John Ingerfield, and Other Stories

or other coin than that of good sense. Good sense is not a legal tender in the marriage mart. Men and women who enter therein with

its grave, to keep its ghost from rising, has piled the stones of indifference and contempt, as many a woman has done before and since. Once upon a time Anne Singleton sat dreaming out a story. It was a story old as the hills-older than some of them-but to her, then, it was quite new and very wonderful. It contained all the usual stock material common to such stories: the lad and the lass, the plighted troth, the richer suitors, the angry parents, the love that was worth braving all the world for. One day into this dream there fell from

ain, she rose, and, crushing it her hand, flung it in the fire with a laugh, and as the flame bur

ide of life is still left to her. It will be pleasant to be the wealthy mistress of a fine house, to give great receptions, to exchange the secret poverty of home for display and

Day by day the atmosphere of the fine house in Bloomsbury grows cold and colder about her

one another. A man and wife must love or hate, like or dislike, in degree as the bond connecting them is drawn tight or allowed to hang slack. By mutual desire their chains of we

ition, the furtherance of his ambition. Doors that would otherwise remain closed she opens to him. Society, that would otherwise pass by with a sneer, sits round his table. His wishes and pleasures are he

sity. He is ever thoughtful of and deferential to her, awarding her at all times an unvarying courteousness that is none the less sincere for being studied. Her every expressed wa

st interesting game he could have elected to occupy his leisure-wonders whether, after all, he would not have been happier over

She is a different being. He must either look up to her as superior to himself, or down upon her as inferior. When a man does the former he is more or less in love, and love to

Anne, his wife, sit far apart, strangers to one

o it, he becomes more strict and exacting; grows a harsher master to his people, a sterner creditor, a greedier dealer, squeezing the uttermo

s ships and barges lie in ever-lengthening lines; and round his greasy cauldrons sweatin

stward a foul thing. Hovering over Limehouse suburb, seeing it cro

ous head, and the white face of Terror runs swiftly through alley and street, crying as it runs, forces itself into John Ingerfield's counting-house, and tells its tale. John Ingerfi

hey say one can communicate it, even without having it oneself. You had better leave London

where he remains for some minutes in conversation with hi

his room. His man is kneeling in the

ou to take i

rs the man: "Mr. Ingerfield is go

t empty drawing-room, and

s "case." Over a dozen of John's hands are down with it already. Two more have sunk prostrate beside their work within the last hour. The panic grows grotesque. Men and women tear their clothes off, looking to see if they have anywhere upon them a rash or a patch of mottled skin, find that they have, or imagine that they have, and rush, screaming, half-undresse

wift foe such as this. There are hospitals and charities galore, but these are mostly in the City, maintained by the City Fathers for the exclusive benefit of poor citizens and mem

nto his terrified people. Standing on the step of his counting-house, and addressing as many of them as are

-swept field, on many a storm-struck sea; "there must be no cowardly selfishness, no faint-hearted despair. If we've got to die we'll die; but please Go

ons of his strong tones roll away a sweet

tending of your sick, and I hope I shall be of some real use to you. My husband and I are so sorry f

lirium in his brain. She puts her hand in his, and their eyes meet; and in

bewildered throng, questioning, comforting, gently compelling, the thought comes to him, Ought he to allow her to be here, risking her life for his people? followed by the thought, How is he going to prevent it? For in this hour the kn

discovering that the trees and flowers has he passed by carelessly a thousand times can think and talk. Once he whispers to her o

se-a long, lofty room at the opposite end of the wharf to the refinery-into a temporary hospital. Selecting some seven or eight of the most reliable women to assist her, she proceeds to prepare it for its purpose. Ledgers might be volumes of poetry, bills of lading mere street ballads, for all the respect that is sh

his pace an instant to ask himself why and wherefore he is doing so, recollects that he was told to do so and to make haste back, marvels who could have dared to tell him to do anything and to make haste back, remembers that it was Anne, is not quite sure what to think about it, but hurries on. He "makes haste back," is praised for having been so quick, and feels pleased with himself; is sent off again in another direction, with instructions what to say when he gets there. He starts off (he is becoming used to being ordered about now). Halfway

of the most extraordinary events that has ever happened

stops in the middle of the road and laughs; and one small boy, who tells the story to his dying day, sees him and hears him,

By night she has her little hospital prepared and three beds already up and occupied; and, al

nd shabby. He places her in the arm-chair near the fire, begging her to rest quiet, and then assists his ol

impler frame shows him to greater advantage; but Anne wonders how it is she has never noticed before that he is a well-set, handsome man. Nor, indeed, is he so very old-looking. Is it a trick of the dim ligh

ople. Anne glances from the dead face to the living and notes the strong likeness between them. Through her half-closed eyes she sees the grim old captain hurling back

able of becoming a noble face. Anne wonders if it has ever looked down tenderly at anyone; feels a sudden fierce pain at the thought; dismisses the thought as impossi

e, tells her supper is ready, and they seat themselves o

t, John Ingerfield and Anne, his wife, draw closer to each other. On the battle-field of life we learn the worth of strength. Anne feels it good, wh

her deep, soul-haunting eyes, changeful with the light and shade of tenderness; listening to her sweet, clear voice, laughing with the joyous, comforting the

ture, wherein are represented many angels, he pauses; for in one of the younger angels of the group-one not quite so severe of feature as her sisters-he fancies he can trace resemblance

n love and joy, and from the flowers there fall the seeds of i

little hospital is open free to all, for John and Anne feel that the whole world are their people. The piled-up casks are gone-shipped to Woolwich and Gravesend, bundled anywhere out of the way, a

g-room above the counting-house. Yet a looker-on might imagine such times dull to them; for they are strangely shy of one an

a bait to catch Anne's voice, mentions girdle-cakes, remembers that his old housekee

em was exceedingly rare, and one usually hereditary, respectfully doubts Anne's capabilities, deferentially suggesting that she is thinking of scones. Anne indignantly repudiates the insinuation, knows

and the old housekeeper is in bed. At each creaking stair they pause, to listen if the noise has awakened her; then, finding all silent, creep forward aga

if examined, to explain satisfactorily. As for his "finding the things" for her, he has not the faintest notion where they are, and possesses no natural aptitude for discovery. Told to find flour, he industriously searches for it in the dresser drawers; sent for the rolling-pin-the nature and characteristics of rolling-pins being described

nd arm. Hundreds of times must he have seen those fair arms, bare to the shoulder, sparkling with jewels; but never before has he seen their wondrous beauty. He longs to clasp them round his neck, yet is fearful lest his trembli

How the impulse came to him, where he-grave, sober, business-man John-learnt such story-book ways can never be known; but in one instant he is down on both knees, smothering the floury h

have been a life made strangely beautiful by self-forgetfulness, strangely sweet by mutual

visions. It would almost seem as though from their faces in those days there shone a

d, they come and go, bearing healing and peace, till at last the plague, like some gorged

the previous night, is asleep, and not wishing to disturb her, he goes into the dining-room and sits down in the easy chair before the fire. The room strikes cold. He stirs the logs, but they

us tone-a voice curiously familiar to him, though he cannot tell to whom it belongs. He does not turn his head, but sits listening to it drowsily. It is talking about tallow: one hundred and ninety-four cas

why do they persist when they see it

here he is. With a fierce straining of his will he grips the brain that is slipping away from him

n and calls softly to the old housekeeper, and she comes up to him, panting and grunting as she climbs each step.

ones: "I shall be away for some days. Tell her to leave here and return home immediately.

door but stops and

to keep her now. It is all over: there is nothing that cannot be done by any one. Tell he

stairs. He takes his hat and cloak from the chair on which he had thrown them, an

gainst the wall. Anne calls to him laughingly, the

Was not that you?

e dark corner; and Anne, thinking she must have been m

the door, lets himself out an

to elicit anything further. What is the meaning of it? What "business" can have compelled John, who for ten weeks has never let the word escape his lips, to leave her like this-without a word! with

he has been slowly untying, and go

d man, who throughout these terrible two months has been their chief stay and help. He meets her on her entran

ellow like that? She has been working too hard, and has got fever on the brain. She must go

ou will not tell me I must find out from some one else-that is all." Then, her quick eyes noting his momentary hesitation, she lays her little ha

room. "Don't go in to him now," he says; "h

ess casks of tallow, Anne sits by

e, and she takes his fevered hand in h

questions and gives a few commonplace directions, but makes

atches his thin hands grow thinner, his sunken eyes gr

our when John wakes as from a drea

alf gratefully, h

s, in a low, laboured voice. "Di

turns her dee

left me here to die?" she ques

rer to him, so that her sof

him. "I could not have lived without you;

breast, softly strokes it as she might a ch

ays him gently back upon the bed, looks for the last

ings needful with their own hands, wishful that no unloving labour may be mingled with their work. They lay him close to the porch, where,

d Samaritan tending the brother fallen by the way, and un

y after; but the gruff doctor says, "Better leav

shed; till the same hand carves thereon, a

AN OF T

Under the charge of your guide, a very young man with the dreamy, wistful eyes of those who live in valleys, you leave the farmstead early in the for

e and dried fish, shoulder your Remington, and step forth silently into the raw, damp

our steps thoughtfully, listening to the smothered thunder of the torrent, tunnelling its way beneath your feet, and wondering whether the frozen arch above it be at all points as firm as is desirable. Now and again, as in single file you walk cautiously along some jagged ridge, you catch glimpses o

had better have left your rifle at the hut, and, instead, have brought a stick which would have been helpful. Notwithstanding which the guide continues sanguine, and in broken English, helped out by stirring gesture, tells o

cipice. Whether the explanation is suicide, or a reprehensible tendency on the part of the animal towards practical jo

om personal ex

out of your way) with his gun-barrel, which incident cheered us a little; and, later on, our flagging spirits were still further revived by the discovery of apparently very recent deer-tracks. These we followed, forgetful, in our eagerness, of the lengthening distance ba

ut though, with characteristic Norwegian sturdiness, he put a bold face upon it, we could see that in that deepening darkness he knew no more t

of our own voices. We agreed there was nothing for it but to stop where we were till morning, clinging to the short grass; so we lay there side by side, for what may have been five minutes or may have been an hour. Then, attempting to turn, I lost my grip and rolled. I made convulsive efforts to clutch the ground, but the

overed the door, and knocked. There came no response, so I knocked louder; then pushed, and the heavy woodwork yielded, groaning. But the darkness within was even darker than the

nto the night. We followed to the door, and called after him, but only a voice came to us out of the blackness, and th

untain solitudes men breed ghosts for company. Let us make a fire. Perhaps, when h

built in the corner of the room. Fortunately, we had some dried reindeer and bread in our bag, and on that and the ryper and the

s, ran this legend: "Hund builded me in the days of Haarfager." The house consisted of two large apartments. Originally, no doubt, these had been separate dwellings standing beside one another, but they were now connecte

e scattered about both rooms, together with much paper, scored with faded ink. The curtains hung in shreds about the windows; a woman's cloak, of an antiquated fashion, drooped from a nail behind the door. In an oak chest we found a tu

we lay aside the last of them, there rose from the depths below us a wailing cry, and all night long it rose a

altered and shortene

from fir

torrent hurls itself into the black waters of the fiord. The house consists of two rooms-or, rather, it is two cabins connected by a passage. The larger one we use as a living room, and the other is our sleeping apartment. We have no servant, but do everything for ourselves. I fear sometimes Muriel must find it lonely. The nearest human habitation is eight miles away, across the mountain, and not a soul comes near us. I spend as much time as I can with her, however, during the day, and make up for it by working at night after she has gone to sleep; and when I question her, she

eing mere talk about the book (a histo

and made my way down to the valley; and this gives me something to tell you. Nearing the village, I met a peasant woman. To my intense surprise, instead of returning my salutation, she stared at me, as if I were some wild animal, and shrank away from me as far as the width of the road would permit. In the village the same experience awaited me. The children ran from me, the people avoided me. At

aga writers, no doubt), who lived here with his young wife. All went peacefully until, u

he charge of one or more of the maids. Here for three months these girls will live in their lonely huts, entirely shut off from the world. Customs change little in this

one behind the other (these are now, as I think I have explained to you, connected by a passage); the smaller one was the homeste

the s?ter passed and repassed each night. On a day when Hund had gone down to fish in the fiord, the wife took an axe, and hacked and hewed at the bridge, yet it still looked firm and solid; a

a curious object embedded in the ice; and when, stooping, he looked closer, he saw two corpses,

door, and no man may keep her out. Many, at different times, have tried to occupy the house, but strange tales are t

m the house and leave them there. That is the most I have been able to do. It comes somewhat as a shock to one to find men and women-fairly educ

r, but from a part seemingl

a long walk alone, and the twilight was thickening into darkness as I neared home. Suddenly looking up from my reverie, I saw, standing on a knoll the other side of the ravine, the figure of a woman. She held a cloak about her head, and I could not see her face. I took off my cap, and called out a good-night to her, but she never moved or spoke. Then-God knows why, for my bra

r dated elev

e, that I am mad-that I have not recovered from my fever-that I have been working too hard-that I have heard a foolish tale, and that it has filled my overstrung brain with foolish fa

d; and I gripped my chair with both hands, and waited, and again there came the tapping-tap, tap, tap. I rose and slipped the bolt of the door leading to the other room, and again I waited, and again there came the tapping-tap, tap, tap. Then I opened the heavy outer door, and the wind rushed pa

my soul at her feet. She never spoke or moved, and neither did I feel the need of spoken words, for I understood

from the other room. Then swiftly she drew her hood about her face and passed out, closing the door softly behind her; and I

r, and I started from my chair to hide it. But the table was already laid for breakfast, and my wife sat with

hing must have been a dream. But later in the day, passing the open door when her

ture of flesh and blood that sat beside me last night. Besides, what woman would she be? The nearest s?ter is a three-hours' climb to a strong man, and the paths are dangerous even in daylight: what woman would have found them in the

ifth

to you as the ravings of a madman. If ever I return to England I may one day show them to you, but when I do it will be when I, with

passes out of me, and is hers. I make no attempt to work. I sit listening for her footsteps on the creaking bridge, for the rustling of her feet upon the grass, for the tapping of her hand upon the d

turning, I thought I saw a white face pressed against the window, but as I looked it vanished. Then she drew her cloak about her, and passed out. I slid back

om the six

tony eyes. She has seen, she has learnt; I feel it, I know it. Yet she winds her arms around my neck, and calls me sweetheart, and smoothes my hair with her soft, false h

he sevent

, round to the other side of the mountain, and began to climb again. It was slow, weary work. Often I had to go miles out of my road to avoid a ravine, and twice I reached a high point only to have to descend again. But at length I crossed the ridge, and crept down to a spot from where, concealed, I could spy upo

to me, and in answer I waved my hat, and shouted curses at her that the wind whirled away into the torrent. She met me with a kiss, and I breathed no hint to her that I had see

tongue refuse to question it? why does all power forsake me in its presence, so that I stand as in a dream?

e, waiting, listening. If it be spirit, she will come to me; and if it be w

the bridge, above the downward crashing of the logs and loosened stones. I hear it as I listen now.

wind shook my voice into mocking laughter. I sit here, feebly striking at the madness that is creeping nearer and nearer to me. I tell myself the whole thing is but the fever in my brain. The bridge was rotten. The storm was strong. The cry is bu

rom the l

e letters. Then, should I never come back, some chance wande

ver grows longer by a single stitch, and I with a volume before me that is ever open at the same page. And day and night we watch each other stealthil

o hide our thoughts. We make a pretence of busying ourselve

only the Night stands there. Then I close-to the latch, and she-the living woman-asks me in her purring voice what sound I heard, hiding a smile as she stoops low over her work; and I answer lightly, and, moving towards her

about her full white throat, and her eyes will slowly come towards me, and her lips will part, and the red tongue creep out; and backwards, step by step, I shall push her before me, gazing the while upon her bloodless face, and it will be my turn to smile. Backwards through the open door, backwards along the garden path between the juniper bushes, backwards till her heels are overhanging the ravine,

er much wandering, found our way back to the valley. But of our guide we heard no news. Whether he remain

TY PA

ate. I was fourteen at the time. It was during the Christmas holidays, and my aunt had given me five shillings to go and see Phelps-I

ired boy of worldly tastes, notwithstanding which I loved him as a brother. My dear mother wished to see him before consenting to the arrangement, so as to be able to form her own opinion as to whether he was a fit and proper companion for me; and, accordingly, he was invited to tea. He came, and made a most favourable impre

gs towards his own expenses ("sprung half a dollar" was how he explained th

in his mind. At the Angel he stopped and said: "Look here, I'll tell you

, and had added an opinion that they ought to be put down by the police-whether the skirts or the halls she did not explain. I also recollected that our charwoman, whose son had lately left London for a protracted stay in Devonshire, had, in conversation with my mother, dated his downf

f Skegson, the tempter, and he lured my feet from the paths that led to virtue and Sadler's Wells, a

e sense, as implying that a person has had enough of a thing, and does not desire any more of it, just then-in all my life. Where we went, and what we saw, my memory is not very clear upon. We sat at a little marble table. I know it was marble because it was so hard, and cool to the head. From out of the smoky mist a ponderous creature of st

ore practical use to me than all the good books and sermons in the world could have been. I can remember

wards, was a reformed character. Indeed, the pendulum of my conscience swung to

ous display of the quality in her later life.) I had formerly expressed contempt for this book, but now, in my regenerate state, I took a morbid pleasure in poring over its denunciations of sin and sinners. There was one picture in it that appeared peculiarly applicable to myself. It represented a gaudily costumed young man, standing on the topmost of three steep steps, smoking a large cigar. Behind him was a very small church, and below, a bright and not

lion to a city in the clouds. This city was referred to in the accompanying letterpress as a place of "Rest and Peace," but inasmuch as the town was represented in the illustration as surrounded

from the door of a tavern, and led past a Music Hall, on the steps of which stood a gentleman smoking a cigar. All the wicked people

tion, that about midway the two paths were connected by a handy little bridge, by the use of which it seemed feasible, starting on the one path and ending up on the other,

urs to my mind a somewhat painful scene of a few months' later date, in which I am seeking to convince a singularly unresp

ccordingly, one Saturday night, I wended my way to the "Pav."; and there the first person that I ran against was my uncle. He laid a heavy hand upon my shoulder, and asked me, in severe tones, what I was doing there. I felt this to be an awkward question, for it would have been useless trying to make him understand my real motives (one's own relations are never sympathetic), and I was somewhat nonplussed for

pon a narrow ledge; and ladies, as they pass, dip the ends of their cloaks into them, and gentlemen stir them up for us with the fe

oduced to a Music Hall chairman once, and when I said to him, "What is your drink?" he took up the "list of beverages" that lay before him, and, opening it, waved his hand lightly acr

eristics of a foghorn and a steam saw, "Miss 'Enerietta Montressor, the popular serio-comic, will now happear." These announcements wer

the necessary qualities for this part of his duty. He was a mild and sleepy little man, and, unfortunately, he had to preside over an exceptionally rowdy audience at a small hall in the South-East district. On the night that I was present, there occurred a

he began,-the poor are staunch sticklers for etiquette: I overheard a small child explaining to her mother one night in Three Colts Street,

o know what had become of "Old Joss," and

oring the interru

owned performer

ones of plaintive inquiry

dignant; he meant zithern, but he called it a zither. "A

e family history of the interrupter begged the chairman to excuse that ill-bred person on the

the Signorina. He again repeated that she was the world-renowned performer on the zithern; and, undet

lemen, with your kind permissi

the gentleman who had started th

t of which a wag with a piping voice suggested as a reason for the favo

rtunity to complete his oft-impeded speech, suddenly remarked, "songs of th

y greeted with a storm of groans and hisses. Her beloved instrument was unfeelingly alluded to as a pie-dish, and she was advised to take it back and get the penny on it. The c

measures. He addressed himself personally to the ringleader of the rioters, the man who had first championed the cause of the absent Joss. This person was a brawny individual, who, judging from appearances, followed in his business hours

e coalheaving professio

into a state suggestive of Jove about to launch a thunderb

ng a fixed smile of ineffable sweetness but she evidently felt that she could go a bit farther than that herself, even if she was a lady. Calling the chairman "an o

rthy of the gods. He was a heaver of coals, quick and ready beyond his kind. During many years sojourn East and South, in the course of many wanderings from Billingsgate to Limehouse Hole, from Petticoat Lane to Whitechape

ts wings falls across the green pastures, and the wind flies before its dar

she b

d the other way. It seized him by the scruff of his neck, and tossed him up into the air, and caught him as he descended, and flung him to the ground, and rolled him on it. It played around him like forked lightning, and blinded him. It danced and shrieked about him like a host of whirling fiends, and

race in its choking folds his people and his gods, to strangle with its threads his every hope, ambition, and belief. Each term she put upon him clung to him like a gar

and never for one instant did she pause or falter; and in

e was out of a Guy Fawkes and a lump of coal. You fel

r with scorn so sharp with insight into his career and character, so heavy with prophetic curse, that

e house, from floor to ceiling, rose and cheered h

from oblivion into success.

es not play upon the zithern. Her name has a homelier sound

OUET

fields, making it seem as though old Earth, feeling the night air cold to its poor bones, were drawing ghostly bedclothes round its withered limbs. I like the twilight of the long grey street, sad with the wailing cry of the distant muffin man. One thinks of him, as, strangely mitred, he glides by through the gloom, jangling his harsh bell, as the High

dusky sky, screaming angrily. I love the lonely, sullen lake, hidden away in mountain solitudes. I suppose it was my childhood's surroundings that instilled in me this affection for sombre hues. On

felt amid the sky and the sea and the sandhills! I ran, and ran, and ran, but I never seemed to move; and then I cried, and sc

man, and many as big as a fair-sized house; and when the sea was angry-and very prone he was to anger by that lonely shore, and very quick to wrath; often have I known him sink to sleep with a peaceful smile on his rippling waves, to w

to one another, pausing to listen. And then the women wou

me thing, called the Bar. I grew to hate and be afraid of this mysterious Bar, for I heard it spoken of always with bated breath, and I knew that it was very cruel to fis

driftwood. She paused when nearly opposite to me, and, facing seaward, fixed her eyes upon the breaking s

the cottages, while a little farther on a group of women were gathered in the roadway

ch as a body reads of in books, who lived in a coral castle deep below the river's mou

y I could see his hideous form floating below the waters. Then, as the little white-sailed boats stole by him, tremblingly, I used to tremble too, lest he should suddenly open his grim jaws and gulp

a fury that was dead. Old Nick had scattered his marbles far and wide, and there were rents and fissures in the pebbly wall such as the oldest fisherman had never known before. Some of the hugest s

d my way between the straggling legs of a big fisher lad, and peered over with the rest. A ray of sunlight streamed down into the pit, and the thing at the bottom gleamed white. Sprawling

said a woman at length; "so

man who had lifted off the stones; "wa

ter-mark, wi' all they stone

grizzled old woman, pressing forwa

up to her, and she clutched it in her skinny hand. It was a gold earring, such as fis

n there," cried the old creature, wildly. "I ought t

hardly have noticed such a thing. But it seems to my remembrance that as the old crone ceased, another woman in the crowd raised her eyes slowly, and fix

ow between black banks; black, stunted trees grow in black fields; black withered flowers by black wayside. Black roads lead from blackness past bl

and hard; and when the rain falls a black mist rises tow

t, and out of the darkness the red flames leap, and high up in the ai

ll-dog fly at a boy and pin him by the throat. The lad jumped about with much sprightliness, and tried to knock the dog away. Whereupon the boy's father rushed out

r with the other children, almost dying for want of food. "Dear, dear me!" she cried, taking the wee wizen

am," the father took upon himself to answer; "bu

st as I was reluctantly preparing to climb into bed, there came a wild ringing at the

ly into my knickerbockers and ran out. The women folk were gathered on the stairs, while my father stood in the hall, c

we could hear him striding down the gravel p

m a crouching figure that felt its way with its hands as it crept along, as a blind man might. The figure stood up when it reached the middle of the hall, and mopped its eyes with a dirty rag that

in a little while, we heard the stamping of hoofs-the angry plunge of a spur-startle

of the lights, had gone into a small room on the right of the hall; the crouching figure, still mopping that moisture from its eyes, followin

l round me and encompass me, so that I was not afraid. Then we waited, while the silence ro

f the oncoming of a wave upon a stony shore, until it broke in a Babel of vehement voices just outside. Aft

to be quiet, so sternly that they were stunned into silence. The furious ringing was repeated; and, this time, thre

ow confused mumbling. Soon they died away

p the hall lamp, a

rose the noise of a great crashing,

My father, trembling a little (or else it was the shadow cast by the flickering lamp), and with lips tight p

g, commanding. I see nothing distinctly until one of the grimmest of the faces thrusts itself before the others, and a voice which, like Aaron's rod, swallows up all its

me to fling myself down upon the grimy faces below, and beat and stamp upon them with my fists. Springing across the hall, he snatched from the wall where it hung an ancient club, part o

cited though I was. I had always been told that only low, wicked people

th iron spikes. My father held it secured to his hand by a chain, and there was an ugly lo

ath she kept crying, "Oh, will they never come-will they never

gures. How she did it I could never understand, for the two heavy bolts had both been drawn, but the next moment the door stood

always very qu

*

he ground beneath my feet is wet and sloppy, and a black rain is falling. There are women's faces in the crowd, wild and haggard, and long skinny arms stretch out thre

great engines fiercely strain and pant like living things fighting beyond their strength. Their gaunt arms whirl madly above me, and

ous clanking of iron chains, the hoarse shouting of many voices, the hurrying tread of many feet; and, through all, the wailing and weeping and cursin

vanished and all is silent now, and I wonder if the whole thing has been a dream

r question. "It's all over, Maggie," answers my father very quietly, as he take

ck; and I, feeling heavy with a troubl

OF THE "CR

rmon at St. Paul's Cathedral. The occasion was a very special and important one, and every God-

on for gin. He lived at Bow, and, on the Sabbath in question, he left his home at five o'clock in the afternoon, and started to walk to the scene of his labours. The road from Bow to the City on a wet and chilly Sunday evening is a cheerless one; who can blame him if on his way he stopped once or twice to comfort

ot, if you pl

The barmaid, impressed by his manner and appearance, drew the attention of the landlord to him. The landlord covertly took stock of so much of him

was a connoisseur, and he knew. Indeed, so good did it seem to him that he felt it would be a waste of opportunity not to have another twopen'ort

down. Then he heard the Bishop's "sixthly and lastly," and took that down, and looked at his notebook and wondered in a peaceful way what had become of the "firstly" to "fifthly" inclusive. He sat

on was wanted that very night. Seizing the robe of a passing wandsman, he tremulously inquired if the Bishop h

he goes!" exclaimed t

the wandsman. The jou

es to speak with him about the sermon he has j

o was the Bishop. He said h

ood health, that he had been up half the night before, and had walked all the way from Bow that evening. He dwelt on the disastrous results to himself an

dulgent smile. "Luckily, I have brought my notes with me, and if you will promise to be very care

he man a neat little black leather bag, insi

added the Bishop. "Be sure and let me

shop's notes were so full and clear that for all practical purposes they were equal to a report. His work was already done. He felt so pleased with h

e said to the barmaid when he had finished;

d a neat little black bag on the seat where he had been lying. Examining it closely, he discovered a brass plate between the handles, and upon the brass plate were engraved t

he open bag. Then he put on his hat and coat, and taking the bag, went out down the court, chuc

st see him to-night. I wouldn't disturb him at thi

losing the door softly behind

l call him "Peters"), sai

about that there lease o' mine. I do hope you gentlemen will

antly, "you don't mean to say you've come to me at elev

er little thing I wished to speak to you about, and that's this"-sayi

. Peters, and Mr. Pete

some mistake,"

d he wasn't our usual sort, and I seed how he tried to hide his face. If he weren't the Bishop, then

non pondered. Such things had been known to h

f this besides yours

ul," replied Mr.

the Canon, "that we may be able to e

and departed. Next morning the Canon waite

heerfully, "he's sent i

rought it. It is right," continued the Canon, "that I should inform your lo

severe, and the Bish

do," he answered apologetically; "but there, al

fervour, "in Heaven's name-for the sake of our Church, let me

turned upon

thing!" he cried; then, seeing the look

get that ba

rought it me," answered the Canon

covered his breath, he told the Canon the real history o