Not Pretty, But Precious

ng the

at that memorable dinner-party, her subsequent seclusion from the world, and Horace's inexplicable absence, had all afforded food for the insatiable appetite of the scandal-mongers. Then Gossip grew eloquent respecting the flirtations and "fast" manners of Clement Rutherford's wife, and whispered that the old lady's seizure had been either apoplexy or paralysis, brought on by her distress of mind at her son's marriage, and that she had never been herself since. Next, the elegant establishment of the newly-wedded pair on Twenty-sixth street, with its gorgeous furniture and costly appointments, furnish

rance at his brother's house. Clement had not heard of his return, and re

gs had been exchanged. "I have some fine cigars for you t

st decline your offer. I have a mes

er the brow of t

breakfast about half an hour ago, so she is probably at home. You had better go up stairs to

bout to leave the room wh

me one question: Are you h

s the bitter reply: "they are eloquent respe

uttered Horace as he ascended the stairs, "my task would have been a harder

rpet, and on the fine Gobelin tapestry which covered the few chairs and the one luxurious couch that formed the useful furniture of the tiny apartment. étagères of carved and gilded wood occupied each corner, and, together with the low mantelshelf (which was upheld by two dancing nymphs in Carrara marble), were crowded with costly trifles in Bohemian glass, Dresden and Sèvres porcelain, gilded bronze, carved ivory and Parian ware. An easel, drawn toward the centre of the room, supported the one painting t

ng it absolutely and ridiculously inappropriate. She wore a robe of turquoise-blue Indian cashmere, edged around the long train and flowing sleeves with a broad border of that marvelous gold embroidery which only Eastern fingers can execute or Eastern imaginations devise. A band of the same embroidery confined the robe around her slender, supple wais

e which was one of her most potent charms. "How kind it

o him to take a seat near her. He drew up his

visitor, who sat twisting one of his gloves and wishing most ardently that Providence had ent

ence, the lady

rest respecting your trav

d him. He turned toward her with the look of one w

elate to you, and one of

'German' was kept up till five o'clock this morning. I am wretchedly tired. Now do go on with your st

ts putting you to sleep. But you must make me one promise. I a

erfectly quiet, no matter how startling your i

and shaded her eyes with her fan. Without heeding the veile

and infantile fascinations so won the heart of Madame Tellier, the proprietress of the establishment, that she decided to take charge of the little creature and educate her, her project being to fit her for the post of English teacher in her school. But the pretty child grew up to be a beaut

nd her at last traveling in Italy under the protection of the Count von Erlenstein, an Austrian noble of great wealth and dissolute character. She has cast aside the name she once bore, and, anticipa

er the pressure of the white, rigid fingers that clasped it. But the listener kept her face hidden, and but for that convulsive mo

now her fair face no more. I will not retrace for you, as I could do, each step in her rapid descent from luxury to poverty, from splendor to vice, from celebrity to ruin. But one day she makes her appearance, under the name of Rhoda Steele, on board the steamship America, bound for New York. The state-room which she occupies is shared by a young girl named Marion Nugent, whose future career is to be that of a governess

s. Rutherford sprang to her feet, her face livid with p

use it pleased Clement Rutherford to marry me--me, a penniless governess. But I am your sister-in-law, and I demand that you treat me with

poke, but he motioned her back with

colored photograph of you, taken some years ago by Hildebrandt of Vienna, and endorsed by him on the back with a certificate stating that it is an accurate likeness of the celebrated Rose Coral. Secondly, I have brought home with me two witnesses--one is Jane Sheldon, late housekeeper for the Rev

nt Rutherford. Have a care, my brother Horace, lest you reveal to the world that your immaculate relatives have been touching pitch of the blackest hue and greatest

on him a glance of insolent disdain. Horace R

rd remains in my hand, and I produce it. It is the Ace

om her lips. She half rose from her seat, but, seeming to recollect herself, she san

red soon after the fancy ball in question, and it was not till his heir, the present count, had been for some time in possession of the estates that it was discovered that the great diamond was missing. It was not to be found, and suspicion immediately fell upon the late count's valet, a Frenchman named Antoine Lasalle; who was found to have been mysteriously possessed of a large sum of money after the count's death. He was arrested, and it was conclusively proved that he had stolen a number of valuable trinkets from his dying master, but still no trace of The Rose of the Morning could be discovered, and Lasalle strenuously denied all knowledge respecting it. The family offered large rewards for its recovery, and the detectives of all the large cities of Europe have been for some time on the alert to discover it, but in vain. As soon as I heard this story, I thought that I could make a tolerably shrewd guess as to the whereabouts of

?" she cried, looking up as she spoke, but her falte

r. On the third finger blazed the beautiful gem of which he had spoken, its great size and purity fully

"but I wish it to run no further risks till I can transfer it to its lawful owner, which will

m her seat, pale,

id. "The game is ended now, and you have w

means of introducing an impostor--a ci-devant lorette--to his family and friends as his wife. Better this scandal of an elopement than the horror of having such a story made public. An income amply sufficient f

. "I will go, never to return. Now leave me.

l, cer

hat discovere

e wonders of that city; so as soon as I became convalescent I prevailed upon her to leave me in the care of some friends and to join a party who were going thither. During her stay she went frequently to the opera. One evening she was greatly disturbed by the loud talking and laughing of some persons in the box next to the one she occupied, and she was much struck with the beauty, the brilliant toilette and the boisterous conduct of one of the female members of the pa

ourtesy: I will de

door. Suddenly, as if moved by a

not hesitate to apply to me. For Heaven's sake, do not return to the life you once led. There was one redeeming feature in t

abruptly. "Only leave me at peace.

e stood leaning against the back of a large arm-chair, her clasped hands resting

tue and not a living woman. Suddenly she seemed to take some desperate resolve: she threw back her

s for Mrs. Winchester's ball. I will wear the pale-blue satin and my point-lace tunic. Be sure you change the white roses that loop it for pink ones, and lay out m

Dose for an adult, ten drops;" while the largest Was simply inscribed "Sulphuric Ether." These she placed on the chimney-piece, and then proceeded

The door closed upon the maid's retreating for

e to remain satisfied with a life of poverty and respectability, and I will not return to one of degradation and vice. But, after all, what does it matter? My fate would have found me sooner or later, and this soft couch is better

f upon it. The daylight faded from the sky and night came, and with the night came sleep--a sleep

the pain of the neuralgic headaches from which she was a constant sufferer. Society said, "How sad! Dreadful, is it not?" and went on its way--not exactly rejoicing, for the death of Mrs. Rutherford deprived its members of her long-promised, long-talked-of Shrove-Tuesday ball, and

fe was other than the innocent English girl she represented herself to be. Walter Nugent wrote a pathetic letter to Mrs. Rutherford, begging that a lock of his lost and now forgiven darling's hair migh

ed the little packet; "but I really think that this is one of the

emetery contemplating with curiosity and interest the insc

omb. Marion Nugent rests beneath the waves of the Atlantic ocean, and here Rose Sherbrooke sleeps in an honored grave beneath the shelter of the dead girl's stainless name. But t

milton

ungry

in this village a boarding-house;

y it contained a bed, washstand, etc.; but a visitor from New York has taken a fancy to

low, uneven, cracked and yellow; the originally coarse and ugly wall-paper now blotched with age; the carpet thin

reens, two vases of garden flowers, a number of Swiss and French knickknacks, and a few

lity and taste; a woman of good society. Of all this you become positive when yo

is both vivacious and refined, both eager and sweet. It would seem as if here were the impossible combination, the ideal

ard when she speaks, and sinking back when she listens. Her sparkling eyes are fixed on the eyes

y sweet expression of face, evidently is fascinated, and even strongly moved, if one may judge

we shall record are a strange

woman in these days needs two husbands--one to fill her purse, and one to fill her heart; one to dress her, and one to love

al pain crossed the young

"I am sure that in what you have quoted there is a s

ly very pleasant to her to hear such words from him, and with

happiness in your hands. My only fear is that I am not half worthy of you--not a thous

him. Then there was a sudden revulsion: with a more violent shudder, evidently of a painful nature, she

with singular quickness, a bright smile dancing along the constantly changing curves of her lips, like sunbeams leaping from wavelet to wavelet, she once more le

er looking at her long in silence. "My whole being

outh: then it suddenly turned to a smile of

seventeen who married a man ten years older--a man who was Reason itself. Her friends told her, and she herself believed it, that she was sure of happiness. But after three years she found t

with an air of not seeing him. In the recollection of this heart-tragedy of the past a

-gown made by her own hands--labored a week, waited and hoped a week for one word of praise--he only said, 'It is too short.' Don't you think it was cruel? It

man with a pleading smile. "You seem to be rep

red quickly. "I am not s

e fingers and slowly drew her against his heart. Her face crimson with feeling, her whole form trembling to the tiniest vein, she rose to her feet, turning away her head as

me?" she at last sobbed. "

of his embrace, she looked him sadly in the eyes, saying, "I must not be so weak. I must save myself and you from

," he answered, stifling with a kiss t

the room, at every square of the threadbare carpet, they halted to renew their talk. Minutes passed, an hour had flow

te to lose the breath of it from her soul: to let it be w

opping into her ear whispers of love which at last drew out her confession of love. And when the parting moment came--that mome

n was Charles Leighton, a native of Northport, who had never gone farther from his hom

rself. Only a month previous to the scene above described she had arrived in Northport to obtain, as she said, a summer

positive was learned of her history. That she had been married was probable: an indefinable something

urious ones who scouted the supposition of wifehood. People addressed her both as "Miss" and "Mrs."; at last it

as nearly a case of love at first sight as perhaps can occur among people of the Anglo-Saxon race. From the beginning he had no doubts about giving her h

some withholding mystery in the past, she had granted him--or rather she had not been able to prevent him from seizing--her

he effect of opium--one of those joys which condense life and abbreviate it, which excite and yet stupefy, which intoxicate

speak. The hands which, while they clung to his, had been soft and moist, became dry and hot as with fever, and then cold as ice. At night she could scarcely sleep: for hours her brain throbbed w

shed; she seemed mad to reward him for his love; she wanted somehow to sacrifice herself for his sake. Yet, although

oh, I have been so hungry, so famished for it, I had begun to despair of it. Yes, when I first met you, I had quite despaired of there being any love in th

le village came to the church to witness her marriage and to doat upon a bridal beauty which lay far more in expression than in form or feature. A few words of de

first glance seemed black because of the darkness, length and closeness of the lashes, and capable of expressing an earnestness and sweetness which no writer or artist might hope to depict; a

tic gratitude for this affection; the spiritual--it was not passionate--fondness which she bore him; the softness of her eyes as she gazed for minutes together into his; the sudden, tremulous outreachings of her hands toward him, as she jus

oked so gay, and what I had heard that was funny. It is just because I am entirely happy

or of her husband's patients, watched with them when there was need, made little collections for their relief, chatted away their forebo

the end of a twenty-foot pole, all felt repaid for their labors by the childlike burst of laughter with which she received it. Now and then, however, shadows fell across this sunshine. In those dark moments she frequently reverted to the unha

Leighton implored. "You seem to be chargin

ing, "No, you are not like him. Even if you should becom

ded, inquiringly. "You seem to fe

hat he half feared lest her mind

power is gone--nearly gone.

rving herself to a confession, she threw herself into

mportance of this avowal; but as he at least saw that the subject was painful

g her; and with a deep sigh, the sigh

egan to speak of a journey which she should soon be obliged to make to New York. She must go, she said to Leighton--it was a matter of property, of business:

e might need to stay would injure his practice. In these days her gayety seemed forced, and more than once he found her weeping; yet so innocent was he, so

are. Whether she would be happy, whether she would be treated with consideration, whether she would be safe from accidents and alarms, whether her delicate he

n he had expected, because to her it wa

ver made the world pleasant to me; and you have made it so pleasant! so different from what it was! a new earth to me! a star! I

e her, impressed him for a moment--only for a truant moment--with doubts as to a mystery. As he left the railway

was

n place of the summer's sweetness and gayety, there is a wintry and almost icy expression in her face, as if she were about to

door of the sombre house where her carriage stops--no o

a man of thin, erect form, a high and narrow forehead, regular and imperturbab

lowly to her and took her hand: he seemed to be hesit

id, her eyes fixed on the floo

at least weary; but he drew his hand away

esently said, in the tone of a man who has ceased to r

at I liked it," she replied

ortland, among the people whom I had requested to take care of you. However, you are accustomed to have

ossed her hitherto pale face, but she made no respon

roke the silence, she seemed to understand that the

his foot, and said in an accent of angry s

he mystery: we have fou

rdship. The institution of marriage is as beneficent as the element of fir

bed of embers. Divorce is public, ugly and brutal: her sensibility revolts from it. Moreover, mere unhappiness, mere disappointment of the affections, does not establis

duty. A flattering shape approaches her dungeon-walls; a voice calls to her to come forth and be glad, if only for a moment; there seems to be a chance of winning the adoratio

feels herself justified in setting aside law, when law, falsifying its purpose, violating its solemn pledge, brings her misery instead of happiness. She will not, or cannot, reflect that special hardships

y, in general, she is so far conscious of guilt, or at least so far fearful of punishment, as to carry on her struggle in the darkness. Few, however maddened by sufferin

us veneration, for the institution of marriage; because it instinctively recoils from trampling upon the form which consecrates love; because in very truth it regards

ns to all modes of fee

oeful question differently from the great majority of her sex. To her, thirsty for sympathy and love, bound to a man who gives her neither, grown fever

e in some respects, but strangely childlike in others--whom most of us love to stigmatize

of infantile and almost incredible simplicity. It was one of the many ob

e asked, "to women wh

in jail," was

s if the iron gates were already closing upon her, a

opinion against that of all civilized soci

t love her for the one who did; but she was afraid of being pursued, afraid of discovery. The knowledge that society had already passed judgment upon her made her se

first, her heart rose in mutiny. Faithful to the only love that there had been for he

was on the point of bursting out into open defiance. She sta

embling chin. At last he said, with a brutality which had become customary with him, "What are

nd scorn she walked aw

laying up this speech of her husband's against him as one of many stolid misdoings which justified both contempt and aversion. In fact, his inability or unwillingness to comprehe

t problem of Hawthorne's--an individual bearing one character, living one life in one place, and

ones where it was condemnable. At Northport she had been like sunlight to her intimates and like a

ling and action. Not a creature of reason, not a creature of con

timent, was an exaggerated man. Here was a beating heart united to a skeleton. The re

ful deception make her believe that you do. You must show her when you return from business that you have thought of her; you must

replied, or at least he would have thought, "My wife is a fool. She is not worth the money

hich she was filled by the discovery that she was a felon, she could not dissemble her feelings when she looked him in the face. Sometimes she w

she took them from the hands of the indifferent clerk with a suffocating beating of the heart. Alone, she devoured them, kissed them passionately a hundred times, sat down in

dly. A relentless cough pursued her, the beautiful flame in her cheek burned freely, and

She merely asked to end her hopeless life in loving arms--

o suspect her. As early in June as might be she obtained permission to go to the seaside

joy which at first blinded

?" were his first words. "Oh, my love, my da

of excitement had died out of her cheeks and eyes, he asked

ered, putting out her arms to him with that little

Her smile was as simple and pure as that of childhood: her violet eyes reminded one of a heaven without a

of country air and renewed happiness, when a disquieting letter arrived from Duvernois. In a tone which was more than

But here her punishment began to double upon her: the being whom she most loved was precisely the

that she might be spared the proposed journey. For three days she feverishly expected an answer, knowing the while that she ought to

At the house of a poor and bed-ridden widow she met, as she had hoped to meet, h

, her troubles. One hand rested on Leighton's arm; her face was lifted steadily to his, like a flower to the light; her violet eyes were dewy and sparkling with happiness. There were little clutches of her fingers on his wrist whenever he turned to

ll be at the window. Look up when you reach the gate. L

her bonnet, she was sitting by th

ed the yard, and halted at the gate with an air of hesitation. Sh

upper hall, down a back stairway, into the garden behind the house, and so on to an orchard already obscure in the twilight

oaned. "Ah, why could he not

turning briskly toward the house. Her first thought was, "He will look up at the wi

r only purpose was to fly from immediate exposure and scorn--to fly both from the man she detested and the man she loved. Her

em find me!" she prayed to some invisib

e neighboring village until Duvernois should disappear and leave her free to return to Leighton. But always the reflection came

when she was certain that Leighton would not forgive her, Alice made wild clutches at the hope that Duvernois might. There were glimpses of the earlier days of her marr

words, "Alice, I forgive your madness: do you a

er hands for reconciliation, putting up her mouth for

pled it under her weary, aching feet, and abh

unereal marshes. Seating herself on a ruinous little bridge of unpainted and wormeaten timbers, she looked down into a narrow, sluggish rivulet, of the color of ink, whic

sper of some one far behind; then it had become clearer, as if the persuading fiend went faster than she throug

oreover, those who now abhor you and scorn you, will pity

elf but by dying?" She wept as she gaze

imy reeds and floating things; that when they found her she would be horrible to look

raced, she crept under the railing of the bridge, seated herself on th

Northport passed by that spot, returning from a vi

keep his wife in a sequestered hamlet, and immediately on her refusal to

vious summer, and that she had been publicly married to a Doctor Leighton. He did not divulge his name-

ed for Mrs. Duvernois, and then correcte

the moment, yet the servant-girl not

amily had seen her enter or go out: it was not

hton," remarked the girl as

vernois did not forsake him: after a moment's hesitation and a quick

t and passed without a word--the face of the one as inexpressive of the strangen

quarter of an hour he became anxious: in

bsequently appeared, was his younger brother, he found the family and the neighborhood in wild alarm over the disappe

ight, when the maddest of chances brought the two husbands together over a body w

ed the corpse with a loud cry, and c

is saddle, and gazed at both

is?" groaned the physician, alread

notoned response of th

n-plate bore the inscription, "Alice Leighton, a

e," whispered the brother, "you may

o marry again?" responded th

ent, and not aware that she might have been an h

de F

other

ortance to myself and to somebody else. The two decades forming the interim between those years constitute my Dark Age, in which I teethed and measled and whooping-coughed, and went to school, and wore my hair in two long pig-tail

d on the earth beneath, for God was in heaven and Charlie was on earth--when I, who had all along been hardly more than a human grasshopper, became the happiest of happy women--so much happier, I thought, than I de

, eager, I was to sacrifice friends, home and country for his dear sake. But Charlie didn't want me to sacrifice my friends; nor did it require any great amount of heroism to exchange my modestly comfortable home for his decidedly luxurious one; and as for country, no

he most adverse circumstances with the most smiling patience, but circumstances obstinately refused to be adverse. I was inwardly conscious that the most trying emergency could not shake my heroic but purely feminine fortitude; but, alas! my fort

durance, and my dignity, and all the rest of it, did finally come

an hour or two, I looked upon his enforced absence as a cruel dispensation of Providence, which I did not bear with "fortitude and sublime dignity," but pouted over like the ridiculous baby I was. Bare conjugal civility required that on leaving the house Charlie should kiss me three times, and on returning six times: anything short of that I should have considered a pre-monitory sympto

ry-side. There were people malicious enough to say that if Charlie's mother had never died, he would never have married, but I take the liberty of resenting such an assertion as a personal insult; for, although I don't doubt the dear old lady was a perfect jewel in her way, yet, looking at the portrait of her which hangs over our parlor mantelpiece, I see the face of a hard, determined-looking woman with cold gray eyes and rigidly set mouth, in a funny-looking black dress, neither high-necked nor low-necked, having

our cozy little parlor, just under the work of art I have described at such length, Charlie committed

ers without which no woman considers her wifehood absolutely asserted), I caugh

lantation that day, had written two business letters, and smoked there's no

), when I asked him if he was tired, and I fancied he was thinking sad thoughts of the mother who had not been dead so very long a

about her, C

arlie, turning his eyes toward me

rlie: weren't you think

ear mother! you don't find ma

him to dismount from it, I had ample opportunity to exercise my "smiling patience, sublime dignity and heroic fortitude." Whether or not I improved my opportunities prop

been taking such good care of themselves, and our two daft selves into the bargain, were found to be sadly demoralized. The discovery came upon us gradually. I think my husband n

er he had risen at earliest dawn and dressed himself, he had nothing better to do than walk out on the front gallery, locate himself in a big wicker chair, tilt his chair back and elevate his feet to the top of the banisters, and stare out over the cottonfields. This position he would maintain, probably, about twenty minutes. Then the pangs of hunger wo

lease yell at the cook, Charlie, and not at me. I'm sure if people will get up at

rlie toward the back door, where I would

nquish all hope of another nap, get up and dress myself, and join my roaring lion on the front gallery, where we would

e breakfast-table, "things are getting all ou

ned thump and asked my lord, with an i

t it was to sit down to my breakfast later th

e it, Charlie?" I

ou how mother did: she had a pretty good-sized bell, that she kept on a table by her bedside, and every morning, as soon as her eyes were open, she would give such a peal with that old bell tha

on earth should we get out of bed at daybreak just

coldly, "I have no desire in the world to force you to

little more than gape in each other's faces for an hour or two, and wish breakfast would come, and wonder what made them

g for good strong coffee, and we also held in common one decided opinion, and

e is getting to be perfectly undrinkable," said he on

inous. Milly ought to be ashamed of herself:

e out enough coffee?

uch Milly takes," I

how much coffee goes out of your pantry, Lulie?

ook carte blanche in the matter of quantity should have had such a disastrous effect in the ma

when I first came here, that every servant you had was as honest as you or I

recollect she had a little oval wooden box, that held, I suppose, about a quart--or two, maybe--of roasted coffee, and that box stood on the mantelpiece in her room; and every morning, as soon as her bell rang,

was only two sp

responded Cha

of which I detached with some difficulty, and as the scent of the roses hung round it still, I had no difficulty in identifying my treasure-trove wit

own despised monitions, I exhumed the wooden box, had it thoroughly cleansed, filled with roasted coffee

for my amiable endeavor to do things as mother did, or because he took the old wooden box for an o

he least. Maybe the charm failed to work because Charlie had forgotten which end of the mantelpiece his mother u

he things that mother used to do at that important season. I suppose she really was a wonderful woman, and I humbly hope that by the time I have lived as long as she did, and get to looking as she does

cotton sacks? That was one thing

hful occupation: I was tired of playing at living. I resolved on a brilliant plan. I would out-mother mother, for she only saw to the making of t

ake the sacks. I informed him with a flourish that I should need but one: I should want her to

rst time they were used? Was I to blame that two women were kept busy mending

machines, etc., etc., winding up with--"Now, when mother was alive" (I fairly winced), "the house was not considered too good for the darkies to sit on the back gallery with their work and make t

, I "made a note of

harlie. The wretched creature would stalk into my bed-room--which I was particularly dainty about--fresh from shooting or fishing, with pounds of mud clinging to his boots, bristling all over with cockleburs, his hands grimed with gunpowder; and helping himself to water from my ewer,

id," "what did mother used to do when you came into her room and tur

on a shelf on the back gallery, and one of those great big rolling towels that lasted about a week; a

ou shall know better than t

em all afraid of her: so I firmly resolved that they should all be afraid of me, poor little me! It is true, I was but twenty, and she was fifty; I was but a pocket edition of a woman, and she was a Webster Unabridged; I had little meek blue eyes, that dropped to the ground in the

il, if she had been present in propria persona, I should have been tempted to try Hiawatha's remarkable feat with his grandmother, and throw her up again

ant, minus clapper and handle, I was enabled to provide myself with its fac-simile. Armed with this instrument of re

effect made the night before. I raised myself very softly, so as not to disturb my husband's gentle slumbers, and, possessing myself of my big bell, I laid on with

meaning of that?" he exclaimed, lookin

illow once more, ostensibly to go to sleep again--in reality to have my laugh out in a quiet fashion, for it was enough to have made

ecious old head, and then he paid me to quit, and afte

aky was a plaintive little request that I would not stick so close to the old woode

sphere: I merely wanted to cure him of telling me how mother did it; so as soon as he thus tacitly acknowledged that his suggestion had n

ng needful. It was the very rainiest, wettest, muddiest picking-season that had ever been seen. In pursuance of my plan, I had

pleasant semi-doze, when the monotonous whirr-r-r of the spinning-wheel first attracted his attention

inning thread to make the sacks with," I

e. "Ahem! Lulie, my dear, how long is

arlie, that's the

ooking foolish, "I know she did, Lulie, but I'l

stand it when mother did

se in those days, Lulie: I suppo

ut the house much in

en't in it, you

uld afford to be amiable; so, giving him a spasmodic little hug and an ener

feebler and feebler. One more energetic displ

ducks and more than the usual degree of severe cold. Charlie was an inveterate duck-s

rash sewed together at the end were made to revolve over the roller, and by way of forcing the experim

unconsciousness of outside cold and discomfort, when

took hold of my nice pitcher with

re mother used to keep it;" and

bounded out to the back gallery. He came back i

r's all frozen in that conf

t for you," I said swee

you think it's exactly fair, when a fellow's been out all the morning shooting ducks for your dinn

mother did," w

his once, you may keep house on your own plan, little lady, and

I'll be as good a housekeeper as your mother was before me. The mistake you and all other men make is, in comparing your wives at the end of their first year of housekeeping

ve Charlie a kiss, and some water to

affidavit he never had a mother, unless it is expressly stipulated in t

Hade

Red

f New Ye

ven, were alone in the house. My husband had been unexpectedly called away on

old where the sun was going down. Over the rest of the sky hung heavy gray clouds. A few drops of rain fell from time to

ke the idea of spending by myself the long eveni

he saw-mill. Our house was the oldest in the village, which does not speak much for its antiquity, as five years before Maysville had been unbr

earing running out into indefinite space. Here also the Indians would encamp when they came to town from their reservation about five miles away, and here also, I regret to say, they would sometimes get drunk, and add what Martha Penney calls "a revolving animosity to the scenery." The squaws, however, would generally secure the knives and guns before

f them, for we were on excellent terms with the whole reservation. My feeling about staying alone w

It was not cold, but chill. The wind howled and shivered

r arms a bundle in a long blue embroidered cloak--a baby, in short. She and her husband firmly believed this infant to be the most beautiful, most inte

y or Hermione Adams--was a very small woman, exceedingly pretty, with ligh

uite believe it, because he could and did work, and never so much as touched even a glass of wine. His parents had died when he was very young, and he

ee country. He had married Minny Adams with the full consent of her parents and the opposition of all her other friends. Contrary

--was a civil engineer, and

up. "Will you take in the wife and the s

yed. "But where are you goi

on the railroad, and have sent for me. I might ha

y n

expressively. "No one can

hey were neither few nor far between--were n

tea?" I asked as he handed me th

n: by-bye, baby! Do you know, we think she's beginning to say 'papa?'"

yes and her mother's mouth, but otherwise she certainly was not handsome. She was ten months old, but she had a look of experience and wisdom in her wee face that would have made her seem old at twenty years. She sat on my lap and watc

s me think sometimes of the fairy changeling that was a hundre

nd. She would not have acknowledged that anything lay out of the range of her

we were in something of a frolic with them and the baby, and it was not till the little one was asl

s back of the house with a noise like thunder. The branches of the huge oaks in the front yard creaked and groaned as only oak boughs

fe under shelter,

ill have no trouble with the men, but he is not apt to. I pity poor Mr. Ro

himself to work to be disagreeable, he can, without doing one uncou

er tries his airs on you, or you wou

and, I suppose. Have you got your work? Then let me read

husband's friend and companion before the baby was born: she did not entirely throw him over now that it had come. She had always been fond of reading, and she continued to keep up her interest in the world outside of her nursery. She thought that as her daughter grew up her mother would be as valuab

een a most intolerable person to live with, and that their marriage, had it come to pass, would have ended in Amy's taking in sewing to support both herself and her husband. As for the Squire, why we had no word for his character but his disappointed rival's, and his drinking might be all a slander. As to his snoring, why poets might snore

of the woods, and tore and shook at the four corners

hat," said Minny. "It is like the banshee. Hark!

, and took the candle and went to open the door. I set the light in the hall, for I knew the wind would blow it out. In spite of this precaution, however, the flame was extinguished,

softest, sweetest voice, like a courteous flute,

he stood in our little entry he looked gigantic indeed. He c

blanket and woolen hunting-frock. He carried his rifle in his hand,

l?" he asked

ear friend, where have you been in this weather? There is a good fire in the kitchen. Come

to the hall and held u

dhood, "how could you come out in all this rain, and bring on your rheumatism? How do

ke a daughter, and scolding him gently meanwhile. The old gentleman had of late years been subject to rheumatism, and it was too likely that this exposure would bring on another attack. The Panther patted he

ink old Ingin melt like maple sug

ite

littl

e pig, fast asleep

your hu

the railroad

he asked, t

the matter?" I asked, a little alarmed at his persistent question

nestly. "I come right

this storm!" said I. "What could

e come see two nice women," said the old g

ce in war and council. Many a man "got up regardless of expense" in college and society might have taken lessons in deportment from this old Pottawatomie. He had known Minny from her childhood. Her father's farm had been the first clearing in all that part of the country. Deacon Adams had always been on ex

n in all his visits to Washington, where he had been a great lion, and in all his dealings with the United States he had shown much wisdom and ability. But report said that when once within the domestic circle and before his squaw, the diplomatist and warrior was exceedingly meek. He bore his wife's death with resignation, but he had never married again. He loved Minny Adams better than anything

stories read to learning to do it for himself, and was especially fond of the Arabian Nights, which he quite believed. She even coaxed him to go to church with her, and might have made a convert of him but for the interference of an exceedingly silly young clergyman. The Panther rather liked to hear the Bible, but I fear he was more a

made the match between Minny and Mr. Moore. Their house was one of his homes, and he was a frequent guest at our own. He petted and spoiled my two children: he was very s

arms. I was alone at the time, and the old man's sympathy was such a comfort to me in my tr

ssive fashion. He was a good deal of an orator, possessing a voice of great sweetness and power; and though he was such an immense creature, all his movements were light and graceful as those of a kitten. He could speak perfectly good, even elegant, English when he chose, but he did not always choose, and gener

r in such wild weather. He did not seem like himself. He was usually very conversable, and would chat away by the

not some of Wyn's things here yet i

e chief can put on, and bring down a pa

never mind," sa

she went out and soon returned with the thin

p just like a rabbit. Always she order me round since she so high, and I just big fool enough let her;" and he went into the next room, and presently came out arra

r silent; and I noticed that in the pauses of the wind he would stop as though listening for some expected sound. I began to think he

b, and stood for a moment looking at the sleeping child with a tendern

xt room," I said. "Go and look

opened from the parlor, and bending down softly ki

tretched his length of limb before the fire, but he did not seem quite at ease, even under the influence of the tobacco. He looked a little t

n gently to rock the cradle. "'Spose she order me

k tall. The last time Wyn and I were at Detroit we went to church, and I heard the very smallest man I ever saw preach a tremendous sermon about the man being the head of the woman, insisting might

said I; "and he says Mr. Moore has no

looked like his namesake just ready for a spring, as the shar

n a tone of relief, a

e what the matter is, or what you are listening

nd seconded M

it all Ingin nonsense," he sai

I should feel more

, please," said

th an effort, "last night went out after a

: we

man lowering his voice and speaking with great earnestness, "hear red fox ba

f the red fox. I knew the Indian superstition that if this animal is heard to bark anywher

s. He does not bark for white people, and you were no

"Never know that sign fail. Then here this littl

had sundry queer notions and superstitions, about which he very seldom spoke, but which nevertheless had

," said Minny, but nevert

s morning to tell her. Then think she not believe it and not mind, and so keep quiet. Then storm come up and wind

w good you are to me! You mean to stay here to-night of course, and in the morning you will see that the red fox was simply

ne my own blood," he said, rather sadly: "boys dead, girl

ou know I belong to you," she said,

little boy too," said the old man, with a sigh--"she tell your mother she nurse you; so she did. You git fat and rosy right off. You all the same one of us after that. No spoil your pretty white skin, thoug

id "Minny with a sigh, for both

. "Deacon Adams, he real good man. Look here, mamma! Like to ask you quest

pretend to know all this world

any way. Now 'spose that so,

neither Minny nor I could venture

n that young man feel bad, and he fret good deal 'bout where that baby gone to, and he ask me, and I no able tell him. Guess me find out when get there: no us

ere new. I'll make you a pair just

e was as fond of finery as any girl, and took no

ession of his mind. Over my work-basket he brightened a little, and chatted away quite like himself, and listened with pleasure to Minny's singing. We did not rise to go to bed till eleven o'clock, which was a very late hour for Maysville. When the Panther spent the night at our h

which he had set down by the door. As he did so an angry look came

broken. "It cannot have been done since you came," I

id the Panther, eager to show that

p anywhere o

of the reservation, which was a terrible thorn in the side of all the missionary's efforts. "Stop a mi

put your

ent's reflection. "Yes, know di

s never broken by accident. It must have been a mere piece of spite beca

git it wet. Wish knew who did that," said he, wit

y, but it can e

le and blankets I had brought for his use, and

nd, I felt something ve

g here that will be spo

f, carelessly. "Mean to tell Minny to

damp, and put it all into my apron. I counted the money and found there were seventy-five dollars. Strong indeed must have been

d. "Part from Washingto

t been long in his possession. Money in the

inny," he said; and as this was by much the w

r like to go to sleep without something to

is rifle with him, and I lent the sh

hed and returned with the axe, which was new and

ou think can po

ve something to catch up. Good

ters. The rain had ceased, but the blast was still roaring without. Minny and her child were in a room which opened out of the parlor opposite m

emselves upon you. If you turn back into the past, there comes up before you every occasion on which you made a fool of yourself, every lost opportunity, every slight injury you ever experienced.

bout the red fox. Who could explain the mysterious way in which animals are warned of approaching danger? Perhaps the old science of divination was not so entirely a delusion; and then I remembered all the old stories in Roman

had been verified: perhaps the present case might be one of the exceptions to the rule. Then I remembered all the s

The Attack on

th him. Ryan's was one of the worst places in all the State. I remembered that the money was in the house, and I began to wish, like the Panther, that I had something to "catch up." Then there were so many noises about!

est part of an hour before I remembered that in a drawer in the front p

two little pistols. I stepped very softly, not to disturb Minny, for I should have been quite ashamed then to have her know my cowardice. I looked in at the door as I passed. She was sound asleep, with her baby on her arm. The baby, however, was broad awake, but lying perfectly still, with her little finger in her mouth. Her eyes shone in the lamplight as she turned them on me--not startled

n I never sat down to my work or went to rest without having rifle or pistol within easy reach of my hand. When I had loaded the weapons, I put them on the table by my bed and lay down again. My excitement s

ith my pistols in my hand. I was greatly startled, but my one idea was to help my old friend. The miserable door resisted me for a moment. Seconds passed that seemed hours. When at last I tore it open, I saw a man

tself full at the ruffian's face and naked throat. It was our big old brindle cat, Tom, roused from his place before the fire. The une

;" for, as I saw that my old friend w

l animal, had almost scratched his eyes out. In the m

mamma," said the

mean to

ordered the man into this place. He obeyed, and I drew the bolt upon him.

ll it. Roused by the noise, the children, and Minny w

" said Minny, kneeling by the

r into the shed, which had been secured only by a button, was wide open. "You get the hammer a

me in silence; little Carry, seeing her mother in tears, put up a piteous lip and sobbed in her unbaby-

e hurt," I said, hold

r--a gun not carrying less than twenty-five to the pound. I had seen gunshot wounds before, and I knew tha

dead?" aske

he man's head was s

mma," he said, touching his hunting-k

h shocked as I might have been had I not lived on

his country. 'Spect they follow me. Mamma," said the Panther, looking up into

It was all your love for us that has done this, but I pray God you

id the boy, thou

tle fellow out in the dark. Besides, no good. You

ard the sound of whe

"Stop whoever it is, and te

ho, happily for us, had been out on one of those err

ry kind and tender in the exercise of his profession. He wasted no ti

"Know it's the end. Kill one of 'em, anyhow!

d killed the other," said the doctor

inting to me: "she got him--she and the cat. Pretty well for one

scoundrel?" as

in that

he was "kilt" already, and should

with all my heart,

ed the Panther into the parl

t open. The man whom he had killed had fired the shot. He had kept his feet to

received the heaviest sentence the law would allow. He confessed that, knowing the chief had a large sum in his possession, himself and his companion had broken the lock of the rifle, intending to waylay the old man and shoot him in the woods. They had not, however, bee

xious to see Wyanota, and Calvin Bruce, who had come with the doctor, instantly volunteered to take his trotting mare and do

ow: not cough myself to death, like an old dog. Minny, little girl, you tell your husband be good to our people, well as he can. Not

they will," said

vices and to pray with the dying man. The Panther thanked him courteously, but he clung to the simple creed of his fathers and

to Mr. Lawrence, who sat quietly at the head of the sofa. "Do you think," he asked wistfully of the clergyman, "that I ever see these two again where I go?" The min

of sorrow she could not understand. She did not scream, as another child would, but hid her face on her mother's bosom and sobbed q

ly. "You be good boys to yo

ck the lamentations which

, about going to his lost children. Then a smile came over his face, a look of sweet relief and comfort sof

, who was in an agony of grief, "God knows, but it was His Son who said, 'Grea

we wrote those words on the s

me very vividly the memory of the augury that

F. Gue

ui

ming creeks, up which here and there the pointed sails of the hidden hay-barges crept, the sunshine turning them to white flames: farther off stood a screen of woods, and from brim to brim between swelled the broad, smooth sheet of the river, coming from the great mountains that gave it birth, washing clean a score of towns on its way, and loitering just here by the pleasant old fishing-town, whose wharves, once doing a mighty business with the Antilles and the farther Indies, now, in the absence of their half dozen foreign-going craft, lay at the mercy of any sand-droger that chose to fling her cable round their capstans. A few idle masts swayed there, belonging to small fishers and fruiters, a solid dew of pitch oozing from their sides in the sun, but not a sail set: a lonely watchman went the rounds among them, a ragged urchin bobbed for flounders in the dock, but otherwise wharves and craft were alike forsaken, and the sun glared down on them as though his rays had made them a desert. The harbor-water lay like glass: now and then the tide stirred it, and all the brown and golden reflections of masts and spars with it, into the likeness of a rippled agate. Not one of the boats that were ordinarily to be seen darting hither and yon, like s

fostered it more kindly, full as they were in their shallow breadth of rotting weeds and the slime of sewers. Perhaps the owner of some pale face looked through the pane and thought of brother or father, or, it may be, of lover, and grew paler with pity, and longed to do kind offices for those who suffered; but the greater part of all the people hived upon the shores would have scouted the thought of going out with aid to those hot pillows ro

rves, and had spread like wild-fire through the town, that, wrecked in a tempest and deserted by the panic-stricken crew, the steadfast master and a boy who stood by him had remained with her, had refitted her as best they might when the storm abated, and had brought her into port at last through fortunate days of fair w

sea-wall with a waving handkerchief, ran crying into a corner; and it was there that Andrew Traverse, the person of only secondary importance in the river scene, rated as a boy

clare it is!" said he, standing in the doorw

a sob, but crouching farther away into

in the sunshine that lay around him, and that glanced along his red shirt

standing by the captain when the ot

s of his merit to listen to the praise of it. "Well, is this all?

er overcomes the landscape, the lips quivered again, the long-lashed eyelids fell, and the face was hidden in another storm of tears. And then, perhaps because he was a sailor, and perhaps be

w proud the little body was! how her heart beat with pleasure at thought of the way in which all men were ready to do him honor! how timidly she turned her eyes upon him and saw the tint deepen on his cheek, the shadow flash into light in his eye, the smile kindle on his lips, as he looked down on her--glad with her pride and pleasure, strong, confident, content

uch until she turned that tearful, rosy face upon him in welcome; but now it seemed to him that she had been his and he hers since time began: he could neither imagine nor remember any other state than this: he said to himself, and then repeated it to her, that he had loved her always, that it was thought of her that had kept him fir

it was only for a little while it lasted. A week's rapt walking in these mid-heavens, where earth and care and each

ony to a stately tea-drinking at the house of the owner of the Sabrina. "Now we shall catch larks," said he; and dressed in a new suit, whose gray tint set off the smoothness of his tanned cheek with the color sometimes mantling through the brown, he entered the house with all the composure of a gentleman used to nothing but high days and holidays. Not that either the state or ceremony at Mr. Maurice's required

ary compliment had been duly observed. "How is it that you are ra

ters as befell us, three years out in the stead of a year and a

e time you must have don

h his bright laugh. "We were officers and cre

rience," sai

, at least. Why, sir, it taught me how to handle a s

ne of these days. And you have had yo

academy had

should you like to have gone through such hard lines, Frarnie?" tur

d?" she asked in her

r danger--two men alone in the leaky, broken brig--but then we c

r deserts," sa

dly any water or biscuit; and at the worst our fate could no

self on having a singularly keen insight into character, studied the young man's every word and gesture, for it was not often that he came across such material as this out of which to make his captains; and to what farther effect in this instance be pursued his studies might have been told, by any one keener than himself, through the tone of satisfaction with which, on re-entering the parlor, he bade his daughter take Andrew down the rooms and tell him the hist

upon his words: indeed, how could he? Perhaps he did not notice it himself; but if he had had a trifle more personal vanity, and had seen how this pale young girl--forbidden by a suspicious father much companionship with gallants--had forgotten all difference of station and purse, and had looked upon him, nobly made, handsome, gay, knowing far more than she did, much as upon a young god just alighted by her side a moment,--if Andrew had been aware of this, and had found any words in which to repeat it, then Louie might have had something to startle her out of her blessedness, and pain might have come to her all the sooner. But since the pain would have been as sharp then as at any future time, it was a pitying, pleasant Fate that let her have her happiness as long as might be. For Louie's love was a different thing from the selfish passion that any clown may feel: she had been happy enough in her littl

for the little red samphire stems to pickle; sails in the float down river and in the creeks, where the tall thatch parted by the prow rustled almost overhead, and the gulls came flying and piping around them: here and there, they two alone, pouring out thought and soul to each other, and every now and then glancing shyly at

airs of the Sabrina, taking him with him in his chaise jogging through the shipyard, where a new barque was getting ready for her launching, examining him the while carefully from time to time after his wont; at last taking him casually h

a knowing shake of the head; and Andrew's innocent brain beg

for a sea-captain, afraid neither of wind nor weather nor the face of clay--can sail a ship and choose her cargo. He's none of your coxcombs that go

fe, reflectively (she was inland-born

Heaven had given me a son, I'd have had him be like this one;

wife, "I can't hear yo

Besides

t to let such things take

Mr. Maurice. "But how abou

s. Maurice, "not

gh the young fellow took a fancy to our Frarnie

here'd be any objection. He is quite uncommon--quite uncommon when you consider all things--but I don't kno

make ducks and drakes of her money as soon as we are gone where there's no returning, and without a 'thank you' for your pains. Look at them now! Should you imagine they th

rs. Maurice, pensively, continuing her own reflections rather than directly replyi

it was for his best interest to make the friendship of the Sabrina's owner; Andrew fretting to see how all this necessary submission to superiors kept him from Louie, but more

to stand by the old brig," said Andrew to some one--by accident it was in Mr. Maurice's hearing. "But if I'd known it was going to take so

and Liverpool, with your old captain. You shall go mate of her. That'll show if you can handle a ship. The Sabri

cried the selfish little thing--what should she do in the long, long, weary days with Andrew gone? But then in a moment she remembered that this was the first step toward going master of that craft in which her bridal voyag

"I served my time before the

ep you will be master of the Sa

owners will think this is enough. This is a great lift. I'll do my best to satisfy them,

't you remember leading me down once to admire the lady on her stern?--like a wate

o know just as much about her goings and comings as the owner did. Somehow--I don't know why--I've always felt as if my fate and fortune hung upon her. It used to be the top of my ambition to go master of her. It is now. I couldn't make up my mind to leave he

ll," said the sympath

that there's some condition or other attached to my promotion--that there's something Mr. Maurice means that I

rain her thoughtless words fired--"perhaps he means for you to ma

tenderly while they listened to a thrush that had built in the garden thicket, mistaking it for the wood, so near the town's edge was it, and so still and sunny was the garde

ings of life, and were indeed nothing to him. How could they have any meaning to him--to him, Louie's lover? What would the whole world be to him, what the sailing of the Sabrina, without Louie? And then a shiver ran

his scarecrow of a daughter--" But there he had need to acknowledge to himself his injustice to Miss Frarnie, a modest maiden who had more cause to complain of him than he of her, since he had done his best to please her, and her only fault lay in being pleased so easily. She was pleased with him: he understood that now, though his endeavors to enlist her had been for a very different manifestation of interest. Perhaps it flattered him a little: he paused long enough to consider what sort of a lot it would be if he really had been plighted to Frarnie instead of Louie. Love and all that nonsense, he had heard say, changed presently into a quiet sort of contentment; and if that were so, it would be all the same at the end of a few years which one he took. He felt that Frarnie was not very sympathetic, that her large white face seldom sparkled with much intelligence, that she would make but a dull companion; but, for all that, she would be, he knew, an excellent housewife: she would bring a house with her too; and when a man is married, and has half a dozen children tumbling round him, there is entertainment enough for him, and it is another bond between him and the wife he did not lov

heats, such finery for port, such dainties and delicacies as only the first mate of the Frarnie could think to have. And as for Louie, it was no outfit, no costly gift of gold or trouble either, that she could give him: she had nothing for him but a long, fine chain woven of her own hair, and she hung it round his neck with tears and embraces and words that could not be uttered and sighs that changed to sobs, and then came lingering delay upon delay, and passionate parting at the last. But when the crew had weighed anchor and the sails were swelling and th

won't abuse our confidence: that's it. He'll wait till he's bridged over the gap between them. The first mate of a successful voyage is a better match for my daughter than the boy who stayed by the Sabrina, br

tered mushroom from the garden; there were the canaries and the cat to be cared for, and the dog that Andrew left with her to feed and shower caresses on; and there was the parrot's toilet to be made and her lesson to be taught, and the single jars of preserves and pickles and ketchups to be put up for winter, and the herbs to be dried: there were not, you may see, many minutes to be wasted out of that busy little life in castle-building or in crying. One day there came a letter with Victoria's head and the Liverpool stamp upon it: she knew it by heart presently, and wore it next her heart by night and day; and even if she had known that Miss Frarnie Maurice received one in the same handwriting by the same mail, it would hardly have made much difference to her; and one day the Sabrina, all freshly coppered and p

d another--a long, long day that seemed as if it would never quench its flame in sunset, and a night that seemed a

n impatient pleasure; and, delighted with the shipmaster's report and with the financial promise of the voyage, the cargo, the freights, and ventures and all, had greeted Andrew with a large-he

ushed through all his bronze--knowing well enough, for had he not gone below in a mighty hurry and tricked himself out in his best togger

ay a word! I've been there myself: I know how you're longing to see her; and

was not so bright at that moment as it had been at others, and for that very reason Andrew was taking great credit to himself for his upright intentions--credit enough to tide him over a good deal of baseness if need were,--"

imed. "I understand your hesitation, and I honor you for it. But I'm no fool, and ther

Mau

ver as soon as we saw which way the wind lay; but of course we decided to say no

sir,

n Frarnie's easily-excited favor a young scapegrace was very likely to supplant Mr. Andrew if things were not brought to a point at once. "It was my duty to look at all sides," he said, without st

gain, leaning forward, his cheeks

heart an honest kiss!" And Andrew, doubting if the minister were not behind the door and he should not find himself married out of hand, irresolute, cowardly, too weak to give up the Sabrina and that sweet new title just ringing in his ears, was pushed along by Mr. Maurice's foolish, hearty hand till he found himself bending over Frarnie with his arm around her waist, his lips upon her cheek, and without, as it seemed to him, either choice or volition on his part. But as he looked up and saw the portraits of the girl's grandfathers, where they appeared to be looking down at him stern and questioning, a guilty shame over the wrong he was doing their child smote him sorely: he saw that he had allowed the one instant of choice to slip away; the sense came over him that he had sealed his own doom, while a vision of Louie's face, full of desolation and horror, was scorching in upon his soul; and there, in the moment of betrothal, his punishment began. He stole down to the Sabrina's wharf that even

hours as came to Louie now--hours of suspense and suffering--hours of a miser

now imagining a thousand dire mishaps. But as the third day came and he was still away--he who had been always wont to seek her as soon as the craft was made fast to wharf--then she felt her worst forebodings taking bodily shape: he was ill, he had fallen o

she asked no questions, and only waited on. A life of suspense, exclaims some one, a life of a spider! And when we are in suspense, says another, all our aids are in suspense with us. Day after day she stayed continually in the house, looking for him to come, never stirring out even into the garden, lest coming she might miss him. Night after nigh

s on the deck there; and after that she tortured herself with conjectures till her brain was wild--chained hand and foot, unable to write him or to seek him in any maidenly modesty, heart and soul in a ferment. Still she waited in that shuddering suspense, with every nerve so tightly strung, t

paid off at last. Captain Andrew Traverse of the Sabrina is going to marry his owner's daughter Frarnie. Luck will take passage on that brig!" And when Louie rose from the bed on which she lay down that night, the Sabrina had been a fortnight gone on her long voyage--a voyage where the captain had

laying this flattering unction to heart, did not call much reason to her aid, or she would have known that there was some meaning in it when she cried all day on coming across an old daguerreotype of Andrew. "It isn't for love of him," she sobbed. "It's for the loss of all that love out of my life that was heaven to me. Oh no, no! I love him no longer: I can't, I can't love him: he is all the same as another woman's husband." But, despite this stout assertion, she

y from day to day, one day like another, till they grew so wearisome she wondered her hair was not gray--the pretty hair that, shorn from her head in her illness, had grown again in a short fleece of silky curls--for it seemed to her that s

jecture as he needs must concerning Louie's means of livelihood now, there was no intelligence to relieve any anxiety he might have felt, or to inform him of the sale of the cottage to pay the debt of the mortgage under which it was bought, or of

concerning Frarnie Maurice, wondering if she were the noble thing that Andrew needed to ennoble him--if she were really so strong and beautiful that the mere sight of her had killed all thought or memory of an older love; trying to believe her all that his guardian angel might wish his wife to be, and to acknowledge that she herself was so low and small and ignorant that she could only have injured him--to be convinced that it was neither weakness, nor covetousness, nor perjury in

after another, remotely chimed the hour, the sound smote her with a familiar sweetness full of pain; and now, as she came along the sea-wall and saw the dark river glimmering widely and ever the same, while its mysterious tide flowed to meet the far-off spark of the lighthouse lantern, she recalled a hundred happy hours when she and Andrew in the boat together had rocked there in soft summer nights, with sunset melting in the stream and wrapping them about with rosy twilight; or those when whispers of the September gales swelled the sail, and the boat flew like a gull from crest to crest of the b

ard it rumored among the harbor-people that the Sabrina was nearly due again, and with that her heart beat so turbulently that she had to crush it down again with the thought that, though Andrew every day drew nearer, came up the happy climates of southern latitudes and spread his sails on favoring gales for home, he only hasten

e there had already died a thousand deaths through expectation of the present coming of the fever already raging in other parts. Hitherto, the health-officers, boarding everything that appeared, had found no occasion to give anything but clean papers, and the town had breathed again. But now, when at last it spread from lip to lip that the fever lay at anchor in mid-channel, knees shook and cheeks grew white, and health-officer and port-physician, in spite of the almost instantaneous brevity of their visit to the infected vessel, were avoided as though they were the pestilence themse

there was who ventured forth on her errand of mercy alone. The fisherman's old boat still lay rocking in the cove, and the oars stood in the shed: Louie knew how to use them well, and making her preparations by daylight, and leaving the rest till nightfall, lest she should be hindered by the authorities, she found means to impress the little cow-boy into her service; and after dark a keg of sweet water was trundled down and stored amidships of the boat, with a

water surrounded him; a flake of ice lay between his lips, that had lately been parched and withering, and delicious coolness swathed his head, that had seemed to be a ball of burning fire. The last that he remembered had been a hot, dry, aching agony, and this was bliss: the sleep into which he fell when waking from the stupor that had benumbed his power of suffering--a power that had rioted till no more could be suffered--lasted during all the spell of that fervid noon sun that hung above the harbor and the town like the unbroken seal of the expected pestilence. A strange still town, fear and heat keeping its streets deserted, its people longing for an east wind that should kill the fever, yet dreading lest it should blow the fever in on them; a strange still harbor, its great peaceful river darkened only by that blot where the sun-soaked craft swung at her anchor; a strange still craft,

ie? Or was it only some one of the tormenting phantoms that for so many burning days had haunted him? He tried in vain to ask: his tongue clove to the roof of his mouth; he seemed to be in the power of one of those fierce nightmares where life depends on a word and the word is not to be spoken. Only a vision, then: he closed his lids thinking it would be gone when he lifted them, but he did not want it to be gone, and looked again to find it as before. And by and by it seemed to him that long since, in a far-off dream, he had gathered strength and uttered the one thought of h

out of which the river gleamed as if just newly rolled from its everlasting fountains,--morning was dawning with the sweet freshness of its fragrant airs stealing from warm low fields, when Andrew once more l

le that used to make his pulse quicken, and that, ill as he ye

re so long ago. "It was a fetter I could not break," he whispered. "I wrote her all about it long ago. I wrote her father that he should have his vessel back again--an

ed. "What odds is all that now

help me liv

nd as it slowly faded there came a wild salt smell, an air that tingled like a tonic through the veins: the east wind was singi

Prescott

er's Res

the Mexi

ears ago, when, but a wee bit of a midshipman, I was the youngster of the starboard steerage mess on board the old fri

rst lieutenant, Mr. Bispham, kept over us. He wore gold-rimmed spectacles; and I can see him now, with the flat eagle-and-anchor buttons shining on his blue coat, as he would pace the quarter-deck, eyeing us young gentlemen of the watch, as

l of odds and ends of yarns, with which he used to delight us young aspirants for naval honors, as he would spin them to us on the booms on moonlight nights, after the hammocks had been piped down. How well do I remember the old fellow's appearance!--his neat white frock and trowsers, his low-quarter purser's shoes, with a bit of a ribbon for a bow; no socks, save the natural, flesh-tinted ones, a blue star, done in India ink, gleaming on his instep; his broad blue collar, decorated with stars and two rows of white tape, falling gracefully from a neck which, as we youngsters asserte

had a shy at him, to see why he had cleared out so suddenly, his remains were taken in charge by his messmates, who rigged the old man out in his muster clothes, sewed him up in his clean white hammock, with an eighteen pound shot at his feet, and reported to the officer of the deck that the body was ready for burial. So, about six bells in the afternoon wat

last man reached the deck, he touched his hat and in a sad sort of way reported, 'All up, sir,' to the first lieutenant, who in his tur

mmock, ready for the last rites. Solemnly and most impressively were the services read, and at the words, 'We commit his body to the deep,' a heavy splash was heard, and poor old Sadler had gone to his long home for ever. Some of us you

n, sir,' says Mr. Gray to the gentleman of the watch; 'Pipe down, sir,' says this youngster to the boatswain; and then such a twitter of pipes followed t

sailors at sea; for, Sadler's body committed to the deep, all hands felt better: the fore and main tacks were hauled aboard, the main yard was filled away, an

as smooth as a mill-pond, the wind was all up and down the mast, and so the ol

old man-of-war's men would think the country was going to 'Jemmy Square-toes' stern first if they didn't have quarters--then down hammocks for the night

, Kentucky, the most dare-devil midshipman of us all, was master's mate of the forecastle; Hammond, Marshall, Smith and I were the gentlemen of the Watch; Rodney Barlow was quartermaster at the 'con;' the lookouts

ang out, 'Lee cat-head;' but the last syllable died away on his lips as his eyes rested upon an object--a white object--standing bolt upright in the water before him, about a hundred yards

aid Buckner, as he quickly

what did he see but old Sadler standing straig

lee bow and the other on the quarter-deck, he walked aft and deliberately touc

he said, 'Mr. Hammond, report Sadler's arrival to the commodor

irst lieutenant quietly seated reading over the black list; and when, with my heart in my throat, I said, 'Mr. B

dder on my way back to the deck, and trembling lest I should see the ghost popping his

it any longer, but had just yelled out, 'Ghost ho! ghost ho! Look out!

'Bungs,' Loblolly boy,' captain of the hold, and, by this time, all the officers too, with

hough the men thought it was to keep old Sadler from boarding us; and as they rushed up on deck they filled the

the water, like a fishing-cork, dancing away all to himself, while the moonlight, first on one side, and then

llis, the second captain of the foretop, hail

and that they ought to be thrown overboard to him; but all this was cut short by the appearance of the commodore on the

his hat, handed it to him, he quietly arranged the focus, and, as we all supposed, was about to point it at Sadler, who was still dancing away for dear life all to himself. But old Jess was too smart for that: he quietly directed his glass to another quarter, to gain a little time, and, graduall

ell as I can remem

. Bispham and speaking in an authoritative tone

ring a ghost on boar

said Mr. Bispham, 'and cal

old Jess wants old Sadler on board, he had better go after him himself.' Some said he had come back after his bag and hammock, and the best way was to let him have them, and then he would top his boom and clear out. Others said the purser had not squared off his account; and one of the afterguard was seen to tickle the mainmast and whistle for a breeze, to give the old fellow

rst lieutenant's eye, lest he should be reminded that no young officer had, as usual, been ordered to go; but the order came at last. When Moffitt asked the first lieutenant, 'What officer, sir, shall

er reported him, s

scovery he belongs to Mr. Buckner, who will tak

e been selected; but a groan, a chattering of the teeth, a trembling and shaking of bones close by

ffitt: 'take charge of the cutter a

t over the gangway to get into the boat I caught his eye, and if you could have seen that forlorn look you would have pitied him; for there was old Sadler turni

ows! they made but little headway, and what with catching crabs, fouling their oars, blasting old Sadler's eyes, and denouncing him generally (one fellow fairly yelled outright when the bow oarsman accidentally touched him), they had a hard pull of it; but still they made some progress, and when Buck sang out, 'Way enough,' every oar flew inboard, every man faced suddenly around, and with this the cutter keeled over, and, her bow touching old Sadler on his shoulder, ducked him out of sight for a second, at which all hands s

eing the ghost still standing bolt upright in the water and dancing away as if nothing had happened to scare him, manned their oars again and pulled cautiously toward hi

the bow, to hook on t

an slammed his boarding-pike right into the ghost, just abaft his left leg, and as the sharp steel touched the body,

lly brought the old gentleman b

ily a fishing-cork is balanced in the water by a very small sinker, and lastly how confined air will buoy up anything--and

was to be continued in force in the United States navy, hang him if he should ever report another

. Mi