes that kind of relation be- 
 tween a parent and his son without which life 
 would be a burden to me, and, I should think, 
 very grievous to you also." 
 
 " Of course I hope that you and I may 
 always be on good terms." 
 
116 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 I was obliged to take this admission for 
 what it was worth. ''If you wish to remain 
 on good terms with me," said I, "you must 
 not oppose me in public when I am acting 
 as a public magistrate." 
 
 "Is he to see Mr Crasweller murdered be- 
 fore his very eyes, and to say nothing about 
 it ? " said Mrs Neverbend. 
 
 Of all terms in the language there was none 
 so offensive to me as that odious word when 
 used in reference to the ceremony which I 
 had intended to be so gracious and alluring. 
 " Sarah," said I, turning upon her in my anger, 
 " that is a very improper word, and one which 
 you should not tempt the boy to use, especially 
 in my presence." 
 
 "English is English, Mr President," she 
 said. She always called me "Mr President" 
 when she intended to oppose me. 
 
 "You might as well say that a man was 
 murdered when he is — is — killed in battle." 
 I had been about to say "executed," but I 
 
JACK NEVERBEND. 117 
 
 stopped myself. Men are not executed in 
 Britannula. 
 
 "No. He is fighting his country's battle 
 and dies gloriously." 
 
 " He has his leg shot off, or his arm, and 
 is too frequently left to perish miserably on 
 the ground. Here every comfort will be pro- 
 vided for him, so that he may depart from 
 this world without a pang, when, in the course 
 of years, he shall have lived beyond the period 
 at which he can work and be useful." 
 
 *'But look at Mr Crasweller, father. Who 
 is more useful than he is ? " 
 
 Nothing had been more unlucky to me as 
 the promoter of the Fixed Period than the 
 peculiar healthiness and general sanity of him 
 who was by chance to be our first martyr. 
 It might have been possible to make Jack 
 understand that a rule which had been found 
 to be applicable to the world at large was not 
 fitted for some peculiar individual, but it was 
 quite impossible to bring this home to the 
 
118 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 mind of Mrs Neverbend. I must, I felt, 
 choose some other opportunity for expounding 
 that side of the arcjument. I would at the 
 present moment take a leaf out of my wife's 
 book and go straight to my purpose. " I tell 
 you what it is, young man," said I ; '' I do 
 not intend to be thwarted by you in carry- 
 ins^ on the sjreat reform to which I have de- 
 voted my life. If you cannot hold your tongue 
 at the present moment, and abstain from mak- 
 ing public addresses in the market-place, you 
 shall go out of Britannula. It is well that 
 you should travel and see something of the 
 world before you commence the trade of pub- 
 lic orator. Now I think of it, the Alpine 
 Club from Sydney are to be in ISTew Zealand 
 this summer, and it will suit you very well 
 to go and climb up Mount Earnshawe and 
 see all the beauties of nature instead of talk- 
 ing nonsense here in Gladstonopolis." 
 
 " Oh, father, I should like nothing better," 
 cried Jack, enthusiastically. 
 
JACK NEVERBEND. 119 
 
 " ISTonsense," said Mrs ISTeverbend ; " are you 
 going to send the poor boy to break his neck 
 among the glaciers ? Don't you remember 
 that Dick Ardwinkle was lost there a year 
 or two ago, and came to his death in a most 
 frightful manner ? " 
 
 "That was before I was born/' said Jack, 
 " or at any rate very shortly afterwards. And 
 they hadn't then invented the new patent 
 steel climbing arms. Since they came up, 
 no one has ever been lost among the glaciers." 
 
 " You had better prepare then to go," said 
 I, thinking that the idea of getting rid of 
 Jack in this manner was very happy. 
 
 "But, father," said he, "of course I can't 
 stir a step till after the great cricket-match." 
 
 "You must give up cricket for this time. 
 So good an opportunity for visiting the New 
 Zealand mountains may never come again." 
 
 "Give up the match V he exclaimed. "Why, 
 the English sixteen are coming here on pur- 
 pose to play us, and swear that they'll beat 
 
120 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 ITS by means of the new catapult. But I 
 know that our steam -bowler will beat their 
 catapult hollow. At any rate I cannot stir 
 from here till after the match is over. I've 
 got to arrange everything myself. Besides, 
 they do count something on my spring-bat- 
 ting. I should be regarded as absolutely a 
 traitor to my country if I were to leave Brit- 
 annula while this is going on. The young 
 Marquis of Marylebone, their leader, is to 
 stay at our house ; and the vessel bringing 
 them will be due here about eleven o'clock 
 next Wednesday." 
 
 "Eleven o'clock next Wednesday," said I, 
 in surprise. I had not as yet heard of this 
 match, nor of the coming of our aristocratic 
 visitor. 
 
 "They won't be above thirty minutes late 
 at the outside. They left the Land's End 
 three weeks ago last Tuesday at two, and 
 London at half-past ten. We have had three 
 or four water telegrams from them since they 
 
JACK NEVERBEND. 121 
 
 started, and they hadn't then lost ten minutes 
 on the journey. Of course I must be at home 
 to receive the Marquis of Marylebone." 
 
 All this set me thinking about many things. 
 It was true that at such a moment I could 
 not use my parental authority to send Jack 
 out of the island. To such an extent had 
 the childish amusements of youth been carried, 
 as to give to them all the importance of politics 
 and social science. What I had heard about 
 this cricket-match had gone in at one ear and 
 come out at the other ; but now that it was 
 brought home to me, I was aware that all 
 my authority would not serve to banish Jack 
 till it was over. Not only would he not obey 
 me, but he would be supported in his dis- 
 obedience by even the elders of the community. 
 But perhaps the worst feature of it all was 
 the arrival just now at Gladstonopolis of a 
 crowd of educated Englishmen. When I say 
 educated I mean prejudiced. They would be 
 Englishmen with no ideas beyond those cur- 
 
122 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 rent in the last century, and would be alto- 
 cjether deaf to tlie wisdom of the Fixed Period. 
 I saw at a glance that I must wait till they 
 should have taken their departure, and post- 
 pone all further discussion on the subject as 
 far as might be possible till Gladstonopolis 
 should have been left to her natural quiescence 
 after the disturbance of the cricket. " Very 
 well," said I, leaving the room. " Then it 
 may come to pass that you will never be 
 able to visit the wonderful glories of Mount 
 Earnshawe." 
 
 "Plenty of time for that," said Jack, as I 
 shut the door. 
 
123 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE CRICKET-MATCH. 
 
 I HAD been of late so absorbed in the affairs 
 of the Fixed Period, that I had altogether for- 
 gotten the cricket-match and the noble strangers 
 who were about to come to our shores. Of 
 course I had heard of it before, and had been 
 informed that Lord Marylebone was to be our 
 guest. I had probably also been told that Sir 
 Lords Longstop and Sir Kennington Oval were 
 to be entertained at Little Christchurch. But 
 when I was reminded of this by Jack a few 
 days later, it had quite gone out of my head. 
 But I now at once began to recognise the im- 
 portance of the occasion, and to see that for 
 the next two months Crasweller, the college, 
 
124 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 and the Fixed Period must be banished, if not 
 from my thoughts, at any rate from my tongue. 
 Better could not be done in the matter than 
 to have them banished from the tongue of all 
 the world, as T certainly should not be anxious 
 to have the subject ventilated within hearing 
 and speaking of the crowd of thoroughly old- 
 fashioned, prejudiced, aristocratic young Eng- 
 lishmen who were coming to us. The cricket- 
 match .sprang to the front so suddenly, that 
 Jack seemed to have forgotten all his energy 
 respecting the college, and to have transferred 
 his entire attention to the various weapons, 
 offensive and defensive, wherewith the London 
 ciub was, if possible, to be beaten. We are 
 never short of ^oney in Britannula ; but it 
 seemed, as I watched the various preparations 
 made for carrying on two or three days' play 
 at Little Christchurch, that England must be 
 sending out another army to take another 
 Sebastopol. More paraphernalia were required 
 to enable these thirty -two lads to play their 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 125 
 
 game with propriety than would have been 
 needed for the depositing of half Gladston- 
 opolis. Every man from England had his 
 attendant to look after his bats and balls, and 
 shoes and greaves ; and it was necessary, of 
 course, that our boys should be equally well 
 served. Each of them had two bicycles for his 
 own use, and as they were all constructed with 
 the new double-acting levers, they passed back- 
 wards and forwards along the bicycle track 
 between the city and Crasweller's house with 
 astonishing rapidity. I used to hear that the 
 six miles had been done in fifteen minutes. 
 Then there came a struggle with the English 
 and the Britannulists, as to which w^ould get 
 the nearest to fourteen minutes ; till it seemed 
 that bicycle-racing and not cricket had been 
 the purpose for which the English had sent 
 out the 4000-ton steam-yacht at the expense 
 of all the cricketers of the nation. It was on 
 this occasion that the track was first divided 
 for comers and goers, and that volunteers were 
 
126 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 set to prevent stragglers from crossing except 
 by the regular bridges. I found that I, the 
 President of the Eepublic, was actually for- 
 bidden to go down in my tricycle to my old 
 friend's house, unless I would do so before 
 noon. " You'd be run over and made mince- 
 meat of," said Jack, speaking of such a catas- 
 trophe with less horror than I thought it ought 
 to have engendered in his youthful mind. 
 Poor Sir Lords was run down by our Jack, 
 — collided as Jack called it. " He hadn't quite 
 impetus enough on to make the turning sharp 
 as he ought," said Jack, without the slightest 
 apparent regret at what had occurred. "Another 
 inch and a half would have saved him. If he 
 can touch a ball from our steam-bowler when 
 I send it, I shall think more of his arms than 
 I do of his legs, and more of his eyes than I 
 do of his luno-s. What a fellow to send out ! 
 Why, he's thirty, and has been eating soup, 
 they tell me, all through the journey." These 
 young men had brought a doctor with them. 
 
THE CEICKET-MATCH. 127 
 
 Dr MacNuffery, to prescribe to them what to 
 eat and drink at each meal ; and the unfortun- 
 ate baronet whom Jack had nearly slaughtered, 
 had encountered the ill-will of the entire club 
 because he had called for mutton-broth when 
 he was sea-sick. 
 
 They were to be a month in Britannula 
 before they would begin the match, so necessary 
 was it that each man should be in the best 
 possible physical condition. They had brought 
 their Dr MacNuffery, and our lads immediately 
 found the need of having a doctor of their own. 
 There was, I think, a little pretence in this, as 
 though Dr Bobbs had been a long-established 
 officer of the Southern Cross cricket club, they 
 had not in truth thought of it, and Bobbs was 
 only appointed the night after MacNuffery's 
 position and duties had been made known. 
 Bobbs was a young man just getting into 
 practice in Gladstonopolis, and understood 
 measles, I fancy, better than the training of 
 athletes. MadSTuffery w^as the most disagree- 
 
128 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 able man of the English party, and soon began 
 to turn up his nose at Bobbs. But Bobbs, I 
 think, got the better of him. " Do you allow 
 coffee to your club ; — coffee? " asked MacNuffery, 
 in a voice mingling ridicule and reproof with 
 a touch of satire, as he had begun to guess 
 that Bobbs had not been long attending to his 
 present work. "You'll find," said Bobbs, "that 
 young men in our air do not need the restraints 
 which are necessary to you English. Their 
 fathers and mothers were not soft and flabby 
 before them, as was the case with yours, I 
 think." Lord Marylebone looked across the 
 table, I am told, at Sir Kennington Oval, and 
 nothing afterwards was said about diet. 
 
 But a great trouble arose, which, however, 
 rather assisted Jack in his own prospects in 
 the long-run, — though for a time it seemed to 
 have another effect. Sir Kennington Oval was 
 much struck by Eva's beauty, and, living as he 
 did in Crasweller's house, soon had an oppor- 
 tunity of so telling her. Abraham Grundle 
 
THE CEICKET-MATCH. 129 
 
 was one of the cricketers, and, as sucli, was 
 frequently on the ground at Little Christ- 
 church ; but he did not at present go into 
 Crasweller's house, and the whole fashionable 
 community of Gladstonoplis was beginning to 
 entertain the opinion that that match was off. 
 Grundle had been heard to declare most author- 
 itatively that when the day came Crasweller 
 should be deposited, and had given it as his 
 opinion that the power did not exist which 
 could withstand the law of Britannula. Whether 
 in this he preferred the law to Eva, or acted in 
 anger against Crasweller for interfering with 
 his prospects, or had an idea that it would not 
 be worth his while to marry the girl while the 
 girl's father should be left alive, or had grad- 
 ually fallen into this bitterness of spirit from 
 the opposition shown to him, I could not quite 
 tell. And he was quite as hostile to Jack as 
 to Crasweller. But he seemed to entertain no 
 aversion at all to Sir Kennington Oval ; nor, 
 I was informed, did Eva. I had known that 
 VOL. I. I 
 
130 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 for the last moiitli Jack's mother had been 
 instant with him to induce him to speak out 
 to Eva ; but he, who hardly allowed me, his 
 father, to open my mouth without contradict- 
 ing me, and who in our house ordered every- 
 thing about just as though he were the master, 
 was so bashful in the girl's presence that he 
 had never as yet asked her to be his wife. ]N"ow 
 Sir Kennington had come in his way, and he 
 by no means carried his modesty so far as to 
 abstain from quarrelling with him. Sir Ken- 
 nington was a good-looking young aristocrat, 
 with plenty of words, but nothing special to 
 say for himself He was conspicuous for his 
 cricketing finery, and when got up to take his 
 place at the wicket, looked like a diver with 
 his diving-armour all on ; but Jack said that 
 he was very little good at the game. Indeed, 
 for mere cricket Jack swore that the English 
 would be " nowhere " but for eight professional 
 players whom they had brought out with them. 
 It must be explained that our club had no 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 131 
 
 professionals. We had not come to that yet, 
 — that a man should earn his bread by playing 
 cricket. Lord Marylebone and his friend had 
 brought with them eight professional " slaves," 
 as our young men came to call them, — most 
 ungraciously. But each "slave" required as 
 much looking after as did the masters, and 
 they thought a great deal more of themselves 
 than did the non-professionals. 
 
 Jack had in truth been attempting to pass 
 Sir Kennington on the bicycle track when he 
 had upset poor Sir Lords Longstop ; and, ac- 
 cording to his own showing, he had more than 
 once allowed Sir Kennington to start in ad- 
 vance, and had run into Little Christchurch 
 bicycle quay before him. This had not given 
 rise to the best feeling, and I feared lest there 
 might be an absolute quarrel before the match 
 should have been played. "I'll punch that 
 fellow's head some of these days," Jack said 
 one evening when he came back from Little 
 Christchurch. 
 
132 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 " What's the matter now ? " I asked. 
 
 " Impudent puj^py ! He thmks because he 
 has got an unmeaning handle to his name, that 
 everybody is to come to his whistle. They 
 tell me that his father was made what they 
 call a baronet because he set a broken arm for 
 one of those twenty royal dukes that England 
 has to pay for." 
 
 " Who has had to come to his whistle now ? " 
 asked his mother. 
 
 " He went over with his steam curricle, and 
 sent to ask Eva whether she would not take a 
 drive with him on the cliffs." 
 
 "She needn't have gone unless she wished 
 it/' I said. 
 
 " But she did go ; and there she was with 
 him for a couple of hours. He's the most 
 unmeaning upstart of a puppy I ever met. 
 He has not three ideas in the world. I shall 
 tell Eva what I think about him." 
 
 The quarrel went on during the whole period 
 of preparation, till it seemed as though Glad- 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 133 
 
 stonopolis had nothing else to talk about. 
 Eva's name was in every one's mouth, till my 
 wife was nearly beside herself with anger. "A 
 girl," said she, "shouldn't get herself talked 
 about in that way by every one all round. I 
 don't suppose the man intends to marry her." 
 
 " I can't see why he shouldn't," I replied. 
 
 "She's nothing more to him than a pretty 
 provincial lass. What would she be in Lon- 
 don?" 
 
 ''Why should not Mr Crasweller's daughter 
 be as much admired in London as here ? " I 
 answered. " Beauty is the same all the world 
 over, and her money will be thought of quite 
 as much there as here." 
 
 "But she will have such a spot upon her." 
 
 " Spot ! What spot ? " 
 
 "As the daughter of the first deposited of 
 the Fixed Period people, — if ever that comes 
 off. Or if it don't, she'll be talked about as 
 her who was to be. I don't suppose any Eng- 
 lishman will think of marrying her." 
 
134 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 This made me very angry. " What ! " I said. 
 "Do you, a Britannulist and my wife, intend 
 to turn the special glory of Britannula to the 
 disgrace of her people ? That which we should 
 be ready to claim as the highest honour, — as 
 being an advance in progress and general civil- 
 isation never hitherto even thought of among 
 other people, — to have conceived that, and to 
 have prepared it, in every detail for perfect 
 consummation, — that is to be accounted as an 
 opprobrium to our children, by you, the Lady 
 President of the Eepublic ! Have you no love 
 of country, no patriotism, no feeling at any 
 rate of what has been done for the world's 
 welfare by your own family ? " I own I did 
 feel vexed when she spoke of Eva as having 
 been as it were contaminated by being a Brit- 
 annulist, because of the law enacting the Fixed 
 Period. 
 
 " She'd better face it out at home than go 
 across the world to hear what other people say 
 of us. It may be all very well as far as state 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 135 
 
 wisdom goes; but the world isn't ripe for it, 
 and we shall only be laughed at." 
 
 There was truth in this, and a certain amount 
 of concession had also been made. I can fancy 
 that an easy-going butterfly should laugh at 
 the painful industry of the ant ; and I should 
 think much of the butterfly who should own 
 that he was only a butterfly because it was the 
 age of butterflies. " The few wise," said I, 
 "have ever been the laughing-stock of silly 
 crowds." 
 
 " But Eva isn't one of the w^ise," she replied, 
 " and would be laughed at without having any 
 of your philosophy to support her. However, 
 I don't suppose the man is thinking of it." 
 
 But the young man was thinking of it ; and 
 had so far made up his mind before he went 
 as to ask Eva to marry him out of hand and 
 return with him to England. We heard of it 
 when the time came, and heard also that Eva 
 had declared that she could not make up her 
 mind so quickly. That was what was said 
 
136 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 when the time drew near for the departure 
 of the yacht. But we did not hear it direct 
 from Eva, nor yet from Crasweller. All these 
 tidings came to us from Jack, and Jack was in 
 this instance somewhat led astray. 
 
 Time passed on, and the practice on the little 
 Christchurch ground was continued. Several 
 accidents happened, but the cricketers took 
 very little account of these. Jack had his 
 cheek cut open by a ball running off his bat 
 on to his face ; and Eva, who saw the accident, 
 was carried fainting into the house. Sir Ken- 
 nington behaved admirably, and himself brought 
 him home in his curricle. We were told after- 
 wards that this was done at Eva's directions, 
 because old Crasweller would have been un- 
 comfortable with the boy in his house, seeing 
 that he could not in his present circumstances 
 receive me or my wife. Mrs Neverbend swore 
 a solemn oath that Jack should be made to 
 abandon his cricket ; but Jack was playing 
 again the next day, with his face strapped up 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 137 
 
 athwart and across with republican black-silk 
 adhesive. When I saw Bobbs at work over 
 him I thought that one side of his face was 
 gone, and that his eye would be dreadfully 
 out of place. "All his chance of marrying 
 Eva is gone," said I to my wife. " The nasty 
 little selfish slut!" said Mrs Neverbend. But 
 at two the next day Jack had been patched 
 up, and nothing could keep him from Little 
 Christchurch. Bobbs was with him the whole 
 morning, and assured his mother that if he 
 could go out and take exercise his eye would 
 be all right. His mother offered to take a 
 walk with him in the city park ; but Bobbs 
 declared that violent exercise would be neces- 
 sary to keep the eye in its right place, and 
 Jack was at Little Christchurch manipulating 
 his steam-bowler in the afternoon. Afterwards 
 Littlebat, one of the English professionals, had 
 his leg broken, and was necessarily laid on 
 one side ; and young Grundle was hurt on 
 the lower part of the back, and never showed 
 
138 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 himself again on the scene of danger. "My 
 life is too precious in the Assembly just at 
 present," he said to me, excusing himself. He 
 alluded to the Fixed Period debate, which he 
 knew would be renewed as soon as the crick- 
 eters were gone. I no doubt depended very 
 much on Abraham Grundle, and assented. 
 The ^match was afterwards carried on with 
 fifteen on each side ; for though each party 
 had spare players, they could not agree as to 
 the use of them. Our next man was better 
 than theirs, they said, and they were anxious 
 that we should take our second best, to which 
 our men would not agree. Therefore the game 
 was ultimately played with thirty combatants. 
 
 " So one of our lot is to come back for 
 a wife almost immediately," said Lord IMary- 
 lebone at our table the day before the match 
 was to be played. . 
 
 " Oh, indeed, my lord ! " said Mrs Neverbend. 
 " I am glad to find that a Britannulan young 
 lady has been so effective. Who is the gen- 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 139 
 
 tleman ? " It was easy to see by my wife's 
 face, and to know by her tone of voice, that 
 she was much disturbed by the news. 
 
 ''Sir Kennington," said Lord Marylebone. 
 " I supposed you had all heard of it." Of 
 course we had all heard of it; but Lord 
 Marylebone did not know what had been 
 Mrs Neverbend's wishes for her own son. 
 
 "We did know that Sir Kennington had 
 been very attentive, but there is no knowing 
 what that means from you foreign gentlemen. 
 It's a pity that poor Eva, who is a good girl 
 in her way, should have her head turned." 
 This came from my wife. 
 
 " It's Oval's head that is turned," continued 
 his lordship ; " I never saw a man so bowled 
 over in my life. He's awfully in love with 
 her." 
 
 " What will his friends say at home ? " asked 
 Mrs Neverbend. 
 
 " We understand that Miss Crasweller is to 
 have a lar^^e fortune ; eicfht or ten thousand 
 
140 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 a-year at the least. I should imagine that she 
 will be received with open arms by all the 
 Ovals ; and as for a foreigner, — we don't call 
 you foreigners." 
 
 " Why not ? " said I, rather anxious to prove 
 that we were foreigners. " What makes a 
 foreigner but a different allegiance? Do we 
 not call the Americans foreigners ? " Great 
 Britain and France had been for years engaged 
 in the great maritime contest with the united 
 fleets of Eussia and America, and had only 
 just made that glorious peace by which, as 
 politicians said, all the world was to be gov- 
 erned for the future; and after that, it need 
 not be doubted but that the Americans were 
 foreign to the English ; — and if the Americans, 
 why not the Britannulists ? We had separated 
 ourselves from Great Britain, without coming 
 to blows indeed ; but still our own flag, the 
 Southern Cross, flew as proudly to our gentle 
 breezes as ever had done the Union -jack 
 amidst the inclemency of a British winter. It 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 141 
 
 was the flag of Britannula, with which Great 
 Britain had no concern. At the present 
 moment I was specially anxious to hear a 
 distinguished Englishman like Lord Maryle- 
 bone acknowledge that we were foreigners. 
 " If we be not foreigners, what are we, my 
 lord?" 
 
 "Englishmen, of course," said he. "What 
 else ? Don't you talk English ? " 
 
 "So do the Americans, my lord," said I, 
 with a smile that was intended to be gracious. 
 " Our language is spreading itself over the 
 world, and is no sign of nationality." 
 
 " What laws do you obey ? " 
 
 ''English, — till we choose to repeal them. 
 You are aware that we have already freed our- 
 selves from the stain of capital punishment." 
 
 " Those coins pass in your market-places ? " 
 Then he brought out a gold piece from his 
 waistcoat-pocket, and slapped it down on the 
 table. It was one of those pounds which 
 the people will continue to call sovereigns, 
 
142 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 although the name has been made actually 
 illeo-al for the rendering of all accounts. 
 "Whose is this image and superscription?" 
 he asked. "And yet this was paid to me 
 to-day at one of your banks, and the lady 
 cashier asked me whether I would take sov- 
 ereigns. How will you get over that, Mr 
 President ? " 
 
 A small people, — numerically small, — cannot 
 of course do everything at once. We have 
 been a little slack perhaps in instituting a 
 national mint. In fact there was a difficulty 
 about the utensil by which we would have 
 clapped a Southern Cross over the British 
 arms, and put the portrait of the Britannulan 
 President of the day, — mine for instance, — in 
 the place where the face of the British mon- 
 arch has hitherto held its own. I have never 
 pushed the question much, lest I should seem, 
 as have done some presidents, over anxious 
 to exhibit myself I have ever thought more 
 of the glory of our race than of putting for- 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 143 
 
 ward my own individual self, — as may be 
 seen by the whole history of the college. " I 
 will not attempt to get over it," I said; "but 
 according to my ideas, a nation does not de- 
 pend on the small external accidents of its coin 
 or its language." 
 
 "But on the flag which it flies. After all, 
 a bit of bunting is easy." 
 
 "Nor on its flag, Lord Marylebone, but on 
 the hearts of its people. We separated from 
 the old mother country with no quarrel, with 
 no ill-will ; but with the mutual friendly wishes 
 of both. If there be a trace of the feeling of 
 antagonism in the word foreigners, I will not 
 use it ; but British subjects we are not, and 
 never can be again." This I said because I 
 felt that there was creeping up, as it were in 
 the very atmosphere, a feeling that England 
 should be again asked to annex us, so as to 
 save our old people from the wise decision to 
 which our own Assembly had come. Oh for 
 an adamantine law to protect the human race 
 
144 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 from the imbecility, the weakness, the discon- 
 tent, and the extravagance of old age ! Lord 
 Marylebone, who saw that I was in earnest, 
 and who was the most courteous of gentlemen, 
 changed the conversation. I had already ob- 
 served that he never spoke about the Fixed 
 Period in our house, though, in the condition 
 in which the community then was, he must 
 have heard it discussed elsewhere. 
 
 The day for the match had come. Jack's 
 face was so nearly healed that Mrs Neverbend 
 had been brought to believe entirely in the 
 efficacy of violent exercise for cuts and bruises. 
 Grundle's back was still bad, and the poor 
 fellow with the broken leg could only be 
 wheeled out in front of the verandah to look 
 at the proceedings through one of those won- 
 derful little glasses which enable the critic 
 to see every motion of the players at half- 
 a- mile's distance. He assured me that the 
 precision with which Jack set his steam- 
 bowler was equal to that of one of those 
 
THE CEICKET-MATCH. 145 
 
 Shoeburyness gunners who can hit a sparrow 
 as far as they can see him, on condition only 
 that they know the precise age of the bird. 
 I gave Jack great credit in my own mind, 
 because I felt that at the moment he was 
 much down at heart. On the preceding day 
 Sir Kennington had been driving Eva about 
 in his curricle, and Jack had returned home 
 tearing his hair. " They do it on purpose to 
 put him off his play," said his mother. But 
 if so, they hadn't known Jack. Nor indeed 
 had I quite known him up to this time. 
 
 I was bound myself to see the game, because 
 a special tent and a special glass had been 
 prepared for the President. Crasweller walked 
 by as I took my place, but he only shook his 
 head sadly and was silent. It now wanted 
 but four months to his deposition. Though 
 there was a strong party in his favour, I do 
 not know that he meddled much with it. I 
 did hear from different sources that he still 
 continued to assert that he was only nine 
 
 VOL. I. K 
 
146 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 years my senior, by wliicli lie intended to gain 
 the favour of a postponement of his term by 
 twelve poor months; but I do not think that 
 he ever lent himself to the other party. Under 
 my auspices he had always voted for the Fixed 
 Period, and he could hardly oppose it now in 
 theory. They tossed for the first innings, and 
 the English club won it. It was all England 
 against Britannula ! Think of the population 
 of the two countries. We had, however, been 
 taught to believe that no community ever 
 played cricket as did the Britannulans. The 
 English went in first, with the two baronets 
 at the wickets. They looked like two stout 
 Minervas with huge wicker helmets. I know 
 a picture of the goddess, all helmet, spear, and 
 petticoats, carrying her spear over her shoulder 
 as she flies through the air over the cities of 
 the earth. Sir Kennington did not fly, but 
 in other respects he was very like the goddess, 
 so completely enveloped was he in his india- 
 rubber guards, and so wonderful was the 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 147 
 
 machine upon his head, by which his brain 
 and features were to be protected. 
 
 As he took his place upon the ground there 
 was great cheerinsr. Then the steam - bowler 
 was ridden into its place by the attendant 
 engineer, and Jack began his work. I could 
 see the colour come and go in his face as he 
 carefully placed the ball and peeped down to 
 get its bearing. It seemed to me as though 
 he were taking infinite care to level it straight 
 and even at Sir Kennington's head. I was 
 told afterwards that he never looked at Sir 
 Kennington, but that, having calculated his 
 distance by means of a quicksilver levelling- 
 glasSjhis object was to throw the ball on a 
 certain inch of turf, from which it might shoot 
 into the wicket at such a degree as to make it 
 very difficult for Sir Kennington to know what 
 to do with it. It seemed to me to take a long 
 time, during which the fourteen men around 
 all looked as though each man were intending 
 to hop off to some other spot than that on 
 
148 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 which he was standing. There used, I am 
 told, to be only eleven of these men ; but now, 
 in a great match, the long-offs, and the long- 
 ons, and the rest of them, are all doubled. 
 The double long -off was at such a distance 
 that, he being a small man, I could only just 
 see him through the field-glass which I kept 
 in my waistcoat -pocket. When I had been 
 lookinfy hard at them for what seemed to be a 
 quarter of an hour, and the men were apparently 
 becoming tired of their continual hop, and when 
 Jack had stooped and kneeled and sprawled, 
 with one eye shut, in every conceivable attitude, 
 on a sudden there came a sharp snap, a little 
 
 smoke, and lo. Sir Kennington Oval was out ! 
 
 There was no doubt about it. I myself saw 
 the two bails fly away into infinite space, and 
 at once there was a sound of kettle-drums, 
 trumpets, fifes, and clarionets. It seemed as 
 though all the loud music of the town band 
 had struck up at the moment with their shrill- 
 est notes. And a huge gun was let off. 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 149 
 
 '• And let the kettle to the trumpet speak, 
 The trumpet to the cannoneer without, 
 The cannons to the heavens, the heavens to earth. 
 Now drinks the king to Hamlet." 
 
 I could not but fancy, at these great signs of 
 success, that I was Hamlet's father. 
 
 Sir Kennington Oval was out, — out at the 
 very first ball. There could be no doubt about 
 it, and Jack's triumph was complete. It was 
 melancholy to see the English Minerva, as he 
 again shouldered his spear and walked back 
 to his tent. In spite of Jack's good play, and 
 the success on the part of my own countrymen, 
 I could not but be sorry to think that the young 
 baronet had come half round the world to be 
 put out at the first ball. There was a cruelty 
 in it, — an inhospitality, — which, in spite of the 
 exigencies of the game, went against the grain. 
 Then, when the shouting, and the holloaing, 
 and the flinging up of the ball were still going 
 on, I remembered that, after it, he would have 
 his consolation with Eva. And poor Jack, 
 when his short triumph was over, would have 
 
150 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 to reflect that, though fortunate in his cricket, 
 he was unhappy in his love. As this occurred 
 to me, I looked back towards the house, and 
 there, from a little lattice window at the end 
 of the verandah, I saw a lady's handkerchief 
 waving. Could it be that Eva was waving it 
 so as to comfort her vanquished British lover ? 
 In the meantime Minerva went to his tent, and 
 bid himself among sympathetic friends ; and I 
 was told afterwards that be was allowed balf a 
 pint of bitter beer by Dr MacNuffery. 
 
 After twenty minutes spent in what seemed 
 to me the very ostentation of success, another 
 man was got to the wickets. This was 
 Stumps, one of the professionals, who was 
 not quite so much like a Minerva, though 
 he, too, was prodigiously greaved. Jack again 
 set his ball, snap went the machine, and 
 Stumps wriggled his bat. He touched the 
 ball, and away it flew behind the wicket. 
 Five republican Minervas ran after it as fast 
 as their legs could carry them ; and I was 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 151 
 
 told by a gentleman who sat next to me 
 scoring, that a dozen, runs had been made. 
 He spent a great deal of time in explaining 
 how, in the old times, more than six at a 
 time were never scored. ISTow all this was 
 altered. A slight tip counted ever so much 
 more than a good forward blow, because the 
 ball went behind the wicket. Up flew on 
 all sides of the ground figures to show that 
 Stumps had made a dozen, and two British 
 clarionets were blown with a great deal of 
 vigour. Stumps was a thick-set, solid, solemn- 
 looking man, who had been ridiculed by our 
 side as being much too old for the game ; 
 but he seemed to think very little of Jack's 
 precise machine. He kept chopping at the 
 ball, which always went behind, till he had 
 made a great score. It was two hours before 
 Jack had sorely lamed him in the hip, and 
 the umpire had given it leg -before -wicket. 
 Indeed it was leg-before-wicket, as the poor 
 man felt when he w^as assisted back to his 
 
152 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 tent. However, he had scored 150. Sir Lords 
 Longstop, too, had run up a good score before 
 he was caught out by the middle long-off, — a 
 marvellous catch they all said it was, — and our 
 trumpets were blown for fully five minutes. But 
 the big gun was only fired when a ball was 
 hurled from the machine directly into the wicket. 
 At the end of three days the Britishers 
 were all out, and the runs were numbered 
 in four figures. I had my doubts, as I looked 
 at the contest, whether any of them would 
 be left to play out the match. I was informed 
 that I was expected to take the President's seat 
 every day ; but when I heard that there were 
 to be two innings for each set, I positively 
 declined. But Crasweller took my place ; and 
 I was told that a gleam of joy shot across 
 his worn, sorrowful face when Sir Kenning- 
 ton began the second innings with ten runs. 
 Could he really wish, in his condition, to send 
 his daughter away to England simply that she 
 might be a baronet's wife ? 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 153 
 
 When the Britannulists went in for the 
 second time, they had 1500 runs to get; and 
 it was said afterwards that Grundle had bet 
 four to one against his own side. This was 
 thought to be very shabby on his part, though 
 if such was the betting, I don't see why he 
 should lose his money by backing his friends. 
 Jack declared in my hearing that he would 
 not put a shilling on. He did not wish either 
 to lose his money or to bet against himself 
 But he was considerably disheartened when 
 he told me that he was not going in on the 
 first day of their second innings. He had 
 not done much when the Britannulists were 
 in before, — had only made some thirty or forty 
 runs; and, worse than that, Sir Kennington 
 Oval had scored up to 300. They told me 
 that his Pallas helmet was shaken with tre- 
 mendous energy as he made his running. And 
 again, that man Stumps had seemed to be 
 invincible, though still lame, and had carried 
 out his bat with a tremendous score. He 
 
154 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 trudged away without any sign of triumph ; 
 but Jack said that the professional was the 
 best man they had. 
 
 On the second day of our party's second 
 innings, — the last day but one of the match, 
 — Jack went in. They had only made 150 
 runs on the previous day, and three wickets 
 were down. Our kettle-drums had had but 
 little opportunity for making themselves heard. 
 Jack was very despondent, and had had some 
 tiff with Eva. He had asked Eva whether 
 she were not going to England, and Eva had 
 said that perhaps she might do so if some 
 Britannulists did not do their duty. Jack 
 had chosen to take this as a bit of genuine 
 impertinence, and had been very sore about 
 it. Stumps was bowling from the British cata- 
 pult, and very nearly gave Jack his quietus 
 during the first over. He hit wildly, and 
 four balls passed him without touching his 
 wicket. Then came his turn again, and he 
 caught the first ball with his Neverbend 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 155 
 
 spring-bat, — for lie had invented it himself, — 
 such a swipe, as he called it, that nobody has 
 ever yet been able to find the ball. The story 
 goes that it went right up to the verandah, 
 and that Eva picked it up, and has treasured 
 it ever since. 
 
 Be that as it may, during the whole of that 
 day, and the next, nobody was able to get him 
 out. There w^as a continual banfrins^ of the 
 kettle-drum, which seemed to give him re- 
 newed spirits. Every ball as it came to him 
 w^as sent away into infinite space. All the 
 Englishmen were made to retire to further 
 distances from the wickets, and to stand about 
 almost at the extremity of the ground. The 
 management of the catapults was intrusted to 
 one man after another, — but in vain. Then 
 they sent the catapults away, and tried the 
 old-fashioned slow bowlino:. It was all the 
 same to Jack. He would not be tempted out 
 of his ground, but stood there awaiting the 
 ball, let it come ever so slowly. Through the 
 
156 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 first of the two days he stood before his wicket, 
 hitting to the right and the left, till hope 
 seemed to spring up again in the bosom of 
 the Britannulists. And I could see that the 
 Englishmen were becoming nervous and un- 
 easy, although the odds were still much in 
 their favour. 
 
 At the end of the first day Jack had scored 
 above 500 ; — but eleven wickets had gone 
 down, and only three of the most inferior 
 players were left to stand up with him. It 
 was considered that Jack must still make, 
 another 500 before the game would be won. 
 This would allow only twenty each to the 
 other three players. " But," said Eva to me 
 that evening, " they'll never get the tw^enty 
 each." 
 
 " And on which side are you, Eva ? " I 
 inquired with a smile. For in truth I did 
 believe at that moment that she was engaged 
 to the baronet. 
 
 " How dare you ask, Mr Neverbend ? " she 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 157 
 
 demanded, with indignation. "Am not I a 
 Britannulist as well as you?" And as she 
 walked away I could see that there was a 
 tear in her eye. 
 
 On the last day feelings were carried to a 
 pitch which was more befitting the last battle 
 of a great war, — some Waterloo of other ages, 
 — than the finishing of a prolonged game of 
 cricket. Men looked, and moved, and talked 
 as though their all were at stake. I cannot say 
 that the Englishmen seemed to hate us, or we 
 them ; but that the affair was too serious to 
 admit of playful words between the parties. 
 And those unfortunates who had to stand up 
 with Jack were so afraid of themselves that 
 they were like young country orators about 
 to make their first speeches. Jack was silent, 
 determined, and yet inwardly proud of himself, 
 feeling that the whole future success of the 
 republic was on his shoulders. He ordered 
 himself to be called at a certain hour, and 
 the assistants in our household listened to his 
 
158 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 words as though feeling that everything de- 
 pended on their obedience. He would not go 
 out on his bicycle, as fearing that some acci- 
 dent might occur, "Although, ought I not 
 to wish that I might be struck dead ? " he 
 said ; " as then all the world would know 
 that though beaten, it had been by the hand 
 of God, and not by our default." It astonished 
 me to find that the boy was quite as eager about 
 his cricket as I was about my Fixed Period. 
 
 At eleven o'clock T was in my seat, and on 
 looking round, I could see that all the rank 
 and fashion of Britannula were at the ground. 
 But all the rank and fashion were there for 
 nothing, unless they had come armed with 
 glasses. The spaces required by the cricketers 
 were so enormous that otherwise they could 
 not see anything of the play. Under my 
 canopy there was room for five, of which I 
 was supposed to be able to fill the middle 
 thrones. On the two others sat those who 
 officially scored the game. One seat had been 
 
THE CEICKET-MATCH. 159 
 
 demanded for Mrs ISTeverbend. " I will see 
 his fate, — whether it be his glory or his fall," 
 — said his mother, with true Eoman feeling. 
 Tor the other Eva had asked, and of course 
 it had been awarded to her. When the play 
 began, Sir Kennington was at the catapult and 
 Jack at the opposite wicket, and I could hardly 
 say for which she felt the extreme interest 
 which she certainly did exhibit. I, as the day 
 went on, found myself worked up to such ex- 
 citement that I could hardly keep my hat on 
 my head or behave myself with becoming pres- 
 idential dignity. At one period, as I shall 
 have to tell, I altogether disgraced myself. 
 
 There seemed to be an opinion that Jack 
 would either show himself at once unequal to 
 the occasion, and immediately be put out, — 
 which opinion I think that all Gladstonopolis 
 was inclined to hold, — or else that he would 
 get his " eye in " as he called it, and go on as 
 long as the three others could keep their bats. 
 I know that his own opinion was the same as 
 
160 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 that general in the city, and I feared that his 
 very caution at the outset would be detrimental 
 to him. The great object on our side was that 
 Jack should, as nearly as possible, be always 
 opposite to the bowler. He was to take the 
 four first balls, making but one run off the last, 
 and then beginning another over at the oppo- 
 site end do the same thing again. It was im- 
 possible to manage this exactly ; but something 
 might be done towards effecting it. There were 
 the three men with whom to work during the 
 day. The first unfortunately was soon made 
 to retire ; but Jack, who had walked up to my 
 chair durino- the time allowed for fetchinf]^ 
 down the next man, told me that he had " got 
 his eye," and I could see a settled look of fixed 
 purpose in his face. He bowed most gracefully 
 to Eva, who was so stirred by emotion that she 
 could not allow herself to speak a word. " Oh 
 Jack, I pray for you ; I pray for you," said his 
 mother. Jack, I fancy, thought more of Eva's 
 silence than of his mother's prayer. 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 161 
 
 Jack went back to his place, and hit the 
 first ball with such energy that he drove it 
 into the other stumps and smashed them to 
 pieces. Everybody declared that such a thing 
 had never been before achieved at cricket, — 
 and the ball passed on, and eight or ten runs 
 were scored. After that Jack seemed to be 
 mad with cricketing power. He took off his 
 greaves, declaring that they impeded his run- 
 ning, and threw away altogether his helmet. 
 " Oh, Eva, is he not handsome ? " said his 
 mother, in ecstasy, hanging across my chair. 
 Eva sat quiet without a sign. It did not 
 become me to say a word, but I did think 
 that he was very handsome ; — and I thought 
 also how ulicommonly hard it would be to hold 
 him if he should chance to win the game. Let 
 him make what orations he might against the 
 Fixed Period, all Gladstonopolis would follow 
 him if he won this game of cricket for them. 
 
 I cannot pretend to describe all the scenes 
 of that day, nor the growing anxiety of the 
 
 VOL. I. L 
 
162 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 Englishmen as Jack went on with one hundred 
 after another. He had already scored nearly 
 1000 when young Grabbe was caught out. 
 Young Grabbe was very popular, because he 
 was so altogether unlike his partner Grundle. 
 He was a fine frank fellow, and was Jack's 
 great friend. '' I don't mean to say that he 
 can really play cricket/' Jack had said that 
 morning, speaking with great authority ; " but 
 he is the best fellow in the world, and will do 
 exactly what you ask him." But he was out 
 now ; and Jack, with over 200 still to make, 
 declared that he gave up the battle almost 
 as lost. 
 
 " Don't say that, Mr Neverbend," whispered 
 Eva. 
 
 "Ah yes; we're gone coons. Even your 
 sympathy cannot bring us round now. If 
 anything could do it that would ! " 
 
 "In my opinion," continued Eva, ''Britan- 
 nula will never be beaten as long as Mr Never- 
 bend is at the wicket." 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 163 
 
 " Sir Kennington has been too much for us, 
 I fear," said Jack, with a forced smile, as he 
 retired. 
 
 There was now but the one hope left. Mr 
 Brittlereed remained, but he was all. Mr 
 Brittlereed was a gentleman who had advanced 
 nearer to his Fixed Period than any other 
 of the cricketers. He was nearly thirty -five 
 years of age, and was regarded by them all 
 as quite an old man. He was supposed to 
 know all the rules of the game, and to be 
 rather quick in keeping the wicket. But 
 Jack had declared that morning that he could 
 not hit a ball in a week of Sundays. " He 
 oughtn't to be here," Jack had whispered ; 
 " but you know how those things are man- 
 aged." I did not know how those things 
 were managed, but I was sorry that he 
 should be there, as Jack did not seem to 
 want him. 
 
 Mr Brittlereed now went to his wicket, 
 and was bound to receive the first ball. This 
 
164 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 he did ; made one run, whereas he might have 
 made two, and then had to begin the war over. 
 It certainly seemed as though he had done 
 it on purpose. Jack in his passion broke the 
 handle of his spring -bat, and then had half- 
 a-dozen brought to him in order that he might 
 choose another. " It was his favourite bat," 
 said his mother, and buried her face in her 
 handkerchief. 
 
 I never understood how it was that Mr 
 Brittlereed lived through that over; but he 
 did live, although he never once touched the 
 ball. Then it came to be Jack's turn, and 
 he at once scored thirty-nine during the over, 
 leaving himself at the proper wicket for re- 
 commencing the operation. I think that this 
 gave him new life. It added, at any rate, 
 new fire to every Britannulist on the ground, 
 and I must say that after that Mr Brittle- 
 reed managed the matter altogether to Jack's 
 satisfaction. Over after over Jack went on, 
 and received every ball that was bowled. 
 
THE CRICKET-MATCH. 165 
 
 They tried their catapult with single, double, 
 and even treble action. Sir Kennington did 
 his best, flinging the ball with his most tre- 
 mendous impetus, and then just rolling it up 
 with what seemed to me the most provoking 
 languor. It was all the same to Jack. He 
 had in truth got his " eye in," and as surely 
 as the ball came to him, it was sent away 
 to some most distant part of the ground. The 
 Britishers were mad with dismay as Jack 
 worked his way on through the last hundred. 
 It was piteous to see the exertions which poor 
 Mr Brittlereed made in running backwards 
 and forwards across the ground. They tried, 
 I think, to bustle him by the rapid succes- 
 sion of their bowling. But the only result 
 was that the ball was sent still further off 
 when it reached Jack's wicket. At last, just 
 as every clock upon the ground struck six 
 with that wonderful unanimity which our 
 clocks have attained since they were all reg- 
 ulated by wires from Greenwich, Jack sent 
 
166 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 a ball flying up into the air, perfectly regard- 
 less whether it might be caught or not, know- 
 ing well that the one now needed would be 
 scored before it could come down from the 
 heavens into the hands of any Englishman. 
 It did come down, and was caught by Stumps, 
 but by that time Britannula had won her 
 victory. Jack's total score during that innings 
 was 1275. I doubt whether in the annals of 
 cricket any record is made of a better innings 
 than that. Then it was that, with an absence 
 of that presence of mind which the President 
 of a republic should always remember, I took 
 off my hat and flung it into the air. 
 
 Jack's triumph would have been complete, 
 only that it was ludicrous to those who could 
 not but think, as I did, of the very little 
 matter as to which the contest had been 
 raised ; — just a game of cricket which two 
 sets of boys had been playing, and which 
 should have been regarded as no more than 
 an amusement, — as a pastime, by which to 
 
THE CEICKET-MATCH. 167 
 
 refresh themselves between their work But 
 they regarded it as though a great national 
 combat had been fought, and the Britannu- 
 lists looked upon themselves as though they 
 had been victorious against England. It was 
 absurd to see Jack as he was carried back 
 to Gladstonopolis as the hero of the occasion, 
 and to hear him, as he made his speeches at 
 the dinner which was given on the day, and 
 at which he was called upon to take the chair. 
 I was glad to see, however, that he was not 
 quite so glib with his tongue as he had been 
 when addressing the people. He hesitated a 
 good deal, nay, almost broke down, when he 
 gave the health of Sir Kennington Oval and 
 the British sixteen ; and I was quite pleased 
 to hear Lord Marylebone declare to his mother 
 that he was "a wonderfully nice boy." I 
 think the English did try to turn it off a 
 little, as though they had only come out there 
 just for the amusement of the voyage. But 
 Grundle, who had now become quite proud 
 
168 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 of his country, and who lamented loudly that 
 he should have received so severe an injury 
 in preparing for the game, would not let this 
 pass. "My lord," he said, "what is your 
 population?" Lord Marylebone named sixty 
 million. " We are but two hundred and fifty 
 thousand," said Grundle, "and see what we 
 have done." "We are cocks fighting on our 
 own dunghill," said Jack, "and that does 
 make a deal of difference." 
 
 But I was told that Jack had spoken a 
 word to Eva in quite a different spirit before 
 he had left Little Christchurch. "After all, 
 Eva, Sir Kennington has not quite trampled 
 us under his feet," he said. 
 
 "AVho thought that he would?" said Eva. 
 " My heart has never fainted, whatever some 
 others may have done." 
 
169 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE COLLEGE. 
 
 I WAS surprised to see that Jack, who was so 
 bold in playing his match, and who had been 
 so well able to hold his own against the Eng- 
 lishmen, — who had been made a hero, and had 
 carried off his heroism so well, — should have 
 been so shamefaced and bashful in regard to 
 Eva. He was like a silly boy, hardly daring 
 to look her in the face, instead of the gallant 
 captain of the band who had triumphed over 
 all obstacles. But I perceived, though it seemed 
 that he did not, that she was quite prepared to 
 give herself to him, and that there was no real 
 obstacle between him and all the flocks and 
 herds of Little Christchurch. Not much had 
 
170 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 been seen or heard of Grundle during the 
 match, and as far as Eva was concerned, he 
 had succumbed as soon as Sir Kennington 
 Oval had appeared upon the scene. He had 
 thought so much of the English baronet as to 
 have been cowed and quenched by his gran- 
 deur. And Sir Kennington himself had, I 
 think, been in earnest before the days of the 
 cricket-match. But I could see now that Eva 
 had merely played him off against Jack, think- 
 ing thereby to induce the younger swain to 
 speak his mind. This had made Jack more 
 than ever intent on beating Sir Kennington, 
 but had not as yet had the effect which Eva 
 had intended. " It will all come right," I said 
 to myself, "as soon as these Englishmen have 
 left the island." But then my mind reverted 
 to the Fixed Period, and to the fast- approach- 
 ing time for Crasweller's deposition. We were 
 now nearly through March, and the thirtieth 
 of June was the day on which he ought 
 to be led to the college. It was my first 
 
THE COLLEGE. 171 
 
 anxiety to get rid of these Englishmen before 
 the subject should be again ventilated. I 
 own I was anxious that they should not 
 return to their country with their prejudices 
 strengthened by what they might hear at Glad- 
 stonopolis. If I could only get them to go 
 before the matter was again debated, it might 
 be that no strong public feeling would be ex- 
 cited in England till it was too late. That 
 was my first desire ; but then I was also 
 anxious to get rid of Jack for a short time. 
 The more I thought of Eva and the flocks, the 
 more determined was I not to allow the per- 
 sonal interests of my boy, — and therefore my 
 own, — to clash in any way with the perform- 
 ance of my public duties. 
 
 I heard that the Englishmen were not to go 
 till another week had elapsed. A week was 
 necessary to recruit their strength and to en- 
 able them to pack up their bats and bicycles. 
 Neither, however, were packed up till the day 
 before they started ; for the track down to 
 
172 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 Little Christcliurcli was crowded with tliem, 
 and they were still practising as though an- 
 other match were contemplated. I was very 
 glad to have Lord Marylebone as an inmate 
 in our house, but I acknowledge that I was 
 anxious for him to say something as to his 
 departure. " We have been very proud to have 
 you here, my lord," I remarked. 
 
 " I cannot say that we are very proud," he 
 replied, "because we have been so awfully 
 licked. Barring that, I never spent a pleas- 
 anter two montlis in my life, and should not 
 be at all unwilling to stay for another. Your 
 mode of life here seems to me to be quite de- 
 lightful, and we have been thinking so much 
 of our cricket, that I have hardly as yet had 
 a moment to look at your institutions. What 
 is all this about the Fixed Period?" Jack, 
 who was present, put on a serious face, and 
 assumed that air of determination which I was 
 beginning to fear. Mrs Neverbend pursed up 
 her lips, and said nothing ; but I knew what 
 
THE COLLEGE. 173 
 
 was passing through her mind. I managed to 
 turn the conversation, but I was aware that I 
 did it very lamely. 
 
 "Jack," I said to my son, "I got a post- 
 card from ISTew Zealand yesterday." The boats 
 had just begun to run between the two islands 
 six days a-week, and as their regular contract 
 pace was twenty -five miles an hour, it was 
 just an easy day's journey. 
 
 "What said the post-card?" 
 
 " There's plenty of time for Mount Earn- 
 shawe yet. They all say the autumn is the 
 best. The snow is now disappearing in great 
 quantities." 
 
 But an old bird is not to be caught with chaff. 
 Jack was determined not to go to the Eastern 
 Alps this year ; and indeed, as I found, not to 
 go till this question of the Fixed Period should 
 be settled. I told him that he was a fool. 
 Although he would have been wrong to assist 
 in depositing his father-in-law for the sake of 
 getting the herd and flocks himself, as Grundle 
 
174 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 woiild have done, nevertheless he was hardly 
 bound by any feelings of honour or conscience 
 to keep old Crasweller at Little Christchurch 
 in direct opposition to the laws of the land. 
 But all this I could not explain to him, and 
 was obliged simply to take it as a fact that he 
 would not join an Alpine party for Mount 
 Earnshawe this year. As I thought of all 
 this, I almost feared Jack's presence in Glad- 
 stonopolis more than that of the young Eng- 
 lishmen. 
 
 It was clear, however, that nothing could be 
 done till the Englishmen were gone, and as I 
 had a day at my disposal I determined to walk 
 up to the college and meditate there on the 
 conduct which it would be my duty to follow 
 during the next two months. The college was 
 about five miles from the town, at the side 
 opposite to you as you enter the town from 
 Little Christchurch, and I had some time since 
 made up my mind how, in the bright genial 
 days of our pleasant winter, I would myself 
 
THE COLLEGE. 175 
 
 accompany Mr Crasweller through the city in 
 an open barouche as I took him to be depos- 
 ited, through admiring crowds of his fellow- 
 citizens. I had not then thought that he 
 would be a recreant, or that he would be de- 
 terred by the fear of departure from enjoy- 
 ing the honours which would be paid to him. 
 But how different now was his frame of mind 
 from that glorious condition to which I had 
 looked forward in my sanguine hopes ! Had 
 it been I, I myself, how proud should I have 
 been of my country and its wisdom, had I 
 been led along as a first hero, to anticipate the 
 euthanasia prepared for me ! As it was, I 
 hired an inside cab, and hiding myself in the 
 corner, was carried away to the college unseen 
 by any. 
 
 The place was called Necropolis. The name 
 had always been distasteful to me, as I had 
 never wished to join with it the feeling of 
 death. Various names had been proposed for 
 the site. Young Grundle had suggested Ore- 
 
176 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 mation Hall, because such was the ultimate 
 end to which the mere husks and hulls of 
 the citizens were destined. But there was 
 something undignified in the sound, — as 
 though we were talking of a dancing saloon 
 or a music hall, — and I would have none 
 of it. My idea was to give to the mind 
 some notion of an approach to good things 
 to come, and I proposed to call the place 
 " Aditus." But men said that it was un- 
 meaning, and declared that Britannulists 
 should never be ashamed to own the truth. 
 Necropolis sounded well, they said, and ar- 
 gued that though no actual remains of the 
 body might be left there, still the tablets 
 would remain. Therefore Necropolis it was 
 called. I had hoped that a smiling hamlet 
 might grow up at the gate, inhabited by those 
 who would administer to the wants of the de- 
 posited ; but I had forgot that the deposited 
 must come first. The hamlet had not yet 
 built itself, and round the handsome gates 
 
THE COLLEGE. 177 
 
 there was nothing at present but a desert. 
 While land in Britannula was plenty, no one 
 had cared to select ground so near to those 
 awful furnaces by which the mortal clay 
 should be transported into the air. From 
 the gates up to the temple which stood in 
 the middle of the grounds, — that temple in 
 which the last scene of life was to be encoun- 
 tered, — there ran a broad gravel path, which 
 was intended to become a beautiful avenue. 
 It was at present planted alternately with 
 eucalypti and ilexes — the gum-trees for the 
 present generation, and the green - oaks for 
 those to come ; but even the gum-trees had 
 not as yet done much to give a furnished ap- 
 pearance to the place. Some had demanded 
 that cedars and yew-trees should be placed 
 there, and I had been at great pains to explain 
 to them that our object should be to make 
 the spot cheerful, rather than sad. Eound the 
 temple, at the back of it, were the sets of 
 chambers in which were to live the deposited 
 
 VOL. I. M 
 
178 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 during their year of probation. Some of these 
 were very handsome, and were made so, no 
 doubt, with a view of alluring the first comers. 
 In preparing wisdom for babes, it is necessary 
 to wrap up its precepts in candied sweets. 
 But, though handsome, they were at present 
 anything but pleasant abodes. Not one of 
 them had as yet been inhabited. As I looked 
 at them, knowing Crasweller as well as I did, 
 I almost ceased to wonder at his timidity. A 
 hero was wanted ; but Crasweller was no hero. 
 Then further off, but still in the circle round 
 the temple, there were smaller abodes, less 
 luxurious, but still comfortable, all of which 
 would in a few short years be inhabited, — if 
 the Fixed Period could be carried out in ac- 
 cordance with my project. And foundations 
 had been made for others still smaller, — for 
 a whole township of old men and women, as 
 in the course of the next thirty years they 
 might come hurrying on to find their last 
 abode in the college. T had already selected 
 
THE COLLEGE. 179 
 
 one, not by any means the finest or the largest, 
 lor myself and my wife, in which we might 
 prepare ourselves for the grand departure. 
 But as for Mrs Neverbend, nothing would 
 bring her to set foot within the precincts of 
 the college ground. "Before those next ten 
 years are gone," she would say, " common-sense 
 will have interfered to let folks live out their 
 lives properly." It had been quite useless 
 for me to attempt to make her understand how 
 unfitting was such a speech for the wife of the 
 President of the Ptcpublic. My wife's oppo- 
 sition had been an annoyance to me from the 
 first, but I had consoled myself by thinking 
 how impossible it always is to imbue a wo- 
 man's mind with a logical idea. And though, 
 in all respects of domestic life, Mrs Neverbend 
 is the best of women, even among women she 
 is the most illogical. 
 
 I now inspected the buildings in a sad frame 
 of mind, asking myself whether it would, ever 
 come to pass that they should be inhabited for 
 
180 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 tlieir intended purpose. When the Assembly, 
 in compliance with my advice, had first en- 
 acted the law of the Fixed Period, a large 
 sum had been voted for these buildings. As 
 the enthusiasm had worn off, men had asked 
 themselves whether the money had not been 
 wasted, and had said that for so small a com- 
 munity the college had been planned on an 
 absurdly grand scale. Still I had gone on, 
 and had watched them as they grew from day 
 to day, and had allowed no shilling to be spared 
 in perfecting them. In my earlier years I had 
 been very successful in the wool trade, and 
 had amassed what men called a large fortune. 
 During the last two or three years I had 
 devoted a great portion of this to the external 
 adornment of the college, not without many 
 words on the matter from Mrs Neverbend. 
 " Jack is to be ruined," she had said, " in order 
 that all the old men and women may be killed 
 artistically." This and other remarks of the 
 kind I was doomed to bear. It was a part of 
 
THE COLLEGE. 181 
 
 the difficulty which, as a great reformer, I 
 must endure. But now, as I walked mourn- 
 fully among the disconsolate and half-finished 
 buildings, I could not but ask myself as to the 
 purpose to which my money had been devoted. 
 And I could not but tell myself that if in 
 coming years these tenements should be left 
 tenantless, my country would look back upon 
 me as one who had wasted the produce of her 
 young energies. But again I bethought me 
 of Columbus and Galileo, and swore that I 
 would go on or perish in the attempt. 
 
 As these painful thoughts were agitating 
 my mind, a slow decrepit old gentleman came 
 up to me and greeted me as Mr President. He 
 linked his arm familiarly through mine, and 
 remarked that the time seemed to be very 
 long before the collec^e received anv of its 
 inhabitants. This was Mr Graybody, the 
 curator, who had been specially appointed 
 to occupy a certain residence, to look after 
 the grounds, and to keep the books of the 
 
182 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 establisliment. Graybody and I liad come as 
 young men to Britannula together, and where- 
 as I had succeeded in all my own individual 
 attempts, he had unfortunately failed. He was 
 exactly of my age, as was also his wife. But 
 under the stress of misfortune they had both 
 become unnaturally old, and had at last been 
 left ruined and hopeless, without a shilling on 
 which to depend. I had always been a sincere 
 friend to Graybody, though he was, indeed, a 
 man very difficult to befriend. On most sub- 
 jects he thought as I did, if he can be said to 
 have thought at all. At any rate he had agreed 
 with me as to the Fixed Period, saying how 
 good it would be if he could be deposited at 
 fifty-eight, and had always declared how bless- 
 ed must be the time when it should have come 
 for himself and his old wife. I do not think 
 that he ever looked much to the principle 
 which I had in view. He had no great ideas 
 as to the imbecility and weakness of human 
 life when protracted beyond its fitting limits. 
 
THE COLLEGE. 183 
 
 He only felt that it would be good to give up ; 
 and that if he did so, others might be made to 
 do so too. As soon as a residence at the college 
 was completed, I asked him to fill it ; and now 
 he had been living there, he and his wife 
 together, with an attendant, and drawing his 
 salary as curator for the last three years. I 
 thought that it would be the very place for 
 him. He was usually melancholy, disheart- 
 ened, and impoverished; but he was always 
 glad to see me, and I was accustomed to go 
 frequently to the college, in order to find a 
 sympathetic soul with whom to converse about 
 the future of the establishment. " Well, Gray- 
 body," I said, " I suppose we are nearly ready 
 for the first comer." 
 
 " Oh yes ; we're always ready ; but then the 
 first comer is not." I had not said much to 
 him during the latter months as to Crasweller, 
 in particular. His name used formerly to be 
 very ready in all my conversations with Gray- 
 body, but of late I had talked to him in a 
 
184 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 more general tone. " You can't tell me yet 
 when it's to be, Mr President ? We do find 
 it a little dull here." 
 
 Now he knew as well as I did the day and 
 the year of Crasweller's birth. I had intended 
 to speak to him about Crasweller, but I wished 
 our friend's name to come first from him. " I 
 suppose it will be some time about mid- 
 winter," I said. 
 
 " Oh, I didn't know whether it might not 
 have been postponed." 
 
 " How can it be postponed ? As years creep 
 on, you cannot postpone their step. If there 
 might be postponement such as that, I doubt 
 whether we should ever find the time for our 
 inhabitants to come. No, Graybody ; there can 
 be no postponement for the Fixed Period." 
 
 " It might have been made sixty-nine or 
 seventy," said he. 
 
 " Originally, no doubt. But the wisdom of 
 the Assembly has settled all that. The Assem- 
 bly has declared that they in Britannula who 
 
THE COLLEGE. 185 
 
 are left alive at sixty-seven shall on that day- 
 be brought into the college. Yon yourself 
 have, I think, ten years to run, and you will 
 not be much longer left to pass them in soli- 
 tude." 
 
 " It is weary being here all alone, I must 
 confess. Mrs G. says that she could not bear 
 it for another twelve months. The girl we 
 have has given us notice, and she is the ninth 
 within a year. No followers will come after 
 them here, because they say they'll smell the 
 dead bodies." 
 
 " Eubbish ! " I exclaimed, angrily ; " positive 
 rubbish ! The actual clay will evaporate into 
 the air, without leaving a trace either for the 
 eye to see or the nose to smell." 
 
 " They all say that when you tried the fur- 
 naces there was a savour of burnt pork." 
 Now great trouble was taken in that matter of 
 cremation ; and having obtained from Europe 
 and the States all the best machinery for the 
 purpose, I had supplied four immense hogs, in 
 
186 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 order that the system might be fairly tested, 
 and I had fattened them for the purpose, as 
 old men are not unusually very stout. These 
 we consumed in the furnaces all at the same 
 time, and the four bodies had been dissolved 
 into their original atoms without leaving a 
 trace behind them by which their former con- 
 dition of life might be recognised. But a trap- 
 door in certain of the chimneys had been left 
 open by accident, — either that or by an enemy 
 on purpose, — and undoubtedly some slight 
 flavour of the pig had been allowed to escape. 
 I had been there on the spot, knowing that I 
 could trust only my own senses, and was able 
 to declare that the scent which had escaped 
 was very slight, and by no means disagreeable. 
 And I was able to show that the trap-door had 
 been left open either by chance or by design, 
 — the very trap-door which was intended to 
 prevent any such escape during the moments 
 of full cremation, — so that there need be no 
 fear of a repetition of the accident. I ought, 
 
THE COLLEGE. 187 
 
 indeed, to Lave supplied four other hogs, and 
 to have tried the experiment again. But the 
 theme was disagreeable, and I thought that 
 the trial had been so far successful as to make 
 it unnecessary that the expense should be 
 again incurred. ''They say that men and women 
 would not have quite the same smell/' said he. 
 
 "How do they know that?" I exclaimed, in 
 my anger. " How do they know what men 
 and women will smell like ? They haven't 
 tried. There won't be any smell at all — not 
 the least ; and the smoke will all consume 
 itself, so that even you, living just where you 
 are, will not know when cremation is going on. 
 We might consume all Gladstonopolis, as I 
 hope we shall some day, and not a living soul 
 would know anything about it. But the pre- 
 judices of the citizens are ever the stumbling- 
 blocks of civilisation." 
 
 " At any rate, Mrs G. tells me that Jemima 
 is going, because none of the young men will 
 come up and see her." 
 
188 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 This was another difficulty, but a small one, 
 and I made up my mind that it should be over- 
 come. " The shrubs seem to grow very well," 
 I said, resolved to appear as cheerful as pos- 
 sible. 
 
 " They're pretty nearly all alive," said Gray- 
 body ; " and they do give the place just an 
 appearance like the cemetery at Old Christ- 
 church." He meant the capital in the prov- 
 ince of Canterbury. 
 
 " In the course of a few years you will be 
 quite — cheerful here." 
 
 '' T don't know much about that, Mr Presi- 
 dent. I'm not sure that for myself I want to 
 be cheerful anywhere. If I've only got some- 
 body just to speak to sometimes, that will be 
 quite enough for me. I suppose old Crasweller 
 will be the first?'' 
 
 " I suppose so." 
 
 "It will be a gruesome time when I have 
 to go to bed early, so as not to see the smoke 
 come out of his chimney." 
 
THE COLLEGE. 189 
 
 " I tell you there will be nothing of the kind. 
 I don't suppose you will even know when 
 they're going to cremate him." 
 
 " He will be the first, Mr President ; and no 
 doubt he will be looked closely after. Old 
 Barnes will be here by that time, won't he, 
 sir ? " 
 
 " Barnes is the second, and he will come just 
 three months before Crasweller's departure. 
 But Tallowax, the grocer in High Street, will 
 be up here by that time. And then they will 
 come so quickly, that we must soon see to get 
 other lodgings finished. Exors, the lawyer, 
 will be the fourth ; but he will not come in till 
 a day or two after Crasweller's departure." 
 
 " They all will come ; won't they, sir ? " asked 
 Graybody. 
 
 " Will come ! Why, they must. It is the 
 law." 
 
 " Tallowax swears he'll have himself strapped 
 to his own kitchen table, and defend himself to 
 the last gasp with a carving-knife. Exors says 
 
190 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 that the law is had, and you can't touch him. 
 As for Barnes, he has gone out of what little 
 wits he ever had with the fright of it, and 
 people seem to think that you couldn't touch 
 a lunatic." 
 
 " Barnes is no more a lunatic than I am." 
 
 " I only tell you what folk tell me. I sup- 
 pose you'll try it on by force, if necessary. 
 You never expected that people would come 
 and deposit themselves of their own accord." 
 
 "The National Assembly expects that the 
 citizens of Britannula will obey the law." 
 
 " But there was one question I was going to 
 ask, Mr President. Of course I am altogether 
 on your side, and do not wish to raise difficul- 
 ties. But what shall I do suppose they take 
 to running away after they have been de- 
 posited? If old Crasweller goes off in his 
 steam -carriage, how am I to go after him, 
 and whom am I to ask to help to bring him 
 back again ? " 
 
 I was puzzled, but I did not care to show it. 
 
THE COLLEGE. 191 
 
 No doubt a hundred little arrangements would 
 be necessary before the affairs of the institution 
 could be got into a groove so as to run steadily. 
 But our first object must be to deposit Cras- 
 weller and Barnes and Tallowax, so that the 
 citizens should be accustomed to the fashion 
 of depositing the aged. There were, as I knew, 
 two or three old women living in various parts 
 of the island, who would, in due course, come 
 in towards the end of Crasweller's year. But 
 it had been rumoured that they had already 
 begun to invent falsehoods as to their age, and 
 I was aware that we might be led astray by 
 them. This I had been prepared to accept as 
 being unavoidable ; but now, as the time grew 
 nearer, I could not but see how difficult it 
 would be to enforce the law against well-known 
 men, and how easy to allow the women to 
 escape by the help of falsehood. Exors, the 
 lawyer, would say at once that we did not even 
 attempt to carry out the law; and Barnes, 
 lunatic as he pretended to be, would be very 
 
192 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 hard to manage. My mind misgave me as I 
 thought of all these obstructions, and I felt 
 that I could so willingly deposit myself at 
 once, and then depart without waiting for my 
 year of probation. But it was necessary that 
 I should show a determined front to old Gray- 
 body, and make him feel that I at any rate 
 was determined to remain firm to my purpose. 
 " Mr Crasweller will give you no such trouble 
 as you suggest," said I. 
 
 " Perhaps he has come round." 
 
 "He is a cjentleman whom we have both 
 known intimately for many years, and he has 
 always been a friend to the Fixed Period. I 
 believe that he is so still, although there is 
 some little hitch as to the exact time at which 
 he should be deposited." 
 
 " Just twelve months, he says." 
 
 " Of course," I replied, " the difference would 
 be sure to be that of one year. He see' iS to 
 think that there are only nine years between 
 him and me." 
 
THE COLLEGE. 193 
 
 " Ten, Mr President ; ten. I know the time 
 well." 
 
 " I had always thought so ; but I should be 
 willing to abandon a year if I could make 
 things run smooth by doing so. But all that 
 is a detail with which up here we need not, 
 perhaps, concern ourselves." 
 
 " Only the time is getting very short, Mr 
 President, and my old woman will break down 
 altogether if she's told that she's to live an- 
 other year all alone. Crasweller won't be a 
 bit readier next year than he is this ; and of 
 course if he is let off, you must let off Barnes 
 and Tallowax. And there are a lot of old 
 women about who are beginning to tell terrible 
 lies about their ages. Do think of it all, Mr 
 President." 
 
 I never thought of anything else, so full 
 was my mind of the subject. When I woke 
 in tl[f3 morning, before I could face the light 
 of day, it was necessary that I should fortify 
 myself with Columbus and Galileo. I began 
 
 VOL. I. N 
 
194 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 to fancy, as the danger became nearer and 
 still nearer, that neither of those great men 
 had been surrounded by obstructions such as 
 encompassed me. To plough on across the 
 waves, and either to be drowned or succeed ; 
 to tell a new truth about the lieavens, and 
 either to perish or become great for ever ! — 
 either was within the compass of a man who 
 had only his own life to risk. My life, — how 
 willingly could I run any risk, did but the 
 question arise of risking it ! How often I felt, 
 in these days, that there is a fortitude needed 
 by man much greater than that of jeopardising 
 his life ! Life ! what is it ? Here was that 
 poor Crasweller, belying himself and all his 
 convictions just to gain one year more of it, 
 and then when the year was gone he would 
 still have his deposition before him ! Is it 
 not so with us all? For me I feel, — have 
 felt for years, — tempted to rush on, and pass 
 through the gates of death. That man should 
 shudder at the thought of it does not appear 
 
THE COLLEGE. 195 
 
 amiss to me. The unknown future is always 
 awful; and the unknown future of another 
 world, to be approached by so great a change 
 of circumstances, — by the loss of our very 
 flesh and blood and body itself, — has in it 
 something so fearful to the imagination that 
 the man who thinks of it cannot but be struck 
 with horror as he acknowledges that by him- 
 self too it has to be encountered. But it has 
 to be encountered ; and though the change be 
 awful, it should not therefore, by the sane 
 judgment, be taken as a change necessarily 
 for the worst. Knowing the great goodness 
 of the Almighty, should we not be prepared 
 to accept it as a change probably for the 
 better ; as an alteration of our circumstances, 
 by which our condition may be immeasurably 
 improved? Then one is driven back to con- 
 sider the circumstances by which such change 
 may be eftected. To me it seems rational to 
 suppose that as we leave this body so shall 
 we enter that new phase of life in which we 
 
196 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 are destined to live : — but with all our higher 
 resolves somewhat sharpened, and with our 
 lower passions, alas ! made stronger also. 
 That theory by which a human being shall 
 jump at once to a perfection of bliss, or fall 
 to an eternity of evil and misery, has never 
 found credence with me. For myself, I have 
 to say that, while acknowledging my many 
 drawbacks, I have so lived as to endeavour 
 to do good to others, rather than evil, and that 
 therefore I look to my departure from this 
 world with awe indeed, but still with satisfac- 
 tion. But I cannot look with satisfaction to 
 a condition of life in which, from my own 
 imbecility, I must necessarily retrograde into 
 selfishness. It may be that He who judges 
 of us with a wisdom which I cannot approach, 
 shall take all this into account, and that He 
 shall so mould my future being as to fit it 
 to the best at which I had arrived in this 
 world ; still I cannot but fear that a taint of 
 that selfishness which I have hitherto avoided. 
 
THE COLLEGE. 197 
 
 but which will come if I allow myself to be- 
 come old, may remain, and that it will be 
 better for me that I should go hence while 
 as yet my own poor wants are not altogether 
 uppermost in my mind. But then, in arrang- 
 ing this matter, I am arranging it for my 
 fellow -citizens, and not for myself. I have 
 to endeavour to think how Crasweller's mind 
 may be affected rather *than my own. He 
 dreads his departure with a trembling, currish 
 fear ; and I should hardly be doing good to 
 him were I to force him to depart in a frame 
 of mind so poor and piteous. But then, again, 
 neither is it altogether of Crasweller that I 
 must think, — not of Crasweller or of myself. 
 How will the coming ages of men be affected 
 by such a change as I propose, should such 
 a change become the normal condition of 
 Death ? Can it not be brought about that 
 men should arrange for their own departure, 
 so as to fall into no senile weakness, no 
 slippered selfishness, no ugly winnings of un- 
 
198 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 defined want, before they shall go hence, and 
 be no more thouc^ht of ? These are the 
 ideas that have actuated me, and to them 
 I have been brought by seeing the conduct 
 of those around me. l^ot for Crasweller, 
 or Barnes, or Tallowax, will this thing be 
 good, — nor for tliose old women wlio are 
 already lying about their ages in their cot- 
 tages, — nor for myself, wlio am, I know, too 
 apt to boast of myself, that even though 
 old age should come upon me, I may be 
 able to avoid the worst of its effects ; but 
 for those untold generations to come, whose 
 lives may be modelled for them under the 
 knowledge that at a certain Fixed Period 
 they shall depart hence with all circumstances 
 of honour and glory. 
 
 I was, however, quite aware that it would 
 be useless to spend my energy in dilating on 
 this to Mr Graybody. He simply was willing 
 to shuffle off his mortal coil, because he found 
 it uncomfortable in the weariDc^. In all likeli- 
 
THE COLLEGE. 199 
 
 hood, had his time come as nigh as that of 
 Crasweller, he too, like Crasweller, would im- 
 potently implore the grace of another year. 
 He would ape madness like Barnes, or arm 
 himself with a carving-knife like Tallowax, 
 or swear that there was a flaw in the law, 
 as Exors was disposed to do. He too would 
 clamorously swear that he was much younger, 
 as did the old women. Was not the world 
 peopled by Craswellers, Tallowaxes, Exorses, 
 and old women? Had I a right to hope to 
 alter the feelings which nature herself had 
 implanted in the minds of men? But still it 
 might be done by practice, — by practice; if 
 only we could arrive at the time in which 
 practice should have become practice. Then, as 
 I was about to depart from the door of Gray- 
 body's house, I whispered to myself again the 
 names of Galileo and Columbus. 
 
 " You think that he will come on the thir- 
 tieth?" said Graybody, as he took my hand at 
 parting. 
 
200 THE FIXED PERIOD. 
 
 " I think," replied I, " that you and I, as loyal 
 citizens of the Eepublic, are bound to suppose 
 that he will do his duty as a citizen." Then I 
 went, leaving him standing in doubt at his 
 door. 
 
 END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. 
 
 PRINTED BY WILLIA5I BLACKWOOD AND SONS.