31290	----	The American Negro Academy. OCCASIONAL PAPERS No 7. Right on the Scaffold, or The Martyrs of 1822. BY MR. ARCHIBALD H. GRIMKE. PRICE FIFTEEN CENTS. WASHINGTON, D. C. Published by the Academy, 1901. The Martyrs of 1822. He was black but comely. Nature gave him a royal body, nobly planned and proportioned, and noted for its great strength. There was that in his countenance, which bespoke a mind within to match that body, a mind of uncommon native intelligence, force of will, and capacity to dominate others. His manners were at once abrupt and crafty, his temper was imperious, his passions and impulses were those of a primitive ruler, and his heart was the heart of a lion. He was often referred to as an old man, but he was not an old man, when he died on a gallows at Charleston, S. C., July 2, 1822. No, he was by no means an old man, whether judged by length of years or strength of body, for he was on that memorable July day, seventy-eight years ago, not more than fifty-six years old, although the hair on his head and face was then probably white. This circumstance and the pre-eminence accorded him by his race neighbors, might account for the references to him, as to that of an old man. All things considered, he was truly an extraordinary man. It is impossible to say where he was born, or who were his parents. He was, alas! as far as my knowledge of his personal history goes, a man without a past. He might have been born of slave parentage in the West Indies, or of royal ones in Africa, where, in that case, he was kidnapped and sold subsequently into slavery in America. I had almost said that he was a man without a name. He is certainly a man without ancestral name. For the name to which he answered up to the age of fourteen, has been lost forever. After that time he has been known as Denmark Vesey. Denmark is a corruption of Telemaque, the praenomen bestowed upon him at that age by a new master, and Vesey was the cognomen of that master who was captain of an American vessel, engaged in the African slave trade between the islands of St. Thomas and Sto. Domingo. It is on board of Captain Vesey's slave vessel that we catch the earliest glimpse of our hero. Deeply interesting moment is that, which revealed thus to us the Negro lad, deeply interesting and tragical for one and the same cause. This first appearance of him upon the stage of history occurred in the year which ended virtually the war for American Independence, 1781, during the passage between St. Thomas and Cap Francais, of Captain Vesey's slave bark with a cargo of 390 slaves. The lad, Telemaque, was a part of that sad cargo, undistinguished at the outset of the voyage from the rest of the human freight. Of the 389 others, we know absolutely nothing. Not an incident, nor a token, not even a name has floated to us across the intervening years, from all that multitudinous misery, from such an unspeakable tragedy, except that the ship reached its destination, and the slaves were sold. Like boats that pass at sea, that slave vessel loomed for a lurid instant on the horizon, and was gone forever--all but Denmark Vesey. How it happened that he did not vanish with the rest of his ill-fated fellows, will be set down in this paper, which has essayed to describe the slave plot which he planned, with which his name is identified, and by which it ought to be, for all time, hallowed in the memory of every man, woman and child of Negro descent in America. On that voyage Captain Vesey was strongly attracted by the "beauty, intelligence, and alertness" of one of the slaves on board. So were the ship's officers. This particular object of interest, on the part of the slave-traders, was a black boy of fourteen summers. He was quickly made a sort of ship's pet and plaything, receiving new garments from his admirers, and the high sounding name, as I have already mentioned, of Telemaque, which in slave lingo was subsequently metamorphosed into Denmark. The lad found himself in sudden favor, and lifted above his companions in bondage by the brief and idle regard of that ship's company. Brief and idle, indeed, was the interest which he had aroused in the breasts of those men, as the sequel showed. But while it lasted it seemed doubtless very genuine to the boy, as such evidences of human regard must have afforded him, in his forlorn state, the keenest pleasure. Bitter, therefore, must have been his disappointment and grief to find, at the end, that he had, in reality, no hold whatever upon the regard of the slave traders. True he had been separated by captain and officers from the other slaves during the voyage, but this ephemeral distinction was speedily lost upon the arrival of the vessel at Cap Francais, for he was then sold as a part of the human freight. Ah! he had not been to those men so much as even a pet cat or dog, for with a pet cat or dog they would not have so lightly parted, as they had done with him. He had served their purpose, had killed for them the dull days of a dull sail between ports, and he a boy with warm blood in his heart, and hot yearnings for love in his soul. But the slave youth, so beautiful and attractive, was not to live his life in the island of Sto. Domingo, or to terminate just then his relations with the ship and her officers, however much Captain Vesey had intended to do so. For Fate, by an unexpected circumstance, threw, for better or for worse, master and slave together again, after they had apparently parted forever in the slave mart of the Cape. This is how Fate played the unexpected in the boy's life. According to a local law for the regulation of the slave trade in that place, the seller of a slave of unsound health might be compelled by the buyer to take him back, upon the production of a certificate to that effect from the royal physician of the port. The purchaser of Telemaque availed himself of this law to redeliver him to Captain Vesey on his return voyage to Sto. Domingo. For the royal physician of the town had meanwhile certified that the lad was subject to epileptic fits. The act of sale was thereupon cancelled, and the old relations of master and slave between Captain Vesey and Telemaque, were resumed. Thus, without design, perhaps, however passionately he might have desired it, the boy found himself again on board of his old master's slave vessel, where he had been petted and elevated in favor high above his fellow-slaves. I say _perhaps_ advisedly, for I confess that it is by no means clear to me whether those epileptic fits were real or whether they were in truth feigned, and therefore the initial _ruse de guerre_ of that bright young intelligence in its long battle with slavery. However, I do not mean to consume space with speculations on this head. Suffice to say that Telemaque's condition was improved by the event. Nor had Captain Vesey any cause to quarrel with the fate which returned to him the beautiful Negro youth. For it is recorded that for twenty years thereafter he proved a faithful servant to the old slave trader, who retiring in due course of time from his black business, took up his abode in Charleston, S. C, where Denmark went to live with him. There in his new home dame fortune again remembered her protege, turning her formidable wheel a second time in his favor. It was then that Denmark, grown to manhood, drew the grand prize of freedom. He was about thirty-four years old when this immense boon came to him. It is not known for how many eager and anxious months or even years, Denmark Vesey had patronized East Bay Street Lottery of Charleston prior to 1800, when he was rewarded with a prize of $1,500. With $600 of this money he bought himself of Captain Vesey. He was at last his own master, in possession of a small capital, and of a good trade, carpentry, which he practiced with great industry. He was successful, massed in time considerable wealth, became a solid man of the community in spite of his color, winning the confidence of the whites, and respect from the blacks amounting almost to reverence. He married--was much married it was said, which I see no reason to doubt, in view of the polygamous example set him by many of the respectabilities of the master-race in that remarkably pious old slave town. A plurality of children rose up, in consequence, to him from the plurality of his family ties; rose up to him, but they were not his, for following the condition of the mothers, they were, under the Slave-Code, the chattels of other men. This cruel wrong eat deep into Vesey's mind. Of course it was most outrageous for him, a black man, to concern himself so much about the human chattels of white men, albeit those human chattels were his own children. What had he, a social pariah in Christian America, to do with such high caste things as a heart and natural affections? But somehow he did have a heart, and it was in the right place, and natural affections for his own flesh and blood, like men with a white skin. 'Twas monstrous in him to be sure, but he could not help it. The slave iron had entered his soul, and the wound which it made rankled in secret there. Not alone the sad condition of his own children embittered his lot, but the sad condition of other black men's children as well. He yearned to help all to better social conditions--to that freedom which is the gift of God to mankind. He yearned to possess this God-given boon, in its fullness and entirety, for himself before he passed thence to the grave. For he possessed it not. He had indeed bought himself, but he soon learned that the right to himself which he had purchased from his master was not the freedom of a man, but the freedom accorded by the Slave-Code, to a black man, a freedom so restrictive in quantity and mean in quality that no white man, however low, could be made to live contentedly under it for a day. In judging this black man, oh! ye critics and philosophers, judge him not hastily and harshly before you have at least tried to put yourselves in his place. You may not even then succeed in doing him justice, for while he had his faults, and was sorely tempted, he was, nevertheless, in every inch of him, from the soles of his feet to the crown of his head, a man. At the period which we have now reached in his history, he was in possession of a fairly good education--was able to read and write, and to speak with fluency the French and English languages. He had traveled extensively over the world in his master's slave vessel, and had thus obtained a stock of valuable experiences, and a wide range of knowledge of men and things of which few inhabitants, whether black or white, in the slave community of Charleston, during the first quarter of the nineteenth century could truthfully have boasted. Yet in spite of these undeniable facts, in spite of his unquestioned ability and economic efficiency as an industrial factor in that city, he was in legal and actual ownership of precious little of that right to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" which the most ignorant and worthless white man enjoyed as a birthright. Wherever he moved or wished to move he was met and surrounded by the most galling and degrading social and civil conditions and proscriptions. True he held a bill of sale of his person, had ceased to be the chattel property of an individual, but he still wore chains, which kept him, and which were intended to keep him and such as him, slaves of the community forever, deprived of every civil right which white men, their neighbors, were bound to respect. For instance, were he wronged in his person or property by any member of the dominant race, be the offender man, woman, or child, Vesey could have had no redress in the courts, in case, the proof of his complaint or the enforcement of his claim depended exclusively upon the testimony of himself and of that of black witnesses, however respectable. Such a man, we may be sure, was conscious of the possession, notwithstanding his black skin and blacker social and civil condition, of longings, aspirations, which the Slave-Code made it a crime for him to satisfy. He must have felt the stir of forces and faculties within him, which, under the heaviest pains and penalties, he was forbidden to exercise. Thus robbed of freedom, ravished of manhood, what was he to do? Ay, what ought he to have done under the circumstances? Ought he to have done what multitudes had done before him, meek and submissive folk, generations and generations of them, borne tamely like them his chains, without an effort to break them, and break instead his lion's spirit? Ought he to have contented himself with such a woeful existence, and to have been willing at its end to mingle his ashes with the miserable dust of all those countless masses of forgotten and unresisting slaves? "Never!" replied what was bravest and worthiest of respect in the breast of this truly great-hearted man. The burning wrong which he felt against slavery had sunk in his mind below the reach of the grappling tongs of reason. It lay like a charge of giant powder, with its slow match attachment in the unplumbed depths of a soul which knew not fear; of a soul which was as hot with smouldering hate and rage as is a live volcano with its unvomited flame and lava. As well, under the circumstances, have tried to subdue the profound fury of the one with argument, as to quench the hidden fires of the other with water. He knew, none better, that his oppressors were strong and that he was weak; that he had but one slender chance in a hundred of redressing by force the wrongs of himself and race. He knew too, that failure in such a desperate enterprise could have for himself but a single issue, viz.: certain death. But he believed that success on the other hand meant for him and his the gain of that which alone was able to make their lives worth the living, to wit.: a free man's portion, his opportunity for the full development and free play of all of his powers amid that society in which was cast his lot. And for that portion, so precious, he was ready to take the one chance with all of its tremendous risks, to stake that miserable modicum of freedom which he possessed, the wealth laboriously accumulated by him, and life itself. It is impossible to fix exactly the time when the bold idea of resistance entered his brains, or to say when he began to plan for its realization, and after that to prepare the blacks for its reception. Before embarking on his perilous enterprise he must have carefully reckoned on time, long and indefinite, as an essential factor in its successful achievement. For, certain it is, he took it, years in fact, made haste slowly and with supreme discretion and self-control. He appeared to have thoroughly acquainted himself with the immense difficulties which beset an uprising of the blacks. Not once, I think, did he underestimate the strength of his foes. A past grand master in the art of intrigue among the servile population, he was equally adept in knowledge of the weak spots for attack in the defences of the slave system, knew perfectly where the masters could best be taken at a disadvantage. All the facts of his history combine to give him a character for profound acting. In the underground agitation, which during a period of three or four years, he conducted in the city of Charleston and over a hundred miles of the adjacent country, he seemed to have been gifted with a sort of Protean ability. His capacity for practicing secrecy and dissimulation where they were deemed necessary to his end, must have been prodigious, when it is considered that during the years covered by his underground agitation, it is not recorded that he made a single false note, or took a single false step to attract attention to himself and movement, or to arouse over all that territory included in that agitation and among all those white people involved in its terrific consequences, the slightest suspicion of danger. In his underground agitation, Vesey, with an instinct akin to genius, seemed to have excluded from his preliminary action everything like conscious combination or organization among his disciples, and to have confined himself strictly to the immediate business in hand at that stage of his plot, which was the sowing of seeds of discontent, the fomenting of hatred among the blacks, bond and free alike, toward the whites. And steadily with that patience which Lowell calls the "passion of great hearts," he pushed deeper and deeper into the slave lump the explosive principles of inalienable human rights. He did not flinch from kindling in the bosoms of the slaves a hostility toward the masters as burning as that which he felt toward them in his own breast. He had, indeed, reached such a pitch of race enmity that, as he was often heard to declare, "he would not like to have a white man in his presence." And so, devoured by a supreme passion, mastered by a single predominant idea, Vesey looked for occasions, and when they were wanting he created them, to preach his new and terrible gospel of liberty and hate. Thus only could he hope to render their condition intolerable to the slaves, the production of which was the indispensable first step in the consummation of his design. Otherwise what possibility of final success could a contented slave population have offered him? He needed a fulcrum on which to plant his lever. He had nowhere in such an enterprise to place it, but in the discontent and hatred of the slaves toward their masters. Therefore on the fulcrum of race hatred he rested his lever of freedom for his people. As the discontented bondsmen heard afresh with Vesey's ears the hateful clank of their chains, they would, in time, learn to think of Vesey and to turn, perhaps, to him for leadership and deliverance. Brooding over their lot as Vesey had revealed it to them, they might move of themselves to improve or end it altogether, by adopting some such bold plan as Vesey's. Meantime he would continue to wait and prepare for that moment, while they would be training in habits of deceit, of deep dissimulation, that formidable weapon of the weak in conflict with the strong, that _ars artium_ of slaves in their attempts to break their chains--a habit of smiling and fawning on unjust and cruel power, while bleeds in secret their fiery wound, rages and plots there also their passionate hate, and glows there too their no less passionate hope for freedom. Everywhere through the dark subterranean world of the slave, in Charleston and the neighboring country, went with his great passion of hate and his great purpose of freedom, this untiring breeder of sedition. And where he moved beneath the thin crust of that upper world of the master-race, there broke in his wake whirling and shooting currents of new and wild sensations in the abysses of that under world of the slave-race. Down deep below the ken of the masters was toiling this volcanic man, forming the lava-floods, the flaming furies, and the awful horrors of a slave uprising. Nowhere idle was that underground plotter against the whites. Even on the street where he happened to meet two or three blacks, he would bring the conversation to his one consuming subject, and preach to them his one unending sermon of freedom and hate. It was then as if his stern voice, with its deep organ chords of passion, was saying to those men: "Forget not, oh my brothers your misery. Remember how ye are wronged every day and hour, ye and your mothers and sisters, your wives and children. Remember the generations gone weeping and clanking heavy chains from the cradle to the grave. Remember the oppression of the living, who with heart-break and death-wounds, are treading their mournful way in bitter anguish and despair across burning desert sands, with parched soul and shriveled minds, with piteous thirsts, and terrible tortures of body and spirit. Weep for them, weep for yourselves too, if ye will, but learn to hate, ay, to hate with such hatred as blazes within me, the wicked slave-system and the wickeder white men who oppress and wrong us thus." Ever on the alert was he for a text or a pretext to advance his underground movement. Did he and fellow blacks for example, encounter a white person on the street, and did Vesey's companions make the customary bow, which blacks were wont to make to whites, a form of salutation born of generations of slave-blood, meanly humble and cringingly self-effacing, rebuking such an exhibition of sheer and shameless servility and lack of proper self-respect, he would thereupon declare to them the self-evident truth that all men were born free and equal, that the master, with his white skin, was in the sight of God no whit better than his black slaves, and that for himself he would not cringe like that to any man. Should the sorry wretches, bewildered by Vesey's boldness and dazed by his terrifying doctrines, reply defensively "we are slaves," the harsh retort "you deserve to remain so," was, without doubt, intended to sting if possible, their abject natures into sensibility on the subject of their wrongs, to galvanize their rotting souls back to manhood, and to make their base and sieve-like minds capable of receiving and retaining, at least, a single fermenting idea. And when Vesey was thereupon asked "What can we do?" he knew by that token that the sharp point of his spear had pierced the slavish apathy of ages of oppression, and that thenceforth light would find its red and revolutionary way to the imprisoned minds within. To the query "What can we do?" his invariable response was, "Go and buy a spelling book and read the fable of Hercules and the Wagoner." They were to look for Hercules in their own stout arms and backs, and not in the clouds, to brace their iron shoulders against the wheels of adversity and oppression, and to learn that self-help was ever the best prayer. At other times, in order to familiarize the blacks, I suppose, with the notion of equality, and to heighten probably at the same time his influence over them, he would select a moment when some of them were within earshot, to enter into conversation with certain white men, whose characters he had studied for his purpose, and during the shuttle-cock and battledore of words which was sure to follow, would deftly let fly some bold remark on the subject of slavery. "He would go so far," on such occasions it was said, "that had not his declarations in such situations been clearly proved, they would scarcely have been credited." Such action was daring almost to rashness, but in it is also apparent the deep method of a clever and calculating mind. The sundry religious classes or congregations with Negro leaders or local preachers, into which were formed the Negro members of the various churches of Charleston, furnished Vesey with the first rudiments of an organization, and at the same time with a singularly safe medium for conducting his underground agitation. It was customary, at that time, for these Negro congregations to meet for purposes of worship entirely free from the presence of the whites. Such meetings were afterward forbidden to be held except in the presence of at least one representative of the dominant race. But during the three or four years prior to the year 1822, they certainly offered Denmark Vesey regular, easy and safe opportunities for preaching his gospel of liberty and hate. And we are left in no doubt whatever in regard to the uses to which he put those gatherings of blacks. Like many of his race he possessed the gift of gab, as the silver in the tongue and the gold in the full or thick-lipped mouth are oftentimes contemptuously characterized. And like many of his race he was a devoted student of the Bible to whose interpretation he brought like many other Bible students, not confined to the Negro race, a good deal of imagination, and not a little of superstition, which with some natures is perhaps but another name for the desires of the heart. Thus equipped it is no wonder that Vesey, as he pored over the Old Testament Scriptures, found many points of similitude in the history of the Jews and that of the slaves in the United States. They were both peculiar peoples. They were both Jehovah's peculiar peoples, one in the past, the other in the present. And it seemed to him that as Jehovah bent his ear, and bared his arm once in behalf of the one, so would he do the same for the other. It was all vividly real to his thought, I believe, for to his mind thus had said the Lord. He ransacked the Bible for apposite and terrible texts, whose commands in the olden times, to the olden people, were no less imperative upon the new times and the new people. This new people was also commanded to arise and destroy their enemies and the city in which they dwelt, "both man and woman, young and old, * * * with the edge of the sword." Believing superstitiously, as he did, in the stern and Nemesis-like God of the Old Testament, he looked confidently for a day of vengeance and retribution for the blacks. He felt, I doubt not, something peculiarly applicable to his enterprise, and intensely personal to himself in the stern and exultant prophecy of Zachariah, fierce and sanguinary words which were constantly in his mouth: "Then shall the Lord go forth, and fight against those nations, as when he fought in the day of battle." According to Vesey's lurid exegeisis "those nations" in the text meant, beyond a peradventure, the cruel masters, and Jehovah was to go forth to fight against them for the poor slaves, and on which ever side fought that day the Almighty God, on that side would assuredly rest victory and deliverance. It will not be denied that Vesey's plan contemplated the total annihilation of the white population of Charleston. Nursing for many dark years the bitter wrongs of himself and race had filled him, without doubt, with a mad spirit of revenge, and had so given him a decided predilection for shedding the blood of his oppressors. But if he intended to kill them to satisfy a desire for vengeance, he intended to do so also on broader ground. The conspirators, he argued, had no choice in the matter, but were compelled to adopt a policy of extermination by the necessity of their position. The liberty of the blacks was in the balance of fate against the lives of the whites. He could strike that balance in favor of the blacks only by the total destruction of the whites. Therefore, the whites, men, women and children, were doomed to death. "What is the use of killing the louse and leaving the nit?" he asked coarsely and grimly on an occasion when the matter was under consideration. And again he was reported to have, with unrelenting temper, represented to his friends in secret council, that, "It was for our safety not to spare one white skin alive." And so it was unmistakably in his purpose to leave not a single egg lying about Charleston, when he was done with it, out of which might possibly be hatched another future slave-holder and oppressor of his people. "Thorough" was in truth, the merciless motto of that terrible man. All roads, on the red map of his plot, led to Rome. Every available instrument which fell in his way, he utilized to deepen and extend his underground agitation among the blacks. Wherefore it was that he seized upon the sectional struggle which was going on in Congress over the admission of Missouri, and pressed it to do service for his cause. The passionate wish, unconsciously perhaps, colored if it did not create the belief on his part, that the real cause of that great debate in Washington, and excitement in the country at large, was a movement for general emancipation of the slaves. It was said that he went so far in this direction as to put it into the heads of the blacks that Congress had actually enacted an emancipation law, and that therefore their continued enslavement was illegal. Such preaching must have certainly added fresh fuel to the deep sense of injury, then burning in the breasts of many of the slaves, and must have operated also to prepare them for the next step which Vesey's plan of campaign contemplated, viz.: a resort to force to wrest from the whites the freedom which was theirs, not only by the will of Heaven, but as well by the supreme law of the land. A period of underground agitation, such as Vesey had carried on for about three or four years, will, unless arrested, pass naturally into one of organized action. Vesey's movement reached, in the winter of 1821-22, such a stage. As far as it is known, he had up to this time done the work of agitator singlehanded and alone. Singlehanded and alone he had gone to and fro through that under world of the slave, preaching his gospel of liberty and hate. But about Christmas of 1821, the long lane of his labors made a sharp turn. This circumstance tended necessarily to throw other actors upon the scene, as shall presently appear. The first step taken at the turn of his long and laborious lane was calculated to put to the utmost test his ability as a leader, as an arch plotter. For it was nothing less momentous than the choice by him of fit associates. On the wisdom with which such a choice was made, would depend his own life and the success of his undertaking. Among thousands of disciples he had to find the right men to whom to entrust his secret purpose and its execution in co-operation with himself. The step was indeed crucial and in taking it he needed not alone the mental qualities which he had exhibited in his role of underground agitator, viz.: serpent-like cunning and intelligence under the direction of the most alert and flexible discretion, but as well a practical and profound knowledge of the human nature with which he had to deal, a keen and infallible insight into individual character. It is not too much to claim for Denmark Vesey, that his genius rose to the emergency, and proved itself equal to a surpassingly difficult situation, in the singular fitness of the five principal men on whom fell his election to associate leadership, with himself, and to the work of organizing the blacks for resistance. These five men, who became his ablest and most efficient lieutenants, were Peter Poyas, Rolla and Ned Bennett, Monday Gell and Gullah Jack. They were all slaves and, I believe, full-blooded Negroes. They constituted a remarkable quintet of slave leaders, combined the very qualities of head and heart which Vesey most needed at the stage then reached by his unfolding plot. For fear lest some of their critics might sneer at the sketch of them which I am tempted to give, as lacking in probability and truth, I will insert instead the careful estimate placed upon them severally by their slave judges. And here it is: "In the selection of his leaders, Vesey showed great penetration and sound judgment. Rolla was plausible and possessed uncommon self-possession: bold and ardent, he was not to be deterred from his purpose by danger. Ned's appearance indicated that he was a man of firm nerves and desperate courage. Peter was intrepid and resolute, true to his engagements, and cautious in observing secrecy where it was necessary; he was not to be daunted nor impeded by difficulties, and though confident of success, was careful against any obstacles or casualties which might arise, and intent upon discovering every means which might be in their favor if thought of beforehand. Gullah Jack was regarded as a sorcerer, and as such feared by the natives of Africa, who believe in witchcraft. He was not only considered invulnerable, but that he could make others so by his charms; and that he could and certainly would provide all his followers with arms. He was artful, cruel, bloody; his disposition in short was diabolical. His influence among the Africans was inconceivable. Monday was firm, resolute, discreet and intelligent." From this picture, painted by bitter enemies, who were also their executioners, could any person, ignorant of the circumstances and the history of those men, possibly guess, with the exception of Gullah Jack, to what race the originals belonged, or think you, that such a person would so much as dream that they were in fact, as they were in the eye of the law under which they lived, nothing more than so many human chattels, subject like cattle to the caprice and the cruelty of their owners? Such nevertheless was the remarkable group of blacks on whom had fallen Vesey's choice. And did they not present an assemblage of high and striking qualities? Here were coolness in action, calculation, foresight, plausibility in address, fidelity to engagements, secretiveness, intrepid courage, nerves of iron in the presence of danger, inflexible purpose, unbending will, and last though not least in its relations to the whole, superstition incarnate in the character of the Negro conjurer. Masterly was indeed the combination, and he had no ordinary gift for leadership, who was able to hit it off at one surprising stroke. As the work of organized preparation for the uprising advanced, Vesey added presently to his staff two principal and several minor recruiting agents, who operated in Charleston and in the country to the North of the city as far as the Santee, the Combahee, and Georgetown. Their exploitation in the interest of the plot extended to the South into the two large islands of James and John's, as well as to plantations across the Ashley River. Vesey himself, it was said, traveled southwardly from Charleston between seventy and eighty miles, and it was presumed by the writers that he did so on business connected with the conspiracy, which I consider altogether probable. He had certainly thrown himself into the movement with might and main. We know, that its direction absorbed finally his whole time and energy. "He ceased working himself at his trade," so ran the testimony of a witness at his trial, "and employed himself exclusively in enlisting men." The number of blacks engaged in the enterprise was undoubtedly large. It is a sufficiently conservative estimate to place this number, I think, at two or three thousand, at least. One recruiting officer alone, Frank Ferguson, enlisted in the undertaking the slaves of four plantations within forty miles of the city; and in the city itself, it was said that the personal roll of Peter Poyas embraced a membership of six hundred names. More than one witness placed the conjectural strength of Vesey's forces as high as 9,000, but I am inclined to write this down as a gross overestimate of the people actually enrolled as members of the conspiracy. Here is an example of the nice calculation and discretion of the man who was the soul of the conspiracy. It is contained in the testimony of an intensely hostile witness, a slave planter, whose slaves were suspected of complicity in the intended uprising. "The orderly conduct of the Negroes in any district of country within forty miles of Charleston," wrote this witness, "is no evidence that they were ignorant of the intended attempt. A more orderly gang than my own is not to be found in this State, and one of Denmark Vesey's directions was, that they should assume the most implicit obedience." Take another instance of the extraordinary aptitude of the slave leaders for the conduct of their dangerous enterprise. It illustrates Peter's remarkable foresight and his faculty for scenting danger, and making at the same time provision for meeting it. In giving an order to one of his assistants, said he, "Take care and don't mention it (the plot) to those waiting men who receive presents of old coats, &c., from their masters or they'll betray us." And then as if to provide doubly against betrayal at their hands, he added "I'll speak to them." His apprehension of disaster to the cause from this class was great, but it was not greater than the reality, as the sequel abundantly proved. Let me not, however, anticipate. If there were immense difficulties in the way of recruiting, there were even greater ones in the way of supplying the recruits with proper arms, or with any arms at all for that matter. But vast as were the difficulties, the leaders fronted them with buoyant and unquailing spirit, and rose, where other men of less faith and courage would have given up in despair, to the level of seeming impossibilities, and to the top of a truly appalling situation. Where were they, indeed, to procure arms? There was a blacksmith among them, who was set to manufacturing pike-heads and bayonets, and to turning long knives into daggers and dirks. Arms in the houses of the white folks they designed to borrow after the manner of the Jews from the Egyptians. But for their main supply they counted confidently upon the successful seizure, by means of preconcerted movements, of the principal places of deposit of arms within the limits of the city, of which there were several. The capture of these magazines and storehouses was quite within the range of probability, for every one of them was at the time in a comparatively unprotected state. Two large gun and powder stores, situated about three and a half miles beyond the Lines, and containing nearly eight hundred muskets and bayonets, were, by arrangement with Negro employees connected with them, at the mercy of the insurgents whenever they were ready to move upon them. The large building in the city, where was deposited the greater portion of the arms of the State, was strangely neglected in the same regard. Its main entrance, opening on the street, consisted of ordinary wooden doors, without the interposition between them and the public of even a brick wall. In the general plan of attack, the capture of this building, which held tactically the key to the defense of Charleston, in the event of a slave uprising, was assigned to Peter Poyas, the ablest of Vesey's lieutenants. Peter, probably disguised by means of false hair and whiskers, was at a given signal at midnight of the appointed day, to move suddenly with his band upon this important post. The difficulty of the undertaking lay in the vigilance of the sentinels doing a duty before this building, and its success depended upon Peter's ability to surprise and slay this man before he could sound the alarm. Peter was confident of his ability to kill the sentinel and capture the building, and I think that he had good ground for his confidence. In conversation with an anxious follower, who feared lest the watchfulness of the guard might defeat the attempt, Peter remarked that he "would advance a little distance ahead, and if he could only get a _grip at his throat he was a gone man_, for his sword was very sharp; he had sharpened it, and made it so sharp it had cut his finger." And as if to cast the last lingering doubt out of his disciple in regard to his (Peter's) ability to fix the sentinel, he showed him the bloody cut on his finger. Other leaders, at the head of their respective bands, were at the same time, and from six different quarters, to attack the city, surprising and seizing all of its strategical points, and the buildings, where were deposited its arms and ammunition. A body of insurgent horse was, meanwhile, to keep the streets clear, cutting down without mercy all white persons, and suspected blacks, whom they might encounter, in order to prevent the whites from concentrating or spreading the alarm through the doomed town. Such was Denmark Vesey's masterly and merciless plan of campaign in bare outline for the capture of Charleston, a plan, which, with such a sagacious head as was Vesey, was entirely feasible, and which would have, undoubtedly, succeeded but for the happening of the unexpected at a critical stage of its execution. Against such an occurrence as was this one, no man in Vesey's situation, however supreme might have been his ability as a leader, could have completely provided. The element of treachery could not by any device have been wholly eliminated from his chapter of accidents and chances. To do what he set out to do, with the means at his disposition, Vesey had of necessity to take the tremendous risk of betrayal at the hand of some black traitor. It was, in reality, sad to relate his greatest risk, and became the one insurmountable barrier in the way of his final success. Sunday at midnight of July 14, 1822, was fixed upon originally as the time for beginning his attack upon the city. But about the last of May, owing to indications that the plot had been discovered, he shortened the period of its preparation, and appointed instead midnight of Sunday, June 16th, of the same year. His reason for selecting the original date illustrates his careful and astute attention to details in making his plans. He had noted that the white population of Charleston was subject, to a certain extent, to regular tidal movements; that at one season of the year this movement was at high tide, and that at another it was at low tide. It was no great difficulty, under the circumstances, for a man like Denmark Vesey to forecast with reasonable accuracy these recurrent movements, and natural enough that he should have planned his attack with reference to them. And this was exactly what he did when he appointed July 14th as the original date for beginning the insurrection. At that time the city was less capable than at an earlier date to cope with a slave uprising, owing to the departure in large numbers from it, for summer resorts, of its wealthier classes. Again his selection of the first day of the week in both instances was equally the result of careful calculation on his part, as on that day large bodies of slaves from the adjacent plantations and islands were wont to visit the town without molestation, whereas on no other day could this have been done. Thus, without exciting alarm, did Vesey plan to introduce his Trojan horse or country bands into the city, where they were to be concealed until the hour for beginning the attack. But the attack, carefully planned as it was, did not take place. For the thing which Peter Poyas feared, and had vainly endeavored to provide against, came to pass. One of those very "waiting men," for whom Peter entertained such deep distrust, and against whom he had raised his voice in sharp warning, betrayed to his master the plot, the secret of which had been communicated to him by an overzealous convert, whose discretion was shorter than his tongue. All this happened on the morning of the 30th of May, and by sunset of that day the secret was in possession of the authorities of the city. Precautionary measures were quickly taken by them to guard against surprise, and to discover the full extent of the intended uprising. Luckily for the conspirators the information given by the traitor was vague and general. Nor was the city able to elicit from the informant of this man, who had been promptly arrested and subjected to examination, any disclosures of a more specific or satisfactory character. He was, in truth, in possession of but few particulars of the plot, and was therefore unable to give any greater definiteness to the government's stock of knowledge relative to the subject. Suspicion, however, lighted on Peter Poyas and Mingo Harth, one of Vesey's minor leaders. They were, thereupon apprehended, and their personal effects searched, but nothing was found to inculpate either, except an enigmatical letter not understood by the authorities at the time. This circumstance, coupled with the coolness and consummate acting of the pair of suspected leaders, perplexed and deceived the authorities to such a degree that they ordered the discharge of the prisoners. But the fright and anxiety of the city were not so readily got rid of. They held Charleston uneasy and apprehensive of danger, and so kept it suspicious and watchful. Things remained in this state of watchfulness anxiety, on both sides, for about a week. Vesey on his part remitted nothing of his preparations for the coming 16th of June, but pushed them if possible with increased vigor and secrecy. He held the while nocturnal meetings at his house on Bull street, where modified arrangements for the execution of his plans were broached and matured. How he dared at this juncture to incur such extreme hazard of detection, it is difficult to understand. But he and his confederates were men of the most indomitable purpose, and took in the desperate circumstances, in which they were then placed, the most desperate chances. They had to. They could not do otherwise. The city on its side, was listening during a part of this same week to a second confession of that poor fellow whose tongue had outmeasured his discretion. It was listening with reviving dread to the wild and incoherent disclosures of this man, whom it had flung into the black hole of the workhouse. There, crazed by misery and fear of death, he raved about a plot among the blacks to massacre the whites and to put the town to fire and pillage. This second installment of William Paul's excited disclosures, while it increased the sense of impending peril, did not put the government in better position to avert it. For groping in the dark still, it knew not yet where or whom to strike. But in this period of horrible suspense and uncertainty its suspicion fell on another one of Vesey's principal leaders. This time it was on Ned Bennett that the city's distrustful eye fastened. Like that game which children play where the object of search is hidden, and where the seekers as they approach near and yet nearer to the place of concealment, grow warm and then warmer, so was the city, in its terrible search for the source of its danger, growing hot and hotter. That was, indeed, a frightful moment for the conspirators when Ned Bennett became suspected. The city, as the children say in their game, was beginning to burn, for it seemed as if it must at the next move, thrust its iron hand into that underground world where the plot was hatching, and clutching the heart of the great enterprise, snatch it, conspiracy and conspirators, into the light of day. But it was at such a tremendous moment of danger, that the leaders, unawed by the imminency of discovery, took a step to throw the city off of their scent, so daring, dextrous and unexpected as to knock the breath out of us. Ned Bennett, whom the city was watching as a cat, before springing, watches a mouse, went voluntarily before the Intendant or Mayor of the city, and asked to be examined, if so be he was an object of suspicion to the authorities. Ned was so surprisingly cool and indifferent, and wore so naturally an air of conscious innocence, that the great man was again deceived, and the city was thus thrown a second time out of the course of its game. Ned's arrest and examination were postponed, as the authorities in their perplexity were afraid to take at the time any decisive action, lest it might prove premature and abortive. And so lying on its arms, the city waited and watched for fresh developments and disclosures, while the insurgent leaders, in their underground world watched warily too, and pushed forward with undiminished confidence their final preparations, when they would, out of the dark, strike suddenly their liberating and annihilating blow. This awful state of suspense, of the most watchful suspicion and anxiety on one side, and of wary and anxious preparations on the other, continued for about five or six days, when it was ended by a second act of treachery emanating from the distrusted class of "waiting men," whose highest aspirations did not seem to reach above their masters' cast off garments. Unlike the first, the information furnished to the authorities by the second traitor, was not lacking in definiteness. For this fellow knew what he was talking about. He knew almost all of the leaders, and many particulars connected with the plot. The city was thus placed in possession of the secret. It knew now the names of the ringleaders. But confident, apparently, of its ability to throttle the intended insurrection, it allowed two days to pass and the 16th of June, without making any arrests. Cat-like it crouched ready to spring, while it followed the unconscious movements of the principal conspirators. For Vesey and his principal officers were at that time, ignorant of the second betrayal, and therefore of the fact that they were from the 14th of June at the mercy of the police. On Saturday night, June 15th, an incident occurred, however, which warned them that they were betrayed, and that disaster was close at hand. This incident revealed as by a flash of lightning the hopelessness of their position. On that day Vesey had instructed one of his aids, Jesse Blackwood, to go into the country in the evening for the purpose of preparing the plantation slaves to enter the city on the day following, which was Sunday, June 16th, the time fixed for beginning the insurrection. Jesse was unable to discharge this mission, either on Saturday night or Sunday morning, owning to the increased strength and vigilance of the city police and of its patrol guard. He had succeeded on Sunday morning in getting by two of their lines, but at the third line he was halted and turned back into the city. When this ominous fact was reported to the Old Chief, Vesey became very sorrowful. He and the other leaders must have instantly perceived that they were caught, as in a trap, and that the end was near. It was probably on this Sunday that they destroyed their papers, lists of names and other incriminating evidence. The shadow of the approaching catastrophe deepened and spread rapidly around and above them as they watched and waited helplessly under the huge asp of slavery, which enraged and now completely coiled, was about to strike. The stroke fell first on Peter, Rolla, Ned, and Batteau Bennett. The last, although but a boy of eighteen, was one of the most active of the younger leaders of the plot. Vesey was not captured until the fourth day afterward. So secret and profound had been his methods of operations in the underground world, that the early reports of his connection with the conspiracy, were generally discredited among the whites. Jesse Blackwood was taken the next day, and four days later, on June 27th, Monday Gell was arrested. Gullah Jack eluded the search of the police until July 5th, when he too was struck by the huge slave asp. In all, there were one hundred and thirty-one blacks arrested, sixty-seven convicted, thirty-five executed, and thirty-seven banished beyond the limits of the United States. Five of these last were of the class of suspects, whom it was thought best to get rid of. Of the whole number of convictions, not one belonged to the bands of either Vesey, or Peter, or Rolla, or Ned, and but few to that of Gullah Jack's. Absolutely true did these five leaders prove to their vow of secrecy, and so died without betraying a single associate. This alas! cannot be said of Monday Gell, who brave and loyal as he was throughout the period of his arrest and trial, yet after sentence of death had been passed upon him, and under the influence of a terror-stricken companion, succumbed to temptation, and for the sake of life, consented to betray his followers. Denmark, Peter, Rolla, Ned, Batteau, and Jesse, were hanged together, July 2, 1822. Ten days later Gullah Jack suffered death on the gallows also. Upon an enormous gallows, erected on the lines near Charleston, twenty-two of the black martyrs to freedom were executed on the 22nd day of the same ill-starred month. A curious circumstance connected with this plot was the high regard in which the insurgents were held by the whites. But instead of my own, I prefer to insert in this place the remarks of the slave judges on this head. In their story of the plot they observed: "The character and condition of most of the insurgents were such as rendered them objects the least liable to suspicion. It is a melancholy truth, that the general good conduct of all the leaders, except Gullah Jack, had secured to them not only the unlimited confidence of their owners, but they had been indulged in every comfort and allowed every privilege compatible with their situation in the community; and although Gullah Jack was not remarkable for the correctness of his deportment, he by no means sustained a bad character. But not only were the leaders of good character and much indulged by their owners, but this was generally the case with all who were convicted, many of them possessed the highest confidence of their owners, and not one of bad character." Comment on this significant fact is unnecessary. It contains a lesson and a warning which a fool need not err in reading and understanding. Oppression is a powder magazine exposed always to the danger of explosion from spontaneous combustion. _Verbum sat sapienti._ Another curious circumstance connected with this history, was the trial and conviction of four white men, on indictments for attempting to incite the slaves to insurrection. They were each sentenced to fine and imprisonment, the fines ranging from $100 to $1,000, and the terms of imprisonment, from three to twelve months. And now for the concluding act of this tragedy, for a final glance at four of its black heroes and martyrs as they appeared to the slave judges who tried them, and to whose hostile pen we are indebted for this last impressive picture of their courage, their fortitude and their greatness of soul. Here it is: "When Vesey was tried, he folded his arms and seemed to pay great attention to the testimony, given against him, but with his eyes fixed on the floor. In this situation he remained immovable, until the witnesses had been examined by the court, and cross-examined by his counsel, when he requested to be allowed to examine the witnesses himself. He at first questioned them in the dictatorial, despotic manner, in which he was probably accustomed to address them; but this not producing the desired effect, he questioned them with affected surprise and concern for bearing false testimony against him; still failing in his purpose, he then examined them strictly as to dates, but could not make them contradict themselves. The evidence being closed, he addressed the court at considerable length * * * When he received his sentence the tears trickled down his cheeks." I cannot, of course, speak positively respecting the exact nature of the thought or feeling which lay back of those sad tears. But of this I am confident that they were not produced by any weak or momentary fear of death, and I am equally sure that they were not caused by remorse for the part which he had taken, as chief of a plot to give freedom to his race. Perhaps they were wrung from him by the Judas-like ingratitude and treachery, which had brought his well-laid scheme to ruin. He was about to die, and it was Wrong not Right which with streaming eyes he saw triumphant. Perhaps, in that solemn moment, he remembered the time, years before, when he might have sailed for Africa, and there have helped to build, in freedom and security, an asylum for himself and people, where all of the glad dreams of his strenuous and stormy life might have been realized, and also how he had put behind him the temptation, "because" as he expressed it, "he wanted to stay and see what he could do for his fellow creatures in bondage." At the thought of it all, the triumph of slavery, the treachery of black men, the immedicable grief which arises from wasted labors and balked purposes, and widespreading failures, is it surprising that in that supreme moment hot tears gushed from the eyes of that stricken but lion-hearted man? But to return to the last picture of the martyrs before their judges: "Rolla when arraigned affected not to understand the charge against him, and when it was at his request further explained to him, assumed with wonderful adroitness, astonishment, and surprise. He was remarkable throughout his trial, for great presence of composure of mind. When he was informed he was convicted and was advised to prepare for death, though he had previously (but after his trial) confessed his guilt, he appeared perfectly confounded, but exhibited no signs of fear. In Ned's behavior there was nothing remarkable, but his countenance was stern and immovable, even whilst he was receiving the sentence of death; from his looks it was impossible to discover or conjecture what were his feelings. Not so with Peter, for in his countenance were strongly marked disappointed ambition, revenge, indignation, and an anxiety to know how far the discoveries had extended, and the same emotions were exhibited in his conduct. He did not appear to fear personal consequences, for his whole behavior indicated the reverse: but exhibited an evident anxiety for the success of their plan, in which his whole soul was embarked. His countenance and behavior were the same when he received his sentence, and his only words were on retiring, 'I suppose you'll let me see my wife and family before I die,' and that not in a supplicating tone. When he was asked a day or two after, if it was possible he could wish to see his master and family murdered who had treated him so kindly, he only replied to the question by a smile." The unquailing courage, the stern fidelity to engagements, and the spirit of devotion and self-sacrifice which characterized so signally the leaders of this slave plot, culminated, it seems to me, in the unbending will and grandeur of soul of Peter Poyas, during those last, tragic days, in Charleston. I doubt if in six thousand years the world has produced a finer example of fortitude and greatness of mind in presence of death, than did this Negro slave exhibit in the black hole of the Charleston workhouse, when conversing with his Chief and Rolla and Ned Bennett, touching their approaching death, and the safety of their faithful and forlorn followers, he uttered thus intrepid injunction: "Do not open your lips! Die silent as you shall see me do." Such words, considering the circumstances under which they were spoken, were worthy of a son of Sparta or of Rome, when Sparta and Rome were at their highest levels as breeders of iron men. It is verily no light thing for the Negroes of the United States to have produced such a man, such a hero and martyr. It is certainly no light heritage, the knowledge, that his brave blood flows in their veins. For history does not record, that any other of its long and shining line of heroes and martyrs, ever met death, anywhere on this globe, in a holier cause or a sublimer mood, than died this Spartan-like slave, more than three quarters of a century ago. May some future Rembrandt have the courage, as the genius, to paint that tragic and imposing scene, with its deep shadows and high lights as I see it now, the dark and hideous dungeon, the sombre figures and grim faces of the four glorious black martyrs, with Peter in the midst, speaking his deathless words: "Do not open your lips! Die silent as you shall see me do." "Right forever on the scaffold, Wrong forever on the Throne, Yet that scaffold sways the future, And, behind the dim unknown, Standeth God within the shadow, Keeping watch above His own." Transcriber's Notes: Passages in italics are indicated by _underscore_. The following misprints have been corrected: "th" corrected to "the" (page 5) "Nego" corrected to "Negro" (page 11) "buiding" corrected to "building" (page 16) "New" corrected to "Ned" (page 19) "behavoir" corrected to "behavior" (page 23) 
34566	----	scanned images of public domain material from the Google Print project.) REMINISCENCES OF SERVICE WITH THE FIRST VOLUNTEER REGIMENT OF GEORGIA, CHARLESTON HARBOR, IN 1863. AN ADDRESS DELIVERED BEFORE THE GEORGIA HISTORICAL SOCIETY, MARCH 3, 1879. BY COLONEL CHARLES H. OLMSTEAD. SAVANNAH, GA.: PRINTED AND PRESENTED BY J. H. ESTILL, PROPRIETOR MORNING NEWS, 1879. ANNALS OF THE WAR. In preparing the following paper, it has been my desire only to record what its title suggests--personal reminiscences. Leaving to other and abler pens the task of writing an accurate history of the scenes and events to which reference is now about to be made, I shall confine myself simply to the task of setting down such things as came under my personal observation, or within the scope of my individual knowledge. I do this the more confidently, remembering the marked interest that invariably attaches to the testimony of an eyewitness, and also bearing in mind (for my own comfort) that this interest will always incline his hearers to leniency in judging literary demerits. It is probable, too, that some of my old comrades will be pleased at this recurrence to an eventful period in their lives, while a younger generation in the ranks may be glad to have placed before them a record, not of the "pomp and circumstance of glorious war," but of its privations, its hardships, its perils, and, it may be added, its lessons of self-abnegation and of devotion to duty. Early in the month of July, 1863, while stationed very comfortably at the Isle of Hope, a courier, "spurring in hot haste," brought orders from Department headquarters that set our camp at once in a turmoil of eager and excited preparation. The 32d Georgia, Col. George P. Harrison, Jr., the 12th and 18th Georgia Battalions, Lieut.-Col. H. D. Capers and Major W. S. Basinger, and a battalion from the First Volunteer Regiment of Georgia, were ordered to proceed with the least possible delay to Savannah, there to take cars for Charleston. A private note at the same time brought the intelligence that that city, so long threatened, and, indeed, once already assailed by sea, was now to undergo a vigorous and combined attack from both land and naval forces. The day was an eventful one to us without this additional stimulant. In the morning we had received the sad news of the fall of Vicksburg and the consequent opening of the Mississippi river to the Federal fleet, from the mountains to the sea, a disaster that secured to the enemy the grand object of his most strenuous exertions, while it severed the young Confederacy in twain and deprived our armies east of the river of all the aid and comfort in the way of material supplies and gallant recruits, that had been so long and so freely drawn from the west bank. We had just learned, too, of the check received by General Lee at the battle of Gettysburg, and now came the summons to tell that our turn had come for a little squeeze in the folds of the traditional "Anaconda," that the New York _Herald_ had so graphically depicted as encircling the South. The men received the orders with enthusiasm--indeed, when was it otherwise with the Southern soldier. Thoroughly conversant, as they all were, with the details of the war, they could not but be depressed by the news of such grave reverses to our arms as the morning's mail had brought them, and they gladly welcomed the relief that active service promised from the tedium of camp life, and the necessity of thinking upon melancholy subjects. Our march began in the midst of a terrific thunder-storm that had the effect, not only of cooling down any overplus of excitement, but also of rendering the road to the city almost a quagmire throughout its entire length. There are pleasanter ways of spending a summer's evening than in trudging for eight miles, through mud and rain, in heavy marching order; but upon this, as on similar occasions during the war, I was deeply impressed by the uncomplaining patience and cheerfulness with which the men endured hardships that few would care to face now, but which, then, were regarded as mere matters of course--distasteful, certainly--but not worth talking about. The storm delayed our march considerably, and upon reaching the depot we found that the 32d Regiment, which had been stationed at a point nearer the city, had already taken train for Charleston. We, too, were soon _en route_, and early in the forenoon of the following day--July 10, 1863--the three battalions were safely in bivouac at the terminus of the Savannah and Charleston Railroad. Here we were met by a staff officer, who informed us that we were to reinforce the garrison of Battery Wagner, on Morris Island, and that at dusk the necessary transportation would be furnished to take us down to the fort. He also told us that the enemy, under cover of a tremendous fire of artillery, from batteries on Folly Island, which had been unmasked during the night, had effected a lodgment on the south end of Morris Island, and had driven our forces back upon "Wagner," which fortification would, doubtless, be attacked on the next day. We learned, also, that another force was threatening James Island, and that the 32d had been sent, with other troops, to meet that danger. Events proved that this last was a feint, to distract attention from the main attack. All day we remained quietly at this place, endeavoring to make out the various points of interest in the beautiful harbor spread before us, and watching the little clouds of smoke that ascended from the parapets of Fort Sumter, as its guns were slowly fired at the enemy. It was a lovely day, clear and bright, without a cloud in the sky. The vegetation about us, freshened by the rain of the previous evening, added sweet odors to the soft sea-breeze that came up the bay. Upon our left the city of Charleston "sat like a queen," her roof tops and spires glittering in the sunlight, while afar down, over an expanse of shining water, could be seen the ships of the fleet swinging lazily at their anchors. The picture was beautiful, and for one I would have found it difficult to realize that beneath it all were the grim front and iron hand of war, but for the dull rumble of the constantly recurring shot from Sumter. That was "the fly in the ointment of the apothecary;" that "the spectre at the feast;" that the refrain ever ringing in our ears and suggesting the unwelcome thought--"it looks peaceful enough now, but just wait until tomorrow." About nightfall we embarked in a steamer that had been sent for us, and, after many delays, were safely landed at Cumming's Point, on the northern end of Morris Island. The line was formed at once, and we set out for Battery Wagner, reporting to its commander, Col. Graham, of the 21st South Carolina Regiment, at about 11 o'clock at night. At the risk of being somewhat tedious, I must here devote a few lines to the topography of this famous island. It is a long, narrow strip of sand, running almost due north and south for about four miles, varying in breadth from, say one hundred yards at the narrowest point to half a mile at the broadest. Upon the west side the island is separated from James Island by Vincent's creek and by broad marshes intersected by numerous salt water creeks, while its eastern shore is washed throughout its entire length by the waters of the Atlantic Ocean. At the south end were the batteries from which our troops had been driven in the morning. Light House Inlet separated this point from Folly Island, and across this inlet the enemy had suddenly thrown their forces, under cover of a furious fire of artillery, as has already been stated. At the northern extremity of the island, known as Cumming's Point, was located Battery Gregg, and about three quarters of a mile to the south of this, Battery Wagner stretched entirely across the island from the sea on the left to Vincent's creek on the right, the battery facing due south. It was an irregular work. On the extreme left a heavy traverse and curtain protected the sally port and gave a flanking fire down the beach to any force that might assail the main work. Then came a salient, one face of which commanded the ship channel, then a broken line, arranged for flanking fires, extending to the marsh. The parapets were solid, and a broad, deep, dry moat added boldness to their profile. Within the parade were bomb-proofs and lightly constructed barracks for the small garrison that had heretofore occupied the work. The armament consisted of one 10 inch Columbiad and some 32-pounders in the sea face, and four or five lighter guns, chiefly howitzers, on the land side. A short distance in front of the right of the line an inward bend of Vincent's creek narrowed the island in such manner as to render it obligatory upon an attacking force to deliver its assault only against the left half of the fort, and also affording scant opportunity for the deployment of such a column. In point of fact this peculiar feature in the topography proved of great service to us, and correspondingly troublesome to the enemy in the operations that followed. The surface of the island is but little raised above the level of the sea and presents a glaring stretch of white sandy hillocks, which were sparsely dotted with the coarse grasses of the coast, and which changed their contour in every high wind. There is but to add that the main channel by which ships enter Charleston harbor runs within easy gunshot of Morris Island from one end of it to the other, then crosses to the northward and passes between Fort Moultrie on Sullivan's Island, and Fort Sumter, built upon a shoal about midway between the two islands. From this rapid sketch, reference being had to the map, it will be readily appreciated that from the base held by the enemy, a _front_ attack upon Charleston could begin here and nowhere else; and that, as the defences of the inner harbor were at that time imperfect, the immediate fall of Wagner would gravely impair the safety of Charleston also. But that little mound of sand had its history to make, a story that will ever bring a flush of honest pride to the face of every man who participated in the long defence. As soon as we had reported to Colonel Graham, the troops were put into position, the 18th Battalion in the salient, the 12th upon its right, and the 1st Georgia on the left, occupying the flanking curtain and the sea face, to which allusion has been made. The guns were all manned by South Carolina artillery and the right and centre of the fort were held by infantry from the same State. The men were cautioned that an attack was expected at daylight, and then, tired out, they slept on their arms upon the ramp, ready at a moment's call for action. Captain C. Werner, of the German Volunteers, was appointed officer of the night, and in a few minutes every sound was hushed save the swash of the waves upon the beach, and the occasional challenge of a sentinel from his post. My own resting place was upon the parapet, and looking up to the cloudless heavens above the solemn glory of the night impressed itself upon my last waking thoughts. At the first peep of dawn, on the 11th, we were wakened by a few straggling shots in our front, followed by a ringing cheer and three distinct volleys of musketry from our picket line. The anticipated assault was upon us. In an instant, the garrison was aroused, and as the men had slept in position they had only to spring to their feet, and we were ready. Now we could see our pickets, their duty having been faithfully performed, retiring rapidly towards our right, in accordance with the instructions they had received, so as to uncover the advancing columns of the enemy. And, then, through the dim, gray light of the morning we could distinguish a dark, blue mass of men moving up the beach towards us, at the double quick, cheering as they came. Then came the thunder of our first gun (what old soldier is there who does not recall _its_ startling effect), then another and another, then the deafening rattle of small arms, mingled with yells and cheers, and we were fairly in the midst of battle. The issue was never doubtful for a moment. The attacking column attempted to deploy after passing the narrow neck in front, but entirely failed to do so; while the dense formation rendered it an easy mark for both infantry and artillery. Still it pressed gallantly on, and some few of the foremost men reached the scarp of the work, only to find themselves unsupported by their comrades, and with no other alternative than to yield themselves prisoners. One brave fellow I saw, however, who had not the thought of yielding in him. Alone he reached the top of the parapet, immediately in front of a 32-pounder, double charged with grape shot. The officer in command (Lieutenant Gilchrist, of South Carolina, if memory serves me,) struck by his bearing, called to him to come in before the gun was fired. His only reply was to put his musket to his shoulder, and a bullet whizzed by Gilchrist's head. The explosion of the gun followed, and a blue and mangled body, all that remained of a brave man and a good soldier, was hurled across the ditch. The engagement was of short duration; the attack had failed, and soon the broken column was in full retreat, rapidly, and without any semblance of order, leaving some hundreds of their number, stretched dead and wounded on the sands, or prisoners in the fort. Our own loss was insignificant in numbers, but the 1st Regiment was sorely bereaved in the death of Captain Werner. This gallant officer was slain early in the fight. He died in the discharge of duty, nobly battling for the land of his adoption. His voice, calling his comrades to arms, had been the first to greet our ears as the morning broke, and now it was hushed forever. Modest, simple, and unpretending in his manners, he had won a warm place in the affections of the command, while his perfect reliability under all circumstances enforced the respect and admiration of all who knew him. Savannah was called upon to mourn the loss of many sons in those terrible years, but none of them had taken up arms in her defense sooner, none suffered privation and imprisonment for her more patiently, and none died more gallantly than Claus Werner. The loss in the 18th Georgia was heavier than in any other organization, as it had occupied the salient, against which the assault was principally directed. Lieutenant Frederick Tupper was severely wounded, and among the killed was young Edward Postell, who now sleeps in Laurel Grove, side by side with a noble brother, who, like himself, as the marble record testifies, "died in battle." Immediately after the action, a singular instance of the ups and downs and uncertainties of warfare, was brought to our attention. Among the first troops to enter Fort Pulaski, at its capture in the previous year, was the 7th Connecticut Regiment, then commanded by Colonel Alfred H. Terry (subsequently Major-General). Both officers and men had behaved towards us with great kindness during the few days that we remained at the fort after its capture, and we had become personally acquainted with quite a number of them. _Now_, we were the victors, and among the prisoners brought in at our end of the line, were many of our old friends of the 7th Connecticut, who recognized and called us by name. The news of the attack created much excitement in Charleston, and during the morning many visitors, both military and civilian, came to the island, some to assure themselves of the continued strength of our position; others to gratify a pardonable curiosity. Among the former was Brig. Gen. Ripley, the district commander, who was much elated at the successful issue of the fight, and who wished to examine, personally, the ground in front of the fort. Now, at one point in our front, torpedoes had been planted the day before, and to prevent any of the garrison from treading upon them, a sentinel was placed to warn them off. At that time the man who held this post was Private Donnolly, of Company G, 1st Georgia, a native of the Emerald Isle, as his name would indicate, and a true son of his mother. Of any knowledge of ordinary military manoeuvres he was calmly innocent. On one occasion a Lieutenant of the company asked him, impatiently: "Donnolly, why _don't_ you keep step? All the men are complaining about you." And received the reply: "Faith, its divil a one of 'em can kape shtep wid me!" Past this hero General Ripley spurred his horse, and was riding straight for the dangerous ground, when he was suddenly brought to a halt by a loud "Shtop!" uttered in the most emphatic tone, and the emphasis receiving additional point from Donnolly's attitude, as he stood with his musket at full cock, at the shoulder, and squinted along the barrel, taking dead aim at the General. For a moment there was strong probability of a vacancy among the Brigadiers of the Confederate army, but an officer rushed forward, struck up the gun, and explained to General Ripley the reason for his being halted. Subsequently, our sentinel was asked: "Donnolly, what were you going to do?" "I was going to shot him." "And why?" "To kape him from being blown up with the saltpaters, to be sure." Donnolly's comrades, in view of his little infirmities of drill, had always insisted upon his having a place in the rear rank, but on this day he was heard to say, with much satisfaction: "There's moighty little throuble getting in the front rank now." Our experience for the next week was a trying one. Failing in the direct attack, the enemy's endeavor seemed to be to make our berth uncomfortably warm, and here the success was undoubted. Day after day the monitors--some four or five in number--and that tremendous war vessel, the "New Ironsides," would take their positions directly opposite the fort, at a distance of six to eight hundred yards, the wooden ships being at much longer range. Then would be poured in upon us a steady stream of shot and shell, much more pleasant to dwell upon as a memory than it was to endure, while upon the land side new batteries were built by the enemy, and each day the weight of metal thrown against us would seem to be heavier than the day before. I well remember the approach of the first monitor. How deliberate its movements; how insignificant its appearance; the deck almost level with the water, and the little black turret giving small promise of its hidden power for attack. My curiosity about the vessel was great, but was soon to be satisfied without stint. There was a slow revolving motion of the turret, a cloud of smoke, a deafening roar, and then, with the rush and noise of an express train, the huge fifteen inch shell, visible at every point of its trajectory, passed over head and burst far in the rear. The next shell exploded in the parapet, covering several of us with dirt. The introduction was complete. Thenceforward we held these singular looking craft in wholesome respect. The "Ironsides," however, was probably the most formidable ship of the fleet. She is said to have carried at bow and stern two hundred pound Parrott guns, and nine eleven-inch Dahlgrens on a side. Her broadsides were not fired in volley, but gun after gun, in rapid succession, the effect upon those who were at the wrong end of the guns being exceedingly demoralizing. Whenever she commenced there was a painful uncertainty as to what might happen before she got through. We had but one gun with which to fight the monitors--the ten-inch Columbiad located just over the sally-port. True, the thirty-twos were tried for a while, but they were so impotent to harm the heavy mail of the ships that their use was soon discontinued. This Columbiad was manned, I think, by the Matthew's Artillery, of South Carolina, and the gunner, Frazer Matthews, was as noble a soldier as the siege produced. In the midst of the hottest fire he would stand quietly on the chassis directing the aiming of the gun with all the coolness and precision of target practice. Never flurried, always intent upon the work before him, and never giving the signal to fire until the aim was taken to his entire satisfaction, the accuracy of his marksmanship was great. Again and again I saw the solid ten-inch shot strike upon the sides of the monitors, only to break into a thousand fragments, that would splash into the sea like so much grape-shot. At first we thought that no harm was done by our fire, but we learned afterwards that the concussion within the turret was tremendous, and that, among others, one very prominent officer had been killed by it. Unfortunately, our Columbiad was soon dismounted, and although a new carriage was supplied, that, too, was knocked to pieces in short order. Indeed, this experience was repeated half a dozen times. Such continuous cannonading of course seriously impaired the integrity of our parapets. But as at that stage of the siege the firing ceased at nightfall, opportunity was given to repair damages, and all night long the garrison would work, filling sand bags and painfully endeavoring to make good the yawning chasms and ragged craters left by the terrible missiles that had been hurled into the fort during the day. There was a constant strain upon all the faculties, that gave little time for anything save the stern duties of the hour, and yet there were humorous incidents ever occurring that even now will bring smiles to the lips of all who remember them. Who can forget "Aquarius," the water bearer, as he was dubbed--a simple-hearted fellow, from the back woods of South Carolina, who devoted his time to bringing water to the wounded. Both heels of his shoes were carried away by a shell, and from that time he went barefooted--there was "danger in shoes," he said. And, then, the simple manner in which, on returning from one of his trips to the well, he held up one full jug and only the handle of another, saying, apologetically, "Oh, a shell took hit." I can see in my mind's eye, too, the brilliant engineering feat of a member of the Oglethorpe Light Infantry, who, while cooking a little dinner in the open parade, provided protection for himself by placing an empty flour barrel alongside of the fire, and gravely sticking his head into it whenever the scream of a shell warned him of approaching trouble. During the week General Taliaferro, of Virginia, assumed command, and on the night of the 17th fresh troops were sent to relieve us--and it may be mentioned here, that this plan of changing commanders, and the garrison (or at least a part of it), every few days, was continued throughout the siege. In fact, the strain upon body and mind was so unremitting, that a week's tour of duty was about as much as any men could undergo at a time, as there was no rest day nor night. We were landed at Fort Johnson, on James Island, a little before dawn on the 18th, and were just getting comfortably settled in the village then existing at that point, when a tremendous cannonading began against the fort we had just left. All day long it continued, exceeding in fierceness and rapidity anything we had yet witnessed. The noise was terrific, great clouds of smoke hung over the devoted battery, and huge columns of sand rose high in the air, as shell after shell rent the parapets, while only an occasional shot in return gave any sign that there was life left in the garrison. With mingled feelings we watched the bombardment, full of anxiety for the ultimate result, and for the safety of our comrades in the fort, there was, also, it must be confessed, a profound complacency at the thought that we were well out of it ourselves. A little before dusk the firing suddenly ceased on the part of the enemy, and almost instantaneously a rapid succession of guns from Sumter, trained for the beach of Morris Island, gave notice that another attempt was to be made to throw a column into Wagner by escalade. It was even so. General Gillmore, fully alive to the difficulties which the topographical features of the ground presented for regular approaches, and counting with reason upon the damaging effect of the awful bombardment, both upon the work itself and the "morale" of the garrison, had determined to make one more effort to wrest the position from the Confederates by storm. To this end he had organized a strong column of two brigades (a third brigade being held in reserve), under command of General Seymour, the formation being made behind the sand hills. Its advance was supported by light batteries, and as the heavy firing ceased, it swept forward with a rush. An officer, who was in Wagner, told me on the following day that the assault came very near meeting with perfect success, for, although it was anticipated, the awful artillery fire had compelled the garrison to seek shelter in the bomb-proofs. The exits from these places were narrow, and there was much trouble in getting the men to the ramparts in time to repel the onslaught. As it was, the result was long doubtful. A part of the enemy's column effected a lodgment in the salient on the left, and not until reinforcements were sent down from James Island to the assistance of the garrison, were these assailants finally overpowered and the entire fort once more in the hands of the Confederates. The attack was bloody and disastrous to the attacking force. Its leader, General Seymour, was dangerously wounded, and General Strong, with many of his best officers, and hundreds of the men, were killed, while the total loss in killed, wounded and prisoners, has been variously estimated at from 1,500 to 2,200 men. Nearly all of the enemy's regiments were in a state of disorganization, and gloom and dismay settled upon them. In this connection it will be of interest to state that, during the siege, the Federal signal book was in our possession, having been captured on the person of a signal officer, near Georgetown, South Carolina. Its valuable secrets had been drawn from him by a Confederate who shared his place of imprisonment in the garb of a Federal prisoner. More than once the knowledge thus acquired proved of essential service to us. On this occasion, the following dispatch from General Gillmore to Admiral Dahlgren had been intercepted, and in General Beauregard's possession hours before the assault: "Continue the bombardment throughout the day; at sunset redouble it. The assault will commence at seven." Notwithstanding this disaster, General Gillmore, with great tenacity of purpose worthy of admiration, gave no evidence of having been diverted from his objective point. Though apparently convinced of the futility of all efforts at a _coup de main_, he at once settled down into an endeavor to reduce Wagner by parallels and trenches. Time was necessary to do this, however, and time was the salvation of Charleston, for upon _our_ side the distinguished officer who commanded the department, General Beauregard, was not idle, and nothing was left undone for the defence, not only of the outworks, but of the inner harbor, and of adjacent islands and inlets. The batteries on Sullivan's Island were strengthened, heavy additions were made to the armament of Sumter, new batteries were constructed within the city limits and upon the shores of James Island; some to command the ship channel, and others to deliver a flanking fire, though at a long distance, upon the enemy's works on Morris Island, while every device that the highest engineering skill could suggest, was gallantly acted upon by the garrison of Wagner to prolong its defence and retard its fall to the latest possible moment. Torpedoes and submarine batteries were placed in the waters of the harbor also, and, although I did not learn that one of them was ever exploded, there can be no doubt that they exerted a great moral effect, and deterred the vessels of the fleet from prowling around where we did not want them. On the night of the 22d of July our second tour of duty at Wagner began. We found General Taliaferro still in command, and the garrison increased to about 1,500 men--though changes were so constantly being made that, without reference to statistical reports, I will not pretend to accuracy on this point. On every hand could be seen evidences of the severe trial through which the fort had already passed and was daily called upon to endure. The barracks and store houses were in ruins, and all of the slopes and inclines, upon which the eye of the engineer had loved to rest, were ploughed up in huge furrows, or pitted with cavernous holes that marked the bursting place of shells. But sand has many advantages over masonry, and wherever during the day the injuries done had impaired the defensive powers of the fort, a thousand busy workers would bend their energies, and the morning light would show guns remounted, parapets repaired and a strong front still presented to the enemy. On the 24th of July the bombardment was unusually severe. The iron-clads, having nothing in Wagner to oppose them (for on that day our 10-inch gun was useless), came in as close as the channel would permit, shortly after daylight, and in conjunction with the land batteries poured in an awful fire upon us for hours, while from our side, Moultrie, Sumter, Gregg, and the batteries on James Island, Johnson, Haskell, and Cheves, joined in the fray. It was certainly a sublime yet terrible sight, never to be forgotten by any who witnessed it. The impact of tremendous missiles, followed by the roar of their explosion, shook the solid earth, and the loud thunder of the guns seemed to rival the artillery of the heavens as its unceasing reverberations smote upon the ear. Grave doubts were entertained as to the ability of our fort to stand much longer this dreadful storm, but help came. About noon the steamer Alice (that had recently run the blockade), under command of Colonel Edward C. Anderson, of this city, came rapidly down the harbor from Charleston, bearing a white flag, and laden, as we learned, with a large number of Federal wounded, who were to be exchanged for Confederate wounded. She steered directly for a position between the fleet and Wagner. One shot was fired over her, but in a moment the cannonading ceased, and never was relief more welcome or more needed. Serious injury had been done to Wagner, injury, indeed, that a short continuance of the firing might have rendered irremediable, as upon inspection it was found that there remained but about eighteen inches of sand as a covering for the logs, of which our main service magazine was built. One shell had carried away the air-flue and the flame, as it burst, had lit up the interior of the magazine, very much to the dismay of the men who were serving there, and who came tumbling out head over heels--evidently not standing on the order of their coming--only desiring to come quickly. Colonel Anderson, in speaking of this occurrence, tells me that as he came down the bay, the gravity of our position was fully realized by him, and his determination formed to pursue the course he did in order to bring the firing to an end as soon as possible. He was warned off as he drew near the fleet, and a shell fired over him, but paid no attention to the warning, and succeeded in what he aimed to do. It was the right thing done at the right time, and, as a member of the garrison, I beg to make here my acknowledgments of the service performed. The bombardment was not renewed that day, and during the afternoon General Taliaferro worked to such good purpose that nightfall found the principal damages substantially repaired. On this occasion was brought to my attention a striking instance of the fact that a lofty heroism and nobility of soul may exist where an ordinary observer would never expect to find them. In the ranks of Company K, of the 1st Georgia, was a man from Bulloch county. Before his enlistment, a charcoal burner; he was of mean exterior, sickly frame and complaining disposition. He had long been a butt for the rough witticisms of his comrades, and more than once came to me for redress. What troubled him most was that the men told him he had been "dug-up," an implication upon the manner of his entry into the world--that he resented bitterly. During the bombardment of this day he had, in the performance of customary guard duty, been posted at the rampart, near the flag staff, to watch for any movements of the enemy that might indicate the formation of an assaulting column. At the end of his tour, Lieutenant Cyrus Carter started from the guard quarters to relieve him. Carter told me that as he crossed the parade, he did so with the profound conviction that he would be struck down before reaching the other side, so appalling was the storm of projectiles that tore up the ground around him. What was his surprise, therefore, to find the sentinel, not sheltered behind the parapet, as it was intended he should be, but quietly walking back and forth upon its very crest, for the expressed reason that he "couldn't see good down thar." The flag staff had been shattered at his side, and with a strip torn from his shirt, he had tied the colors to the stump and continued his walk. As may be well supposed our charcoal burner escaped criticism after that. From this time forward the works of the enemy were pushed forward most assiduously. One parallel after another was opened and breaching batteries established, armed with heavy sea coast mortars and rifle guns of tremendous size and power. On our part, corresponding exertions were made. A heavy fire from our howitzers and other guns was maintained; sharp-shooters, armed with Whitworth rifles, kept unremitting watch upon the movements of the enemy, and a well placed line of rifle-pits, two or three hundred yards in our front, gave additional strength to our position and seriously annoyed the besiegers. There were two sides to the matter of sharp-shooting, however, and the loss of some brave officers and men, killed by bullets fired at a thousand yards distance, or more, warned us against anything like heedless exposure. The discomforts and privations to which the garrison was subjected rapidly increased, and soon attained proportions that will be remembered by those who endured them, like the details of some horrible dream. To avoid an unnecessary loss of life, the men were kept as much as possible within the bomb-proofs during the day time; but the gun squads and riflemen, of course, were constantly exposed, as well as numbers who could find no room in the shelters, or who preferred taking the fresh air, with all its attendant hazards. From these there were constant additions to the list of our losses. The wounded (and the wounds were mostly of a terrible character), were all brought in among the men, and the surgical operations were performed in the midst of the crowd, by the light of candles, that dimly burned in the heavy air from which all vitality had been drawn. The cries of these poor sufferers, the unceasing roar of artillery above and around, the loss of rest, the want of pure air, and the baking heat of a Southern summer, all combined to render the position almost unbearable. The enemy's dead from the two assaults had been buried immediately in front of the moat; those from our garrison just back of the fort. From the description of the island it will be understood that shallow graves only could be given--graves from which a high wind would blow the light, sandy soil, or which a bursting shell would rend, exposing the bodies to the sunshine. The whole air was tainted with corruption, and finally the little wells, from which our supply of water was drawn, became so foul, from the same cause, that their use was abandoned, and thenceforward drinking water was sent from the city of Charleston. Now began a most remarkable feature of the siege, and one that has marked a new era in the science of attack and imposed new and startling problems upon the military engineer charged with the construction of permanent fortifications. I allude, of course, to the battering down of the walls of Fort Sumter from a distance of two and a half miles. The power of rifled guns against masonry had been conclusively demonstrated during the previous year at Fort Pulaski. There, however, the breaching batteries were distant about one mile, but there were few who could believe that at more than twice that range Sumter was seriously endangered. It had been thought that the grand old fort was safe so long as Wagner held out. But one morning a new battery opened; the shot and shell went high above our heads, and were hurled with irresistible power against the walls of Sumter. Great masses of masonry from the outer wall fell as each shot struck, and ere many days it seemed as though nought but a pile of ruins would mark the spot. Here, however, General Beauregard gave splendid evidence of his readiness to meet emergencies, and of his skill as an engineer. As soon as it became evident that the fort must yield to the power of the heavy artillery brought to bear upon it, he rapidly withdrew all the guns that could be utilized for defensive purposes at other points, and from the very ruins of Sumter, constructed, as it were, a new fortification, fully adequate to the purpose of commanding the ship channel to the city. But all other power of the fort was gone, and in the subsequent events on Morris Island, Sumter took no part. This bombardment lasted for seven days, and in that time a first class masonry fort was reduced to a shapeless ruin from batteries located at points far beyond the remotest distance at which any engineer had ever dreamed of danger. The debris of the walls fell in a natural slope and served as an impenetrable protection to the lower casemates of the channel face, in which the new battery was placed. Some little time elapsed, however, before these changes were completed, and I am unable to understand why Admiral Dahlgren did not meanwhile avail himself of the opening thus offered and push with his iron-clads for the inner harbor. We certainly looked for such a dash, and General Gillmore was evidently chagrined at the fact that it was not made. Whether or not such a course would have been successful is problematical. There can be no doubt, though, that it would have added grave complications to the Confederate military position, to say the least of it. At such time as the 1st Regiment was not on duty at Wagner, it was posted at Fort Johnson, the point of James Island nearest to Morris Island. For a time our comrades of the 12th and 18th Battalions shared this post with us, but as the season progressed, we were separated; the 12th going to Sumter and other points, and the 18th to Fort Moultrie, where it performed months of arduous and trying service. At Fort Johnson, which, up to that time had possessed no special strength, very heavy works were constructed, having reference not only to the inner harbor, but also to the operations of the enemy on Morris Island. These batteries, as well as the others along the shores of James Island, proved very annoying to the enemy, and the accuracy of their fire is mentioned more than once in his reports. A most interesting feature in this summer's operations was the development of the attacking power of movable torpedoes. Special interest attaches to a boat that was brought from Mobile, by railroad, and which was generally known, from its shape, as the "Cigar Boat." Its history is linked with deeds of the loftiest heroism and devotion of self to the service of country. The story is familiar to all of us, yet I cannot refrain from repeating it. This boat was one day made fast to the wharf at Fort Johnson, preparatory to an expedition against the fleet, and taking advantage of the opportunity, I examined it critically. It was built of boiler iron, about thirty feet in length, with a breadth of beam of four feet by a vertical depth of six feet, the figures being approximate only. Access to the interior was had by two man-holes in the upper part, covered by hinged caps, into which were let bull's eyes of heavy glass, and through these the steersman looked in guiding the motions of the craft. The boat floated with these caps raised only a foot or so above the level of the water. The motive power was a propeller, to be worked by hand of the crew, cranks being provided in the shaft for that purpose. Upon each side of the exterior were horizontal vanes, or wings, that could be adjusted at any angle from the interior. When it was intended that the boat should go on an even keel, whether on the surface or under, these vanes were kept level. If it was desired to go below the water, say, for instance, at an angle of ten degrees, the vanes were fixed at that angle and the propeller worked. The resistance of the water against the vanes would then carry the boat under. A reversal of this method would bring it to the surface again. A tube of mercury was arranged to mark the depth of descent. It had been the design of the inventor to approach near to an enemy, then to submerge the boat and pass under the ship to be attacked, towing a floating torpedo to be exploded by means of electricity as soon as it touched the keel. Insufficient depth of water in the harbor prevented this manner of using the boat, however, and so she was rigged with a long spar at the bow, to which a torpedo was attached, to be fired by actual concussion with the object to be destroyed. This change necessarily made the boat more unwieldy, and probably had something to do with the tragic circumstances of her after history. It will be remembered that she was sunk at the wharf at Port Johnson by the waves from a passing steamer, while a part of the crew were in her. Days elapsed before she could be raised. The dead were removed, and a second crew volunteered. They made repeated and successful experiments in the harbor, but finally they, too, went down and, from some unknown cause, failed to come up. Once more a long time passed before the boat was raised, and then the poor remains of the devoted crew were taken from her in an indescribable condition. Yet, still another set of men came forward and volunteered for the duty. Surely love of country and courage of the sublimest type never found better exponents than these. The expedition started, but did not return. That night the sloop-of-war, "Housatonic," was reported as having been sunk by a torpedo in the lower harbor, but of the gallant men who had thus accomplished what they aimed to do, nothing definite was ever known until after the war, when divers, in endeavoring to raise the Housatonic, discovered the cigar boat with the bleached bones of her crew lying near the wreck of the noble ship that she had destroyed. The line of rifle pits in front of Wagner had been gallantly held by our men during the siege, and had sorely troubled the besiegers. On the 21st of August an infantry force attempted the capture of these pits, without success. On the afternoon of the 26th, a heavy artillery fire was brought to bear upon them without dislodging the holders, but that night a dashing charge of the 24th Massachusetts Regiment gained the position, capturing most of the Confederates who held it, about seventy men. General Gillmore's fifth and last parallel was at once established on the ground thus won, and before dawn on the 27th, under cover of the flying sap, the trenches were pushed about one hundred yards nearer to the fort. Notwithstanding this success, General Gillmore, in his report, speaks of this period as "the dark and gloomy days of the siege," and of the progress made as "discouragingly slow, and even painfully uncertain." The ground between his front and Wagner was thickly studded with torpedoes, his left flank was searched by the unremitting fire from our batteries on James Island. The head of the sap was slowly pushed forward under the ceaseless fire of howitzers and sharp-shooters from the entire front of the fort, while last, though not least, the besiegers had now reached a point where every onward step compelled them to dig through the bodies of their dead, who had been buried some weeks before. "In the emergency," General Gillmore availed himself of his superior resources in artillery, to keep down the active resistance of Wagner, and to this end every gun ashore and afloat was turned upon it. The final bombardment began at daybreak on the 5th of September and for forty-two hours continued with a severity and awful terror beyond the power of words to describe. That night, as witnessed from Fort Johnson, where the 1st Regiment were stationed, the scene was grand in the extreme. The lurid flushes of the guns, their unceasing roar, the shells from every description of tremendous artillery, that could be tracked through the air by flaming fuses; the mortar shell rising in stately curve and steady sweep, the Parrott shell darting like lightning in its mission of death, the missiles from the fleet booming along the water and bursting in Wagner with cruel accuracy, the glare of calcium lights, bringing out every detail of our works as in the noonday--all these filled the souls of Confederate spectators with awe, and found their painful antithesis in--_the silence of Wagner_. The end had come. All through the 6th the bombardment continued, and that evening the sap had reached the counter scarp of the work, and only the ditch and parapet separated the combatants. The assault was ordered for nine o'clock on the morning of the 7th, but by midnight on the 6th the place was evacuated by the Confederates, the whole force being taken off the island in row boats. Some few of these boats were intercepted, but the garrison, as a garrison, was saved. The enemy at once occupied both Wagner and Gregg, and Morris Island, in its entirety, was in their possession. So ended the siege of Battery Wagner, after a defense of fifty-seven days: a defense that may, without question, be said to have saved Charleston. The outwork was taken, but the inner citadel still proudly stood. Still from the ruins of Sumter, still from historic Moultrie, still from the "City by the Sea," the Southern Cross fluttered in the breezes of the bay and bade defiance to the foe. The evacuation so successfully accomplished, in the face of so many difficulties, under so terrible a fire, and with the enemy in such close proximity, has justly been considered a remarkable event and the crowning glory of the defense. That had been protracted to the latest moment, and when resistance was no longer possible, the brave garrison was saved to add fresh lustre to the Southern arms on many another field. On the afternoon of the 8th of September, notice was received by the commanders of batteries within range of Sumter, that a boat attack would be made upon that fortification during the night, and they were ordered at a given signal to open with all their guns upon the point where the boats were expected. The signals of the enemy had again been interpreted, and upon our side there was perfect readiness. The garrison of Sumter prepared to meet the enemy upon the slope with a shower of musketry. The guns of our contiguous batteries were carefully trained upon the right spot before dark, and as soon as night had fallen, a Confederate ironclad moved into position to add the fire of her powerful guns. Silently the night wore on; for hours not a sound broke its stillness; the men sat drowsily by the guns, and the belief gained ground that the proposed attack had been abandoned, when suddenly there was a twinkle of a musket from Sumter, then a rocket soared in the air, and then the bellowing thunder of the great guns and the explosion of shells instantaneously and startlingly contrasted with the sleepy quiet of our long hours of watching. The assault was repulsed with considerable loss to the assailants, but with no loss to the garrison. It is singular to note from General Gillmore's report, as an evidence of a want of harmony between the land and naval forces, that two independent expeditions were organized for this attack--one by Admiral Dahlgren, the other by General Gillmore. The report says: "The only arrangement for concert of action between the two parties, that were finally made, were intended simply to prevent accident or collision between them. Each party was deemed in itself sufficiently strong for the object in view." The naval expedition, consisting of some twenty-five or thirty boats, came directly from the ships, in tow of steam tugs, and, reaching Sumter first, at once delivered its attack. The land forces, about 400 strong, embarked in their boats in Vincent's creek. The windings of the creek probably delayed them, and they had not quite reached the fort when the naval assault was made and repulsed. All hope of a surprise being at an end, the second force retired. From this time the active operations for the reduction of Charleston upon this line virtually ceased, though an interchange of artillery fire was continued with more or less activity for many months. Not until Sherman's great army swept through South Carolina, and the dying days of the Confederacy were at hand, did the proud city bow her head, and yield to the inevitable. Mr. President, my story is told. It has been my endeavor to place graphically before this audience a sketch of some of the scenes of that eventful summer. They have passed into history, but history fails to record a thousand little details which breathe life into the picture. Some of these I have tried to present. Certainly no period of the war was more fruitful in dramatic incident, and in no portion of the Confederacy was there a grander exhibition of scientific warfare. The wonderful developments of engineering skill, both in the attack and in the defense, will ever mark the siege as a most memorable one, while the share of success attained by each side robs the memory of the event of any sting of mortification for Federal and Confederate alike. Sure am I that every member of the First Georgia who participated in these stirring scenes will, to his latest day, feel his heart throb with pride in saying, "I was at Charleston in 1863." Savannah, March, 1879. NOTE.--Referring to the action of Col. Anderson, related on page 10, it is proper to state that the steamer Alice was sent out from Charleston _in conformity to an explicit arrangement that had been entered into by the commanding Generals for an exchange of wounded on that day_. She carried a "hospital flag," as well as the ordinary flag of truce. Soon after the firing ceased, she was met by the Federal steamer Cosmopolitan, bearing the Confederate wounded, when the exchange was effected. Both steamers then returned, and the truce ended. C. H. O. Transcriber's Note Variable spelling, e.g. defense and defence, is preserved as printed. 
5696	----	A YANKEE GIRL AT FORT SUMTER BY ALICE TURNER CURTIS AUTHOR OF The Little Maid's Historical Series, etc. Illustrated by ISABEL W. CALEY PHILADELPHIA 1920 INTRODUCTION Sylvia Fulton, a little Boston girl, was staying with her father and mother in the beautiful city of Charleston, South Carolina, just before the opening of the Civil War. She had become deeply attached to her new friends, and their chivalrous kindness toward the little northern girl, as well as Sylvia's perilous adventure in Charleston Harbor, and the amusing efforts of the faithful negro girl to become like her young mistress, all tend to make this story one that every little girl will enjoy reading, and from which she will learn of far-off days and of the high ideals of southern honor and northern courage. I. SYLVIA II. A NEW FRIEND III. SYLVIA IN TROUBLE IV. AN UNEXPECTED JOURNEY V. ESTRALLA AND ELINOR VI. SYLVIA AT THE PLANTATION VII. SYLVIA SEES A GHOST VIII. A TWILIGHT TEA-PARTY IX. TROUBLESOME WORDS X. THE PALMETTO FLAG XI. SYLVIA CARRIES A MESSAGE XII. ESTRALLA HELPS XIII. A HAPPY AFTERNOON XIV. MR. ROBERT WAITE XV. "WHERE IS SYLVIA?" XVI. IN DANGER XVII. A CHRISTMAS PRESENT XVIII. GREAT NEWS XIX. SYLVIA MAKES A PROMISE XX. "TWO LITTLE DARKY GIRLS" XXI. FORT SUMTER IS FIRED UPON CHAPTER I SYLVIA "Your name is in a song, isn't it?" said Grace Waite, as she and her new playmate, Sylvia Fulton, walked down the pleasant street on their way to school. "Is it? Can you sing the song?" questioned Sylvia eagerly, her blue eyes shining at what promised to be such a delightful discovery. Grace nodded smilingly. She was a year older than Sylvia, nearly eleven years old, and felt that it was quite proper that she should be able to explain to Sylvia more about her name than Sylvia knew herself. "It is something about 'spelling,'" she explained, and then sang, very softly: "'Then to Sylvia let us sing, That Sylvia is spelling. She excels each mortal thing, Upon the dull earth dwelling.' "I suppose it means she was the best speller," Grace said soberly. "I think it is a lovely song," said Sylvia. "I'll tell my mother about it. I am so glad you told me, Grace." Sylvia Fulton was ten years old, and had lived in Charleston, South Carolina, for the past year. Before that the Fultons had lived in Boston. Grace Waite lived in the house next to the one which Mr. Fulton had hired in the beautiful southern city, and the two little girls had become fast friends. They both attended Miss Patten's school. Usually Grace's black mammy, Esther, escorted them to and from Miss Patten's, but on this morning in early October they were allowed to go by themselves. As they walked along they could look out across the blue harbor, and see sailing vessels and rowboats coming and going. In the distance were the three forts whose historic names were known to every child in Charleston. Grace never failed to point them out to the little northern girl, and to repeat their names: "Castle Pinckney," she would say, pointing to the one nearest the city, and then to the long dark forts at the mouth of the harbor, "Fort Sumter, and Fort Moultrie." "Don't stop to tell me the names of those old forts this morning," said Sylvia. "I know just as much about them now as you do. We shall be late if we don't hurry." Miss Patten's house stood in a big garden which ran nearly to the water's edge. The schoolroom opened on each side to broad piazzas, and there was always the pleasant fragrance of flowers in the big airy room. Sylvia was sure that no one could be more beautiful than Miss Patten. "She looks just like one of the ladies in your 'Godey's Magazine,'" she had told her mother, on returning home from her first day at school. And with her pretty soft black curls, her rosy cheeks and pleasant voice, no one could imagine a more desirable teacher than Miss Rosalie Pattten. There were just twelve little girls in her school. There were never ten, or fourteen. Miss Patten would never engage to take more than twelve pupils; and the twelve always came. Mrs. Waite, Grace's mother, had told Mrs. Fulton that Sylvia was very fortunate to attend the school. School had opened the previous week, and Sylvia had begun to feel quite at home with her new schoolmates. The winter before, Mrs. Fulton had taught her little daughter at home; so this was her first term at Miss Patten's. Miss Patten always stood near the schoolroom door until all her pupils had arrived. As each girl entered the room she made a curtsey to the pretty teacher, and then said "good-morning" to the pupils who had already arrived, and took her seat. When the clock struck nine Miss Rosalie would take her place behind the desk on the platform at the further end of the room, and say a little prayer. Then the pupils were ready for their lessons. "Isn't Miss Rosalie lovely," Sylvia whispered as she and Grace moved to their seats, "and doesn't she wear pretty clothes?" Grace nodded. She had been to Miss Rosalie's school for three years, and she wondered a little at Sylvia's admiration for their teacher, although she too thought Miss Patten looked exactly like a fashion plate. Grace was eager to get to her desk. From where she sat she could see the grim lines of the distant forts; and this morning they had a new value and interest for her; for at breakfast she had heard her father say that, although the forts were occupied by the soldiers of the United States Government, it was only justice that South Carolina should control them, and if the State seceded from the Union Charleston must take possession of the forts. With the consent of the United States Government if possible, but, if this was refused, by force. Grace had been thinking about this all the morning, wondering if Charleston men would really send off the soldiers in the forts. She had not spoken of this to Sylvia as they came along the street facing the harbor, and now as she looked at the distant forts on guard at the entrance of the harbor, she resolved to ask Miss Rosalie why the United States should interfere with the "Sovereign State of South Carolina," which her father had said would defend its rights. "Question time" was just before the morning session ended. Then each pupil could ask a question. But as a rule only one or two of the girls had any inquiry to make. To-day, however, there were several who had questions to ask and Grace waited with what patience she could until it was her turn. When Miss Rosalie smiled at her and called her name, Grace rose and said: "Please, Miss Rosalie, if Charleston owns the forts, could anyone take them away?" The teacher's dark eyes seemed to grow larger and brighter, and she straightened her slender shoulders as if preparing to defend the rights of her State. "My dear girl, who would question the right of South Carolina to control all forts on her territory? We all realize that this is a time of uncertainty for our beloved State; we may be treated with harshness, with injustice, but every loyal Carolinian will protect his State." The little girls looked at each other with startled eyes. What was Miss Rosalie talking about, they wondered, and what did Grace Waite mean about anybody "taking" Fort Sumter or Fort Moultrie? Of course nobody could do such a thing. School was dismissed with less ceremony than usual that morning, and the little girls started off in groups, talking and questioning each other about what Miss Rosalie had said. Two or three ran after Grace and Sylvia to ask Grace what she meant by her question. "Of course we know that northern people want to take our slaves away from us," declared Elinor Mayhew, the oldest girl in school, whose dark eyes and curling hair were greatly admired by auburn-haired, blue-eyed Sylvia, "but of course they can't do that. But how could they take our forts?" "I don't know," responded Grace. "That's why I asked Miss Rosalie. I guess I'll have to ask my father." "We'll all ask our fathers," said Elinor, "and to-morrow we will tell each other what they say. I don't suppose YOUR father would care if the forts were taken," and she turned suddenly toward Sylvia. "I suppose all the Yankees would like to tell us what we ought to do." Sylvia looked at her in surprise. The tall girl had never taken any notice of the little Boston girl before, and Sylvia could not understand why Elinor should look at her so scornfully or speak so unkindly. The other girls had stopped talking, and now looked at Sylvia as if wondering what she would say. "I don't know what you mean," she answered bravely, "but I know one thing: my father would want what was right." "That's real Yankee talk," said Elinor. "They say slavery isn't right." There was a little murmur of laughter among the other girls. For in 1860 the people of South Carolina believed they were quite right in buying negroes for slaves, and in selling them when they desired; so these little girls, some of whom already "owned" a colored girl who waited upon them, had no idea but what slavery was a right and natural condition, and were amused at Elinor's words. "Why do you want to be so hateful, Elinor?" demanded Grace, before Sylvia could reply. "Sylvia has not said or done anything to make you talk to her this way," and Grace linked her arm in Sylvia's, and stood facing the other girls. "Well, Grace Waite, you can associate with Yankees if you wish to. But my mother says that Miss Patten ought not to have Sylvia Fulton in her school. Come on, girls; Grace Waite can do as she pleases," and Elinor, followed by two or three of the older girls, went scornfully down the street. "Sylvia! Wait!" and a little girl about Sylvia's age came running down the path. It was Flora Hayes; and, next to Grace Waite, Sylvia liked her the best of any of her new companions. "Don't mind what Elinor Mayhew says. She's always horrid when she dares to be," said Flora. Flora's father was a wealthy cotton planter, and their Charleston home was in one of the historic mansions of that city. Beside that there was the big old house on the Ashley River ten miles from the city, where the family stayed a part of the time. Flora's eyes were as blue as Sylvia's, and her hair was very much the same color. She was always smiling and friendly, and was better liked than Elinor Mayhew, who, as Flora said, was always ready to tease the younger girls. "I don't know what she meant," said Sylvia as, with Grace on one side and Flora on the other, they started toward home. "She is just hateful," declared Grace. "I wish I had not asked Miss Rosalie about the forts. But I did want to know. It would be dreadful not to see them where they have always been." "Oh, Grace! You didn't think they were going to move the forts to Washington, did you?" laughed Flora. "I know better than that. Taking the forts means that the Government of the United States would own them instead of South Carolina." Grace laughed good-naturedly. She was always as ready to laugh at her own mistakes as at those of others; and in the year that Sylvia had known her she had never seen Grace vexed or angry. Both Grace and Flora advised Sylvia not to tell her mother of Elinor's unkindness, or of her taunting words. But it was rather difficult for Sylvia to keep a secret from her mother. "You see, it will make your mother sorry, and she will fret about it," Flora had said; and at this Sylvia had decided that no matter what happened at school she would not tell her mother about it. She almost dreaded seeing Elinor again, and wondered why Elinor's mother had not wanted Miss Patten to take her as a pupil. Mr. and Mrs. Fulton were surprised when at supper time Sylvia demanded to know what a "Yankee" was. She thought her mother looked a little troubled. But her father smiled. "Yankee is what Britishers call all Americans," he answered. "Then Elinor Mayhew is just as much a Yankee as I am," thought Sylvia, and she smiled so radiantly at the thought that Mrs. Fulton was reassured, and did not question her. The next day was Saturday, and Mr. Fulton had planned to take his wife and Sylvia to Fort Moultrie. The military band of the fort played every afternoon, and the parapet of the fort was a daily promenade for many Charleston people. During the summer workmen had been making necessary repairs on the fortifications; but visitors were always welcomed by the officers in charge, one of whom, Captain Carleton, was a college friend of Sylvia's father. Sylvia could row a small boat very well, and her father had purchased a pretty sailboat which he was teaching her to steer. She often went with her father on trips about the harbor, and the little girl always thought that these excursions were the most delightful of pleasures. There was a favorable breeze this Saturday afternoon, and the little boat, with its shining white paint and snowy sail, skimmed swiftly across the harbor. Sylvia watched the little waves which seemed to dance forward to meet them, looked at the many boats and vessels, and quite forgot Elinor Mayhew's unkindness. Her mother and father were talking of the black servants, whom they had hired with the house of Mr. Robert Waite, Grace's uncle. Sylvia heard them speak of Aunt Connie, the good-natured black cook, who lived in a cabin behind the Fultons' kitchen. "Aunt Connie wants to bring her little girl to live with her. Their master is willing, if we have no objections," Sylvia heard her mother say. "Oh, let the child come," Mr. Fulton responded; "how old is she?" "Just Sylvia's age. Her name is Estralla," replied Mrs. Fulton. "You'll have a little darky for a playmate, Sylvia. How will you like that?" her father asked. But before Sylvia could answer, the boat swung alongside the landing-place at the fort and she saw her father's friend, Captain Carleton, waiting to welcome them. The band was playing, and a few people were on the parapet. "Not many visitors to-day," said the Captain, as they all walked on together. "I am afraid the Charleston people resent the fact that the United States is protecting its property." As they walked along the Captain pointed to the sand which the wind had blown into heaps about the sea-front of the old fort. "A child of ten could easily come into the fort over those sand-banks," he said. "Whose fort is this?" asked Sylvia, so earnestly that both the Captain and her father smiled. "It belongs to the United States, of which South Carolina is one," replied the Captain. Sylvia gave a little sigh of satisfaction. Even Elinor Mayhew could not find any fault with that, she thought, and she was eager to get home and tell Grace what the Captain had said. On the way back Sylvia asked her mother if she knew that there was a song with her name in it. "Why, of course, dear child. You were named for that very Sylvia," replied her mother. "'Then to Sylvia let us sing, That Sylvia is excelling; She excels each mortal thing Upon the dull earth dwelling; To her let us garlands bring'"-- sang Mrs. Fulton; "and you can thank your father for choosing your name," she added gaily. "Oh! But Grace said it was about spelling," explained Sylvia; "but I like your way best," she added quickly. There were a good many pleasant things for Sylvia to think of that night. Not every girl could be named out of a song, she reflected. Then there was the little colored girl Estralla, who was to arrive the next day, and besides these interesting facts, she had discovered who really owned the forts, and could tell her schoolmates on Monday. All these pleasant happenings made Sylvia forgetful of Elinor Mayhew's unkindness. Before bedtime she had learned the words of the song from which she was named. She knew Grace would think that "excelling" was much better than "spelling." CHAPTER II A NEW FRIEND The next morning Sylvia was awakened by a tapping on her chamber door. Usually Jennie, the colored girl who helped Aunt Connie in the work of the house, would come into the room before Sylvia was awake with a big pitcher of hot water, and Sylvia would open her eyes to see Jennie unfastening the shutters and spreading out the fresh clothes. So this morning she wondered what the tapping meant, and called out: "Come in." The door opened very slowly and a little negro girl, with a round woolly head and big startled eyes, stood peering in. She was barefooted, and wore a straight garment of faded blue cotton. For a moment the two children stared at each other. Then Sylvia remembered that Aunt Connie's little girl was coming to live with her mother. "Are you Estralla?" she asked eagerly, sitting up in bed. "Yas, Missy," replied the little darky, lifting the big pitcher of water and bringing it into the room, where she stood holding it as if not knowing what to do next. "Set the pitcher down," said Sylvia. "Yas, Missy," said Estralla, her big eyes fixed on the little white girl in the pretty bed who was smiling at her in so friendly a fashion. She took a step or two forward, her eyes still fixed on Sylvia, and not noticing the little footstool directly in front of her, over which she stumbled with a loud crash, breaking the pitcher and sending the hot water over her bare feet. "Oh, Mammy! Mammy! Mammy!" she screamed, lying face downward on the floor with the overturned footstool and broken pitcher, while the steaming water soaked through the cotton dress. In a moment Sylvia was out of bed. "Get up, Estralla," she commanded, "and stop screaming." The little darky's wails ceased, and she looked up at the slender white figure standing in front of her. "I kyan't git up; I'se all scalded and cut," she sobbed, "an' if I does get up I'se gwine to get whipped for breaking the pitcher," and at the thought of new trouble in store for her, she began to scream again. "Get up this minute," said Sylvia. "I don't believe the water was hot enough to scald you; it never is really hot. Here, help me sop it up," and grabbing her bath towel Sylvia began to mop up the little stream of water which was trickling across the floor. Estralla managed to get to her feet. She was still holding fast to the handle of the broken pitcher. The front of her cotton dress was soaked, but she was not hurt. "I'll get whipped, yas'm, I will, fer breaking the pitcher." "You won't!" declared Sylvia, half angrily. "It's my mother's pitcher, and I'll tell her you didn't mean to break it. Now you go and put on another dress, and tell Jennie to come up here and wipe up this floor." "I ain't got no other dress; an' if I goes an' tells I'll get whipped," persisted the child. Sylvia began to wonder what she could do. She thought Estralla was stupid and clumsy to fall down and break the pitcher, and now she thought her silly to be so frightened. "I tells you, Missy, I su'ly will be whipped," she repeated so earnestly that Sylvia began to believe it. "An' when my mammy sees my dress all wet--" and Estralla began to sob, but so quietly that Sylvia realized the little darky was really frightened and unhappy. "Don't cry, Estralla," she said more gently, patting her on the shoulder. "I'll tell you what to do. You are just about my size, and I'll give you one of my dresses. It's pink, and it's faded a little, but it's pretty. And you take this towel and wipe up the floor as well as you can. Then you slip off your dress and put on mine." While Sylvia talked Estralla stopped crying and began to look a little more cheerful. Sylvia ran to the closet and was back in a moment with a pink checked gingham. It had a number of tiny ruffles on the skirt, and a little frill of lace around the neck. "Landy! You don't mean I kin KEEP that, Missy?" exclaimed Estralla, her face radiant at the very thought. "Yes, quick. Somebody may come. Slip off your dress." In a moment the old blue frock lay in a little heap on the floor, and Sylvia had slipped the pink dress over Estralla's head, and was fastening it. The little darky chuckled and laughed now as if she had not a trouble in the world. "Listen, Estralla! Here, pick up every bit of the pitcher and put the pieces on the chair. Nobody shall know that you broke it. And now you take this wet towel and your dress and spread them somewhere outdoors to dry. You can tell your mammy I gave you the dress. Now, run quick. My mother may come." Estralla stood quite still looking at Sylvia. She had stopped laughing. "Will you' mammy scold you 'bout dat pitcher?" she asked. "I don't know. Anyway, nobody shall know that you broke it. You won't be whipped. Run along," urged Sylvia. But Estralla did not move. "I don't keer if I is whipped," she announced. "I guess, mebbe, my mammy won't whip hard." "Sylvia, Sylvia," sounded her mother's voice, and both the little girls looked at each other with startled eyes. "Run," said Sylvia, giving Estralla a little push. "Run out on the balcony." Estralla did not question the command, and in a moment, carrying dress and towel, she had vanished through the open window. "Why, child! What has happened?" exclaimed Mrs. Fulton, coming into the room and looking at the overturned footstool, the pieces of the broken pitcher, and at Sylvia standing in the middle of the floor with an anxious, half-frightened expression. "Don't look so frightened, dear child. A broken pitcher isn't worth it," said Mrs. Fulton smilingly. "It's only hot water, and won't hurt anything. Only Father is waiting for breakfast, so use cold water this morning. Here is your blue muslin--I'll tie your sash when you come down," and giving Sylvia a kiss her mother hurried away. "My landy!" whispered Estralla, peering in from the balcony window. "Your mammy's a angel. An' so is you, Missy. I was gwine tell her the trufe if she'd scolded, I su'ly was. Landy! I'd a sight ruther be whipped than have you scolded, Missy." Sylvia looked at her in astonishment. Estralla, with round serious eyes, stood gazing at her as if she was ready to do anything that Sylvia could possibly ask. "Run. It's all right," said Sylvia with a little smile, and Estralla, with a backward look over her shoulder, went slowly out of the room. "I'm gwine to recollect this jes' as long as I live," Estralla whispered as she made her way back to the kitchen. "Nobuddy ever cared if I was whipped before, or if I wasn't whipped. An' I'll do somethin' fer Missy sometime, I will. An' she give me dis fine dress too." She bent over and smoothed out one of the little ruffles, and chuckled happily. Her mammy was busy preparing breakfast when Estralla slid quietly into the kitchen. When she did look around and saw the child wearing the pink dress she nearly dropped the dish of hot bacon which Jennie was waiting to take to the dining-room. "Wha' on earth did you get you' pink dress? Did Missy give it to you? Well, you step out to the cabin and take it off. This minute! Put you' blue frock right on. Like as not her mammy won't let you keep it," and Aunt Connie hurried Jennie off to the dining-room with the breakfast tray. Estralla did not know what to do. Her blue dress was hung over a syringa bush behind the cabin. And at the dreadful thought that Mrs. Fulton might take away the pink dress she began to cry. "Missy Sylvia said 'twas faded. She said to put it on," whimpered Estralla. Aunt Connie began to be more hopeful. If the dress was faded--and she turned and looked at it more closely. "Well, honey, 'tis faded. An' I guess Missy Sylvia's mammy won' take it back. An' it's the Sabbath day, so you jes' wear it," she said, patting the little woolly head. "Mammy's glad to have you dressed up; but you be mighty keerful." "Yas, Mammy. I jes' love Missy Sylvia," replied the little girl, now all smiles, and forgetting how nearly she had come to serious trouble. Nothing more was said to Sylvia about the broken pitcher; but when Jennie put the room in order, and brought down the broken pieces, Aunt Connie exclaimed: "Good massy! It's a good thing my Estralla didn't do that! I'd 'a' cuffed her well, I su'ly would." Sylvia did not think to tell her mother about the gift of the pink dress to Estralla. She did not feel quite happy that she had not explained the broken pitcher to her mother; but she had promised Estralla that she would not tell, and Sylvia knew that a promise was a very serious thing, something not to be easily forgotten. She did not see Estralla again that day, and Jennie brought the hot water as usual the next morning. Grace and Mammy Esther called for Sylvia on Monday morning, and Sylvia at once told her friend that she had been named from the song. This seemed very wonderful to Grace, and she listened to Sylvia's explanation of "excelling" instead of "spelling," and said she didn't think it was of any consequence. But when Sylvia told her what Captain Carleton had said about the forts, Grace shook her head and looked very serious. "Don't tell Elinor Mayhew, Sylvia. Because really South Carolina does own the forts. My father said so. He said that South Carolina was a Sovereign State," she concluded. "What's that? What's a 'sovereign'?" questioned Sylvia. Grace shook her head. It had sounded like a very fine thing when her father had spoken it, so she had repeated it with great pride. "We can ask Miss Rosalie," she suggested. Mammy Esther left the girls at the gate of Miss Patten's garden. As they went up the path Flora Hayes came to meet them. "I was waiting for you," she said. "I want to ask you both to come out to our plantation next Saturday and spend Sunday. My mother is going to write and ask your mothers if they will give me the pleasure of your company." "I am sure I can come," declared Grace, "and I think it's lovely of you to ask me." "You'll come, won't you, Sylvia?" said Flora, putting her arm over the little girl's shoulders as they went up the steps. "Yes, indeed; thank you very much for asking me," replied Sylvia. She had visited the Hayes plantation early in the summer, and thought it a more wonderful place even than the big mansion on Tradd Street where the Hayes family lived in the winter months. Mr. Hayes owned hundreds of negroes, and raised a great quantity of cotton. The house at the plantation was large, with many balconies, and cool, pleasant rooms. Flora had a pair of white ponies, and there were pigeons, and a number of dogs. Sylvia was sure that it would be a beautiful visit, especially as Grace would be there. As she went smilingly toward her seat in the schoolroom she passed Elinor Mayhew, who was already seated. "Yankee!" whispered Elinor sharply, looking at her with scornful eyes. But Sylvia, remembering that her father had said that all Americans were Yankees, nodded to the older girl and responded: "Yankee your-self!" CHAPTER III SYLVIA IN TROUBLE The Hayes plantation was about ten miles distant from Charleston, on the opposite side of the Ashley River. Flora told Sylvia and Grace that the Hayes coachman would drive them out, and that they would start early on Saturday morning. Sylvia, remembering her former visit, knew well how delightful the drive would be, and thinking of the pleasure in store quite forgot to be troubled by Elinor Mayhew's hostility. At recess the girls usually walked about in the garden, or tossed a ball back and forth. Miss Rosalie would sit on the broad piazza overlooking the garden, her fingers busy with some piece of delicate embroidery. To-day, as they filed out and down the steps, Elinor whispered to several of her companions. And suddenly Sylvia realized that she was standing alone. Grace Waite had lingered to speak to Miss Rosalie; Flora had been excused just before recess, as her black mammy had arrived with a note from Mrs. Hayes. The other girls were gathered in a little group about Elinor, who was evidently telling them something of great interest. Sylvia walked slowly along toward a little summer-house where Miss Patten sometimes had little tea-parties. She hoped Grace would not stay long with Miss Patten. The other girls were between Sylvia and the arbor, and none of them moved to let her pass; nor did any of them speak to her, as she paused with a word of greeting. "Now, girls," she heard Elinor say; and the others, half under their breath, but only too distinctly for Sylvia, called out: "Yankee, Yankee!" Then like a flock of bright-colored birds they ran swiftly into the summer-house. For a moment Sylvia stood quite still. She realized that Elinor meant to be hateful; but she remembered that her father had said that all Americans were called "Yankees," and she was not a coward. She went straight on to the arbor. Elinor Mayhew stood on the steps. "You are just as much a Yankee as I am. And you ought to be proud of it," declared Sylvia, facing the older girl. "Hear that, girls!" called Elinor to the group about her. There was a little angry murmur from the others. "Don't you dare say that again, Miss Boston," called May Bailey, who stood next to Elinor. Sylvia was now thoroughly angry. She knew of no reason why these girls should treat her in so unkind a fashion. She felt very desolate and unhappy, but she faced them bravely. "Yankees! Yankees! It's what all Americans are," she declared defiantly. In an instant the little girls were all about her. Elinor Mayhew was holding her hands, and the others were pushing her along the path to the shore. The thick growing shrubs hid them from the house. Sylvia did not cry out or speak. She was not at all afraid, nor did she resist. "We ought to make her take it back," said May Bailey, as Elinor stopped, and they all stood in a close group about Sylvia. "Of course she's got to take it back, and apologize on her knees," declared Elinor. "She might as well learn that South Carolinians will not be insulted," and Elinor lifted her head proudly. "I won't take it back!" retorted Sylvia, "and you are the ones who will have to apologize. Yes, every one of you, before I will ever speak to you again." "Hear that, girls! Wouldn't it be dreadful if she never spoke to us again!" sneered Elinor. "She means she will tell Miss Rosalie," said one of the girls. "I don't, either. I can look after my own afffairs," retorted Sylvia bravely. "I'm not a tell-tale. Although I suppose girls who act the way you do would tell." "Get down on your knees," commanded Elinor, trying to push the little girl. "There's the bell," and they all turned and scampered back to the house, leaving Sylvia on the path; for Elinor had let go of her so suddenly that she had fallen forward. Her knees were hurt, and one of her hands was bruised by the fall. For a moment she lay sobbing quietly. She was angry and miserable. She had been brave enough when the girls had seemed to threaten her, but now her courage was gone. She could not go back to the schoolroom and face all those enemies. If Miss Rosalie came in search of her she might not be able to resist telling her what had happened; and, miserable and unhappy as she was, Sylvia resolved that she would never tell. "But Elinor Mayhew and all the rest of them shall be sorry for this. Yes, they shall," she sobbed as she got to her feet and turned toward the shore. She knew she must either go straight back to the schoolroom or else find a hiding-place until they had ceased to search for her. There was a wall at the foot of the garden, covered with fragrant jessamine and myrtle. If she could only get over that wall, thought Sylvia, she would be safe. She ran swiftly forward and began to scramble up, grasping the sturdy vines, and finding a foothold on some bit of rough brick. She reached the top just as she heard Miss Rosalie's servant calling her name. Sylvia looked down to the further side. The vines drooped over and below the wall a high bank of sand sloped to the shore. Holding tight to the vines she slid down, hitting her bruised knees against the rough surface. The vines cut her hands, and when she tumbled into the sand her dress was torn and soiled, her pretty hair-ribbon was gone, and her once white stockings were grimy. Beside these misfortunes her hands were bleeding. Never in all her life had Sylvia been so wretched. She sat quite still in the warm sand, and wondered what she could do. If she went home her mother would insist upon an explanation of her untidy condition. Beside that Sylvia was not sure if she could find her way home unless she climbed back into the garden. She looked along the shore at the landing-place not far distant where several boats were bobbing up and down in the wash of the incoming tide. She could see boats coming and going between the forts and the city. She could see grim Fort Sumter, with its guns that seemed to look straight at her. She watched a schooner coming across the bay, and realized that it was coming to that very wharf. A number of men landed, and several carts came down and boxes were unloaded, and negroes carried them to the schooner. Sylvia got up and walked along the shore until she was near the wharf, and stood watching the negroes as they lifted the heavy boxes. She wished she could ask one of them to tell her the way home. Then she noticed a tall figure in uniform coming up the wharf. "It's Captain Carleton!" she exclaimed joyfully, quite forgetting for the moment her torn dress and scratched hands as she ran toward him. "Why! Is it Sylvia Fulton?" exclaimed the surprised Captain, looking down at the untidy little figure. "Why, what has happened?" "Oh, dear," sobbed Sylvia, "I guess I'm lost." "Well, well! It's lucky you came down to this wharf. Come on board the schooner, and we'll see to these little hands first thing," and the good-natured Captain rested a kindly hand on the little girl's shoulder and walked down the wharf. Sylvia heard the men talking of the Charleston Arsenal, and of the boxes of arms which were to be taken on the schooner to Fort Sumter. The Captain bathed the little hurt hands and flushed face, talking pleasantly to the little girl about the schooner, and asking her if she did not think it a much finer craft than her father's small boat; so in a little while she was comforted and quite at home. "Now, sit here by the cabin window, and I will come back and take you home as soon as I settle this trouble about my supplies," and the Captain hurried back to the wharf. Sylvia sat quite still and looked out of the round port-hole. She felt very tired, and leaned her head against the cushioned wall. She could hear the monotonous chant of the negroes, and feel the swaying motion of the vessel, and soon was fast asleep. She did not know when the schooner was towed out into the channel, nor when the sails were hoisted and they went sailing down the bay. For Captain Carleton had entirely forgotten his little guest. When he hurried back to the wharf he discovered a little group of Charleston citizens, one of whom was Elinor Mayhew's father, disputing the right of the United States officers to take guns from the Charleston Arsenal to Fort Sumter; and when the matter was settled he had hurried the departure of the vessel. Not until they were ready to land at the fort did he remember his little friend. He went down to the cabin, and found Sylvia fast asleep. "Poor little Yankee! I wonder what will happen to her if South Carolina really leaves the Union," he thought, and then his face grew troubled as he remembered that Mr. and Mrs. Fulton must be in great trouble and anxiety over the disappearance of their little daughter. But first of all he must see the schooner's cargo safely unloaded at Fort Sumter, and send his men back to Fort Moultrie; then he would take Sylvia home, or find some way to notify her parents that she was safe and well cared for. CHAPTER IV AN UNEXPECTED JOURNEY When Sylvia did not come in with the other girls Miss Patten sent a maid in search of her. But she did not search very carefully. She called Sylvia's name a few times, sauntered about the garden, and then reported: "Can't find Missy Sylvia." She was then told to go straight to Mrs. Fulton's house on the East Battery and see if Miss Sylvia had reached home. Miss Patten did not feel anxious. She thought it probable that the little northern girl did not realize the rules of the school, had become tired, and so started for home. "Did Miss Sylvia say anything to any of you young ladies about leaving the grounds?" she questioned the pupils. But they all declared that they knew nothing of her whereabouts. "She was on the path behind us when the bell rang," volunteered May Bailey. Elinor's face was unusually flushed, and she kept her eyes on her book. Probably the "little Yankee," as she called Sylvia even in her thoughts, had run home to tell her mother of the trouble. By the time Miss Patten's messenger had reached the Fulton house Sylvia was in the cabin of the little schooner. The girl gave her message to Mrs. Fulton in so indefinite a manner that at first Sylvia's mother hardly understood whether Sylvia was in the garden of the school, or had started for home. Estralla was standing near the steps and began whimpering: "Oh, Missy Sylvia los'! That w'at she say. She lost!" "Nonsense, Estralla! Sylvia could not be lost in Miss Patten's garden," said Mrs. Fulton; but she decided to return to the school with the maid. As they went down the street Estralla followed close behind. Her bare feet made no noise, but now and then she choked back a despairing little wail. For the little colored girl was sure that some harm had befallen her new friend. When Mrs. Fulton appeared at the school-room door Miss Patten was greatly alarmed. Elinor Mayhew and May Bailey exchanged a look of surprised apprehension. They felt sure that Sylvia had hurried home and told her mother just what had happened. If she had, and Mrs. Fulton had come to inform Miss Patten, they knew there would be unpleasant things in store for them. In a short time a thorough search for the lost girl was in progress. Servants were sent along the streets, and Mrs. Fulton hastened home thinking it possible that Sylvia might be in her own room. No one paid any attention to the little colored girl in the faded blue cotton gown who wandered about the paths and around the summer-house. Estralla noticed two of the older girls talking together, and heard the taller one say: "Well, wherever she is, she needn't think we will ever take back one word. She IS a Yankee!" "They'se done somethin' to my missy," decided Estralla. "They'se scairt her." She ran down the path toward the wall at the end of the garden, and stopped suddenly; for right in front of her, caught on the jessamine vine which grew over the wall, she saw a fluttering blue ribbon. "Dat's off'n Missy Sylvia's hair, dat ribbon is," she whispered, reaching up for it. Holding it fast in her hands she looked closely at the mass of heavy vines, and nodded her little woolly head. "Dat's w'at she done. She dumb right up here, to git away frum those imps o' Satan w'at was a plaguein' her," decided Estralla, and in an instant she was going up the wall in a much easier manner than had been possible for Sylvia. She dropped on the further side, just as Sylvia had done, and traced Sylvia's steps to near the landing-place. Then she stopped short. Men were loading boxes on a schooner at the end of the pier, and she could see a tall officer in uniform standing on the deck of the vessel. "Hullo, here's another small girl. Black one this time," said one of the white sailors. "Yas, Massa! Please whar' is my missy?" replied the little darky eagerly. "Safe in the cabin," nodded the good-natured man. Estralla slipped behind a pile of boxes, and watched for a chance to get on board the vessel without being seen. She had heard many tales, told by the older colored people, of little children, yes, and grown people, too, who had been enticed on board vessels in far-off African ports, and carried off to be sold into slavery. Estralla remembered that all those people in the stories were black; but who could tell but what there was some place in the world where white people were sold? Anyway, she resolved that wherever Missy Sylvia went she would go with her. In a few moments she saw a chance to run over the gangplank. She went straight toward the cabin door and peered in. Yes, there was Missy Sylvia on the broad cushioned seat under the window. Very softly Estralla tiptoed across the cabin. Just as she was about to speak Sylvia's name the sound of approaching footsteps startled her, and, sure that she would be sent on shore by whoever might discover her, she looked about for a hiding-place, and the next instant she was curled up under the very seat on which Sylvia was asleep. It was not long before Estralla followed her missy's example. But she was wide awake when Captain Carleton came into the cabin. As soon as he returned to the deck Estralla crawled out from her hiding-place and looked about her. "Wake up, Missy," she whispered leaning over Sylvia; and Sylvia sat up quickly, with a little cry of astonishment. "Don't you be skeered," said Estralla softly, "'cause I ain' gwine to let you be carried off. I knows jes' how slaves are ketched. Yas'm, I does. My mammy tole me. They gits folks in ships and carries 'em off an' sells 'em to folks. An' I ain' gwine to let 'em have you, Missy." There were tears in Estralla's eyes. She knew that her own brother had been sold the previous year and taken to a plantation in Florida. She had heard her mother say that she, Estralla, might be sold any time. She knew that slavery was a dreadful thing. "Where are they taking us?" questioned Sylvia, for she realized that the vessel was moving swiftly through the water. She wondered why Captain Carleton had gone away. Seeing Estralla there gave her a dreadful certainty that what the little darky said might be true. Perhaps the vessel might have others on board who were being taken off to be sold, as Estralla declared. "Yas, Missy. My mammy's tole me jes' how white folks gets black folks fer slaves. Takes 'em away from their mammies, an' never lets 'em go back. Yas!" And Estralla's big eyes grew round with terror. "But I am a white girl, Estralla," said Sylvia. Estralla shook her head dolefully. "Yas, Missy. But I'se gwine to git you safe home. You do jes' as I tell you an' you'll be safe back with your mammy by ter-morrow!" she declared. "You lay down and keep your eyes tight shut till I comes back," she added, and Sylvia, tired and frightened, obeyed. The schooner was now coming to her landing at Fort Sumter. Estralla managed to get on deck without being noticed. She did not know where they were, but wherever it was she resolved to get Sylvia out of the vessel, and ran back to the cabin. "Now, don' you speak to nobuddy. Jes' keep right close to me," she whispered. And Sylvia obeyed. The two little girls crept up the cabin stairs, and crouching close to the side of the cabin made their way toward the stern of the vessel. The crew and the soldiers and Captain Carleton were now all toward the bow. A small boat swung at the stern of the schooner. "Now, Missy, we's got to git ourselves into that boat and row back home," whispered Estralla, grasping the rope. At that moment Sylvia turned to look back. She could see a tall officer on the forward deck, and without an instant's hesitation she ran toward him calling: "Captain Carleton! Captain Carleton!" He turned smilingly toward her, and Sylvia clasped his hand. "I didn't know where I was," she said. "You are at Fort Sumter. And it's all my fault," he answered. "I forgot all about you until we were nearly here. But one of my men is going to sail you safely home. What's this?" he added, as Estralla appeared by Sylvia's side. "It's Estralla. Her mammy is our cook," said Sylvia. The Captain looked a little puzzled. He wondered how the little darky had got on board the vessel without being seen. "Well, she will be company for you. And you must ask your father and mother to forgive my carelessness in taking you so far from home," said the Captain. It was sunset when Sylvia and Estralla, escorted by one of the soldiers from Fort Sumter, came walking up East Battery. Mrs. Fulton was on the piazza, and Mrs. Waite and Grace were with her. Grace was the first to see and recognize Sylvia, and with a cry of delight ran to welcome her. The soldier had a note for Mrs. Fulton explaining that Sylvia, apparently on her way from school, had wandered down to the landing, and of Captain Carleton's forgetting her presence in the cabin, so that Sylvia was not questioned that night in regard to her disappearance from Miss Patten's. Grace knew nothing of Sylvia's encounter with Elinor Mayhew, so no one could imagine why she had started for home without a word to Miss Patten. Mrs. Fulton was too rejoiced to have her little girl safely at home to question or blame her. Sylvia was not hungry. The officer in charge of Fort Sumter had given the two children an excellent supper. But she was tired and very glad to have a warm bath and go straight to bed. "Oh, Mother! This has been the most horrid day in all my life," she said, as her mother brushed out the tangled yellow hair, and helped her prepare for bed. "It has been rather hard for your father and me," Mrs. Fulton reminded her; "we began to fear some dreadful thing had happened to our little girl. Promise me, Sylvia, never to run away from school again." Sylvia promised. She wished she could tell her mother that it was not school she ran away from; that she was trying to escape the taunts and unfriendliness of her schoolmates. But she remembered her promise. She had declared proudly that she should not tell, and hard as it was she resolved that she would keep that promise. But she wished with all her heart that she need not go to school another day. "Do I have to go to Miss Patten's school, Mother?" she asked in so unhappy a voice that Mrs. Fulton realized something unpleasant had happened. "We will talk it over to-morrow, dear," she said; "go to sleep now," and Sylvia crept into the white bed quite ready to sleep, but wondering how she could talk about going to school, and still keep her promise, when to-morrow came. CHAPTER V ESTRALLA AND ELINOR In the morning Sylvia did not refer to what had happened the day before, so her mother decided not to question her. Grace and Flora both arrived at an early hour to accompany Sylvia to school. They were eager to hear how she had happened to be on the schooner which had carried arms to Fort Sumter from the Charleston Arsenal. But Sylvia did not seem to want to talk of her adventure, and both the little southern girls were too polite to question her. "Father says those guns don't belong to the United States, they belong to South Carolina." Sylvia did not reply. She recalled one of her lessons, however, where she had learned that the United States meant each and every State in the Union and she remembered what Captain Carleton had said. "Mother says I may go with you on Saturday, Flora," interrupted Grace; "I wish it was Friday this minute." "So do I," agreed Flora laughingly; "and we must teach Sylvia to ride on one of the ponies this time." For on the previous visit Sylvia had said that she wished she could ride as Flora did. "Oh! Truly? Flora, do you really mean it?" Sylvia asked. "Of course I do. We will have a ride Saturday afternoon and again Sunday," replied Flora. With the pleasure of the plantation visit in store Sylvia for the moment forgot all about her dread of facing the girls at school. Miss Patten detained her at the door of the schoolroom with a warmer greeting than usual, but said: "My dear, I want to talk with you at recess;" but her smile was so friendly and her words so kind that Sylvia was not troubled. As she passed Elinor's seat she did not look up, but the whisper, "Yankee," made her flush, and brought back all her dislike of the tall, handsome Elinor. At recess, after the other girls had left the schoolroom, Miss Patten came to Sylvia's desk and sat down beside her. "Sylvia, dear," she said gently, "I want you to tell me why you started off alone yesterday. Had anything happened here at school to make you so unhappy that you did not want to stay?" Sylvia looked up in surprise. Why, Miss Patten seemed to know all about it, she thought. How easy it would be to tell her the whole story. But suddenly she resolved that no matter what Miss Patten knew, she, Sylvia, must not break her word. So she looked down at her desk, and made no reply. "I am sure none of the other pupils would mean to hurt your feelings, Sylvia. But if any of them have carelessly said something that sounded unkind, I know they will apologize," continued the friendly voice; and again Sylvia looked up. If she told what Elinor and May had said she was now sure that Miss Rosalie would make them both say they were sorry; and Sylvia remembered that she had declared to them that they should do exactly that. "Would they really, Miss Patten?" she asked in so serious a voice that the teacher believed for the moment that she would soon know the exact reason why Sylvia had fled from the school; and she was right, she was about to hear it, but not from Sylvia. There was a little silence in the quiet pleasant room where the scent of jessamine and honey-suckle came through the open windows, and no sound disturbed the two at Sylvia's desk. Sylvia was assuring herself that she really ought to tell Miss Patten; but somehow she could not speak. If she broke a promise, even to an enemy, as she felt Elinor Mayhew to be, she would despise herself. But Elinor would have to apologize for the way she had treated Sylvia. Just at this moment of hesitation a round woolly head appeared at one of the open windows. Two small black hands rested on the window-sill, and a moment later Estralla, in her faded blue dress, was standing directly in front of Miss Patten and Sylvia. "I begs pardon, Missy Teacher. But I knows my missy ain't done nuffin' to be kept shut up for. An' I knows why she runned off yesterd'y. Yas'm. I heered dat tall dark girl an' nuther girl sayin' as how Missy Sylvia was a Yankee. Yas'm; and as how they was glad they called her names. Yas'm, I sho' heered 'em say those very words," and Estralla bobbed her head, and stood trembling in every limb before "Missy Teacher," not knowing what would happen to her, but determined that the little white girl, who had protected her, and given her the fine pink dress, should not be punished. "Oh, Estralla!" whispered Sylvia, her face brightening. Miss Rosalie stood up, and rested her hand on Sylvia's shoulder. "And so you would not tell, or complain about your schoolmates?" Then without waiting for a reply, she leaned over and kissed Sylvia. "That is right, dear child. I am proud to have you as a pupil. Now," and she turned to Estralla, "you run home as fast as you can go. Your young mistress is not being punished, and will not be. But you did just right in coming to tell me. But the next time you come remember to come in at the door!" and Miss Rosalie smiled pleasantly at the little darky, whose face now was radiant with delight. "Yas'm. I sho' will 'member," and with a smile at Sylvia, Estralla tiptoed toward the open door and disappeared. It was a very grave teacher who watched her pupils return to their seats that morning. It was a time when all the people in the southern city were anxious and troubled. There had always been slaves in South Carolina, and now the Government of the United States was realizing that the black people must not be kept in servitude; that they had the same rights as white people; and it was difficult for the Charleston people to acknowledge that this was right. Miss Rosalie was a South Carolinian, and she was sure that Charleston people did right to insist on keeping their slaves, even if it meant war. And it now seemed likely that the North and South might come to warfare. The word "Yankee" was as hateful to Miss Rosalie as it was to Elinor Mayhew, and for that very reason she determined that Elinor should make a public apology for calling one of her schoolmates a "Yankee." To the Carolinians the name meant the name of their enemies, and it seemed to Miss Rosalie a very dreadful thing to accuse this little northern girl of being an enemy. After the girls were all seated she said in a very quiet tone: "Elinor, please come to the platform." For a moment Elinor hesitated. Then she walked slowly down the aisle and stood beside Miss Patten. "Now, young ladies, I do not need to explain to you the meaning of the word 'courtesy.' You all know that it means kindness and consideration of the rights and feelings of others. You know as well the meaning of the word 'hospitality'; that it means that any person who is received beneath your roof is entitled to courtesy and to more than that, to protection. Even savages will protect any traveler who comes into their home, and give the best they have to make him comfortable." Miss Rosalie stopped a moment, and then said: "If there is anyone of you who has not known the meaning of the two words to which I refer, will she please to rise." The girls all remained seated. "Elinor, you will now apologize for having failed in courtesy and in hospitality to one of my pupils." Elinor stood looking out across the schoolroom. Her mouth was tightly closed, and apparently she had no intention of obeying. "Do I have to apologize for speaking the truth?" she demanded. The girls held their breath. Was it possible that Elinor dared defy Miss Patten? Grace and Flora were sadly puzzled. They were the only pupils who did not understand the exact reason, Elinor's treatment of Sylvia, for Miss Patten's demand. The teacher did not respond, and Elinor did not speak. Then after a moment Miss Patten said, "Take your seat, Elinor. I shall make this request of you again at the beginning of the afternoon session. If you do not comply with it you will no longer be received as a pupil in this school." CHAPTER VI SYLVIA AT THE PLANTATION When the afternoon session opened Elinor Mayhew was not in her usual place. Grace and Flora had been told by the other girls what had happened on the day of Sylvia's disappearance from school. May Bailey had declared that Sylvia must have "run straight to the teacher," and that she was a telltale as well as a "Yankee." Grace had defended her friend warmly. "I don't know how Miss Rosalie found out, but I'm sure Sylvia did not tell," she declared. Flora was unusually quiet. There were many scornful looks sent in Sylvia's direction that afternoon, which Miss Patten noticed and easily understood. Before school was dismissed she said that she had a brief announcement to make. "I want to say to you that the pupil whom Elinor treated with such a lack of courtesy did not inform me of the fact. Nor would she say one word against any of her schoolmates when I questioned her. Someone who overheard Elinor's unfriendly remarks came and told me." Flora Hayes smiled and drew a long breath. She did not blame Sylvia for being a "Yankee," but it had troubled her to think of her new friend as a "telltale," whatever her provocation might have been. The other girls began to look at Sylvia with more friendly eyes, and as they ran down the steps several found a chance to nod and smile at her, or to exchange some word. So Sylvia began to feel that her troubles were over, if Elinor Mayhew did not return to school. "Father, are you sure 'Yankee' doesn't mean anything beside 'American'?" she asked in a very serious tone, as she sat beside Mr. Fulton on the piazza that evening. They were quite alone, as Mrs. Fulton had stepped to the kitchen to speak to Aunt Connie. "The girls at school all think it means something dreadful," she added. "Let me see, Sylvia. You study history, don't you?" responded her father slowly. "Of course you do; and you know that George Washington and General Putnam and General Warren, and many more brave men, defended this country and its liberty?" "Why, yes," replied Sylvia, greatly puzzled. "The men of South Carolina were among the bravest and most loyal of the defenders of our liberties. And when America's enemies called American men 'Yankees' they meant General Washington and every other American who was ready to defend the United States of America. So if any of your friends use the word 'Yankee' scornfully they agree with the enemies of the Union. No one need be ashamed of being called a 'Yankee.' It means someone who is ready to fight for what is right." But Sylvia still wondered. "The girls don't think so," she said. "Well, that is because they don't understand. They will know when they are older," said Mr. Fulton. He did not imagine that any of the companions of his little daughter had treated her in an unfriendly fashion, and thought it a good opportunity to make her understand the real meaning of the word. "You are a Yankee girl. And that means you must always try to protect other people who need protection," said her father. Sylvia's face brightened. She could easily understand that. It meant that she must not let Estralla get a whipping when she had not deserved it; and she was glad she had not told the real story of the broken pitcher. She resolved always to remember what her father had said. The remainder of the week passed pleasantly. Elinor Mayhew did not return to school, and the other girls profited by her example and no longer teased or taunted the little northern girl. Saturday morning proved to be perfect weather for the drive to the Hayes plantation. The sun shone, the clear October air was full of autumnal fragrance, and when the Hayes carry-all, drawn by two pretty brown horses, and driven by black Chris, the Hayes coachman, and Flora's black mammy on the seat beside him, stopped in front of Sylvia's house and Flora came running up the path, Sylvia and Grace were on the steps all ready to start. There was plenty of room for all three girls on the back seat, and Flora declared that Sylvia should sit between Grace and herself. Mrs. Fulton and Estralla stood at the gate and watched the happy little party drive off. Estralla looked very sober. Ever since the adventure at Fort Sumter the little colored girl had felt that she must look after Missy Sylvia carefully. And she was not well pleased to see her young mistress disappear from her watchful eyes. "What a funny name 'Estralla' is," laughed Flora, as Sylvia called back a good-bye. "Oh, that isn't her name, really," explained Grace. "You know my Uncle Robert owns her, and Auntie Connie named her after Aunt Esther and Cousin Alice. Her name is really Esther Alice. But the colored people never speak as we do." "How can anybody 'own' anybody else, even if their skin is black?" asked Sylvia. Both her companions looked at her in such evident surprise that Sylvia was sure she ought not to have asked such a question. Suddenly she remembered that Flora's "Mammy" and "Uncle Chris," as Flora called him, were negroes, and of course must have heard. She resolved not to ask another question during her visit. Their way took them through pleasant streets shaded by spice trees and an occasional oak. From behind high walls came the fragrance of orange blossoms, ripening pomegranates and grapes. Very soon they had crossed the Ashley River, and now the road ran between broad fields of cotton where negroes were already at work gathering the white fluffy crop which would be packed in bags and bales and shipped to many far distant ports. The three little friends talked gaily of the pleasant visit which had just begun. Sylvia was hoping that Flora would again speak of the promised ride on one of the white ponies, but not until Uncle Chris guided the swift horses into the driveway, shaded by fine live-oaks, which led to the big house, was her wish gratified. "We'll have a ride this afternoon, girls, if you are not too tired," she said. Grace and Sylvia promptly declared that they were not at all tired, and that a ride was just what they would like best. The plantation's "big house," as the negroes called the owner's home, was the largest house Sylvia had ever entered. Its high piazza with the tall pillars was covered by a tangle of jessamine vines and climbing roses. The front hall led straight through the house to another piazza, which looked out over beautiful gardens and a tiny lake. Behind a thick hedge of privet were the cabins of the house servants. The negroes who did the work on the plantation, caring for the horses and cows, and working in the cotton fields, lived at some distance from the "big" house. Mrs. Hayes came out on the piazza to welcome the party. She had come down from Charleston on the previous day. It seemed to Sylvia she had never seen so many negroes before in all her life. Neat colored maids were flitting about the house, colored men were at work in the garden, and colored children peered smilingly around the corner of the house. A colored maid was told to look after Grace and Sylvia, and she led the way up the beautiful spiral staircase to a pleasant chamber overlooking the garden. There were two small white beds, with a little mahogany light-stand between them. On this stand stood a tall brass candlestick. There were two dressing-tables, and two small bureaus, and a number of comfortable chintz-covered chairs. The floor was of dark, shining wood, and beside each bed was a long, soft white rug. Sylvia and Grace knew that this room had been arranged especially for any of Flora's young friends whom she might entertain, and they both thought it was one of the nicest rooms that anyone could imagine. The smiling colored maid brushed their hair, helped them into the fresh muslin dresses they had each brought, and when they were ready opened the door and followed them down the stairs where they found Flora awaiting them. "Luncheon is all ready," she said, and led the way into the dining-room, where Mrs. Hayes and Flora's two older brothers, Ralph and Philip, were waiting for them. The boys were tall, good-looking lads, and as they were in the uniform of the Military School of Charleston, of which they were pupils, Sylvia thought they must be quite grown up, although Ralph was only sixteen and his brother two years younger. They had ridden out on horseback from Charleston, and had just arrived. Flora introduced them to Sylvia, and Grace greeted them as old acquaintances. "I suppose you girls are looking forward to the corn-shucking to-night?" Ralph asked, with his pleasant smile, as he held Sylvia's chair for her to take her seat at the table, while Philip performed the same service for Grace. "Oh, my dear boy! You have betrayed Flora's surprise," said Mrs. Hayes. "She had planned not to let the girls know about it until nightfall." "What is a 'corn-shucking'?" questioned Sylvia; for she had always lived in a city and did not know much about farm or plantation affairs. "Shall I tell her, Flora?" questioned Ralph, laughingly. "No! No, indeed! Wait, Sylvia, then it will be a surprise after all," responded Flora. Sylvia smiled happily. She was sure that this visit was going to be even more delightful than when she had been Flora's guest in the early spring. There seemed to be so many things to do on a plantation, she thought. The young people were all hungry, and enjoyed the roasted duck, with the sweet-potatoes and the grape jelly. Beside these there were hot biscuit and delicious custards. Sylvia had finished her custard when two maids brought a large tray into the room, and in a moment the little girls exclaimed in admiring delight; for the tray contained two doves, made of blanc-mange, resting in a nest of fine, gold-colored shreds of candied orange-peel, and an iced cake in the shape of a fort, with the palmetto flag on a tiny staff. At the sight of their State flag both the boys arose from their seats and saluted. "That's the flag to fly over Charleston's forts!" declared Ralph as he sat down. After luncheon was over Mrs. Hayes advised the girls to lie down for a little rest before starting for their ride. But they all declared they were not tired, and there were so many things to see and enjoy at the plantation that Sylvia and Grace were delighted when Flora suggested that first of all they should go out through the garden to the negro quarters, stopping at the stables on their way for a look at the ponies. Sylvia was ready before the other girls and stood on the piazza waiting. She was leaning against one of the vine-covered pillars that supported the piazza, and Ralph and Philip, who were sitting just around the corner, did not know she was there and could not see her. Sylvia could hear their voices, but did not at first notice what they were saying until the word "Yankee" caught her ear. "The first thing you know those northern Yankees will take our forts," she heard Philip say, and heard Ralph laugh scornfully as he responed: "They can't do it, or free our slaves, either. Say, did you know Father was going to sell Dinkie; she's making such a fuss that I reckon she'll get a lashing; says she don't want to leave her children." There was a little silence, and then the younger boy spoke. "I wish they wouldn't sell Dinkie. I hate to have her go. It isn't fair. Of course she feels bad to leave those little darkies of hers. Jove!" and the boy's voice had an angry tone, "Dinkie shan't be whipped! I won't have it. She used to be my mammy." Suddenly Sylvia realized that she was listening, and ran down the steps toward the little lake which lay glimmering in the sun beneath the shade of the overhanging pepper trees. She ran on past the lake down a little path which led toward the pine woods. She no longer felt happy, and full of anticipations of the surprise in store at the corn-shucking. All she could think of was "Dinkie," a woman who was to be sold away from her children, and who was to be whipped because she rebelled against the cruelty of her master. "It's because she's a slave," Sylvia whispered to herself. "I hate slavery. My father said Yankees always fought for what was right. Why don't they fight against slavery?" She quite forgot that Flora and Grace would wonder where she had gone, and be alarmed at her absence. "I do wish I could see Dinkie," she thought. "I wish I could do something to help set every slave free." Then she remembered that Philip had declared that Dinkie should neither be sold nor whipped. "I like Philip," she declared aloud, and was surprised to hear a little chuckling laugh from somewhere behind her, and turned quickly to find a smiling negro woman close behind her. "I likes Massa Philip myse'f," declared the woman, "an' I wishes I could see him jus' a minute," and her smile disappeared. "I'se shuah Massa Philip won' let 'em sell Dinkie, or lash her either," and putting her apron over her face the woman began to cry. "He won't! I heard him say he wouldn't have it," Sylvia assured her eagerly. "Don't cry, Dinkie," and she patted the woman's arm. Dinkie let her apron fall and looked eagerly at Sylvia. "You'se the little Yankee missy, ain't you?" she questioned. "I hear say that Yankees don't believe in selling black folks." "They don't; I'm sure they don't. I'll run right back and tell Philip you want to see him," replied Sylvia. "You stay right here by this tree," she added, pointing to a big live-oak. "Yas, Missy, I thanks you," replied the woman. Sylvia ran back toward the house as fast as she could go. She could see the ponies standing before the house, a small negro boy holding their bridle-reins. The girls were on the steps waiting for her. "I mustn't let them know that Dinkie wants to see Philip," she thought, as the girls called out that they had been looking everywhere for her. At that moment the two boys came along the piazza. "Philip is going to teach you how to mount, and how to hold your reins, Sylvia," said Flora. Grace and Sylvia were to ride the white ponies, and Flora was to ride a small brown horse which her mother usually rode. Philip came slowly down the steps. He looked very sober, and Sylvia was sure that he was thinking about Dinkie. "I don't believe he thinks slavery is right," she thought, as Philip raised his cap, and asked if she was ready to mount "Snap," the pony which she was to ride. Flora and Grace were already mounted, and trotted slowly off. Sylvia and Philip were alone on the driveway. "Dinkie wants to see you. She's waiting down by the oak, beyond the lake," said Sylvia. "And don't let her be whipped," she added. The boy looked up at her quickly. "Don't tell the girls that she sent for me," he replied. "Dinkie shan't be whipped, or sold either." He did not thank Sylvia for her message, and she was glad that he did not. With a brief word of direction as to the proper manner of holding the reins, he turned toward the lake, and Sylvia's pony trotted slowly down the drive to where Flora and Grace were waiting. Flora led the way past the stables, and down a broad path which led to the negro quarters. The ponies went at a slow pace, as Flora wanted to be sure that Sylvia was not afraid, and that she was enjoying her first ride. "The corn-shucking will be here," she said, pointing with her pretty gold-mounted whip to a number of corn-cribs. "They will bring the corn in from the fields, and we will come down in good season." "And the moon will be full to-night," said Grace, beginning to sing: "'De jay-bird hunt de sparrer-nes', All by de light of de moon. De bee-martin sail all 'roun', All by de light of de moon. De squirrel he holler from de top of de tree; Mr. Mole he stay in de groun', Oh, yes! Mr. Mole he stay in de groun'--'" Sylvia listened and smiled as she looked at the happy faces of her friends. But she could not forget Dinkie, and wondered if Philip could really protect the unhappy woman from a whipping, and prevent her being sold away from her children. As they passed the cabins of the negroes the children ran out bobbing and smiling to their young mistress, and Flora called out a friendly greeting. "Father's going to sell a lot of those niggers," she said carelessly. "They eat more than they're worth." "But won't their mothers feel dreadfully to let them go?" ventured Sylvia. "Of course they will," declared Grace, before Flora could respond. "And I do think it's a shame. Did you know Uncle Robert is going to sell Estralla?" she asked turning to Sylvia. Sylvia's grasp on the reins loosened, and she nearly lost her seat on the broad back of the fat pony. "What for?" she questioned, thinking to herself that Estralla should not be sold away from her home and mother if she, Sylvia, could prevent it. "Oh, Uncle's agent says she isn't of any use, and he can get a good price for her. He would have sold her last month if your mother had not taken her in. I expect Aunt Connie will be half crazy, for all her other children are gone," said Grace. "We mustn't ride too far this time," Flora interrupted, "because it's Sylvia's first ride. Hasn't she done well? Do you suppose you can turn the pony?" "Yes, indeed," answered Sylvia, drawing the left rein so tightly that the little pony swung round before Flora had time to give a word of direction. As they were now headed toward home "Snap" went off at a good pace, well in advance of the others. It was all Sylvia could do to keep her seat, but she was not frightened, and when the pony raced up the driveway and came to a standstill directly in front of the piazza steps she was laughing with delight. For the moment she had quite forgotten Dinkie and Estralla. CHAPTER VII SYLVIA SEES A GHOST "It was splendid," declared Sylvia as Grace and Flora dismounted and the three little friends entered the house. Flora's black "Mammy" was waiting for them on the piazza. "Thar's some 'freshments fur yo' in de dinin'-room," she said; and the girls were glad for the cool milk and the tiny frosted cakes which a negro girl served them. Sylvia wondered if Flora ever did anything for herself; for there seemed to be so many negro servants who were on the alert to wait upon all the white people at the "big house." "Come up to my room, girls, and rest until it's time to dress for supper," said Flora. Flora's room was just across the hall from the one where Grace and Sylvia were to sleep. Instead of a small white bed like theirs there was a big bed of dark mahogany with four tall, high posts. The bed was so high that there was a cushioned step beside it. The portrait of a lady hung over a beautiful inlaid desk, and Flora pointed to it with evident pride. "That's my great-grandmother; and her father built this house. My mother says that she was Lady Caroline, and that she was so beautiful that whenever she went to Charleston people would run after her coach just to look at her," and Flora looked at her companions expectantly, quite forgetting that she had told them the story before. "Oh, Flora! Every time I come out here you tell me about your wonderful great-grand-mother," said Grace, "and you used to tell me that her ghost haunted this house." "Well, it does," declared Flora. Sylvia had never heard of Lady Caroline's ghost. "Do tell me about it, Flora," she urged. There was a wide cushioned seat with many pillows beneath the windows, and here the girls established themselves very comfortably. "Yes, tell Sylvia the story," said Grace, piling up several cushions behind her back. "Of course it isn't true, but it's thrilling." "It is true," persisted Flora. "My mother says that her own governess saw Lady Caroline's ghost. And that she had on the very hat she has on in the portrait, and the same blue dress and lace collar. You know there's a secret stairway in this house. It leads from one of the closets in your room down to a closet in my father's library and out-of-doors, and Lady Caroline's ghost always comes in that way." Sylvia looked up at the beautiful pictured face with a little shiver. "I guess that the governess dreamed it," she said. "Of course she did," declared Grace. "I think you look like that picture, Flora," she added. "Well, whether you believe it or not, everybody knows that this is a haunted house," persisted Flora. "Why, there is an account of it in a book." But Grace shook her head laughingly. "Flora, show Sylvia your lovely lace-work," she said. Flora nodded, but Sylvia was sure that she was not pleased at Grace's refusal to believe in the ghost. "Mammy! Mam-m-e-e," called Flora, and in a moment the black woman stood bobbing and smiling in the doorway. "Bring my lace-work," said Flora. "Yas, Missy," and Mammy trotted across the room to a little table in the further corner and brought Flora a covered basket. She opened it and set it down in front of her little mistress. "Do's yo' want anyt'ing else, Missy Flora?" she asked. "If I do I'll call," replied the little girl, and Mammy again disappeared. The basket was lined with rose-colored silk, and there were little pockets all around it. In the centre lay a cushion on which was a lace pattern defined by delicate threads and tiny circles of pins. A little strip of finished lace was rolled up in a bit of tissue paper. Flora took off the paper. "See, it is the jessamine pattern," she explained. "My mother's governess was a Belgian lady, and she taught my mother how to make lace and my mother taught me." "I wish I could make lace," said Sylvia. "It would be lovely to make some for a present for my mother." "Of course it would. I'll teach you this winter," promised the good-natured Flora; "let me see your hands. You know a lace-maker's hands must be as smooth as silk, because any roughness would catch the delicate threads." Sylvia's hands were still scratched and roughed from her fall in Miss Rosalie's garden and her scramble over the wall, and Flora shook her head. "You'll have to wait awhile. And you must wear gloves every time you go out, and wash your hands in milk every night," she said very seriously. "Now I'll show you my embroidery. Mam-m-e-e! Mam-m-e-e," and another basket was brought and opened. This basket was also lined with rose-colored silk, but the silk had delicate green vines running over it. On the inside of the cover, held in place by tiny straps, were two pairs of shining scissors with gold handles, a gold-mounted emery bag, shaped like a strawberry, an embroidery stiletto of ivory, and a gold thimble. Flora lifted out the embroidery frame, and putting on her thimble took a few exact, dainty stitches in the collar. "What lovely work you can do, Flora!" exclaimed Sylvia. "Don't you ever play dolls?" remembering her own cherished dolls in their small chairs in the corner of her room at home. "Oh, I used to," replied Flora, "but since I began school at Miss Patten's I don't seem to care about dolls." "Flora can play on the harp," announced Grace. "Oh, only just a little," responded Flora quickly. "I think Flora can do more things than any girl I ever knew," declared Sylvia admiringly; "and I was just thinking that the servants did everything in the world." Flora laughed. "You never lived on a plantation, or you couldn't think that. Why, my mother works more than Mammy ever did. She has to tell all the house darkies what to do, and see that all the hands have clothes, and that the fruits are preserved. Why, she's always busy," replied Flora. "And of course ladies have to know how to do things," she concluded. When Grace and Sylvia went to their own room Flora went with them. "I'll show you where that secret staircase is," she said, and opening the closet door pressed on a broad panel which moved slowly. "There," and Flora drew Sylvia near so she could look down a dark narrow stairway. "But that isn't seeing a ghost," Grace said laughingly. It was rather late when Mrs. Hayes led the way back to the house, and Grace declared that she was almost too sleepy to walk up-stairs. But Sylvia was not at all sleepy. After the colored girl had helped them prepare for bed, blown out the candle, and left the room, she lay watching the shadows of the moving vines on the wall. She wished she was at home, for who knew but that Estralla's master might sell her before she returned. Sylvia wondered what she could do to protect the little girl. "I might hide her," she thought; but what place would be secure? Suddenly she remembered something that she had heard Captain Carleton say when she was eating luncheon on that unlucky trip to Fort Sumter. "This fort could make South Carolina give up slavery," he had said. Why, then, of course Estralla would be perfectly safe if she was only at Fort Sumter, concluded the little girl, with a long sigh of relief. "I must get her there just as soon as I get home," she decided. Then suddenly Sylvia sat straight up in bed. The closet door had swung softly open, and a figure with a big hat and trailing dress stepped out. Sylvia was not frightened. "It's the ghost," she whispered; and leaning across poked Grace, exclaiming: "Grace! Look quick! here is Lady Caroline!" In an instant Grace was wide awake. "Where?" she demanded, in a frightened voice, clutching Sylvia's hand. "Right there! By the closet door," said Sylvia. "Oh! she's gone!" For as she looked toward the closet the figure had disappeared. "There, you waked me up for nothing. You dreamed it," declared Grace. "Oh, I didn't! Truly, I didn't. I haven't been asleep," Sylvia insisted. "It is just as Flora said. There is a ghost." Just then both the girls heard a startled cry, and a sound as if something had fallen in the room under them. "What's that?" whispered Grace. "Oh, Sylvia, do you suppose there really is a ghost?" "Yes, I saw it," declared Sylvia, with such evident satisfaction in her tone that Grace forgot to be frightened. "Well, I guess it fell downstairs," she chuckled; but in spite of their lack of fear both the little girls were excited over the unusual noise, and Sylvia was sure now that Flora had been right in saying the house was haunted. She wished it was already morning that she might tell Flora all that had happened. CHAPTER VIII A TWILIGHT TEA-PARTY It was late when Grace and Sylvia awoke the following morning, but they were down-stairs before the boys appeared. Mrs. Hayes greeted them smilingly, but she said that Flora was not well and that Mammy would take her breakfast to her up-stairs. "After breakfast you must go up and stay with her a little while," said Mrs. Hayes. "Why, Flora was never ill in her life," declared Ralph; "what's the matter?" "She is not really ill, but she fell over something last night and bruised her arm and shoulder, so that she feels lame and tired, and I thought a few hours in bed would be the best thing for her," explained Mrs. Hayes. "Mammy doesn't seem to know just how it happened," she concluded. Sylvia and Grace had talked over the "ghost" before coming down-stairs. Grace had tried best to convince Sylvia that she had really dreamed "Lady Caroline," but Sylvia insisted that a figure in a wide plumed hat and a trailing gown had really stepped out of the closet. "The moon was shining right where she stood. I saw her just as plainly as I could see you when you sat up in bed," Sylvia declared. But both the girls agreed that it would be best not to say anything about "Lady Caroline" until they had told Flora. After breakfast Mammy came to tell the visitors that Flora was ready to see them. "But jus' for a little while," she added, as she opened the door of Flora's chamber. Flora was bolstered up in bed, and had on a dainty dressing-gown of pink muslin tied with white ribbons. But there was a bandage about her right wrist, and a soft strip of cotton was bound about her head. "Oh, girls! It's too bad that I can't help you to have a good time to-day," she said, "and all because I was so clumsy." Both the girls assured her that it was a good time just to be at the Hayes plantation. "Flora! There is a ghost! Just as you said! I saw it. Just about midnight," said Sylvia. "Truly!" exclaimed Flora, in rather a faint voice. "Yes. And it was Lady Caroline. For it wore a big hat, like the one in the picture, and its dress trailed all about it," replied Sylvia. "Then I guess Grace will believe this is a haunted house," said Flora, a little triumphantly. "I didn't see it," said Grace. "And, truly, I believe Sylvia just dreamed it." Flora sat up in bed suddenly. "Sylvia did not dream it. I know she saw it," she declared. "Well, perhaps so. But I didn't," and Grace laughed good-naturedly; but Flora turned her face from them and began to cry. "After my being hurt, and--" she sobbed, but stopped quickly. Sylvia and Grace looked at each other in amazement. "It's because she is ill. And she's disappointed because you didn't see Lady Caroline," Sylvia whispered. In a moment Flora looked up with a little smile. "I am so silly," she said. "You must forgive me. But I'm sure Sylvia did see--" "I begin to think she did," Grace owned laughingly. She had happened to look toward the open closet and had seen certain things which made her quite ready to own that Flora might be right. But she was rather serious and silent for the rest of the visit. Before they left Flora's room Flora asked Sylvia not to tell anyone that she had seen a "ghost." "You see, the boys would laugh, and no one but me really believes the house is haunted," she explained. Of course Sylvia promised, but she was puzzled by Flora's request. It was decided that Ralph and Philip should ride back to Charleston that afternoon when Uncle Chris drove the little visitors home, and that Flora should stay at the plantation with her mother for a day or two. Sylvia had enjoyed her visit. She had even enjoyed seeing the "ghost," but she was sorry that she could not tell her mother and father of the great adventure. Nevertheless she was glad when the carriage stopped in front of her own home, and she saw Estralla, smiling and happy in the pink gingham dress, waiting to welcome her. "Sylvia, I'm coming over to-night. I've got something to tell you," Grace said, as the two friends stood for a moment at Sylvia's gate, after they had thanked Uncle Chris, and said good-bye to Sylvia's brothers. Grace was so serious that Sylvia wondered what it could be. "It isn't that Estralla is going to be sold right away, is it?" she asked anxiously. "No. I'll tell you after supper," Grace responded and ran on to her own home. Sylvia's mother and father were interested to hear all that she had to tell them about the corn-shucking, and of the wonderful cake with its palmetto flag. She told them about poor Dinkie, and what Philip had said: that Dinkie should not be sold away from her children, or whipped. Mr. Fulton seemed greatly pleased with Sylvia's account of her visit. He said Philip was a fine boy, and that there were many like him in South Carolina. They had just finished supper when Grace appeared, and the two little girls went up to Sylvia's room. "What is it, Grace?" Sylvia asked eagerly. "I can't think what you want to tell me that makes you look so sober." Grace looked all about the room and then closed the door, not seeing a little figure crouching in a shadowy corner. "I wouldn't want anybody else to hear. It's about the ghost," she whispered. "I know all about it. It was Flora herself! Yes, it was!" she continued quickly. "When we were in her room this morning I saw a big hat with a long feather on it, hanging on her closet door, and a long blue skirt, one of her mother's. They weren't there yesterday, for the door was open, just as it was to-day." "Well, what of that?" asked Sylvia. "Oh, Sylvia! Can't you see?" Grace asked impatiently. "Flora dressed up in her mother's things, and then came up the stairs to our room. She was determined to make us think she had a truly ghost in her house. Then when you called out, she got frightened and stumbled on the stairs. You know we heard someone fall and cry out. Of course it was Flora. Nobody seems to know how she got hurt. The minute I saw that plumed hat I knew just the trick she had played. I knew there wasn't a ghost," Grace concluded triumphantly. Sylvia felt almost disappointed that it had not really been "Lady Caroline." She wondered why Flora had wanted to deceive them. "I don't think it was fair," she said slowly. "Of course it wasn't fair. I wouldn't have believed that a Charleston girl would do such a mean trick," declared Grace. "Of course, as we were her company, we can't let her know that we have found her out." "Perhaps she meant to tell us, anyway," suggested Sylvia hopefully. "I'm sure she did. She thought it would make us laugh." "Well, then why didn't she?" asked Grace. Sylvia's face clouded; she could not answer this question, but she was sure that Flora had not meant to frighten or really deceive them, and she wanted to defend her absent friend. "Well, Grace, we know Flora wouldn't do anything mean. And, you see, she got hurt, and so she's just waiting to get well before she tells us of the joke. You wait and see. Flora will tell us just as soon as we see her again." There was a little note of entreaty in Sylvia's voice, as if she were pleading with Grace not to blame Flora. "I know one thing, Sylvia. You wouldn't do anything mean, if you are a Yankee," Grace declared warmly. "What's that noise?" she added quickly. The room was shadowy in the gathering twilight, and the two little girls had been sitting near the window. As Grace spoke they both turned quickly, for there was a sudden noise of an overturned chair in the further corner of the room, and they could see a dark figure sprawling on the floor. Before Sylvia could speak she heard the little wailing cry which Estralla always gave when in trouble, and then: "Don't be skeered, Missy! It's nobuddy. I jes' fell over your doll-ladies." "Oh, Estralla! You haven't broken my dolls! What were you up here for, anyway?" and Sylvia quite forgot all her plans to rescue Estralla as she ran toward her. The "doll-ladies," as the little darky girl had always called Sylvia's two china dolls which sat in two small chairs in front of a doll's table in one corner of the room, were both sprawling on the floor, their chairs upset, and the little table with its tiny tea-set overturned. Grace lit the candles on Sylvia's bureau, while Sylvia picked up her treasured dolls, "Molly" and "Polly," which her Grandmother Fulton had sent her on her last birthday. "I wuz up here, jest a-sittin' an' a-lookin' at 'em, Missy," wailed Estralla. "I never layed hand on 'em. An' when you an' Missy Grace comes in I da'sent move. An' then when I does move I tumbles over. I 'spec' now I'll get whipped." "Keep still, Estralla. You know you won't get whipped," replied Sylvia, finding that Molly and Polly had not been hurt by their fall, and that none of the little dishes were broken. "You ought to tell her mother to whip her. She's no business up here," said Grace. "Don't, Grace!" Sylvia exclaimed. "We don't get whipped every time we make a mistake. And Estralla hasn't anything of her own. Just think, your Uncle Robert can sell her away from her own mother. You said yourself that you didn't think that was fair." Estralla had scrambled to her feet and now stood looking at the little white girls with a half-frightened look in her big eyes. "Oh, Missy! I ain't gwine to be sold, be I?" she whispered. Sylvia put her arm around Estralla's shoulders. "No!" she said, "you shall not be sold. Now, don't look so frightened. We will have a tea-party for Molly and Polly, and you shall wait on them. Run down and ask your mother to give us some little cakes." Estralla was off in an instant, and while she was away Sylvia and Grace spread the little table, brought cushions from the window-seats and advised Molly and Polly to forgive the disturbance. When Mrs. Fulton came up-stairs a little later to tell Grace that her black Mammy had come to take her home she found three very happy little girls. Sylvia and Grace were being entertained at tea by Misses Molly and Polly, while Estralla with shining eyes and a wide smile carried tiny cups and little cakes to the guests, and chuckled delightedly over the clever things which Sylvia and Grace declared Molly and Polly had said. "A candle-light tea-party," exclaimed Mrs. Fulton, as she came into the room and smiled down on the happy group. "Perhaps Flora will own up," Grace said, as the two girls followed Mrs. Fulton down the stairs. "Anyway, you are mighty fair about it, and you're good to that stupid little darky." "Oh, Estralla isn't stupid. Not a bit," replied Sylvia laughingly. Estralla, who was carefully putting the little table in order, heard Sylvia's defense of her, and for a moment she stood very straight, holding one of the tiny cups in each hand. "I jes' loves Missy Sylvia, I do, I jes' wish ez how I could do somethin' so she'd know how I loves her," and two big tears rolled down the black cheeks of the little slave girl who had known so little of kindness or of joy. CHAPTER IX TROUBLESOME WORDS It was a week after Sylvia's visit to the Hayes plantation before Flora returned to school. A heavy rain had made the roads nearly impassable, and a little scar on Flora's forehead reminded Sylvia and Grace of her unlucky tumble. On Flora's first appearance at school Sylvia was confident that she would at once confess her part in "Lady Caroline's" appearance, and at recess she and Grace were eager to walk with Flora. It was now the first of November, but the air was warm and the garden had many blossoming plants and shrubs. Flora said that she was glad to be back at school. She told the girls that her father had returned from a northern trip and that he had given Dinkie and her children to Philip. "Phil teased him so that Father was tired of hearing him. He said Phil was a regular abolitionist," Flora explained with her pretty smile. "What's an abbylitionzist?" asked Grace. "Ask Sylvia. I heard my father say that Sylvia's father was one," answered Flora. "I don't know. But my father is a Congregationalist," replied Sylvia. "Perhaps that's what your father meant." "No, it's something about not believing in having slaves, I know that much," said Flora. "Who would do our work then?" questioned Grace. Flora could not answer this question. Sylvia resolved to ask Miss Rosalie at question time the meaning of this new word. If her father and Philip Hayes were "abolitionists," she was quite sure the word meant something very brave and fine. "What about Miss Flora and her ghost now?" Grace found a chance to whisper, as they entered the schoolroom. "She doesn't mean to own up." "Wait, she will," was Sylvia's response as she took her seat. When question time came Sylvia was ready. She stood up smiling and eager, and Miss Rosalie smiled back. She had grown fond of her little pupil from Boston, and thought to herself that Sylvia was really becoming almost like a little southern girl in her graceful ways and pleasant smile. "What is your question, Sylvia?" she asked. "If you please, Miss Rosalie, what does 'abolitionist' mean?" Some of the older girls exchanged startled looks, and May Bailey barely restrained a laugh. Probably Grace and Sylvia were the only girls in school who had not heard the word used as a term of reproach against the people of the northern states who wished to do away with slavery. Miss Rosalie's smile faded, but she responded without a moment's hesitation: "Why, an 'abolitionist' is a person who wishes to destroy some law or custom." There was a little murmur among the other pupils, but Grace and Sylvia looked at each other with puzzled eyes. Philip did not wish to "destroy" anything, thought Sylvia; he only wanted to protect Dinkie. And she was sure that her father would not destroy anything, unless it was something which would harm people. So it was a puzzled Sylvia who came home from school that day. She decided that her father could answer a question much better than Miss Rosalie, and resolved to ask him the meaning of the word. "Come up-stairs, Estralla," she said, finding the little negro girl at the gate as usual waiting for her. "I have some things my mother said I could give you." Estralla followed happily. She didn't care very much what it might be that Missy Sylvia would give her, it was delight enough for Estralla to follow after her. But when the little girl saw the things spread out on Sylvia's bed she exclaimed aloud: "Does you mean, Missy, dat I'se to pick out somethin'? Well, then I chooses the shoes. I never had no shoes." "They are all for you," said Sylvia, lifting up a pretty blue cape and holding it toward Estralla. "My lan'!" whispered Estralla. There was a dress of blue delaine with tiny white dots, two pretty white aprons, the blue cape, and shoes and stockings, beside some of Sylvia's part-worn underwear. She had begged her mother to let her give the little darky these things, and Mrs. Fulton had been glad that her little daughter wished to do so. "Estralla has never had ANYTHING," Sylvia had urged, "and she is always afraid of something. Of being whipped or sold. And I would like to see her have clothes like other girls." Estralla wanted to try on the shoes at once, and when she found that they fitted very comfortably, she chuckled and laughed with delight. Neither of the girls heard a rap at the door, and both were surprised when Aunt Connie, who had opened the door and stood waiting, exclaimed: "Fo' lan's sake! Wat you lettin' that darky dress up in you' clo'es fer, Missy Sylvia?" "They are her own clothes now, Aunt Connie," Sylvia explained. "My mother said I might give them to her." For a moment the negro woman stood silent. Then she put her hands up to her face and began to cry, very quietly. Estralla's laughter vanished. She wondered if her mammy was going to tell her that she could not keep the things. "'Scusie, Missy," muttered Aunt Connie; "you'se an angel to my po' little gal. An' I'se 'bliged to you. But I'se feared the chile won't wear 'em long. Massa Robert Waite's man sez he's gwine sell her off right soon." "He cyan't do no sech thing. Missy Sylvia won't let him," declared Estralla, who was perfectly sure that "Missy Sylvia" could do whatever she wished. With a pair of shoes on her feet and the blue cape over her shoulders Estralla had more courage. Sylvia's kindness had given the little colored girl a hope of happier days. "Aunt Connie, I'll do all I can for Estralla," said Sylvia. "Will you, Missy? Then ask yo' pa not to let Estralla be sold," pleaded Aunt Connie. Sylvia promised, and Aunt Connie went off smilingly. But Sylvia wondered if her father could prevent Mr. Robert Waite from selling the negro girl. "Estralla," she said very soberly, "I have promised that you shall not be sold, and I will ask my father. But if he cannot do anything, we will have to do something ourselves. Will you do whatever I tell you?" "Oh, yas indeed, Missy," Estralla answered eagerly. "Well, I'll ask Father to-night. And to-morrow morning you bring up my hot water, and I'll tell you what he says. But don't be frightened, anyway," said Sylvia. "I ain't skeered like I used to be," responded Estralla. "Yo' see, Missy, I feels jes' as if you was my true fr'en'." "I'll try to be," Sylvia promised. Estralla went off happy with her new possessions, and Sylvia turned to the window, and looked off across the beautiful harbor toward the forts. She had heard her father say, that very noon, that South Carolina would fight to keep its slaves, and she wondered if the soldiers in Fort Moultrie would not fight to set the black people free. She remembered that her father had said that Fort Sumter was the property of the United States; and, for some reason which she could not explain even to herself, she was sure that Estralla would be safe there. If Mr. Robert Waite really meant to sell her, Sylvia again resolved to find some way to get the little slave girl to Fort Sumter. When Estralla brought the hot water the next morning she found a very sober little mistress. For Sylvia's father had not only explained the meaning of the word "abolitionist" as being the name the southerners had given to the men who were determined that slavery of other men, whatever their color, should end, but he had told his little daughter that he could do nothing to prevent the sale of the little colored girl, and that not even at Fort Sumter would she be safe. Sylvia had not gone to sleep very early. She lay awake thinking of Estralla. "Suppose somebody could sell me away from my mother," she thought, ready to cry even at such a possibility. Sylvia knew that Aunt Connie had been whipped because she had rebelled against parting with her older children, and there was no Philip to take Aunt Connie's part. "Mornin', Missy," said Estralla, coming into the room, and setting down the pitcher of hot water very carefully. She had on the pink gingham with one of the white aprons, and as she stood smiling and neat at the foot of Sylvia's bed, she looked very different from the clumsy little darky who had tumbled into the room a few weeks ago. Sylvia smiled back. "Estralla, I want you to be sure to come up-stairs to-night after the house is all quiet. Don't tell your mother, or anybody," she said very soberly. "All right, Missy," agreed Estralla, sure that whatever Missy Sylvia asked was right. Sylvia said nothing more, but dressed and went down to breakfast. She heard her father say that he feared that South Carolina would secede from the United States, and she repeated the word aloud: "'Secede'? What does that mean?" She began to think the world was full of difficult words. "In this case it means that the State of South Carolina wishes to give up her rights as one of the States of the Union," Mr. Fulton explained, "but we hope she will give up slavery instead," he concluded. Grace was at the gate as Sylvia came out ready for school, and called out a gay greeting. "What are you so sober about, Sylvia?" she asked as they walked on together. CHAPTER X THE PALMETTO FLAG When Sylvia had told Estralla to come to her room that night, she had determined to find a way to get the little negro to a place of safety. Sylvia did not know that a negro was, in those far-off days, the property of his master as much as a horse or a dog, and that wherever the negro might go his master could claim him and punish him for trying to escape. Any person aiding a slave to escape could also be punished by law. All Sylvia thought of was to have Estralla protected, and she was quite sure that a United States fort could protect one little negro girl. Nevertheless she was troubled and worried as to how she could carry out her plan; but she resolved not to tell Grace. As usual Flora was waiting at Miss Patten's gate for her friends. She was wearing a pretty turban hat, and pinned in front was a fine blue cockade, to which Flora pointed and said: "Look, girls. This is the Secession Cockade. Ralph gave it to me," she explained; "all loyal Carolinians ought to wear it, Ralph says." "What does it mean to wear one?" asked Sylvia. "Oh, it means that you believe South Carolina has a right to keep its slaves, and sell them, of course; and if the United States interferes, why, Carolinians will teach them a lesson," Flora explained grandly, repeating the explanation her father had given her that very morning. Many of the other girls wore blue cockades, and a palmetto flag was hung behind Miss Rosalie's desk. "Young ladies," said Miss Rosalie, "I have hung South Carolina's flag where you can all see it. You all know that a flag is an emblem. Our flag means the glory of our past and the hope of the future. I will ask you all to rise and salute this flag!" The little girls all stood, and each raised her right hand. All but Sylvia. Flushed and unhappy, with downcast eyes, she kept her seat. This was not the "Stars and Stripes," the flag she had been taught to love and honor. She knew that the palmetto flag stood for slavery. Sylvia did not know what Miss Rosalie would say to her, and, even worse than her teacher's disapproval, she was sure that her schoolmates, perhaps even Grace and Flora, would dislike and blame her for not saluting their flag. But she was soon to realize just how serious was her failure to salute the palmetto flag. Miss Rosalie came down the aisle and laid a note on Sylvia's desk. It was very brief: "You may go home at recess. Take your books and go quietly without a word to any of the other pupils. You may tell your parents that I do not care to have you as a pupil for another day." As Sylvia read these words the tears sprang to her eyes. It was all she could do not to sob aloud. She dared not look at the other girls. She held a book before her face, and only hoped that she could keep back the tears until recess-time. But not for a moment did Sylvia wish that she had saluted a flag which stood for the protection of slavery. Miss Rosalie had said that a flag was an "emblem," and even in her unhappiness Sylvia knew that the emblem of the United States stood for justice and liberty. When the hour of recess came Sylvia had her books neatly strapped, and, as Miss Rosalie had directed, she left the room quietly without one word to any of the other girls. She had nearly reached the gate when she heard steps close behind her and Grace's voice calling: "Sylvia, Sylvia, dear," and Grace's arm was about her. "It's a mean shame," declared the warm-hearted little southern girl, "and flag or no flag, I'm your true friend." "Grace! Grace!" called Miss Rosalie, and before Sylvia could respond her loyal playmate had turned obediently back to the house. Sylvia stepped out on the street, her eyes a little blurred by tears, but greatly comforted by Grace's assuring words of friendship. She did not want to go home and tell her mother what had happened, and show her Miss Patten's note, for she knew that her mother would be troubled and unhappy. Suddenly she decided to go to her father's warehouse and tell him, and go home with him at noon. She was sure her father would think she had done right. She turned and walked quickly down King Street, and in a short time she was near the wharves and could see the long building where her father stored the cotton he purchased from the planters. The wharves were piled high with boxes and bales, and there were small boats coming in to the wharves, and others making ready to depart. Sylvia could see her father's boat close to the wharf near the warehouse. "I wish I could take that boat and carry Estralla off to Fort Sumter," she thought. A good-natured negro led her to Mr. Fulton's office, and before her father could say a word Sylvia was in the midst of her story. She told of the blue cockades that the other girls wore, of the palmetto flag, and of her failure to salute it, and handed him Miss Patten's note. Mr. Fulton looked serious and troubled as he listened to his little girl's story. Then he lifted her to his knee, took off her pretty hat, and said: "Too bad, dear child! But you did right. A little Yankee girl must be loyal to the Stars and Stripes. I am glad you came and told me." For a moment it seemed to Sylvia that her father had forgotten all about her. He was looking straight out of the window. While he had not forgotten his little girl he was thinking that Charleston people must be quite ready to take the serious step of urging their State to declare her secession from the United States, and her right to buy and sell human beings as slaves. He wished that the United States officers at Fort Moultrie could realize that at any time Charleston men might seize Fort Sumter, where there were but few soldiers, and he said aloud: "I ought to warn them." Sylvia wondered for a moment what her father could mean, but he said quickly: "Jump down and put on your hat. I'm going to sail down to Fort Moultrie and have a talk with my good friends there, and you can come with me." At this good news Sylvia forgot all her troubles. A sail across the harbor with her father was the most delightful thing that she could imagine. And she held fast to his hand, smiling happily, as they walked down the wharf where the boat was fastened. Mr. Fulton was beginning to find his position as a northern man in Charleston rather uncomfortable. Many of his southern friends firmly believed that the northern men had no right to tell them that slavery was wrong and must cease. He wished to protect his business interests, or he would have returned to Boston; for it was difficult for him not to declare his own patriotic feeling that Abraham Lincoln, who had just been elected President of the United States, would never permit slavery to continue. Mr. Fulton sent a darky with a message to Sylvia's mother that he was taking the little girl for a sail to the forts, and in a short time they were on board the Butterfly, as Sylvia had named the white sloop, and were going swiftly down the harbor. "May I steer?" asked Sylvia, and Mr. Fulton smilingly agreed. He was very proud of his little daughter's ability to sail a boat, and although he watched her shape the boat's course, and was ready to give her any needed assistance, he was sure that he could trust her. As they sailed past Fort Sumter Sylvia could see men at work repairing the fortifications. Over both forts waved the Stars and Stripes. She made a skilful landing at Fort Moultrie, greatly to the admiration of the sentry on guard. Mr. Fulton and Sylvia went directly to the officer's quarters, which were in the rear of the fort, and where Mrs. Carleton gave Sylvia a warm welcome. She asked the little girl about her school and Sylvia told her what had happened that morning. "I am not surprised," said Captain Carleton. "I expect any day that Charleston men will take Fort Sumter, and fly the palmetto flag, instead of the Stars and Stripes. If Major Anderson had his way we would have a stronger force in Fort Sumter, and that is greatly needed." Major Anderson was the officer in command at Fort Moultrie. He was a southern man, but a true and loyal officer of the United States. When Captain Carleton and Mr. Fulton went out Mrs. Carleton asked Sylvia if she was sorry to leave the school, and if she liked her schoolmates. Sylvia was eager to tell her of all the good times she had enjoyed with Grace and Flora, and declared that they were her true friends. Then she told Mrs. Carleton about Estralla, and of her resolve that the little darky girl should not be separated from Aunt Connie. "Your best plan, then, will be to go and see Mr. Robert Waite and ask him. He is a kind-hearted man, and perhaps he will promise you to let the child stay with her mother. I hope it will not be long now before all the slaves will be set free," said Mrs. Carleton. Before Sylvia could respond Captain Carleton came hurrying into the room. He had a letter in his hand, and asked Sylvia to excuse Mrs. Carleton for a moment, and they left the room together. In a few moments Mrs. Carleton returned alone, and Sylvia heard Captain Carleton say: "It is worth trying." "My dear Sylvia, I want you to do something for me; it is not really for me," she added quickly, "it is for the United States. Something to help keep the flag flying over these forts." "Oh, can I do something like that?" Sylvia asked eagerly. "Yes, my dear. Now, listen carefully. Here is a letter which Major Anderson wants delivered to a gentleman who will start for Washington to-morrow. If anyone from this fort should be seen visiting that gentleman he would not be allowed to leave Charleston as he plans. If your father, even, should call upon him it would create suspicion. So I am going to ask you to carry this letter to the address written on the envelope, and you must give it into his own hands to-night. Not even your own father will know that you have this letter; so if he should be questioned or watched he will be able to deny knowing of its existence. Are you willing to undertake it?" "Yes! Yes!" promised Sylvia. "I will carry it safely. The gentleman shall have the letter to-night," and she reached out her hand to take it. But Mrs. Carleton shook her head. "No, my dear, I will pin it safely inside your dress. It would not do for you to be seen leaving the fort with a letter in your hand." CHAPTER XI SYLVIA CARRIES A MESSAGE Mrs. Fulton did not seem surprised to hear of Sylvia's dismissal from Miss Patten's school because of her failure to salute the palmetto flag. She did not say very much of the occurrence that afternoon, when Sylvia returned from the fort, for she wanted Sylvia to think as pleasantly as possible of her pretty teacher. But she was surprised that Sylvia herself did not have more to say about the affair. But Sylvia's own thoughts were so filled by the mysterious letter which was pinned inside her dress, with wondering how she could safely deliver it without the knowledge of anyone, that she hardly thought of school. For the time she had even forgotten Estralla. "What do you say to becoming a teacher yourself, Sylvia dear?" her mother asked, as they sat together in the big sunny room which overlooked the harbor. "When I grow up?" asked Sylvia. Mrs. Fulton smiled. Sylvia "grown up" seemed a long way in the future. "No--that is too far away," she answered. "I was thinking that perhaps you would like to teach Estralla to read and write. You could begin to-morrow, if you wished." "Yes, indeed! Mother, you think of everything," declared Sylvia. "Why, that will be better than going to school!" "But we must not let your own studies be neglected," her mother reminded her, "so after you have given Estralla a morning lesson each day you and I will study together and keep up with Grace and Flora. By the way, Flora was here just before you and your father reached home; she was very sorry not to see you, and I have asked Flora and Grace to come to supper to-morrow night." Sylvia began to think that a world without school was going to be a very pleasant world after all. She was sure that it would be great fun to teach Estralla, and to have lessons with her mother was even better than reciting to pretty Miss Rosalie; and, beside this, her best friends were coming to supper the next night, so she had many pleasant things to think of, which was exactly what her mother had planned. Her father had said that she might ask Grace to go sailing with them in the Butterfly in a day or two; and now Sylvia resolved to ask if she might not ask Flora as well, and perhaps Estralla could go, too. So it was no wonder that she ran up-stairs singing: "There's a good time coming, It's almost here,"-- greatly to the satisfaction of her father and mother, who had feared that she would be very unhappy over the school affair. They were sorry it had happened, but they could not blame Sylvia. "Oh, Missy Sylvia, here I is," and as Sylvia set her candle on the table, Estralla stood smiling before her. "Oh!" exclaimed Sylvia with such surprise that the little darky looked at her wonderingly. "Yo' tells me to come, an' here I is," she repeated. "You tells me," and Estralla sniffed as if ready to give her usual wails, "that you'se gwine to stop my bein' sold off from my mammy. How you gwine to stop it, Missy?" For a moment Sylvia was tempted to tell Estralla that it couldn't be helped, as long as South Carolina believed in slavery. But Estralla's sad eyes and pleading look made her resolve again to protect this little slave girl against injustice. So she replied quickly: "That is my secret. But don't you worry. Some day, very soon, I shall tell you all about it. You know, Estralla, that you need not be afraid. And what do you think! I am not going to school any more." Estralla's face had brightened. She was always quite ready to smile, but she could not understand why Sylvia had wanted her to come so mysteriously to her room. "And I am going to teach you to read and write," Sylvia added. "Is you, Missy?" Estralla responded in a half-frightened whisper. Now, she thought, she knew all about Missy Sylvia's reasons for the secret visit. For very few slave-owners allowed anyone to teach the slaves to read and write. Estralla knew this, and it seemed a wonderful thing that Missy Sylvia proposed. "I'll tell you all about it to-morrow morning," said Sylvia; "now run away," and with a chuckle of delight Estralla closed the door softly behind her. She had been quite ready to run away with Missy Sylvia when she had crept up the stairs earlier in the evening. But to stay safely with her mammy and learn to read seemed a much happier plan to the little darky. If she could read and write! Why, it would be almost as wonderful as it would to be a little white girl, she thought. Now Sylvia realized, as she stood alone in her safe, pleasant chamber, that as soon as possible she must deliver the letter entrusted to her. If it was to go to Washington it must be some message that was of importance to the officers at Fort Moultrie and Fort Sumter, she thought. Perhaps it might even be something that would help Carolinians to give up slavery; and then Estralla and Aunt Connie, and all the black people she knew and liked, could be safe and have homes of their own. Sylvia went to the window and peered out. The street and garden lay dark and shadowy. Now and then a dark figure went along the street. The house seemed very quiet. She tiptoed to the closet and took out a brown cape. It was one which she wore on stormy days, and nearly covered her. Then from one of the bureau drawers she drew out a long blue silk scarf, and twisted it about her head. "I can pull the end over my face, and they'll think I'm a darky," she thought, resolved if anyone spoke to her not to answer. She whispered over the name and address on the letter. She knew that the street led from King Street, and she was sure that she could find it. But it was some distance from home; it would be late before she could get back. She blew out her candle, opened her chamber door and stood listening. She could not hear a sound, and tiptoed cautiously along the hall to the stairs. What if the door of her mother's room should open, she thought, terrified at such a possibility. What could she say? She had promised not to tell of the letter, and what reason could she give for creeping out of the house at that hour? But she reached the lower floor safely, and now came the danger of making a noise when opening the door. Sylvia grasped the big key and turned it slowly. Then she pulled at the heavy door, and it swung back easily. She gave a long breath of relief as she stepped out on the piazza. She left the door ajar, so that she could slip in easily on her return. Keeping in the shadow of the trees she reached the street, and now she felt sure that nothing could prevent her from delivering the letter. She ran swiftly along, now and then meeting someone who glanced wonderingly at the flying little figure. She had reached King Street and was nearly at the street where she was to turn, when suddenly a heavy hand grasped her arm and nearly swung her from her feet. "Running off, are you? And wearing your mistress's clothes at that, I'll warrant," said a gruff voice. "Wall, now, whose darky are you?" Sylvia pulled the silken scarf from her face, and even in the glimmer of the dull street-lamp under which the man had drawn her he could see the auburn hair and blue eyes. But he still kept his grasp on her arm. There were slaves who were not black, he knew, and "quality white" girls were not running about Charleston streets alone at night. "What is your name?" he demanded. Sylvia looked at him resentfully. "How dare you grab me like this?" she demanded. "Let me go." The man released his grasp instantly. No darky girl or slave would have spoken like that. He vanished as suddenly as he had appeared, more frightened now than Sylvia herself. For an instant Sylvia stood quite still. She felt ready to cry, and now walked more slowly. For the first time she realized something of what it must be to be a colored girl. "If I had been Estralla he could have dragged me off and had me whipped," she thought. "Oh, I must get Mr. Robert Waite to let Estralla stay safe with us." She was now near her destination, which proved to be a large house right on the street. She knocked at the door several times before it was opened. Then she found herself looking up at a tall man whose white hair and kindly smile gave her confidence. "Well, little girl, whom do you wish to see?" he asked pleasantly. "I have a message, I--" began Sylvia, her voice trembling a little. "Are you Mr. Doane?" "Yes; come in," and he held the door open for her to enter, and then closed and fastened it behind them. Sylvia drew the letter from its hiding-place and handed it to him, and Mr. Doane slipped it into his pocket. "Come in, my child, and rest a moment; you are out of breath," he said, leading the way to a small room at the end of the narrow hall. Sylvia was glad to sit down in a low chair near the table, while Mr. Doane opened the envelope. She could see that there was another letter enclosed, as well as the one which the tall man was reading with such interest. When he had finished reading the letter he tore it into a great many small pieces. Then he put the enclosed envelope carefully in an inner pocket. "So you brought me this letter from the fort. Well, you have done what I hope may prove a great service to the Stars and Stripes. I thank you," he said, looking with smiling eyes at the tired little figure in the brown cape. Then he asked Sylvia her name, and she told him that no one, not even her dear mother, knew that she had brought the message. Before they had finished their talk he had heard all about the blue cockades that the girls had worn at Miss Patten's school, and of Sylvia's refusal to salute the palmetto flag. "You see I couldn't do that, because it would mean that I believed that Estralla ought to be a slave, and of course I don't believe such a dreadful thing," she explained. So then Mr. Doane heard all about Estralla and Aunt Connie. Sylvia decided that she liked Mr. Doane even better than Captain Carleton. And when he told her again that by her courage in bringing him the message from the fort, and by her silence in regard to it, that she had done him a great service, as well as a service to those whose only wish for South Carolina was that the State should free herself from slavery, Sylvia forgot all about the long walk through the shadowy streets. "I wish I had someone to send with you to see you home safely," Mr. Doane said, a little anxiously, as they stood together in the little hallway. "But I am known here, and I fear everything I do is watched. So I must trust that you will be safely cared for." Before Sylvia could reply, and say that she was not at all afraid to go alone, the outer door rattled as if someone were trying to push it open. "You have been followed. Run back to the sitting-room," whispered Mr. Doane. "I will open the door." CHAPTER XII ESTRALLA HELPS Sylvia, standing just inside the door of the small room, heard the outer door swing open. She heard Mr. Doane's sharp question, and then a familiar wail. "Oh! It's Estralla!" she exclaimed, and ran back to the entry. "It's Estralla! Oh! I'm so glad!" she said. "Don' you be skeered, Missy Sylvia," said Estralla valiantly. "Dis yere man cyan't take you off'n sell you." "All Estralla can think of is that somebody is going to be carried off and sold," Sylvia said, turning to Mr. Doane, who stood by looking very serious. "How did you know where your little mistress was?" he questioned gravely. For if this little darky knew of Sylvia's errand he feared that she might tell others, and so Sylvia would have brought the message from the fort to little purpose. The letter, which was now in Mr. Doane's pocket, was to the Secretary of War in Washington, asking for permission for Major Anderson to take men to Fort Sumter, before the secessionists could occupy it. "I follers Missy," explained Bstralla. "An' when that man grabs her on King Street, I was gwine to chase right home an' get Massa Fulton, but Missy talks brave at him, an' he lets go of her. Oh, Missy! What you doin' of way off here?" At this question Mr. Doane smiled, realizing that the little negro girl had no knowledge of the message which Sylvia had delivered. "Well, Estralla, suppose Miss Sylvia came to try and help give you your freedom?" he asked. "An' my mammy?" demanded Estralla eagerly. "Why, of course," Mr. Doane replied. "For anything that helps to convince South Carolina that she is wrong will help to free the slaves," he added, turning to Sylvia. "Now, Estralla, if you love Miss Sylvia, if you want to stay with your mammy, you must never tell of her visit here to-night. Remember!" and Mr. Doane's voice was very stern. "Estralla won't tell," Sylvia declared confidently; "and I am glad she came to go home with me." "Shuah I'll do jes' what Missy wants me to," said the little darky. "Try to let Mrs. Carleton know that I received the letter, and that I hope to reach Washington safely," said Mr. Doane, as he bade Sylvia good-night. As the door closed behind them Estralla clasped Sylvia's hand. "Wat dat clock say?" she asked; for one of the city clocks was striking the hour. "It's twelve o'clock," answered Sylvia. "Oh! My lan', Missy! Dat's a terrible onlucky time fer us to be out," whispered Estralla. "Dat's de time w'en witch folks comes a-dancin' an' a-prancin' 'roun' and takes off chilluns." Sylvia knew that all the negroes believed in witches and all sorts of impossible tales, so Estralla's words did not at all frighten her, but she did wish that she was safe in her own home. The streets were now dark and silent, and black shadows seemed to lurk at every corner as, hand in hand, Estralla and Sylvia ran swiftly along. "I tells you, Missy, dat it's jes' lucky I comes after you, cos' witch-folks, w'at comes floatin' 'roun' 'bout dis hour of de night, dey ain't gwine to tech us; cos' when dey's two folks holdin' each other hands tight, jes' like we is, dey don't dast to tech us," said Estralla. "Where were you, Estralla, when I came down-stairs?" Sylvia asked. "I was jes' a-takin' a little sleep on de big rug side of your door, Missy. I'se been a-sleepin' dere dis long time. My mammy lets me. An' when you opens de door I mos' calls out, but didn't. I jes' stan's up quick, so's you nebber know I was thar," and Estralla chuckled happily. Sylvia wondered to herself why Estralla should choose such a hard bed. Then, suddenly, she realized all Estralla's devotion. That the little negro girl had slept there to be near her "fr'en'." She remembered the first time that she had ever seen Estralla, on the morning when she had tumbled in to Sylvia's room and broken the big pitcher, and that even then Estralla had been ready to confess and take the whipping that she was sure would follow, rather than let Sylvia be blamed. She recalled Estralla's effort to rescue her at Fort Sumter on the day Sylvia had run away from Miss Patten's school; and she remembered that it was Estralla who had told Miss Patten the real reason, and so saved her from further trouble. "Estralla, you have been my true friend," she declared, "and I am going to remember it always. I am going to ask my mother to put a nice little bed for you in your mammy's cabin." "Don' yo' do that, Missy. I likes sleepin' on de rug," pleaded Estralla. "Hush, we must creep in without making any noise," responded Sylvia, in a whisper, for they were now directly in front of Sylvia's home. Noiselessly Estralla led the way. "Oh, Missy! de door is shut fas'," she whispered, as she endeavored to push it open. "But it can't be shut," Sylvia answered. Both the little girls pushed against it, but the door stood fast. "Oh! What will we do?" half sobbed Sylvia, who was now very tired, and almost too sleepy to think of anything. "We cyan't get in de back door. My mammy she'd wake up if a rabbit run twixt her cabin an' de kitchen," Estralla whispered back. "I 'spec's I'll hev' to climb up to de winder ober de porch, and comes down and let you in." "Oh! Can you, Estralla?" Sylvia's voice was very near to tears. She had forgotten all about the importance of the message she had safely delivered. All she wanted now was to be inside this dear safe house where her mother and father were sleeping, not knowing that their little girl, cold and sleepy, was shut out. "I 'spec's I can," Estralla answered. "You jes' stay quiet, an' in 'bout four shakes of a lamb's tail I'se gwine to open de door, an' in yo' walks." There was a little scrambling noise among the stout vines which ran up the pillars of the porch as Estralla started to carry out her plan. A cat, or a fluttering bird, would have hardly made more commotion. Sylvia listened eagerly. Suppose the porch window was fastened? she thought fearfully. It seemed a very long time before the front door opened, and Estralla reached out and clutched at the brown cape. Noiselessly they crept up the stairs, Estralla leading the way. It was she who opened the door of Sylvia's room, and then with a whispered "Yo'se all right now, Missy," closed it behind her. Sylvia hung up the brown cape in the closet, and slipped off her dress. She was soon in bed and fast asleep, and it was late the next morning before she awoke--so late that her father had breakfasted and gone to his warehouse; Estralla had been sent on an errand, and Mrs. Fulton decided that Sylvia should have a holiday. "You seem tired, dear child," she said a little anxiously, as Sylvia said that she did not want to go to walk; that she had rather sit still. "I guess I am tired," acknowledged the little girl, and was quite content to sit by the window with a story-book, instead of giving Estralla a lesson. "If it had not been for Estralla I don't know what would have happened to me last night," she thought. She wondered who had closed and fastened the front door, but dared not ask. Grace and Flora were to come early that afternoon, as soon after school as possible, and Flora had sent Sylvia a note that she would bring her lace-work and give her a lesson. By noon Sylvia felt rested, and was looking eagerly forward to her friends' visit. She began to feel that she was a very fortunate little girl to have had the chance to do something that might help, as Mr. Doane had said, to give the black people their freedom. She only wished that she could tell her mother and father of the midnight journey. "But I will ask Mrs. Carleton the next time I go to the fort to let me tell Mother," she resolved. CHAPTER XIII A HAPPY AFTERNOON Grace was the first to arrive, and she declared that she wished that she was in Sylvia's place and need not go to school another day. The two little friends stood at the window watching for Flora, and it was not long before they saw her coming up the walk, closely followed by her black "Mammy," who was carrying two baskets. One of these seemed very heavy. "What can be in Mammy's basket, I wonder?" said Grace. "And, look, Sylvia! Flora isn't wearing the blue cockade! That's because she is coming to visit you. She had it on at school this morning." Flora wore the same pretty velvet turban which she had worn on Sylvia's last day at school. She had on a cape of garnet-colored velvet, and as she came running into the room Sylvia looked at her with admiring eyes. "You do look so pretty, Flora! And I am so glad to see you. Come up-stairs to my room and take off your things." "It isn't half the fun going to school now that you don't come, Sylvia," responded Flora, as the three friends went up the broad staircase together. "Mammy," with her baskets, followed them, and when she had helped her little mistress lay aside her cape and hat, Flora said: "You can go home now, Mammy, And my mother will tell you when to come after me." "Yas, Missy," responded the old colored woman, and with a curtsey to each of the little girls she left the room. "What makes your mammy look so sober, Flora?" questioned Grace. "She is usually all smiles; but to-day she hasn't a word to say for herself." "Oh, the darkies are all stirred up over all this talk about their being set free," Flora answered, "and even Mammy, who was Mother's nurse, and has always been well taken care of, thinks it would be a fine thing for her children and grandchildren to be 'jes' like white folks,'" and Flora laughed scornfully. "But that needn't make her look sober!" insisted Grace. "I reckon she's upset because my mother sold two or three little slaves yesterday--Mammy's grandchildren," Flora answered carelessly. Sylvia could feel her face flushing, and she said over to herself that no matter what Flora said that she, Sylvia, must remember that Flora was her guest. Beside that, had not Flora taken off the blue cockade so that Sylvia would not be reminded of the trouble at school? But Grace felt no such restraints. She was a southern girl as well as Flora, but she was sorry for the old colored woman. "Well, I do wish we could keep the pickaninnies until they grow up. It seems a shame when they feel so bad to be sold off to strangers. And some of them are abused too," she said. "You talk as if they felt just the same as we do, and that's silly," Flora declared; "but Philip talks just the same. He says he is going to give Dinkie her freedom," and she turned toward the two baskets which Mammy had set down with such care near Molly and Polly. "I brought my lace-work, and Mother has fixed a cushion for you, Sylvia, and one for Grace, too. See! The pattern is begun on each one, and I will give you both lessons until you know as much as I do." As Flora talked she had opened the smaller basket and taken out two square boxes and handed one to each of her friends. "Open them," she said, nodding smilingly. The box which she handed to Sylvia was covered with plaited blue silk. It had a narrow edge of gilt braid around the cover. Grace's box was covered with yellow silk, but the boxes were of the same size. As Sylvia and Grace lifted the covers they smiled and exclaimed happily. The lace cushion lay inside, and in dainty little pockets on each side of the boxes were the delicate threads and materials for the lace. A thimble of gold, with "Sylvia from Flora" engraved around its rim, was in Sylvia's box, and one exactly like it was in Grace's box. "Oh, Flora Hayes! This is the most beautiful present that ever was!" declared Sylvia; and Grace, holding the box with both hands, was hopping up and down saying over and over: "Flora! You are just like the Golden Princess in a fairy story who gives people what they want most." "My mother made the boxes herself," Flora explained proudly. "I wanted to give you girls something, and I'm awfully glad you like them." Then Flora stood up quickly. "Girls! I dressed up in Mother's hat and skirt, that night at the plantation. It wasn't Lady Caroline." She spoke very rapidly as if she wished to finish as quickly as possible. It was not easy to think of Flora Hayes as being ashamed, but Sylvia felt quite sure that Flora felt sorry that she had attempted to deceive her friends. "I knew it all the time," said Grace slowly, "and I told Sylvia it was you; didn't I, Sylvia?" "Yes," said Sylvia, "and we knew you were sure to tell us about it, Flora. But you did look just like the picture of Lady Caroline." Flora sat down. It had been so much easier to confess than she had expected. Neither Grace nor Sylvia had seemed resentful or surprised. "You didn't tell me that you knew," she said, a little accusingly. "Oh, well, we couldn't do that, Flora. You see we were your guests," Grace explained. "And we knew you were sure to tell us," Sylvia added. Flora was silent for a moment. She was thinking that both her friends had been rather fine about the whole affair. They had not run screaming from their room on the appearance of the "ghost," and alarmed the house, and so brought discovery and punishment and shame upon her; neither had they resented her not confessing. "Well, I do think you two girls are the nicest girls in this town," she declared, "and I am mighty proud that you are my friends. I can tell you one thing: I'll never try to make anyone believe in ghosts again. I was half frightened to death myself when I crept up those stairs, and my shoulder has been lame ever since." Grace and Sylvia had wondered what the large basket contained, but in their interest over Flora's beautiful gifts, and their delight in her "owning up" to being the "ghost," they had quite forgotten about it. It was Flora who now pointed at it and said laughingly: "I've brought my dolls in that basket." "Molly and Polly will be glad enough to have company," Sylvia assured her. Flora opened the basket and took out a large black "mammy" in a purple dress, white apron, and a yellow handkerchief twisted turban-fashion about her head. "Mammy Jane always goes with the young ladies," she explained laughingly, and took out two fine china dolls dressed in white muslin with broad crimson silk sashes. Each of these fine ladies had a tiny parasol of crimson silk. "I'm going home after my dolls," exclaimed Grace, and while Sylvia brought cushions for these unexpected visitors, and introduced them to Molly and Polly, Grace hurried home and was soon back again with her own treasured dolls, which she introduced as "Mr. and Mrs. and Miss Delaney." The lesson in lace-making was quite forgotten as the three girls played with the array of dolls. Sylvia ran to the door and called Estralla, who appeared so quickly that Sylvia wondered where she could have been. Estralla was told that she must help "Mammy Jane" take care of the doll visitors, and the little negro's face beamed with pleasure. Not one of the little girls in the pleasant room was as happy as Estralla; and when supper was ready and Sylvia and her friends went down-stairs, leaving Estralla in charge of all the dolls, she could hardly believe in her good fortune, and, as usual, was sure it was all due to her beloved Missy Sylvia. After supper the dolls were all invited downstairs to be introduced to Sylvia's father and mother; and Estralla, smiling and delighted, was entrusted with bringing "Mammy Jane." The three friends often looked back on that happy afternoon, for on the very next day Mr. Hayes decided to move his family to the plantation, and it was many days before Sylvia, Grace and Flora were to be together again. The citizens of Charleston, in December, 1860, were becoming anxious as to what might befall them. Very soon it might be possible that South Carolina would secede from the Union, and war with the northern states might follow. In such a case the guns of Fort Sumter and Fort Moultrie might fire on Charleston, and many planters who had homes in Charleston were sending their families to their country homes. Northern men who had business in Charleston were also anxious, and Sylvia did not know that her own father was seriously considering a return to Boston. But the little girls bade each other good-night with happy smiles and laughter, and without a thought but that they would have many more pleasant times together. Sylvia did not even think of the lace-making until she brought down her pretty box to show to her mother and father. "The Charleston people have been so kind to us," Mrs. Fulton said, a little sadly. "They are the most courteous and kindly people in the world," declared Mr. Fulton. Sylvia went up to her room wondering why her mother and father seemed so serious, when everything was so lovely. She had almost forgotten her adventure of the previous night, and went happily to bed with Flora's pretty gift on the light-stand beside her bed. CHAPTER XIV MR. ROBERT WAITE It was a very sober little darky who came up to Sylvia's room the next morning. She set down the pitcher of water and moved silently toward the door. "What's the matter, Estralla?" Sylvia called; for usually Estralla was all smiles, and had a good deal to say. Estralla shook her head. "Nuffin', Missy. I knowed you couldn't do nuffin' 'bout it. My mammy says how nobody can." "Wait, Estralla! What do you mean?" exclaimed Sylvia, sitting up in bed. "I'se gwine to be sold! Jes' like I tells you. My mammy was over to Massa Waite's house las' night, and she hears ober dar dat Massa Robert's gwine to sell off every nigger what ain't workin'--this week!" Estralla's voice had drifted into her old-time wail. "Oh, Estralla! What can I do?" and Sylvia was out of bed in a second, standing close beside the little colored girl. "I dunno, Missy Sylvia. I 'spec' dar ain't nuffin' you kin do. But you has been mighty good to me," Estralla replied. "It's mighty hard to go off and leave my mammy an' never see you-all no more, Missy Sylvia. I dunno whar I'll be sent." "Estralla, if you were earning wages for Mr. Robert Waite would he let you stay here?" Sylvia asked eagerly. "I reckon he would, Missy. But who's a-gwine to pay wages for a pickaninny like me? Nobuddy! Missy, I'se a-gwine to run off an' hide myself 'til the Yankee soldiers comes and sets us free," said Estralla. "You can't do that. But don't be frightened, Estralla. I have thought of something. I will hire you! Yes, I will; and pay wages for you to Mr. Waite. I'll go tell him so this very day," declared Sylvia, her face brightening, as she remembered the twenty dollars in gold which her Grandmother Fulton had given her when she had left Boston. "You can do whatever you please with it," was what Grandmother Fulton had said. Sylvia had thought that she would ask her mother to buy her a watch with the money, but she did not remember that now. She knew that, more than anything, she would rather keep Estralla safe. Twenty dollars was a good deal of money, she reflected. If the northern soldiers would only come quickly and set the slaves free! But even if they did not come for a long time the money would surely pay Mr. Waite wages for Estralla, so that he would not insist on selling her. Estralla's face had brightened instantly at Sylvia's promise. And when Sylvia explained that she had money of her very own, and even opened her writing desk and showed Estralla the shining gold pieces, the little darky's fears vanished. She was as sure that all would be well now, as she had been frightened and despondent when she entered the room. "Shall I tell my mammy?" she asked eagerly. "Yes," Sylvia responded. "I know my mother will let me. Because Grandma said I could do as I pleased with the money. And I please to pay it to Mr. Waite." "Then I'll be your maid, won't I, Missy Sylvia?" chuckled the little darky with proud delight, "an' I'll allers go whar yo' goes, like Missy Flora Hayes' mammy does." "Why, yes, I suppose you will," agreed Sylvia. Sylvia had meant to tell her mother and father of her plan about Estralla at breakfast time, but her father was just leaving the dining-room when she came in. "Are you going to ask your little friends to go out in the Butterfly this afternoon?" he asked. "If you want to go to the forts you must be on hand early." "I'll ask them right away after breakfast, before they start for school," Sylvia promised eagerly. She was glad that she could go to the forts again, and tell Mrs. Carleton that she had given the letter to Mr. Doane. This filled her thoughts for the moment, so she quite forgot about her plan to employ Estralla, especially as her mother had decided that lessons would not begin until the following week. It had seemed to Mrs. Fulton that her little daughter was tired, and not as well as usual, and she was glad that the sailing expedition would take her out for a long afternoon on the water. Sylvia ate her breakfast hurriedly, and ran upstairs for her cape and hat, to find Estralla waiting just inside the door of her room. "Wat yo' mammy say 'bout my bein' yo' maid?" questioned the little darky. "Oh, it will be all right. I am going to ask Grace and Flora to go sailing this afternoon, and I'll keep on to Mr. Robert Waite's and have it all settled this morning," Sylvia replied, putting on her pretty new hat. "You may come, too," she added. "Yas, Missy. Wat yo' reckon Massa Robert gwine to say?" questioned Estralla earnestly. "I think I will take the money," Sylvia said, not answering Estralla's question; "then Mr. Waite will be sure that I can pay him." Mrs. Fulton saw Sylvia, closely followed by Estralla, running across the garden toward the house where Grace Waite lived. "Poor little darky! What will she do when Sylvia goes north?" she thought. For Mr. Fulton had told her that very morning that he was sure South Carolina would secede from the Union, and then northern men would no longer be welcome in Charleston. That meant of course that the Fultons would have to return to Boston, if that were possible, but all communication with northern states might be prevented. It was no wonder that Mr. and Mrs. Fulton were anxious and worried. Grace was ready to start for school when Sylvia and Estralla arrived, and her mother gave her consent at once for her to go sailing in the afternoon. "The Christmas holidays will soon be here, so a half day out of school will not matter," Mrs. Waite said smilingly, and gave Grace a note for Miss Patten. "I'll walk to Flora's with you," said Grace. "Now, Sylvia, own up that you think Charleston is nicer than Boston. Why, it is all ice and snow and cold weather up there, and here it is warm and pleasant. You couldn't go sailing if you were in Boston to-day," she added laughingly. "No, but I could go sleighing," responded Sylvia. As they came in sight of Flora's home they both exclaimed in surprise: "Why, they are all going away! Look, Flora and her mother are in the carriage!" said Grace, "and there is Philip on horseback." The carriage had turned on to the street, and even as Grace spoke a curve in the road hid it from view. Philip, evidently giving some directions to the negroes who were loading trunks and boxes into a cart, rode down the driveway just as Grace and Sylvia reached the entrance. He greeted them smilingly, and stopped his horse to speak with them. "It was all planned for us to go to the plantation before Flora got home last night," he explained. "Father thought it was best for the family to be out of the city. You see, it's getting time for Carolinians to take possession of the forts, and there may be trouble. But the palmetto flag will soon float over Fort Sumter," he added smilingly, and with a touch of his cap and a smiling good-bye he rode off. Sylvia was sorry that Flora was going away, but that Philip should want the palmetto flag to take the place of the Stars and Stripes over Fort Sumter seemed a much greater misfortune. "When he knows it stands for slavery," she thought, wondering if he had entirely forgotten about Dinkie. "I'll have to run, or I'll be late for school," declared Grace. "I'll be all ready when you call," and with a gay good-bye she was off down the street, leaving Sylvia and Estralla standing alone near the high wall which enclosed the garden of the Hayes house. "Massa Robert Waite, he live right 'roun' de corner," said Estralla, and the two girls turned down the street leading to the house of Estralla's master. Sylvia went up the flight of stone steps which led to Mr. Waite's door a little fearfully. A tall, good-natured colored man opened the door and asked her errand, and then led the way across the wide hall and rapped at a door. "A little white missy to see you, Massa Robert," he said, and in a moment Sylvia found herself standing before a smiling gentleman, whose red face and white whiskers made her think of the pictures of Santa Claus. "Won't you be seated, young lady?" he said, very politely, waving his hand toward a low cushioned chair, and bowing "as if I were really grown up," thought Sylvia. "I am Sylvia Fulton," she said, wondering why her voice sounded so faint. "Perhaps you are the daughter of Mr. John Fulton, who does me the favor of renting my house on the East Battery," responded Mr. Waite, with another bow. "Yes, sir," said Sylvia meekly, wondering whether she would ever dare tell him her errand. There was a little silence, and then Mr. Waite took a seat near his little visitor and said: "Let me see; is not your name in a song? 'Then to Sylvia let us sing,'" he hummed, beating time with his right hand. "Oh, yes, I was named for that song. And, if you please, Mr. Waite, would you let me pay you wages for Estralla?" "For Estralla? Now, of course, I ought to know all about Estralla. But, you see, I have a man who attends to the names, and all that, of my negroes. But perhaps you can tell me who Estralla is?" replied Mr. Waite. "If you please, sir, she is Aunt Connie's little girl, and she lives with us, and I like her, and I thought--" began Sylvia, but Mr. Waite raised his hand, and she stopped suddenly. "I see! I see! You want her to wait upon you. I see. Quite right. But if she is living in your house she is not costing me a penny for board. So I am indebted to you. Well! Well! I must see that whatever you wish is carried out. You need not pay me wages, little Miss Sylvia, but you shall have the girl for your own servant as long as you live in my house, and I am delighted to have you take her off my hands. Yes, indeed! Yes, indeed!" and Mr. Waite smiled and bowed, and seemed exactly like Santa Claus. "I'm ever so much obliged," said Sylvia. "I like Estralla." "Do you? Yes! Well! And I hope you will come again, Miss Sylvia. I am greatly pleased to have made your acquaintance," and the polite gentleman escorted her to the door, where he bade her good-bye with such an elegant bow that Sylvia nearly fell backward in her effort to make as low a curtsey as seemed necessary. Estralla had hidden herself behind some shrubbery, and joined Sylvia at the gate. "Would he hire me out, Missy?" she asked eagerly. "My, no!" answered Sylvia, and before she could explain the generosity of Estralla's owner, the little darky was wailing and sobbing: "I knowed I'd be sold! I knowed it." "Keep still, Estralla! Mr. Waite says I may have you without paying him. Just as long as I live in his house he said you were to be my maid! Oh, Estralla! He was just as kind and polite as if I had been a grown-up young lady," said Sylvia with enthusiasm. "Yas'm, I reckons he would hafter be, 'cos he's a Carolinian gen'man. I'se mighty glad he gives me to you, Missy. I reckon my mammy's gwine to be glad," and Estralla, quite forgetting that there was such a thing as trouble in the world, danced along beside her new mistress. Sylvia hurried home, eager to tell her mother of her wonderful new friend, and of Flora's departure to the plantation. Mrs. Fulton listened in surprise. But when Sylvia finished her story of Mr. Waite's kindness, declaring that he was just like Santa Claus, she did not reprove her for going on such an errand without permission, but agreed with her little daughter that Mr. Robert Waite was a very kind and generous gentleman. Aunt Connie was as delighted as it was possible for a mother to be who knows that her youngest child is safe under the same roof with herself. She tried to thank Sylvia for protecting Estralla, but Sylvia was too happy over her success to listen to her. When Grace returned from school Sylvia ran over and told her all about her Uncle Robert's kindness. Grace listened with wondering eyes. "Oh, that's just like Uncle Robert," she declared. "But I think you were brave to ask him." CHAPTER XV "WHERE IS SYLVIA?" The Butterfly was all ready and waiting for its passengers when Grace and Sylvia, followed by the smiling and delighted Estralla, who was carrying Sylvia's cape and trying to act as much like a "rale grown-up lady's maid" as possible, came down to the long wharf. Although it was December, there was little to remind anyone of winter. The air was soft and clear, the sun shone brightly, and only a little westerly breeze ruffled the blue waters of the harbor. Negroes were at work on the wharf loading bales of cotton on a big ship. They were singing as they worked, and Sylvia resolved to remember the words of the song: "De big bee flies high, De little bee makes de honey, De black man raise de cotton, An' de white man gets de money." She repeated it over and then Grace sang it, with an amused laugh at her friend's interest in "nigger songs." Mr. Fulton came to meet them and helped them on board the boat. As the Butterfly made its way out into the channel the little girls looked back at the long water-front, where lay many vessels from far-off ports. In the distance they could see the spire of St. Philip's, one of the historic churches of Charleston, and everywhere fluttered the palmetto flag. Sylvia sat in the stern beside her father, and very soon the tiller was in her hand and she was shaping the boat's course toward the forts. Grace watched her admiringly. "I believe you could steer in the dark," she declared. "Of course she could if she had a compass and was familiar with the stars," said Mr. Fulton; and he called Grace's attention to the compass fastened securely near Sylvia's seat, and explained the rules of navigation. "Is that the way the big ships know how to find their harbors?" asked Grace, when Mr. Fulton told her of the stars, and how the pilots set their course. "Yes, and if Sylvia understood how to steer by the compass she could steer the Butterfly as well at night as she can now." Sylvia looked at the compass with a new interest; she was sure that navigation would be a much more interesting study than grammar, and resolved to ask her father to teach her how to "box the compass." There had been many changes at Fort Moultrie since Sylvia's last visit. A deep ditch had been dug between the fort and the sand-bars, and many workmen were busy in strengthening the defences, and Sylvia and Grace wondered why so many soldiers were stationed along the parapet. Captain Carleton seemed very glad to welcome them, and sent a soldier to escort the girls to the officers' quarters, while Mr. Fulton went in search of Major Anderson. Sylvia wondered if she would have a chance to tell Mrs. Carleton that she had safely delivered the message. Mrs. Carleton was in her pleasant sitting-room and declared that she had been wishing for company, and held up some strips of red and white bunting. "I am making a new flag for Fort Sumter," she said. "Perhaps you will help me sew on the stars, one for each State, you know." "Is there one for South Carolina?" asked Grace, as Mrs. Carleton found two small thimbles, which she said she had used when she was no older than Sylvia, and showed the girls how to sew the white stars securely on the blue. "Yes, indeed! One of the first stars on the flag was for South Carolina," replied Mrs. Carleton, "and this very fort was named for a defender of America's rights." While Grace and Sylvia were so pleasantly occupied Estralla had wandered out, crossed the bridge which connected the officers' quarters with the fort, and now found herself near the landing-place, so that when Mrs. Carleton made the girls a cup of hot chocolate and looked about to give Estralla her share, the little colored girl was not to be seen. "I'll call her," said Sylvia, and ran out on the veranda. No response came to her calls, so she went down the steps and along the walk which led to the sand-bars, past the houses and barracks on Sullivan's island. No one was in sight whom she could ask if Estralla had passed that way. She climbed a small sand-hill covered with stunted little trees and looked about, but could see no trace of the little darky. It had not occurred to Sylvia that Estralla would go back to the fort. "Oh, dear! I wonder where she can be," thought Sylvia, calling "Estralla! Estralla!" and sure that if she was within hearing Estralla would instantly appear. As Sylvia climbed over the sandy slope she saw here and there a small green vine with glossy leaves and a tiny yellow blossom, and resolved to gather a bunch to carry back to Mrs. Carleton. "When I give them to her I'll have a chance to say that Mr. Doane has the letter," she thought. Wandering on in search of the flowers, she went further and further from the fort, up one sand slope and clown another, almost forgetting her search for Estralla, and finally deciding that it was time to go back to Mrs. Carleton. "Probably Estralla is there before this, and they will be looking for me," she thought, and climbed another sandy slope, expecting to see the houses and barracks directly in front of her. But she found herself facing the open sea, and look which way she would there was only shore, sand heaps and blue water. But Sylvia was not at all alarmed. She was sure that all she had to do was to follow the line of shore and she would soon be in sight of some familiar place, so she started singing to herself as she walked on: "De big bee flies high, De little bee makes de honey," and hoping that Mrs. Carleton would not think that she had been careless in losing her way. It was rather difficult walking. Her feet slipped in the sand, and after a little Sylvia decided not to follow the shore, but to climb back over the sand-hills. A cold wind was now blowing from the water, and she was glad of the shelter of the stunted trees, and decided to rest for a little while. "Of course I can't be lost, because I know exactly where I am. This is Sullivan Island, and the fort is right over there. I mustn't rest but a minute, for my father said we would start home early," she thought, and again started on, going directly away from the fort, and over sand-hills and into little sloping valleys farther and farther away from familiar places. The December day drew to a close, and dusky shadows crept over the island. Once or twice Sylvia's wanderings had brought her back to the shore, but not until the darkness began to gather did she really understand that she was lost, and that she was too tired to walk much longer. She thought of the little compass on board the Butterfly, and wondered if a compass would help anyone find her way on land as well as on the sea. At last she began to call aloud: "Estralla! Estralla!" feeling almost sure that, like herself, Estralla must be wandering about lost in the sand-hills. It was nearly dark before she gave up trying to find her way to the fort, and, shivering and half afraid, crawled under the scraggly branches of some stunted trees on a sheltered slope. "My father will come and find me, I know he will," she said aloud, almost ready to cry. "I'll wait here, and keep calling 'Estralla,' so he will hear me." A few moments after Sylvia started to find Estralla Mrs. Carleton had been called to a neighbor's house. "Tell Sylvia I won't be gone long," she had said to Grace. Grace did not mind being alone until Sylvia returned. She helped herself to the rich creamy chocolate and the little frosted cakes, and then curled up on a broad couch near the window with a book full of wonderful pictures. The pictures were of a tall man on horseback, and a short, fat man on a donkey. "The Adventures of Don Quixote," was the title of the book, and after Grace began to read she entirely forgot Sylvia, Estralla, and Mrs. Carleton. And not until Mr. Fulton came into the room an hour later did she lift her eyes from the book. "All ready to start!" said Mr. Fulton, "and it will be dusk before we reach home. Where is Sylvia?" "Oh!" exclaimed Grace, looking up in surprise. "Hasn't she come back with Estralla? Mrs. Carleton has just gone to the next house." "Well, put on your things and run after them, that's a good girl," said Mr. Fulton. "Why, here is Estralla now," he added, as the little colored girl appeared at the door. "Tell Miss Sylvia to come down to the landing; I'll meet you there," and he hurried away, thinking his little daughter was safe with Mrs. Carleton. "Whar' is Missy Sylvia?" asked Estralla, who had been asleep in a sunny corner of the veranda for the last hour. "Where is Sylvia?" echoed Mrs. Carleton, who came in at that moment. "Has she gone to the boat?" "Why, I don't know. Perhaps she has. Mr. Fulton said for us to come right to the landing," said Grace, her thoughts still full of the faithful Sancho Panza of whom she had been reading. "I will go to the wharf with you. It was too bad to leave you. I must see Sylvia before she goes. Perhaps I may not be permitted to have visitors much longer," said Mrs. Carleton, and she and Grace left the pleasant room and, followed closely by Estralla, made their way over the bridge to the landing-place. "Where is Sylvia?" asked Mr. Fulton, looking at his watch. "We really ought to have started an hour ago." For a moment the little group looked at each other in silence. Then with a sudden cry Estralla darted off. Mrs. Carleton hurriedly explained Sylvia's starting off to find Estralla, and her own departure. She blamed herself that she had permitted Sylvia to go out alone. "She must be somewhere about the fort," declared Captain Carleton. "Oh, yes," agreed Mr. Fulton, "but we had best lose no time in finding her." While Captain Carleton questioned the soldiers, Mr. Fulton and Mrs. Carleton and Grace hastened back to the officers' quarters, and a thorough search for the little girl was begun at once. No one gave a thought to Estralla, who had traced her little mistress along the street, and was now running along a sandy slope beyond the barracks calling: "Missy Sylvia! Missy Sylvia!" But no answer came to her calls. CHAPTER XVI IN DANGER Estralla did not know why she was so sure that Missy Sylvia had wandered out beyond the barracks; but, since her little mistress was not at Mrs. Carleton's, and had not come to the landing-place, the little colored girl was sure that she must be among the sand-hills, and she ran along calling Sylvia's name as she ran. Now and then she stopped to listen for some response, or to look about for some sign that might tell her that Sylvia had passed that way, and near the top of one of the little slopes she found a bunch of the green vines and yellow blossoms which Sylvia had dropped. "She shuah am somewhar near," thought Estralla, and just then she heard a far-off call. "Dat was my name!" she exclaimed aloud, and listened more intently than ever. "Maybe 'twas jes' one o' them gull-birds a-callin'," she decided as no further sound came to her ears. Now she went on more carefully, but she, too, came to the shore; but it was on the inner curve of the land, a little cove where an old shanty stood near the water, and a boat was drawn up near by. Estralla looked into the rough cabin, half hoping to find Sylvia there. Then she went back a little way and shouted Sylvia's name again and again, and this time there was a response. "Estralla! Estralla!" came clearly to her ears. "My lan' o' grashus!" whispered the little darky, and then called loudly, "I'se a-comin', Missy Sylvia." And now Sylvia called again. Back and forth sounded the voices of the two girls, each one moving toward the other, for at the welcome sound of Estralla's call Sylvia had sprung up and hurried in the direction from which the voice seemed to come. It was now so nearly dusk that as they came in sight of each other they were like dark shadows. "Oh, Estralla! Where is my father?" Sylvia cried as Estralla ran toward her and flung both arms about her little mistress. "He's a-waitin' fer yo', Missy! Don' be skeered; I'se gwine to take keer of yo'." "Do you know the way back, Estralla?" asked Sylvia. "I couldn't find the fort." "No, Missy; I reckon we couldn't fin' nuthin' now, 'tis too nigh dark. But thar's a cabin an' a boat jes' over t'other side o' dis san' heap. I kin fin' them," responded Estralla, turning back. They walked very slowly, for Estralla wanted to be quite sure that they were going in the right direction, and not until they were in sight of the cabin and the shadowy outlines of the boat did she feel safe. Then with a sigh of relief she exclaimed: "Wat I tell yo', Missy Sylvia! Ain't dar a boat, like what I said? An' don' yo' know all 'bout a boat? Course yo' does. Now yo' can sail us right off home. An' when yo' pa comes home 'mos' skeered to def, 'cos he cyan't fin' yo', thar' yo'll be," and Estralla chuckled happily as if all their troubles were over. But Sylvia was not so sure. Unless there was a sail or a pair of oars the boat would be of little use, and even with oars and sail could she guide the boat safely to Charleston? They soon discovered that there was a pair of oars in the boat, but there was no sail or tiller. Sylvia could row, but Estralla could not be of any use. But it seemed the only way in which they could reach either Fort Moultrie or their home, for both the little girls realized that they might wander about the sand-hills all night without finding their way back to the fort. It was chilly and dark, and the old cabin with its sagging roof and open doorway was not a very inviting shelter. Indeed, Estralla was quite sure that a lion, or at the very least a family of wolves, was at that moment safely hidden in one of the dark corners of the cabin. "The moon is out! Look!" said Sylvia, "and there goes a steamer." Sylvia did not know that this steamer was a guard-boat which Governor Pickens of South Carolina had ordered stationed between Sullivan's Island and Fort Sumter to prevent, if possible, any United States troops being landed at that fort. "I can see the fort!" declared Sylvia. "That's it off beyond the boat," and she pointed down the harbor. "Now, we will start. I know I can row the boat that far, and I am sure my father will not go home without us. To-morrow we will send this boat back." Sylvia had now forgotten all her weariness, and she was no longer afraid. She was sure that in a little while she would be safely at the fort, and then, she resolved, she would at once tell Mrs. Carleton that Mr. Doane had the letter and ask permission to tell her mother of her part in the secret message. The boat was already half afloat, and it was an easy matter to pull up the big stone attached to a strong rope which served as an anchor, and then to push off from shore. "You watch, Estralla, and if any other boat comes near shout at the top of your voice," said Sylvia as she dipped the oars into the dark water and pulled off from shore. "My lan', Missy! Bar's dat light agin," called the half-frightened darky, "an' we's right in it dis time!" An instant later a call came from the guardboat. "Boat ahoy! Where bound?" and before Sylvia could ship her oars or answer the call she found herself looking straight into the blinding light, and felt the little boat rising on the crest of the wave made by the steamer. "We's gwine to be drownded, Missy!" shouted Estralla, and before Sylvia could say a word the frightened little darky had sprung up and lurched forward across Sylvia's knees. The boat tipped and the water rushed over one side, but Sylvia, clutching the oars steadily, and remembering her father's frequent warnings, sat perfectly still and the little craft righted itself. "You nearly upset us; keep still where you are. Don't move!" said Sylvia angrily. The light had flashed in another direction now, and the guard-boat had moved on, thinking the boat contained two young darkies bound for Sullivan's Island after a visit to Charleston. Sylvia could feel the water about her feet and ankles. She wished that she had called for help, for she realized now that they might be run into and sunk by some passing craft. Beside that the wind and tide were now carrying them swiftly along toward the open sea. Then, suddenly, Sylvia dropped her oars and screamed at the top of her voice. Estralla shouted loudly. Their boat had run directly against the wall of Fort Sumter. In an instant there were lights flashing over the parapet. There was the sound of voices, a call, and then the little craft was held firmly against the barricade and a gruff voice called: "Stop your noise, and we'll have you safe in a jiffy." But it seemed a long time to the frightened children before a tall soldier swung over into the boat and lifted Sylvia and then Estralla up to the outstretched hands which grasped them so firmly. "What on earth were you out in that boat for?" questioned an elderly gruff-voiced officer, when Sylvia and Estralla, thoroughly drenched and wondering what new misfortune was in store for them, followed him into a bare little cell-like room where the lamplight made them blink and shield their eyes for a moment. Sylvia told of their adventures as quickly as possible, and the officer listened in amazement. "Upon my word!" he said as she finished. "It's a wonder you are alive to tell the story. And so you are a little Yankee girl? Well! Come along to my quarters and my wife will put you both to bed, or you'll be too ill to go home to-morrow." "Can't we go to Fort Moultrie right away?" pleaded Sylvia. "My father must be worried about me." "No one from this fort can go to Fort Moultrie," he responded gravely. "Those flash-lights are from a guard-boat which the South Carolina people have sent down the harbor so that Major Anderson won't send us reinforcements without their knowledge. I wish Anderson would send some message to the President," he added, as if thinking aloud. Sylvia wondered to herself if the letter she had carried to Mr. Doane might not be a message to the President? She wished she could tell this big officer about it. But she remembered her promise to Mrs. Carleton not to speak of it to anyone. "Here's a half-drowned little Yankee girl and her little darky," said the officer, as he led the two girls into a warm pleasant room where a pretty elderly lady with white hair sat with her needlework. "For pity sake, Gerald!" she exclaimed. "They are shivering with cold," and without asking a single question she began to take off Sylvia's wet dress. "Gerald, send Sally right in with hot milk," she directed, and the officer vanished. It was not long before Sylvia was sitting up in bed wrapped in a gay-colored blanket and drinking milk so hot and sweet and spicy that it seemed as if she could never have enough of it. Estralla was curled up in a big scarlet wrapper on a rug near the fire with a big mug of the spiced and sweetened milk. And when they had finished this a plate of hot buttered biscuit, and thin slices of ham, was brought in. Then there was more warm milk. "Now you must both go straight to sleep," commanded Mrs. Gerald, "and to-morrow morning my husband will take you safely home," and kissing Sylvia, and with a kindly smile for Estralla, the friendly woman bade them good-night. There was no light now in the room save the dancing firelight, Sylvia lay watching the shadows on the wall. Estralla was fast asleep, but her little mistress lay awake thinking over the adventures of the day. She was at Fort Sumter, the long dark fort which she had so often seen with the Stars and Stripes waving above it from her home, from Miss Patten's schoolroom, and in her sails about the harbor. Sylvia snuggled down in her comfortable bed with a sense of safety and comfort. "I wish my father and mother could know I am at Fort Sumter," was her last waking thought. CHAPTER XVII A CHRISTMAS PRESENT Every nook and corner of Fort Moultrie was searched for the missing Sylvia, and when no trace of her could be discovered, her friends became nearly certain that the little girl must have slipped from the landing-place into the sea, and that it was useless to search for her. But it was late in the evening before Mr. Fulton gave up the search, and with a sad and anxious heart headed the Butterfly toward Charleston. He still hoped that his little girl might be found. A party of soldiers, headed by Captain Carleton, had started to search for her on Sullivan's Island, but this had not been determined upon until late in the evening, at about the time when Estralla and Sylvia were embarking upon their adventurous voyage to Fort Sumter. No one had given a thought to the little darky girl. She was supposed to be somewhere about the fort. Grace, warmly wrapped in a thick shawl, sat beside Mr. Fulton as the Butterfly made its swift way across the dark harbor. They could see the dark line of the guard-boat, but they were not molested and came into the wharf safely. Grace held close to Mr. Fulton's hand as they hurried toward home with the sad news of Sylvia's disappearance. Neither of them spoke until they reached the walk leading to the door of Grace's home, then Grace said: "I know Sylvia will be found. Estralla will surely find her and bring her home." "Estralla! Why, I had entirely forgotten her," responded Mr. Fulton. "She ran off as soon as Sylvia was missed," Grace continued earnestly, "and she will find her. Probably she has found her before this." "I believe you are right. Estralla is a clever little darky, and if she started in search of Sylvia perhaps she has been able to find her. I had not thought of it," and Mr. Fulton's voice had a new note of hope. "Thank you, Grace. I will start back to the fort as soon as I have talked with Sylvia's mother." But on Mr. Fulton's return to the wharf he found a sentry on guard who refused him permission to go to the fort. It was in vain that Mr. Fulton explained that his little daughter was lost, that he must be permitted to return to the fort. The sentry wasted no words. "Orders, sir. Sorry," was the only response he could get, and at midnight Mr. Fulton was in his own house looking out over the harbor. Mingled with his anxious fear for the safety of his little daughter was the thought of the sentries now guarding Charleston's water-front, of the assembling of soldiers in the city, and the evident plan of the southerners to seize the forts in the harbor and force the Government into war. He realized that in that case it would not be possible for his family to remain in Charleston. Early the next morning Sylvia was awakened and made ready for her return, and when the sun shone brightly over the waters of the harbor she and Estralla, with Captain Gerald and a strong negro servant, were on board a boat sailing rapidly toward home. They landed at the wharf where the Butterfly was fastened, and before Captain Gerald had stepped on shore Sylvia called out: "Father! Father! There he is! And Mother, too!" and in another moment her mother's arms were about her, and she was telling as rapidly as possible the story of her adventures, and of Estralla coming to her rescue. Grace came running to meet Sylvia as they came near their home. "Oh, Sylvia, I wish I had been with you," she exclaimed. "That is twice you have been to Fort Sumter without meaning to go, isn't it?" "We will hope that her next visit will not be as dangerous as this one," said Mr. Fulton soberly. For several days Sylvia could think and talk only of her wanderings among the sand-hills, and of her first sight of the guard-boat. She began teaching Estralla on the very day of her return, and the little darky made rapid progress. "Father, when may we go to Fort Moultrie again?" she asked one morning a few days later, for she wanted very much to see Mrs. Carleton, and was quite sure that her father would be ready to sail down the harbor on any pleasant day, and his reply made her look up in surprise. "I do not know that we shall ever go to the forts again," her father had replied. "Did you not hear the bells ringing and the military music yesterday? South Carolina has seceded from the Union. No one is allowed to go to the forts. And unless Major Anderson takes possession of Fort Sumter the Confederates will." "And we are to start for Boston next week, dear child," Sylvia's mother added. It seemed to Sylvia that her mother was very glad at the thought of returning to her former home. But Sylvia was not glad. What would become of Estralla? Mr. Waite had said that as long as Sylvia lived in his house the little colored girl could be her maid. But if they went to Boston and left Estralla behind Sylvia was sure that there would be nothing but trouble for the faithful little darky. "Why, Sylvia! What is the matter?" questioned her mother anxiously; for Sylvia was leaning her head on the table. "I can't go to Boston and leave Estralla!" she sobbed. "She has done lots of brave things for me. She wouldn't leave me to be a slave." Mr. and Mrs. Fulton looked at each other with puzzled eyes. "But Estralla would not want to leave her mammy," suggested Mr. Fulton. "Oh, Father! Can't Aunt Connie and Estralla go with us?" and Sylvia lifted her head and looked hopefully at her father. "Couldn't I buy Estralla and then make her free? I've got that gold money Grandma gave me." "I am afraid it wouldn't be much use for me to even try to buy a slave's freedom now," Mr. Fulton said a little sadly. "Don't suggest such a thing to Aunt Connie, Sylvia." "When shall we go to Boston?" Sylvia asked. "Right away after Christmas, unless Fort Sumter is attacked before that time. Washington ought to send troops and provisions for the forts at once!" replied Mr. Fulton. After her father had left the house Sylvia and her mother went up to Mrs. Fulton's pleasant sitting-room. "We must begin to pack at once," declared Sylvia's mother, "and do not go outside the gate alone, Sylvia. I wish we could leave Charleston immediately." "Won't I see Mrs. Carleton again?" Sylvia asked anxiously. "I do not know, dear child, but run away and give Estralla her lesson, as usual. It will not be a very gay Christmas for any of us this year," responded Mrs. Fulton, and Sylvia went slowly to her own room where Estralla was waiting for her. The little colored girl had put the room in order; there was a bright fire in the grate, the morning sunshine filled the room, and Miss Molly and Polly, smiling as usual, were in the tiny chairs behind the little round table. "Dar's gwine to be war, Missy!" Estralla declared solemnly. "Yas'm. Dar's soldiers comin' in from ebery place. Won't de Yankees come and set us free, Missy?" Sylvia shook her head. "I don't know, Estralla! Let's not talk about it," she replied. "Wal, Missy, lots of darkies are runnin' off! My mammy say we'll stay right here 'til Massa Fulton goes, an' den"--Estralla stopped, leaned a little nearer to Sylvia and whispered, "an' den my mammy an' I we'se gwine to go with Massa Fulton." Mrs. Fulton was not in her room, so Sylvia went down the stairs to look for her. She heard voices in the sitting-room, and turned in that direction. "Oh!" she whispered, as she stood in the open door. For her mother was sitting on the big sofa near the open fire, and beside her sat Mr. Robert Waite, while her father was standing in front of them. They were all talking so earnestly that they did not notice the surprised little girl standing in the doorway, and Sylvia heard Mr. Waite say: "I shall be glad to protect your interests here, Mr. Fulton, as far as it is possible to do so. And you had better leave Charleston immediately. The city is no longer a safe place for northern people. The conflict may begin at any moment." "'Conflict,'" Sylvia repeated the word to herself. Probably it meant something dreadful, she thought, recalling the "question period" at Miss Rosalie's school. Just then Mr. Waite glanced toward the door and saw Sylvia. In a second he was on his feet, bowing as politely as on their last meeting. "Miss Sylvia, I am glad to see you again," and he stepped forward to meet her. Sylvia, feeling quite grown-up, made her pretty curtsey, and smiled with delight at Mr. Waite's greeting, as he led her toward her mother and, with another polite bow, gave her the seat on the sofa. "I was hoping to see Miss Sylvia," he said. "I had meant to make her a little Christmas gift, with your permission," and he bowed again to Mrs. Fulton. "She was kind enough to interest herself in behalf of one of my people, the little darky, Estralla. And so I thought this would please you," and he smiled at Sylvia, who began to be sure that Mr. Waite and Santa Claus must be exactly alike. As he spoke he handed Sylvia a long envelope. "Do not open it until to-morrow, if you please," he added. Sylvia promised and thanked him. She wondered if the envelope might not contain a picture of this kind friend. She knew that she must not ask a question; questions were never polite, she remembered, especially about a gift. But whatever it was she was very happy to think Mr. Robert Waite had remembered her. They all went to the door with their friendly visitor, and stood there until he had reached the gate. Then Sylvia said, speaking very slowly: "I think Mr. Robert Waite is just like the Knights in that book, 'The Age of Chivalry.' They always did exactly what was right, and so does he; and they were polite and so is he." "Then, my dear, perhaps you will always remember that to do brave and gentle deeds with kindness is what 'chivalry' means," responded Mrs. Fulton. Grace came in that afternoon greatly excited that it was a holiday. The whole city was rejoicing over the fact that South Carolina had been the first of the southern states to secede from the Union. Palmetto flags floated everywhere; the streets were filled with marching men. Major Anderson in Fort Moultrie watched Fort Sumter with anxious eyes, hoping for a word from Washington which would give him authority to occupy it before the Charleston men could turn its guns against him. Already Mr. Doane had reached Washington; the message Sylvia had carried through the night had been delivered, and its answer, by a trusted messenger, was on its way south. CHAPTER XVIII GREAT NEWS Sylvia carried the long envelope which Mr. Robert Waite had given her to her room, and put it in the drawer of her desk with the treasured gold pieces. "It will be splendid to have a picture of Mr. Waite to show Grandma Fulton," she thought happily, "and I can tell her all about him." Then her thoughts rested on Flora, in the "haunted house," and she opened the silk-covered work-box and tried on the pretty gold thimble. She thought of her gold pieces, and a sudden resolve came into her mind: "I will give Flora and Grace each a gold locket, with my picture in it." And just then Mrs. Fulton entered the room, and Sylvia ran toward her: "Mother! Mother! I have a beautiful plan. I want to give Flora and Grace each a present. I want to give them each a gold locket with my picture in it. On Grace's locket I want 'Grace from Sylvia,' and on Flora's, 'Flora from Sylvia.' I can pay for them with my gold money. I may, mayn't I, Mother?" and Sylvia looked eagerly toward her mother. "Of course you may; but it is too late to get the pictures and lockets in time for Christmas," responded Mrs. Fulton. "I don't care when; only if we do go back to Boston I want them to have something to remember me by," said Sylvia, remembering the unfailing loyalty of her two little southern friends. "The day after Christmas we will select the lockets, and see about the pictures," said Mrs. Fulton. Before Sylvia could answer there came a tap at the door, and Aunt Connie, evidently rather anxious and uncertain, whispered: "Dar's a lady, Mistress, a lady f'um de fort, an' she say--" "It must be Mrs. Carleton. I'll go right down," responded Mrs. Fulton, and, followed by Sylvia, she hurried down the stairs, to find Mrs. Carleton awaiting them. "Captain Carleton insisted that I should come to you," she said. "He feels sure that the Charleston men mean to take Fort Sumter at once. Major Anderson is sending the women and children away from Fort Moultrie to places of safety." "Of course you must stay with us, and we are delighted to have you," said Mrs. Fulton. "We want to stay in Charleston unless it becomes necessary for us to leave." Mrs. Carleton greeted Sylvia warmly, and, greatly to her surprise, said: "I have not had the opportunity to thank you, dear child, for delivering the message safely. We have heard that Mr. Doane has presented the letter to the President, and Major Anderson is sure that reinforcements and provisions for the forts will be sent at once." Then turning to Mrs. Fulton, she continued: "I know this loyal child kept her secret, and that even you and her father do not realize what a service your little daughter has rendered to the cause of Freedom!" Mrs. Fulton was looking at her visitor in amazement. "Sylvia! Message! Secret?" she exclaimed in such a puzzled tone that both Mrs. Carleton and Sylvia laughed aloud. "Tell her, Sylvia! And I want to hear how you delivered the letter," said Mrs. Carleton. So Sylvia told the story of creeping out of the house at nearly midnight, of the man who had declared her to be a runaway darky, of Estralla following her, and of their return. "And the door was closed and fastened, although I left it open," she concluded. Mrs. Fulton recalled that one night they had been slightly disturbed by some unusual noise and that Mr. Fulton had gone down-stairs and discovered the front door open. "And we blamed Aunt Connie," she added. "I did want to tell you, Mother," said Sylvia, "but it's even better to have Mrs. Carleton tell you." That evening the story was retold to Mr. Fulton, who listened with even more surprise than Sylvia's mother had shown. He said that Estralla had been as brave as Sylvia, and that he wished he could do an equal service for the United States. "This will be a fine story to tell Grandma Fulton," he whispered to Sylvia, when he gave her his good-night kiss. She awoke early, before Estralla appeared with the usual pitcher of hot water and to light the fire in the grate, and in a moment was out of bed and at her desk. She opened the envelope very carefully, expecting to see the pictured face of her kind friend smiling at her, But there was no picture. There were only two documents tied with red tape, and with big red seals on them, and a number of printed and signed papers. "Oh, clear! It isn't anything at all except letters," exclaimed Sylvia, nearly ready to cry with disappointment. And, suddenly, she did cry--a cry so like Estralla's wail that the little darky just entering the room stopped short, and nearly dropped the pitcher of hot water. "Wat's de matter, Missy? Wat is de matter?" Estralla demanded. Tears were in Sylvia's eyes as she turned toward the little darky. They were not tears for her own disappointment at not finding the expected picture, but they were tears for what Sylvia believed to be the most bitter misfortune that could befall Estralla and Aunt Connie. For she was sure that the papers in that envelope were to tell her that Aunt Connie and Estralla had both been sold. But she resolved quickly that Estralla should not know of this until she had told her mother. "Nothing I can tell you now, Estralla," she said, wiping away her tears. Estralla looked quite ready to weep with her young mistress, but she lit the fire, and crept silently out of the room. Sylvia dressed as quickly as possible, picked up the papers and ran to her mother's room. "Look, Mother! It's dreadful. It wasn't a picture of Mr. Robert Waite at all. It's just a lot of papers about Estralla and Aunt Connie being sold," and Sylvia began to cry bitterly. Mr. Fulton took the papers and looked them over, while Sylvia with her mother's arm about her sobbed out her disappointment. "Sold! Estralla! Why, my dear Sylvia, these papers give Aunt Connie and Estralla their freedom, from yesterday. And these," and Mr. Fulton held up the smaller documents, "give them permission to leave Charleston for the north at any time within six months." For a moment neither Sylvia nor her mother made any response to this wonderful statement. "Truly, Father? Truly?" exclaimed Sylvia with shining eyes. "Yes. These papers have been recorded. Estralla and her mother are no longer slaves. They are free," said Mr. Fulton, as he folded the papers. "Mr. Waite has made you the finest gift in the world, little daughter," he added seriously. "And Estralla and Aunt Connie may go to Boston with us?" pleaded Sylvia, quite sure that her father and mother would agree. "Won't Grandma be surprised to see them?" Mrs. Carleton was as pleased and surprised as Sylvia herself over Mr. Waite's gift, and it was decided that directly after breakfast Sylvia should tell Aunt Connie and Estralla the wonderful news. It was too great to be kept a secret even until Christmas Day. "Dar, Mammy! Wat I tells yo'? I tells yo' Missy Sylvia gwine to look out fer us," Estralla declared triumphantly, evidently not at all surprised. "But it is Mr. Robert Waite who has given you your freedom," Sylvia reminded them, "and my father says that you must both go with me and thank him." "Yas, Missy," responded Aunt Connie, "but I reckons we wouldn't be thankin' him if 'twan't fer yo'. Massa Robert HE knows dat all his niggers gwine to be free jes' as soon as de Yankees come. Yas, indeedy, he knows. But we shuahly go long wid yo', Missy, an' thanks him. We knows our manners." Many eyes turned to watch the smiling colored woman and the delighted little negro girl who walked down King Street that afternoon, one on each side of a little white girl who looked as well pleased as her companions, for Sylvia decided that no time should be lost in telling Mr. Robert Waite of how greatly his generosity was appreciated. He welcomed Sylvia with his usual cordiality, and told Aunt Connie that he wished her good fortune, and sent her and Estralla home. "I will walk back with your young mistress," he said, and Sylvia felt that it was the proudest day of her life when she walked up King Street beside the friendly southerner. "He talks just as if I were grown up," thought Sylvia gratefully, when Mr. Waite spoke of the forts, and of the possibilities of war between the northern and southern states. "Tell your father not to hasten his preparations to leave Charleston; you are among friends, and these difficulties may be adjusted," Mr. Waite said as he bade Sylvia good-bye, and wished her a happy Christmas. CHAPTER XIX SYLVIA MAKES A PROMISE "It doesn't seem a bit like Christmas," declared Sylvia, as she stood at the sitting-room window looking out at the falling rain. Christmas day of 1860 was a gloomy, rainy day in Charleston, and many people felt exactly as Sylvia did, that it was not like Christmas. Grace came over in the morning bringing a little chased gold ring for Sylvia, which the little girl promised always to wear. She wished that she could tell Grace about the lockets, but decided it would be better to surprise Grace with the locket itself. As soon as Grace returned home Sylvia ran to find her mother. "We will go down street and buy the lockets to-morrow morning, won't we, Mother?" she asked, and Mrs. Fulton promised that they would start early. Sylvia resolved that, if the lockets and pictures did not take all her money, she would buy a doll for Estralla. She knew that nothing else would please the little colored girl as much as a "truly" doll. But the morning of December twenty-sixth found the city of Charleston angry and excited. Crowds collected in the streets, and Mr. Fulton received a message from Mr. Robert Waite asking him to remain at home until Mr. Waite arrived. "What is the matter, Father?" Sylvia asked. "He isn't coming to take back Estralla, is he?" "No, of course not, child. It is trouble over the forts," responded her father. And in a short time Mr. Waite arrived. But he was not smiling this morning. He was very grave and serious. "Major Anderson has evacuated Moultrie, and he and his men are at Fort Sumter," said Mr. Waite. "I came to assure you that whatever action Charleston takes that I will protect your household and property as far as possible." Then Sylvia heard him say that Governor Pickens had seized Castle Pinckney, and that troops had been sent to Sullivan's Island to occupy Fort Moultrie, and the United States Arsenal, situated in the midst of the city of Charleston, was also in possession of the secessionists. Sylvia listened to every word, but without much idea of what it all meant. "Can't we buy the lockets to-day, Mother?" she asked. "No, we must not go on the streets to-day," Mrs. Fulton answered; but Mr. Waite smiled at the little girl and said: "I will gladly accompany Miss Sylvia if she has errands to do," so Sylvia told him about the pictures and lockets for Grace and Flora, and Mr. Waite assured her mother and father that he could easily spare the time to go with her upon so pleasant an errand. The friendly man realized that the little household were troubled and anxious, and that it would reassure them if their little girl could safely carry out her plan. So the two set forth together. Mr. Robert Waite was too well known for any southerner to doubt his loyalty to South Carolina, and his visit to Mr. Fulton's house was in itself a protection to the family. As they walked along Sylvia told him how kind Grace and Flora had been to her. "If we should go away the lockets will remind them how much I think of them," she said, and Mr. Waite smiled and said: "Yes, indeed," but it seemed to Sylvia that he was not really thinking about the lockets. She held close to his hand, for there were crowds on every corner, and loud and violent threats against Major Anderson were heard from nearly every group. Sylvia heard one man declare that it was the duty of Charleston men to fire upon Fort Sumter at once; and before they reached the shop where she was to purchase the lockets Sylvia began to fear that she would never see Captain Carleton again. The lockets were purchased, and Mr. Waite took Sylvia to a studio to sit for the pictures for the lockets. There was enough money left to purchase a fine doll for Estralla, and Mr. Waite gave her a box filled with candy of many kinds, shapes and flavors. All these things occupied her thoughts so pleasantly that for a time she quite forgot the disturbance in the streets, and all the trouble that seemed so near to her and to her Charleston friends. "I will call to-morrow," said Mr. Waite, as he left the little girl at her own door. "And tell your father that he had best not go on the streets unless he goes with my brother or myself." This last message made Sylvia very sober. She came into the sitting-room holding her packages, and found her mother and Mrs. Carleton busy with their sewing, while her father was at his desk writing. She repeated Mr. Waite's message, and her father nodded silently. Then Sylvia told them that the lockets and pictures would be ready the following day. "And I have a doll for Estralla," she concluded. "Why not make the doll a fine dress and mantle?" suggested Mrs. Carleton. "Come up to my room and I will help you," and Sylvia agreed smilingly. Mrs. Carleton had a roll of crimson silk in her work-bag and before supper time the new doll was dressed and ready for Estralla. "This is for you, Estralla," Sylvia said, when Estralla came up to her room, as she often did in the late afternoon. "Fer me, Missy! He, he, I knows w'en you's jokin'; but 'tis a fine lady doll," responded the little girl, wishing with all her heart that the beautiful doll in the gorgeous silken dress which Sylvia was holding toward her might really be hers. "Take it, Estralla! It is for you. Truly it is," and Sylvia's tone was so serious that Estralla came slowly forward and took the doll. For a moment the two little girls stood looking at each other in silence, Sylvia smiling, but Estralla with a surprised, half-anxious expression. "Don't be afraid of it. Can't you have a doll of your own?" said Sylvia. "Mebbe I can," replied Estralla, and then two big tears ran down her black cheeks. "I'se got so much now, Missy Sylvia, dat I dunno as 'tis safe fer me to hev a doll," she whispered; but in a moment she was all smiles, and ran off to show her new treasure to her mother. The pictures and the lockets proved all that Sylvia had hoped, and on New Year's day, when Grace came in for her daily visit, Sylvia gave her a small package. "Please open it, Gracie!" she said, all eagerness to see her friend's delight. Mr. Fulton had purchased a slender chain for each locket, and as Grace held up the pretty gift she exclaimed delightedly: "Oh, Sylvia! It is lovely, and I'll always wear it," and looked at the tiny picture of her friend with smiling satisfaction. Sylvia had written a letter to Flora, and Grace promised to see that the locket and letter should reach her safely. Every day Mr. Robert Waite or his brother escorted Mr. Fulton upon any errand of business to which he was obliged to attend. News had reached Charleston that a steamer with supplies and reinforcements for Major Anderson was on its way, and Mr. Robert Waite declared that the Confederates would never permit it to reach the fort. Mrs. Carleton was very anxious. She had not received any message from her husband. "If I could sail a boat I would go to Fort Sumter myself," she said one morning as she and Sylvia stood at a window overlooking the harbor. "I can sail a boat," responded Sylvia. Mrs. Carleton turned and looked at the little girl. "If all this trouble ends in war, if the Confederates really dare fire upon the flag of the United States, I do not know how I can get any word from my husband," she said. Sylvia thought that her friend's voice sounded as if she were about to cry, and the little girl slipped her hand into Mrs. Carleton's. She wished there was something she could say to comfort her. Then she thought quickly that there was something. "I'll sail you over to the fort to see him whenever you ask me to," she said impulsively. "Dear child, I may have to ask you, but I hope not. 'Twould be a dangerous undertaking," she said, leaning over to kiss Sylvia's cheek. That was the sixth of January, 1861, and on the ninth a steamer, The Star of the West, with supplies and reinforcements for Major Anderson, entered Charleston harbor and was fired upon by a Confederate battery concealed in the sand-hills at Sullivan Island. And now for many days the Fultons heard only discouraging news. Everywhere there was great activity among the Confederates. Mrs. Carleton became more and more anxious for news of Captain Carleton, but she did not remind Sylvia of her promise. Grace and Sylvia were together a great deal, and every morning Sylvia would run out to the front porch to wave a good-bye to Grace on her way to school. Then there was Estralla's lesson hour, her own studies, and Mrs. Carleton was teaching her to crochet a silk purse as a gift to Mr. Robert Waite, so that Sylvia did not think very much about the soldiers at Fort Sumter. "What do you think about starting for Boston with us, Mrs. Carleton?" Mr. Fulton said one night just as Sylvia was going up-stairs. "I really think the time has come for me to take Sylvia and her mother to Boston, and I am sure Captain Carleton would want you to go with us." "And Estralla and Aunt Connie will go, too; won't they, Father?" said Sylvia, running back to her father's side. "Yes, child. But I thought you were upstairs," responded Mr. Fulton. "Do not speak of our leaving Charleston to anyone. Remember. Not to Grace or Estralla, until your mother or I give you permission." Sylvia promised. It seemed to her the best of good news that they would soon see Grandmother Fulton, and she went happily off to bed thinking of all she would have to tell her grandmother, and of the long letters she would write to Flora and Grace. "And when summer comes they must both come and make me a visit," she thought, little knowing that when summer came no little southern girl would be allowed to visit a Boston girl. CHAPTER XX "TWO LITTLE DARKY GIRLS" "When will Mr. Lincoln be President?" Sylvia asked a few mornings after her father's announcement of his intention to return to Boston. "He was inaugurated yesterday," replied her mother. "Then can't Captain Carleton go north with us?" asked Sylvia, who had convinced herself that when Mr. Lincoln was in charge of the Government that all the troubles over Charleston's forts would end. But Mrs. Fulton shook her head. "Captain Carleton must stay and perhaps fight to defend the flag," she replied. "I wish we could leave at once, but we must stay as long as we can." Sylvia listened soberly. She wondered what her mother would say if she knew of her promise to Mrs. Carleton to take a message to Fort Sumter if Mrs. Carleton should ask her to do so. The warm days of early March made the southern city full of fragrance and beauty. Many flowers were in bloom, the hedges were green, and the air soft and warm. Sylvia and Grace often spoke of Flora, and wished that they could again visit the plantation. Philip had brought Sylvia a letter from Flora, thanking her for the locket, and hoping that they would see each other again. Philip had not come into the house. He seemed much older to Sylvia than he did on her visit to the plantation in October. He said that Ralph was in the Confederate army. "I'd be a soldier if I was only a little older," he declared; and Sylvia did not even ask him about Dinkie, or the ponies. She wished that she could tell him that very soon she was going to Boston, but she knew that she must not; so she said good-bye, and Philip walked down the path, and waved his cap to her as he reached the gate. It had been many weeks since the Butterfly had sailed about Charleston harbor. But the little boat was in the charge of an old negro who took good care of it. The negro knew Sylvia, and he knew that it was through her interest in Estralla that the little negro girl and her mother had been given their freedom. Now and then he appeared at Aunt Connie's kitchen, and one warm day toward the last of March, when Sylvia was wandering about the garden, she saw Uncle Peter going up the walk to the rear of the house. "Oh, Uncle Peter! Wait!" she called and ran to ask him about the boat. Uncle Peter had a great deal of news to tell. He said that unless Major Anderson and his soldiers left Fort Sumter at once that all the forts, and the new batteries built by the Confederates, would open fire upon Sumter and destroy it. "I hears a good deal, Missy, 'deed I does," he declared, "but I doan' let on as I hears. Massa Linkum he's gwine to send a lot o' big ships down here 'fore long. Yas, indeed." "I wish I could have a sail in the Butterfly again," said Sylvia, a little wistfully. "Do you, Missy? Well, I reckons you can. I doan' believe any body'd stop me a-givin' yo' a little sail 'roun' de harbor," said Uncle Peter. "I 'spec's Major Anderson is a-waitin' an' a-watchin' fer dem ships of Massa Linkum to come a-sailin' in," continued the old negro; for it was a time when the colored people were eager and hopeful for some news that might promise them their freedom. Sylvia knew that Mrs. Carleton was worried and unhappy. It was known in Charleston that Fort Sumter was near the end of its food supplies, and that unless the Government at Washington sent reinforcements and provisions very soon by ships that the little garrison would be at the mercy of the Confederates, who were daily growing in strength. As Sylvia left Uncle Peter and walked back to the house she was thinking of her promise to Mrs. Carleton. "Perhaps she won't ask me. But if I could go and see Captain Carleton, and tell him that she was going to Boston with us, and then bring her back a message, I know she'd be happier," thought the little girl. And she thought, too, of the pleasure it would be to once more sail the Butterfly to Fort Sumter. She sat down on the porch steps, and a moment later Estralla appeared bringing a plate of freshly baked sugar cookies from Aunt Connie. "Mammy says she made these 'special for you, Missy," declared Estralla smilingly. "I'll go and thank her myself," said Sylvia, taking the plate, and offering one of the cookies to Estralla. "Uncle Pete he say as de soldiers at Fort Sumter mus' be gettin' hungry," said the little colored girl. "I wish you and I could take Captain Carleton some of these cookies," responded Sylvia. "If you was black like I is we could go a-sailin' right off to de fort in plain daylight," said Estralla. Sylvia sprang to her feet so quickly that she nearly upset the plate of cookies. "Could we? Oh, Estralla, could we really?" she exclaimed. Estralla looked at her little mistress with wondering eyes. "Yas, course; nobody'd mind two leetle nigger gals. But you ain't black, Missy." "But, Estralla, listen. I could be black. You could rub soot from the chimney all over my face and hands. And I could pin my hair close on top of my head and twist one of your mammy's handkerchiefs tight over it. Then nobody would know me." Sylvia had quite forgotten the fine cookies. She was holding Estralla by the arm, and talking very rapidly. Estralla was almost frightened at Sylvia's eagerness. "Yas, Missy; but what for do you wanter go?" she asked. "Oh, Estralla! If the men are hungry we could carry them something to eat. But most of all I want to see Captain Carleton, and get some message for his wife. She is so unhappy to go away without a word." "Come 'long down in de garden," said Estralla, now as interested as Sylvia herself, "an' tells me more whar' nobody'll be hearin'," and the two little girls hurried off to a far corner of the pleasant garden. "Uncl' Peter won' let us take the boat," Estralla objected as Sylvia told her how easy the plan would be; "an' how be you gwine to get all blacked up without folks knowin' it?" But Sylvia had an answer for every objection. "I'll come to your cabin and dress up there, and I will ask your mammy to give me some food for a poor man. Some cookies and a cake," she said. "We will start early to-morrow morning. And, Estralla, we will have to tell Uncle Peter, or he won't let us have the boat." "Lan', Missy, I'll do jes' w'at yo' says. But I reckon Uncle Pete won' let us. Wat yo' mammy gwine to think w'en you ain't home to your dinner?" responded Estralla. But she was finally convinced that Missy Sylvia could carry out the plan, and agreed to have a large quantity of soot ready at her mother's cabin the next morning. Sylvia was glad that she had eaten only one of the cookies. She carried the remainder to her room and then went to the kitchen. "Will you make me a fine big cake, Aunt Connie?" she asked. "Lan', course I will, chile! But, w'at you wan' it fer?" answered Aunt Connie, smiling down at the little girl whom she loved so dearly. "It's a secret, Aunt Connie! I want to give it away, and I don't want to tell even my mother until--well," and Sylvia hesitated a moment, and then continued, "until next week. Then I will tell her, and you too." "Dat's right, Missy. I'll make yo' de finest cake I knows how. Le's see! I'll put citron, an' raisins, an' currants in it. An' butter! Yas, thar'll be a fine lot o' things in dat cake!" and Aunt Connie rolled her eyes, and lifted her hands as if she could already taste its richness. All that afternoon Sylvia could think of nothing but the proposed trip. She sat with Mrs. Carleton a little while before supper, and told her of what Uncle Peter had said: that ships from the north were on the way to the aid of Fort Sumter. "Oh! I do wish I could send the news to Sumter. It would give them all courage," said Mrs. Carleton. Sylvia was for a moment tempted to tell her friend that she would carry the message, but she kept silent, thinking to herself that here was another reason for her to carry out her plan. "If you could send a message to Captain Carleton what would you say?" questioned Sylvia, and Mrs. Carleton smiled at Sylvia's serious voice. "Why, if I could only let him know that I was safe and well and going to Boston with you, in case Sumter really is attacked; I know that is what he wants to hear." Mrs. Carleton's smile vanished. Sylvia realized that this kind friend was troubled, and wished with all her heart that she could say: "To-morrow I will tell you all about Captain Carleton." But she knew that she must keep silent until she had carried out her plan. Sylvia was the first one at the breakfast table the next morning, and was delighted when her mother said that she and Mrs. Carleton were invited to luncheon at the house of a friend. "Aunt Connie and Estralla will take good care of you," Mrs. Fulton added, and Sylvia felt her face flush. But she made no reply, and soon hurried to the cabin where Estralla was waiting for her. It was still early in the forenoon when two little negro girls, one carrying a large package wrapped in a newspaper, appeared at the wharf where the Butterfly was moored. Uncle Peter was not to be seen. But he had just left the boat, whose sail had not even been lowered, and the two girls hurried on board. In a moment Sylvia had unfastened the rope, pushed the boat clear of the landing, and rudder in hand was steering the boat out toward the channel. Two or three men in uniform watched the little "darkies," as they supposed both the girls to be, with amusement. Negro children were always playing about, and no attention was paid to them. "My landy," whispered Estralla, "dat was jes' as easy. W'at Uncle Pete do w'en he fin's de boat gone?" But it happened that Uncle Peter had been sent on an errand to a distant part of the town, and before he returned the Butterfly was well down the harbor. Once or twice a guard-boat passed them closely enough to make sure that there were only two colored children in the boat, and they came up under the walls of Fort Sumter without a hindrance. The sentries at the fort had watched the little craft with anxious eyes, wondering if it could be bringing any message. But when the soldiers looked down at the two little negro girls they laughed, in spite of their disappointment. When Sylvia said that her name was Sylvia Fulton, and that she had come to see Captain Carleton, a sentry exclaimed: "That girl has blacked her face. She is white." But Captain Carleton could hardly believe that it was his little friend Sylvia. And he was eager to hear all that she could tell him. Estralla held the cake and cookies, which she had carefully wrapped in a newspaper, and the Captain seemed as much pleased with the paper as with the cake. "You can write a letter to Mrs. Carleton and we will take it," suggested Sylvia, and then she told him Uncle Peter's news: that the President was sending ships to the aid of the fort. "That is great news," said the Captain; "if it is only true we may keep the fort for the Union." Within the hour of their arrival Sylvia and Estralla were on their way home. The Captain had praised and thanked Sylvia for the loyal friendship that had prompted her visit. "Mrs. Carleton and I will always remember your courage," he said, as he handed her the letter. "I am so glad I thought about it; but it was really Estralla. She said if I was black we could come," Sylvia had replied. Then the boat swung clear and headed toward Charleston. "I am not going to land at the big wharves," said Sylvia. "I am going to that wharf near Miss Patten's garden. And then we'll tell Uncle Peter where the Butterfly is." It was early in the afternoon when Estralla appeared at the cloor of her mammy's kitchen. "Whar on airth you been? An' whar's yo' missy?" demanded Aunt Connie. "Didn' I makes her a fine om'lit fer her dinner, an' it's ruinated." "Missy wants a big pitcher of hot water," replied Estralla, dancing about just beyond Aunt Connie's reach. "Missy Sylvia say to tell you we been carryin' de cake to her fr'en', an' she gwine to tell you, Mammy," explained Estralla when her mammy had finally grasped her firmly by the shoulders. "W'y didn' yo' say dat firs' place? H'ar's de hot water," and Estralla hurried off to help Sylvia scrub off the sticky soot which had so well disguised her; and when Mrs. Fulton and Mrs. Carleton returned they found a very rosy-faced smiling little girl on the porch all ready to tell them of her trip to Fort Sumter, and to give Mrs. Carleton the longed-for news from her husband. CHAPTER XXI FORT SUMTER IS FIRED UPON When Sylvia's father heard of her sailing the Butterfly to Fort Sumter he was greatly troubled. "If it should be discovered that my daughter had carried a message to Fort Sumter we would all be in danger; even the Waites would give us up," he declared. "What made you undertake such a thing, Sylvia?" The little girl explained as well as she could her wish to get news of Captain Carleton for his wife, and said that she was sure no one knew that she was a white girl. But Mr. Fulton was anxious and uneasy, and Sylvia began to realize that her secret adventure might bring serious results to those she loved best. "I told Captain Carleton what Uncle Peter said about ships coming to help Fort Sumter," she said, feeling almost sure that her father would think this the worst of all, but determined to make a full confession. She resolved that never again would she make plans without telling her mother and father, for she was most unhappy at her father's troubled look, and at his disapproval. "What?" exclaimed Mr. Fulton. "Did you tell Captain Carleton that reinforcements were coming to the aid of Fort Sumter?" "Oh, yes, I did, Father," sobbed Sylvia, who was now sure that she had told the very worst of her acts. But to her surprise she heard her father say: "Thank heaven! That may influence Anderson to hold the fort until help arrives," and his arm was about his little daughter, and she looked up through her tears to hear him say: "The news you carried to the fort is just what they wanted to know. And it may help to save the Union. It is worth while for us all to face personal danger if it proves that you were of service." Sylvia did not quite understand why Uncle Peter's news should be so important, but her father explained to her that Major Anderson would now feel sure of help, and that his men would have courage to bear hardship and hunger if need be until the ships arrived. "And you forgive me for going?" Sylvia pleaded. "My dear child! I am glad and proud that you could carry such a message to brave soldiers," her father replied, "but do not mention it to anyone. I must hasten my arrangements to leave Charleston. General Beauregard may fire upon Fort Sumter at any day, and I am of no use here." Sylvia drew a long breath of relief. That her father should really praise her for what she had feared might prove a very serious mistake made the little girl happy although it did not change her resolve never again to make adventurous plans without the approval of her mother or father. She realized that, although she had carried a valuable message, she had also endangered her father's safety if her visit to the fort was discovered, as every southerner would believe that Mr. Fulton had made the plan to be of aid to the United States. The little household now began its preparations to start north as soon as possible, and Sylvia was eager for the time to come that would see them safely on their way to their northern home. Grace Waite and her mother had gone into the country, and Sylvia did not know if she would see her friend again. The morning of April 11, 1861, dawned brightly over the harbor of Charleston, whose waters were covered with white sails putting hastily to sea. Guard-boats were plying constantly between the harbor and the islands. It was rumored about the town that before sunset the Confederate batteries would open fire upon Fort Sumter. Mr. Fulton's preparations to leave Charleston were completed, and if nothing prevented they would start for Boston on April 14th. On the eleventh, however, Mrs. Carleton hardly left the window from which she could look out over the harbor toward Fort Sumter. At any moment it might be attacked, and she knew that such an attack meant the beginning of a terrible civil war. Sylvia wandered about the house and garden with Estralla, telling the little colored girl of the home in Boston which she soon hoped to see. The hours passed, and the streets of Charleston grew strangely quiet. At sunset everything was calm, and no sound of guns disturbed the peace of the April evening, and Sylvia went to bed at the usual hour, not thinking that she would be wakened by the roar of cannon. The older members of the family sat up until after midnight. The sea was calm, and the night still under the bright starlight. At last they decided to retire, but there was little sleep for them that night. At half-past four the next morning the sound of guns from Fort Johnson broke upon the stillness. It was the signal to the Confederate batteries to open fire. Hardly had the echo of the opening gun died upon the air when every Confederate fort and battery opened fire upon Sumter, until the fort was "surrounded by a circle of fire." The Fulton household dressed hurriedly and from the windows looked over the harbor at the flashing lights and bursts of flame. Sylvia stood close beside Mrs. Carleton, and they were all silent. Aunt Connie brought up hot coffee and a tray of food, but none of them cared to eat. Mr. Fulton waited anxiously for the sound of answering guns from Fort Sumter. But not until seven o'clock that morning did Fort Sumter open its fire. "War has begun," said Mr. Fulton gravely, turning away from the window. "Will the President's ships come soon, Father?" asked Sylvia. "We must hope so," he answered; "and now there is no time for us to lose. We must start at once." "Bres' de Lord!" said Aunt Connie, who was standing near the door, and as Mr. Fulton spoke she hurried off to her cabin to make her final preparations for the long journey. Mrs. Fulton hastened to pack up the few things they would take with them, and Sylvia helped Mrs. Carleton pack. Early in the fore-noon they were ready. Mr. Robert Waite's carriage was at the door, with Mr. Waite, who had come to escort them on the first stage of their journey. "I wish I could say good-bye to Grace," said Sylvia as she went down the steps of the porch. She was all ready to enter the carriage when she heard her name called: "Sylvia! Sylvia!" and Grace came flying up the path. "Grace! Grace!" responded Sylvia, and for a moment the two little girls, "Yankee" and southern girl, clung closely together, while the noise of the echoing guns from the forts boomed over the harbor. "We will always be friends, won't we, Sylvia?" said Grace; and Sylvia responded "Always." Then with one more good-bye kiss Grace turned and ran back to Mammy Esther. She had persuaded her mother to bring her to Charleston that she might bid Sylvia good-bye, and now they would hasten back to the country, for Charleston might be attacked by United States ships of war, and was no longer a place of safety. The Fultons now entered the carriage. Aunt Connie and Estralla were the only members of the party who were smiling and happy. To Estralla it was the most wonderful day of her life. She was free. And with her mammy and her Missy Sylvia she was starting for a world where little colored girls could go to school, just as white children did, and never be bought or sold. She looked at Sylvia with adoring eyes. "What are you thinking of, Estralla?" asked Sylvia. Estralla leaned close to her "true fr'en'" and whispered: "I was a-t'inkin' 'bout my breakin' of de pitcher, an' a-spillin' de hot water, Missy Sylvia. You took my part den, Missy, an' you'se allers taken my part. My mammy say she bress de Lord dat you came to Charleston." Sylvia smiled back at the little colored girl. For a moment she forgot the booming of the distant guns, and remembered only her friends and the happy days she had spent in her southern home. The next Volume in this Series will be: A YANKEE GIRL AT BULL RUN 
26986	----	THE GHOST GIRL BY THE SAME AUTHOR Sea Plunder $1.30 net The Gold Trail $1.30 net The Pearl Fishers $1.30 net The Presentation $1.30 net The New Optimism $1.00 net Poppyland $2.00 net The Poems of François Villon Translated by H. DE VERE STACPOOLE Boards $3.00 net Half Morocco $7.50 net THE GHOST GIRL BY H. DE VERE STACPOOLE AUTHOR OF "THE MAN WHO LOST HIMSELF," "SEA PLUNDER," "THE PEARL FISHERS," "THE GOLD TRAIL," ETC. NEW YORK: JOHN LANE COMPANY LONDON: JOHN LANE, THE BODLEY HEAD TORONTO: S. B GUNDY--MCMXVIII Copyright, 1918 By JOHN LANE COMPANY PRESS OF VAIL-BALLOU COMPANY BINGHAMTON, N. Y. U. S. A. THE GHOST GIRL PART I CHAPTER I It was a warm, grey, moist evening, typical Irish weather, and Miss Berknowles was curled up in a window-seat of the library reading a book. Kilgobbin Park lay outside with the rooks cawing in the trees, miles of park land across which the dusk was coming, blotting out all things from Arranakilty to the Slieve Bloom Mountains. The turf fire burning on the great hearth threw out a rich steady glow that touched the black oak panelling of the room, the book backs, and the long-nosed face of Sir Nicholas Berknowles "attributed to Lely" and looking down at his last descendant from a dusty canvas on the opposite wall. The girl made a prettier picture. Red hair when it is of the right colour is lovely, and Phylice Berknowles' hair was of the right red, worn in a tail--she was only fifteen--so long that she could bite the end with ease and comfort when she was in a meditative mood, a habit of perdition that no schoolmistress could break her of. She was biting her tail now as she read, up to her eyes in the marvellous story of the Gold Bug, and now, unable to read any more by the light from the window, she came to the fire, curled herself on the hearthrug and continued the adventures of the treasure-seekers by the light of the burning turf. What a pretty face it was, seen by the full warm glow of the turf, and what a perfectly shaped head! It was not the face and head of a Berknowles as you could easily have perceived had you compared it with the portraits in the picture gallery, but of a Mascarene. Phyl's mother had been a Mascarene, a member of the old, adventurous family that settled in Virginia when Virginia was a wilderness and spread its branches through the Carolinas when the Planter was king of the South. Red hair had run among the Mascarenes, red hair and a wild spirit that brooked no contradiction and knew no fear. Phyl had inherited something of this restless and daring spirit. She had run away from the Rottingdean Academy for the Daughters of the Nobility and Gentry where she had been sent at the age of twelve; making her way back to Ireland like a homing pigeon, she had turned up one morning at breakfast time, quite unshaken by her experiences of travel and with the announcement that she did not like school. Had her mother been alive the traveller would have been promptly returned, but Phyl's father, good, easy man, was too much taken up with agrarian disputes, hunting, and the affairs of country life to bother much about the small affair of his daughter's future and education. He accepted her rejection of his plans, wrote a letter of apology to the Rottingdean Academy, and hired a governess for her. She wore out three in eighteen months, declared herself dissatisfied with governesses and competent to finish the process of educating and polishing herself. This she did with the aid of all the books in the library, old Dunn, the rat-catcher of Arranakilty, a man profoundly versed in the habits of rodents and birds, Larry the groom, and sundry others of low estate but high intelligence in matters of sport and woodcraft. Now it might be imagined from the foregoing that hardihood, self-assertion, and other unpleasant characteristics would be indicated in the manner and personality of this lover of freedom and rebel against restraint. Not at all. She was a most lovable and clinging person, when she could get hold of anything worth clinging to, with a mellifluous Irish voice at once soothing and distracting, a voice with pockets in it but not a trace of a brogue or only the very faintest suspicion. Yet when she spoke she had the Irish turn of words and she used the word "sure" in a manner strange to the English. She had reached the point in the "Gold Bug" where Jupp is threatening to beat Legrand, when, laying the book down beside her on the hearthrug, she sat with her hands clasping her knees and her eyes fixed on the fire. The tale had suddenly lost interest. She was thinking of her dead father, the big, hearty man who had gone to America only eight weeks ago and who would never return. He had gone on a visit to some of his wife's people, fallen ill, and died. Phyl could not understand it at all. She had cried her heart out amongst the ruins of her little world, but she could not understand why it had been ruined, or what her father had done to be killed like that, or what she had done to deserve such misery. The Reverend Peter Graham of Arranakilty could explain nothing about the matter to her understanding. She nearly died and then miraculously recovered. Acute grief often ends like that, suddenly. The mourner may be maimed for life but the sharpness of the pain of that dreadful, dreadful disease is gone. Phyl found herself one morning discussing rats with old Dunn, asking him how many he had caught in the barn and taking a vague sort of interest in what the old fellow was saying; books began to appeal to her again and the old life to run anew in a crippled sort of way. Then other things happened. Mr. Hennessey, the family lawyer, who had been a crony of her father's and who had known her from infancy, came down to Kilgobbin to arrange matters. It seemed that Mr. Berknowles before dying had made a will and that the will was being brought over from the States by Mr. Pinckney, his wife's cousin in whose house he had died. "I'm sure I don't know what the chap wants coming over with it for," said Mr. Hennessey. "He said it was by your father's request he was coming, but it's a long journey for a man to take at this season of the year--and I hope the will is all right." There was an implied distrust in his tone and an antagonism to Mr. Pinckney that was not without its effect on Phyl. She disliked Mr. Pinckney. She had never seen him but she disliked him all the same, and she feared him. She felt instinctively that this man was coming to make some alteration in her way of life. She did not want any change, she wanted to go on living just as she was with Mrs. Driscoll the housekeeper to look after her and all the old servants to befriend her and Mr. Hennessey to pay the bills. Mr. Hennessey was in the house now. He had come down that morning from Dublin to receive Mr. Pinckney, who was due to arrive that night. Phyl, sitting on the hearthrug, was in the act of picking up her book when the door opened and in came Mr. Hennessey. He had been out in the grounds overlooking things and he came to the fire to warm his hands, telling Phyl to sit easy and not disturb herself. Then, as he held a big foot to the warmth he talked down at the girl, telling her of what he had been about and the ruination Rafferty was letting the greenhouses go to. "Half-a-dozen panes of glass out--and 'I've no putty,' says he. 'Putty,' said I to him, 'and what's that head of yours made of?' The stoves are all out of order and there's a hole in one of the flues I could get my thumb in." "Rafferty's awfully good to the dogs," said Phyl in her mellow voice, so well adapted for intercession. "He may be a bit careless, but he never does forget to feed the animals. He's got the chickens to look after, too, and then there's the beagles, he knows every dog in the pack and every dog knows him--oh, dear, what's the good of it all!" The thought of the beagles had brought up the vision of their master who would never hunt with them again. Her voice became tinged with melancholy and Hennessey changed the subject, taking his seat in one of the armchairs that stood on either side of the fireplace. He was a big, loosely-made man, an easy going man with a kind heart who would have come to financial disaster long ago only for his partner, Niven. "He's almost due to be here by now," said he, taking out his watch and looking at it, "unless the express from Dublin is late." "What'll he be like, do you think?" said Phyl. "There's no saying," replied Mr. Hennessey. "He's an American and I've never had much dealings with Americans except by letter. By all accounts they are sharp business men, but I daresay he is all right. The thing that gets me is his coming over. Americans don't go thousands of miles for nothing, but if it's after any hanky-panky business about the property, maybe he'll find Jack Hennessey as sharp as any American." "He's some sort of a relation of ours," said Phyl. "Father said he was a sort of cousin." "On your mother's side," said Hennessey. "Yes," said Phyl. Then, after a moment's pause, "D'you know I've often thought of all those people over there and wondered what they were like and how they lived--my mother's people. Father used to talk of them sometimes. He said they kept slaves." "That was in the old days," said Hennessey. "The slaves are all gone long ago. They used to have sugar plantations and suchlike, but the war stopped all that." "It's funny," said Phyl, "to think that my people kept slaves--my mother's people--Oh, if one could only see back, see all the people that have gone before one so long ago-- Don't you ever feel like that?" Mr. Hennessey never had; his forebears had been liquor dealers in Athlone and he was content to let them lie without a too close inquisition into the romances of their lives. "Mr. Hennessey," said Phyl, after a moment's silence, "suppose Father has left Mr. Pinckney all his money--what will become of me?" "The Lord only knows," said Hennessey; "but what's been putting such fancies in your head?" "I don't know," replied the girl. "I was just thinking. Of course he wouldn't do such a thing--It's your talking of the will the last time you were here set me on, I suppose, but I dreamed last night Mr. Pinckney came and he was an American with a beard like Uncle Sam in _Punch_ last week, and he said Father had made a will and left him everything--he'd left him me as well as everything else, and the dogs and all the servants and Kilgobbin--then I woke up." "Well, you were dreaming nonsense," said the practical Hennessey. "A man can't leave his daughter away from him, though I'm half thinking there's many a man would be willing enough if he could." Phyl raised her head. Her quick ear had caught a sound from the avenue. Then the crash of wheels on gravel came from outside and her companion, rising hurriedly from his chair, went to the window. "That's him," said the easy-speaking Hennessey. CHAPTER II He left the room and Phyl, rising from the hearthrug, stood with her hand on the mantelpiece listening. Hennessey had left the door open and she could hear a confused noise from the hall, the sound of luggage being brought in, the bustle of servants and a murmur of voices. Then a voice that made her start. "Thanks, I can carry it myself." It was the newcomer's voice, he was being conducted to his room by Hennessey. It was a cheerful, youthful voice, not in the least suggestive of Uncle Sam with the goatee beard as depicted by the unimaginative artist of _Punch_. And it was a voice she had heard before, so she fancied, but where, she could not possibly tell--nor did she bother to think, dismissing the idea as a fancy. She stood listening, but heard nothing more, only the wind that had risen and was shaking the ivy outside the windows. Byrne, the old manservant, came in and lit the lamps and then after a few minutes Hennessey entered. He looked cheerful. "He seems all right and he'll be down in a minute," said the lawyer; "not a bit of harm in him, though I haven't had time to tackle him over money affairs." "How old is he?" asked the girl. "Old! Why, he's only a boy, but he's got all a man's ways with him--he's American, they're like that. I've heard say the American children order their own mothers and fathers about and drive their own motor-cars and gamble on the Stock Exchange." He pulled out his watch and looked at it; it pointed to ten minutes past seven; then he lit a cigar and sat smoking and smoking without a word whilst Phyl sat thinking and staring at the fire. They were seated like this when the door opened and Byrne shewed in Mr. Pinckney. Hennessey had called him a boy. He was not that. He was twenty-two years of age, yet he looked only twenty and you would not have been particularly surprised if you had been told that he was only nineteen. Good-looking, well-groomed and well-dressed, he made a pleasant picture, and as he came across the room to greet Phyl he explained without speaking what Mr. Hennessey meant about "all the manners of a man." Pinckney's manner was the manner of a man of the world of thirty, easy-going, assured, and decided. He shook hands with Phyl as Hennessey introduced them, and then stood with his back to the fireplace talking, as she took her seat in the armchair on the right, whilst the lawyer remained standing, hands in pockets and foot on the left corner of the fender. The newcomer did most of the talking. By a downward glance every now and then he included Phyl in the conversation, but he addressed most of his remarks to Mr. Hennessey. "And you came over by the Holyhead route?" said the lawyer. "I did," replied Pinckney. "And what did you think of Kingstown?" "Well, upon my word, I saw less of it than of a gentleman with long hair and a bundle of newspapers under his arm who received me like a mother just as I landed, hypnotised me into buying half-a-dozen newspapers and started me off for Dublin with his blessing." "That was Davy Stevens," said Phyl, speaking for the first time. Pinckney's entrance had produced upon her the same effect as his voice. You know the feeling that some places produce on the mind when first seen-- "I have been here before But when or how I cannot tell I know the lights along the shore--" It seemed to her that she had known Pinckney and had met him in some place, but when or how she could not possibly remember. The feeling had almost worn off now. It had thrilled her, but the thrill had vanished and the concrete personality of the man was dominating her mind--and not very pleasantly. There was nothing in his manner or his words to give offence; he was quite pleasant and nice but--but--well, it was almost as though she had met some one whom she had known and liked and who had changed. The little jump of the heart that his voice caused in her had been followed by a chill. His manner displeased her vaguely. He seemed so assured, so every day, so cold. It seemed to her that not only did he hold his entertainers at a critical distance, but that he was somehow wanting in respectfulness to herself--Lunatic ideas, for the young man could not possibly have been more cordial towards two utter strangers and as for respectfulness, one does not treat a girl in a pigtail exactly as one treats a full-grown woman. "Oh, Davy Stevens, was it?" said Pinckney, glancing down at Phyl. "Well, I never knew the meaning of peaceful persuasion till he had sold out his stock on me. Now in the States that man would likely have been President by this--Things grow quicker over there." "And what did you think of Dublin?" asked Hennessey. "Well," said the young man, "the two things that struck me most about Dublin were the dirt and the want of taxicabs." A dead silence followed this remark. Never tell an Irishman that Dublin is dirty. Hennessey was dumb, and as for Phyl, she knew now that she hated this man. "Of course," went on the other, "it's a fine old city and I'm not sure that I would alter it or even brush it up. I should think it's pretty much the same to-day as when Lever wrote of it. It's a survival of the past, like Nuremberg. All the same, one doesn't want to live in a survival of the past--does one?" "I've lived there a good many years," said Hennessey; "and I've managed to survive it. It's not Chicago, of course; it's just Dublin, and it doesn't pretend to be anything else." "Just so," said Pinckney. He felt that he had put his foot in it; recalling his own lightly spoken words he felt shocked at his want of tact, and he was casting about for something to say about the sacred city of a friendly nature but not too fulsome, when Byrne opened the door and announced that dinner was served. CHAPTER III Phyl led the way and they crossed the hall to the dining-room, a room oak-panelled like the library and warm with the light of fire and candles. Once upon a time there had been high doings in this sombre room, hunt breakfasts and dinners, rousing songs, laughter, and the toasting of pretty women--now dust and ashes. Here highly coloured gentlemen had slept the sleep of the just, under the table, whilst the ladies waited in vain for them in the drawing-room, here Colonel Berknowles had drunk a glass of mulled wine on that black morning over a hundred-and-thirty years ago when he went out with Councillor Kinsella and shot him through the lungs by the Round House on the Arranakilty Road. The diminutive Tom Moore had sung his songs here "put standing on the table" by the other guests, and the great Dan had held forth and the wind had dashed the ivy against the windows just as it did to-night with fist-fulls of rain from the Slieve Bloom Mountains. Byrne had put the big silver candlesticks on the table in honour of the guest, and he now appeared bearing in front of him a huge dish with a cover a size too small for it. He placed the dish before Mr. Hennessey and removed the cover, disclosing a cod's "head and shoulders" whilst a female servant appeared with a dish of potatoes boiled in their jackets and a tureen of oyster sauce. Now a cod's head and shoulders served up like this in the good old Irish way is, honestly, a ghastly sight. The thing has a countenance and an expression most forbidding and all its own. The appearance of the old dish cover, clapped on by the cook in a hurry in default of the proper one, had given Phyl a turn and now she was wondering what Mr. Pinckney was thinking of the fish and the manner of its serving. All at once and as if stimulated into life by the presence of the new guest, all sorts of qualms awoke in her mind. The dining arrangements of the better class Irish are, and always have been, rather primitive, haphazard, and lacking in small refinements. Phyl was conscious of the fact that Byrne had placed several terrible old knives on the table, knives that properly belonged to the kitchen, and when the second course, consisting of a boiled chicken, faced by a piece of bacon reposing on a mat of boiled cabbage, appeared, the fact that one of the dishes was cracked confronted her with the equally obvious fact that the cook in her large-hearted way had sent up the chicken with the black legs unremoved. It seemed to Phyl's vision--now thoroughly distorted--that the eyes of the stranger were everywhere, cool, critical, and amused; so obsessed was her mind with this idea that it could take no hold upon the conversation. Pinckney was talking of the States; he might just as well have been talking about Timbuctoo for all the impression he made on her with her unfortunate head filled with cracked dishes, chickens' black legs, Byrne's awkwardness and the suddenly remembered crumb-brush. It was twenty years old and it had lost half of its bristles in the service of the Berknowles who had clung to it with a warm-hearted tenacity purely Irish. "Sure, that old brush is a disgrace to the table," was the comment Phyl's father had made on it once, just as though he were casually referring to some form of the Inevitable such as the state of the weather. The disgrace had not been removed and it was coming to the table, now, in the hand of Byrne. Phyl watched the crumbs being swept up, she watched the cloth being taken off and the wine and dessert placed in the good old fashion, on the polished mahogany, then leaving the gentlemen to their wine, she retired upstairs and to her bedroom. She felt angry with Byrne, with the cook, with Mr. Hennessey and with herself. Plenty of people had been to dinner at Kilgobbin, yet she had never felt ashamed of the _ménage_ till now. This stranger from over the water, notwithstanding her dislike for him, had the power to disturb her mind as few other people had disturbed it in the course of her short life. Other people had put her into worse tempers, other people had made her dislike them, but no one else had ever roused her into this feeling of unrest, this criticism of her belongings, this irritation against everything including herself. Her bedroom was a big room with two windows looking upon the park; it was almost in black darkness, but the windows shewed in dim, grey oblongs and she made her way to one of them, took her place in the window-seat and pressed her forehead against the glass. The rain had ceased and the clouds had risen, but the moon was not yet high enough to pierce them. Phyl could just make out the black masses of the distant woods and the movement of the near fir-trees shaking their tops like hearse plumes to the wind. The park always fascinated her when it was like that, almost blotted out by night. These shapes in the dark were akin to shapes in the fire in their power over the fancy of the gazer. Phyl as she watched them was thinking: not one word had this stranger said about her dead father. Mr. Berknowles had died in his house and this man had buried him in Charleston; he had come over here to Ireland on the business of the will and he had come into the dead man's house as unconcernedly as though it were an hotel, and he had laughed and talked about all sorts of things with never a word of Him. If Phyl had thought over the matter, she might have seen that, perhaps, this silence of Pinckney's was the silence of delicacy, not of indifference, but she was not in the humour to hold things up to the light of reason. She had decided to dislike this man and when the Mascarenes came to a decision of this sort they were hard to be shaken from it. She had decided to dislike him long before she saw him. What Phyl really wanted now was perhaps a commonsense female relative to stiffen her mind against fancies and give her a clear-sighted view of the world, but she had none. Philip Berknowles was the last of his race, the few distant connections he had in Ireland lived away in the south and were separated from him by the grand barrier that divides Ireland into two opposing camps--Religion. Berknowles was a Protestant, the others Papists. Phyl, as she sat watching saw, now, the line of the woods strengthen against the sky; the moon was breaking through the clouds and its light increasing minute by minute shewed the parkland clearly defined, the leafless oaks standing here and there, oaks that of a summer afternoon stood in ponds of shadow, the clumps of hazel, and away to the west the great dip, a little valley haunted by a fern-hidden river, a glen mysterious and secretive, holding in its heart the Druids' altar. The Druids' altar was the pride of Kilgobbin Park; it consisted of a vast slab of stone supported on four other stones, no man knew its origin, but popular imagination had hung it about with all sorts of gruesome fancies. Victims had been slaughtered there in the old days, a vein of ironstone in the great slab had become the bloodstain of men sacrificed by the Druids; the glen was avoided by day and there were very few of the country people round about who would have entered it by night. Phyl, who had no fear of anything, loved the place; she had known it from childhood and had been accustomed to take her worries and bothers there and bury them. It was a friend, places can become friends and, sometimes, most terrific enemies. The girl listening, now, heard voices below stairs. Hennessey and his companion were evidently leaving the dining-room and crossing the hall to the library. Going out on the landing she caught a glimpse of them as they stood for a moment looking at the trophies in the hall, then they went into the library, the door was closed, and Phyl came downstairs. In the hall she slipped on a pair of goloshes over her thin shoes, put on a cloak and hat and came out of the front door, closing it carefully behind her. To put it in her own words, she couldn't stand the house any longer. Not till this very evening did she feel the great change that her father's death had brought in her life, not till now did she fully know that her past was dead as well as her father, and not till she had left the house did the feeling come to her that Pinckney was to prove its undertaker. There was something alike cold and fateful in the impression that this man had made upon her, an extraordinary impression, for it would be impossible to imagine anything further removed from the ideas of Coldness and Fate than the idea of the cheerful and practical Pinckney. However, there it was, her heart was chilled with the thought of him and the instinctive knowledge that he was going to make a great alteration in her life. She crossed the gravelled drive to the grass sward beyond. The night had altered marvellously; nearly every vestige of cloud had vanished, blown away by the wind. The wind and the moon had the night between them and the air was balmy as the air of summer. Phyl turned and looked back at the house with all its windows glittering in the moonlight, then she struck across the grass now almost dried by the wind. Phyl had something of the night bird in her composition. She had often been out long before dawn to pick up night lines in the river and she knew the woods by dark as well as by day. She was out now for nothing but a breath of fresh air, she did not intend to stay more than ten minutes, and she was on the point of returning to the house when a cry from the woods made her pause. One might have fancied that some human being was crying out in agony, but Phyl knew that it was a fox, a fox caught in a trap. She was confirmed in her knowledge by the barking of its mates; they would be gathered round the trapped one lending all the help they could--with their voices. The girl did not pause to think; forgetting that she had no weapon with which to put the poor beast out of its misery, and no means of freeing it without being bitten, she started off at a run in the direction of the sound, entering the woods by a path that led through a grove of hazel; leaving this path she struck westward swift as an Indian along the road of the call. Her mother's people had been used to the wilds, and Phyl had more than a few drops of tracker blood in her veins; better than that, she had a trace of the wood instinct that leads a man about the forest and makes him able to strike a true line to the west or east or north or south without a compass. The trees were set rather sparsely here and the moonlight shewed vistas of withered fern. The wind had fallen, and in the vast silence of the night this place seemed unreal as a dream. The fox had evidently succeeded in liberating itself from the trap, for its cries had ceased, cut off all of a sudden as though by a closing door. Phyl paused to listen and look around her. Through all the night from here, from there, came thin traces of sound, threads fretting the silence. The trotting of a horse a mile away on the Arranakilty road, the bark of a dog from near the Round House, the shaky bleat of a sheep from the fold at Ross' farm came distinct yet diminished almost to vanishing point. It was like listening to the country sounds of Lilliput. With these came the vaguest whisper of flowing water, broken now and again by a little shudder of wind in the leafless branches of the trees. "He's out," said Phyl to herself. She was thinking of the fox. She knew that the trap must be somewhere about and she guessed who had set it. Rafferty, without a doubt, for only the other day he had been complaining of the foxes having raided the chickens, but there was no use in hunting for the thing by this light and without any indication of its exact whereabouts, so she struck on, determined to return to the house by the more open ground leading through the Druids' glen. She had been here before in the very early morning before sunrise on her way to the river, Rafferty following her with the fish creel, but she had never seen the place like this with the moonlight on it and she paused for a moment to rest and think, taking her seat on a piece of rock by the cromlech. Phyl, despite her American strain, was very Irish in one particular: though cheerful and healthy and without a trace of morbidness in her composition, she, still, was given to fits of melancholy--not depression, melancholy. It is in the air of Ireland, the moist warm air that feeds the shamrock and fills the glens with soft-throated echoes and it is in the soul of the people. Phyl, seated in this favourite spot of hers, where she had played as a child on many a warm summer's afternoon, gave herself over to the moonlight and the spirit of Recollection. She had forgotten Pinckney, and the strange disturbance that he had occasioned in her mind had sunk to rest; she was thinking of her father, of all the pleasant days that were no more--she remembered her dolls, the wax ones with staring eyes, dummies and effigies compared with that mysterious, soulful, sinful, frightful, old rag doll with the inked face, true friend in affliction and companion in joy, and even more, a Ju-ju to be propitiated. That thing had stirred in her a sort of religious sentiment, had caused in her a thrill of worship real, though faint, far more real than the worship of God that had been cultivated in her mind by her teachers. The old Druid stone had affected her child's mind in somewhat the same way, but with a difference. The Ju-ju was a familiar, she had even beaten and punched it when in a temper; the stone had always filled her with respect. There are some people the doors of whose minds are absolutely closed on the past; we call them material and practical people; there are others in which the doors of division are a wee crack open, or even ajar, so that their lives are more or less haunted by whisperings from that strange land we call yesterday. In some of the Burmese and Japanese children the doors stand wide open so that they can see themselves as they were before they passed through the change called death, but the Westerners are denied this. In Phyl's mind as a child one might suppose that through the doors ajar some recollections of forgotten gods once worshipped had stolen, and that the power of the Ju-ju and the Druids' stone lay in their power of focussing those vague and wandering threads of remembrance. To-night this power seemed regained, for she passed from the contemplation of concrete images into a vague and pleasant state, an absolute idleness of the intellect akin to that which people call daydreaming. With her cloak wrapped round her she sat, elbows on knees and her chin in the palms of her hands giving herself up to Nothing before starting to resume her way to the house. Sitting like this she suddenly started and turned. Some one had called her: "Phylice!" For a moment she fancied that it was a real voice, and then she knew that it was only a voice in her head, one of those sounds we hear when we are half asleep, one of those hails from dreamland that come now as the ringing of a bell that never has rung, or the call of a person who has never spoken. She rose up and resumed her way, striking along the glen to the open park, yet still the memory of that call pursued her. "Phylice!" It seemed Mr. Pinckney's voice, it _was_ his voice, she was sure of that now, and she amused herself by wondering why his voice had suddenly popped up in her head. She had been thinking about him more than about any one else that evening and that easily accounted for the matter. Fancy had mimicked him--yet why did Fancy use her name and clothe it in Pinckney's voice?--and it was distinctly a call, the call of a person who wishes to draw another person's attention. Pinckney had never called her by her name and she felt almost irritated at the impertinence of the phantom voice in doing so. This same irritation made her laugh when she realised it. Then the idea that Byrne might lock the hall door before she could get back drove every other thought away and she began to run, her shadow running before her over the moonlit grass. Half way across the sward, which was divided from the grass land proper by a Ha-ha, she heard the stable clock striking eleven. CHAPTER IV When Phyl withdrew from the dining-room, Hennessey filled his glass with port, Pinckney, who took no wine, lit a cigarette and the two men drew miles closer to one another in conversation. They were both relieved by the withdrawal of the girl, Hennessey because he wanted to talk business, Pinckney because her presence had affected him like a wet blanket. His first impression of Phyl had been delightful, then, little by little, her stiffness and seeming lifelessness had communicated themselves to him. It seemed to him that he had never met a duller or more awkward schoolgirl. His mind was of that quick order which requires to be caught in the uptake rapidly in order to shine. Slowness, coldness, dulness or hesitancy in others depressed him just as dull weather depressed him. He did not at all know with what a burning interest his arrival had been awaited, or the effect that his voice had produced and his first appearance. He did not know how the dull schoolgirl had weighed him in a mysterious balance which she herself did not quite comprehend and had found him slightly wanting. Neither could he tell the extent of the paralyses produced in that same mind of hers by the cracked china, the old dish cover, Byrne's awkwardness, and the deboshed crumb-brush. He should have kept to his first impression of her, for first impressions are nearly always right; he should have sought for the reason of so much charm proving charmless, so much positive attraction proving so negative in effect. But he did not. He just took her as he found her and was glad she was gone. "And I believe," said Hennessey, "the South is different now. It used to be all cotton before the war." "Oh, no," said Pinckney. "Before the war there was a lot of cotton grown but we used to grow other things as well, we used to feed ourselves, the plantation was economically independent. The war broke us. We had to get money, so we grew cotton as cotton was never grown before; the South became a great sheet of cotton. You see, cotton is the only crop you can mortgage, so we grew cotton and mortgaged it. Of course the old-time planter is gone, everything is done now by companies, and that's the devil of it--" Pinckney was silent for a moment and sat staring before him as though he were looking at the Past. "Companies, you see, don't grow sunflowers to look at, don't grow trees to shade them, don't make love in a wild and extravagant manner and shoot other companies for crossing them in their affections--don't play the guitar, in short. "Companies don't breed trotting horses and wear panama hats and put flowers in their buttonholes. The old Planter used to do these things and a lot of others. He was a bit of a patriarch in his way, too--well, he's gone and more's the pity. He's like an old house pulled down. No one can ever build it again as it was. The South's a big industrial region now. Not only cotton--ore and coal and machinery. We supply the North and East with pig-iron, machinery, God knows what. Berknowles was very keen on Southern industries, regularly bitten. He was talking of selling off here and coming to settle in Charleston when the illness took him-- and that reminds me." He took a document from his pocket. "This is the will. I've kept it on my person since I started for here. It's not the thing to trust to a handbag. It's in correct form, I believe. Temperley, our solicitor, made it out for him and it leaves everything to the girl when she's twenty--but just read it and see what you think." He lit another cigarette whilst Hennessey, putting on his glasses and pushing his dessert plate away, spread the will on the table. Pinckney watched him as he read it. Hennessey was a new order of being to him. This easy-going, slipshod, garrulous gentleman, fond of his glass of wine, contrasted strangely with the typical lawyer of the States. Flushed and not in his business mood, the man of law cast his eyes over the document before him, reading bits of it here and there and seeming not inclined to bother himself by a concentration of his full energies on the matter. Then, suddenly, his eyes became fixed on a paragraph which he re-read as though puzzled by the meaning of it. Then he looked up at the other over his glasses. "Why, what's this?" said he. "He has made _you_ Phyl's guardian. _You!_" Pinckney laughed. "Yes, that was the chief thing that brought me over. He has made me her guardian, till she's twenty, and he made me promise to look after her interests and see to all business arrangements. He said he had no near relations in Ireland, and he said that he'd sooner trust the devil than the few relatives he had, that they were Papists--that is to say Roman Catholics--he seemed to fear them like the deuce and their influence on the girl. I couldn't understand him. I've never seen any harm in Roman Catholics; there are loads in the States and they seem to be just as good citizens as the others, better, for they seem to stick tighter by their religion. Anyhow, there you are. Berknowles had them on the brain and nothing would do him but I must come over to look after the business myself." Hennessey, with his finger on the will, had been staring at Pinckney during this. He looked down now at the document and then up again. "But you--her guardian--why, it's absurd," said he. "You aren't old enough to be a guardian, why, Lord bless my soul, what'll people be doing next? A young chap like you to be the guardian of a girl like Phyl--why, it's not proper." "Not only am I to be her guardian," said Pinckney with a twinkle in his eyes, "but she's to come and live under my roof at Charleston. I promised Berknowles that--He was dying, you see, and one can refuse nothing to a dying man." Hennessey rose up in an abstracted sort of way, went to the sideboard, poured himself out a whisky and soda, took a sip, and sat down again. "Extraordinary, isn't it?" said Pinckney, tapping the ash off his cigarette. "All the same, you need not be worried at the impropriety of the business; there's none, nothing improper could live in the same house with my aunt, Maria Pinckney. Vernons belongs to her though I live there." "Vernons," put in the other. "What's that?" "It's the name of our house in Charleston. It's mine, really, but my father left it to Maria to live in; it comes to me at her death. I don't want that house at all. I want her to keep it forever, but it's such a pleasant old place, I like to live there instead of buying a house of my own. Vernons isn't exactly a house, it's more like a family tree--hollow--with all the ancestors inside instead of hanging on the branches." "But why on earth didn't Berknowles make your aunt guardian to the girl?" asked Hennessey. "There'd have been some sense in that--a middle-aged woman--" "I beg your pardon," said Pinckney, "my aunt is not a middle-aged woman, she's not fifteen." "Not what?" said Hennessey. "Not fifteen--in years of discretion, though she's over seventy as time goes. She has no knowledge at all of what money is or what money means--she flings it away, doesn't spend it--just flings it away on anything and everything but herself. I don't believe there's a charity in the States that hasn't squeezed her, or a beggar-man in the South that hasn't banked on her. She was sent into the world to grow flowers and look after stray dogs and be robbed by hoboes; she has been nearly seventy years at it and she doesn't know she has ever been robbed. She's not a fool by any manner of means, and she rules the servants at Vernons in the good old patriarchal way, but she's lost where money is concerned. That's why Berknowles wanted me to look after the girl's interests. As for anything else, I guess Maria Pinckney will be the real guardian." "Well, I don't know," said Hennessey. He was confused by all these new ideas shot into his mind suddenly like this after dinner, he could see that Pinckney was genuine enough, all the same it irritated him to think that Philip Berknowles should have chosen a youth like this to be second father to Phyl. What was the matter with himself, Hennessey? Hadn't he a fine house in Merrion Square and a wife who would have treated the girl like a daughter? "Well, I don't know," said he. "It's not for me to dispute the wishes of a client, but I've known Phyl since she was born and I've known her father since we were together at Trinity College and I'd have taken it more handsome if he'd left the looking after of her to me." "I wonder he didn't," said Pinckney. "He spoke of you a good deal to me, spoke of you as his best friend; all the same he seemed set on the idea of us taking care of the girl. He fell in love with Charleston and he cottoned to us; then, of course, there were the family reasons. Phyl's mother was a Mascarene; my mother was her mother's first cousin. Vernons belonged to the Mascarenes, my mother brought it to my father as part of her wedding portion. The Pinckneys' old house was lost to us in the smash up after the war. So, you see, Phyl ought to be as much at home at Vernons as I am. Funny, isn't it, how things get mixed up and old family houses change hands?" "And when do you want to take her away?" asked Hennessey. "Upon my word, I've never thought of that," replied the other. "I want to see things settled up here and to go over the accounts with you. Berknowles said the house had better be let--I should think it would be easy to find a good tenant--then I want to go to London on business and get back as quick as possible. She need not come back with me, it would scarcely give her time to get things ready. There's a Mrs. Van Dusen, a friend of ours who lives in New York, she's coming over in a month or so and Phyl might come with her as far as New York. It's all plain sailing after that." "Well," said Hennessey, folding up the will and putting it in his pocket. "I suppose it's all for the best, but it's hard lines for a man to lose his best friend and see a good old estate like Kilgobbin taken off to the States--Oh, you needn't tell me, if Phyl goes out there she's done for as far as Ireland is concerned. Sure, they never come back, the people that go there, and if she does come back it'll be with an American husband and he master of Kilgobbin. I know what America is, it never lets go of the man or woman it catches hold of." "You're not far wrong there," said Pinckney. "You see, life is set to a faster pace in America than over here and once you learn to step that pace you feel coming back here as if you were living in a country where people are hobbled. At least that's my experience. Then the air is different. There's somehow a feeling of morning in America that goes through the whole day--almost--here, afternoon begins somewhere about eleven." Hennessey yawned, and the two men, rising from the table, left the room and crossed the hall to the library. Here, after a while, Hennessey bade the other good night and departed for bed, whilst Pinckney, leaning back in his armchair, fell into a lazy and contemplative mood, his eyes wandering from point to point. All this business was very new to him. Pinckney had inherited his father's brains as well as his money. He had discovered that a large fortune requires just as much care and attention as a large garden and that a man can extract just as much interest and amusement and the physical health that comes from both, out of money-tending as out of flower and vegetable growing. Knowing all about cotton and nearly everything about wheat, he managed occasionally to do a bit of speculative dealing without the least danger of burning his fingers. Self-reliant and self-assured, knowing his road and all its turnings, he had moved through life up to this with the ease of a well-oiled and almost frictionless mechanism. But here was a new thing of which he had never dreamed. Here was another destiny suddenly thrust into his charge and another person's property to be conserved and dealt with. Never, never, did he dream when acceding to Berknowles' request, of the troubles, little difficulties and causes of indecision that were preparing to meet him. Up till now, one side of his character had been almost unknown to him. He had been quite unaware that he possessed a conscience most painfully sensitive with regard to the interests of others, a conscience that would prick him and poison his peace were he to leave even little things undone in the fulfilment of the trust he had undertaken so lightheartedly. Possessing a keen eye for men he began to recognise now why Berknowles had not chosen the easy-going Hennessey to look after Phyl and her affairs, and he guessed, just by the little bit he had seen of Kilgobbin and the servants, the slipshoddedness and waste going on behind the scenes in the absence of a master and mistress. Pinckney loathed waste as he loathed inefficiency and as he loathed dirt. They were all three brothers with Drink in his eyes and as he leaned back in the chair now, his gaze travelling about the room, he could not but perceive little things that would have brought exclamations from the soul of a careful housekeeper. The furniture had been upholstered, or rather re-upholstered in leather some five years ago. There is nothing that cries out so much against neglect as leather, and the chairs and couch in the library of Kilgobbin, without exactly crying out, still told their tale. Some of the buttons were gone, and some of them hung actually by the thread in the last stage of departure. There was a tiny triangular rent in the leather of the armchair wherein Phyl had been sitting and another armchair wanted a castor. The huge Persian rug that covered the centre of the floor shewed marks left by cigar and cigarette ash, and under a Jacobean book-case in the corner were stuffed all sorts of odds and ends, old paper-backed novels, a pair of old shoes, a tennis racquet and a boxing glove--besides other things. Pinckney rose up, went to the book-case and placed his fingers on top of it, then he looked at his fingers and the bar of dust upon them, brushed his hand clean and came back to his chair by the fire. He heard the stable clock striking eleven. The sound of the wind that had been raging outside all during dinner time had died away and the sounds of the house made themselves manifest, the hundred stealthy accountable and unaccountable little sounds that night evolves from an old house set in the stillness of the country. Just as the night jasmine gives up its perfume to the night, so does an old house its past in the form of murmurs and crackings and memories and suggestions. Notwithstanding Dunn's attentions there were rats alive in the cellars and under the boarding--and mice; the passages leading to the kitchen premises made a whispering gallery where murderers seemed consulting together if the scullery window were forgotten and left open--as it usually was, and boards in the uneven flooring that had been preparing for the act for weeks and months would suddenly "go off with a bang," a noise startling in the dead of night as the crack of a pistol, and produced, heaven knows how, but never by daylight. Even Pinckney, who did not believe in ghosts, became aware as he sat now by the fire that the old house was feeling for him to make him creep, feeling for him with its old disjointed fingers and all the artfulness of inanimate things. He was aware that Sir Nicholas Berknowles was looking down at him with the terrible patient gaze of a portrait, and he returned the gaze, trying to imagine what manner of man this might have been and how he had lived and what he had done in those old days that were once real sunlit days filled with people with real voices, hearts, and minds. A gentle creak as though a light step had pressed upon the flooring of the hall brought his mind back to reality and he was rising from his chair to retire for the night when a sound from outside the window made him sit down again. It was the sound of a step on the gravel path, a step stealthy and light, a real sound and no contraption of the imagination. The idea of burglars sprang up in his mind, but was dismissed; that was no burglar's footstep--and yet! He listened. The sound had ceased and now came a faint rubbing as of a hand feeling for the window followed by the sharp rapping of a knuckle on the glass. "Hullo," cried Pinckney, jumping to his feet and approaching the shuttered window. "Who's there?" "It's me," said a voice. "I'm locked out. Byrne's bolted the front door. Go to the hall door, will you, please, and let me in?" "Phyl," said Pinckney to himself. "Good heavens!" Then to the other, "I'm coming." Byrne had left a lamp lighted in the hall and the guest's candlestick waiting for him on the table. The lamp was sufficient to show him the executive side of the big front door that had been nearly battered in in the time of the Fenians and still possessed the ponderous locks and bars of a past day when the tenants of Kilgobbin had fought the pikemen of Arranakilty and Rupert Berknowles had hung seventeen rebels, no less, on the branches of the big oak "be the gates." Pinckney undid bolt and bar, turned the key in the great lock and flung the door open, disclosing Phyl standing in the moonlight. The contrast between the forbidding and ponderous door and the charming little figure against which it had stood as a barrier might have struck him had his mind been less astonished. As it was he could think of nothing but the strangeness of the business in hand. "Where on earth have you been?" said he. "Out in the woods," said Phyl, entering quite unconcerned and removing her cloak. "A fox got trapped in the woods and I went to let it out and couldn't find it, then that old fool Byrne locked the door; lucky you were up. I saw the light in the library shining through a crack in the shutters and knocked." Pinckney was putting up the bar and sliding the bolts. He said nothing. Had Phyl been another girl, he might have laughed and joked over the matter, but care of Phyl's well-being was now part of his business in life and that consideration just checked his speech. There was nothing at all wrong in the affair, and never for a moment did he dream of making the slightest remonstrance; still, the unwisdom of a young girl wandering about in the woods at night after trapped foxes was a patent fact which disturbed the mind of this guardian unto dumbness. Phyl, who was as sensitive to impressions as a radiometer to light, noted the silence of the other and resented it as she hung up her old hat and cloak. She knew nothing of the true facts of the case, she looked on Pinckney as a being almost of her own age, and that he should dare to express disapproval of an act of hers not concerning him, even by silence, was an intolerable insult. She knew that she loathed him now.--Prig! This was the first real meeting of these two and Fate, with the help of Irish temper and the Pinckney conscience, was making a fine fiasco of it. Phyl, having hung up the hat and coat, turned without a word, marched into the library and finding the book she had been reading that day, put it under her arm. "Good night," said she as she passed him in the hall. "Good night," he replied. He watched her disappearing up the stairs, stood for a moment irresolute, and then went into the library. He knew he had offended her and he knew exactly how he had offended her. There are silences that can be more hurting than speech--yet what could he have said? He rummaged in his mind to find something he might have said and could find nothing more appropriate than a remark about the weather and the fineness of the night. Yet a bald and decrepit remark like that would have been as bad almost as silence, for it would have ignored the main point at issue--the night-wandering of his ward. He sat down again for a moment in the armchair by the fireplace and began to wrestle with the position in which he found himself. This was a small business, but if Phyl in the future was to do things that he did not approve of it would be his plain duty to remonstrate with her. An odious position for youth to be placed in. How she would loathe and hate him! Pinckney, though a man of the world in many ways and a good business man, was still at heart a boy just as young as Phyl; even in years he was very little older than she, and the boy side of his mind was in full revolt at the job set before him by fate. Then he came to a resolution. "She can do jolly well what she pleases," said he to himself, "without my interference. Aunt Maria can attend to that. My business will be to look after her property and keep sharks off it. _I'm_ not going to set up in business to tell a girl what she ought or oughtn't to do--that's a woman's job." Satisfied with this seeming solution of the difficulty he went to bed. Meanwhile, Phyl, having marched off with the book under her arm found, when she reached her room, that she had forgotten a matchbox, and, too proud to return to the hall for one, went to bed in the dark. She lay awake for an hour, her mind obsessed by thoughts of this man who had suddenly stepped into her life, and who possessed such a strange power to disturb her being and fill it with feelings of unrest, irritation and, strangely enough, a vague attraction. The attraction one might fancy the iron to feel for the distant magnet, or the floating stick for the far-off whirlpool. Then she fell asleep and dreamed that they were at dinner and Mr. Hennessey was waiting at table. Her father was there and, before the dream converted itself into something equally fatuous she heard Pinckney's voice, also in the dream; he seemed looking for her in the hall and he was calling to her, "Phyl--Phyl!" CHAPTER V Next morning came with a burst of sunshine and a windy, cloudless sky. Pinckney, dressing with his window open, could see the park with the rooks wheeling and cawing over the trees, whilst the warm wind brought into the room all sorts of winter scents on the very breath of summer. This rainy land where the snow rarely comes has all sorts of surprises of climate and character. Nothing is truly logical in Ireland, not even winter. That is what makes the place so delightful to some minds and so perplexing to others. Hennessey was staying for a day or two to go over accounts and explain the working of the estate to Pinckney. He was in the hall when the latter came down, and gave him good morning. "Where's your mistress?" said Hennessey to old Byrne, as they took their seats at the breakfast table. "Faith, she's been out since six," said Byrne. "She came down threatenin' to skin Rafferty alive for layin' fox thraps in the woods, then she had a bite of bread and butter and a cup of tea Norah made for her, and off she went with Rafferty to hunt out the thraps and take them up. It's little she cares for breakfast." "I was the same way myself when I was her age," said Hennessey to Pinckney. "Up at four in the morning and out fishing in Dublin Bay--it's well to be young." "Look here," said the young man, as Byrne left the room, "she was out till eleven last night in the woods; she knocked me up as I was sitting in the library and I let her in. _I_ don't see anything wrong in the business, but all the same, it's not a particularly safe proceeding and I suppose a mother or father would have jawed her--I couldn't. I suppose I showed by my manner that I didn't approve of her being out so late, for she seemed in a huff as she went up to bed. My position is a bit difficult, but I'm hanged if I'm going to do the heavy father or careful mother business. If she was only a boy, I could talk to her like a Dutch uncle, but I don't know anything about girls. I wish--" Pinckney's wish remained forever unexpressed, for at the moment the door opened and in came Phyl. Her face was glowing with the morning air and she seemed to have forgotten the business of the night before as she greeted Pinckney and the lawyer and took her place at the table. "Phyl," said the lawyer, half jocularly, "here's Mr. Pinckney been complaining that you were wandering about all night in the woods, knocking him up to let you in at two o'clock in the morning." Phyl, who was helping herself to bacon, looked up at Pinckney. "Oh, you cad," said her eyes. Then she spoke: "I came in at eleven. If I had known, I would have called up Byrne or one of the servants to let me in." Pinckney could have slain Hennessey. "Good gracious," he said. "_I_ wasn't complaining. I only just mentioned the fact." "The fact that I was out till two," said Phyl, with another upward glance of scorn. "I never said any such thing. I said eleven." "It was my loose way of speaking; but, sure, what's the good of getting out of temper?" put in Hennessey. "Mr. Pinckney wasn't meaning anything, but you see, Phyl, it's just this way, your father has made him your guardian." "My _what!_" cried the girl. "_Oh_, Lord!" said Pinckney, in despair at the blundering way of the other. Then finding himself again and the saving vein of humour, without which man is just a leaden figure: "Yes, that's it. I'm your guardian. You must on no account go out without my permission, or cough or sneeze without a written permit--Oh, Phyl, don't be thinking nonsense of that sort. I _am_ your guardian, it seems, and by your father's special request, but you are absolutely free to do as you like." "A nice sort of guardian," put in Hennessey with a grin. "I am only, really, guardian of your money and your interests," went on the other, "and your welfare. When you came in last night late, I was a bit taken aback and I thought--as a matter of fact, I thought it might be dangerous being out alone in this wild part of the country so late at night, but I did not want to interfere; you can understand, can't you? What I want you to get out of your mind is, that I am that odious thing, a meddling person. I'm not." Phyl was very white. She had risen from the table and was at the window. Here was her dream come true of the bearded American who had suddenly appeared to claim her and Kilgobbin and the servants and everything. Pinckney had not a beard, but he was an American and he had come to claim everything. The word guardian carried such a force and weight and was so filled with fantastic possibilities to the mind of Phyl, that she scarcely heard his soft words and excuses. Phyl had the Irish trick of running away with ideas and embroidering the most palpable truths with fancies. It was an inheritance from her father, and she stood by the window now unable to speak, with the word "Guardian" ringing in her ears and the idea pressing on her mind like an incubus. Hennessey had risen up. He was the first to break silence. "There's no use in meeting troubles half way," said he vaguely. "You and Phyl will get along all right when you know each other better. Come out, the two of you, and we'll go round the grounds and you will be able to see for yourself the state of the house and what repairs are wanting." "One moment," said Pinckney. "I want to tell Phyl something--I'm going to call you Phyl because I'm your guardian--d'you mind?" "No," said Phyl, "you can call me anything you like, I suppose." "I'm not going to call you anything I like--just Phyl-- Well, then, I want to tell you what we have to do. It's not my wishes I have to carry out but your father's. He wanted to let this house." "Let Kilgobbin!" "Yes, that is what he said. He wanted to let it to a good tenant who would look after it till you are of age. I think he was right. You see, you could not live here all alone, and if the place was shut up it would deteriorate." "It would go to wrack and ruin," said Hennessey. "And the servants?" said Phyl. "We will look after them," said Pinckney, "the new tenant might take them on; if not, we'll give them time to get new places." "Byrne's been here before I was born," said the girl, with dry lips, "so has Mrs. Driscoll. They are part of the place; it would ruin their lives to send them away." "Well," said Pinckney, "I don't want to be the ogre to ruin their lives; you can do anything you like about them. If the new tenant didn't take them, you might pension them. I want you to be perfectly happy in your mind and I want you to feel that though I am, so to speak, the guardian of your money, still, that money is yours." She was beginning to understand now that not only was he striving to soothe her feelings and propitiate her, but that he was very much in earnest in this business, and crowding through her mind came a great wave of revulsion against herself. Phyl's nature was such that whilst always ready to fly into wrath and easily moved to bitter resentment, one touch of kindness, one soft word, had the power to disarm her. One soft word from an antagonist had the power to wound her far more than a dozen words of bitterness. Filled now with absolutely superfluous self-reproach, she stood for a moment unable to speak. Then she said, raising her eyes to his: "I am sure you mean to do what is for the best.--It was stupid of me--" "Not a bit," said the other, cheerfully. "I want to do the things that will make you happy--that's all. I'm a business man and I know the value of money. Money is just worth the amount of happiness it brings." "Faith, that's true," said Hennessey, who had taken his seat again and was in the act of lighting a cigar. "When I was a boy," went on the other. "I was always kept hard up by my father. It was like pulling gum teeth to get the price of a fishing rod out of him. When I think of all the fun I might have bought with a few dollars, it makes me wild. You can't buy fun when you get old; you may buy an opera house or a yacht, but you can't buy the real stuff that makes life worth living." Phyl glanced out of the window at the park, then as though she had found some inspiration there, she turned to Pinckney. "If you don't mind about the money, then why don't you let me live here instead of letting the place? I can live here by myself and I would be happy here. I won't be happy if I leave it." "Well," said Pinckney, "there's your father's wish, first of all." "I'm sure if he knew how I felt, he wouldn't mind," said Phyl mournfully, turning her gaze again to the park. "On top of that," went on Pinckney, "there's--your age. Phyl, it wouldn't ever do; it's not I that am saying it, it's custom, the world, society." Phyl, like the hooked salmon that has taken the gaudy fly, felt a check and recognised that a Power had her in hand, recognised in the light-going and fair-speaking Pinckney something of adamant, a will not to be broken or bent. She felt for a moment a revolt against herself for having fallen to the lure and allowed herself to come to friendly terms with him. Then this feeling faded a bit. The very young are very weak in the face of constituted authority--besides, there was always at the back of Pinckney her father's wish. "And then again, on top of that," he went on, "there's the question of your coming to live with us; your father wished it." "In America!" cried Phyl. "Do you mean I am to live in America?" "Well, we live there; why not? It's not a bad place to live in--and what else are you to do?" She could not answer him. This time she saw that the bogey man had got her and no mistake. America to her seemed as far as the moon and far less familiar. If Pinckney had declared that it was necessary for her to die, she would have been a great deal more frightened, but the prospect would not have seemed much more desolate and forbidding and final. He saw at once the trouble in her mind and guessed the cause. He had a rare intuition for reading minds, and it seemed to him he could read Phyl's as easily as though the outside of her head were clear glass--he had cause to modify this cocksure opinion later on. "Don't worry," he said. "If you don't like America when you see it, you can come back to Ireland. I daresay we can arrange something; anyhow, don't let us meet troubles half way." "When am I to go?" said Phyl. "Sure, Phyl, you can stay as long as you like with us," said Mr. Hennessey. "The doors of 10, Merrion Square, are always open to you, and never will they be shut on you except behind your back." Pinckney laughed; and a servant coming in to clear the breakfast things, Hennessey led the way from the room to show Pinckney the premises. CHAPTER VI They crossed the hall, and passing through a green-baize covered door went down a passage that led to the kitchen. "This is the housekeeper's room," said Hennessey, pointing to a half open door, "and the servants' hall is that door beyond. This is the kitchen." They paused for a moment in the great old-fashioned kitchen, with an open range capable of roasting a small ox, one might have fancied. Norah, the cook, was busy in the scullery with her sleeves tucked up, and under the table was seated Susie Gallagher, a small and grubby hanger-on engaged in the task of washing potatoes. The potatoes were beside her on the floor and she was washing them in a tin basin of water with the help of an old nail-brush. There was a horse-shoe hung up, for luck, on the wall over the range, and a pile of dinner plates, from last night's dinner and still unwashed, stood on the dresser, where also stood a half-bottle of Guinness' stout and a tumbler; an old setter bitch lay before the fire and a jackdaw in a wicker cage set up a yell at the sight of the visitors, that brought Norah out of the scullery to receive them, a broad smile on her face and her arms tucked up in her apron. "He always yells like that at the sight of tramps or stray people about," apologised the cook. "He's better than a watch-dog. Hold your tongue, you baste; don't you know your misthress when you see her?" "Rafferty caught him in the park," said Phyl, "and cut his tongue with a sixpence so as to make him able to speak." They left the kitchen and came into the yard. A big tin can of refuse was standing by the kitchen door, and on top of all sorts of rubbish, potato peelings, cabbage stalks and so forth, lay the carcass of a boiled fowl. It was the fowl they had dined off the night before and it lay there just as it had gone from the table, that is to say, minus both wings and the greater part of the breast, but with the legs intact. Pinckney stared at this sinful sight. Then he pointed to it. "What's that doing there?" he asked. "Waitin' to be took away be the stable boy, sor," replied the cook, who had followed them to the door. "All the rubbish is took away in that ould can every mornin'." "Good God!" said Pinckney under his breath. The expression was shaken out of him, so to speak, and out of a pocket of his character which had never been fully explored, of whose existence, indeed, he was not particularly aware. This Irish expedition was to show him a good many things in life and in himself of which up to this he had been in ignorance. He had never been brought face to face with waste, bald waste without a hat on or covering of any sort, before. "Haven't you any poor people about here?" he asked. "Hapes, sor." Pinckney was on the point of saying something more, but he checked himself, remembering that in the eyes of the servants he was here in the position of a guest. He followed Hennessey across to the stable yard, where Larry, the groom, was washing the carriage that had fetched him from the station the night before. "The servants won't eat chicken," said Phyl, in an apologetic way. She had noted everything and she guessed his thoughts. "They won't eat game either--and they throw things away if they don't like them--of course, it's wasteful, but they _do_ give things to the poor. Lots of poor people come here, every day nearly, but they don't care for scraps--you see, it _is_ insulting to give a poor person scraps, just as though they were animals. I remember the cook we had before Norah did it when she came first, and all the poor people stopped coming to the house. Said she ought to know better than to offer them the leavings." "Cheek!" "Well, I don't know," said Phyl. "We've done it for hundreds of years." She closed her mouth in a way she had when she did not wish to pursue a subject further. Despite the fact that she had made friends with Pinckney, she was galled by his attitude of criticism. Guardian or no guardian, he was a stranger; relation or no relation, he was a stranger, and what right had a stranger to dare to come and turn up his nose at the poor people or make remarks--he hadn't said a word--about the wastefulness of the servants? The redoubtable Rafferty was standing in the yard chewing a straw and watching Larry at work. Rafferty was a man of genius, who had started as a helper and odd job person, and had risen to the position of factotum. He had ousted the Scotch gardener and insinuated a relation of his own in his place. There was scarcely a servant about the estate that was not a relation of Rafferty's. Philip Berknowles had put up with a lot from Rafferty simply because Rafferty was an invaluable person in his way when not crossed. Everything went smoothly when the factotum was not interfered with. Cross him and there were immediate results ranging from ill-groomed horses to general unrest. He was a dark individual, half groom, half game-keeper in dress, a "wicked-looking divil," according to the description of his enemies, and an exceedingly foxy-looking individual in the eyes of Pinckney. "Rafferty," said Mr. Hennessey, "I want to show this gentleman round. Let's see the stables." Rafferty touched his cap and led the way, showing first the stalls and boxes where four or five horses were stabled, and then leading the way through the coach-house to the path from which opened the kitchen gardens. They were immense and walled in with red brick, capable, one might fancy, of supplying the wants of three or four houses the size of Kilgobbin. Pinckney noted this fact, also that the home farm to which the kitchen gardens led was apparently a prosperous and going little concern, with its fowls and chickens penned or loose, styes filled with grunting pigs, and turkeys gobbling and spreading their tails in the sun. "Who looks after all this?" asked Pinckney. "I do, sor," replied Rafferty. "What are the takings?" "I beg your pardon, sor?" "The profits, I mean. You sell these things, don't you?" "Kilgobbin isn't a farm, sor, it's a gintleman's estate." Pinckney, not at all set back by this snub, turned and looked the factotum in the face. "Just so," said he, "but I've never heard of gentlemen growing pigs to look at; peacocks, maybe, but not pigs. However, we'll have another look at the business later." He turned and they went on, Rafferty disturbed in his mind and much put about by the manner of the other in whom he began to divine something more than a casual guest, Phyl almost as much put out as Rafferty. The idea that the factotum might have been robbing her father right and left never occurred to her; even if it had, it would not have softened the fact that a strange hand was at work in her old home turning over things, inspecting them, holding them up for comment. She managed to drop behind as they left the farm yard for the paddocks, then turning down the yew lane that led back to the house, she ran as though hounds were after her, reached the house, locked herself in her bedroom, and flung herself on the bed in a tempest of weeping, dragging a pillow over her head as if to shield herself from the blows that the world was aiming at her. Phyl, without mother, brothers or sisters, had centred all her affection on her father and Kilgobbin; the servants, the place itself and all the things and people about it were part and parcel with her life, and the death of her father had intensified her love of the place and the people. If Pinckney had only known, he might have put the business of the inspection of the property and the dealing with the servants into other hands, but Pinckney was young and full of energy and business ability; he was full of conscientiousness and the determination to protect his ward's interests; he had scented a rogue in Rafferty, and at this very minute returning to the house with Hennessey, he was declaring his intention to make an overhaul of the working of the estate. Rafferty was to appear before him and produce his accounts and make explanations. Mrs. Driscoll was to be examined as to the expenditure, etc. He little knew the hornet's nest into which he was about to poke his finger. CHAPTER VII The grand inquisition began that evening after dinner--Phyl did not appear at dinner, alleging a headache--and Rafferty, summoned to the library, had to stand whilst Pinckney, seated at the table with a pen in his hand and a sheet of paper before him, went into the business of accounts. Mark how the unexpected occurs in life. Rafferty, who had been pilfering for years, selling garden produce and keeping the profits, robbing corn from the corn bin in the stable, poaching and selling birds and ground game to a dealer in Arranakilty, receiving illicit commissions and so forth, had on the death of his master shaken off all restraint and prepared for a campaign of open plunder. The very last thing he could have imagined was the sudden appearance of an American business man on the scene, armed with absolute power and possessing the eye of a hawk. "Your master asked me just before he died to look after this estate," began Pinckney; "in fact, he has appointed me to act as guardian to Miss Berknowles, so I just want to see how things stand. Now, to begin with the horses. I want to know everything about the stables during the last--shall we say--six months. Who supplies the corn and the hay and the straw?" "I've been gettin' some from Faulkner of Arranakilty, sor, and some from Doyle of Bally-brack." "Don't you grow any horse food on the estate?" "We don't grow no corn, sor." "Well, hay and straw?" "You can't get straw, sor, widout you grow corn." "I know that--but how about hay--surely you grow lots of grass?" "We graze the grass, sor." "Do you let the grazing?" "Well, sor, it's this way; the masther was never very shtrict about the grazin'; we puts some of the horses out to grass, ourselves, and we lets poor folk have a bit of grazin' now and then for their cattle, though master was never after makin' money from the estate--" "Just so. Have you the receipted bills for the fodder during the last six months?" "Yes, sor. The master always sent me wid the money to pay the bills." "You have got the receipts?" "The which, sor?" "The bills receipted." "Bills, sure, what's the good of keepin' bills, sor, when the money's paid. I b'lave they're somewhere in an ould crock in the stable, at laste that's where I saw thim last." "Well," said Pinckney, "you can fetch them for me to-morrow morning, and now let's talk about the garden." Rafferty, not knowing what Pinckney might discover and so being unable to lie with confidence, had a very bad quarter of an hour over the garden. Pinckney was not a man to press another unduly, nor was he a man to haggle about halfpence or worry servants over small peccadillos. He knew quite well that grooms are grooms, and will be so as long as men are men. He would never have bothered about little details had Rafferty been an ordinary servant. He recognised in Rafferty, not a servant to be dismissed or corrected, but an antagonist to be fought. It was the case of the dog and badger. Rafferty was Graft and all it implies, Pinckney was Straight Dealing. And Straight Dealing knew quite well that the only way to get Graft by the throat is to ferret out details, no matter how small. So Rafferty was taken over details. He had to admit that he had "given away" some of the stuff from the garden and sold "a bit," sending it up to Dublin for that purpose; but he was not to be caught. "And the profits," said Pinckney. "I suppose you handed them over to Mr. Berknowles?" "No, sor; the master always tould me to keep any bit of money I might draa from anything I planted extra for me perkisites, that was the understandin' I had with him." "And over the farmyard, I suppose anything you could make by selling any extra animals you planted was your perquisite?" "Yes, sor." "Very well, Rafferty, that will do for to-night; get me those receipted bills to-morrow morning. Come here at ten o'clock and we will have another talk." Rafferty went off, feeling more comfortable in his mind. The word Perquisites might be made to cover a multitude of sins, but he would not have been so easy if he had known that Mrs. Driscoll had been called up immediately after his departure. Mrs. Driscoll was one of those terrible people who say nothing yet see everything; for the last year and a half she had been watching Rafferty; knowing it to be quite useless to report what she knew to her easy-going master, she had, none the less, kept on watching. As a result, she was now able to bring up a hard fact, a small hard fact more valuable than worlds of ductile evidence. Rafferty had "nicked"--it was the lady's expression--a brand-new lawn mower. "I declare to God, sir, I don't know what he _has_ took, for me eyes can't be everywhere, but I do know he's took the mower." "Why did you not tell Miss Phyl?" "I did, sir, and she only said, 'Oh, there must be a mistake--what would he be doin' with it,' says she. 'Sellin' it,' says I. 'Nonsense,' says she. You see, sir, Rafferty and she has always been hand in glove, what with the fishin' and shootin', and the horses and such like, and she won't hear a word against him." Mrs. Driscoll had called Rafferty a sly devil--he was. At eleven o'clock next morning, Phyl, crossing the stable yard with some sugar for the horses, met Rafferty. He was crying. "Why, what on earth's the matter, Rafferty?" asked the girl. "I've got the shove, miss," replied Rafferty, "after all me years of service, I'm put out to end me days in a ditch." "You mean you're discharged!" she cried. "Was it Mr. Pinckney?" "That's him," replied Rafferty. "Says he's the masther of us all. 'Out you get,' says he, 'or it's I that'll be callin' a p'leeceman to put you,' says he. Flung it in me face that I'd stolen a laan mower. Me that's ben on the estate man and boy for forty year. A laan mower! Sure, Miss Phyl, what would I be doin' with a laan mower?" Phyl turned from him and ran to the house. Pinckney and Hennessey were seated in the library when the door burst open and in came Phyl. Her eyes were bright and her lips were pale. "You told me you would keep all the servants," said she. "Rafferty tells me you have dismissed him." "I should think I had," said Pinckney lightly, and not gauging the mad disturbance of the other, "and it's lucky for him I haven't put him in prison." The word prison was all that was wanted to fire the mine. Pinckney stood for a moment aghast at the change in the girl. "I _hate_ you," she cried, coming a step closer to him. "I loathe you--master of us all, are you? Dare to touch any one here and I'll burn the house down with my own hands--you--you--" She paused for want of breath, her chest heaving and her hands clenched. Then Pinckney exploded. The good old fiery Pinckney blood was up. Oh, without any manner of doubt our ancestors are still able to speak, and it was old Roderick Pinckney--"Pepper Pinckney" was his nickname--that blazed out now. It was also the fire of youth answering the fire of youth. "Damn it!" he cried. "I've come here to do my best--I don't care--keep who you want--be robbed if you like it--I'm off--" He caught up all the sheets of paper he had been covering with figures and tore them across. "Beast!" cried Phyl. She rushed from the room and upstairs like a mad creature. The bang of her bedroom door closed the incident. "Now don't be taking on so," said Hennessey. "You've both of you lost your temper." "Lost my temper--maybe. I'm going all the same. Right back to the States. I'm off to Dublin by the next train and you'd better come and finish the business there. You'd better have her to stay with you in Dublin. I don't want to see her again. Anyhow, we'll settle all that later." "Maybe that's the best," said Hennessey. "My wife will look after her till she's ready to go to the States--if she wants to." "Please God she doesn't," replied the other. Phyl did not see Pinckney again. He went off to Dublin by the two-ten train with Hennessey, the latter promising to be back on the morrow to arrange things. CHAPTER VIII Dublin can never have been a cheerful city. Even in the days when the butchers joined in street fights and hung their antagonists when caught on steel hooks--like legs of mutton--the gaiety of Dublin one may fancy to have been more a matter of spirits than of spirit. Echoes from the days when the Parliament sat in Stephen's Green come down to us through the works of Charles Lever, but the riotous gaiety of the old days when Barrington was a judge of the Admiralty Court, the Hell Fire Club an institution, and Count Considine a figure in society, must be taken with a grain of salt. Mangan shows you the old Dublin as it was in those glorious times, and in the new Dublin of to-day the shade of Mangan seems still to walk arm in arm with the shade of Mathurin. Gloomy ghosts addicted to melancholy, noting with satisfaction that the streets are as dirty as ever, the old Public Houses still standing, that, despite the tramways--those extraordinary new modern inventions--the tide of life runs pretty much the same as of old. The ghosts of Mangan and Mathurin have never seen a taxi cab. Dublin at the present day is a splendid city for old ghosts to wander in without having their corns trodden on or their susceptibilities injured. Phyl had come to Dublin to live with the Hennesseys in Merrion Square. "Never shall my door be shut on you except behind your back," Hennessey had said, and he meant it. The girl was worth several thousand a year; had she been penniless it would have been just the same. You may meet many geniuses in your journey through life, many brilliant people, many beautiful people, many fascinating people, but you will not meet many friends. Hennessey belonged to the society of Friends, his wife was a member of the same community, and he would have been ruined only for his partner Niven, who was an ordinary lowdown human creature who believed in no one and kept the business together. On the day of her arrival at Merrion Square and during her first interview with Mrs. Hennessey in the large, cheerless drawing-room where decalcomanied flower pots lingered like relics of the Palæolithic age of Art, Phyl kept herself above tears, just as a swimmer keeps his head above water in a choppy sea. It was all so gloomy, yet so friendly, that the mind could not openly revolt at the gloom; it was all so different from the wind and trees and freedom of Kilgobbin, and Mrs. Hennessey, whom she had only seen once before, was so different, on closer acquaintance, from any of the people she had hitherto met in her little world. Mrs. Hennessey, with a soul above dust and housekeeping, a faded woman, not very tidy, with an exalted air, pouring out tea from a Britannia metal ware teapot and talking all the time about Willy Yeates, the Irish Players and Lady Gregory's last play, fascinated the girl, who did not know who Willy Yeates was and who had never seen the Irish Players. Nor could she learn from Mrs. Hennessey. It was impossible to get a word in edgeways with that lady. Sometimes, indeed, during a lull in her mind disturbance, she would remain quiet whilst you answered some question, only to find that she had totally forgotten the question and was not listening to your reply. Phyl got so used to Mrs. Hennessey after a few days that she did not listen to her questions, and so the two being matched, they got on well together. Young people soon accommodate themselves to their surroundings, and in a month the girl had grown to the colour of her new life, at least, on the outside of her mind. It seemed to her that she had lived years in Merrion Square. Kilgobbin--Hennessey had managed to let the place--seemed a dream of her childhood. She saw no future, and rebellion was impossible; there was nothing to rebel against--except the dulness and greyness of life. No people could have been kinder than the Hennesseys; unfortunately they had numerous friends, and the friends of the Hennesseys did not appeal to Phyl. A boy in her position would have adapted himself quickly enough, and been hail fellow well met with Mr. Mattram, the dentist of Westland Row, or the young Farrels, whose father owned one of the biggest wine merchants' businesses in the city; but the feminine instinct told Phyl that these were not the sort of people from whose class she had sprung, that their circle was not her circle and that she had stepped down in life in some mysterious way. This fact was brought sharply home to her by a young Farrel, a male of the Farrel brood, a hobbledehoy, good-looking enough but with a Dublin accent and a cheeky manner. This immature wine merchant at a party given by Mrs. Hennessey had made love to Phyl and had tried to kiss her behind the dining-room door. The recollection of the smack in the face she had given him soothed her that night as she lay tossing in her bed, and it was on this night and for the first time since she left Kilgobbin that the recollection of Pinckney came before her otherwise than as a shadow. He stood with the Hennessey circle as his background, a bright, good-looking figure and a gentleman to his finger-tips. Why had she cast aside her own people--even though they were distant relations? What stupidity had caused her to insult Pinckney by telling him she hated him? She found herself asking that question without being able to answer it. After all that fuss at Kilgobbin and Pinckney's departure, Mr. Hennessey had proved to her that Rafferty was a rogue who deserved no quarter; the man had been dismissed, the whole business was done with and over, and now, looking back in cool blood, she was utterly unable to reconstruct and put together the reasons for the outburst of anger that had severed her from the one kinsman who had put out his hand to help her. She could no longer conjure up the feeling that Pinckney was an interloper come to break up Kilgobbin and spoil the home she had known from childhood. Fate had done that. Kilgobbin was gone--let to strangers; Hennessey had taken over her guardianship _pro tem_, and it was entirely owing to herself that she was in her present position. She had no right to criticise the friends of the Hennesseys; she had deliberately walked into that circle from which she felt she never could escape now. Just as Pinckney had discovered that guardianship was showing him traits in his character hitherto unknown to him, Phyl was discovering her woman's instinct as regards social matters. She recognised that once having taken her place amongst the Hennessey set, her position for life was fixed, as far as Ireland was concerned. She was branded. The Berknowles were an old family, but she was the last of them. The relatives living in the south could be no help to her; they were poor, rabid Catholics and had fallen to little account, owing to unwise marriages and that irresponsible fatuous apathy in affairs which is the dry rot of Ireland and the Irish people. They were proud as Lucifer, but no one was proud of them. If only Philip Berknowles had been a man to make fast friends amongst his own class, some of those friends might have come to his daughter's rescue now. But Berknowles had lived his own life since the death of his wife, an easy-going country gentleman in a county mostly inhabited by squireens and cottage folk, caring little for the _convenances_ and with no taste for women's society. Thoughts born of all these facts, some of which were only half understood, filled the mind of the girl as she lay awake with the noise of that raucous party ringing in her ears; and when she fell asleep, it was only to awake with a sense of despondency weighing upon her and the odious Farrel incident waiting to follow her through the day. About a week later, coming down to breakfast one morning, she found a letter on her plate. A letter with American stamps on it and the address, Miss Phylice Berknowles, Merrion Square, Dublin, Ireland, written in a firm, bold hand. Mrs. Hennessey was not down and Mr. Hennessey had departed for the office, so Phyl had the breakfast table to herself--and the letter. She knew at once whom it was from, even before she read the postmark, "Charleston." Pinckney, the man who had been in her thoughts during the past six or seven days, the man who had left Ireland righteously disgusted with her, the man to whom she had said, "I hate you!" The scene flashed before her as she tore the envelope open, his sudden blaze of anger, the way he had torn the papers up, his departure. What was he going to say to her now? She flushed at the thought that this thing in her hand might prove to be his opinion of her in cold blood, a reproof, a remonstrance--she opened the folded sheet--ah! "Dear Phyl, "Aunt Maria was greatly disappointed when I returned here without you, she had quite made up her mind that you were coming back with me. We both lost our temper that day, but I was the worse, for I said a word I shouldn't have said, and for which I apologise. Aunt Maria says it was the Pinckney temper. However that may be, we shall be delighted to see you. Mrs. Van Dusen leaves on the 6th of next month. I am sending all particulars to Mr. Hennessey. You could meet Mrs. Van Dusen at Liverpool and go with her as far as New York. Let me have a cable to know if you are coming. Pinckney, Vernons, Charleston, U. S. A., is the cable address. "Your affectionate guardian--also cousin-- "R. Pinckney." Then underneath, in an angular, old-fashioned hand, one of those handwritings we associate with crossed letters, rosewood desks, valentines and wafers: "Be sure to come. I am very anxious to see you, and I only hope you will like me as much as I am sure to like you. "Maria Pinckney." Phyl caught her breath back when she read this and her eyes filled with tears. It was the woman's voice that touched her, coming after Pinckney's business-like and jerky sentences. Then she sat with the letter before her, looking at the new prospect it had opened for her. Was Pinckney still angry, despite his talk about the Pinckney temper; had he written not of his own free will but at the desire of Maria Pinckney? She read the thing over again without finding any solution to this question. But one fact was clear. Maria Pinckney was genuine in her invitation. "I'll go," said Phyl. She rose up from the table as though determined then and there to start off for America, left the room, went upstairs and knocked at Mrs. Hennessey's door. That lady was sitting up in bed with a stocking tied round her throat--she was suffering from a slight attack of tonsilitis--and the Irish _Times_ spread on her knees. "Mrs. Hennessey," said Phyl, "I have just had a letter from my cousins in America, and they want me to go out to them." "Want you to go to America!" said Mrs. Hennessey. "On a visit, I suppose?" "No, to stay there." "To stay in America; but what on earth do they want you to do that for? Who on earth would dream of leaving Dublin to live in America! It's extraordinary the ideas some people get hold of. Then, of course, they don't know, that's all that's to be said for them. It's like hearing people talking and talking of all the fine views abroad, and you'd think they'd never seen the Dargle or the Glen of the Downs; they don't know the beauty of their own country or haven't eyes to see it, and they must go raving of the Bay of Naples with Kiliney Bay a stone's throw away from them, and talking of Paris with Dublin outside their doors, and praising up foreign actors with never a word of the Irish Players. Dublin giving her best to them, and they with deaf ears to her music and blind eyes to her sons." "But, you see, Mrs. Hennessey, the Pinckneys are my relations." "Irish?" cried the good woman, absolutely unconscious of everything but the vision before her. "Those that can't see their own land aren't Irish. Mongrels is the name for them, without pride of heart or light of understanding." She was off. With a far, fixed gaze and her mind in a state of internal combustion, she seemed a thousand miles away from Phyl and her affairs, fighting the battles of Ireland. Phyl gathered the impression that, if she went to America Mrs. Hennessey would grieve less over the fact that she (Phyl) was leaving Merrion Square, than over the fact that she was leaving Dublin. She escaped, carrying this impression with her, went upstairs, dressed, and then started off for Mr. Hennessey's office. It was a cold, bright day and Dublin looked almost cheerful in the sunlight. The lawyer looked surprised when she was shown into his private room; then, when she had told him her business, he fumbled amongst the papers on his desk and produced a letter. "This is from Pinckney," said he. "It came by the same post as yours, only it was directed to the office. It's the same story, too. He wants you to go over." "I've been thinking over the whole business," said Phyl, "and I feel I ought to go." "Aren't you happy in Dublin?" asked he. "M'yes," answered the other. "But, you see--at least, I'm as happy as I suppose I'll be anywhere, only they are my people and I feel I ought to go to them. It's very lonely to have no people of one's own. You and Mrs. Hennessey have been very kind to me, and I shall always be grateful, but--" "But we aren't your own flesh and blood. You're right. Well, there it is. We'll be sorry to lose you, but, maybe, though you haven't much experience of the world, you've hit the nail on the head. We aren't your flesh and blood, and though the Pinckneys aren't much more to you, still, one drop of blood makes all the difference in the world. Then again, you're a cut above us; we're quite simple people, but the Berknowles were always in the Castle set and a long chalk above the Hennesseys. I was saying that to Norah only last night when I was reading the account of the big party at the Viceregal Lodge and the names of all the people that were there, and I said to her, 'Phyl ought to be going to parties like that by and by when she grows older, and we can't do much for her in that way,' and off she goes in a temper. 'Who's the Aberdeens?' says she. 'A lot of English without an Irish feather in their tails, and he opening the doors to visitors in his dressing gown--Castle,' she says, 'it's little Castle there'll be when we have a Parliament sitting in Dublin.'" "I don't want to go to parties at the Viceregal Lodge," said Phyl, flushing to think of what a snob she had been when only a few days back she had criticised the Hennesseys and their set in her own mind. These honest, straightforward good people were not snobs, whatever else they might be, and if her desire for America had been prompted solely by the desire to escape from the social conditions that environed her friends, she would now have smothered it and stamped on it. But the call from Charleston that had come across the water to her was an influence far more potent than that. That call from the country where her mother had been born and where her mother's people had always lived had more in it than the voices that carried the message. "Well," said Hennessey, "you mayn't want to go to parties now, but you will when you are a bit older. However, you can please yourself--Do you want to go to America?" "I do," said Phyl. "It's not that I want to leave you, but there is something that tells me I have got to go. When I read the letter first this morning, I was delighted to think that Mr. Pinckney was not still angry with me, and I liked the idea of the change, for Dublin is a bit dreary after Kilgobbin and--and well, I _will_ say it--I don't care for some of the people I have met in Dublin. But since then a new feeling has come over me. I think it came as I was walking down here to the office. It's a feeling as if something were pulling me ever so slightly, yet still pulling me from over there. My father said that there was more of mother in me than him. I remember he said that once--well, perhaps it's that. She came from over there." "Maybe it is," said Hennessey. CHAPTER IX The thing was settled definitely that night, Mrs. Hennessey resisting the idea at first, more, one might have fancied from her talk, because the idea was anti-national than from love of Phyl, though, as a matter of fact, she was fond enough of the girl. "It's what's left Ireland what it is," went on the good lady. "Cripples and lunatics, that's all that's left of us with your emigration; all the good blood of Ireland flowing away from her and not a drop, scarcely, coming back." "I'll come back," said Phyl, "you need not fear about that--some day." "Ay, some day," said Mrs. Hennessey, and stared into the fire. Then the spirit moving her, she began to discant on things past and people vanished. Synge, and Oscar Wilde and Willie Wilde, who was the real genius of the family, only his genius "stuck in him somehow and wouldn't come out." She passed from people who had vanished to places that had changed, and only stopped when the servant came in with the announcement that supper was ready. Then at supper, lo and behold! she discussed the going away of Phyl, as though it were a matter arranged and done with and carrying her full consent and approval. During the weeks following, Phyl's impending journey kept Mrs. Hennessey busy in a spasmodic way. One might have fancied from the preparations and lists of things necessary that the girl was off to the wilds of New Guinea or some region equally destitute of shops. Hennessey remonstrated, and then let her have her way--it kept her quiet, and Phyl, nothing loath, spent most of her time now in shops, Tod and Burns, and Cannock and White's, examining patterns and being fitted, varying these amusements by farewell visits. She was invited out by all the Hennesseys' friends, the Farrels and the Rourkes, and the Longs and the Newlands, and the Pryces and the Oldhams, all prepared tea-parties in her honour, made her welcome, and made much of her, just as we make much of people who have not long to live. She was the girl that was going to America. She did not appreciate the real kindness underlying this terrible round of festivities till she was standing on the deck of the _Hybernia_ at Kingstown saying good-bye to Hennessey. Then, as the boat drew away from the Carlisle pier, as it passed the guardship anchorage and the batteries at the ends of the east and west piers, all those people from whom she had longed to escape seemed to her the most desirable people on earth. Bound for a world unknown, peopled with utter strangers, Ireland, beloved Ireland, called after her as a mother calls to her child. Oh, the loneliness! the desolation! As she stood watching the Wicklow mountains fading in the grey distance, she knew for the first time the meaning of those words, "Gone West"; and she knew what the thousands suffered who, driven from their cabins on the hillside or the moor, went West in the old days when the emigrant ship showed her tall masts in Queenstown Harbour and her bellying canvas to the sunset of the Atlantic. At Liverpool, she found Mrs. Van Dusen, a tall, rather good-looking, rather hard-looking but exceedingly fashionable individual, at the hotel where it was arranged they should meet. Phyl, looking like a lost dog, confused by travel and dumb from dejection, had little in common with this lady, nor did a rough passage across the Atlantic extend their knowledge of one another, for Mrs. Van Dusen scarcely appeared from her state-room till the evening when, the great ship coming to her moorings, New York sketched itself and its blazing skyscrapers against the gloom before the astonished eyes of Phyl. PART II CHAPTER I Holyhead, Liverpool, New York, each of these stopping places had impressed upon Phyl the distance she was putting between herself and her home, making her feel that if this business was not death it was, at least, a very good imitation of dying. But the south-bound express from New York was to show her just what people may be expected to feel _after_ they are dead. America had been for Phyl little more than a geographical expression. "Uncle Tom's Cabin," "The Last of the Mohicans," "The Settlers in Canada" and "Round the World in Eighty Days," had given her pictures, and from these she had built up a vague land of snow and forests, log huts, plains, Red Indians, runaway negroes and men with bowie knives. New York had given this fantastic idea a rough joggle, the south-bound express tumbled it all to pieces. Forests and mountains and plains would have been familiar to her imagination, but the south-bound express was producing for her inspection quite different things from these. New Jersey with its populous towns, for instance, towns she never could have imagined or dreamed of, filled with people whose existence she could not picture. What gave her a cold grue was the suddenly grasped fact that all this great mechanism of life, cities, towns, roaring railways, agricultural lands, manufacturing districts filled with English speaking people--that all this was alien, knew nothing of Ireland or England, except as it might know of Japan or a dream of the past. The people in the train were talking English--were English to all intents and purposes, and yet, as far as England and Ireland were concerned, she knew them to be dead. It had been freezing in New York, a great rainstorm was blowing across the world as they crossed the Delaware; it passed, sweeping away east under the arch of a vast rainbow, even the rainbow seemed alien and different to Irish rainbows--it was too big. Then came Philadelphia, where some of the dead folk left the train and others got in. One had an Irish voice and accent. He was a big man with a hard, pushful face and a great under jaw. Phyl knew him at once for what he was, and that he had died to Ireland long years ago. Then came Wilmington and Baltimore, and then, long after sunset in the dark, a warmer air that entered the train like a viewless passenger, nerve soothing and mind lulling--the first breath of the South. Next morning, looking from the windows of the car, she saw the South. Vast spaces of low-lying land broken by river and bayou, flooded by the light of the new risen sun and touched by a vague mist from the sea, soft as a haze of summer, warm with light and everywhere hinting at the blue deep sky beyond. Youth, morning, and the spirit of the sea all lay in that luminous haze, that warm light filled with the laziness of June; and, for one delightful moment, it seemed to Phyl that summer days long forgotten, rapturous mornings half remembered were here again. The rumble of trestle and boom of bridge filled the train, and now the masts of ships showed thready against the hazy blue of the sky; frame houses sprang up by the track and fences with black children roosting on them; then the mean streets of the coloured quarter and now, as the cars slackened speed, came the bustle that marks the end of a journey. People were getting their light luggage together, and as Phyl was strapping the bundle that held her travelling rug and books, a waft of tepid, salt-scented air came through the compartment and on it the voice of the negro attendant rousing some drowsy passenger. "Charleston, sah." She got out, dazed and numbed by the journey, and stood with the rug bundle in her hand looking about her, half undecided what to do, half absorbed by the bustle and movement of the platform. Then, pushing towards her through the crowd, she saw Pinckney. He had come to meet her, and as they shook hands, Phyl laughed. He seemed so bright and cheerful, and the relief at finding a friend after that long, friendless journey was so great that she laughed right out with pleasure, like a little child--laughed right into his eyes. It seemed to Pinckney that he had never seen the real Phyl before. He took the bundle from her and gave it to a negro servant, and then, giving the luggage checks to the servant and leaving him to bring on the luggage, he led the girl through the crowd. "We'll walk to the house," said he, "if you are not too tired; it's only a few steps away--well--how do you like America?" "America?" she replied. "I don't know--it's different from what I thought it would be, ever so much different--and this place--why, it is like summer here." "It's the South," said Pinckney. "Look, this is Meeting Street." They had turned from the street leading from the station into a broad, beautiful highway, placid, sun flooded, and leading away to the Battery, that chief pride and glory of Charleston. On either side of the street, half hidden by their garden walls, large stately houses of the Georgian era showed themselves. Mansions that had slumbered in the sun for a hundred years, great, solid houses whose yellow-wash seemed the incrustation left by golden and peaceful afternoons, houses of old English solidity yet with the Southern touch of deep verandas and the hint of palm trees in their jealously walled gardens. "Oh, how beautiful!" said Phyl. She stopped, looked about her, and then gazed away down the street. It was as though the old stately street--and surely the Street of Other Days might be its name--had been waiting for her all her life, waiting for her to turn that corner leading from the commonplace station, waiting to greet her like the ghost of some friend of childhood. Surely she knew it! Like the recollection of a dream once dreamed, it lay before her with its walled gardens, its vaguely familiar houses, its sunlight and placidity. Pinckney, proud of his native town and pleased at this appreciation of it, stood by without speaking, watching the girl who seemed to have forgotten his existence for a moment. Her head was raised as if she were inhaling the sea wind lazily blowing from the Battery, and bearing with it stray scents from the gardens by the way. Then she came back to herself, and they walked on. "It's just as if I knew the place," said she, "and yet I never remember seeing anything like it before." "I've felt that way sometimes about places," said Pinckney. "It seemed to me that I knew Paris quite well when I went there, though I'd never been there before. Charleston is pretty English, anyway, and maybe it's that that makes it seem familiar. But I'm glad you like it. You like it, don't you?" "Like it!" said she. "I should think I did--It's more than liking--I love it." He laughed. "Better than Dublin?" It was her turn to laugh. "I never loved Dublin." She turned her head to glance at a peep of garden showing through a wrought iron gate. "Oh, Dublin!--don't talk to me about it here. I want to keep on feeling I'm here really and that there's nowhere else." "There isn't," said he, disclosing for the first time in his life, and quite unconsciously, his passion for the place where he had been born. "There's nowhere else but Charleston worth anything--I don't know what it is about, but it's so." They were passing a wall across whose top peeped an elbow of ivy geranium. It was as though the unseen garden beyond, tired of constraint and drowsily stretching, had disclosed this hint of a geranium coloured arm. Pinckney paused at a wrought iron gate and opened it. "This is Vernons," said he. CHAPTER II A grosbeak was singing in the magnolia tree by the gate and the warmth of the morning sun was filling the garden with a heart-snatching perfume of jessamine. Jessamine and the faint bitterness of sun warmed foliage. It was a garden sure to be haunted by birds; not large and, though well kept, not trim, and sing the birds as loud as they might, they never could break the charm of silence cast by Time on this magic spot. In the centre of the lawn stood a dial, inscribed with the old dial motto: The Hours Pass and are Numbered. Phyl paused for a moment just as she had paused in the street, and Pinckney looking at her noticed again that uptilt of the head, and that far away look as of a person who is trying to remember or straining to hear. Then a voice from the house came across the broad veranda leading from the garden to the lower rooms. A female voice that seemed laughing and scolding at the same time. "Dinah! Dinah! bless the girl, will she never learn sense-- Dinah! Ah, there you are. How often have I told you to put General Grant in the sun first thing in the morning?-- You've been dusting! I'll dust you. Here, get away." Out on the veranda, parrot cage in hand, came a most surprising lady. Antique yet youthful, dressed as ladies were wont to dress of a morning in long forgotten years, bright eyed, and wrathfully agitated. "Aunt," cried Pinckney. "Here we are." The sun was in Miss Pinckney's eyes; she put the cage down, shaded her eyes and stared full at Phyl. "God bless me!" said Miss Pinckney. "This is Phyl," said he, as they came up to the verandah steps. Miss Pinckney, seeming not to hear him in the least, took the girl by both hands, and holding her so as if for inspection stared at her. Then she turned on Pinckney with a snap. "Why didn't you tell me--she's--why, she's a Mascarene. Well, of all the astonishing things in the world-- Child--child, where did you get that face?" Before Phyl could answer this recondite question, she found herself enveloped in frills and a vague perfume of stephanotis. Maria Pinckney had taken her literally to her heart, and was kissing her as people kiss small children, kissing her and half crying at the same time, whilst Pinckney stood by wondering. He thought that he knew everything about Maria Pinckney, just as he had fancied he knew himself till Phyl had shewn him, over there in Ireland, that there were a lot of things in his mind and character still to be known by himself. This, as regards him, seemed the special mission of Phyl in the world. "It's the likeness," said Miss Pinckney. "I thought it was Juliet Mascarene there before me in the sun, Juliet dead those years and years." Then commanding herself, and with one of those reverses, sudden changes of manner and subject peculiar to herself: "Where's your luggage?" "Abraham is bringing it along." "Abraham! Do you mean you didn't drive, _walked_ here from the station?" "Yes," said Pinckney shamefacedly, almost, and wondering what sin against the _covenances_ he had committed now. "And she after that journey from N'York. Richard Pinckney, you are a--man--I was going to have called you a fool--but it's the same thing. Here, come on both of you--the child must be starving. This is the breakfast room, Phyl--Phyl! I will never get used to that name; no matter, I'm getting an old woman, and mustn't grumble--mustn't grumble--umph!" She took Pinckney's walking-stick from him and, with the end of it, picked up a duster that the mysterious Dinah, evidently, had left lying on the floor. She put the duster out on the veranda, rang a bell and ordered the coloured boy who answered it to send in breakfast. Phyl, commanded by Miss Pinckney, sat down to table just as she was without removing her hat. The old lady had come to the conclusion that the newcomer must be faint with hunger after her journey, and when Miss Pinckney came to one of her conclusions, there was nothing more to be said on the matter. It was a pleasant room, chintzy and sunny; they sat down to a gate-legged table that would just manage to seat four comfortably whilst the urn was brought in, a copper urn in which the water was kept at boiling point by a red hot iron contained in a cylinder. Phyl knew that urn. They had one like it at Kilgobbin and she said so, but Miss Pinckney did not seem to hear her. There were times when this lady was almost rude--or seemed so owing to inattention, her bustling mind often outrunning the conversation or harking back to the past when it ought to have been in the present. Tea making, and the making of tea was a solemn rite at Vernons, absorbed her whole attention, but Pinckney noticed this morning that the hand, that old, perfect, delicately shaped hand, trembled ever so slightly as it measured the tea from the tortoise-shell covered tea caddy, and that the thin lips, lips whose thinness seemed only the result of the kisses of Time, were moving as though debating some question unheard. He recognised that the coming of Phyl had produced a great effect on Maria Pinckney. No one knew her better than he, for no one loved her so well. It was she who ordered him about, still, just as though he were a small boy, and sometimes as he sat watching her, so fragile, so indomitable, like the breath of winter would come the thought that a day would come--a day might come soon when he would be no longer ordered about, told to put his hat in the hall--which is the proper place for hats--told not to dare to bring cigars into the drawing-room. To Phyl, Maria Pinckney formed part of the spell that was surrounding her; Meeting Street had begun the weaving of this spell, Vernons was completing it with the aid of Maria Pinckney. The song of the Cardinal Grosbeak in the garden, the stirring of the window curtains in the warm morning air, the feel of morning and sunlight, the scent of the tea that was filling the room, the room itself old-fashioned yet cheerful, chintzy and sunny, all the things had the faint familiarity of the street. It was as though the blood of her mother's people coursing in her veins had retained and brought to her some thrill and warmth from all these things; these things they knew and loved so well. "There's the carriage," said Miss Pinckney, whose ears had picked out the sound of it drawing up at the front door. "They know where to take the luggage. Richard, go and see that they don't knock the bannisters about. Abraham is all thumbs and has no more sense in moving things than Dinah has'n dusting them. Only last week when Mrs. Beamis was going away, he let that trunk of hers slip and I declare to goodness I thought it was a church falling down the stairs and tearing the place to pieces." There was little of the stately languor of the South in Miss Pinckney's speech. She was Northern on the mother's side. But in her prejudices she was purely Southern, or, at least, Charlestonian. Pinckney laughed. "I don't think Phyl's luggage will hurt much even if it falls," said he. "English luggage is generally soft." "It's only a trunk and a portmanteau," said Phyl, as he left the room, but Miss Pinckney did not seem to hear; pouring herself out another cup of tea (she was the best and the worst hostess in the whole world) and seeming not to notice that Phyl's cup was empty, she was off on one of her mind wandering expeditions, a state of soul that sometimes carried her into the past, sometimes into the future, that led her anywhere and to the wrapt, inward contemplation of all sorts of things and subjects from the doings of the Heavenly Host to the misdoings of Dinah. She talked on these expeditions. "Well, I'm sure and I'm sure I don't know what folk want with the luggage they carry about with them nowadays-- The old folk didn't. Not Saratoga trunks, anyhow. I remember 'swell as if it was yesterday way back in 1880, when Richard's father and mother were married, old Simon Mascarene--he belonged to your mother's lot, the Mascarenes of Virginia-- He came to the wedding, and all he brought was a carpet-bag. I can see the roses on it still. He wore a beaver hat. They'd been out of fashion for years and years. So was he. Twenty dollars apiece they cost him, and his clothes were the same. Looked like a picture out of Dickens. Your grandmother was there, too, came from Richmond for the wedding, drove here in her own carriage. She and Simon were the last of the Virginia Mascarenes and they looked it. Seems to me some people never can be new nor get away from their ancestors. If you'd dressed Simon in kilts it wouldn't have made any difference, much, he'd still have been Simon Mascarene of Virginia, just as stiff and fine and proud and old-fashioned." "It seems funny that my people should have been the Virginia Mascarenes," said Phyl, "because--because--well, I feel as if my people had always lived here--this feels like home--I don't know what it is, but just as I came into the street outside there I seemed to know it, and this house--" "Why, God bless my soul," said Miss Pinckney, whose eyes had just fallen on the girl's empty cup, "here have I been talking and talking, and you waiting for some more tea. Why didn't you ask, child?--What were you saying? The Virginia Mascarenes-- Oh, they often came here, and your mother knew this house as well as Planters. That was the name of their house in Richmond. But what I can't get over is your likeness to Juliet. She might have been your sister to look at you both--and she dead all these years." "Who was Juliet?" "She was the girl who died," said Miss Pinckney. "You know, although Richard calls me Aunt, I am not really his aunt; it's just an easy name for an old woman who is an interloper, a Pinckney adrift. It was this way I came in. Long before the Civil War, the Pinckneys lived at a house called Bures in Legare Street. A fine old house it was, and is still. Well, I was a cousin with a little money of my own, and I was left lonely and they took me in. James Pinckney was head of the family then, and he had two sons, Rupert and Charles. I might have been their sister the way we all lived together and loved each other--and quarrelled. Dear me, dear me, what is Time at all that it leaves everything the same? The same sun, and flowers and houses, and all the people gone or changed-- Well, I am trying to tell you-- Rupert fell in love with Juliet Mascarene, who lived here. He was killed suddenly in '61-- I don't want to talk of it--and she died of grief the year after. She died of grief--simply died of grief. Charles lived and married in 1880 when he was forty years old. He married Juliet's brother's daughter and Vernons came to him on the marriage. He hadn't a son till ten years later. That son was Richard. Charles left Richard all his property and Vernons on the condition that I always lived here--till I died, and that's how it is. I'm not Richard's aunt, it's only a name he gives me--I'm only just an old piece of furniture left with the house to him. I'm so fond of the place, it would kill me to leave it; places grow like that round one, though I'm sure I don't know why." "I don't wonder at you loving Vernons," said Phyl. "I was just the same about our place in Ireland, Kilgobbin--I thought it would kill me to leave it." "Tell me about it," said Miss Pinckney. Phyl told, or tried to tell. Looking back, she found between herself and Ireland the sunlight of Charleston, the garden with the magnolia trees where the red bird was singing and the jessamine casting its perfume. Ireland looked very far away and gloomy, desolate as Kilgobbin without its master and with the mist of winter among the trees. All that was part of the Past gone forever, and so great was the magic of this new place that she found herself recognising with a little chill that this Past had separated itself from her, that her feeling towards it was faintly tinged by something not unlike indifference. "Well," said Miss Pinckney, when she had finished, "it must be a beautiful old place, though I can't seem to see it-- You see, I've never been in Ireland and I can't picture it any more than the new Jerusalem. Now Dinah knows all about the new Jerusalem, from the golden slippers right up she sees it--I can't. Haven't got the gift of seeing things, and it seems strange that the A'mighty should shower it on a coloured girl and leave a white woman wanting; but it appears to be the A'mighty knows his own business, so I don't grumble. Now I'm going to show you the house and your room. I've given you a room looking right on the garden, this side. You've noticed how all our houses here are built with their sides facing the street and their fronts facing the garden, or maybe you haven't noticed it yet, but you will. 'Pears to me our ancestors had some sense in their heads, even though they didn't invent telegraphs to send bad news in a hurry and railway cars to smash people to bits, and telephones to let strangers talk right into one's house just by ringing a bell. Not that I'd let one into Vernons. You may hunt high or low, garret or basement, you won't find one of those boxes of impudence in Vernons--not while I have servants to go my messages." Miss Pinckney was right. For years she had fought the telephone and kept it out, making Richard Pinckney's life a tissue of small inconveniences, and suffering this epitaph on her sanity to be written by all sorts of inferior people, "Plumb crazy." She led the way from the breakfast-room and passed into the hall. The spirit of Vernons inhabited the hall. One might have fancied it as a stout and prosperous gentleman attired in a blue coat with brass buttons, shorts, and wearing a bunch of seals at his fob. Oak, brought from England, formed the panelling, and a great old grandfather's clock, with the maker's name and address, "Whewel. Coggershall," blazoned on its brass face, told the time, just as it had told the time when the Regent was ruling at St. James's in those days which seem so spacious, yet so trivial in their pomp and vanity. Sitting alone here of an afternoon with the sun pointing fingers through the high leaded windows, Whewel of Coggershall took you under his spell, the spell of old ghosts of long forgotten afternoons, spacious afternoons filled with the cawing of rooks and the drone of bees. English afternoons of the good old time when the dust of the post chaise was the only mark of hurry across miles of meadow land and cowslip weather. And then as you sat held by the sound of the slow-slipping seconds, maybe, from some door leading to the servants' quarters suddenly left open a voice would come, the voice of some darky singing whilst at work. A snatch of the South mixing with your dream of England and the past, and making of the whole a charm beyond words. That is Charleston. Set against the panelling and almost covering it in parts were prints, wood-cuts, engravings, portraits in black and white. Here was a silhouette of Colonel Vernon, the founder of the house, and another of his wife. Here was an early portrait of Jeff Davis, hollow-cheeked and goatee-bearded, and here was Mayflower, the property of Colonel Seth Mascarene, the fastest trotting horse in Virginia, worshipped by her owner whose portrait hung alongside. Phyl glanced at these pictures as she followed Miss Pinckney, who opened doors shewing the dining-room, a room rather heavily furnished, hung with portraits of long-faced gentlemen and ladies of old time, and then the drawing-room. A real drawing-room of the Sixties, a thing preserved in its entirety, in all its original stiffness, interesting as a valentine, perfumed like an old rosewood cabinet. Keepsakes and Books of Beauty lay on the centre table, a gilt clock beneath a glass shade marked the moment when it had ceased to keep time over twenty-five years ago, the antimacassars on the armchairs were not a line out of position; not a speck of dust lay anywhere, and the Dresden shepherds and shepherdesses simpered and made love in the same old fashion, preserving unaltered the sentiment of spring, the suggestion of Love, lambs, and the song of birds. "It's just as it used to be," said Miss Pinckney. "Nothing at all has been changed, and I dust it myself. I would just as soon let a servant loose here with a duster as I'd let one of the buzzards from the market-place loose in the larder. Those water-colours were done by Mary Mascarene, Juliet's sister, who died when she was fifteen; they mayn't be masterpieces but they're Mary's, and worth more'n if they were covered with gold. Mrs. Beamis sniffed when she came in here--she's the woman whose trunk got loose on the stairs I told you about--sniffed as if the place smelt musty. She's got a husband who's made a million dollars out of dry goods in Chicago, and she thought the room wanted re-furnishing. Didn't say it, but I knew. A player-piano is what she wanted. Didn't say it, but _I_ knew. Umph!" Miss Pinckney, having shown Phyl out, looked round the room as if to make sure that all the familiar ghosts were in their places, then she shut the door with a snap, and turning, led the way upstairs murmuring to herself, and with the exalted and far away look which she wore when put out. Phyl's room lay on the first landing, a bright and cheerful room papered with a rather cheap flower and sprig patterned paper, spring-like for all its cheapness, and just the background for children's heads when they wake up on a bright morning. A bowl of flowers stood on the dressing-table, and the open window shewed across the verandah a bit of the garden, where the cherokee roses were blooming. "This is your room," said Miss Pinckney. "It's one of the brightest in the house, and I hope you'll like it-- Listen!" Through the open window came the chime of church-bells. "It's the chimes of St. Michael's. You'll never want a clock here, the bells ring every quarter, just as they've rung for the last hundred years; they're the first thing I remember, and maybe they'll be the last. Well, come on and I'll show you some more of the house, if you're not tired and don't want to rest." She led the way from the room and along the corridor, opening doors and shewing rooms, and then up a back stairs to the top floor beneath the attics. The house seemed to grow in age as they ascended. Not a door in Vernons was exactly true in line; the old house settling itself down quietly through the years and assisted perhaps by the great earthquake, though that had left it practically unharmed, shewed that deviation from the right line in cornice and wainscoting and door space, which is the hall mark left on architecture by genius or age. The builders of the Parthenon knew this, the builders of Vernons did not-- Age supplied their defects. Up here the flooring of the passages and rooms frankly sagged in places, and the beams bellied downwards ever so little and the ceilings bowed. "I've seen all these bed-rooms filled in the old days," said Miss Pinckney. "We had wounded soldiers here in the war. What Vernons hasn't seen of American history isn't worth telling--much. Here's the nursery." She opened a door with bottle-glass panels, real old bottle-glass worth its weight in minted silver, and shewed Phyl into a room. "This is the nursery," said she. It was a large room with two windows, and the windows were barred to keep small people from tumbling into the garden. The place had the air of silence and secrecy that haunts rooms long closed and deserted. An old-fashioned paper shewing birds of Paradise covered the walls. A paper so old that Miss Pinckney remembered it when, as a child, she had come here to tea with the Mascarene children, so good that the dye of the gorgeous Paradise birds had scarcely faded. A beam of morning sun struck across the room, a great solid, golden bar of light. Phyl, as she stood for a moment on the threshold, saw motes dancing in the bar of light; the air was close and almost stuffy owing to the windows being shut. A rocking-horse, much, much the worse for wear stood in one corner, he was piebald and the beam of light just failed to touch his brush-like tail. A Noah's Ark of the good old pattern stood on the lid of a great chest under one of the windows, and in the centre of the room a heavy table of plain oak nicked by knives and stained with ink told its tale. There were books in a little hanging book-case, books of the 'forties' and 'fifties': "Peter Parley," "The Child's Pilgrim's Progress," "The Dairy-Maid's Daughter," an odd volume of _Harper's_ _Magazine_ containing an instalment of "Little Dorrit," Caroline Chesebro's "Children of Light," and Samuel Irenæus Prime's "Elizabeth Thornton or the Flower and Fruit of Female Piety, and other Sketches." Miss Pinckney opened one of the windows to let in air; Phyl, who had said nothing, stood looking about her at the forsaken toys, the chairs, and the little three-legged stool most evidently once the property of some child. All nurseries have a generic likeness. It seemed to her that she knew this room, from the beam of light with the motes dancing in it to the bird-patterned paper. Kilgobbin nursery was papered with a paper giving an endless repetition of one subject--a man driving a pig to market--with that exception, the two rooms were not unlike. Yet those birds were the haunting charm of this place, the things that most appealed to her, things that seemed the ghosts of old friends. She came to the window and looked out through the bars. Across the garden of Vernons one caught a glimpse of other gardens, palmetto-tree tops, and away, beyond the battery, a hint of the blue harbour. Just the picture to fill an imaginative child's mind with all sorts of pleasant fancies about the world, and Phyl, forgetting for a moment Miss Pinckney, herself, and the room in which she was, stood looking out, caught in a momentary day dream, just like a child in one of those reveries that are part of the fairy tale of childhood. That touch of blue sea beyond the red roofs and green palmetto fronds gave her mind wings for a moment and a world to fly through. Not the world we live in, but the world worth living in. Old sailor-stories, old scraps of thought and dreams from nowhere pursued her, haunted her during that delightful and tantalising moment, and then she was herself again and Miss Pinckney was saying: "It's a pretty view and hasn't changed since I was a child. Now, in N'York they'd have put up skyscrapers; Lord bless you, they'd have put them up at a _loss_ so's to seem energetic and spoil the view. That's a N'Yorker in two words, happy so long as he's energetic and spoiling views--" Then gazing dreamily towards the touch of blue sea. "Well, I guess the Lord made N'Yorkers same as he made you and me. His ways are _in_scrutable and past finding out; so'r the ways of some of his creatures." She turned from the window, and her eye fell on the great chest by the other window. Going to it, she opened the lid. It was full of old toys, mostly broken. She seemed to have forgotten the presence of Phyl. Holding the chest's lid open, she gazed at the coloured and futile contents. Then she closed the lid of the chest with a sigh. CHAPTER III The South dines at four o'clock--at least Charleston does. It was the old English custom and the old Irish custom, too. In the reign of William the Conqueror people dined at eleven A.M. or was it ten? Then, as civilisation advanced, the dinner hour stole forward. In the time of the Georges it reached four o'clock. In Ireland, the most conservative country on earth, some people even still sit down to table at four--in Charleston every one does. One would not change the custom for worlds, just as one would not change the old box pews of St. Michael's or replace the cannon on the Battery with modern ordinance. Richard Pinckney did not dine at home that day. He was dining with the Rhetts in Calhoun Street, so Miss Pinckney said as they sat down to table. She sniffed as she said it, for the Rhetts, though one of the best families in the town, were people not of her way of thinking. The two Rhett girls had each a motor-car of her own and drove it--abomination! The automobile ranked in her mind with the telephone as an invention of the devil. Phyl had not seen Richard Pinckney since the morning and now he was dining out. Her heart had warmed to him at the station on the way to Vernons, and at breakfast he had appeared to her as a quite different person to the Richard Pinckney who had come to Kilgobbin, more boyish and frank, less of a man of the world. She had not seen him since he left the room at breakfast-time to look after her luggage. Miss Pinckney said he had gone off "somewhere or another" and grumbled at him for going off leaving his breakfast not quite finished, she said that he was always "scatter braining about" either at the yacht club or somewhere else. Phyl, as she sat now at the dining-table with the dead and gone Mascarene men and women looking at her from the canvases on the wall, felt ever so slightly hurt. Youth calls to youth irrespective of sex. She felt as a young person feels when another young person shows indifference. Then came the thought: was he avoiding her? Was he angry still about the affair at Kilgobbin, or was it just that he did not want to be bothered talking to her, looked on her as a nuisance in the house, a guest of no interest to him and yet to whom he had to be polite? She could not tell. Neither could she tell why the problem exercised her mind in the way it did. Even at Kilgobbin, despite the fact of her antagonism towards him, Pinckney had possessed the power of disturbing her mind and making her think about him in a way that no one else had ever succeeded in doing. No one else had made her feel the short-comings in the household _ménage_ at Kilgobbin, no one else had made her so fiercely critical of herself and her belongings. She did not recognise the fact, but the fact was there, that it was a necessity of her being to stand well in this man's eyes. When a woman falls in love with a man or a man with a woman, the first necessity of his or her being is to stand well in the eyes of the loved one, anything that may bring ridicule or adverse criticism or disdain is death. Phyl was not in love with Richard Pinckney, nor had she been in love with him at Kilgobbin, all the same the sensitiveness to appearances felt by a lover was there. Her anger that night when he had let her in at eleven o'clock was due, perhaps, less to his implied reproof then the fact that she had felt cheap in his eyes, and now, sitting at dinner with Miss Pinckney the idea that he was still angry with her was obscured by the far more distasteful idea that she was of absolutely no account in his eyes, a creature to whom he had to be civil, an interloper. Her cheeks flushed and her eyes brightened at the thought, but Miss Pinckney did not notice it. She had turned from the subject of the Rhetts and their automobiles to Charleston society in general. "Now that you've come," said she, "you will find there's not a moment you won't enjoy yourself if you're fond of gadding about. All the society here is in the hands of young people, balls and parties! The St. Cecilias give three balls a year. I go always, not to dance but to look on. Richard is a St. Cecilia--St. Cecilias? Why, it's just a club a hundred-and-forty years old. There are two hundred of them, all men, and they know how to entertain. I have been at every ball for the last half century. Not one have I missed. Then there's the yacht club and picnics to Summerville and the Isle of Palms, and bathing parties and boating by moonlight. If you are a gad-about you will enjoy all that." "But I'm not," said Phyl. "I've never been used to society, much. I like books better than people, unless they're--" "Unless they're what?" "Well--people I really like." "Well," said Miss Pinckney, "one wouldn't expect you to like people you _didn't_ like--there's no 'really' in liking, it's one thing or the other--you don't care for girls, maybe?" "I haven't seen much of them," replied Phyl, "except at school, and that was only for a short time. I--I ran away." "Ran away! And why did you run away?" "I was miserable; they were kind enough to me, but I wanted to get home--Father was alive then--I felt I had to get home or die--I can't explain it--It felt like a sort of madness. I had to get back home." Miss Pinckney was watching the girl, she scarcely seemed listening to her--Then she spoke: "Impulsive. If I wasn't sitting here in broad daylight, I'd fancy it was Juliet Mascarene. What makes you so like her? It's not the face so much, though the family likeness runs strong, still, the face is different, though like--It's just you yourself--well, I'm sure I don't know, seems to me there's a lot of things hid from us. Look at the Pringles, Anthony's family, the ones that live in Tradd Street. If you put their noses together, they'd reach to Legare Street. It runs in the family. Julian Pringle, he died in '70, he was just the same. Now why should a long nose run through a family like that, or a bad temper, or the colour of hair? I don't know. The world's a puzzle and the older one grows, the more it puzzles one." After dinner, Miss Pinckney ordered Phyl to put on her hat and they started out for a drive. Every day at five o'clock, weather permitting, Miss Pinckney took an airing. She was one of the sights of Charleston, she, and the dark chestnut horses driven by Abraham the coloured coachman, and the barouche in which she drove; a carriage of other times, one of those deathless conveyances turned out in Long Acre in the days when varnish was varnish and hand labour had not been ousted by machinery. It was painted in a basket-work pattern, the pattern peculiar to the English Royal carriages, and the whole turn-out had an excellence and a style of its own--a thing unpurchasable as yesterday. They drove in the direction of the Battery and here they drew up to look at the view. On one side of them stood the great curving row of mansions facing the sea, old Georgian houses and houses more modern, yet without offence, set in gardens where the palmetto leaves shivered in the sea wind and the pink mimosa mixed its perfume with the salt-scented air. On the other side lay the sea. Afternoon, late afternoon, is the time of all times to visit this spacious and sunlit place. It is then that the old ghosts return, if ever they return, to discuss the news brought by the last packet from England, the doings of Mr. Pitt, the Paris fashions. Looking seaward they would see no change in the changeless sea and little change in the city if they turned their eyes that way. Miss Pinckney got out and they walked a bit, inspecting the guns, each with its brass plate and its story. Far away in the haze stood Fort Sumter,--a fragment of history, a sea warrior of the past, voiceless and guarding forever the viewless. It may have been some recollection of the Brighton front and of the great harbour of Kingstown with the sun upon it, and all this seemed vaguely familiar to Phyl, pleasantly familiar and homely. She breathed the sea air deeply and then, as she turned, glancing towards the land, a recollection came to her of the story she had been reading that evening in the library at Kilgobbin--"The Gold Bug." It was near here that Legrand had found the treasure. He had come to Charleston to buy the mattocks and picks--no, it was Jupp the negro who had come to buy them. She turned to Miss Pinckney. "Did you ever read a story called 'The Gold Bug' by Edgar Allan Poe?" she asked. "It is about a place near here--Sullivan's Island--that's it--I remember now." "Why, I knew him," said Miss Pinckney. "Knew Edgar Allan Poe!" said Phyl. "I knew him when I was a child and I have sat on his knee and I can see his face--what a face it was! and the coat he wore--it had a velvet collar--his teeth were beautiful, and his hair--beautiful glossy hair it was, but he was not handsome as people use that expression, he was extraordinary, such eyes--and the most wonderful voice in the world. I'm seventy-five years of age and he died in October '49, and I met him three years before he died, so you see I was a pretty small child. It was at Fordham. He'd just taken a cottage there for his wife, who was ailing with consumption, and my aunt, Mary Pinckney, who was a friend of the Osgoods, took me there. It must have been summer for I remember a bird hanging in a cage in the sunshine, a bob-o'-link it was, he had caught it in the woods. "Dear Lord! I wonder where that summer day's gone to, and the bob-o'-link--'pears to me we aren't even memories, for memories live and we don't." They were walking along, Abraham slowly following with the carriage, and Miss Pinckney was walking in an exultant manner as though she saw nothing about her, as though she were treading air. Phyl had unconsciously set free a train of thought in the mind of Miss Pinckney, a train that always led to an explosion, and this is exactly how it happened and what she said. "But his memory will live. Look right round you, do you see his statue?" "No," said Phyl, sweeping the view. "Where is it?" "Just so, where is it? It's not here, it's not in N'York, it's not in Baltimore, it's not in Philadelphia, it's not in Boston. The one real splendid writing man that America has produced she's ashamed to put up a statue to. Why? Because he drank! Why, God bless my soul, Grant drank. No, it wasn't drink, it was Griswold. The man who hated him, the man who crucified his reputation and sold the remains for thirty pieces of silver to a publisher, Griswold, Rufus Griswold--Judas Griswold that was his real name, and he hid it--" Miss Pinckney had lowered her parasol in her anger, she shut it with a snap and then shot it up again; as she did so an automobile driven by a girl and which was approaching them, passed, and a young man seated by the girl raised his hat. It was Richard Pinckney. The girl was a very pretty brunette. This thing was too much for Miss Pinckney in her present temper; all her anger against Griswold seemed suddenly diverted to the automobile. She snorted. "There goes Richard with Venetia Frances Rhett," said she. "Ought to be ashamed of herself driving along the Battery in that outrageous thing; goodness knows, they're bad enough driven by men, scaring people to death and killing dogs and chickens, without girls taking to them--" She stared after the car, then signalling to Abraham, she got into the barouche, Phyl followed her and they continued their drive. That evening after supper Miss Pinckney's mind warmed to thoughts of the good old days when motor-cars were undreamed of, and stirred up by the recollection of Edgar Allan Poe, discharged itself of reminiscences worth much gold could they have been taken down by a stenographer. She was sitting with Phyl in the piazza, for the night was warm, and whilst a big southern moon lit the garden, she let her mind stray over the men and women who had made American literature in the '50's and '60's, many of whom she had known when young. Estelle Anna Lewis of Baltimore, Nathaniel Hawthorne, William Cullen Bryant, Elizabeth Oakes Smith, Cornelius Mathews, Frances Sargent Osgood, N. P. Willis, Laughton Osborn. She had known Lowell and Longfellow, yet her mind seemed to cling mostly to the lesser people, writers in the _Southern Literary Messenger_, the _Home Journal_, the _Mirror_ and the _Broadway Journal_. People well-known in their day and now scarcely remembered, yet whose very names are capable of evoking the colour and romance of that fascinating epoch beyond and around the Civil War. "They're all dead and gone," said she, "and folk nowadays don't seem to trouble about the best of them, or remember their lines, yet there's nothing they write now that's as good--I remember poor Thomas Ward. 'Flaccus' was the name he wrote under, a thin skeleton of a man always with his head in the air and his mind somewhere else, used to write in the _Knickerbocker Journal_; I heard him recite one of his things. "'And, straining, fastened on her lips a kiss, That seemed to suck the life blood from her heart.' "That stuck in my head, mostly, I expect, because Thomas Ward didn't look as if he'd ever kissed a girl, but they are good lines and a lot better than they write nowadays." The wind had risen a bit and was stirring in the leaves of the magnolias, white carnations growing near the sun dial shook their ruffles in the moonlight, and from near and far away came the sounds of Charleston, voices, the sound of traffic and then, a thread of tune tying moonbeams, magnolias, carnations and cherokee roses in a great southern bunch, came the notes of a banjo, plunk, plunk, and a voice from somewhere away in the back premises, the voice of a negro singing one of the old Plantation songs. Just a snatch before some closing door cut the singer off, but enough to make Phyl raise her head and listen, listen as though a whole world vaguely guessed, a world forgotten yet still warm and loving, youthful and sunlit, were striving to reach her and speak to her--As though Charleston the mysterious city that had greeted her first in Meeting Street were trying to tell her of things delightful, once loved, once known and forever vanished. As she lay awake that night with the moonlight showing through the blinds, the whole of that strange day came before her in pictures: the face of Frances Rhett troubled her, yet she did not know in the least why; it seemed part of the horribleness of automobiles and the anger of Miss Pinckney and the tribulations of Edgar Allan Poe. Then the fantastic band of forgotten _literati_ trooped before her, led by "Flaccus," the man who didn't look as if he had ever kissed a girl, yet who wrote: "And, straining, fastened on her lips a kiss, That seemed to suck the life blood from her heart." CHAPTER IV Phyl awoke to the early morning sunlight and the sounds of Charleston. The chimes of St. Michael's were striking six and through the summery sunlit air carried by the sea wind stirring the curtains came the cries of the streets and the rumbling of early morning carts. Oh, those negro cries! the cry of the crab-seller, the orange vendor, the man who sells "monkey meat" dolorous, long drawn out, lazy, you do not know the South till you have heard them. The sound of a mat being shaken and beaten on the piazza, adjoining that on which her window opened came now, and two voices in dispute. "Mistress Pinckney she told me to tell you--she mos' sholey did." "Go wash yo' face, yo' coloured trash, cummin' here wid yo' orders--skip out o' my piazza--'clar' to goodness I dunno what's cummin' to niggers dese days." Then Miss Pinckney's voice as from an upper window: "Dinah! Seth! what's that I hear? Get on with your work the pair of you and stop your chattering. You hear me?" When Phyl came down Richard Pinckney was in the garden smoking a cigarette and gathering some carnations. "They're for aunt," said he, "to propitiate her for my being late last night. I wasn't in till one. I'm worse even than you, you see, and the next time you are out till eleven and I let you in and grumble at you, you can hit back. Have a flower." He gave her the finest in his bunch and Phyl put it in her belt. If she had any doubt as to the sincerity of his welcome his manner this morning ought to have set her mind at rest. She stood looking at him as he tied the stalks of the flowers together and he was worth looking at, a fresh, bright figure, the very incarnation of youth and health and one might almost say innocence. Clear eyed, well-groomed, good to look upon. "I generally pick a flower and put it on her plate," said he, "but this morning she shall have a whole bunch--hope you slept all right?" "Rather," said Phyl, "I never sleep much the first night in a new place--but somehow--oh, I don't know how to express it--but nothing here seems new." "Nothing is," said he laughing, "it's all as old as the hills--you like it, don't you?" "It's not a question of liking--of course I like it, who could help liking it--it's more than that. It's a feeling I have that I will either love it or hate it, and I don't know which yet, all sorts of things come back to me here, you see, my mother knew the place--do people remember what their mothers and fathers knew, I wonder? But, if you understood me, it's not so much remembering as feeling. All yesterday it seemed to me that I had only to turn some corner and come upon something waiting for me, something I knew quite well, and the smells and sounds and things are always reminding me of something--you know how it is when you have forgotten a name and when it's lying just at the back of your mind--that's how I feel here, about nearly everything--strange, isn't it?" "Oh, I don't know," said the practical Pinckney. "This place is awfully English for one thing, sure to remind you of a lot of things in Ireland and England, and then there's of course the fact that you are partly American, but I don't see why you should ever hate it." "_Indeed_, I didn't mean that," said she flushing up at the thought that in trying to express herself she had made such a blunder. "I meant--I meant, that this something about the place that is always reminding me of itself might make me hate _it_." "Or love it?" "Yes, but I can't explain--the place itself no one could hate, you must have thought me rude." "Not a bit--not the least little bit in the world. Well, I believe you'll come to love it, not hate it." "It," said Phyl. "I don't know that, because I don't know what it is--this something that is always peeping round corners at me yet hiding itself." "_Richard_!" came Miss Pinckney's voice from the piazza where she had just appeared, "smoking cigarettes before breakfast, how often have I told you I won't have you smoking before breakfast--why, God bless my soul, what are you doing with all those carnations?" He flung the cigarette-end away, but she refused to kiss him on account of the tobacco fumes, though she took the flowers. Cigarettes, like telephones, automobiles, and the memory of Edgar Allan Poe, formed a subject upon which once started Miss Pinckney was hard to check, and whilst she poured out the tea, she pursued it. "Dr. Cotton it was who told me, the one who used to live in Tradd Street, he was a relative of Dr. Garden the man that gave his name to that flower they call the gardenia--had it sent him from somewhere in the South, but I'm sure I don't know where--New Orleans, I think, but it doesn't matter. I was saying about Dr. Cotton, _old_ Dr. Cotton of Tradd Street, he told me that the truth about young William Pringle's death was that he was black when he died, from cigarette smoking, black as a crow. Used to smoke before breakfast, used to smoke all day, used to smoke in his sleep, I b'lieve. Couldn't get rid of the pesky habit and died clinging to it, black as a crow. I can't abide the things. Your father used to smoke Bull Durham in a corn cob, or a cigar, he'd a' soon have smoked one of those cigarettes of yours as soon as he'd have been caught doing tatting. Don't tell me, there's no manhood in them, it's just vice in thimble-fulls. I'd much sooner see a man lying healthily under the table once in a way than always half fuddled, and I'd sooner be poisoned out by a green cigar now and then, than always having that nasty sickly cigarette smell round the place." "But good gracious, Aunt, I'm not a cigarette smoker, only once and away and at odd times." "I wasn't talking about you so much as the young men of to-day, and the young women, they're the worst, for they encourage the others to make fools of themselves, and if they're not smoking themselves they're sucking candy. Candy sucking and cigarette smoking is the ruin of the States. Those Rhett girls _live_ on candy, and they look it--pasty faces." "Why!" said he, "what grudge have you got against the Rhetts now, Aunt--it's as bad to take a girl's complexion away as a man's character--what have the Rhetts been doing to you?" Miss Pinckney did not seem to hear the question for a moment, then she said, speaking as if to some invisible person: "That Frances Rhett may be reckoned the belle of Charleston, that's what I heard old Mr. Outhwaite call her, but she's a belle I wouldn't care to have tied round my neck. Belle! She's no more a belle than I am, there are hundreds of prettier girls between here and the Battery, but she's one of those sort that have the knack of setting young men against each other and making them fight for her; she's labelled herself as a prize, which she isn't. I declare to goodness the world frightens me at times, the way I see fools going about labelled as clever men, and women your grandfathers wouldn't have cast an eye at going about labelled as beauties. I do believe if I was to give myself out as a beauty to-morrow I'd have half the young idiots in Charleston after me, believing me." "They're after you already," said Pinckney, "only yesterday I heard young Reggy Calhoun saying--" "I know," said Miss Pinckney, "and I want no more of your impudence. Now take yourself off if you've finished your breakfast, for Phyl and I have work to do." He got up and went off laughing by way of the piazza and they could hear his cheery voice in the garden talking to the old negro gardener. Miss Pinckney's eyes softened. She was fiddling with a spoon and when she spoke she seemed speaking to it, turning it about as if to examine its pattern all the time. "I don't know what mothers with boys feel like, but I do want to see that boy safe and married before I go. He's just the sort to be landed in unhappiness; he is, most surely; well, I don't know, there's no use in warning young folk, you may spank 'em for stealing the jam but you can't spank 'em from fooling with the wrong sort of girl." Miss Pinckney had talked the night before of Phyl's father and had proposed taking her this morning to the Magnolia cemetery to see the grave. She broke off the conversation suddenly as this fact strayed into her mind, and, rising up, invited Phyl to follow her to the kitchen premises where she had orders to give before starting. "I always look after my own house," said she, "and always will. Fine ladies nowadays sit in their drawing-rooms and ring their bells for the servants to rob them and they aren't any more respected. That's what makes the Charleston negro the impudentest lump of blackness under the sun, that and knowing they're emancipated. They've got to look on themselves as part of the Heavenly Host. Well, I'll have no emancipated rubbish in my house, and the consequence is I never lose a servant and I never get impudence. They'll all get a pension when they're too old to work, and good food and good pay whilst they're working, and I've said to them 'you're no more emancipated than I am, we're all slaves to our duty and the only difference between now and the old days is I can't sell you--and if you were idle enough to make me want to sell you there's no one would buy such rubbish nowadays.' Half the trouble is that people these times don't know how to talk to coloured folk, and the other half is that they don't want to talk to them." She led the way down passages to the great kitchen, stonebuilt, clean and full of sunlight. The door was open on to the yard and through an open side door one could get a glimpse of the scullery, the great washing up sink, generations old, and worn with use, and above it the drying dresser. There were no new-fangled cooking inventions at Vernons, everything was done at an open range of the good old fashion still to be found in many an English country house. Miss Pinckney objected to "baked meat" and the joints at Vernons were roast, swinging from a clockwork Jack and basted all the time with a long metal ladle. By the range this morning was seated an old coloured woman engaged in cutting up onions. This was Prue the oldest living thing in Vernons and perhaps in Charleston; she had been kitchen maid before Miss Pinckney was born, then cook, and now, long past work, she was just kept on. Twenty-five years ago she had been offered a pension and a cottage for herself but she refused both. She wanted to die where she was, so she said. So they let her stay, doing odd jobs and bossing the others just as though she were still mistress of the kitchen--as in fact she was. She had become a legend and no one knew her exact age, she was creepin' close to a hundred, and her memory which carried her back to the slave days was marvellous in its retentiveness. She had cooked a dinner for Jeff Davis when he was a guest at Vernons, she could still hear the guns of the Civil War, so she said, and the Mascarene family history was her Bible. She looked down on the Pinckneys as trash beside the Mascarenes, and interlopers, and this attitude and point of view though well known to Miss Pinckney was not in the least resented by her. But during the last few years this old lady's intellect had been steadily coming under eclipse; still insisting on doing little jobs in a futile sort of way, silence had been creeping upon her so that she rarely spoke now, and when she did, by chance, her words revealed the fact that her mind was dwelling in the past. Rachel, the cook, a sturdy coloured woman with her head bound up in an isabelle-coloured handkerchief was standing by the kitchen table on which she was resting the fore-finger of her left hand, whilst with the right she was turning over some fish that had just been sent in from the fishmonger's. She seemed in a critical mood, but what she said to Miss Pinckney was lost to Phyl whose attention was attracted by a chuckling sound from near the range. It was Prue. The old woman at sight of Phyl had dropped the knife and the onion on which she had been engaged. She was now seated, hands on knees, chuckling and nodding to the girl, then, scarcely raising her right hand from her knee, she made a twiddling movement with the fore-finger as if to say, "come here--come here--I have something to tell you." Phyl glanced at Miss Pinckney who was so taken up with what Rachel was saying about the fish that she noticed nothing. Then she looked again at Prue and, unable to resist the invitation, came towards her. The old woman caught her by the arm so that she had to bend her head. "Miss Julie," whispered Prue, "Massa Pinckney told me tell yo' he be at de gate t'night same time 'slas' night. Done you let on 's I told yo'," she gave the arm a pinch and relapsed into herself chuckling whilst Phyl stood with a little shiver, half of relief at her escape from that bony clutch, half of dread--a vague dread as though she had come in contact with something uncanny. She came to the table again and stood without looking at Prue, whilst Miss Pinckney completed her orders, then, that lady, having finished her business and casting an eye about the place on the chance of finding any dirt or litter, saw Prue and asked how she was doing. "Well, miss, she's doin' fa'r," replied Rachel, "but I'm t'inking she's not long fore de new Jerusalem. Sits didderin' dere 'n' smokin' her pipe, 'n' lays about her wid her stick times, fancyin' there'er dogs comin' into de kitchen." "A dog bit her once way back in the '60's," said Miss Pinckney; "they used to keep dogs here then. She don't want for anything?" "Law no, miss, _she_ done want for nothin'; look at her now laffin' to herself. Haven't seen her do that way dis long time. Hi, Prue, what yo' laffin' at?" Prue, instead of answering leant further forward hiding her face without checking her merriment. "Crazy," said Miss Pinckney, "but it's better to be laughing crazy than crying crazy like some folk--here's a quarter and get her some candy." She put the coin on the table and marched off followed by Phyl. "She wanted to tell me something," said Phyl as they were driving to the cemetery; "she beckoned me to her and took hold of my arm and whispered something." "What did she say?" Phyl, somehow, could not bring herself to betray that crazy confidence. "I don't know, exactly, but she called me Miss Julie." "Oh--she called you Miss Julie," said the other. Then she relapsed into thought and nothing more was said till they reached their destination. CHAPTER V Charleston's Magnolia Cemetery like everything else about Charleston shows the touch of the War. Here the soldiers lie who fought so bravely under Wade Hampton and here lies the general himself. Go south, go north, and you will not find a place touched by the War where you will not find noble memories, echoes of heroic deeds, legends of brave men. Miss Pinckney was by no means a peace party and this thought was doubtless in her head as she stood surveying the confederate graves. There were relations here and men whom she had known as a child. "That's the War," said she, "and people abuse war as if it was the worst thing in the world, insulting the dead. 'Clare to goodness it makes me savage to hear the pasty-faces talking of war and making plans to abolish it. It's like hearing a lot of children making plans to abolish thunder storms. Where would America be now without the War, and where'd her history be? You tell me that. It'd just be the history of a big canning factory. These men aren't dead, they're still alive and fighting--fighting Chicago; fighting pork, and wheat, and cotton and railway-stock and everything else that's abolishing the soul of the nation. "There's Matt Carey's grave. He had everything he wanted, and he wasn't young. Now-a-days he'd have been driving in his automobile killing old women and chickens, or tarpoon fishing down 'n Florida letting the world go rip, or full of neur--what do they call it--that thing that gets on their nerves and makes crazy old men of them at forty--I've forgotten. _He_ didn't. He took up a gun and died like a lion, and he was a middle-aged business man. No one remembers him, I do believe, except, maybe me, clean forgotten--and yet he helped to put a brick into the only monument worth ten cents that America has got--The War. "And some northern people would say 'nice sort of brick, seeing he was fighting on the wrong side.' Wrong side or right side he was fighting for something else than his own hand. _That's_ the point." She closed up her lips and they went on. Phyl found her father's grave in a quiet spot where the live-oaks stood, the long grey moss hanging from their branches. Miss Pinckney, having pointed out the grave, strayed off, leaving the girl to herself. The gloomy, strange-looking trees daunted Phyl, and the grave, too young yet to have a headstone, drew her towards it, yet repelled her. It was like meeting in a dream some one she had loved and who had turned into a stranger in a strange place. Just as Charleston had dimmed Ireland in her mind as a bright light dims a lesser light, so had some influence come between her and the memory of her father. That memory was just as distinct as ever, but grief had died from it, as though Time had been at work on it for years and years. The Phyl who had stepped out of the south-bound express and the girl of this morning were the same in mind and body, but in soul and outlook they had changed and were changing as though the air of the south had some magic in it, some food that had always been denied her and which was necessary for her full being. Miss Pinckney returned from her wanderings amongst the graves and they turned to the gate. "It used to seem strange to me coming here when I was a girl," said she. "It always seemed as if I was come to visit people who could never come to see me. I used to pity them, but one gets older and one gets wiser, and I fancy it's they that pity us, if they can see us at all, which isn't often likely." "D'you think they come back?" said Phyl. "My dear child, if I told you what I thought, you'd say I was plum crazy. But I'll say this. What do you think the Almighty made folk for? to live a few years and then lie in a grave with folk heaping flowers on them? There's no such laziness in nature. I don't say there aren't folk who live their lives like as if they were dead, covered with flowers and never moving a hand to help themselves like some of those N'York women--but they don't count. They're against nature and I guess when they die they die, for they haven't ever lived." Then, vehemently: "Of course, they come back, not as ghosts peekin' about and making nuisances of themselves, but they come back as people--which is the sensible way and there's nothing unsensible in nature. Mind you, I don't say there aren't ghosts, there are, for I've seen 'em; I saw Simon Pinckney, the one that died of drink, as plain as my hand same day he died, but he was a no account. He hadn't the making of a man, so he couldn't come back as a man, and he wasn't a woman, so he couldn't come back as a woman; so he came back as a ghost. He was always an uneasy creature, else I don't suppose he'd have come back as anything. When a man wears out a suit of clothes he doesn't die, he gets a new one, and when he wears out a body--which isn't a bit more than a suit of clothes--he gets a new one. If he hasn't piled up grit enough in life to pay for a new body, he goes about without one and he's a ghost. That's my way of thinking and I know--I know--n'matter." She put up her sunshade and they returned, driving through the warm spring weather. Phyl was silent, the day had taken possession of her. The scent of pink mimosa filled the air, the blue sky shewed here and there a few feather traces of white cloud and the wind from the sea seemed the very breath of the southern spring. It seemed to Phyl as they drove that never before had she met or felt the loveliness of life, never till this moment when turning a corner the song of a bird from a garden met them with the perfume of jessamine. Charleston is full of surprises like that, things that snatch you away from the present or catch you for a moment into the embrace of some old garden lurking behind a wrought iron gate, or tell you a love story no matter how much you don't want to hear it--or tease you, if you are a practical business man, with some other futility which has nothing at all to do with "real" life. It seemed to Phyl as though, somehow, the whole of the morning had been working up to that moment, as though the perfume of the jessamine and the song of the birds were the culmination of the meaning of all sorts of things seen and unseen, heard and unheard. The message of the crazy old negress came back to her. Who was Miss Julie? and who was the Mr. Pinckney that was to meet her, and where was the gate at which they were to meet in such a secretive manner? Was it just craziness, or was it possible that this was some real message delivered years and years ago. A real lover's message which the old woman had once been charged to deliver and which she had repeated automatically and like a parrot. Miss Julie--could it be possible that she meant Miss Juliet--The Juliet Mascarene to whom she, Phyl, bore such a strong family likeness, could it be possible that the likeness had started the old woman's mind working and had recalled the message of a half-a-century ago to her lips. It was a fascinating thought. Juliet had been in love with one of the Pinckneys and this message was from a Pinckney and one day, perhaps, most likely a fine spring day like to-day, Pinckney had given the negro girl a message to give to Juliet, and the lovers and the message and the bright spring day had vanished utterly and forever leaving only Prue. The gate would no doubt be the garden gate. Phyl in all her life had never given a thought to Love, she had known nothing of sentiment, that much abused thing which is yet the salt of life, and Romance for her had meant Adventure; all the same she was now weaving all sorts of threads into dreams and fancies. What appealed to her most was her own likeness to Juliet, the girl who had died so many, many years ago. A likeness incomplete enough, according to Miss Pinckney, yet strong enough to awaken memories in the mind of Prue. CHAPTER VI "Miss Pinckney," said Phyl, as they sat at luncheon that day, "you remember you said yesterday that I was like Juliet Mascarene?" "So you are," replied the other, "though the likeness is more noticeable at first sight as far as the face goes--I've got a picture of her I will show you, it's upstairs in her room, the one next yours on the same piazza--why do you ask me?" "I was thinking," replied Phyl, "that the old woman in the kitchen--Prue--may have meant Juliet when she called me Julie, and that it was the likeness that set her mind going." "It's not impossible. Prue's like that crazy old clock Selina Pinckney left me in her will. It'd tell you the day and the hour _and_ the minute and the year and the month and the weather. A little man came out if it was going to rain and a little woman if it was going to shine. But if you wanted to know the time, it couldn't tell you nearer than the hour before last of the day before yesterday, and if you sneezed near it, it'd up and strike a hundred and twenty. I gave it to Rachel. She said it was 'some' clock, said it was a dandy for striking and the time didn't matter as the old kitchen clock saw to that. It's the same with Prue, the time doesn't matter, and they look up to her in the kitchen mostly, I expect, because she's an oddity, same as Selina Pinckney's clock. Seems to me anything crazy and useless is reckoned valuable these days, and not only among coloured folk but whites--Dinah, hasn't Mr. Richard come in yet?" "No, Mistress Pinckney," replied the coloured girl, who had just entered the room, "I haven't seen no sign of him." "Running about without his luncheon," grumbled the lady, "said he had a deal in cotton on. I might have guessed it." Then when Dinah had left the room and talking half to herself, "There's nothing Richard seems to think of but business or pleasure. I'm not saying anything against the boy, he's as good and better than any of the rest, but like the rest of them his character wants forming round something real. It wasn't so in the old days, they were bad enough then and drank a lot more, but they had in them something that made for something better than business or pleasure. Matt Curry didn't go out and get killed for business or pleasure, and all the old Pinckneys didn't fight in the war or fight with one another for business or pleasure. There's more in life than fooling with girls or buying cotton or sailing yacht races, but Richard doesn't seem to see it. I did think that having a ward to look after would have sobered him a bit and helped to form his character--well, maybe it will yet." "I don't want to be looked after," said Phyl flushing up, "and if Mr. Pinckney--" she stopped. What she was going to say about Pinckney was not clear in her mind, clouded as it was with anger--anger at the thought that she was an object to be looked after by her "guardian," anger at the implication that he was not bothering to look after her, being too much engaged in the business of fooling with girls and buying cotton, and a reasonable anger springing from and embracing the whole world that held his beyond Vernons. "Yes?" said Miss Pinckney. "Oh, nothing," replied the other, trying to laugh and making a failure of the business. "I was only going to say that Mr. Pinckney must have lots to do instead of wasting his time looking after strangers, and if he hadn't I don't want to be looked after. I don't want him to bother about me--I--I--" It did not want much more to start her off in a wild fit of weeping about nothing, her mind for some reason or other unknown even to herself was worked up and seething just as on that day at Kilgobbin when the woes of Rafferty had caused her to make such an exhibition of herself in the library. Anything was possible with Phyl when under the influence of unreasoning emotion like this, anything from flinging a knife at a person to breaking into tears. Miss Pinckney knew it. Without understanding in the least the psychological mechanism of Phyl, she knew as a woman and by some electrical influence the state of her mind. She rose from the table. "Stranger," said she, taking the other by the arm, "you call yourself a stranger. Come along upstairs with me. I want to show you something." Still holding her by the arm, caressingly, she led her off across the hall and up the stairs; on the first floor landing she opened a door; it was the door of the bedroom next to Phyl's, a room of the same shape and size and with the same view over the garden. Just as the drawing-room had been kept in its entirety without alteration or touch save the touch of a duster, so had this room, the bedroom of a girl of long ago, a girl who would now have been a woman old and decrepit--had she lived. "Here's the picture you wanted to see," said Miss Pinckney leading Phyl up to a miniature hanging on the wall near the bed. "That's Juliet, and if you don't see the family likeness, well, then, you must be blind.--And you calling yourself a stranger!" Phyl looked. It was rather a stiff and finicking little portrait; she fancied it was like herself but was not sure, the colour of the hair was almost the same but the way it was dressed made a lot of difference, and she said so. "Well, they did their hair different then," replied Miss Pinckney, "and that reminds me, it's near time you put that tail up." She sat down in a rocker by the window and with her hands on her knees contemplated Phyl. "I'm your only female relative, and Lord knows I'm far enough off, anyhow I'm something with a skirt on it, and brains in its head, and that's what a girl most wants when she comes to your age. You'll be asked to parties and things here and you'll find that tail in the way; it's good enough for a schoolgirl, but you aren't that any longer. I'll get Dinah to do your hair, something simple and not too grown-up--you don't mind an old woman telling you this--do you?" "Indeed I don't," said Phyl. "I don't care how my hair is done, you can cut it off if you like, but I don't want to go to parties." "Well, maybe you don't," said Miss Pinckney, "but, all the same, we'll get Dinah to look to your hair. Dinah can do most anything in that way; she'd get twice the wages as a lady's maid elsewhere and she knows it, but she won't go. I've told her over and again to be off and better herself, but she won't go, sticks to me like a mosquito. Well, this was Juliet's room just as that's her picture; she died in that bed and everything is just exactly as she left it. It was kept so after her death. You see, it wasn't like an ordinary person dying, it was the tragedy of the whole thing that stirred folk so, dying of a broken heart for the man she was in love with. It set all the crazy poets off like that clock of Selina Pinckney's I was telling you of. The _News and Courier_ had yards of obituary notice and verses. It made people forget the war for a couple of days. There's all her books on that shelf and the diary the poor thing used to keep. Open one of the drawers in that chest." Phyl did so. The drawer was packed with clothes neatly folded. The air became filled with the scent of lavender. "There are her things, everything she ever had when she died. It may seem foolish to keep everything like that, foolish and sentimental, and if she'd died of measles or fallen down the stairs and killed herself maybe her old things would have been given away, but dying as she did--well, somehow, it didn't seem right for coloured girls to be parading about in her things. Mrs. Beamis sniffed here just as she sniffed in the drawing-room, and she said, one night, something about sentiment, as if she was referring to chicken cholera. I knew what she meant. She meant we were a pack of fools. Well, she ought to know. I reckon she ought to be a judge of folly--the life she leads in Chicago. Umph!--Now I'm going to lie down for an hour, and if you take my advice you'll do the same. The middle of the day was meant to rest in. You can get to your room by the window." She kissed Phyl and went off. Phyl, instead of going to her room, took her seat in the rocker and looked around her. The place held her, something returned to it that had been driven away perhaps by Miss Pinckney's cheerful and practical presence, the faint odour of lavender still clung to the air, and the silence was unbroken except for a faint stirring of the window curtains now and then to the breeze from outside. Everything was, indeed, just as it had been left, the toilet tidies and all the quaint contraptions of the '50's and '60's in their places. On the wall opposite the bed hung several water colours evidently the work of that immature artist Mary Mascarene, a watch pocket hung above the bed, a thing embroidered with blue roses, enough to disturb the sleep of any æsthete, yet beautiful enough in those old days. There was only one stain mark in the scrupulous cleanliness and neatness of the place--a panel by the window, once white painted but now dingy-grey and scored with lines. Phyl got up and inspected it more closely. Children's heights had evidently been measured here. There was a scale of feet marked in pencil, initials, and dates. Here was "M. M.," probably Mary Mascarene, "2 ft. 6 inches. Nineteen months," and the date "April, 1845," and again a year later, "M. M. 2 ft. 9-1/2 inches, May, 1846." So she had grown three and a half inches in a year. "J. M."--Juliet without doubt--"3 feet, 3 years old, 1845." Juliet was evidently the elder--so it went on right into the early '60's, mixed here and there with other initials, amongst which Phyl made out "J. J." and "R. P.," children maybe staying at the house and measured against the Mascarene children--children now old men and women, possibly not even that. It was in the kindly spirit of Vernons not to pass a painter's brush over these scratchings, records of the height of a child that lingered only in the memory of the old house. Phyl turned from them to the bookshelf and the books it contained. "Noble Deeds of American Women," "Precept on Precept," "The Dairyman's Daughter," and the "New England Primer"--with a mark against the verses left "by John Rogers to his wife and nine small children, and one at the breast, when he was burned at the stake at Smithfield in 1555." There were also books of poetry, Bryant, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, "Powhatan, a metrical romance in seven cantos by Seba Smith," and several others. Phyl did something characteristic. She gathered every single book into a pile in her arms and sat down on the floor with them to have a feast. This devourer of books was omnivorous in her tastes, especially if it were a question of sampling, and she had enough critical faculty to enable her to enjoy rubbish. She lingered over Powhatan and its dedication to the "Young People of the United States" and then passed on to the others till she came to a little black book. It was Juliet Mascarene's diary and proclaimed the fact openly on the first page with the statements: "I am twelve years old to-day and Aunt Susan has given me this book to keep as my diary and not to forget to write each day my evil deeds as well as my good, which I will if I remember them. She didn't give me anything else. I had to-day a Paris doll from Cousin Jane Pinckney who has winking eyes which shut when you lay her on her back and pantalettes with scallops which take off and on and a trunk of clothes with a little key to it. Father gave me a Bible and I have had other things too numerous for mension. "Signed Juliet Mascarene." with never a date. Then: "I haven't done any evil deeds, or good ones that I can remember, so I haven't written in this book for maybe a week. Mary and I, we went to a party at the Pinckneys to-day at Bures, the Calhoun children and the Rutledges were there and we had Lady Baltimore cake and a good time. Mary wore her blue organdie and looked very nice and Rupert Pinckney was there, he's fourteen and wouldn't talk to the children because they were too small for him, I expect. He told me he was going to have a pony same as Silas Rhett that threw him in the market place Wednesday last and galloped all the way to Battery before he was stopped, only his was to be a better one with more shy in it, said Silas Rhett ought to be tied on next time. Then old Mr. Pinckney came in and shewed us a musical snuff-box and we went home, and driving back Mary kicked me on the shin by axident and I pinched her and she didn't cry till we'd got home, then she began to roar and mother said it was my ungovernable temper, and I said I wished I was dead. "I shan't go to any more parties because it's always like that after them. Father told me I was to pray for a new heart and not to have any supper but Prue has brought me up a cake of her own making. So that's one evil deed to put down--It's just like Mary, any one else would have cried right out in the carriage and not bottled it up and kept it up till she got home. "This is a Friday and Prue says Friday parties are always sure to end in trouble for the devil puts powder in the cakes and the only way to stop him is to turn them three times round when they're baking and touch them each time with a forked hazel twig." Phyl read this passage over twice. The mention of Prue interested her vastly. Prue even then had evidently been a favourite of Juliet's. She read on hoping to find the name of the coloured woman again, but it did not occur. The diary, indeed, did not run over more than a year and a half, but scrappy as it was and short in point of time, the character of Juliet shone forth from it, uneasy, impetuous, tormenting and loving. Many books could not have depicted the people round Vernons so well as this scribbling of a child. Mary Mascarene, quiet, rather a spoil-sport and something of a tale-teller, dead and gone Pinckneys and Rhetts. Aunt Susan, Cousin Jane Pinckney, Uncle George who beat his coloured man, Darius, because the said Darius had let him go out with one brass button missing from his blue coat. Simon Pinckney--the one whose ghost walked--and who "fell down in the garden because he had the hiccups," these and others of their time lived in the little black book given by the miserly Aunt Susan "to keep as my diary and not to forget to write each day my evil deeds as well as my good." Towards the end there was another reference to Rupert Pinckney, the tragic lover of the future: "Rupert Pinckney was here to-day with his mother to luncheon and we had a palmetto salad and mother said when he was gone he was the most frivulus boy in Charleston, whatever that was, and too much of a dandy, but father said he had stuff in him and Aunt Susan, who was here too, said 'Yes, stuff and nonsense,' and I said he could ride his pony without tumbling off like Silas Rhett, anyhow. "Then they went on talking about his people and how they hadn't as much money as they used to have, and Aunt Susan said that was so, and the worst of it is they're spending more money than they used to spend, and father said, well, anyhow, that wasn't a very common complaint with _some_ people and he left the room. He never stays long in the room with Aunt S. "I think the Pinckneys are real nice." "Mr. Simon Mascarene from Richmond and his wife came to see us to-day and stay for a week. They drove here in their own carriage with four brown horses and you could not tell which horse was which, they are so alike, they are very fine people and Mr. M. has a red face--not the same red as Mr. Simon Pinckney's, but different somehow--more like an apple, and a high nose which makes him look very grand and fine." The same Simon Mascarene, no doubt, that came to the wedding of Charles Pinckney in 1880 as old Simon Mascarene, the one whose flowered carpet bag still lingered in the memory of Miss Pinckney. "Mrs. M. is very fine too and beautifully dressed and mother gave her a great bouquet of geraniums and garden flowers with a live green caterpillar looping about in the green stuff which nobody saw but me, till it fell on Mrs. M.'s knee and she screamed. There is to be a big party to-morrow and the Pinckneys are coming and Rupert." There the diary ended. Phyl put it back on the shelf with the books. She had not the knowledge necessary to visualise the people referred to, those people of another day when Planters kept open house, when slaves were slaves and Bures the home of the old gentleman with the musical snuff-box, but she could visualise Juliet as a child. The writing in the little book had brought the vision up warm from the past and it seemed almost as though she might suddenly run in from the sunlit piazza that lay beyond the waving window curtains. There was a bureau in one corner, or rather one of those structures that went by the name of Davenports in the days of our fathers. Phyl went to it and raised the lid. She did so without a second thought or any feeling that it was wrong to poke about in a place like this and pry into secrets. Juliet seemed to belong to her as though she had been a sister, her own likeness to the dead girl was a bond of attraction stronger than a family tie, and Juliet's mournful love story completed the charm. The desk contained very little, a seal with a dove on it, some sticks of spangled sealing-wax, a paper knife of coloured wood with a picture of Benjamin Franklin on the handle and some sheets of note-paper with gilt edges. Phyl noticed that the gilt was still bright. She took out the paper knife and looked at it, and then held the blade to her lips to feel the smoothness of it, drawing it along so that her lips touched every part of the blade. Then she put it back, and as she did so a little panel at the back of the desk fell forward disclosing a cache containing a bundle of letters tied round with ribbon. Phyl started as though a hand had been laid on her arm. The point of the paper knife must have touched the spring of the panel, but it seemed as though the desk had suddenly opened its hand, closed and clasping those letters for so many years. For a moment she hesitated to touch them. Then she thought of all the time they had lain there and a feeling that Juliet wouldn't mind and that the old bureau had told its secret without being asked, overcame her scruples. She took the letters and sitting down again on the floor, untied the ribbon. There were no envelopes. Each sheet of paper had been carefully folded and sealed with green wax, with the seal leaving the impression of the dove. There was no address, and they had evidently been tied together in chronological order. But the handwriting was the handwriting of Juliet Mascarene fully formed now. The first of these things ran: "It wasn't my fault. I didn't create old Mr. Gadney and send him to church to keep us talking in the street like that. I did _not_ see you. You couldn't have passed, and if you did you must have been invisible. I feel dreadfully wicked writing to you. Do you know this is a clandestine correspondence and must stop at once? You mustn't _ever_ write to me again, nor I mustn't see you. Of course I can't help seeing you in church and on the street--and I can't help thinking about you. They'll be making me try and stop breathing next. I don't care a button for the whole lot of them. It was all Aunt Susan's doing, only for her my people would never have quarrelled with yours and I wouldn't have been so miserable. I feel sometimes as if I could just take a boat and sail off to somewhere where I would never see any people again. "It was clever of you to send your letter by P. This goes to you by the same hand." There was no signature and no date. Phyl turned the sheet of paper over to make sure again that there was no address. As she did so a faint, quaint perfume came to her as though the old-fashioned soul of the letter were released for a moment. It was vervain, the perfume of long ago, beloved of the Duchesse de Chartres and the ladies of the forties. She laid the letter down and took up the next. "It is _wicked_ of you. My people never would be so mean as to quarrel with your people or look down on them because they have lost money. Why did you say that--and you know I said in my last letter that I could not write to you again. I was shocked when P. pinched my arm as I was passing her on the stairs and handed me your note--Don't you--don't you--how shall I say it? Don't you think you and I could meet and speak to one another somewhere instead of always writing like this? Somewhere where no one could see us. Do you know--do you know--do you, ahem! O dear me--know that just inside our gate there's a little arbour. The tiniest place. When I was a child I used to play there with Mary at keeping house, there's a seat just big enough for two and we used to sit there with our dolls. No one can see the gate from the lower piazza, and the gate doesn't make any noise opening, for father had it oiled--it used to squeak a bit from rust, but it doesn't now and I'll be there to-morrow night at nine--in the arbour--at least I _may_ be there. I just want to tell you in a way I can't in a letter that my people aren't the sort of folk to sneer at any one because they have lost money. "I am sending this by P. "The arbour is just back of the big magnolia as you come in, on the left." Phyl gave a little laugh. Then with half-closed eyes she kissed the letter, laid it softly on the floor beside the first and went on to the next. "Not to-night. I have to go to the Calhouns. It is just as well, for I have a dread of people suspecting if we meet too often. No one sees us meet. No one knows, and yet I fear them finding out just by instinct. Father said to me the other day, 'What makes you seem so happy these times?' If Mary had been alive she would have found out long ago, for I never could keep anything hid from her. I was nearly saying to him, 'If you want to know why I am so happy go and ask the magnolia tree by the gate.' "Sometimes I feel as if I were deceiving him and everybody. I am, and I don't care--I don't care if they knew. O my darling! My darling! My darling! If the whole world were against you I would love you all the more. I will love you all my life and I will love you when I am dead." Phyl's eyes grew half blind with tears. This cry from the Past went to her heart like a knife. The wind, strengthening for a moment, moved the window curtains, bringing with it the drowsy afternoon sounds of Charleston, sounds that seemed to mock at this voice declaring the deathlessness of its love. It was impossible to go on reading. Impossible to expose any more this heart that had ceased to beat. The meetings in the arbour behind the magnolia tree, the kisses, the words that the leaves and birds alone could hear--they had all ended in death. It did not matter now if the garden gate creaked on its hinges, or if watching eyes from the piazza saw the glossy leaves stirring when no wind could shake them--nothing mattered at all to these people now. She put all the letters back in the bureau, carefully closing them in the secret drawer. CHAPTER VII "Miss Pinckney," said Phyl that night as they sat at supper, "when you left me this afternoon in Juliet's room I stopped to look at the books and things and when I opened the bureau I touched a spring by accident and a little panel fell out and I found a lot of old letters behind it. It was wrong of me to go meddling about and I thought I ought to tell you." "Old letters," said Miss Pinckney, "you don't say--what were they about?" "I read one or two," said the girl. "I'd never, never have dreamed of touching them only--only they were hers--they were to him." "Rupert?" "Yes." "Love letters?" "Yes." Miss Pinckney sighed. "He kept all her letters," said she, "and they came back to her after he was killed. He was killed here in Charleston, at Fort Sumter, in the war; they brought him across here and carried him on a stretcher and she--well, well, it's all done with and let it rest, but it is strange that those letters should have fallen into your hands." "Why, strange?" "Why?" burst out Miss Pinckney. "Why I have dusted that old bureau inside and out a hundred times, and pulled out the drawers and pushed them in and it never shewed sign of having anything in it but emptiness, and you don't do more'n look at it and you find those letters. It's just as if the thing had deceived me. I don't mind, and I don't want to see them, they weren't intended for other eyes than his and hers--and maybe yours since they were shewn you like that." "Was it wrong of me to look at them?" asked Phyl. "I never would have done it only--only--Oh, I don't know, I somehow felt she wouldn't mind. She seemed like a sister--I would never dream of looking at another person's letters but she did not seem like another person. I can't explain. It was just as though the letters were my own--just exactly as though they were my own when I found them in my hands." Phyl was talking with her eyes fixed before her as though she were looking across some great distance. Miss Pinckney gave a little shiver, then supper being over she rose from the table and led the way from the room. Richard Pinckney had dined with them but he was out for supper somewhere or another. They went to the drawing-room and had not been there for more than a few minutes when Frances Rhett was announced. The Rhetts were on intimate enough terms with the Pinckneys to call in like this without ceremony; Frances had called to speak to Miss Pinckney about some charity affair she was getting up in a hurry, but she had not been five minutes in the room before Phyl knew that she had called to look at her. To look at the girl who had come to live with the Pinckneys, the red headed girl. Phyl did not know that girls of Frances' type dread red haired girls, if they are pretty, as rabbits dread stoats, but she did know in some uncanny way that Frances Rhett considered Richard Pinckney as her own property to be protected against all comers. All at once and new born, the woman awoke in her instinctive, mistrustful and armed. Frances Rhett, despite Miss Pinckney's dispraise of her, was a most formidable person as far as the opposite sex was concerned. One of the women of whom other women say, "Well, I don't know what he sees in her, I'm sure." A brunette of eighteen who looked twenty, full-blooded, full lipped, full curved, sleepy-eyed, she seemed dressed by nature for the part of the world and the flesh--with a hint of the devil in those deep, dark, pansy blue eyes that seemed now by artificial light almost black. "Well, I'll subscribe ten dollars," said Miss Pinckney; "I reckon the darkie babies won't be any the worse for a _crêche_ and maybe not very much better for it. If you could get up an institution to distil good manners and respect for their betters into their heads I'd give you forty. I'm sure I don't know what the coloured folk of Charleston are coming to, one of them nearly pushed me off the sidewalk the other day, bag of impudence! and the way they look at one in the street with that sleery leery what-d'-you-call-yourself-you-white-trash grin on their faces s'nough to raise Cain in any one's heart." "I know," replied the dark girl, "and they are getting worse; the whip is the only thing that as far as I can see ever made them possible, and what we have now is the result of your beautiful Abolitionists." "Don't call them my beautiful Abolitionists," replied the other. "I didn't make 'em. All the same I don't believe in whipping and never did. It's the whip that whipped us in the war. If white folk had treated black folk like Christians slavery would have been the greatest god-send to blacks. It was what stays are to women. But they didn't. The low down white made slavery impossible with his whipping and oppression and _we_ had to suffer. Well, we haven't ended our sufferings and if these folk go on multiplying like rabbits there's no knowing what we've got to suffer yet." Miss Rhett concurred and took her departure. "Now, that girl," said the elder lady when Frances Rhett was gone, "is just the type of the people I was telling her about. No idea but whipping. _She_ wouldn't have much mercy on a human creature black or tan _or_ white. Thick skinned. She didn't even see that I was telling her so to her face. Wonder what brought her here this hour with her _crêche_. It's just a fad. If they got up a charity to make alligator bait of the black babies so's to sell the alligator skins to buy pants with texts on them for the Hottentots it'd be all the same to her. Something to gad about with. I wish I'd kept that ten dollars in my pocket." Miss Pinckney went to bed early that night--before ten--and Phyl, who was free to do as she chose, sat for a while in the lower piazza watching the moon rising above the trees. She had a little plan in her mind, a plan that had only occurred to her just before the departure of Miss Pinckney for bed. She sat now watching the garden growing ghostly bright, the sun dial becoming a moon dial, the carnations touched by that stillness and mystery which is held only in the light of the moon and the light of the dawn. Phyl found herself sitting between two worlds. In the light of the northern moon in summer there is a vague rose tinge to be caught at times and in places when it falls full on house wall or the road on which one is walking. The piazza to-night had this living and warm touch. It seemed lit by a glorified ethereal day. A day that had never grown up and would never lose the charm of dawn. Yet the garden to which she would now turn her eyes shewed nothing of this. Night reigned there from the cherokee roses moving in the wind to the carnations motionless, moon stricken, deathly white. Sure that Miss Pinckney would not come down again, Phyl rose and crossed the garden towards the gate. She wanted to see if the trysting place behind the magnolia and the bushes that grew about it were still there. At the gate she paused for a moment, glancing back at the house as Juliet Mascarene might have done on those evenings when she had an appointment with her lover. Then, pushing through the bushes and past the magnolia trees she found herself in a little half moonlit space, a natural arbour through whose roof of leaves the moonlight came in quavering shafts. She stood for a moment absolutely still whilst her eyes accustomed themselves to the light. Then she began to search for the seat she guessed to be there, and found it. It was between an oak bole and the wall of the garden, and the bushes behind had grown so that their branches half covered it. Neglected, forsaken, unknown, perhaps, to the people now living in Vernons it had lingered with the fidelity of inanimate things, protected by the foliage of the southern garden from prying eyes. She pushed back the leaves and branches and bent them out of the way, then she took her seat, and as she did so several of the bent branches released themselves and closed half round her in a delightful embrace. From here she could see brokenly the garden and the walk leading from the gate, with the light of the moon now strong upon the walk. The night sounds of the street just beyond the wall came mixed with the stir of foliage as the wind from the sea pressed over the trees like the hand of a mesmerist inducing sleep. So it was here that Juliet Mascarene had sat with Rupert Pinckney on those summer nights when the world was younger, before the war. The war that had changed everything whilst leaving the roses untouched and the moonlight the same on the bird-haunted garden of Vernons. Everything was the same here in this little space of flowers and trees. But the lovers had vanished. "For man walketh in a vain shadow and disquieteth himself in vain." The words strayed across Phyl's mind brought up by recollection. "He cometh up and is cut down like a flower, he fleeth as it were a shadow, and never continueth in one stay." The trees seemed whispering it, the eternal statement that leaves the eternal question unanswered. The garden was talking to her, the night, the very bushes that clasped her in a half embrace; perfumes, moonlight, the voice of the wind, all were part of the spell that bound her, held her, whispered to her. It was as though the love letter of Juliet had led her here to show her as in a glass darkly the vainness of love in the vainness of life. Vainly, for as she sat watching in imagination the forms of the lost lovers parting there at the gate, suddenly there came upon her a stirring of the soul, a joyous uplifting as though wings had been given to her mind for one wild second raising it to the heights beyond earthly knowledge. "Love can never die." It was as though some ghostly voice had whispered this fact in her ear. Juliet was not dead nor the man she loved, changed maybe but not dead. In some extraordinary way she knew it as surely as though she herself had once been Juliet. Religion to Phyl had meant little, the Bible a book of fair promises and appalling threats, vague promises but quite definite threats. As a quite small child she had gathered the impression that she was sure to be damned unless she managed to convert herself into a quite different being from the person she knew herself to be. Death was the supreme bogey, the future life a thing not to be thought of if one wanted to be happy. Yet now, just as if she had been through it all, the truth came flooding on her like a golden sea, the truth that life never loses touch with life, that the body is only a momentary manifestation of the ever living spirit. Meeting Street, the old house so full of memories, Juliet's letters, the garden, they had all been stretching out arms to her, trying to tell her something, whispering, suggesting, and now all these vague voices had become clear, as though strengthened by the moonlight and the mystery of night. Clear as lip-spoken words came the message: "You have lived before and we say this to you, we, the things that knew you and loved you in a past life." A step that halted outside close to the garden gate broke the spell, the gate turned on its hinges shewing through its trellis work the form of a man. It was Pinckney just returned from some supper-party or club. Phyl caught her breath back. Suddenly, and at the sight of Pinckney, Prue's words of that morning entered her mind. "Miss Julie, Massa Pinckney told me tell yo' he be at de gate t'night same's las' night. Done you let on as I told you." And here he was, the man who had been occupying her thoughts and who was beginning to occupy her dreams, and here she was as though waiting for him by appointment. But there was much more than that. Worlds and worlds more than that, a whole universe of happiness undreamed of. She rose from the seat and the parted bushes rustled faintly as they closed behind her. Pinckney, who had just shut the gate, heard the whisper of the leaves, he turned and saw a figure standing half in shadow and half in moonlight. For a moment he was startled, fancying it a stranger, then he saw that it was Phyl. "Hullo," said he. "Why, Phyl, what are you doing here?" The commonplace question shattered everything like a false note in music. "Nothing," she answered. Then without a word more she ran past him and vanished into the house. Pinckney cast the stump of his cigar away. "What on earth is the matter with her now?" said he to himself. "What on earth have I done?" The word she had uttered carried half a sob with it, it might have been the last word of a quarrel. He stood for a moment glancing around. The wild idea had entered his mind that she had been there to meet some one and that his intrusion had put her out. But there was no one in the garden; nothing but the trees and the flowers, wind shaken and lit by the moon, the same placid moon that had lit the garden of Vernons for the lovers of whom he knew nothing except by hearsay, and for whom he cared nothing at all. CHAPTER VIII When Phyl awoke from sleep next morning, the brightness of the South had lost some of its charm. Something magical that had been forming in her mind and taking its life from Vernons had been shattered last night by Pinckney's commonplace question. This morning, looking back on yesterday, she could remember details but she could not recapture the essence. The exaltation that had raised her above and beyond herself. It was like the remembrance of a rose contrasted with the reality. The whole day had been working up to that moment in the little arbour, when her mind, tricked or led, had risen to heights beyond thought, to happiness beyond experience, only to be cast down from those heights by the voice of reality. The thing was plain enough to common sense; she had let herself be over-ruled by Imagination, working upon splendid material. Prue's message, her own likeness to Juliet, Juliet's letters, the little arbour, those and the magic of Vernons had worked upon her mind singly and together, exalting her into a soul-state utterly beyond all previous experience. It was as though she had played the part of Juliet for a day, suffered vaguely and enjoyed in imagination what Juliet had suffered and enjoyed in life, known Love as Juliet had known it--for a moment. The brutal touch of the Real coming at the supreme moment to shatter and shrivel everything. And the strange thing was that she had no regrets. Looking back on yesterday, the things that had happened seemed of little interest. Sleep seemed to have put an Atlantic ocean between her and them. Coming down to breakfast she found Pinckney just coming in from the garden; he said nothing about the incident of the night before, nor did she, there were other things to talk about. Seth, one of the darkies, had been 'kicking up shines,' he had given impudence to Miss Pinckney that morning. Impudence to Miss Pinckney! You can scarcely conceive the meaning of that statement without a personal knowledge of Miss Pinckney, and a full understanding of the magic of her rule. Seth was, even now, packing up the quaint contraptions he called his luggage, and old Darius, the coloured odd job man, was getting a barrow out of the tool-house to wheel the said luggage to Seth's grandmother's house, somewhere in the negro quarters of the town. The whole affair of the impudence and dismissal had not taken two minutes, but the effects were widespread and lasting. Dinah was weeping, the kitchen in confusion; one might have thought a death had occurred in the house, and Miss Pinckney presiding at the breakfast table was voluble and silent by turns. "Never mind," said Pinckney with all the light-heartedness of a man towards domestic affairs. "Seth's not the only nigger in Charleston." "I'm not bothering about his going," replied Miss Pinckney. "He was all thumbs and of no manner of use but to make work; what upsets me is the way he hid his nature. Time and again I've been good to that boy. He looked all black grin and frizzled head, nothing bad in him you'd say--and then! It's like opening a cupboard and finding a toad, and there's Dinah going on like a fool; she's crying because he's going, not because he gave me impudence. Rachel's the same, and I'm just going now to the kitchen to give them a talking to all round." Off she went. "I know what that means," said Pinckney. "It's only once in a couple of years that there's any trouble with servants and then--oh, my! You see Aunt Maria is not the same as other people because she loves every one dearly, and looks on the servants as part of the family. I expect she loves that black imp Seth, for all his faults, and that's what makes her so upset." "Same as I was about Rafferty," said Phyl with a little laugh. Pinckney laughed also and their eyes met. Just like a veil swept aside, something indefinable that had lain between them, some awkwardness arising, maybe, from the Rafferty incident, vanished in that moment. Phyl had been drawing steadily towards him lately, till, unknown to her, he had entered into the little romance of Juliet, so much so that if last night, at that magical moment when he met her on entering the gate--if at that moment he had taken her in his arms and kissed her, Love might have been born instantly from his embrace. But the psychological moment had passed, a crisis unknown to him and almost unknown to her. And now, as if to seal the triumph of the commonplace, suddenly, the vague reservation that had lain between them, disappeared. "Do you know," said he, "you taught me a lesson that day, a lesson every man ought to be taught before he leaves college." "What was that?" asked Phyl. "Never to interfere in household affairs. Of course Rafferty wasn't exactly a household affair because he belonged mostly to the stable, still he was your affair more than mine. Household affairs belong to women, and men ought to leave them alone." "Maybe you're right," said Phyl, "but all the same I was wrong. Do you know I've never apologised for what I said." "What did you say?" asked he with an artless air of having forgotten. "Oh, I said--things, and--I apologise." "And I said--things, and I apologise--come on, let's go out. I have no business this morning and I'd like to show you the town--if you'd care to come." "What about Miss Pinckney?" asked Phyl. "Oh, she's all right," he replied. "The Seth trouble will keep her busy till lunch time and I'll leave word we've gone out for a walk." Phyl ran upstairs and put on her hat. As they were passing through the garden the thought came to her just for a moment to show him the little arbour; then something stopped her, a feeling that this humble little secret was not hers to give away, and a feeling that Pinckney wouldn't care. Dead lovers vanished so long and their affairs would have little interest for his practical mind. The morning was warmer even than yesterday. The joyous, elusive, intoxicating spirit of the Southern spring was everywhere, the air seemed filled with the dust of sunbeams, filled with fragrance and lazy sounds. The very business of the street seemed part of a great universal gaiety over which the sky heat hazy beyond the Battery rose in a dome of deep, sublime tranquil blue. They stopped to inspect the old slave market. Then the remains of the building that had once been the old Planters Hotel held Phyl like a wizard whilst Pinckney explained its history. Here in the old days the travelling carriages had drawn up, piled with the luggage of fine folk on a visit to Charleston on business or pleasure. The Planters was known all through the Georgias and Virginia, all through the States in the days when General Washington and John C. Calhoun were living figures. The ghost of the place held Phyl's imagination. Just as Meeting Street seemed filled with friendly old memories on her first entering it, so did the air around the ruins of the "Planters." Then having paused to admire the gouty pillars of St. Michael's they went into the church. The silence of an empty church is a thing apart from all other silences in the world. Deeper, more complete, more filled with voices. As they were entering a negro caretaker engaged in dusting and tidying let something fall, and as the silence closed in on the faint echo that followed the sound they stopped, just by the font to look around them. Here the spirit of spring was not. The shafts of sunlight through the windows lit the old fashioned box pews, the double decked pulpit, and the font crowned with the dove with the light of long ago. Sunday mornings of the old time assuredly had found sanctuary here and the old congregations had not yet quite departed. The occasional noise of the caretaker as he moved from pew to pew scarcely disturbed the tranquillity, the scene was set beyond the reach of the sounds and daily affairs of this world, and the actors held in a medium unshakable as that which holds the ghostly life of bees in amber and birds in marqueterie. "That was George Washington's pew," whispered Pinckney, "at least the one he sat in once. That's the old Pinckney pew, belonged to Bures--other people sit there now. This is our pew--Vernons. The Mascarenes had it in the old days, of course." Phyl looked at the pew where Juliet Mascarene had sat often enough, no doubt, whilst the preacher had preached on the vanity of life, on the delusions of the world and the shortness of Time. Many an eloquent divine had stood in the pulpit of St. Michael's, but none have ever preached a sermon so poignant, so real, so searching as that which the old church preaches to those who care to hear. They turned to go. Outside Phyl was silent and Pinckney seemed occupied by thoughts of his own. They had got to that pleasant stage of intimacy where conversation can be dropped without awkwardness and picked up again haphazard, but you cannot be silent long in the streets of Charleston on a spring day. They visited the market-place and inspected the buzzards and then, somehow, without knowing it, they drifted on to the water side. Here where the docks lie deserted and the green water washes the weed grown and rotting timbers of wharves they took their seats on a baulk of timber to rest and contemplate things. "There used to be ships here once," said he. "Lots of ships--but that was before the war." He was silent and Phyl glanced sideways at him, wondering what was in his mind. She soon found out. A struggle was going on between his two selves, his business self that demanded up-to-dateness, bustle, and the energetic conduct of affairs, and his other self that was content to let things lie, to see Charleston just as she was, unspoiled by the thing we call Business Prosperity. It was a battle between the South and the North in him. He talked it out to her. Went into details, pointed to Galveston and New Orleans, those greedy sea mouths that swallow the goods of the world and give out cotton, whilst Charleston lay idle, her wharves almost deserted, her storehouses empty. He spoke almost vehemently, spoke as a business man speaks of wasted chances and things neglected. Then, when he had finished, the girl put in her word. "Well," said she, "it may be so but I don't want it any different from what it is." Pinckney laughed, the laugh of a man who is confessing a weakness. "I don't know that I do either," said he. It was rank blasphemy against Business. At the club you would often find him bemoaning the business decay of the city he loved, but here, sitting by the girl on the forsaken wharf, in the sunshine, the feeling suddenly came to him that there was something here that business would drive away. Something better than Prosperity. It was as though he were looking at things for a moment through her eyes. They came back through the sunlit streets to find Miss Pinckney recovered from the Seth business, and after luncheon that day, assisted by Dinah and the directions of Miss Pinckney, Phyl's hair "went up." "It's beautiful," said the old lady, as she contemplated the result, "and more like Juliet than ever. Take the glass and look at yourself." Phyl did. She did not see the beauty but she saw the change. Her childhood had vanished as though some breath had blown it away in the magic mirror. PART III CHAPTER I In a fortnight Phyl had adjusted herself to her new environment so completely that to use Pinckney's expression, she might have been bred and born in Charleston. Custom and acquaintanceship had begun to dull without destroying the charm of the place and the ghostly something, the something that during the first two days had seemed to haunt Vernons, the something indefinable she had called "It" had withdrawn. The spell, whatever it was, had been broken that night in the garden, when Pinckney's commonplace remark had shattered the dream-state into which she had worked herself with the assistance of Prue, Juliet's letters, the little secret arbour and the moonlight of the South. One morning, coming down to breakfast, she found Miss Pinckney in agitation, an open telegram in one hand and a feather duster in the other. It was one of the early morning habits of Miss Pinckney to range the house superintending things with a feather duster in hand, not so much for use as for the purpose of encouraging others. She was in the breakfast room now dusting spasmodically things that did not require dusting and talking all the time, pausing every now and then to have another glance at the telegram whilst Richard Pinckney, unable to get a word in, sat on a chair, and Jim, the little coloured page, who had brought in the urn, stood by listening and admiring. "Forty miles from here and ten from a railway station," said Miss Pinckney, "and how am I to get there?" "Automobile," said Pinckney. It was evidently not his first suggestion as to this means of locomotion, for the suggestion was received without an outburst, neither resented nor assented to in fact. They took their seats at table and then it all came out. Colonel Seth Grangerson of Grangerson House, Grangerville, S. Carolina, was ill. Miss Pinckney was his nearest relative, the nearest at least with whom he was not fighting, and he had wired to her, or rather his son had wired to her, to come at once. "As if I were a bird," said the old lady. Grangerville was a backwater place, badly served by the railway, and it would take the best part of a day to get there by ordinary means. "A car will get you there inside a couple of hours," said Pinckney. "As if he couldn't have sent for Susan Revenall," went on she as though oblivious to the suggestion, "but I suppose he's fought with them again. I patched up a peace between them last midsummer, but I suppose the patches didn't stick; he's fought with the Revenalls, he's fought with the Calhouns, he's fought with the Beauregards, he's fought with the Tredegars--that man would fight with his own front teeth if he couldn't get anything better to fight with, and now he's dying I expect he reckons to have a fight with me, just to finish off with. He killed his poor wife, and Dick Grangerson would never have gone off and got drowned only for him--Oh, he's not so bad," turning to Phyl, "he's good enough only for that--will fight." "Too much pep," said Pinckney. "I'm sure I don't know what it is. They're the queerest lot the Almighty ever put feet on, and I don't mind saying it, even though they are relatives." Turning to Phyl. "I suppose you know, least I suppose you think, that the Civil War was fought for the emancipation of the darkies and that they _were_ emancipated." "Yes!" "Well, they weren't--at least not at Grangersons. While the Colonel's father was fighting in the Civil War, his first wife, she was a Dawson, kept things going at home, and after the war was over and he was back he took up the rule again. Emancipation--no one would have dared to say the word to him, he'd have killed you with a look. The North never beat Grangerson, it beat Davis and one man and another but it never beat Grangerson, he carried on after the war just as he carried on before, told the darkies that emancipation was nigger talk and they believed him. People came round telling them they were free, and all they got was broken heads. They were a very tetchy lot, those niggers, are still what are left of them. You see, they've always been proud of being Grangerson's niggers, that's the sort of man he is, able to make them feel like that." "Silas helps to carry on the place, doesn't he?" asked Pinckney. "Yes, and just in the same tradition, only he's finding it doesn't work, I suspect. You see, the old darkies are all right, but when he's forced to get new labour he has to get the new darkies and they're all wrong, and he thrashes them and they run away. They never take the law of him either. I reckon when they get clear of Silas they don't stop running till they get to Galveston." They talked of other things and then, breakfast over, Miss Pinckney turned to Richard. "Well, what about that automobile?" "I'll have one at the door for you at ten," said he. She turned to Phyl. "You'd better go with me--if you'd like to; you'd be lonely here all by yourself, and you may as well see Grangersons whilst the old man's there, though maybe he'll be gone before we arrive. We may be there for a couple of days, so you'd better take enough things." Then she went off to dress herself for the journey, and an hour later she appeared veiled and apparelled, Dick following her with the luggage, a bandbox and a bag of other days. She got into the big touring car without a word. Phyl followed her and Pinckney tucked the rug round their knees. "You've got the most careful driver in Charleston," said he, "and he knows the road." Miss Pinckney nodded. She was flying straight in the face of her pet prejudice. She was not in the least afraid of a break down or an overset. An accident that did not rob her of life or limb would indeed have been an opportunity for saying "I told you so." She was chiefly afraid of running over things. As Pinckney was closing the door on them who should appear but Seth--Seth in a striped sleeved jacket, all grin and frizzled head and bearing a bunch of flowers in his hand. He had not been dismissed after all. When Miss Pinckney had gone into the kitchen to pay him his wages he had carried on so that she forgave him. The flowers--her own flowers just picked from the garden--were an offering, not to propitiate but to please. Pinckney laughed, but Miss Pinckney as she took the bouquet scarcely noticed either him or Seth, her mind was busy with something else. She leaned over towards the chauffeur. "Mind you don't run over any chickens," said she. It was a gorgeous morning, with the sea mists blowing away on the sea wind, swamp-land and river and bayou showing streets and ponds of sapphire through the vanishing haze. Phyl was in high spirits; the tune of Camptown Races, which a street boy had been whistling as they started, pursued her. Miss Pinckney, dumb through the danger zone where chickens and dogs and nigger children might be run over, found her voice in the open country. The bunch of flowers presented to her by Seth and which she was holding on her lap started her off. "I hope it is not a warning," said she; "wouldn't be a bit surprised to find Seth Grangerson in his coffin waiting for the flowers to be put on him; what put it in to the darkey's head to give me them! I don't know, I'm sure, same thing I suppose that put it into his head to give me impudence." "You've taken him back," said Phyl. "Well, I suppose I have," said the other in a resigned voice, "and likely to pay for my foolishness." Pinckney had said that it was only a two hours' run from Charleston to Grangerville, but he had reckoned without taking into consideration the badness of some of the roads, and the intricacies of the way, for it was after one o'clock when they reached the little town beyond which, a mile to the West, lay the Colonel's house. Grangerville lies on the border of Clarendon county, a tiny place that yet supports a newspaper of its own, the _Grangerville Courier_. The _Courier_ office, the barber's shop and the hotel are the chief places in Grangerville, and yellow dogs and black children seem the bulk of the population, at least of a warm afternoon, when drowsiness holds the place in her keeping, and the light lies broad and steadfast and golden upon the cotton fields, and the fields of Indian corn, and the foliage of the woods that spread to southward, enchanted woods, fading away into an enchanted world of haze and sun and silence. When the great Southern moon rises above the cotton fields, Romance touches even Grangerville itself, the baying of the yellow dog, darkey voices, the distant plunking of a banjo, the owl in the trees--all are the same as of old--and the houses are the same, nearly, and the people, and it is hard to believe that over there to the North the locomotives of the Atlantic Coast railway are whistling down the night, that men are able to talk to one another at a distance of a thousand miles, fly like birds, live like fish, and perpetuate their shadows in the "movies." Grangersons lay a mile beyond the little town, a solidly built mansion set far back from the road, and approached by an avenue of cypress. As they drew up before the pillared piazza, upon which the front door opened, from the doorway, wide open this warm day, appeared an old gentleman. A very fine looking old man he was. His face, with its predominant nose, long white moustache and firm cleft chin, was of that resolute and obstinate type which seems a legacy of the Roman Empire, whose legionaries left much more behind them in Gaul and Britain than Trajan arches and Roman roads. He was dressed in light grey tweeds, his linen was immaculate--youthful and still a beau in point of dress, and bearing himself erect with the aid of a walking stick, a crutch handled stick of clouded malacca, Colonel Seth Grangerson, for he it was, had come to his front door, drawn by the sound of the one thing he detested more than anything in life, a motor car. "Why, Lord! He's not even in bed," cried the outraged Miss Pinckney, who recognised him at once. "All this journey and he up and about--it beats Seth and his impudence!" The Colonel, whose age dimmed eyes saw nothing but the automobile, came down the steps, panama hat in hand, courtly, freezing, yet ready to explode on the least provocation. Within touch of the car he recognised the chief occupant. "Why, God bless my soul," cried he, "it's Maria Pinckney." "Yes, it's me," said the lady, "and I expected to find you in bed or worse, and here you are up. Silas sent me a telegram." "He's a fool," cut in the old gentleman. "I had one of my old attacks last night, and I told him I'd be up and about in the morning--and I am. Good Gad! Maria, you're the last person in the world I'd ever have expected to see in one of these outrageous things." He had opened the door of the car and was presenting his arm to the lady. "You can shut the door," said Miss Pinckney. "I'm not getting out. The thing's not more outrageous than your getting up like that right after an attack and dragging me a hundred miles from Charleston over hill and dale--I'm not getting out, I'm going right back--right back to Charleston." The Colonel turned his head and called to a darkey that had appeared at the front door. "Take the luggage in," said he. Miss Pinckney got out of the car despite herself, half laughing, half angry, and taking the gallantly proffered arm found herself being led up the steps of Grangersons, pausing half way up to introduce Phyl, whom she had completely forgotten till now. The Colonel, like his son Silas, as will presently be seen, had a direct way with women; the Grangersons had pretty nearly always fallen in love at sight and run away with their wives. Colonel Seth's father had done this, meeting, marrying and fascinating the beautiful Maria Tredegar, and carrying her off under his arm like a hypnotised fowl, and from under the noses of half a dozen more eligible suitors, just as now, the Colonel was carrying Maria Pinckney off into his house half against her will. Phyl following them, gazed round at the fine old oak panelled hall, from which they were led into the drawing room, a room not unlike the drawing room at Vernons, but larger and giving a view of the garden where the oleanders and cherokee money and the crescent leaves of the blue gum trees were moving in the wind. Colonel Seth, despite the war, had plenty of roses and Grangersons was kept up in the old style. Just as in Nuremberg and Vittoria we see mediæval cities preserved, so to speak, under glass, so at Grangersons one found the old Plantation, house and all, miraculously intact, living, almost, one might say, breathing. The price of cotton did not matter much to the Colonel, nor the price of haulage. This son of the Southerner who had refused to be beaten by the North in the war, cared for nothing much beyond the ring of sky that made his horizon. Twice a year he made a visit to Charleston, driving in his own carriage, occasionally he visited Richmond or Durham, where he had an interest in tobacco; New York he had never seen. He loathed railways and automobiles, mainly, perhaps, because they were inventions of the North, that is to say the devil. He had a devilish hatred of the North. Not of Northerners, but just of the North. The word North set his teeth on edge. It did not matter to him that Charleston was picking up some prosperity in the way of phosphates, or that Chattanooga was smelting ore into money, or that industrial prosperity was abroad in the land; he was old enough to have a recollection of old days, and from the North had come the chilly blast that had blown away that age. A servant brought in cake and wine to stay the travellers till dinner time, refreshment that Miss Pinckney positively refused at first. "You will stay the night," said the Colonel, as he helped her, "and Sarah will show you to your rooms when we have had a word together." Miss Pinckney, sipping her wine, made no reply, then placing the scarcely touched glass on the table and with her bonnet strings thrown back, she turned to the Colonel. "Do you see the likeness?" said she. "What likeness?" asked the old gentleman. "Why, God bless my soul, the likeness to Juliet Mascarene. Phyl, turn your face to the light." The Colonel, searching in his waistcoat pocket, found a pair of folding glasses and put them on. "She gets it from her mother's side," said Miss Pinckney, "the Lord knows how it is these things happen, but it's Juliet, isn't it?" The Colonel removed his glasses, wiped them with his handkerchief, and returned them to his pocket. "It is," said he. Then in the fine old fashion he turned to the girl, raised her hand to his lips and kissed it. "Phyl," said Miss Pinckney, "would not you like to have a look at the garden whilst we have a chat? Old people's talk isn't of much interest to young people." "Old people," cried the warrior. "There are no old people in this room." He made for the door and opened it for Phyl, then he accompanied her into the hall, where at the still open door he pointed the way to the garden. CHAPTER II Outside Phyl stood for a moment to breathe the warm scented air and look around her. To be treated like a child by any other person than Maria Pinckney would have incensed her, all the same to be told to do a thing because it was good for her, or because it was a pleasant thing to do, in the teller's opinion, was an almost certain way of making her do the exact opposite. The garden did not attract her, the place did. That cypress avenue with the sun upon it, that broad sweep of drive in front of the house, the distant peeps of country between trees and the languorous lazy atmosphere of the perfect day fascinated her mind. She came along the house front to the right, and found herself at the gate of the stable yard. The stable yard of Grangersons was an immense flagged quadrangle bounded on the right, counting from the point of entrance, by the kitchen premises. There was stable room for forty horses, coach-house accommodation for a dozen or more carriages. The car had been run into one of the coach-houses and the yard stood empty, sunlit, silent, save for the voices of the pigeons wheeling in the air, or strutting on the roof of the great barn adjoining the stables. One of the stable doors was open and as Phyl crossed the yard a young man appeared at the open door, shaded his eyes and looked at her. Then he came forward. It was Silas Grangerson, and Phyl thought he was the handsomest and most graceful person she had ever seen in her life. Silas was a shade over six feet in height, dark, straight, slim yet perfectly proportioned; his face was extraordinary, the most vivid thing one would meet in a year's journey, and with a daring, and at times, almost a mad look unforgettable when once glimpsed. Like the Colonel and like his ancestors Silas had a direct way with women. "Hallo," said he, with the sunny smile of old acquaintanceship, "where have _you_ sprung from?" Phyl was startled for a moment, then almost instantly she came in touch with the vein and mood and mind of the other and laughed. "I came with Miss Pinckney," said she. "You're not from Charleston?" "Yes, indeed I am." "But where do you live in Charleston? I've never seen you and I know every--besides you don't look as if you belonged to Charleston--I don't believe you've come from there." "Then where do you think I've come from?" "I don't know," said Silas laughing, "but it doesn't matter as long as you're here, does it? 'Scuse my fooling, won't you--I wouldn't with a stranger, but you don't seem a stranger somehow--though I don't know your name." "Phylice Berknowles," said Phyl, glancing up at him and half wondering how it was that, despite his good looks, his manhood, and their total unacquaintanceship, she felt as little constrained in his presence as though he were a boy. "And my name is Silas Grangerson. Say, is Maria Pinckney in the house with father?" "She is." "Talking over old times, I s'pose?" said Silas. "Yes!" "I can hear them. It's always the same when they get together--and I suppose you got sick of it and came out?" "No, they put me out--asked me wouldn't I like to look at the garden." Already she had banded herself with him in mild opposition to the elders. "Great--Jerusalem. They're just like a pair of old horses wanting to be left quiet and rub their nose-bags together. Look at the garden! I can hear them--come on and look at the horses." He led the way to a loose box and opened the upper door. "That's Flying Fox, she's mine, the fastest trotter in the Carolinas--you know anything about horses?" "Rather!" "I thought you did, somehow. Mind! she doesn't take to strangers. Mind! she bites like an alligator." "Not me," said Phyl, fondling the lovely but fleering-eyed head protruding above the lower door. "So she doesn't," said Silas admiringly, "she's taken to you--well, I don't blame her. Here's John Barleycorn," opening another door, "own brother to the Fox, he's Pap's; he's a bolter, and kicks like a duck gun. She's got all her vice at one end of her and he at the other, match pair." He whistled between his teeth as he put up the bars, then he shewed other horses, Phyl watching his every movement, and wondering what it was that gave pleasure to her in watching. Silas moved, or seemed to move, absolutely without effort, and his slim brown hands touched everything delicately, as though they were touching fragile porcelain, yet those same hands could bend an iron bar, or rein in John Barleycorn even when the bit was between the said J. B.'s teeth. "That's the horses," said he, flinging open a coach-house door, "and that's the shandrydan the governor still drives in when he goes to Charleston. Look at it. It was made in the forties, and you should see it with a darkey on the box and Pap inside, and all his luggage behind, and he going off to Charleston, and the nigger children running after it." Phyl inspected the mustard-yellow vehicle. Then he closed the door on it, put up the bar, and, the business of showing things over, did a little double shuffle as though Phyl were not present, or as though she were a boy friend and not a strange young woman. "Say, do you like poetry?" said he, breaking off and seeming suddenly to remember her presence. "No," said Phyl. "At least--" "Well, here's some. "'There was an old hen and she had a wooden leg, She went to the barn and she laid a wooden egg, She laid it right down by the barn--don't you think.'" "Well?" said she, laughing. "'It's just about time for another little drink--' some sense in poetry like that, isn't there? But all the drinks are in the house and I don't want to go in. I'm hiding from Pap. Last night when he was ratty with rheumatism, he let out at me, saying the young people weren't any good, saying Maria Pinckney was the only person he knew with sense in her head, called me a name because I poured him out a dose of liniment instead of medicine, by mistake--though he didn't swallow it--and wished Maria was here. So I just sent Jake, the page boy, off with a wire to her; didn't tell any one, just sent it. Come on and look at the garden--you've got to look at the garden, you know." He led the way past the barn to a farmyard, where hens were clucking and scratching and scraping in the sunshine; the deep double bass grunting of pigs came from the sties, by the low wall across which one could see the country stretching far away, the cotton fields, the woods, all hazed by the warmth of the afternoon. "Let's sit down and look at the garden," said he, pointing to a huge log by the near wall--"and aren't the convolvuluses beautiful?" "Beautiful," said Phyl, falling into the vein of the other. "And listen to the roses." "They grunt like that because it's near dinner time--they're pretty much like humans." He took a cigarette case from his pocket and a cigarette from the case. "You don't mind smoking, do you?" "Not a bit." "Have one?" "I daren't." "Maria Pinckney won't know." "It's not her--I smoked one once and it made me sick." "Well, try another--I won't look if you are." "They'll--she'll smell it." "Not she, you can eat some parsley, that takes the smell away." "Oh, I don't mind telling her--it's only--well, there." She took a cigarette and he lit it for her. "Blow it through your nose," he commanded, "that's the way. Now let's pretend we're two old darkies sitting on a log, you push against me and I'll push against you, you're Jim and I'm Uncle Joseph. 'What yo' crowding me for, Jim,'" he squeezed up gently against her, and Phyl jumped to her feet. He glanced up at her, sideways, laughing, and for the life of her she could not be angry. "Don't you think we'd better go and look at the garden?" said she. "In a minute, sit down again. I won't knock against you. It was only my fun. We'll pretend I'm Pap, and you're Maria Pinckney, if you like. You've let your cigarette go out." "So I have." "You can light it from mine." Phyl hesitated and was lost. It was the nearest thing to a kiss, and as she drew back with the lighted cigarette between her lips, she felt a not unpleasant sense of wickedness, such as the virtuous boy feels when led to adventure by the bad boy. Sitting on a log, smoking cigarettes, talking familiarly with a stranger, taking a light from him in such a fashion with her face so close to his that his eyes-- They smoked in silence for a moment. Then Silas spoke: "Do you ever feel lonesome?" said he. "Awfully--sometimes." "So do I." Silence for a moment. Then: "I go off to Charleston when I feel like that--once in a fortnight or so--Where do you live in Charleston?" "I live with Miss Pinckney--I thought you knew." "You didn't say that. You only said you came with her." "Well, I live with her at Vernons. I'm Irish, y' know. My--my father died in Charleston, and I came from Ireland to live with Miss Pinckney. Mr. Richard Pinckney is my guardian." "Your which? Dick Pinckney your guardian! Why, he's not older than I am--that fellow your guardian--why, he wears a flannel petticoat." "He doesn't," cried Phyl, flinging away the cigarette, which had become noxious, and roused to sudden anger by the slighting tone of the other. "What do you mean by saying such a thing?" "Oh, I only meant that he's too awfully proper for this life. He goes to Charleston races, but never backs a horse, scarcely, and one Mint Julep would make him see two crows. He's a sort of distant relation of ours." Phyl was silent. She resented his criticism of her friend, and just in this moment the something mad and harum scarum in the character of Silas seemed shown up to her with electrical effect. Criticism is a most dangerous thing to indulge in, unless anonymously in the pages of a journal, for the right to criticise has to be made good in the mind of the audience, unless the audience is hostile to the criticised. Then she said: "I don't know anything about Mint Juleps or race courses, but I do know that Mr. Pinckney has been--is--is my friend, and I'd rather not talk about him, if you please." "Now, you're huffed," cried Silas exultingly, as though he had scored a point at some game. "I'm not." "You are--you've flushed." Phyl turned pale, a deadly sign. "I'd never dream of getting out of temper with _you_," said she. It was his turn to flush. You might have struck Silas Grangerson without upsetting his balance, but the slightest suspicion of a sneer raised all the devil in him. Had Phyl been a man he would have knocked him off the log. He cast the stump of his cigarette on the ground and pounded it with his heel. Had there been anything breakable within reach he would have broken it. Her anger with him vanished and she laughed. "You've flushed now," said she. CHAPTER III When they came round to the front of the house they found Colonel Grangerson and Miss Pinckney coming down the steps. They were going to the garden in search of Phyl. "We've been looking at the horses," said Silas, after he had greeted Miss Pinckney. "No, sir, I did not leave any of the doors open, but I've been looking for Sam with a blacksnake whip to liven him up. He left the grey without grooming after she was brought in this morning, and I was rubbing her down myself when this lady came into the yard." "I'll skin that nigger," cried the Colonel. "I reckon I'll save you that trouble, sir," replied the son, as they turned garden-wards. Silas had little use for "r's" and said "suh" for "sir" and "wah" for "war." He was also quite a different person in the presence of his father from what he was when alone or in the presence of strangers. In the presence of his father, past generations spoke in his every word and action, he became sedate, deferential, leisurely. It was not fear of the elder man that caused this change, it was reflection from him. The shadows were long in the garden, and away across the pastures, glimpsed beyond the cypress hedge and bordering the cotton fields, the pond-shadows cast by the live oaks at noon had become river shadows, flowing eastward; the murmur of bees filled the air like a haze of sound, and here and there as they passed a bush coloured flowers detached themselves and became butterflies. They sat down on a great old stone bench lichened and sun warmed to enjoy the view, and the Colonel talked of tobacco and politics and cotton, including them all in his conversation in the grand patriarchal manner. Phyl understanding little, and half drowsed by the warmth and the buzzing of the bees and the voice of the speaker, had given herself up to that lazy condition of mind which is the next best thing to sleep, when she was suddenly aroused. She was seated between Miss Pinckney and Silas. Silas had pinched her little finger. She snatched her hand away, and turned towards him. He was looking away over the pastures; his profile showed nothing but its absolute correctness. Miss Pinckney had noticed nothing, and the Colonel, who had finished with cotton, looking at his watch, declared that it was close on dinner time. After supper that night, Phyl found herself in the garden. Silas had not appeared at supper; the Colonel had brought down a book of old photographs, photographs of people and places dead or changed, and he and Miss Pinckney became so absorbed in them that they had little thought for the girl. She went out to look at the moon, and it was worth looking at, rising like a honey coloured shield above the belt of the eastern woods. The whole world was filled with the moonlight, warm tinted, and ghostly as the light of vanished days, white moths were flitting above the bushes, and on the almost windless air the voice of an owl came across the cotton fields. Phyl reached the seat where they had all sat that afternoon. It was still warm from the all-day sunshine, and she sat down to rest and listen. The owl had ceased crying, and through the league wide silence faint sounds far and near told of the life moving and thrilling beneath the night; the boom of a beetle, voices from the distant road, and now and then a whisper of wind rising and dying out across the garden and the trees. A faint sound came from behind the seat, and before Phyl could turn two warm hands covered her eyes. She plucked them away and stood up. "I _wish_ you wouldn't do things like that," she cried. "How _dare_ you?" "I couldn't help it," replied the other, "you looked so comfortable. I didn't mean to startle you. I thought you must have heard me coming across the grass." "I didn't--and you shouldn't have done it." "Well, I'm sorry. There, I've apologised, make friends." "There is nothing to make friends about," she replied stiffly. "No, I don't want to shake hands--I'm not angry, let us go into the house." "Don't," said Silas imploringly. "He and she are sitting over that old album, comparing notes. I saw them through the window, that's why I came to look for you in the garden. Do you know, I believe the Governor was gone once on Maria, years ago, but they never got married. He married my mother instead." Phyl forgot her resentment. The faint idea that Colonel Grangerson and Maria Pinckney had perhaps been more than friends in long gone days, had strayed across her mind, to be dismissed as a fancy. It interested her to find Silas confirming it. "Of course, I can't say for certain," he went on, lighting a cigarette. "I only judge by the way they go on when they're together, and the way he talks of her. Say, do you ever want to grow old?" "No, I don't--ever." "Neither do I. I hope I'll be kicked to death by a horse, or drowned or shot before I'm forty. I don't want to die in any beds with doctors round me. I reckon if I'm ever like that I'll drink the liniment instead of the medicine--same as I nearly drenched Pap--and go to heaven with a red label for my ticket. Sit down for a while and let's talk." "No, I don't care to sit down." "I won't touch you. I promise." Phyl hesitated a moment and then sat down. She was not afraid of Silas in the least, but his tricks of an overgrown boy did not please her; it seemed to her sometimes as though his irresponsibility was less an inheritance from youth, than from some ancestor ill-balanced to the point of craziness. If any other man of his age had acted and spoken to her as he had done she would have smacked his face, but Silas was Silas, and his good looks and seeming innocence, and something really charming that lay away at the back of his character and gave colour to this personality, managed, somehow, to condone his queerness of conduct. All the same she sat a foot away from him on the seat, and kept her hands folded on her lap. Silas sat for a while smoking in silence, then he spoke. "Where's this you said you came from?" "Ireland." "You don't talk like a Paddy a bit." "Don't I?" "Not a bit, nor look like one." "Have you seen many Irish people?" "No, mostly in pictures--comic papers, you know, like _Puck_." "I think it's a shame," broke out Phyl. "People are always making fun of the Irish, drawing them like monkeys with great upper lips--but it's only ignorant people who never travel who think of them like that." "That's so, I expect," replied Silas, either unconscious of the dig at himself or undesirous of a quarrel, "and the next few dollars I have to spare I'll go to Ireland. I'm crazy now to see it." "What's made you crazy to see it?" "Because it's the place you come from." Phyl sniffed. "I hate compliments." "I wasn't complimenting you, I was complimenting Ireland," said Silas sweetly. She was silent, a white moth passing close to her held her gaze for a moment, then it flitted away across the bushes. "Let's forget Ireland for a moment," said she, "and talk of Charleston. Do you know many people there?" "I know most every one. The Pinckneys and Calhouns and Tredegars and Revenalls and--" "Rhetts." "Yes--but there are a dozen Rhetts; same as there's half a hundred Pinckneys and Calhouns, families, I mean. What's his name--Richard Pinckney, your guardian, is engaged to a Rhett." "He is not." "He is--Venetia Frances, the one that lives in Legare Street. Why, I've seen them canoodling often, and every one says they are engaged." "Well, he's not, or Miss Pinckney would have told me." "Oh, she's blind. I tell you he is, and she'll be your guardian when he's married her." "That she won't," said Phyl. "How'll you help it? A man and wife are one." "He's only guardian of my property." "Well, Heaven help your property when she gets a finger in the pie; she'll spend it on hats--sure." This outrageous statement, uttered with a laugh, left Phyl cold. The statement about Frances Rhett had disturbed her, she could not tell exactly why, for it was none of her business whom Pinckney might choose to marry--still--Frances Rhett! It was almost as though an antagonism had existed between them since that afternoon when she had seen Frances first, driving in the car with Richard Pinckney. She rose to her feet and Silas rose also, throwing away the end of his cigarette. "Going into the house?" said he. "Yes!" "Well, you'll be off to-morrow morning, and I won't see you, for I have to be out early, but I'll see you in Charleston, though not at Vernons maybe, for I'm not in love with Richard Pinckney, and I don't care much for visiting his house. But I'll see you somewhere, sure." "Good-bye," said she holding out her hand. He took it, held it, and then, all of a sudden, she found herself in his arms. Helpless as a child, in his arms and smothered with kisses. He kissed her on the mouth, on the forehead, on the chin, and with a last kiss on the mouth that made her feel as though her life were going from her, he vanished. Vanished amidst the bushes whilst she stood, tottering, dazed, breathless, outraged, yet--in some extraordinary way not angry. Pulled between tears and laughter, resentment, and a strange new feeling suddenly born in her from his burning lips, and the strength that had held her for a moment to itself. In one moment, and as though with the stroke of a sword, Silas had cut down the barrier that had divided her from the reality of things. He had kissed away her childhood. Then throwing out her hands as though pushing away some presence that was surrounding her, she ran to the house. In the hall she sat down for a moment to recover herself before going into the drawing room, where Miss Pinckney and the Colonel were closing the book which held for them the people and the places they had known in youth, and between its leaves who knows what old remembrances, like the withered flower that has once formed part of a summer's day. CHAPTER IV They started at ten o'clock next morning for Charleston, the Colonel standing on the house steps and waving his hand to them as they drove off. Silas was nowhere to be seen, he had gone out before breakfast, so the butler said, and had not returned. Miss Pinckney resented this casual treatment. "He ought to have been here to bid us good-bye," said she, as they cleared the avenue. "He's got the name for being a mad creature, but even mad creatures may show common courtesy. I'm sure I don't know where he gets his manners from unless it's his mother's lot, same place as he got his good looks." "Why do you say he's mad?" asked Phyl. "Because he is. Not exactly mad, maybe, but eccentric, he swum Charleston harbour with his clothes on because some one dared him, and was nearly drowned with the tide coming in or going out, I forget which; and another day he got on the engine at Charleston station and started the train, drove it too, till they managed to climb over the top of the carriages or something and stop him--at least that's the story. He'll come to a bad end, that boy, unless he mends his ways. Lots of people say he's got good in him. So he has, perhaps, but it's just that sort that come to the worst end, unless the good manages to fight the bad and get it under in time." Phyl said nothing. Her mind was disturbed. She had slept scarcely at all during the night, and her feelings towards Silas Grangerson, now that she was beyond his reach, were alternating in the strangest way between attraction and repulsion. They would have repelled the thought of him entirely but for the instinctive recognition of the fact that his conduct had been the result of impulse, the impulse of a child, ill governed, and accustomed to seize what it wanted. Added to that was the fact of his entire naturalness. From the moment of their first meeting he had talked to her as though they were old acquaintances. Unless when talking to his father, everything in his manner, tone, conversation was free, unfettered by convention, fresh, if at times startling. This was his great charm, and at the same time his great defect, for it revealed his want of qualities no less than his qualities. Do what she could she was unable to escape from the incident of last night, it was as though those strong arms had not quite released their hold upon her, as though Pan had broken from the bushes, shown her by his magic things she had never dreamed of, and vanished. It was nearly two o'clock when they reached Vernons. Richard Pinckney was at home, and at the sight of him Phyl's heart went out towards him. Clean, well groomed, honest, kindly, he was like a breath of fresh sea air after breathing tropical swamp atmosphere. Strange to say Miss Pinckney seemed to feel somewhat the same. "Yes, we're back," said she, as they passed into the dining-room where some refreshments were awaiting them, "and glad I am to be back. Vernons smells good after Grangersons. Oh, dear me, what is it that clings to that place? It's like opening an old trunk that's been shut for years. I told Seth Grangerson, right out flat, he ought to get away from there into the world somewhere, but there he sits clinging to his rheumatism and the past. I declare I nearly cried last night as he was showing me all those old pictures." "He's not very ill then," said Richard. "Ill! Not he. It was that fool Silas sent the telegram. Just an attack of rheumatism." She went upstairs to change and the two young people went into the garden, where Richard Pinckney was having some alterations done. On the day Phyl's hair went up it seemed to Richard that a new person had come to live with them. Phyl had suddenly turned into a young woman--and such a young woman! He had never considered her looks before, to young men of his age and temperament girls in pigtails are, as far as the manhood in them is concerned, little more and sometimes less than things. But Phyl with her hair up was not to be denied, and had he not been philandering after Frances Rhett, and had Phyl been a total stranger suddenly seen, it is quite possible that a far warmer feeling than admiration might have been the result. As it was she formed a new interest in life. He showed her the alterations he was making, slight enough and causing little change in the general plan of the garden. "I scarcely like doing anything," said he, "but that new walk will be no end of an improvement, and it will save that bit of grass which is being trodden to death by people crossing it, then there's all those bushes by the gate, they're going, those behind the tree,--a little space there will make all the difference in the world." "Behind the magnolia?" "Yes." "I wish you wouldn't," said Phyl. "Why?" "Because they have been there always and--well, look!" She led the way behind the tree, pushed the bushes aside and disclosed the seat. She no longer felt that she was betraying a secret. Her experience at Grangersons had in some way made Vernons seem to her now really her home, and Richard Pinckney closer to her in relationship. "Why, how did you know that was there?" said Richard. "I've never seen it." "Juliet Mascarene used to sit there with--with some one she was in love with. I found some of her old letters and they told about it--see, it's a little arbour, used to be, though it's all so overgrown now." "Juliet," said he. "That was the girl who died. I have heard Aunt Maria talk about her and she keeps her room just as it used to be. Who was the somebody?" "It was a Mr. Rupert Pinckney." "I knew there was a love story of some sort connected with her, but I never worried about the details. So they used to come and sit here." "Yes, he'd come to the gate at night and she'd meet him. Her people did not want her to marry him and so they had to meet in secret." "That was a long time ago." "Before you were born," said Phyl. He looked at her. "Aunt is always saying how like you are to her," said he, "but she's mad on family likenesses, and I never thought of it. It may be a want in me but I've never taken much interest in dead relatives; but somehow, finding this little place tucked away here gives one a jog. It's like finding a nest in a tree. How long have you known of it?" "Oh, some time. I found a bundle of her old letters--" she paused. Richard Pinckney had taken his place on the little seat, just as one sits down in an armchair to see if it is comfortable, and was leaning back amidst the bush branches. "This is all right," said he, "sit down, there's lots of room--you found her letter, tell us all about it." Phyl sat down and told the little story. It seemed to interest him. "The Pinckneys lost money," said he, "and that's why the old Mascarene birds were set against her marrying him, I suppose. Makes one wild that sort of thing. What right have people to interfere?" "Money seems everything in this world," said Phyl. "It's not--it seems to be, but it's not. Money can't buy happiness after one is grown up. You remember I told you that over in Ireland; when candy and fishing rods mean happiness money is all right--after that money is useful enough, but it's the making of it and not the spending it that counts,--that and a lot of things that have nothing to do with money. If the Mascarenes hadn't been fools they'd have seen that a poor man with kick in him--and the Pinckneys always had that--was as good as a rich man, and those two might have got married." "No," said Phyl, "they never could have got married, he had to die. He was killed, you know, at the beginning of the war." "You're a fatalist." "Well, things happen." "Yes, but you can stop them happening very often." "How?" "Just by willing it." "Yes," said Phyl meditatively, "but how are you to use your will against what comes unexpectedly. Now that telegram yesterday morning took me to Grangersons with Miss Pinckney. Suppose--suppose I had broken my leg or, say, fallen into a well there and got drowned--that would have been Fate." "No," said Pinckney, "carelessness, the telegram would not have drowned you, but your carelessness in going too close to the well." "Suppose," said Phyl, "instead of that, Mr. Silas Grangerson had shot me by accident with a gun--the telegram would have brought me to that without any carelessness of mine." "No, it couldn't," said Pinckney lightly, "it would still have been your own fault for going near such a hare-brained scamp. Oh, I'm only joking, what I really mean is that nine times out of ten the thing people call Fate is nothing more than want of foresight." "And the tenth time it is Fate," said Phyl rising. CHAPTER V Next morning brought Phyl a letter. It came by the early post, so that she got it in her bedroom before coming down. Phyl had few correspondents and she looked at the envelope curiously before opening it. "Miss Berknowles, at Vernons. Charleston." ran the address written in a large, boyish, yet individual hand. She knew at once and by instinct whom it was from. "I'm coming to Charleston in a day or two, and I want to see you," ran the letter which had neither address nor date, "but I'm not coming to Pinckneys. I'll be about town and sure to find you somewhere. I can't get you out of my mind since last night. Tried to, but can't." That was all. Phyl put the letter back in its envelope. She was not angry, she was disturbed. There was an assurance about Silas Grangerson daunting in its simplicity and directness. Something that raised opposition to him in her heart, yet paralysed it. Instinct told her to avoid him, to drive him from her mind, ay and something more than instinct. The spirit of Vernons, the calm sweet soul of the place, that seemed to hold the past and the present, Juliet and herself, peace and happiness with the promise of all good things in the future, this spirit rose up against Silas Grangerson as though he were the antagonist to happiness and peace, Juliet and herself, the present and the past. Rose up, without prevailing entirely. Silas had impressed himself upon her mind in such a manner that she could not free herself from the impression. Young as she was, with the terribly clear perception of the male character which all women possess in different degrees, she recognised that Silas was dangerous to that logical and equitable state of existence we call happiness, not on account of his wildness or his eccentricities, but because of some want inherent in his nature, something that spoke vaguely in his words and his actions, in his handsome face and in his careless and graceful manner. All the same she could not free herself from the impression he had made upon her, she could not drive him from her mind, he had in some way paralysed her volition, called forces to his aid from some unknown part of her nature, perhaps with those kisses which she still felt upon the very face of her soul. She came down to breakfast, and afterwards finding herself alone with Miss Pinckney, she took Silas's letter from her pocket and handed it to her. She had been debating in her own mind all breakfast time as to whether she ought to show the letter; the struggle had been between her instinct to do the right thing, and a powerful antagonism to this instinct which was a new thing in her. The latter won. And then, lo and behold, when she found herself alone with Miss Pinckney in the sunlit breakfast room, almost against her will and just as though her hand had moved of its own volition, she put it in her pocket and produced the letter. Miss Pinckney read it. "Well, of all the crazy creatures!" said she. "Why, he has only met you once. He's mad! No, he isn't--he's a Grangerson. I know them." She stopped short and re-read the letter, turned it about and then laid it down. "Just as if he'd known you for years. And you scarcely spoke to him. Did he _say_ anything to you as if he cared for you?" "No, he didn't," said Phyl quite truthfully. "Did he look at you as if he cared for you?" "No," replied the other, dreading another question. But Miss Pinckney did not put it. She could not conceive a man kissing a girl who had never betrayed his feelings for her by word or glance. "Well, it gets me. It does indeed; acting like a dumb creature and then writing this-- Do you care for _him_?" "I--I--no--you see, I don't know him--much." "Well, he seems to know you pretty well, there's no doubt about one thing, Silas Grangerson can make up his mind pretty quick. He won't come to Vernons, won't he? Well, maybe it's better for him not, for I've no patience with oddities. That's what's wrong with him, he's an oddity, and it's those sort of people make the trouble in life--they're worse than whisky and cards for bringing unhappiness. Years and years and years ago--I'm telling you this though I've never told it to any one else--Seth Grangerson, Silas's father, seemed to care for me, not much, still he seemed to care. Then one day all at once he came into the room where I was, through the window, and told me to come off and get married to him, wanted me to go away right off. I was a fool in those days, but not all a fool, and when he tried to put his arm round my waist, my hand went up and smacked his face. "We are good enough friends now, but I've often thought of what I escaped by not marrying him. You saw him and the life he's leading at that out of the way place, but you didn't see his obstinacy and his queerness, and Silas is ten times worse, more crazy--well, there, you're warned--but mind you I don't want to be meddling. I've seen so many carefully prepared marriages turn out pure miseries, and so many crazy matches turn out happily, that I'm more than cautious in giving advice. Seems to me that people before they are married are quite different creatures to what they turn out after they are married." "But I don't want to get married," said Phyl. "No, but, seems to me, Silas does," replied the other. CHAPTER VI One bright morning three days later, as Phyl was crossing Meeting Street near the Charleston Hotel, whom should she meet but Silas. Silas in town get up, quite a different looking individual from the Silas of Grangersons, dressed in perfectly fitting light grey tweed, a figure almost condoning one for the use of that old-time, half-discredited word "Elegant." "There you are," said Silas, his face lighting up. "I thought it wouldn't be long before I met you. Meeting Street is like a rabbit run, and I reckon the whole of Charleston passes through it twice a day." His manner was genuinely frank and open, and he seemed to have completely forgotten the incident of the kissing. Phyl said nothing for a moment; she felt put out, angry at having been caught like a rabbit, and not over pleased at being compared to one. Then she spoke freezingly enough: "I don't know much about the habits of Charleston; you will not find _me_ here every day. I have only been out twice here alone and--I'm in a hurry." "Why, what's the matter with you?" cried Silas in a voice of astonishment. "Nothing." "But there is, you're not angry with me, are you?" "Not in the least," replied the other, quite determined to avoid being drawn into explanations. "Well, that's all right. You don't mind my walking with you a bit?" "No!" "I only came here last night, and I'm putting up at the Charleston," said Silas. "Of course there are a lot of friends I could stay with but I always prefer being free; one is never quite free in another person's house; for one thing you can't order the servants about, though, upon my word, now-a-days one can't do that, much, anywhere." "I suppose not," said Phyl. The fact was being borne in upon her that Silas in town was a different person from Silas in the country, or seemed so; more sedate and more conventional. She also noticed as they walked along that he was saluted by a great many people, and also, before she had done with him that morning, she noticed that the leery, impudent looking, coloured folk seemed to come under a blight as they passed him, giving him the wall and yards to spare. It was as though the impersonification of the blacksnake whip were walking with her as well as a most notoriously dangerous man, a man who would strike another down, white or coloured, for a glance, not to say a word. She had come out on business, commissioned by Miss Pinckney to purchase a ball of magenta Berlin wool. Miss Pinckney still knitted antimacassars, and the construction of antimacassars is impossible without Berlin wool--that obsolete form of German Frightfulness. She bestowed the things on poor folk to brighten their homes. When Phyl went into the store to buy the wool Silas waited outside, and when she came out they walked down the street together. She had intended returning straight home after making her purchase but they were walking now not towards Vernons but towards the Battery. "What do you do with yourself all day?" asked Silas, suddenly breaking silence. "Oh, I don't know," she replied, "nothing much--we go out for drives." "In that old basket carriage thing?" "With Miss Pinckney." "I know, I've seen her often--what else do you do?" "Oh, I read." "What do you read?" "Books." "Doesn't Pinckney ever take you out?" "No, I don't go out much with Mr. Pinckney; you see, he's generally so busy." Silas sniffed. They had reached the Battery and were standing looking over the blue water of the harbour. The day was perfect, dreamy, heavenly, warm and filled with sea scents and harbour sounds; scarcely a breath of wind stirred across the water where a three-master was being towed to her moorings by a tug. "She's coming up to the wharves," said Silas. "They steer by the spire of St. Philips, the line between there and Fort Sumpter is all deep water. How'd you like to be a sailor?" "Wouldn't mind," said Phyl. "How'd you like to take a boat--I mean a decent sized fishing yawl and go off round the world, or even down Florida way? Florida's fine, you don't know Florida, it's got two coasts and it's hard to tell which is the best. From Indian River right round and up to Cedar Keys there's all sorts of fishing, and you can camp out on the reefs; one cooks one's own food and you can swim all day. There's tarpon and barracuda and sword fish, and nights when there's a moon you could see to read a book." "How jolly!" "Let's go there?" "How do you mean?" "Oh, just you and I. I'm fed up with everything. We could have a boatman to help sail and steer." He spoke lightly and laughingly, and without much enthusiasm and as though he were talking to some one of his own sex, and Phyl, not knowing how to take him, said nothing. He went on, his tone growing warmer. "I'm not joking, I'm dead sick of Grangersons and Charleston, and I reckon you are too--aren't you?" "No." "You may think so, but you are, all the same, without knowing it." "I think you are talking nonsense," said Phyl hurriedly, fighting against a deadly sort of paralysis of mind such as one may suppose comes upon the mind of a bird under the spell of a serpent. "No one could be kinder than Miss Pinckney, and so no one could be happier than I am. I love Vernons." "All the same," said Silas, "you are not really alive there. It's the life of a cabbage, must be, there's only you and Maria and--Pinckney. Maria is a decent old sort but she's only a woman, and as for Pinckney--he doesn't care for you." This statement suddenly brought Phyl to herself. It went through her like a knife. She had ceased to think of Richard Pinckney in any way but as a friend. At one time, during the first couple of days at Vernons, her heart had moved mysteriously towards him; the way he had connected himself through Prue's message with the love story of Juliet had drawn her towards him, but that spell had snapped; she was conscious only of friendliness towards Richard Pinckney. Why, then, this sudden pain caused by Silas's words? "How do you know?" she flashed out. "What right have you to dare--" She stopped. The blaze of her anger seemed to Silas evidence that she cared for Pinckney. "You're in love with him," said he, flying out. The bald and brutal statement took Phyl's breath from her. She turned on him, saw the anger in his face, and then--turned away. His state of mind condoned his words. To a woman a blow received from the passion she has roused is a rude sort of compliment, unlike other compliments it is absolutely honest. "I am in love with no one," said she; "you have no right to say such things--no right at all--they are insulting." A gull, white as snow, came flitting by and wheeled out away over the harbour; as her eyes followed it he stood looking at her, his anger gone, but his mind only half convinced by her feeble words. "I didn't mean to insult you," he said; "don't let us quarrel. When I'm in a temper I don't know what I say or do--that's the truth. I want to have you all for myself, have ever since the first moment I saw you over there at Grangersons." "Don't," said Phyl. "I can't listen to you if you talk like that--Please don't." "Very well," said Silas. The quick change that was one of his characteristics showed itself in his altered voice. His was a mind that seemed always in ambush, darting out on predatory expeditions and then vanishing back into obscurity. They turned away from the sea front and began to retrace their steps, silently at first, and then little by little falling into ordinary conversation again as though nothing had happened. Silas knew every corner of Charleston, and the history of every corner, and when he chose he could make his knowledge interesting. In this mood he was a pleasant companion, and Phyl, her recent experience almost forgotten, let herself be led and instructed, not knowing that this armistice was the equivalent of a defeat. She had already drawn much closer to him in mind, this companionship and quiet conversation was a more sure and deadly thing than any kisses or wild words. It would linger in her mind warm and quietly. Put in a woman's mind a pleasant recollection of yourself and you have established a force whose activity may seem small, but is in reality great, because of its permanency. They did not take a direct line in the direction of Vernons, and so presently found themselves in front of St. Michael's. The gate of the cemetery was open and they wandered in. The place was deserted, save by the birds, and the air perfumed by all manner of Southern growing things. Sun, shadow, silence, and that strange peace which hangs over the homes of the dead, all were here, ringed in by the old walls and the faint murmur of the living city beyond. They walked along the paths, looking at the tombstones, and pausing to read the inscriptions, Phyl gradually entering into that state of mind wherein reality and material things fall out of perspective. The fragrant elusive poetry of death, which can speak in the songs of birds and the scent of flowers in the sunshine and the shade of trees more clearly than in the voice of man, was speaking to her now. All these people here lying, all these names here inscribed, all these were the representatives of days once bright and now forgotten, love once sweet and now unknown. Then, as though something had led or betrayed her to the place, she paused where the graves lay half shadowed by a magnolia, she read the nearest inscription with a little catch of her breath. Then the further one. They were the graves of Juliet Mascarene and Rupert Pinckney, the dead lovers who had passed from the world almost together, whose bodies lay side by side in the cold bed of earth. In a moment the spell of the little arbour was around her again, in a moment the pregnant first impression of Vernons had re-seized her, fresh as though the commonplace touch of everyday life had never spoiled it. It was as though the spirit of Juliet and the spirit of the old house were saying to her "Have you forgotten us?" Tears welled to her eyes. Silas standing beside her was saying something, she did not know what. She scarcely heard him. Misinterpreting her silence, unconscious as an animal of her state of mind and the direction of her thoughts, the man at her side moved towards her slightly, seemed to hesitate, and then, suddenly clasping her by the waist kissed her upon the side of the neck. Phyl straightened like a bow when the string is released. Then she struck him, struck him open handed in the face, so that the sound of the blow might have been heard beyond the wall. His face blanched so that the mark on it showed up, he took a step back. For a moment Phyl thought he was going to spring upon her. Then he mastered himself, but if murder ever showed itself upon the countenance of man it showed itself in that half second on the countenance of Silas Grangerson. "You'll be sorry for that," said he. "Don't speak to me," said Phyl. "You are horrible--bad--wicked--I will tell Richard Pinckney." "Do," said Silas. "Tell him also I'll be even with him yet. You're in love with him, that's what's the matter with you--well, wait." He turned on his heel and walked off. He did not look back once. As he vanished from sight Phyl clasped her hands together. It was as though she had suddenly been shown the real Silas--or rather the something light and evil and dangerous, the something inscrutable and allied to insanity that inhabited his mind. She was not thinking of herself, she was thinking of Richard Pinckney. She felt that she had been the unconscious means of releasing against him an evil force. A force that might injure or destroy him. CHAPTER VII She came out of the cemetery. There was no sign of Silas in the street nor on the front of the church. Phyl had a full measure of the Celtic power to meet trouble halfway, to imagine disaster. As she hurried home she saw all manner of trouble, things happening to Richard Pinckney, and all brought about through herself. Amidst all these fancies she saw one fact: He must be warned. She found Miss Pinckney in the linen room. The linen room at Vernons was a treasure house beyond a man's description, perhaps even beyond his true appreciation. There in the cupboards with their thin old fashioned ring handles and on the shelves of red cedar reposed damask and double damask of the time when men paid for their purchases in guineas, miraculous preservations. Just as the life of a china vase is a perpetual escape from the stupidity of servant maids and the heaviness of clumsy fingers, so the life of these cream white oblongs, in which certain lights brought forth miraculous representations of flowers, festoons and birds, was a perpetual preservation from the moth, from damp, from dryness, from the dust that corrupts. A house like Vernons exists not by virtue of its brick and mortar; to keep it really alive it must be preserved in all its parts, not only from damp and decay, but from innovation; one can fancy a gas cooker sending a perpetual shudder through it, a telephone destroying who knows what fragrant old influences; the store cupboards and still room are part of its bowels, its napery, bed sheets, and hangings part of its dress. The man knew what he was doing who left Miss Pinckney a life interest in Vernons, it was that interest that kept Vernons alive. She was exercising it on the critical examination of some sheets when Phyl came into the room, now, with the wool she had purchased and the tale she had to tell. Miss Pinckney carefully put the sheet she was examining on one side, opened the parcel and looked at the wool. "I met Silas Grangerson," said Phyl as the other was examining the purchase with head turned on one side, holding it now in this light, now in that. "Silas Grangerson! Why, where on earth has he sprung from?" asked Miss Pinckney in a voice of surprise. "I don't know, but I met him in the street and we walked as far as the Battery and--and--" She hesitated for a moment, then it all came out. To no one but Maria Pinckney could she have told that story. "Well, of all the astounding creatures," said Miss Pinckney at last. "Did he ask you to marry him?" "No." "Just to run away with him--kissed you." "He kissed me at Grangersons." "At Grangersons. When?" "That night. I went into the garden and he came out from amongst some bushes." "Umph-- It's the family disease-- Well, if I get my fingers in his hair I promise to cure him. He wants curing. He'll just apologise, and that before he's an hour older. Where's he staying?" "No, no," said Phyl, "you mustn't ever say I told you. I don't mind. I would have said nothing only for Mr. Pinckney." "You mean Richard?" "Yes." "What has he to do with it?" Phyl did not hesitate nor turn her head away, though her cheeks were burning. "Silas Grangerson thinks I care for Mr. Pinckney, he said he would be even with him. I know he intends doing him some injury. I feel it--and I want you to warn him to be careful--without telling him, of course, what I have said." Miss Pinckney was silent for a moment. She had already matched Phyl and Richard in her mind. She had come to a very full understanding of her character, and she would have given all the linen at Vernons for the certainty that those two cared for one another. Frances Rhett rode her like an obsession. Life and nature had given Maria Pinckney an acquired and instinctive knowledge of character, and in the union of Richard and Frances Rhett she divined unhappiness, just as a clever seaman divines the unseen ice-berg in the ship's track. She smelt it. "Phyl," said she, "do you care for Richard?" The question quickly put and by those lips caused no confusion in the girl's mind. "No," said she. "At least-- Oh, I don't know how to explain it--I care for everything here, for Vernons and everything in it, it is all like a story that I love--Juliet and Vernons and the past and the present. He's part of it too. I want to have it always just as it is. I didn't tell you, but when that happened in the cemetery, I was looking at her grave; you never told me it was there with his. I came on it by accident and she was seeming to speak to me out of it. I was thinking of her and him, when--that happened. It was just as though some one had struck _her_ and him. I can't explain exactly." "Strange," said Miss Pinckney. She turned and began to put away with a thoughtful air the linen she had been examining. Then she said: "I'll tell Richard and warn him to keep away from that fool, not that there is any danger--but it is just as well to warn him." Phyl helped to put away the linen and then she went upstairs to her room. She felt easier in her mind and taking her seat on a cane couch by the window she fell into a book. The History of the Civil War. This bookworm had always one sure refuge in trouble--books. Books! Have we ever properly recognised the mystery and magic that lies in that word, the magic that allows a man to lead ever so many other lives than his own, to be other people, to travel where he has never been, to laugh with folk he has never seen, to know their sorrows as he can never know the sorrows of "real people"--and their joys. Phyl had been Robinson Crusoe and Jane Eyre, Monte Cristo and Jo. History which is so horribly unreal because it deals with real people had never appealed to her, but the history of the Civil War was different from others. It had to do with Vernons. CHAPTER VIII After luncheon that day Phyl, having nothing better to do, went up to her room and resumed her book. Richard Pinckney had not come in to luncheon, he rarely returned home for the meal, yet all the same, his absence made her uneasy. Suppose Silas Grangerson had met him--suppose they had fought? She called to recollection Silas's face just after she had struck him, the insane malevolence in it, the ugliness that had suddenly destroyed his good looks. Silas was capable of anything, he would never forgive that blow and he would try to return it, of that she felt certain. He could not avenge himself on her but he could on Richard. He imagined that she cared for Richard Pinckney. Did she? The question came to her again in Miss Pinckney's voice--she did not even try to answer it. As though it irritated her, she tossed the book she was holding in her hand to the floor and lay with her eyes fixed on the lace window curtains that were moving slightly to the almost imperceptible stirring of the air from outside. Beyond the curtains lay the golden afternoon. Sometimes a bird shadow, the loveliest thing in shadow-land, would cross the curtains, sometimes a note of song or the sound of a bird's flight from tree to tree would tell that there was a garden down below. The street beyond the garden and the city beyond the street could be heard, but were little more evident to the senses than those things in a picture which we guess but cannot see. Phyl, allowing her mind to be led by these faint and fugitive sounds, fell into a reverie. Then she fell asleep and straight way began to dream. She dreamed that Miss Pinckney was in the room moving about dusting things, a duster in one hand, an open letter in the other. There was troublous news of some sort in the letter, but what it was Miss Pinckney would not say. Then the room turned into the piazza, where Juliet Mascarene was standing with her hands on the rail, looking down on the garden. She seemed to know Juliet quite well and was not a bit surprised to see her there; she touched her but she did not turn. Phyl slipped her arm round Juliet's waist and stood with her looking at the garden, and as they stood thus the most curious dream feeling came upon her, a feeling of duality, Juliet was herself, she was Juliet. Then as this feeling died away Juliet vanished and she was standing alone on the piazza. Then she half woke, falling asleep again to be awakened fully by a sound. A sound, deep, sonorous, now rhythmical, now confused. It was the sound of guns. She had heard it once long ago on the Brighton coast, and now as she sat up every nerve and muscle tense, and her mind filled with a vague dread, it came so heavily that the walls of Vernons shook. She ran on to the piazza. There was no one there. The garden gate was wide open, there was no one in the garden, and she noticed, though without any astonishment, that some one had been at work in the garden altering the paths. A white butterfly was flittering above the flowers, and a red bird leaving the magnolia tree by the gate, flew, a splash of colour, across to the garden beyond. These things she saw but did not heed. She was under the spell of the guns, the sound rose against the brightness of the day as a black cloud rises across the sky or a sorrow across one's life, insistent, rhythmical, a pall of sound now billowing, now sinking, as though blown under by a wind. She sought the piazza stairs and next moment was in the garden, then she found herself in the street. Meeting Street was almost deserted. On the opposite side two stout, elderly and rather quaintly dressed gentlemen were walking along in the direction of the station, but away down towards the Charleston Hotel there was a crowd. The sight of this crowd filled her with terror, a terror remote from reason, an impersonal terror, as though the deadliest peril were threatening not herself but all things and everything she loved. She ran, and as she drew close to the striving mass of people she saw men bearing stretchers. They were pushing their way through the crowd, making to enter a house on the right. Then came a voice. The voice of one man shouting to another. "Young Pinckney's killed." The words pierced her like a sword, she felt herself falling. Falling through darkness to unconsciousness, from which she awoke to find herself lying on the cane couch in her room. She sat up. The curtains were still stirring gently to the faint wind from outside, on the floor lay the history of the Civil War open just as she had cast it there before falling asleep. The sound of the guns had ceased, and nothing was to be heard but the stray accustomed sounds of the city and the street. She struggled to her feet and came out on the piazza. The garden gate was closed and the garden was unaltered. She had dreamt all that, then. For a minute she tried to persuade herself that it was a dream, then she gave up the attempt. That was no dream. Everything in it was four square. She could still see the shadows of the two gentlemen who had been walking on the other side of the street, shadows cast clearly before them by the sun. The first part of her experience had been a dream, all that about Miss Pinckney and Juliet. But right from the sound of the guns all had been reality. She had seen, touched, heard. Glancing back into the room she saw the book lying on the floor, the sight of it was like a crystallising thread for thought. She had seen the past, she had heard the guns of the war. She went back into the room and took her seat on the couch and held her head between her hands. She recalled the terror that told her that everything she loved was in danger. When the man had cried out that young Pinckney was killed, it was the thought of the death of Richard Pinckney that struck her into unconsciousness. Yet she knew that what she had seen was the day of the death of Rupert Pinckney, that one of those figures carried on the stretchers was his figure, that her grief was for him. Had she then experienced what Juliet once experienced, seen what she saw, suffered what she suffered? Was she Juliet? The thought had approached her vaguely before this, so vaguely and so stealthily that she had not really perceived it. It stood before her now frankly in the full light of her mind. Was she Juliet, and was Richard Rupert Pinckney? She recalled that evening in Ireland when she had heard his voice for the first time, and the thrill of recognition that had passed through her, how, at the Druids' Altar that night she had heard her name called by his voice, the feeling in Dublin that something was drawing her towards America. Her feelings when she had first entered Meeting Street and the garden of Vernons, Miss Pinckney's surprise at her likeness to Juliet. Prue's recognition of her, the finding of those letters, the finding of the little arbour--any one of these things meant little in itself, taken all together they meant a great deal--and then this last experience. Her mind like a bird caught in a trap made frantic efforts to escape from the bars placed around it by conclusion; the idea seemed hateful, monstrous, viewed as reality. Fateful too, for that feeling of terror in the vision had all the significance of a warning. Then as she sat fighting against the unnatural, her imaginative and superstitious mind trembling at that which seemed beyond imagination, a miracle happened. The thought of danger to Richard Pinckney brought it about. All at once fear vanished, the fantastic clouds surrounding her broke, faded, passing, showing the blue sky, and Truth stood before her in the form of Love. It was as though the vision had brought it to her wrapped up in that terror she had felt for him. In a moment the fantasy of Juliet became as nothing beside the reality. If it were a thousand times true that she had once been Juliet what did it matter? She had loved Richard Pinckney always, so it seemed to her, and nothing at all mattered beside the recognition of that fact. Perfect love casteth out fear, even fear of the supernatural, even fear of Fate. * * * * * "Richard," said Miss Pinckney that night, finding herself alone with him, "that Silas Grangerson is in town and I want you to beware of him." "Silas," said he, "why I saw him at the club, he's gone back home by this, I expect, at least he said he was going back to-night. Why should I beware of him?" "He's such an irresponsible creature," she replied. "I'm going to tell you something, and mind, what I'm going to tell you is a secret you mustn't breathe to any one: he's in love with Phyl." "Silas?" "Yes. I knew it wouldn't be long before some one was after her. She's the prettiest girl in Charleston, and she's different from the others somehow." The cunning of the woman held her from praise of Phyl's goodness and mental qualities, or any over praise of the goods she was bringing to his attention. "Has he spoken to her about it?" asked he. "I'm sure to goodness I don't know what I'm about telling you a thing that was told to me in confidence," said the other. "Well, you promise never to say a word to Phyl or to any one else if I tell you." "I promise." "Well, he's--he's kissed her." Richard Pinckney leaned forward in his chair. He seemed very much disturbed in his mind. "Does she care for him?" "I don't believe she does--yet. They always begin like that; girls don't know their minds till all of a sudden they find some man who does." "Well, let's hope she never cares for Silas Grangerson," said he rising from his chair. "You know what he is." He left the room and went out on the piazza where the girl was sitting. He sat down beside her and they fell into talk. Richard Pinckney's mind was disturbed. Only the day before he had proposed to Frances Rhett and had been accepted. No one knew anything of the engagement; they had decided to say nothing about it for a while, but just keep it to themselves. The trouble with Pinckney was that Frances had, so to say, put the words of the proposal into his mouth. Frances had flirted with every man in Charleston; out of them all she had chosen Pinckney as a permanent attaché, not because she was in love with him but because he pleased her best. She matched him against the others, as a woman matches silk. Pinckney had allowed himself to be led along; there is nothing easier than to be led along by a pretty woman. When the trap had closed on him he recognised the fact without resenting it. He was no longer a free man. Phyl had told him this without speaking. For some time past he had been admiring her, and yesterday on returning in chains from Calhoun Street, Phyl picking roses in the garden seemed to him the prettiest picture he had seen for a long time, but it did not give him pleasure; it stirred the first vague uneasy recognition that his chains had wrought. He had no right to look at any girl but Frances--and he had been looking at her for a year without the picture stirring any wild enthusiasm in his mind. Miss Pinckney's revelation as to Silas had come to him as a blow. He could not tell what had hit him or exactly where he had been hit. What did it matter to him if a dozen men were in love with Phyl? What right had he to feel injured? None, yet he felt injured all the same. As he sat by her now in the lamp-lit piazza, the thought that would not leave his mind was the thought that Silas had kissed her. Behind the thought was the feeling of the boy who sees the other boy going off with the ripest and rosiest apple. And Phyl was charming to-night. Something seemed to have happened to her, increasing the power of her personality, her voice seemed ever so slightly changed, her manner was different. This was a woman, distinct from the girl of yesterday, as the full blown from the half blown flower. They talked of trifles for a while, and then he remembered something that he ought to have mentioned before. The Rhetts were giving a dance and they had sent an invitation to Phyl as well as Miss Pinckney. "It will be here by the morning post, I expect," said he. "You'd like to go, wouldn't you?" Phyl hesitated for a moment. "Is that--I mean is that young lady Miss Frances Rhett--the one who called here?" "Yes," cut in Pinckney, "those are the people. You'll come, won't you?" "Is Miss Pinckney going?" "She--of course she's going, she goes to everything, and old Mrs. Rhett is anxious to meet you." "It is very kind of them," said Phyl. "Yes, I'll come." But she spoke without enthusiasm, and it seemed to him that a chill had come over her. Did she know of his entanglement with Frances Rhett? And could it be-- He put the question aside. He had no right to indulge in any fancies at all about Phyl as regarded himself. Then Miss Pinckney came out on the piazza and Phyl rose to go into the house. CHAPTER IX When Silas Grangerson left the cemetery of St. Michael's he walked for half a mile without knowing or caring in what direction he was going. Phyl had done more than slap his face. She had slapped his pride, his assurance of himself, and his desire for her all at the same time. Silas rarely bothered about girls, yet he knew that he had the power to fascinate any woman once he put his mind to the work. He had not tried his powers of fascination on Phyl. It was the other way about. Phyl absolutely unconsciously had used her fascination upon him. Something in her, recognised by him on their first meeting in the stable yard, had put away the barrier of sex. He had talked to her as if she had been a boy. Sitting on the seat beside her whilst the Colonel had been prosing over politics and tobacco, the prompting came to Silas to pinch her finger just for fun; when he had put his hands over her eyes that night it was in obedience to the same prompting, but at the moment of parting from her, a desire quite new had overmastered him. He had kissed a good many girls, but never in his life had he kissed a girl as he kissed Phyl. Something cynical in his feelings for the other sex had always left him somewhat cold, but Phyl was different from the others, she had in some way struck straight at his real being. When he left her that night at Grangersons he was almost as disturbed as she. He scarcely slept. He was out at dawn and on his return after she had left he sat down and wrote the letter which Phyl received next morning. Silas was in love for the first time in his life, but love with Silas was a thing apart from the love of ordinary men. There was no worship of the object; the something that crystallises out in the form of love-letters, verses, bouquets, and candy was not there. He wanted Phyl. He had no more idea of marriage than the great god Pan. If she had consented he would have taken her off on that yawl of his imagination round the world or down to Florida, without thought of the morrow or the _convenances_, or Society; but please do not imagine this rather primitive gentleman a chartered libertine. He would have married her as soon as not, but he had neither the genius nor the inclination for the courtship that leads by slow degrees up to the question, "Will you marry me?" He wanted her at once. As he walked along now with the devil awake in his heart, he felt no anger towards Phyl; all his rage was against Pinckney; he had never liked Pinckney, he more than suspected that Phyl cared for him and he wanted some one to hate badly. He had walked himself into a reasonable state of mind when he found himself outside the Queen City Club. He went in and one of the first men he met was Pinckney. So well did he hold himself in hand that Pinckney suspected nothing of his feelings. Silas was far too good a sportsman to shout at the edge of the wood, too much of a gentleman to desire a brawl in public. He was going to knife Pinckney, he was also going to capture Phyl, but the knifing of Pinckney was the main objective and that required time and thought. He did not desire the blood of the gentleman; he wanted his pride and _amour propre_. He wanted to hit him on the raw, but he did not know yet where, exactly, the raw was nor how to hit it. Time would tell him. He was specially civil to his intended victim, and he went off home that evening plotting all the way, but arriving at nothing. He was trying to make bricks without straw. Pinckney did not drink, nor did he gamble, and he was far too good a business man to be had in that way. However, all things come to him who waits, and next morning's post brought him a ray of light in the midst of his darkness. It brought him an invitation to the Rhetts' dance on the following Wednesday; nearly a week to wait, but, still, something to wait for. "What are you thinking about, Silas?" asked old Seth Grangerson as they sat at breakfast. "I'm thinking of a new rabbit trap, suh," responded the son. The rabbit trap seemed to give him a good deal of food for thought during the week that followed; food that made him hilarious and gloomy by turns, restless also. Had he known it, Phyl away at Charleston, was equally restless. She no longer thought of Silas. She had dismissed him from her mind, she no longer feared him as a possible source of danger to the man she loved. Love had her entirely in his possession to torture as he pleased. She knew only one danger, the danger that Richard Pinckney did not care in the least for her, and as day followed day that danger grew more defined and concrete. Richard had taken to avoiding her, she became aware of that. She fancied that she displeased him. If she had only known! CHAPTER X Silas Grangerson came to town on the Wednesday, driving in and reaching the Charleston Hotel about five o'clock in the afternoon. The Grangersons scarcely ever used the railway. Silas, often as he had been in Charleston, had never put foot in a street car; even a hired conveyance was against the prejudices of these gentlemen. This antagonism towards public means of locomotion was not in the least the outcome of snobbishness or pride; they had come from a race of people accustomed to move in a small orbit in their own particular way, an exclusive people, breeders and lovers of horses, a people to whom locomotion had always meant pride in the means and the method; to take a seat in a stuffy railway car at so much a mile, to grab a ticket and squeeze into a tram car, to drive in a cab drawn by an indifferent horse would have been hateful to these people; it was scarcely less so to their descendants. So Silas came to Charleston driving a pair of absolutely matched chestnuts, a coloured manservant in the Grangerson livery in attendance. After dinner he strolled into the bar of the hotel, met some friends, made some bets on the forthcoming races and at eight o'clock retired upstairs to dress. He was one of the first of the guests to arrive. The Rhetts' house in Legare Street was about the same size as Vernons and equally old, but it had not the same charm, the garden was much larger than that at Vernons, but it had not the same touch of the past. Houses, like people, have personalities and the house of the Rhetts had a telephone without resenting the intruder, electric everythings, even to an elevator, modern cookers, modern stoves, everything in a modern way to save labour and make life easy, and all so cunningly and craftily done that the air of antiquity was supposed not to be disturbed. Illusion! Nothing is gained without some sacrifice; you cannot hold the past and the present in the same hand, the concealed elevator spoke in all the rooms once its presence was betrayed, the telephone talked--everywhere was evident the use of yesterday as a veneer of to-day. However that may be, the old house was gay enough to-night with flowers and lights, and Silas, looking better perhaps than he had ever looked in his life, found himself talking to Frances Rhett with an animation that surprised himself. Frances had never had a chance of leading Silas behind her chariot; to fool with her would have meant an expenditure of time and energy in journeys to Charleston quite beyond his inclination. This aloofness coupled with his good looks had set him apart from others. But to-night he was quite a different being; to-night, in some mysterious way, he managed to convey the impression, pleasing enough, that he had come to see her and her alone. As they stood together for a moment, he led the talk into Charleston channels, asking about this person and that till the folk at Vernons came on the _tapis_. "Is it true what I hear, that Richard Pinckney has become engaged to the girl who is staying there?" asked Silas. Frances smiled. "I don't think so," she replied. "Who told you?" "Upon my word I forget," said he, "but I judged mostly by my own eyes--they seemed like an engaged couple when I saw them last." New guests were arriving and she had to go forward to help in receiving them. Silas moved towards her, but in the next moment they had for a snatch of conversation, she did not refer to the subject, nor did he. The Vernons people were late, so late that when they arrived they were the last of the guests; dancing was in progress and, on entering the ballroom, Richard Pinckney was treated to the pleasing sight of his _fiancée_ whirling in the arms of Silas Grangerson. Phyl, looking lovely in the simple, rather old-fashioned dress evolved for her by the combined geniuses of Maria Pinckney and Madame Organdie, produced that sensation which can only be evoked by newness, her effect was instantaneous and profound, it touched not only every one of these strangers but also Maria Pinckney and Richard. They had come with her, but it was only in the ballroom that they recognised with whom they had come. So with a book, a picture, a play, the producer and his friends only recognise its merits fully when it is staged and condemned or praised by the public. A _débutante_ fails or succeeds at first glance, and the instantaneous success of Phyl was a record in successes. And Frances Rhett had to watch it and dance. The Inquisition had its torments; Society has improved on them, for her victims cannot cry out and the torments of Frances Rhett were acute. Not that she was troubling much about Richard Pinckney and what the poisonous Silas had said; she was not in love with Richard Pinckney, but she was passionately in love with herself. She was the belle of Charleston; had been for the last year; and one of her chief incentives to marriage was an intuitive knowledge that prestige fades, that the position of principal girl in any society is like the position of the billiard ball the juggler balances on the end of a cue--precarious. She wanted to get married and ring down the curtain on an unspoiled success, and now in a moment she saw herself dethroned. In a moment. For no jeweller of Amsterdam ever had an eye for the quality of diamonds surer than the eye of Frances Rhett for the quality of other women's beauty. At the first glance to-night, she saw what others saw, though more clearly than they, that it was the touch of the past that gave Phyl her _cachet_, a something indefinable from yesterday, the lack of which made the other girls, by contrast, seem cheap. Never could she have imagined that the "red-headed girl at Vernons" could gain so much from setting, a setting due to the instinct as well as the taste of "that old Maria Pinckney." She had always laughed at Maria, as young people sometimes will at the old. When Richard came up to her a little later on, he found himself coldly received; she had no dances for him except a few at the bottom of the programme. "You shouldn't have been late," said she. "Well," he said, "it was not my fault. You know what Aunt Maria is, she kept us ten minutes after the carriage was round, and then Phyl wasn't ready." "She looks ready enough now," said the other, looking at Phyl and the cluster of young men around her. "What delayed her? Was she dyeing her head? It doesn't look quite so loud as when I saw her last." "Her head's all right," replied Pinckney, irritated by the manner of the other, "inside and out, and one can't say the same for every one." Frances looked at him. "Do you know what Silas Grangerson asked me to-night?" she said. "No." "He asked me were you engaged to her." "Phyl?" "Miss Berknowles. I don't know her well enough to call her Phyl." "He asked you that?" "Yes, said every one was talking of it, and the last time he saw you together you looked like an engaged couple the way you were carrying on." "But he has never seen us together," cried the outraged Pinckney; "that was a pure lie." "I expect he saw you when you didn't see him; anyhow, that's the impression people have got, and it's not very pleasant for me." Richard Pinckney choked back his anger. He fell to thinking where Silas could have seen them together. "I don't know whether he saw us or not," said he, "but I am certain of one thing; he never saw us 'carrying on' as you call it; anyhow, I'll have a personal explanation from Silas to-morrow." "_Please_ don't imagine that I object to your flirting with any one you like," said Frances with exasperating calm. "If you have a taste for that sort of thing it is your own business." Pinckney flushed. "I don't know if you _want_ to quarrel with me," said he, "if you do, say so at once." "Not a bit," she replied, "you know I never quarrel with any one, it's bad form for one thing and it is waste of energy for another." A man came up to claim her for the next dance and she went off with him, leaving Pinckney upset and astonished at her manner and conduct. It was their first quarrel, the first result of their engagement. Frances had seemed all laziness and honey up to this; like many another woman she began to show her real nature now that Pinckney was secured. But it was not an ordinary lovers' quarrel; her anger had less to do with Richard Pinckney than with Phyl. Her hatred of Phyl, big as a baobab tree, covered with its shadow Vernons, Miss Pinckney, and Richard. He was part of the business of her dethronement. Richard wandered off to where Maria Pinckney was seated watching the dancers. "Why aren't you dancing?" asked she. "Oh, I don't know," he replied. "I'm not keen on it and there are loads of men." Miss Pinckney had watched him talking to Frances Rhett and she had drawn her own deductions, but she said nothing. He sat down beside her. He had been wanting to tell her of his engagement for a long time past, but had put it off and put it off, waiting for the psychological moment. Maria Pinckney was a very difficult person to fit into a psychological moment. "I want to tell you something," said he. "I'm engaged to Frances Rhett." "Engaged to be married to her?" "Yes." Miss Pinckney was dumb. What she had always dreaded had come to pass, then. "You don't congratulate me?" "No," she replied. "I don't." Then, all of a sudden, she turned on him. "Congratulate you! If I saw you drowning in the harbour, would you expect me to stand at the Battery waving my hand to you and congratulating you? No, I don't congratulate you. You had the chance of being happy with the most beautiful girl in the world, and the best, and you've thrown it away to pick up with _that_ woman. Phyl would have married you, I know it, she would have made you happy, I know it, for I know her and I know you. Now it's all spoiled." He rose to his feet. It was the first time in his life that he had seen Maria Pinckney really put out. "I'll talk to you again about it," said he. Then he moved away. He had the pleasure of watching Frances dancing the next waltz with Silas Grangerson, and Silas had the pleasure of watching him as he stood talking to one of the elderly ladies and looking on. Silas's rabbit trap was in reality a very simple affair, it was a plan to pick a quarrel with Richard through Frances, if possible; to make the imperturbable Pinckney angry, knowing well how easily an angry man can be induced to make a fool of himself. To keep cool and let Richard do the shouting. Unfortunately for Silas, the sight of Phyl in all her beauty had raised his temperature far above the point of coolness. There were moments when he was dancing, when he could have flung Frances aside, torn Phyl from the arms of her partner and made off with her through the open window. This dance was a deadly business for him. It was the one thing needed to cap and complete the strange fascination this girl exercised upon his mind, his imagination, his body. It was only now that he realised that nothing else at all mattered in the world, it was only now that he determined to have her or die. Silas was of the type that kills under passion, the type that, unable to have, destroys. Preparing a trap for another, he himself had walked into a trap constructed by the devil, stronger than steel. Yet he never once approached or tried to speak to Phyl. He fed on her at a distance. Fleeting glimpses of the curves of her figure, the Titian red of her hair, the face that to-night might have turned a saint from his vows, were snatched by him and devoured. He would not have danced with her if he could. To take her in his arms would have meant covering her face with kisses. Nor did he feel the least anger against the men with whom she danced. All that was a sham and an unreality, they were shadows. He and Phyl were the only real persons in that room. Later on in the evening, Richard Pinckney, tired with the lights and the noise, took a stroll in the garden. The garden was lit here and there with fairy lamps and there were coigns of shadow where couples were sitting out chatting and enjoying the beauty of the night. The moon was nearing the full and her light cut the tree shadows distinctly on the paths. Passing a seat occupied by one of the sitting out couples, Pinckney noticed the woman's fan which her partner was playing with; it was his own gift to Frances Rhett. The man was Silas Grangerson and the woman was Frances. They were talking, but as he passed them their voices ceased. He felt their eyes upon him, then, when he had got twenty paces or so away, he heard Frances laugh. He imagined that she was laughing at him. Already angry with Silas, he halted and half turned, intending to go back and have it out with him, then he thought better of it and went his way. He would deal with Silas later and in some place where he could get him alone or in the presence of men only. Pinckney had a horror of scenes, especially in the presence of women. Twenty minutes later he had his opportunity. He was crossing the hall from the supper room, when he came face to face with Silas. They were alone. "Excuse me," said Richard Pinckney, halting in front of the other, "I want a word with you." "Certainly," answered Silas, guessing at once what was coming. "You made some remarks about me to Miss Rhett this evening," went on the other. "You coupled my name with the name of a lady in a most unjustifiable manner and I want your explanation here and now." "Who was the lady?" asked Silas, seemingly quite unmoved. "Miss Berknowles." "In what way did I couple your name with her, may I ask?" "No, you mayn't." Richard had turned pale before the calm insolence of the other. "You know quite well what you said and if you are a gentleman you will apologise-- If you aren't you won't and I will deal with you in Charleston accordingly." Phyl was at that moment coming out of the supper room with young Reggie Calhoun--the same who, according to Richard that morning at breakfast long ago, was an admirer of Maria Pinckney. She saw the two men, in profile, facing one another, and she saw Silas's right hand, which he was holding behind his back, opening and shutting convulsively. She saw the blow given by Pinckney, she saw Silas step back and the knife which he always carried, as the wasp carries its sting, suddenly in his hand. Then she was gripping his wrist. Face to face with madness for a moment, holding it, fighting eye to eye. Had she faltered, had her gaze left his for the hundredth part of a second, he would have cast her aside and fallen upon his prey. It was her soul that held him, her spirit--call it what you will, the something that speaks alone through the eye. Calhoun and Pinckney stood, during that tremendous moment, stricken, breathless, without making the slightest movement. They saw she was holding him by the power of her eye alone; so vividly did this fact strike them that for a dazed moment it seemed to them that the battle was not theirs, that the contest was beyond the earthly plane, that this was no struggle between human beings, but a battle between sanity and madness. Its duration might have been spanned by three ticks of the great old clock that stood in the corner of the hall telling the time. Then came the ring of the knife falling on the floor. It was like the breaking of a spell. Silas, white and bewildered-looking as a man suddenly awakened from sleep, stood looking now at his released hand as though it did not belong to him, then at Pinckney, and then at Phyl who had turned her back upon him and was tottering as though about to fall. Pinckney, stepping forward, was about to speak, when at that moment the door of the supper room opened and a band of young people came out chatting and laughing. Calhoun, who was a man of resource, kicked the knife which slithered away under one of the seats. Phyl, recovering herself, walked away towards the stairs; Silas without a word, turned and vanished from sight past the curtain of the corridor that led to the cloakroom. Calhoun and Pinckney were left alone. "What are you going to do?" asked Calhoun. "I am at his disposal," replied the other. "I struck him." "Struck him, damnation! He drew a knife on you; he ought to be hoofed out of the club; he'd have had you only for that girl. I never saw anything so splendid in my life." "Yes," said Pinckney, "she saved my life. He was clean mad, but thank God no one knows anything about it and we avoided a scene. Say nothing to any one unless he wants to push the matter further. I am quite at his disposal." PART IV CHAPTER I When Silas reached the cloakroom he took a glance at himself in the mirror, then putting on his overcoat and taking his hat from the attendant he came back into the hall. Pinckney and Calhoun had just strolled away into the ballroom; there was no one in the hall, and without a thought of saying good-bye to his hostess, he left the house. He felt no anger against Pinckney, nor did he think as he walked down Legare Street that but for the mercy of God and the intervention of Phyl he might at that moment have been walking between two constables, a murderer with the blood of innocence on his hands. Not that he was insensible to reason or the fitness of things, he had always known and acknowledged that when in a passion he was not accountable for his acts; he admitted the fact with regret and also with a certain pride. To-night he might have felt the regret without any pride to leaven it but for the fact that his mind was lost to every consideration but one--Phyl. All through his life Silas had followed with an iron will the line that pleased him, never for a moment had he counted the cost of his actions; just as he had swum the harbour with his clothes on so had he plunged into any adventure that came to hand; he knew Fear just as little as he knew Consequence. Well, now he found himself for the first time in his life face to face with Fate. All his adventures up to this had been little things involving at worst loss of life by accident. This was different; it involved his whole future and the future of the girl who had mastered his mind. Leaving Legare Street he reached Meeting Street and passed up it till he reached Vernons. The moon, high in the sky now, showed the garden through the trellis-work of the iron gate, and Silas paused for a moment and looked in. The garden, seen like this with the moonlight upon the roses and the glossy leaves of the southern trees, presented a picture charming, dream-like, almost unreal in its beauty. He tried the gate. It was locked. On ordinary nights it would be open till the house closed, or in the event of Pinckney being out, until he returned, but to-night, owing to the absence of the family, it was locked. Then, turning from the gate he crossed the road and took up his position in a corner of shadow. Five minutes passed, then twenty, but still he kept watch. There were few passers-by at that hour and little traffic; he had a long view of the moonlit street and presently he saw the carriage he was waiting for approaching. It drew up at the front door of Vernons and he watched whilst the occupants got out; he caught a glimpse of Phyl as she entered the house following Miss Pinckney and followed by Richard, then the door shut and the carriage drove away. Silas left his concealment and crossed the road. He paced for a while up and down outside the door of Vernons, then he came to the garden gate again and looked in. From here one could get a glimpse of the first and second floor piazzas and the windows opening upon them. He could not tell which was the window of Phyl's room, it was enough for him that the place held her. In the way in which he had crossed the road, in his uneasy prowling up and down before the house, and now in his attitude as he stood motionless with head raised there was something ominous, animal-like, almost wolfish. As he stood a call suddenly came from the garden. It was the call of an owl, a white owl that rose on the sound and flitted softly as a moth across the trees to the garden beyond. Silas turned away from the gate and came back down the street towards his hotel, arrived there he went straight to his room and to bed. But he did not go to sleep. His head was full of plans, the craziest and maddest plans. Pinckney he had quite dismissed from his mind, the consciousness of having committed a vile action in drawing a knife upon an unarmed man was with him, and the knowledge that the consequences might include his expulsion from Charleston society, but all that instead of sobering him made him more reckless. He would have Phyl despite the Devil himself. He would seize her and carry her off, trap her like a bird. He determined on the morrow to return early to Grangersons and think things out. CHAPTER II Whilst he was lying in bed thinking things out, the folk at Vernons were retiring to rest. Maria Pinckney knew nothing of what had occurred between Silas and Richard. Richard Pinckney, Phyl and Reggie Calhoun were the only three persons in Charleston, leaving Silas aside, who knew of the business and in a hurried consultation just before leaving the Rhetts they had agreed to say nothing. Calhoun was for publishing the affair. "The man's dangerous," said he; "some day or another he'll do the same thing again to some one and succeed and swing." "I think he's had his lesson," said Pinckney; "he went clean mad for the moment. Then there's the fact that I struck him. No, taking everything into consideration, we'll let it be. I don't feel any animosity against him, not half as much as if he'd stabbed me behind the back with a libel-- He did tell a lie about me to-night but it was the stupid sort of lie a child might have told. The man has his good points as well as his bad and I don't want to push the thing against him." "I don't think he will do it again," said Phyl. She, like Richard, felt no anger against Silas; it was as though they recognised that Silas was the man really attacked that night, attacked by the Devil. They both recognised instinctively his good qualities. Miss Pinckney, it will be remembered, once said that it is the man with good in him that comes to the worst end unless the good manages to fight the bad and get it under in time. She had a terrible instinct for the truth of things. "Well," said Calhoun, "it's not my affair; if you choose to take pity on him, well and good; if it were my business I'd give him a cold bath, that might stop him from doing a thing like that again. I'll say nothing." Though Miss Pinckney was in ignorance of the affair she was strangely silent during the drive home and when Phyl went to her room to bid her good night, she found her in tears, a very rare occurrence with Miss Pinckney. She was seated in an armchair crying and Phyl knelt down beside her and took her hand. Then it all came out. "I had hoped and hoped and hoped for him, goodness knows he has been my one thought, and now he has thrown himself away. Richard is engaged to Frances Rhett. He told me so to-night--well, there, it's all ended, there's no hope anywhere, she'll never let him go, and she'll have Vernons when I'm gone. She picked him out from all the other men--why?-- Why, because he's the best of the lot for money and position. Care about him! She cares no more for him than I do for old Darius. I'm sure I don't know why this trouble should have fallen on me. I suppose I have committed some sin or another though I can't tell what. I've tried to live blameless and there's others that haven't, yet they seem to prosper and get their wishes--and there's no use telling me to be resigned," finished she with a snap and as if addressing some viewless mentor. "I can't--and what's more I won't. Never will I resign myself to wickedness, and stupidity is wickedness, not even a decent, honest wickedness, but a crazy, sap-headed sort of wickedness, same as influenza isn't a disease but just an ailment that kills you all the same." Phyl, kneeling beside Miss Pinckney, had turned deathly white. Only half an hour ago when the little conference with Calhoun had been concluded, Richard Pinckney had taken her hand. His words were still ringing in her ears: "You saved my life. I can't say what I feel, at least not now." He had looked straight into her eyes, and now half an hour later--This. Engaged to Frances Rhett! She rose up and stood beside Miss Pinckney for a moment whilst that lady finished her complaints. Then she made her escape and returned to her room-- As she closed the door she caught a glimpse of herself in the old-fashioned cheval glass that had been brought up by Dinah and Seth to help her in dressing for the dance and which had not been removed. Every picture in every mirror is the work of an artist--the man who makes a mirror is an artist; according to the perfection of his work is the perfection of the picture. The old cheval glass was as truthful in its way as Gainsborough, but Gainsborough had never such a lovely subject as Phyl. She started at her own reflection as though it had been that of a stranger. Then she looked mournfully at herself as a man might look at his splendid gifts which he has thrown away. All that was no use now. She sat down on the side of her bed with her hands clasped together just as a child clasps its hands in grief. Sitting like this with her eyes fixed before her she was looking directly at Fate. It was not only Richard Pinckney that she was about to lose but Vernons and the Past-- Just as Juliet Mascarene had lost everything so was it to happen to her. Or rather so had it happened, for she felt that the game was lost--some vague, mysterious, extraordinary game played by unknown powers had begun on that evening in Ireland when standing by the window of the library she had heard Pinckney's voice for the first time. The sense of Fatality came to her from the case of Juliet. Consciously and unconsciously she had linked herself to Juliet. The extravagant idea that she herself was Juliet returned and that Richard Pinckney was Rupert had come to her more than once since that dream or vision in which the guns had sounded in her ears. The idea had frightened her at first, then pleased her vaguely. Then she had dismissed it, her _ego_ refusing any one else a share in her love for Richard, any one--even herself masquerading under the guise of Juliet. The idea came back to her now leaving her utterly cold, and yet stirring her mind anew with the sense of Fate. * * * * * When she fell asleep that night she passed into the dreamless condition which is the nearest thing we know to oblivion, yet her sub-conscious mind must have carried on its work, for when she awoke just as dawn was showing at the window it was with the sense of having passed through a long season of trouble, of having fought with--without conquering--all sorts of difficulties. She rose and dressed herself, put on her hat and came down into the garden. Vernons was just wakening for the day, and in the garden alive with birds, she could hear the early morning sounds of the city, and from the servants' quarters of the house, voices, the sound of a mat being beaten and now and then the angry screech of a parrot. General Grant slept in the kitchen and his cage was put out in the yard every morning at this hour. Later it would be brought round to the piazza. He resented the kitchen yard as beneath his dignity and he let people know it. Phyl tried the garden gate, it was locked and Seth appearing at that moment on the lower piazza, she called to him to fetch the key. He let her out and she stood for a moment undecided as to whether she would walk towards the Battery or in the opposite direction. Meeting Street never looked more charming than now in the very early morning sunlight; under the haze-blue sky, almost deserted, it seemed for a moment to have recaptured its youth. A negro crab vendor was wheeling his barrow along, crying his wares. His voice came lazily on the warm scented air. She turned in the direction of the station. The voice of the crab seller had completed in some uncanny way the charm of the deserted street and the early sunlight. She was going to lose all this. Vernons and the city she loved, Juliet, Miss Pinckney, the past and the present, she was going to lose them all, they were all in some miraculous way part of the man she loved, her love of them was part of her love for him. She could no longer stay in Charleston; she must go--where? She could think of nowhere to go but Ireland. To stay here would be absolutely impossible. As she walked without noticing whither she was going her mind cleared, she began to form plans. She would go that very day. Nothing would stop her. The thing had to be done. Let it be done at once. She would explain everything to Miss Pinckney. She would escape without seeing Richard again. What she was proposing to herself was death, the ruin of everything she cared for, the destruction of all the ties that bound her to the world, the present and the past. It was the recognition that these ties had been broken for her and all these things taken away by the woman who had taken away Richard. Presently she found herself in the suburbs, in a street where coloured children were playing in the gutter, and where the houses were unsubstantial looking as rabbit-hutches, but there was a glimpse of country beyond and she did not turn back. She did not want breakfast. If she returned to Vernons by ten o'clock it would give her plenty of time to pack her things, say good-bye to Miss Pinckney and take her departure before Richard returned to luncheon--if he did return. It did not take her long to pass through the negro quarter, and now, out in the open country, out amidst those great flat lands in the broad day and under the lonely blue sky her mood changed. Phyl was no patient Grizel, the very last person to be trapped in the bog of love's despondency. Abstract melancholy produced by colours, memories, or sounds was an easy enough matter with her, but she was not the person to mourn long over the loss of a man snatched from her by another woman. As she walked, now, breathing the free fresh air, a feeling of anger and resentment began to fill her mind. Anger at first against Frances Rhett but spreading almost at once towards Richard Pinckney. Soon it included herself, Maria Pinckney, Charleston--the whole world. It was the anger which brings with it perfect recklessness, akin to that which had seized her the day in Ireland when in her rage over Rafferty's dismissal she had called Pinckney a Beast. Only this anger was less acute, more diffuse, more lasting. The sounds of wheels and horses' hoofs on the road behind her made her turn her head. A carriage was approaching, an English mail phaëton drawn by two high-stepping chestnuts and driven by a young man. It was Silas Grangerson. Returning to Grangerson's to make plans for the capture of Phyl, here she was on the road before him and going in the same direction. For a moment he could scarcely believe his eyes. Then reining in and leaving the horses with the groom he jumped down and ran towards her. After the affair of last night one might fancy that he would have shown something of it in his manner. Not a bit. "I didn't expect to come across _you_ on the road," said he. "Won't you speak to me--are you angry with me?" "It's not a question of being angry," said Phyl, stiffly. She walked on and he walked beside her, silent for a moment. "If you mean about that affair last night," said he, "I'm sorry I lost my temper--but he hit me--you don't understand what that means to me." "You tried to--" "Kill him, I did, and only for you I'd have done it. You can't understand it all. I can scarcely understand it myself. He _hit_ me." "I don't think you knew what you were doing," said Phyl. "I most surely did not. I was rousted out of myself. I reckon he didn't know what he was doing either when he struck. He ought to have known I was not the person to hit. I'll show you, just stand before me for a moment." Phyl faced him. He pretended to strike at her and she started back. "There you are," said he; "you know I wasn't going to touch you but you had to dodge. Your mind had nothing to do with it, just your instinct. That was how I was. When he landed his blow I went for my knife by instinct. If you tread on a snake he lets out at you just the same way. He doesn't think. He's wound up by nature to hit back." "But you are not a snake." "How do you know what's in a man? I reckon we've all been animals once, maybe I was a snake. There are worse things than snakes. Snakes are all right, they don't meddle with you if you don't meddle with them. They've got a bad name they don't deserve. I like them. They're a lot better citizens, the way they look after their wives and families, than some others and they know how to hit back prompt--say, where are you going to?" "I don't know," said Phyl. "I just came for a walk--I'm leaving Charleston." She spoke with a little catch in her voice. All Silas's misdoings were forgotten for the moment, the fact that the man was dangerous as Death to himself and others had been neutralised in her mind by the fact, intuitively recognised, that there was nothing small or mean in his character. Despite his conduct in the cemetery, despite his lunatic outburst of the night before, in her heart of hearts she liked him; besides that, he was part of Charleston, part of the place she loved. Ah, how she loved it! Had you dissected her love for Richard Pinckney you would have found a thousand living wrappings before you reached the core. Vernons, the garden, the birds, the flowers, the blue sky, the sunlight, Meeting Street, the story of Juliet, Miss Pinckney, even old Prue. Memories, sounds, scents, and colours all formed part of the living thing that Frances Rhett had killed. "Leaving Charleston!" said Silas, speaking in a dazed sort of way. "Yes. I cannot stay here any longer." "Going--say--it's not because of what I did last night." "You--oh, no. It has nothing to do with you." She spoke almost disdainfully. "But where are you going?" "Back to Ireland." "When?" "To-day." Then, suddenly, in some curious manner, he knew. But he was clever enough, for once in his life, to restrain himself and say nothing. "I will go this afternoon," said she, as though she were talking of a journey of a few miles. "Have you any friends to go to?" Phyl thought of Mr. Hennessy sitting in his gloomy office in gloomy Dublin. "Yes, one." "In Ireland?" "Yes." "Can't you think of any other friends?" "No." "Not even me?" "I don't know," said poor Phyl, "I never could understand you quite, but now that I am in trouble you seem a friend--I'm miserable--but there's no use having friends here. It only makes it the worse having to go." "Do you remember the day I asked you to run off to Florida with me," said Silas, "and leave this damned place? It's no good for any one here and you've found it out--the place is all right, it's the people that are wrong." Phyl made no reply. "You're not going back," he finished. She glanced at him. "You're going to stay here--here with me." "I am going back to Ireland to-day," said Phyl. "You are not, you are going to stay here." "No. I am going back." She spoke as a person speaks who is half drowsy, and Silas spoke like a person whose mind is half absent. It was the strangest conversation to listen to, knowing their relationship and the point at issue. "You are going to stay here," he went on. "If I lost you now I'd never find you again. I've been wanting you ever since I saw you that day first in the yard-- D'you remember how we sat on the log together?--you can't tramp all the way back to Charleston-- Come with me and you'll be happy always, all the time and all your life--" "No," said Phyl, "I mustn't--I can't." Her mind, half dazed by all she had gone through, by the mesmerism of his voice, by the brilliant light of the day, was capable of no real decision on any point. The dark streets of Dublin lay before her, a vague and nightmare vision. To return to Vernons would be only her first step on the return to Ireland, and yet if she did not return to Vernons, where could she go? Silas's invitation to go with him neither raised her anger nor moved her to consent. Phyl was an absolute Innocent in the ways of the world. No careful mother had sullied her mind with warnings and suggestions, and her mind was by nature unspeculative as to the material side of life. Instinctively she knew a great deal. How much knowledge lies in the sub-conscious mind is an open question. They walked on for a bit without speaking and then Silas began again. "You can't go back all that way. It's absurd. You talk of going off to-day, why, good heavens, it takes time even to start on a journey like that. You have to book your passage in a ship--and how are you to go alone?" "I don't know," said Phyl. His voice became soft. It was the first time in his life, perhaps, that he had spoken with tenderness, and the effect was perfectly magical. "You are not going," he said, "you are not; indeed, I want you far too much to let you go; there's nothing else I want at all in the world. I don't count anything worth loving beside you." No reply. He turned. The coloured groom was walking the horses, they were only a few yards away. He went to the man and gave him some money with the order to return to Charleston and go back to Grangersons by train, or at least to the station that was ten miles from Grangerville. Then as the man went off along the road he stood holding the near horse by the bridle and talking to Phyl. "You can't walk back all that way; put your foot on the step and get in, leave all your trouble right here. I'll see that you never have any trouble again. Put your foot on the step." Phyl looked away down the road. She hesitated just as she had hesitated that morning long ago when she had run away from school. She had run away, not so much to get home as to get away from homesickness. Still she hesitated, urged by the recklessness that prompted her to break everything at one blow, urged by the dismal and hopeless prospect towards which the road to Charleston led her mind, held back by all sorts of hands that seemed reaching to her from the past. Confused, bewildered, tempted yet resisting, all might have been well had not a vision suddenly risen before her clear, definite, and destructive to her reason. The vision of Frances Rhett. Everything bad and wild in Phyl surged up before that vision. For a second it seemed to her that she loathed the man she loved. She put her foot on the step and got into the phaëton. Silas, without a word, jumped up beside her, and the horses started. CHAPTER III She had committed the irrevocable. When the contract is signed, when the china vase is broken, all the regret in the world will not alter the fact. It was not till they had gone ten miles on their way that the regret came, sudden and painful as the stab of a dagger. Miss Pinckney's kindly old face suddenly rose up before Phyl. She would have been waiting breakfast for her. She saw the breakfast room, sunny and pleasant, the tea urn on the table, the garden through the open window-- Then came the thought--what matter. All that was lost to her anyhow. It did not matter in the least what she did. She was running away with Silas Grangerson. She had a vague sort of idea that they were running away to be married, that she would have to explain things to Colonel Grangerson when they got to the house and that things would arrange themselves somehow. But now, she sat voiceless beside her companion, answering only in monosyllables when he spoke; a voice began to trouble her, a voice that repeated the half statement, half question, over and over again. "You are running away to be married to Silas Grangerson?" She was running away from her troubles, from the prospect of returning to Ireland, from the idea of banishment from Vernons. She was running away out of anger against the woman who had taken Richard. She was running away because of pique, anger and the reckless craving to smash everything and dash everything to pieces--but to marry Silas Grangerson! "Stop!" cried Phyl. Silas glanced sideways at her. "What's the matter now?" "I want to go back." "Back to Charleston!" "Yes, stop, stop at once--I must go back, I should never have come." Silas was on the point of flashing out but he shut his lips tight, then he reined in. "Wait a moment," said he with his hand on her arm, "you can't walk back, we are nearly half way to Grangersons. I can't drive you because I don't want to return to Charleston. If you have altered your mind you can go back when we reach Grangersons, you can wire from there. The old man will make it all right with Maria Pinckney." Phyl hesitated, then she began to cry. It was the rarest thing in the world for her to cry like this. Tears with her meant a storm, but now she was crying quietly, hopelessly, like a lost child. "Don't cry," said he, "everything will be all right when we get to Grangersons--we'll just go on." The horses started again and Phyl dried her eyes. They covered another five miles without speaking, and then Silas said: "You don't mean to stick to me, then?" "I can't," said Phyl. "You care for some one else better?" "Yes." "Is it Pinckney?" "Yes." "God!" said he. He cut the off horse with the whip. The horses nearly bolted, he reined them in and they settled down again to their pace. The country was very desolate just here, cotton fields and swampy grounds with here and there a stretch of water reflecting the blue of the sky. After a moment's silence he began again. There was something in Silas's mentality that seemed to have come up from the world of automata, something tireless and persistent akin to the energy that drives a beetle over all obstacles in its course, on or round them. "That's all very well," said he, "but you can't always go on caring for Pinckney." "Can't I?" said Phyl. "No, you can't. He's going to get married and then where will you be?" Phyl, staring over the horses' heads as though she were staring at some black prospect, set her teeth. Then she spoke and her voice was like the voice of a person who speaks under mesmerism. "I cared for him before he was born and I'll care for him after I'm dead and there's no use in bothering a bit about it now. _You_ couldn't understand. No one can understand, not even he." The road here bordered a stretch of waste land; Silas gazed over it, his face was drawn and hard. Then he suddenly blazed out. Laying the whip over the horses and turning them so sharply that the phaëton was all but upset he put them over the waste land; another touch of the whip and they bolted. Beyond the waste land lay a rice field and between field and waste land stood a fence; there was doubtless a ditch on the other side of the fence. "You'll kill us!" cried Phyl. "Good--so," replied Silas, "horses and all." She had half risen from her seat, she sat down again holding tight to the side rail and staring ahead. Death and destruction lay waiting behind that fence, leaping every moment nearer. She did not care in the least. She could see that Silas, despite his words, was making every effort to rein in, the impetus to drive to hell and smash everything up had passed; she watched his hands grow white all along the tendon ridges with the strain. The whole thing was extraordinary and curious but unfearful, a storm of wind seemed blowing in her face. Then like a switched out light all things vanished. CHAPTER IV Twenty yards from the fence the off side wheel had gone. The phaëton, flinging its occupants out, tilted, struck the earth at the trace coupling just as a man might strike it with his shoulder, dragged for five yards or so, breaking dash board and mud guard and brought the off side horse down as though it had been poleaxed. Silas, with the luck that always fell to him in accidents, was not even stunned. Phyl was lying like a dead creature just where she had been flung amongst some bent grass. He rushed to her. She was not dead, her pulse told that, nor did she seem injured in any way. He left her, ran to the horses, undid the traces and got the fallen horse on its feet, then he stripped them of their harness and turned them loose. Having done this he returned to the girl. Phyl was just regaining consciousness; as he reached her she half sat up leaning on her right arm. "Where are the horses?" said she. They were her first thought. "I've let them loose--there they are." She turned her head in the direction towards which he pointed. The horses, free of their harness, had already found a grass patch and were beginning to graze. The broken phaëton lay in the sunshine and the cushions flung to right and left showed as blue squares amidst the green of the grass; a light wind from the west was stirring the grass tops and a bird was singing somewhere its thin piping note, the only sound from all that expanse of radiant blue sky and green forsaken country. "How do you feel now?" asked Silas. "All right," said Phyl. "We'd better get somewhere," he went on; "there are some cabins beyond that rice field, I can see their tops. There's sure to be some one there and we can send for help." Phyl struggled to her feet, refusing assistance. "Let us go there," said she. She turned to look at the horses. "They'll be all right," said Silas; "there's lots of grass and there's a pond over there--they'd live here a month without harm." He led the way to the fence, helped her over, and then, without a word they began to plod across the rice field. When they reached the cabins they found them deserted, almost in ruins. They faced a great tract of tree-grown ground. In the old plantation days this place would have been populous, for to the right there were ruins of other cabins stretching along and bordering an old grass road that bent westward to lose itself amongst the trees, but now there was nothing but desolation and the wind that stirred the mossy beards of the live oaks and the rank green foliage of weeds and sunflowers. An old disused well faced the cabins. Phyl gave a little shudder as she looked around her. Her mind, still slightly confused by the accident and beaten upon by troubles, could find nothing with which to reply to the facts of the situation--alone here with Silas Grangerson, lost, both of them, what explanation could she make, even to herself, of the position? In the nearest cabin to the right some rough dry grass had been stored as if for the bedding of an animal. It was too coarse for fodder. Silas made her sit down on it to rest. Then he stood before her in the doorway. For the first time in his life he seemed disturbed in mind. "I'll have to go and get help," said he, "and find out where we are. It's my fault. I'm sorry, but there's no use in going over that. You aren't fit to walk. I'll go and leave you here. You won't be afraid to stay by yourself?" "No," said Phyl. "You needn't be a bit, there's no danger here." "I am thirsty," said she. "Wait." He went to the well head. The windlass and chain were there rusty but practicable and a bucket lay amongst the grass. It was in good repair and had evidently been used recently. He lowered it and brought up some water. The water was clear diamond bright, and cold as ice. Having satisfied himself that it was drinkable he brought the bucket to Phyl and tilted it slightly whilst she drank. Then he put it by the door. "Now I'll go," said he, "and I shan't be long. Sure you won't be afraid?" "No," she replied. "You're not angry with me?" "No, I'm not angry." He bent down, took her hand and kissed it. She did not draw it away or show any sign of resentment; it was cold like the hand of a dead person. He glanced back as he turned to go. She saw him stand at the doorway for a moment looking down along the grass road, his figure cut against the blaze of light outside, then the doorway was empty. She was never to see him again. * * * * * Outside in the sunlight Silas hesitated for a moment as though he was about to turn back, then he went on, striking along the grass road and between the trees. Although he had never been over the ground before, he guessed it to be a part of the old Beauregard plantation and the distance from Grangerville to be not more than eight miles as the crow flies. By the road, reckoning from where the accident had occurred, it would be fifteen. But the lie of the place or the distance from Grangersons mattered little to Silas. His mind was going through a process difficult to describe. Silas had never cared for anything, not even for himself. Danger or safety did not enter into his calculations. Religion was for him the name of a thing he did not understand. He had no finer feelings except in relationship to things strong, swift and brilliant, he had no tenderness for the weakness of others, even the weakness of women. He had seized on Phyl as a Burgomaster gull might seize on a puffin chick, he had picked her up on the road to carry her off regardless of everything but his own desire for her--a desire so strong that he would have dashed her and himself to pieces rather than that another should possess her. Well, as he watched her seated on the straw in that ruined cabin, subdued, without energy, and entirely at his mercy, a will that was not his will rose in opposition to him. Some part of himself that had remained in utter darkness till now woke to life. It was perhaps the something that despite all his strange qualities made him likeable, the something that instinct guessed to be there. It stood between him and Phyl. He was conscious of no struggle with it because it took the form of helplessness. Nothing but force could make her give him what he wanted. The thing was impossible, beyond him. He felt that he could do everything, fight everything, subdue everything--but the subdued. There was something else. Weakness had always repelled him, whether it was the weakness of the knees of a horse or the weakness of the will of a man. Phyl's weakness did not repel him but it took the edge from his passion. It was almost a form of ugliness. He had determined on finding help to send some one back for Phyl; any of the coloured folk hereabouts would be able to pilot her to Grangersons. He was not troubling about the broken phaëton or the horses; the horses had plenty of food and water; so far from suffering they would have the time of their lives. They might be stolen--he did not care, and nothing was more indicative of his mental upset than this indifference toward the things he treasured most. All to the left of the grass road, the trees were thin, showing tracts of marsh land and pools, and the melancholy green of swamp weeds and vegetation. The vegetable world has its reptiles and amphibians no less than the animal; its savages, its half civilised populations, and its civilised. The two worlds are conterminous, and just as cultivated flowers and civilised people are mutually in touch, here you would find poisonous plants giving shelter to poisonous life, and the amphibious giving home to the amphibious. The woods on the right were healthier, more dense, more cheerful, on higher ground; one might have likened the grass road to the life of a man pursuing its way between his two mysteriously different characters. Silas had determined to make straight for home after having sent assistance for Phyl, what he was going to do after arriving home was not evident to his mind; he had a vague idea of clearing out somewhere so that he might forget the business. He had done with Phyl, so he told himself. But Phyl had not done with him. He had been scarcely ten minutes on his road when her image came into his mind. He saw her, not as he had seen her last seated on the straw in the miserable cabin, but as he had seen her at the ball. The curves of her limbs, the colour of her hair, her face, all were drawn for him by imagination, a picture more beautiful even than the reality. Well, he had done with her, and there was no use in thinking of her--she cared for that cursed Pinckney and she was as good as dead to him, Silas. An ordinary man would have seen hope at the end of waiting, but Silas was not an ordinary man, a long and dubious courtship was beyond his imagination and his powers. Courtship, anyhow, as courtship is recognised by the world was not for him. He wanted Phyl, he did not want to write letters to her. There is something to be said for this manner of love-making, it is sincere at all events. He tried to think of something else and he only succeeded in thinking of Phyl in another dress. He saw her as he saw her that first day in the stable yard at Grangersons. Then he saw her as she was dressed that day in Charleston. Then he remembered the scene in the churchyard. He could still feel the smack she had given him on the face. The smack had not angered him with her but the remembrance of it angered him now. She would not have done that to Pinckney. Turning a corner of the road he came upon a clear space and on the borders of the clearing to the right some cottages. There were some half-naked pikaninnies playing in the grass before them; and a coloured woman, washing at a tub set on trestles, catching sight of him, stood, shading her eyes and looking in his direction. Silas paused for a moment as if undecided, then he came on. He asked the woman his whereabouts and then whether she could sell him some food. She had nothing but some corn bread and cold bacon to offer him and he bought it, paying her a dollar and not listening to her when she told him she could not make change. He was like a man doing things in his sleep; his mind seemed a thousand miles away. The woman packed the bread and bacon in a mat basket with a plate and knife and watched him turn back in his tracks and vanish round the bend of the road, glad to see the last of him. She reckoned him crazy. He was going back to Phyl. His resolution never to see her again had vanished. She was his and he was going to keep her, no matter what happened. He would never part with her alive, if she killed him, if he killed her, what matter. Nothing would stand in his path. He reached the turning and there in the sunlight lay the half ruined cabins and the well. Walking softly he came to the door of the cabin where he had left Phyl. She was there lying on the straw fast asleep. It was the sleep that comes after exhaustion or profound excitement; she scarcely seemed to breathe. Putting his bundle down by the door he came in softly and knelt down beside her. His face was so close to hers that he could feel her breath upon his mouth. It only wanted that to complete his madness. He was about to cast himself beside her when a pain, vicious and sharp as the stab of a red hot needle struck him just above his right instep. CHAPTER V When Richard Pinckney came down to breakfast that morning, he found Miss Pinckney seated at the table reading letters. "Phyl went out early and has not come back yet," said she putting the letters aside and pouring out the tea. "Gone out," said he. "Where can she have gone to?" Miss Pinckney did not seem to hear the question. She was not thinking of Phyl or her whereabouts. Richard's engagement to Frances Rhett was still dominating her mind, casting a shadow upon everything. It was like a death in the family. "I hope she's not bothered about what happened last night," went on Richard. "I didn't tell you at the time, but I had--some words with Silas Grangerson, and--Phyl was there. Silas is a fool, but it's just as well the thing happened for it has brought matters to a head. I want to tell you something--I'm not engaged to Frances Rhett." "Not engaged?" "I was, but it's broken off. I had a moment's talk with her before we left last night. I was in a temper about a lot of things, and the business with Silas put the cap on it. Anyhow, we had words, and the thing is broken off." "Oh, dear me," said Miss Pinckney. The joyful shock of the news seemed to have reduced her mind to chaos for a moment. One could not have told from her words or manner whether the surprise was pleasant or painful to her. She drew her chair back from the table a little, and sought for and found her handkerchief. She dried her eyes with it as she found her voice. "I don't know, I don't know, I'm sure. I've prayed all night that this might be, and now that the Lord has heard my prayer and answered it, I feel cast right down with the wonder of it. Had I the right to interfere? I don't know, I'm sure. It seems terrible to separate two people but I had no thought only for you. I've spoken against the girl, and wished against her, and felt bad in my heart against her, and now it's all over I'm just cast down." "She did not care for me," said Pinckney. "Why she was laughing at me last night with him. They were sitting outside together, and when I passed them I heard them laughing at me." Miss Pinckney put her handkerchief away, drew in her chair, and poured herself out some more tea energetically and with a heightened colour. "I don't want to speak bad about any one," said she, "but there are girls and girls. I know them, and time and again I've seen girls hanging themselves out with labels on them. 'I'm the finest apple on the tree,' yet no one has picked them for all their labels, because every one has guessed that they aren't--That crab apple labelling itself a pippin and daring to laugh at you! And that long loony Silas Grangerson, a man without a penny to bless himself with, a creature whose character is just kinks. Well, I'm sure--pass me the butter--laughing at you. And what were they laughing at pray? Aren't you straight and the best looking man in Charleston? Couldn't you buy the Rhetts twice over if you wanted to buy such rubbish? Aren't you the top man in Charleston in name and position and character? Why, they'll be laughing at the jokes in the N'York papers next--They'll be appreciating their own good sense and cleverness and personal beauty next thing--They'll be worshipping Bryan." "Oh, I don't think they'll ever get as bad as that," said he laughing, "but I don't think I care whether people grin at me or not; it's only just this, she and I were never meant for each other, and I found it out, and found it out in time. You see the engagement was never made public, so the breaking of it won't do her any harm. She would not let me tell people about it, she said it would be just as well to keep it secret for a while, and then if either of us felt disposed we could break it off and no harm done." "Meaning that she could break it off if she wanted to but you couldn't." "Perhaps. When I went back last night and told her I wanted to be free, she flew out." "Said you must stick to your word?" "Nearly that. Then I told her she herself had said that it was open to either of us to break the business off." "What did she say to that?" "Nothing. She had nothing to say. She asked why I wanted to break it off." "And you told her it was because of her conduct, I hope." "No. I told her it was because I had come to care for some one else." Miss Pinckney said nothing for a moment. Then she looked at him. "Richard, do you care for Phyl?" "Yes." "Thank God," said she. The one supreme wish of her life had been granted to her. Her gaze wandered to the glimpse of garden visible through the open window and rested there. She was old, she had seen friend and relative fade and vanish, the Mascarenes, the Pinckneys, children, old people, all had become part of that mystery, the past. Richard alone remained to her, and Phyl. On the morning of Phyl's arrival Miss Pinckney had felt just as though some door had opened to let this visitor in from the world of long ago. It was not only her likeness to Juliet Mascarene, but all the associations that likeness brought with it. Vernons became alive again, as in the good old days. Charleston itself caught some tinge of its youth. And there was more than that. "Richard," said she, coming back from her fit of abstraction, "I will tell you something I'd never have spoken of if you didn't care for her. It may be an old woman's fancy, but Phyl is more to us, seems to me, than we think, she's Juliet come back--Oh, it's more than the likeness. I'm sure I can't explain what I mean, it's just she herself that's the same. There's a lot more to a person than a face and a figure. I know it sounds absurd, so would most things if we had never heard them before. What's more absurd than to be born, and look at that butterfly, what's more absurd than to tell me that yesterday it was a worm? Well, it doesn't much matter whether she was Juliet or not, now she's going to be yours, and to save you from that pasty--no matter she's over and done with, but I reckon she's laughing on the wrong side of her face this morning." Miss Pinckney rose from the table. The absence of Phyl did not disturb her. Phyl sometimes stayed out and forgot meals, though this was the first time she had been late for breakfast. Richard, who had business to transact that morning in the town looked at his watch. "I'm going to Philips', the lawyers," said he, "and then I'll look in at the club. I'll be back to luncheon." An hour later to Miss Pinckney engaged in dusting the drawing-room appeared Rachel the cook. Rachel was the most privileged of the servants, a trustworthy woman with a character and will of her own, and absolutely devoted to the interests of the house. "Mistress Pinckney," said the coloured woman closing the door. "Ole Colonel Grangerson's coachman's in de kitchen, an' he says Miss Phyl's been an' run off with young Silas Grangerson dis very mornin'." Miss Pinckney without dropping the duster stood silent for a moment before Rachel. Then she broke out. "Miss Phyl run off with young Silas Grangerson! What on earth are you talking about, what rubbish is this, who's dared to come here talking such nonsense? Go on--what more have you to say?" Rachel had a lot to say. Phyl had met Silas on the road beyond the town. They had talked together, then Silas had sent the groom back to Charleston to return to Grangerville by train, and had driven off with Phyl. The groom, a relation of Dinah's, having some three hours to wait for a train, had dropped into Vernons to pass the time and tell the good news. He was in the kitchen now. Miss Pinckney could not but believe. She threw the duster on a chair, left the room and went to the kitchen. Prue was still in her corner by the fireplace, and Colonel Grangerson's coloured man was seated at the table finishing a meal and talking to Dinah who scuttled away as he rose up before the apparition of Miss Pinckney. "What's all this nonsense you have been talking," said she, "coming here saying Miss Phyl has run away with Mr. Silas? She started out this morning to meet him and drive to Grangersons; I'm going there myself at eleven--and you come here talking of people running away. Do you know you could be put in prison for saying things like that? You _dare_ to say it again to any one and I'll have you taken off before you're an hour older, you black imp of mischief." There was a rolling pin on the table, and half unconsciously her hand closed on it. Colonel Grangerson's man, grey and clutching at his hat, did not wait for the sequel, he bolted. Then the unfortunate woman, nearly fainting, but supported by her grand common sense and her invincible nature, left the kitchen and, followed by Rachel, went to the library. Here she sat down for a moment to collect herself whilst Rachel stood watching her and waiting. "It is so and it's not so," said she at last, talking half to herself half to the woman. "It's some trick of Silas Grangerson's. But the main thing is no one must know. We have got to get her back. No one must know--Rachel, go and find Seth and send him off at once to the garage place and tell them to let me have an automobile at once, at once, mind you. Tell them I want the quickest one they've got for a long journey." Rachel went off and Miss Pinckney left to herself went down on her knees by the big settee adjoining the writing table and began to wrestle with the situation in prayer. Miss Pinckney was not overgiven to prayer. She held that worriting the Almighty eternally about all sorts of nonsense, as some people do who pray for "direction" and weather, etc., was bad form to say the least of it. She even went further than that, and held that praising him inordinately was out of place and out of taste. Saying that, if Seth or Dinah came singing praises at her bedroom door in the morning instead of getting on with their work, she would know exactly what it meant--Laziness or concealed broken china, or both. But in moments of supreme stress and difficulty, Miss Pinckney was a believer in prayer. Her prayer now was speechless, one might compare it to a mental wrestle with the abominable situation before God. When she rose from her knees everything was clear to her. Two things were evident. Phyl must be got back at any cost, and scandal must be choked, even if it had to be choked with solid lies. To save Phyl's reputation, Miss Pinckney would have perjured herself twice over. Miss Pinckney had many faults and limitations, but she had the grand common sense of a clean heart and a clear mind. She could tell a lie with a good conscience in a good cause, but to hide even a small fault of her own, the threat of death on the scaffold would not have made her tell a lie. She went to the writing table now and taking a sheet of paper, wrote: _Dear Richard,_ Seth Grangerson is bad again, and I am going over there now with Phyl. We mayn't be back to-night. I am taking the automobile. We will be back to-morrow most likely. Your affectionate Aunt, Maria Pinckney. She read the note over. If all went well then everything would be well. If the worst occurred then she could explain everything to Richard. It was a desperate gamble; well she knew how the dice were loaded against her, but the game had to be played out to the very last moment. Already she had stopped the mouth of slander by her prompt action with Colonel Grangerson's coloured man, but she well knew how coloured servants talk; Grangerson's man was safe enough, he was frightened and he would have to get back to Grangerville. Rachel was absolutely safe, Dinah alone was doubtful. She called Rachel in, gave her the note for Richard and told her to keep a close eye on Dinah. "Don't let her get talking to any one," said Miss Pinckney, "and when Mr. Richard comes in give him that note yourself. If he asks about Miss Phyl, say she came back and went with me. You understand, Rachel, Miss Phyl has done a foolish thing, but there's no harm in it, only what fools will make of it if they get chattering. No one must know, not even Mr. Richard." "I'll see to that, Miss Pinckney, an' if I catch Dinah openin' her mouth to say more'n 'potatoes' I'll dress her down so's she won't know which end of her's which." Miss Pinckney went upstairs, dressed hurriedly, packed a few things in a bag and the automobile being now at the door, started. It was after one o'clock when she reached Grangersons. Just as on the day when she had arrived with Phyl, Colonel Grangerson, hearing the noise of the car, came out to inspect. He came down the steps, hat in hand, saw the occupant, started back, and then advanced to open the door. "Why, God bless my soul, it's you," cried the Colonel. "What has happened?" Miss Pinckney without a word got out and went up the steps with him. In the hall she turned to him. "Where is Silas?" "Silas," replied the Colonel. "I haven't seen him since he went to Charleston to attend some dance or another. What on earth is the matter with you, Maria?" "Come in here," said Miss Pinckney. She went into the drawing room and they shut the door. "Silas has run away with Phyl," said she, "that's what's the matter with me. Your son has taken that girl off, Seth Grangerson, and may God have mercy upon him." "The red-headed girl?" said the Colonel. "Phyl," replied she, "you know quite well whom I mean." Colonel Grangerson made a few steps up and down the room to calm himself. Maria Pinckney was speaking to him in a tone which, had it been used by any one else, would have caused an explosion. "But when did it happen," he asked, "and where have they gone? Explain yourself, Maria. Good God! Why the fellow never spoke to her scarcely--are you sure of what you say?" Miss Pinckney told her tale. "I came here to try and get her back," said she, "thinking he and she might possibly have come here or that you might know their whereabouts--they have not come, but there is just the chance that they may come here yet." "But if they have run off with each other," said the Colonel, "how are we to stop them--they'll be married by this." Miss Pinckney who had taken off her gloves sat down and began to fold them, neatly rolling one inside the other. "_Married,_" said she. The Colonel standing by the window with his hands in his pockets turned. "And why not?" said he. "The girl's a lady, and you told me she was not badly off. Silas might have done worse it seems to me." "Done worse! He couldn't have done worse. I'd sooner see her dead in her coffin than married to Silas--There, you have it plain and straight. He'll make her life a misery. Let me speak, Seth Grangerson, you are just going to hear the truth for once. You have ruined that boy the way you've brought him up, he was crazy wild to start with and you've never checked him. Oh, I know, he has always been respectful to you and flattered your pride and vanity, he calls you sir when he speaks to you, and you are the only person in the world to whom he shews respect. I don't say he acts like that from any double dealing motive, it's just the old southern tradition he's inherited; he does respect you, and I daresay he's fond of you, but he respects nothing else, especially women. I know him. And I know her, and he'll make her life a misery. If he'd left her alone she'd have been happy. Richard loves her, and would have made her a good husband. My mind was set on it, and now it's all over." Miss Pinckney began to weep, and the Colonel who had been swelling himself up found his anger collapsing. She was only a woman. Women have queer fancies--This especial woman too was part of the past and privileged. He came to her and stood beside her and rested his hand on her shoulder. "My dear Maria," said the Colonel, "youth is youth--There is not any use in laying down the law for young people or making plans for their marriages. Leave it in the hands of Providence. The most carefully arranged marriages often turn out the worst, and a scratch match has often as not turned out happily. Anyhow, you will stay here till news comes of them?" "Yes, I will stay," said Miss Pinckney. CHAPTER VI At eleven o'clock that night, just as Miss Pinckney was on the point of retiring to bed the news came in the form of Phyl herself. She arrived in a buggy driven by the farmer who owned the land through which the grass road ran. She gave a little glad cry when she saw Miss Pinckney and ran into her arms. Upstairs and alone with the lady, she told her story. Told her how she had met Silas on the road that morning, how, tired of life and scarce knowing what she did, she had got into the phaëton, how he had upset it and smashed it, how she had sheltered in the cabin whilst he went in search of help. "Then I went to sleep," said Phyl, "and when I woke up it was afternoon. He was not there, but he must have come back when I was asleep and left some food for me, for there was a bundle outside the door with some bread and bacon in it. Then I started off to walk and found a village with some coloured people. I told them I was lost and wanted to get to Grangersons. They were kind to me, but I had to wait a long time before they could find that gentleman, the farmer, and he could get a cart to drive me here." "Thank God it is all over and you are back," said Miss Pinckney. "But oh, Phyl! what made you do it?" "I don't know," said Phyl. But Miss Pinckney did. "Listen," said she. "You know what I told you about Richard and Frances Rhett--that's all done with. He has broken off the engagement." Phyl flushed, then she hid her burning face on Miss Pinckney's shoulder. Miss Pinckney held her for awhile. Then she began to talk. "We will get right back to-morrow early; no one knows anything and I'll take care they never do. Well, it's strange--I can understand everything but I can't understand that crazy creature. What's become of him? That's what I want to know." * * * * * This is what had become of him. Kneeling beside Phyl the sudden sharp pain just above his instep made him turn. In turning he caught a glimpse of his assailant. It had been creeping towards the door when he entered and had taken refuge beneath the straw. He had almost knelt on it. Escaping, a movement of his foot had raised its anger and it had struck, it was now whisking back into the darkness of the cabin beyond the straw heap. He recognised it as the deadliest snake in the South. For a moment he recognised nothing else but the fact that he had been bitten. His passion and desire had vanished utterly. Phyl might have been a thousand miles away from him for all that he thought of her. He rose up and came out into the sunlight, went to the well head, sat down on the frame and removed his shoe and sock. The mark of the bite was there between the adductor tendons. A red hot iron and a bottle of whisky might have saved him. He had not even a penknife to cut the wound out--He thought of Phyl, she could do nothing. He thought of the bar of the Charleston Hotel, and the verse of the song about the old hen with a wooden leg and the statement that it was just about time for another little drink, ran through his head. Then suddenly the idea came to him that there might possibly be help at the village where he had obtained the food from the coloured woman. It was a long way off, but still it was a chance. He put the sock in his pocket, put on the shoe and started. He ran for the first couple of hundred yards, then he slackened his pace, then he stopped holding one hand to his side. The poison already had hold of him. The game was up and he knew it. It was useless to go on, he would not live to reach the village or reaching it would die there. And every one would pity him with that shuddering pity people extend to those who meet with a horrible form of death. Death from snake bite was a low down business, it was no end for a Grangerson; but there in the swamp to the left a man might lie forever without being found out. He turned from the road to the left and walked away among the trees. The ground here sank beneath the foot, a vague haze hung above the marsh and the ponds. Here nothing happened but the change of season, night and day, the chorus of frogs and the crying of the white owl amidst the trees. CHAPTER VII Miss Pinckney and Phyl left Grangersons next morning at seven o'clock to return to Charleston. During the night the Colonel had sent after the horses and they had been captured and brought back. The broken phaëton was left for the present. "I'll make Silas go and fetch it himself when he comes back," said the Colonel. "I reckon the exercise will do him good." "Do," said Miss Pinckney, "and then send him on to me. I reckon what I'll give him will help him to forget the exercise." On the way back she said little. She was reckoning with the fact that she had deceived Richard. Now that everything had turned out so innocently and so well she decided to tell him the bare facts of the matter. There was nothing to hide except the fact of Phyl's stupidity in going with Silas. Richard Pinckney was not in when they arrived but he returned shortly before luncheon time and Miss Pinckney, who was waiting for him, carried him off into the library. She shut the door and faced him. "Richard," said Miss Pinckney, "Seth Grangerson is as well as you are. I didn't go to see him because he was ill, I went because of Phyl. She did a stupid thing and I went to set matters right." She explained the whole affair. How Phyl had met Silas, how he had persuaded her to get into the phaëton with him, the accident and all the rest. The story as told by Miss Pinckney was quite simple and without any dark patches, and no man, one might fancy, could find cause for offence in it. Miss Pinckney, however, was quite unconscious of the fact that Silas Grangerson had attempted to take Richard Pinckney's life on the night of the Rhetts' dance. To Richard the thought that Phyl should have met Silas only a few hours after that event, talked to him, made friends with him, and got into his carriage was a monstrous thought. He could not understand the business in the least, he could only recognise the fact. Had he known that it was her love for him and her despair at losing him that led her to the act it would have been different. He said nothing for a moment after Miss Pinckney had finished. Having already confessed to her his love for Phyl he was too proud to show his anger against her now. "It was unwise of her," he said at last, turning away to the window and looking out. "Most," replied she, "but you cannot put old heads on young shoulders. Well, there, it's over and done with and there's no more to be said. Well, I must go up and change before luncheon. You are having luncheon here?" "No," said he, "I have to meet a man at the club. I only just ran in to see if you were back." He went off and that day Miss Pinckney and Phyl had luncheon alone. CHAPTER VIII Richard Pinckney, like most people, had the defects of his qualities, but he was different from others in this: his temper was quick and blazing when roused, yet on rare occasions it could hold its heat and smoulder, and keep alive indefinitely. When in this condition he shewed nothing of his feelings except towards the person against whom he was in wrath. Towards them he exhibited the two main characteristics of the North Pole--Distance and Ice. Phyl felt the frost almost immediately. He talked to her just the same as of old but his pleasantness and laughter were gone and he never sought her eye. She knew at once that it was the business with Silas that had caused this change, and she would have been entirely miserable but for the knowledge of two great facts: she was innocent of any disloyalty to him, he had broken off his engagement to Frances Rhett. Instinct told her that he cared for her, Miss Pinckney had told her the same thing. Yet day after day passed without bringing the slightest change in Richard Pinckney. That gentleman after many debates with himself had arrived at the determination against will, against reason, against Love, and against nature to have nothing more to do with Phyl. Old Pepper Pinckney, that volcano of the past had suffered a fancied insult from his wife; no one knew of it, no one suspected it till on his death his will disclosed it by the fact that he had left the lady--one dollar. The will being unwitnessed--that was the sort of man he was--did not hold; all the same, it held an unsuspected part of his character up for public inspection. Richard, incapable of such an act, still had Pepper Pinckney for an ancestor. Ancestors leave us more than their pictures. Having come to this momentous decision, he arrived at another. One morning at breakfast he announced his intention of going to New York on business, he would start on the morrow and be gone a month. The Beauregards had always been bothering him to go on a visit and he might as well kill two birds with one stone. Miss Pinckney made little resistance to the idea. She had noticed the coolness between the young people; knowing how much they cared one for the other she had little fear as to the end of the matter and she fancied a change might do good. But to Phyl it seemed that the end of the world had come. All that day she scarcely spoke except to Miss Pinckney. She was like a person stunned by some calamity. Richard Pinckney, notwithstanding the fact that he was to leave for New York on the morrow, did not return to dinner that night. Phyl went upstairs early but she did not go to her room, she went to Juliet's. Sorrow attracts sorrow. Juliet had always seemed more than a friend, more than a sister, even. There were times when the ungraspable idea came before her that Juliet was herself. The vision of the Civil War sometimes came back to her and always with the hint, like a half veiled threat, that Richard the man she loved was Rupert the man she had loved, that following the dark law of duplication that works alike for types and events, forms and ideas, her history was to repeat the history of Juliet. She had saved Richard from death at the hands of Silas Grangerson, her love for him had met Fate face to face and won, but Fate has many reserve weapons. She is an old warrior, and the conqueror of cities and kings does not turn from her purpose because of a momentary defeat. Phyl shut the door of the room, put the lamp she was carrying on a table and opened the long windows giving upon the piazza. The night was absolutely still, not a breath of wind stirred the foliage of the garden and the faint sounds of the city rose through the warm night. The waning moon would not rise yet for an hour and the stars had the sky to themselves. She turned from the window and going to the little bureau by the door opened the secret drawer and took out the packet of letters. Then drawing an armchair close to the table and the lamp she sat down, undid the ribbon and began to read the letters. She felt just as though Juliet were talking to her, telling her of her troubles. She read on placing each letter on the table in turn, one upon the other. The chimes of St. Michael's came through the open window but they were unheeded. When she had read through all the letters she picked out one. The one containing the passionate declaration of Juliet's love. She re-read it and then placed it on the table on top of the others. If she could speak of Richard like that! But she could do nothing and say nothing. It is one of the curses of womanhood that a woman may not say to a man "I love you," that the initiative is taken out of her hands. Phyl was a creature of impulse and it was now for the first time in her life that she recognised this fatal barrier on the woman's side. With the recognition came the impulse to over jump it. He cared for her, she knew, or had cared for her. She felt that it only required a movement on her side, a touch, a word to destroy the ice that had formed between them. If he were to go away he might never return, nay, he would never return, of that she felt sure. And he would go away unless she spoke. She must speak, not to-morrow in the cold light of day when things were impossible, but now, at once, she would say to him simply the truth, "I love you." If he were to turn away or repulse her it would kill her. No matter, life was absolutely nothing. She rose from her chair and was just on the point of turning to the door when something checked her. It was the clock of St. Michael's striking one. One o'clock. The whole household would be in bed. He would have retired to his room long ago--and to-morrow it would be too late. She could never say that to him to-morrow; even now the impulse was dying away, the strength that would have broken convention and disregarded all things was fading in her. She had been dreaming whilst she ought to have been doing, and the hour had passed and would never return. She sat down again in the chair. The moon in the cloudless sky outside cast a patch of silver on the floor, then it shewed a silver rim gradually increasing against the sky as it pushed its way through the night to peep in at Phyl. Leaning back in the chair limp and exhausted, with closed eyes, one might have fancied her dead or in a trance and the moon as if to make sure pushed on, framing itself now fully in the window space. The clock of St. Michael's struck two, then it chimed the quarter after and almost on the chime Phyl sat up. It was as though she had suddenly come to a resolve. She clasped her hands together for a moment, then she rose, gathered up the letters and put them away, all except one which she held in her hand as though to give her courage for what she was about to do. She carefully extinguished the lamp and then led by the moonlight came out on to the piazza. Charleston was asleep under the moon; the air was filled with the scent of night jessamine and the faint fragrance of foliage, and scarcely a sound came from all the sleeping city beyond the garden walls and the sea beyond the city. As she stood with one hand on the piazza rail, suddenly, far away but shrill, came the crowing of a cock. She shivered as though the sound were a menace, then rigidly gliding like a ghost escaped from the grave and warned by the cockcrow that the hour of return was near, she came along the piazza, mounted the stair to the next floor and came along the upper piazza to the window of Richard Pinckney's bedroom. The window was open and, pushing the curtains aside, she went in. CHAPTER IX Richard Pinckney went to his room at eleven that night. He rarely retired before twelve, but to-night he had packing to do as Jabez, his man, was away and he knew better than to trust Seth. He packed his portmanteau and left it lying open in case he had forgotten anything that could be put in at the last moment. Then he packed a kit-bag and, having smoked a cigarette, went to bed. But he did not fall asleep. As a rule he slept at once on lying down, but to-night he lay awake. He was miserable; going away was death to him, but he was going. First of all, because he had said that he was going. Secondly, because he wanted to hit and hurt Phyl whom he loved, thirdly, because he wanted to torture himself, fourthly, because he loathed and hated Silas Grangerson, fifthly, because in his heart of hearts he knew what he was doing was wrong. You never know really what is in a man till he is pinched by Love. Love may stun him with a blow or run a dagger into him without bringing his worst qualities to light whilst a sly pinch will raise devils--all the miserable devils that march under the leadership of Pique. If he had not loved Phyl the fact of her going off with Silas for a drive after what had occurred on the night before would have hurt him. Loving her it had maddened him. He was not angry with her now, so he told himself--just disgusted. Meanwhile he could not sleep. The faithful St. Michael's kept him well aware of this fact. He lit a candle and tried to read, smoked a cigarette and then, blowing the candle out, tried to sleep. But insomnia had him fairly in her grip; to-night there was no escape from her and he lay whilst the moon, creeping through the sky, cast her light on the piazza outside. St. Michael's chimed the quarter after two and sleep, long absent, was coming at last when, suddenly, the sound of a light footstep on the piazza drove her leagues away. Then outside in the full moonlight he saw a figure. It was Phyl, fully dressed, standing with outstretched hands. Her eyes wide open, fixed, and sightless, told their tale. She was asleep. She moved the curtains aside and entered the room, darkening the window space, passed across the room without the least sound, reached the bed, and knelt down beside it. Her hand was feeling for him, it touched his neck, he raised his head slightly from the pillow and her arm, gliding like a snake round his neck drew his head towards her; then her lips, blindly seeking, found his and clung to them for a moment. Nothing could be more ghostly, more terrible, and yet more lovely than that kiss, the kiss of a spirit, the embrace of a soul rising from the profound abysm of sleep to find its mate. Then her lips withdrew and he lay praying to God, as few men have ever prayed, that she might not wake. He felt the arm withdrawing from around his neck, she rose, wavered for a moment, and then passed away towards the window. The lace curtains parted as though drawn aside, closed again, and she was gone. He left his bed and came out on the piazza. Craning over he caught a glimpse of her returning along the lower piazza and vanishing. Coming back to his room he saw something lying on the floor by his bed; it was a letter; he struck a match, lit the candle and picked the letter up. It was just a folded piece of paper, it had been sealed, but the seal was broken, and sitting down on the side of the bed he spread it open, but his hands were shaking so that he had to rest it on his knee. It was not from Phyl. That letter had been written many, many years ago, the ink was faded and the handwriting of another day. He read it. "Not to-night. I have to go to the Calhouns. It is just as well for I have a dread of people suspecting if we meet too often.... "Sometimes I feel as if I were deceiving him and everybody. I am, and I don't care. Oh, my darling! my darling! my darling! If the whole world were against you I would love you all the more. I will love you all my life, and I will love you when I am dead." It was the letter of Juliet to her lover. He turned it over and looked at the seal with the little dove upon it. He knew of Juliet's letters, and he knew at once that this was one of them, and he guessed vaguely that she had been reading it when sleep overtook her and that it had formed part of the inspiration that led her to him. But the whole truth he would never know. * * * * * A blazing red Cardinal was singing in the magnolia tree by the gate, butterflies were chasing one another above the flowers; it was seven o'clock and the blue, lazy, lovely morning was unfolding like a flower to the sea wind. Richard Pinckney was standing in the piazza before his bedroom window looking down into the garden. To him suddenly appeared Seth. "If you please, sah," said Seth, "Rachel tole me tell yo' de train for N'York--" "Damn New York," said Pinckney. "Get out." Seth vanished, grinning, and he returned to his contemplation of the garden. She must never know.--In the years to come, perhaps, he might tell her-- In the years to come-- He was turning away when a step on the piazza below made him come to the rail again and lean over. It was Phyl. She vanished and then reappeared again, leaving the lower piazza and coming right out into the garden. He waited till the sun had caught her in both hands, holding her against the background of the cherokee roses, then he called to her: "Phyl!" She started, turned, and looked up. THE END 
4958	----	This eBook was edited by Charles Aldarondo (www.aldarondo.net). JUSTICE IN THE BY-WAYS. A TALE OF LIFE. BY F. COLBURN ADAMS, AUTHOR OF "OUR WORLD," ETC., ETC., ETC. "A rebellion or an invasion alarms, And puts the people upon its defence; But a corruption of principles Works its ruin more slowly perhaps, But more surely." NEW YORK: LONDON: 1856. PREFACE. PREFACES, like long sermons to fashionable congregations, are distasteful to most readers, and in no very high favor with us. A deep interest in the welfare of South Carolina, and the high esteem in which we held the better, and more sensible class of her citizens, prompted us to sit down in Charleston, some four years ago (as a few of our friends are aware), and write this history. The malady of her chivalry had then broken out, and such was its virulence that very serious consequences were apprehended. We had done something, and were unwise enough to think we could do more, to stay its spread. We say unwise, inasmuch as we see, and regret that we do see, the malady breaking out anew, in a more virulent type-one which threatens dire consequences to this glorious Union, and bids fair soon to see the Insane Hospital of South Carolina crammed with her mad-politicians. Our purpose, the reader will not fail to discover, was a high moral one. He must overlook the means we have called to our aid in some instances, remember that the spirit of the work is in harmony with a just sense of duty to a people among whom we have long resided, and whose follies deserve our pity, perhaps, rather than our condemnation. To remain blind to their own follies, is the sin of weak States; and we venture nothing when we say that it would be difficult to find a people more dragged down by their own ignorance than are the South Carolinians. And yet, strange as it may seem, no people are more energetic in laying claim to a high intellectual standard. For a stranger to level his shafts against the very evils they themselves most deprecate, is to consign himself an exile worthy only of that domestic garment Tar and feathers. in which all who think and write too freely, are clothed and sent away. And though the sentiments we have put forth in this work may not be in fashion with our Southern friends, they will give us credit for at least one thing-picturing in truthful colors the errors that, by their own confessions, are sapping the very foundations of their society. Our aim is to suggest reforms, and in carrying it out we have consulted no popular prejudice, enlarged upon no enormities to please the lover of tragedy, regarded neither beauty nor the art of novel making, nor created suffering heroines to excite an outpouring of sorrow and tears. The incidents of our story, which at best is but a mere thread, are founded in facts; and these facts we have so modified as to make them acceptable to the reader, while shielding ourself from the charge of exaggeration. And, too, we are conscious that our humble influence, heretofore exerted, has contributed to the benefit of a certain class in Charleston, and trust that in this instance it may have a wider field. Three years and upwards, then, has the MS. of this work laid in the hands of a Philadelphia publisher, who was kind enough to say more good things of it than it deserved, and only (as he said, and what publishers say no one ever thinks of doubting) regretted that fear of offending his Southern customers, who were exceedingly stiff in some places, and tender in others, prevented him publishing it. Thankful for the very flattering but undeserved reception two works from our pen (both written at a subsequent period) met, in England as well as this country, we resolved a few weeks ago to drag the MS. from the obscurity in which it had so long remained, and having resigned it to the rude hands of our printer, let it pass to the public. But there seemed another difficulty in the way: the time, every one said, and every one ought to know, was a hazardous one for works of a light character. Splash & Dash, my old publishers, (noble fellows), had no less than three Presidents on their shoulders, and could not be expected to take up anything "light" for several months. Brick, of the very respectable but somewhat slow firm of Brick & Brother, a firm that had singular scruples about publishing a work not thickly sprinkled with the author's knowledge of French, had one candidate by the neck, and had made a large bet that he could carry him into the "White House" with a rush, while the junior partner was deeply immersed in the study of Greek. Puff, of the firm of Puff & Bluff, a house that had recently moved into the city to teach the art of blowing books into the market, was foaming over with his two Presidential candidates, and thought the public could not be got to read a book without at least one candidate in it. It was not prudent to give the reading world more than a book of travels or so, said Munch, of the house of Munch & Muddle, until the candidates for the White House were got nicely out of the way. Indeed, there were good reasons for being alarmed, seeing that the publishing world had given up literature, and, following the example set by the New York Corporation, taken itself very generally to the trade of President-making. Wilkins, whose publications were so highly respectable that they invariably remained on his shelves, and had in more than one instance become so weighty that they had dragged the house down, thought the pretty feet of some few of the female characters in this volume a little too much exposed to suit the delicate sensibilities of his fair readers. Applejack, than whose taste none could be more exquisite, and who only wanted to feel a manuscript to tell whether it would do to publish it, made it a point, he said, not to publish novels with characters in them that would drink to excess. As for the very fast firm of Blowers & Windspin, celebrated for flooding the country with cheap books of a very tragic character, why, it had work enough on hand for the present. Blowers was blessed with a wife of a literary turn of mind, which was very convenient, inasmuch as all the novels with which the house astonished the world were submitted to her, and what she could not read she was sure to pass a favorable judgment upon. The house had in press four highly worked up novels of Mrs. Blowers' own, Mr. Blowers said,--all written in the very short space of six weeks. She was a remarkable woman, and extraordinary clever at novels, Blowers concluded with an air of magnificent self-satisfaction. These works, having been written by steam, Mr. Windspin, the unior partner, was expected to put into the market with a very large amount of high pressure. Our friends in South Carolina, we knew, would be anxious to see what we had written of them in this volume, and we have made and shall continue to make it a point to gratify them: hence our haste in this instance. Conscious, too, that life is the great schoolmaster, and that public taste is neither to be regulated by a few, nor kept at any one point, we caught up a publisher with only one candidate for the "White House" on his shoulders, and with his assistance, now respectfully submit this our humble effort. NEW YORK, Sept., 1856. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I.--Tom Swiggs' Seventh Introduction on board of the Brig Standfast, CHAPTER II.--Madame Flamingo-Her Distinguished Patrons, and her very respectable House, CHAPTER III.--In which the Reader is presented with a Varied Picture, CHAPTER IV.--A few Reflections on the Cure of Vice, CHAPTER V.--In which Mr. Snivel, commonly called the Accommodation Man, is introduced, and what takes place between him and Mrs. Swiggs. CHAPTER VI.--Containing Sundry Matters appertaining to this History, CHAPTER VII.--In which is seen a Commingling of Citizens, CHAPTER VIII.--What takes place between George Mullholland and Mr. Snivel, CHAPTER IX.--In which a Gleam of Light is shed on the History of Anna Bonard, CHAPTER X.--A Continuation of George Mullholland's History, CHAPTER XI.--In which the Reader is introduced to Mr. Absalom McArthur, CHAPTER XII.--In which are Matters the Reader may have anticipated, CHAPTER XIII.--Mrs. Swiggs comes to the Rescue of the House of the Foreign Missions, CHAPTER XIV.--Mr. McArthur makes a Discovery, CHAPTER XV.--What Madame Flamingo wants to be, CHAPTER XVI.--In which Tom Swiggs gains his Liberty, and what befalls him, CHAPTER XVII.--In which there is an Interesting Meeting, CHAPTER XVIII.--Anna Bonard seeks an Interview with the Antiquary, CHAPTER XIX.--A Secret Interview, CHAPTER XX.--Lady Swiggs encounters Difficulties on her Arrival in New York, CHAPTER XXI.--Mr. Snivel pursues his Search for the Vote-Cribber, CHAPTER XXII.--Mrs. Swiggs falls upon a Modern Heathen World, CHAPTER XXIII.--In which the very best Intentions are seen to fail, CHAPTER XXIV.--Mr. Snivel advises George Mullholland how to make Strong Love, CHAPTER XXV.--A Slight Change in the Picture, CHAPTER XXVI.--In which a High Functionary is made to play a Singular Part, CHAPTER XXVII.--The House of the Nine Nations, and what may be seen in it, CHAPTER XXVIII.--In which is presented Another Picture of the House of the Nine Nations, CHAPTER XXIX.--In which may be seen a few of our Common Evils, CHAPTER XXX.--Containing Various Things appertaining to this History, CHAPTER XXXI.--The Keno Den, and what may be seen in it, CHAPTER XXXII.--In which a State of Society is slighty Revealed, CHAPTER XXXIII.--In which there is a Singular Revelation, CHAPTER XXXIV.--The Two Pictures, CHAPTER XXXV.--In which a Little Light is shed upon the Character of our Chivalry, CHAPTER XXXVI.--In which a Law is seen to serve Base Purposes, CHAPTER XXXVII.--A Short Chapter of Ordinary Events, CHAPTER XXXVIII.--A Story without which this History would be found wanting, CHAPTER XXXIX.--A Story with many Counterparts, CHAPTER XL.--In which the Law is seen to Conflict with our Cherished Chivalry, CHAPTER XLI.--In which Justice is seen to be very accommodating, CHAPTER XLII.--In which Some Light is thrown on the Plot of this History, CHAPTER XLIII.--In which is revealed the One Error that brought so much Suffering upon many, CHAPTER XLIV.--In which is recorded Events the Reader may not have Expected, CHAPTER XLV.--Another Shade of the Picture, CHAPTER XLVI.--The Soul may gain Strength in a dreary Cell, CHAPTER XLVII.--In which is a Happy Meeting, and something Pleasing, CHAPTER XLVIII.--A Few Words With the Reader, JUSTICE IN THE BY-WAYS. CHAPTER I. TOM SWIGGS' SEVENTH INTRODUCTION ON BOARD OF THE BRIG STANDFAST. IT is in the spring of 1847 this history commences. "Steady a bit! Here I am, boys, turned up again-a subject of this moral reform school, of moral old Charleston. If my good old mother thinks it'll reform a cast-off remnant of human patchwork like me, I've nothing to say in protest. Yes, here I am, comrades (poor Tom Swiggs, as you used to call me), with rum my victor, and modern vengeance hastening my destruction." This is the exclamation of poor Tom Swiggs (as his jail companions are pleased to call him), who, in charge of two officers of the law, neither of whom are inclined to regard him with sympathy, is being dragged back again to the Charleston jail. The loathsome wreck of a once respectable man, he staggers into the corridor, utters a wild shriek as the iron gate closes upon him, and falls headlong upon the floor of the vestibule, muttering, incoherently, "there is no hope for one like me." And the old walls re-echo his lamentation. "His mother, otherwise a kind sort of woman, sends him here. She believes it will work his reform. I pity her error-for it is an error to believe reform can come of punishment, or that virtue may be nurtured among vice." Thus responds the brusque but kind-hearted old jailer, who view swith an air of compassion his new comer, as he lays, a forlorn mass, exposed to the gaze of the prisoners gathering eagerly about him. The dejected man gives a struggle, raises himself to his haunches, and with his coarse, begrimed hands resting on his knees, returns the salutation of several of his old friends. "This, boys, is the seventh time," he pursues, as if his scorched brain were tossed on a sea of fire, "and yet I'm my mother's friend. I love her still-yes, I love her still!" and he shakes his head, as his bleared eyes fill with tears. "She is my mother," he interpolates, and again gives vent to his frenzy: "fellows! bring me brandy-whiskey-rum-anything to quench this flame that burns me up. Bring it, and when I'm free of this place of torment, I will stand enough for you all to swim in." "Shut your whiskey-pipe. You don't appreciate the respectability of the company you've got among. I've heard of you," ejaculates a voice in the crowd of lookers-on. "What of a citizen are you?" inquires Tom, his head dropping sleepily. "A vote-cribber-Milman Mingle by name; and, like yourself, in for formal reform," retorts the voice. And the burly figure of a red, sullen-faced man, comes forward, folds his arms, and looks for some minutes with an air of contempt upon the poor inebriate. "You're no better than you ought to be," incoherently continues Tom, raising his glassy eyes as if to sight his seemingly querulous companion. "Better, at all events, than you," emphatically replies the man. "I'm only in for cribbing voters; which, be it known, is commonly called a laudable enterprise just before our elections come off, and a henious offence when office-seekers have gained their ends. But what use is it discussing the affairs of State with a thing like you?" The vote-cribber, inclined to regard the new-comer as an inferior mortal, shrugs his shoulders, and walks away, contemplatively humming an air. "If here ain't Tom Swiggs again!" exclaims a lean, parchment-faced prisoner, pressing eagerly his way through the circle of bystanders, and raising his hands as he beholds the wreck upon the floor. "Fate, and my mother, have ordered it so," replies Tom, recognizing the voice, and again imploring the jailer to bring him some brandy to quench the fires of his brain. The thought of his mother floated uppermost, and recurred brightest to the wandering imagination of this poor outcast. "There's no rum here, old bloat. The mother having you for a son is to be pitied-you are to be pitied, too; but the jail is bankrupt, without a shilling to relieve you in the liquor line," interposes another, as one by one the prisoners begin to leave and seek their several retreats. "That breath of yours," interrupts the vote-cribber, who, having returned, stands regarding the outcast man with singular interest, "would make drunk the whole jail. A week in 'Mount Rascal' The upper story used for the confinement of felons. will be necessary to transmute you, as they call it, into something Christian. On 'the Mount' you will have a chance to philosophize-mollify the temperature of your nervous system-which is out of fix just now." There is an inert aristocracy, a love of distinction, among the lowest dregs of society, as there is also a love of plush and other insignificant tawdry among our more wealthy republicans. Few would have thought of one inebriate affecting superiority over another, (the vote-cribber was an inebriate, as we shall show,) but so it was, nevertheless. "I own up," rejoins Tom, "I own up; I love my mother, and am out of sorts. You may call me a mass of filth-what you please!" "Never mind; I am your friend, Tom," interrupts the brusque old jailer, stooping down and taking him gently by the arm. "Good may come of the worst filth of nature-evil may come of what seemeth the best; and trees bearing sound pippins may have come of rotten cores. Cheer up!" The cool and unexpected admonition of the "vote-cribber" leaves a deep impression in Tom's feelings. He attempts, heaving a sigh, to rise, but has not strength, and falls languidly back upon the floor. His countenance, for a few moments, becomes dark and desponding; but the kind words that fall from the jailer's lips inspire him with confidence; and, turning partly on his side, he thrusts his begrimed hands into a pair of greasy pockets, whistling "Yankee Doodle," with great composure. The jailer glances about him for assistance, saying it will be necessary to get him up and carry him to his cell. "To a cell-a cell-a cell!" reiterates the inebriate. "Well, as the legal gentry say," he continues, "I'll enter a 'non-contender.' I only say this by way of implication, to show my love for the fellow who gathers fees by making out writs on my account." In reply to a question from the jailer, he says they mistake Tom Swiggs, if they think he has no pride left. "After all, there's something more in you than I thought, Tom. Give us your hand," says the vote-cribber, extending cordially his hand, as if a change for the better had come over him, and grasping firmly that of the inebriate. Raising his besotted head, Tom gazes distrustfully at the cribber, as if questioning his sincerity. "I am not dead to shame," he mutters, struggling at the same time to suppress his emotions. "There are, Tom," continues the cribber, playfully, "two claims on you-two patent claims! (He lets go the inebriate's hand, and begins teasing his long, red beard.) And, are you disposed to come out on the square, in the liquor line, you may redeem yourself--" "Name 'em!" interposed Tom, stopping short in his tune. "The gentleman commonly called Mister Jones, and a soap-chandler, are contesting a claim upon you. The one wants your body, the other your clothes. Now, as I am something of a lawyer, having had large dealings in elections, I may say, as a friend, that it is only a question of time, so far as you are concerned. Take my advice, then, and cheat both, by selling out, in advance. The student and the janitor pay good prices for such things as you. Give the last-named worthy a respondentia bond on yourself, redeemable before death, or resign the body after, (any lawyer will make the lien valid,) and the advance will produce floods of whiskey. Come out, Tom, like a hero, on the square." An outcast, hurled deep into the gulf of despair, and surrounded by victims of poverty and votaries of crime, the poor inebriate has yet left him one lingering spark of pride. As if somewhat revived, he scrambles to his feet, staggers into the room of a poor debtor, on the left of the long, sombre aisle, and drawing from his pocket a ten-cent piece, throws it upon the table, with an air of great importance. "I am not moneyless," he exclaims--"not I!" and he staggers to the great chimney-place, rebounding to the floor, saying, "Take that-bring her in-quench my burning thirst!" Tom is the only surviving, and now the outcast, member of a somewhat respectable family, that has moved in the better walks of society. His mother, being scrupulous of her position in society, and singularly proud withal, has reared and educated her son in idleness, and ultimately slights and discards him, because he, as she alleges, sought society inferior to his position and her dignity. In his better days he had been erect of person, and even handsome; but the thraldom of the destroyer has brought him to the dust, a pitiable wreck. Tom has seen thirty summers, presents a full, rounded figure, and stands some five feet ten. He wears an old brown coat, cut after the fashion of a surtout, that might have fitted him, he says, when he was a man. But it has lost the right cuff, the left flap, and a part of the collar; the nefarious moths, too, have made a sieve of its back. His trowsers are of various colors, greasy down the sides, ragged at the bottoms, and revealing two encrusted ancles, with feet stuck into old shoes, turned under at the heels for convenience sake. A remark from the cribber touches his pride, and borrowing a few pins he commences pinning together the shattered threads of his nether garment. A rope-yarn secured about his waist gives a sailor-like air to his outfit. But, notwithstanding Tom affects the trim of the craft, the skilled eye can easily detect the deception; for the craftsman, even under a press of head sail, preserves a becoming rig. Indeed, Tom might have attempted without effect, during his natural life, to transform himself into a sailor. The destroyer was his victor; the inner man was but a reflex of the outer. He pulled an old cloth cap over his face, which was immersed in a massive black beard, bordering two red, swollen cheeks; and with his begrimed hands he rubbed lustily his inflamed eyes--once brown, large, and earnest--now glassy and sunken. "I'm all square, ain't I?" he inquires, looking with vacant stare into the faces of those who tease him with facetious remarks, then scans his haberdashery. There yet remains something displeasing to him. His sense of taste is at stake. This something proves to be a sooty striped shirt, open in front, and disclosing the remains of a red flannel under-garment. Every few minutes will he, as if touched with a sense of shame, wriggle his shoulders, and pull forward the wreck of his collarless coat, apparently much annoyed that it fails to cover the breastwork of his distress. Again he thrusts his hands into his pockets, and with an air of apparent satisfaction, struts twice or thrice across the dingy room, as if he would show how far he has gained his equilibrium. "I shall go straight mad; yes, mad, if the whiskey be not brought in," he pursues, stopping short in one of his sallies, and with a rhetorical flourish, pointing at the piece of silver he so exultingly tossed upon the table. As if his brain were again seized by the destroyer's flame, his countenance becomes livid, his eyes glare wildly upon each object near him; then he draws himself into a tragic attitude, contorts hideously his more hideous face, throws his cap scornfully to the ground, and commences tearing from his head the matted black hair that confusedly covers it. "If my mother thinks this a fit place for me--" He pauses in the middle of his sentence, gives an imploring stare at his companions, shakes and hangs down his head; then his brain reels, and his frame trembles, and like a lifeless mass he falls to the floor. "I'm gone now--gone--gone--gone!" he mutters, with a spasmodic effort, covering his face with his hands. "He'll go mad; you can only save him with a hair of the same dog," one of the prisoner's measuredly suggests, folding his arms, and looking mechanically upon the wretched man. A second agrees with the first; a third says he is past cure, though a gallon of whiskey were wasted upon him. Mr. Mingle, the vote-cribber--regarded good authority in such matters--interposes. He has not the shadow of a doubt but that a speedy cure can be effected, by his friends drinking the whiskey, (he will join them, without an objection,) and just letting Tom smell the glass. A fifth says, without prejudice to the State of South Carolina, if he knew Tom's mother, he would honestly recommend her to send him special minister to Maine. There, drinking is rather an aristocratic indulgence, enjoyed only on the sly. Suddenly the poor inebriate gives vent to his frenzy. The color of his face changes from pale livid to sickly blue; his hands seem more shrunken and wiry; his body convulses and writhes upon the floor; he is become more the picture of a wild beast, goaded and aggravated in his confinement. A narcotic, administered by the hand of the jailer, produces quiet, and with the assistance of two prisoners is he raised to his feet, and supported into the corridor, to receive the benefit of fresh air. Here he remains some twenty minutes, stretched upon two benches, and eyed sharply by the vote-cribber, who paces in a circle round him, regarding him with a half suspicious leer, and twice or thrice pausing to fan his face with the drab felt hat he carries under his arm. "A curious mother that sends you here for reform," muses the vote-cribber; "but he must be a perfect fleshhook on the feelings of the family." Send him up into Rogue's Hall," exclaims a deep, sonorous voice, that echoes along the aisle. The vote-cribber, having paused over Tom, as if to contemplate his degradation, turns inquiringly, to see from whence comes the voice. "It is me!" again the voice resounds. Two glaring eyes, staring anxiously through the small iron grating of a door leading to a close cell on the left of the corridor, betrays the speaker. "It's Tom Swiggs. I know him--he's got the hydrophobia; its common with him! Take him in tow, old Spunyarn, give him a good berth, and let him mellow at thirty cents a day," continues the voice. The last sentence the speaker addressed to a man of comely figure and frank countenance, who has just made his appearance, dressed in the garb of a sailor. This man stoops over Tom, seems to recognize in him an old acquaintance, for his face warms with kindliness, and he straightway commences wiping the sun-scorched face of the inebriate with his handkerchief, and with his hand smooths and parts, with an air of tenderness, his hair; and when he has done this, he spreads the handkerchief over the wretched man's face, touches the querulous vote-cribber on the arm, and with a significant wink beckons him away, saying, "Come away, now, he has luffed into the wind. A sleep will do him good." CHAPTER II. MADAME FLAMINGO-HER DISTINGUISHED PATRONS, AND HER VERY RESPECTABLE HOUSE. REGARD us forbearingly, generous and urbane reader; follow us undaunted whither we go, nor charge us with tracing crime in a bad cause. We will leave the old prison, the dejected inebriate, the more curious group that surround him, and the tale of the destroyer it develops, and escort you in our walk to the mansion of Madame Flamingo, who is well known in Charleston, and commonly called the Mother of Sin. It is a massive brick pile, situate in one of the public thoroughfares, four stories high, with bold Doric windows, set off with brown fluted freestone, and revealing faded red curtains, overlain with mysterious lace, and from between the folds of which, at certain hours of the day, languid and more mysterious eyes may be seen peering cautiously. Madame Flamingo says (the city fathers all know it) she has a scrupulous regard to taste, and develops it in the construction of her front door, which is of black walnut, fluted and carved in curious designs. In style it resembles somewhat the doors of those fashionable churches that imitate so closely the Italian, make good, paying property of fascinating pews, and adopt the more luxurious way of getting to heaven (prayer-book of gold in hand) reclining on velvet and satin damask. The mansion of Madame Flamingo differs only in sumptuousness of furniture from twenty others of similar character, dotted here and there about the little city. Add to these the innumerable smaller haunts of vice that line the more obscure streets-that, rampart-like, file along the hundred and one "back lanes" that surround the scattered town, and, reader, you may form some estimation of the ratio of vice and wretchedness in this population of thirty thousand, of which the enslaved form one-third. Having escorted you to the door, generous reader, we will forget the common-place jargon of the world, and affect a little ceremony, for Madame Flamingo is delicately exact in matters of etiquette. Touch gently the bell; you will find it there, a small bronze knob, in the fluting of the frame, and scarce perceptible to the uninitiated eye. If rudely you touch it, no notice will be taken; the broad, high front of her house will remain, like an ill-natured panorama of brick and freestone, closed till daylight. She admits nothing but gentlemen; and gentlemen know how to ring a bell. Well, you have touched it like one of delicate nerves, and like a bell with manners polished by Madame Flamingo herself, it answers as faintly as does the distant tinkle of an Arab's bell in the desert. There! It was recognized as the ring of a genteel gentleman, and Madame Flamingo's heavy foot is heard advancing up the hall. Be a diplomatist now. Show a white glove, and a delicate hand, and a winning smile, and you have secured your passport to the satin and brocade of her mansion. A spring is heard to tick, a whisper of caution to some one within follows, and a block broad enough to admit your hat swings open, disclosing the voluptuous splendor of a great hall, the blaze of which flashes upon your senses, and fills you instinctively with curious emotions. Simultaneously a broad, cheerful face, somewhat matronly in its aspect, and enlivened with an urbane smile, darkens the space. After a few moments' pause we see two sharp gray eyes peering curiously at us, and a soft but quick accenting voice inquires who we are. Ah! yes, the white glove has told who we are, for the massive doors swing open, and we find ourselves in a long, stately hall, resplendent of Persian carpets, lounges in tapestry, walls and ceiling frescoed in uncouth and bright-colored designs, and curiously wrought chandeliers, shedding over all a bewitching light. The splendor is more gaudy than regal; it strikes our fancy, but leaves our admiration unmoved. The door is suddenly closed, and the short, portly figure of Madame (she bows, saying her house is most select) stands before us, somewhat nervous, as if she were yet undecided about our position in society. She has seen some sixty summers, made her nefarious reputation in New York; there she keeps a joint establishment, which, she adds, has been kindly patronized by the members of several pumpkin-headed corporations. Indeed, her princely tabernacle there was owned by one of these individuals, but in deference to his reputation she had the lease of a third party. Of corporations in general has she the very highest opinion. Madame Flamingo's round, dapper figure, is set off with a glossy, black satin, made high at the neck, about which a plain white collar is arranged, corresponding nicely with the dash of snowy lace down the stomacher, and an embroidered buff apron, under which she every few minutes thrusts her fat, jewelled fingers. Her face is pallid, her chin fat and dimpled, her artificial hair light brown, and lain smoothly over a low forehead, which is curiously contrasted with a jauntily-setting cap, the long strings of which flutter down her shoulders. "If you please, gentlemen," she says, "my house is highly respectable-highly respectable (don't make strange of me tending my own door!) I assure you gentlemen." And Madame Flamingo's eyes quicken, and she steps round us, now contemplating us suspiciously, then frisking her hands beneath her embroidered apron, which she successively flaunts. We have assured her of our standing in society. To which, with an air of resumed confidence, and a quickened step, she says she has (that is, she thinks she has) seen us before, and is glad to see us again. She is getting well down in the role of years, has a treacherous memory-the result of arduous business, and a life of trouble-the poison of a war upon society-the excitement of seeking revenge of the world. She cannot at all times trust her memory, for it has given out in the watchfulness necessary to the respectability of her house, which she regards as the Gibraltar from which she turns upon society her unerring guns. "Lord, gentlemen," she says in quick accents, "the reputation of this house-I watch it as our senator to Congress does his-is my bank stock; and on the respectability and behavior of my customers, who are of the first families, depends my dividends. Madame Flamingo wouldn't-gentlemen, I am no doubt known to you by reputation?-soil the reputation of her house for uncounted gold." This she whispers, tripping nervously over the soft carpet up the hall, until she reaches mid-way, where on the right and left are two massive arched doors of black walnut, with stained glass for fan-lights. Our guardian (she has assumed the office) makes a significant motion with her left hand, which she moves backward, places her right upon the porcelain knob, turns to the right, and puts her ear inquiringly to the door. "It's a sort of commonwealth; yes, sir, a commonwealth-but then they are all gentlemen-some very distinguished," she continues, shaking her head as if to caution us. Voices in loud conversation are heard in the room to the right, while from out the left float the mellow notes of a waltz, accompanied by the light tripping of feet. With an urbane bow, and a familiar smile, Madame opens the door, watches with an air of exultation the effect her sumptuously-furnished parlors, and her more sumptuously-dressed worshippers, have on our feelings. The great glare of Gothic windows; the massive curtains of orange-colored satin that, veiled with lace, pend in undulating folds over them; the cloudlike canopy that overhangs a dias at the further end of the parlor; the gorgeously-carved piano, with keys of pearl, that stands in dumb show beneath the drapery; the curiously-carved eagles, in gilt, that perch over each window, and hold daintily in their beaks the amber-colored drapery; the chastely-designed tapestry of sumptuously-carved lounges, and reclines, and ottomans, and patrician chairs, and lute tabs, arranged with exact taste here and there about the great parlor; the massive centre and side-tables, richly inlaid with pearl and Mosaic; the antique vases interspersed along the sides, between the windows, and contrasting curiously with the undulating curtains, looped alternately with goddesses of liberty, in gilt; the jetting lights from a great chandelier, blending with prismatic reflections; and the gaudy gossamers in which weary and blanched-faced females flaunt, more undressed than dressed-all mingle in one blaze of barbaric splendor. It is here your child of ignorance and neglect is fascinated and made to drink the first cup of death; it is here your faltering sister falls; it is here your betrayed daughter seeks revenge; it is here your forlorn, outcast sufferer first feels the world her enemy, has no sympathizing sister to stretch out the hand of encouragement, and sinks hopeless in the agony of her meditations. It is here, alas! too often necessity forces its hapless victims, and from whence a relentless world--without hope of regaining the lost jewel-hurls them down a short life, into a premature grave. Your church is near by, but it never steps in here to make an inquiry; and if it chance to cast a suspicious look in now and then, it is only as it passes along to inquire the state of the slave market, of so much more importance is the price of men. Your common school (a thing unknown, and held extremely dangerous in Carolina!) may be your much talked of guiding star to virtue; your early education is your bulwark against which the wave of vice is powerless; but unless you make it something more than a magnificent theory-unless you seek practical means, and go down into the haunts of vice, there to drag up the neglected child, to whom the word early education is a mystery, you leave untouched the festering volcano that vomits its deadly embers upon the community. Your homilies preached to pew-holders of fashion, who live sumptuously, ride sumptuously to church of a Sunday, and meekly enjoy a sumptuous sermon for appearance sake, will, so long as you pass unheeded the haunts of vice, fall as chaff before the wind. You must make "early education" more than the mere motto of future happiness; you must go undaunted into the avenues of want and misery, seek out the fallen child, forbear with her, and kindly teach her how much good there is in its principles, its truths. Pardon, generous reader, this digression, and keep our arm while we see of what metal are the votaries at the shrine of Madame Flamingo. "I am-that is, they say I am-something of an aristocrat, you see, gentlemen," says the old woman, flaunting her embroidered apron, and fussily doddling round the great centre-table, every few minutes changing backward and forward two massive decanters and four cut-glass goblets. We bow approvingly. Then with an air of exultation she turns on her centre, giving a scrutinizing look at the rich decorations of her palace, and again at us, as if anxious to draw from us one word of approval. "Gentlemen are no way sensitive here," pursues Madame Flamingo, moving again the great decanters, "it's a commonwealth of gentlemen, you see. In New York-I dash out there, you know-my house is a perfect palace. I keep a footman and coachman there, have the most exact liveries, and keep up an establishment equal to my Fifth Avenue neighbors, whose trade of rope and fish is now lost in their terrible love of plush. I am a woman of taste, you see; but, my honor for it, gentlemen, I know of no people so given to plush and great buttons as our Fifth Avenue parvenues." It is a high old house this of Madame Flamingo. We speak approvingly of all we see, her pride is stimulated, she quickens her conversation. "I think you said two bottles, gentlemen? Our sparkling Moselle is pronounced a gem by connoisseurs." And again flaunting her embroidered apron, she trips hurriedly out of the room. While she is gone we turn to view its human furniture. Yonder, in a cozy alcove, stands a marble-topped pier-table, at which are seated two gentlemen of great respectability in the community, playing whist with fair but frail partners. Near them, on a soft lounge, is seated a man of portly person and venerable appearance (his hair is snowy white, and he has a frank, open countenance), holding converse with, and evidently enamoured of a modest and beautiful girl, of some sixteen summers, who has just taken her seat at the opposite end. Madame Flamingo addresses this man as "Judge." His daylight duty is known to be that of presiding over a criminal court. The girl with whom he nervously holds conversation, and whose bright, Italian eyes, undulating black hair, Grecian face and fair features, swelling bust and beautifully-chiseled shoulders, round polished arms and tapering hands, erect figure, so exactly dressed in black brocade, and so reserve in her demeanor, is the Anna Bonard of this history. "Judge!" she says in reply to a question he has advanced, and turning disdainfully upon him her great black eyes, walks gracefully out of the room. Sitting on a sofa opposite is a slender youth, somewhat flashily dressed. His complexion is sandy, there is something restless in his manner; and in his features, which are sharp and watchful, is that which indicates a mind weak and vacillating. He sits alone, seemingly thoughtful, and regarding with a jealous eye the insidious manner in which the venerable judge addresses the beautiful Anna, in whom you must know, reader, he has a deep and passionate interest. As Anna passes out of the room he, like one in despair, rests his head in his pale, bony, and freckled hand, and mutters to himself: "I will have revenge. His gray hairs shall not save him--my name is George Mullholland!" Here and there, on sofas arranged between the great windows, sit faded denizens, reclining languidly in dresses of various bright colors, set off with gaudy trinkets, and exhibiting that passion for cheap jewelry so much in vogue with the vulgar of our self-plumed aristocracy--such as live at fashionable hotels, and, like Mrs. Snivel, who has a palace on the Fifth Avenue, make a show-case for cheap diamonds of themselves at breakfast table. Beside these denizens are men of every shade and grade of society. With one sits the distinguished lawyer; with a second converses the grave-demeanored merchant, who seeks, away from the cares of his domestic hearth, to satisfy his curiosity here; with a third, the celebrated physician sips his wine; with a fourth, the fatherly planter exchanges his saliant jokes; with a fifth, Doctor Handy the politician-who, to please his fashionable wife, a northern lady of great beauty, has just moved from the country into the city, keeps up an unmeaning conversation. In the lefthand corner, seated on an ottoman, and regarding the others as if a barrier were placed between them, are two men designated gamblers. Your Southern gentleman is, with few exceptions, a votary of the exciting vice; but he who makes it his profession severs the thread that bound him to society. And there sits not far from these members of the sporting fraternity, the tall, slender figure of a man, habited in the garb of a quaker. He regards everything about him with the eye of a philosopher, has a flowing white beard, a mild, playful blue eye, a short but well-lined nose, a pale oval face, an evenly-cut mouth, and an amiable expression of countenance. He intently watches every movement of the denizens, and should one accost him, he will answer in soft, friendly accents. He seems known to Madame Flamingo, whom he regards with a mysterious demeanor, and addresses as does a father his child. The old hostess gets no profit of his visits, for "he is only a moralist," she says, and his name is Solon --; and better people love him more as more they know him. Madame Flamingo has returned, followed by a colored gentleman in bright livery, bearing on a silver tray two seductive bottles of the sparkling nectar, and sundry rich-cut goblets. "There! there!" says the old hostess, pointing to the centre-table, upon which the colored man deposits them, and commences arranging some dozen glasses, as she prepares to extract the corks. Now she fills the glasses with the effervescing beverage, which the waiter again places on the tray, and politely serves to the denizens, in whose glassy eyes, sallow faces, coarse, unbared arms and shoulders, is written the tale of their misery. The judge drinks with the courtesan, touches glasses with the gambler, bows in compliment to the landlady, who reiterates that she keeps the most respectable house and the choicest wine. The moralist shakes his head, and declines. And while a dozen voices are pronouncing her beverage excellent, she turns suddenly and nervously to her massive, old-fashioned side-board, of carved walnut, and from the numerous cut glass that range grotesquely along its top, draws forth an aldermanic decanter, much broken. Holding it up to the view of her votaries, and looking upon it with feelings of regret, "that," she says, "is what I got, not many nights since, for kindly admitting one-I don't know when I did such a thing before, mind ye!--of the common sort of people. I never have any other luck when I take pity on one who has got down hill. I have often thought that the more kind I am the more ungrateful they upon whom I lavish my favors get. You must treat the world just as it treats you-you must." To your simple question, reader, more simply advanced, she replies coquettishly: "Now, on my word of honor, Tom Swiggs did that. And the poor fellow-I call him poor fellow, because, thinking of what he used to be, I can't help it-has not a cent to pay for his pranks with. Bless you, (here Madame Flamingo waxes warm,) why I knew Tom Swiggs years ago, when he wasn't what he is now! He was as dashing a young buck then as you'd meet in the city; used to come here a perfect gentleman; and I liked him, and he liked me, and he got to liking the house, so you couldn't, if you had wanted to, have kept him away. And he always had no end of money, which he used to spend so freely. Poor fellow! (she sighs and shakes her head,) I confess I used to almost love Tom then. Then he got to courting a lady-she (Madame corrects herself) wasn't a lady though, she was only the daughter of a mechanic of small means--mechanic families have no standing in society, you see-and this cut deep into his mother's pride. And she, you see, was not quite sure where she stood in society, you see, and wouldn't for the world have her pride lessened; so she discarded poor Tom. And the girl has been got out of the way, and Tom has become penniless, and such a wreck of dissipation that no respectable house will admit him. It's a stiff old family, that Swiggs family! His mother keeps him threading in and out of jail, just to be rid of him. She is a curious mother; but when I think how he looks and acts, how can I wonder she keeps him in jail? I had to put him there twice--I had! (Madame Flamingo becomes emphatic.) But remembering what a friend of the house he used to be, I took pity on him, let him out, and lent him two dollars. And there's honor--I've great faith in honor-in Tom, who, I honestly believe, providing the devil do not get him in one of his fits, will pay all damages, notwithstanding I placed the reputation of my house in jeopardy with him a few nights since, was forced to call three policemen to eject him, and resolved that he should not again darken my door." CHAPTER III. IN WHICH THE READER IS PRESENTED WITH A VARIED PICTURE. TOM has passed a restless night in jail. He has dreamed of bottled snakes, with eyes wickedly glaring at him; of fiery-tailed serpents coiling all over him; of devils in shapes he has no language to describe; of the waltz of death, in which he danced at the mansion of Madame Flamingo; and of his mother, (a name ever dear in his thoughts,) who banished him to this region of vice, for what she esteemed a moral infirmity. Further on in his dream he saw a vision, a horrible vision, which was no less than a dispute for his person between Madame Flamingo, a bishop, and the devil. But Madame Flamingo and the devil, who seemed to enjoy each other's company exceedingly, got the better of the bishop, who was scrupulous of his dignity, and not a little anxious about being seen in such society. And from the horrors of this dream he wakes, surprised to find himself watched over by a kind friend-a young, comely-featured man, in whom he recognizes the earnest theologian, as he is plumed by the prisoners, whom he daily visits in his mission of good. There was something so frank and gentle in this young man's demeanor-something so manly and radiant in his countenance-something so disinterested and holy in his mission of love--something so opposite to the coldness of the great world without--something so serene and elevated in his youth, that even the most inveterate criminal awaited his coming with emotions of joy, and gave a ready ear to his kindly advice. Indeed, the prisoners called him their child; and he seemed not dainty of their approach, but took them each by the hand, sat at their side, addressed them as should one brother address another;--yea, he made them to feel that what was their interest it was his joy to promote. The young theologian took him a seat close by the side of the dreaming inebriate; and as he woke convulsively, and turned towards him his distorted face, viewing with wild stare each object that met his sight, the young man met his recognition with a smile and a warm grasp of the hand. "I am sorry you find me here again-yes, I am." "Better men, perhaps, have been here--" "I am ashamed of it, though; it isn't as it should be, you see," interrupts Tom. "Never mind-(the young man checks himself)-I was going to say there is a chance for you yet; and there is a chance; and you must struggle; and I will help you to struggle; and your friends--" Tom interrupts by saying, "I've no friends." "I will help you to struggle, and to overcome the destroyer. Never think you are friendless, for then you are a certain victim in the hands of the ruthless enemy--" "Well, well," pauses Tom, casting a half-suspicious look at the young man, "I forgot. There's you, and him they call old Spunyarn, are friends, after all. You'll excuse me, but I didn't think of that;" and a feeling of satisfaction seemed to have come over him. "How grateful to have friends when a body's in a place of this kind," he mutters incoherently, as the tears gush from his distended eyes, and child-like he grasps the hand of the young man. "Be comforted with the knowledge that you have friends, Tom. One all-important thing is wanted, and you are a man again." "As to that!" interrupts Tom, doubtingly, and laying his begrimed hand on his burning forehead, while he alternately frets and frisks his fingers through his matted hair. "Have no doubts, Tom-doubts are dangerous." "Well, say what it is, and I'll try what I can do. But you won't think I'm so bad as I seem, and 'll forgive me? I know what you think of me, and that's what mortifies me; you think I'm an overdone specimen of our chivalry-you do!" "You must banish from your mind these despairing thoughts," replies the young man, laying his right hand approvingly on Tom's head. "First, Tom," he pursues, "be to yourself a friend; second, forget the error of your mother, and forgive her sending you here; and third, cut the house of Madame Flamingo, in which our chivalry are sure to get a shattering. To be honest in temptation, Tom, is one of the noblest attributes of our nature; and to be capable of forming and maintaining a resolution to shake off the thraldom of vice, and to place oneself in the serener atmosphere of good society, is equally worthy of the highest commendation." Tom received this in silence, and seemed hesitating between what he conceived an imperative demand and the natural inclination of his passions. "Give me your hand, and with it your honor-I know you yet retain the latent spark-and promise me you will lock up the cup--" "You'll give a body a furlough, by the way of blowing off the fuddle he has on hand?" "I do not withhold from you any discretionary indulgence that may bring relief--" Tom interrupts by saying, "My mother, you know!" "I will see her, and plead with her on your behalf; and if she have a mother's feelings I can overcome her prejudice." Tom says, despondingly, he has no home to go to. It's no use seeing his mother; she's all dignity, and won't let it up an inch. "If I could only persuade her--" Tom pauses here and shakes his head. "Pledge me your honor you'll from this day form a resolution to reform, Tom; and if I do not draw from your mother a reconciliation, I will seek a home for you elsewhere." "Well, there can't be much harm in an effort, at all events; and here's my hand, in sincerity. But it won't do to shut down until I get over this bit of a fog I'm now in." With child-like simplicity, Tom gives his hand to the young man, who, as old Spunyarn enters the cell to, as he says, get the latitude of his friend's nerves, departs in search of Mrs. Swiggs. Mrs. Swiggs is the stately old member of a crispy old family, that, like numerous other families in the State, seem to have outlived two chivalrous generations, fed upon aristocracy, and are dying out contemplating their own greatness. Indeed, the Swiggs family, while it lived and enjoyed the glory of its name, was very like the Barnwell family of this day, who, one by one, die off with the very pardonable and very harmless belief that the world never can get along without the aid of South Carolina, it being the parthenon from which the outside world gets all its greatness. Her leading and very warlike newspapers, (the people of these United States ought to know, if they do not already,) it was true, were editorialized, as it was politely called in the little State-militant, by a species of unreputationized Jew and Yankee; but this you should know-if you do not already, gentle reader-that it is only because such employments are regarded by the lofty-minded chivalry as of too vulgar a nature to claim a place in their attention. The clock of old Saint Michels, a clock so tenacious of its dignity as to go only when it pleases, and so aristocratic in its habits as not to go at all in rainy weather;--a clock held in great esteem by the "very first families," has just struck eleven. The young, pale-faced missionary inquiringly hesitates before a small, two-story building of wood, located on the upper side of Church street, and so crabbed in appearance that you might, without endangering your reputation, have sworn it had incorporated in its framework a portion of that chronic disease for which the State has gained for itself an unenviable reputation. Jutting out of the black, moss-vegetating roof, is an old-maidish looking window, with a dowdy white curtain spitefully tucked up at the side. The mischievous young negroes have pecked half the bricks out of the foundation, and with them made curious grottoes on the pavement. Disordered and unpainted clapboards spread over the dingy front, which is set off with two upper and two lower windows, all blockaded with infirm, green shutters. Then there is a snuffy door, high and narrow (like the State's notions), and reached by six venerable steps and a stoop, carefully guarded with a pine hand-rail, fashionably painted in blue, and looking as dainty as the State's white glove. This, reader, is the abode of the testy but extremely dignified Mrs. Swiggs. If you would know how much dignity can be crowded into the smallest space, you have only to look in here and be told (she closely patterns after the State in all things!) that fifty-five summers of her crispy life have been spent here, reading Milton's Paradise Lost and contemplating the greatness of her departed family. The old steps creak and complain as the young man ascends them, holding nervously on at the blue hand-rail, and reaching in due time the stoop, the strength of which he successively tests with his right foot, and stands contemplating the snuffy door. A knocker painted in villanous green-a lion-headed knocker, of grave deportment, looking as savage as lion can well do in this chivalrous atmosphere, looks admonitiously at him. "Well!" he sighs as he raises it, "there's no knowing what sort of a reception I may get." He has raised the monster's head and given three gentle taps. Suddenly a frisking and whispering, shutting of doors and tripping of feet, is heard within; and after a lapse of several minutes the door swings carefully open, and the dilapidated figure of an old negro woman, lean, shrunken, and black as Egyptian darkness--with serious face and hanging lip, the picture of piety and starvation, gruffly asks who he is and what he wants? Having requested an interview with her mistress, this decrepit specimen of human infirmity half closes the door against him and doddles back. A slight whispering, and Mrs. Swiggs is heard to say--"show him into the best parlor." And into the best parlor, and into the august presence of Mrs. Swiggs is he ushered. The best parlor is a little, dingy room, low of ceiling, and skirted with a sombre-colored surbase, above which is papering, the original color of which it would be difficult to discover. A listen carpet, much faded and patched, spreads over the floor, the walls are hung with several small engravings, much valued for their age and associations, but so crooked as to give one the idea of the house having withstood a storm at sea; and the furniture is made up of a few venerable mahogany chairs, a small side-table, on which stands, much disordered, several well-worn books and papers, two patch-covered foot-stools, a straightbacked rocking-chair, in which the august woman rocks her straighter self, and a great tin cage, from between the bars of which an intelligent parrot chatters--"my lady, my lady, my lady!" There is a cavernous air about the place, which gives out a sickly odor, exciting the suggestion that it might at some time have served as a receptacle for those second-hand coffins the State buries its poor in. "Well! who are you? And what do you want? You have brought letters, I s'pose?" a sharp, squeaking voice, speaks rapidly. The young man, without waiting for an invitation to sit down, takes nervously a seat at the side-table, saying he has come on a mission of love. "Love! love! eh? Young man-know that you have got into the wrong house!" Mrs. Swiggs shakes her head, squeaking out with great animation. There she sits, Milton's "Paradise Lost" in her witch-like fingers, herself lean enough for the leanest of witches, and seeming to have either shrunk away from the faded black silk dress in which she is clad, or passed through half a century of starvation merely to bolster up her dignity. A sharp, hatchet-face, sallow and corrugated; two wicked gray eyes, set deep in bony sockets; a long, irregular nose, midway of which is adjusted a pair of broad, brass-framed spectacles; a sunken, purse--drawn mouth, with two discolored teeth protruding from her upper lip; a high, narrow forehead, resembling somewhat crumpled parchment; a dash of dry, brown hair relieving the ponderous border of her steeple-crowned cap, which she seems to have thrown on her head in a hurry; a moth-eaten, red shawl thrown spitefully over her shoulders, disclosing a sinewy and sassafras-colored neck above, and the small end of a gold chain in front, and, reader, you have the august Mrs. Swiggs, looking as if she diets on chivalry and sour krout. She is indeed a nice embodiment of several of those qualities which the State clings tenaciously to, and calls its own, for she lives on the labor of eleven aged negroes, five of whom are cripples. The young man smiles, as Mrs. Swiggs increases the velocity of her rocking, lays her right hand on the table, rests her left on her Milton, and continues to reiterate that he has got into the wrong house. "I have no letter, Madam--" "I never receive people without letters-never!" she interrupts, testily. "But you see, Madam--" "No I don't. I don't see anything about it!" again she interposes, adjusting her spectacles, and scanning him anxiously from head to foot. "Ah, yes (she twitches her head), I see what you are--" "I was going to say, if you please, Madam, that my mission may serve as a passport--" "I'm of a good family, you must know, young man. You could have learned that of anybody before seeking this sort of an introduction. Any of our first families could have told you about me. You must go your way, young man!" And she twitches her head, and pulls closer about her lean shoulders the old red shawl. "I (if you will permit me, Madam) am not ignorant of the very high standing of your famous family--" Madam interposes by saying, every muscle of her frigid face unmoved the while, she is glad he knows something, "having read of them in a celebrated work by one of our more celebrated genealogists--" "But you should have brought a letter from the Bishop! and upon that based your claims to a favorable reception. Then you have read of Sir Sunderland Swiggs, my ancestor? Ah! he was such a Baron, and owned such estates in the days of Elizabeth. But you should have brought a letter, young man." Mrs. Swiggs replies rapidly, alternately raising and lowering her squeaking voice, twitching her head, and grasping tighter her Milton. "Those are his arms and crest." She points with her Milton to a singular hieroglyphic, in a wiry black frame, resting on the marble-painted mantelpiece. "He was very distinguished in his time; and such an excellent Christian." She shakes her head and wipes the tears from her spectacles, as her face, which had before seemed carved in wormwood, slightly relaxes the hardness of its muscles. "I remember having seen favorable mention of Sir Sunderland's name in the book I refer to--" She again interposes. The young man watches her emotions with a penetrating eye, conscious that he has touched a chord in which all the milk of kindness is not dried up. "It's a true copy of the family arms. Everybody has got to having arms now-a-days. (She points to the indescribable scrawl over the mantelpiece.) It was got through Herald King, of London, who they say keeps her Majesty's slippers and the great seal of State. We were very exact, you see. Yes, sir-we were very exact. Our vulgar people, you see-I mean such as have got up by trade, and that sort of thing-went to a vast expense in sending to England a man of great learning and much aforethought, to ransack heraldry court and trace out their families. Well, he went, lived very expensively, spent several years abroad, and being very clever in his way, returned, bringing them all pedigrees of the very best kind. With only two exceptions, he traced them all down into noble blood. These two, the cunning fellow had it, came of martyrs. And to have come of the blood of martyrs, when all the others, as was shown, came of noble blood, so displeased-the most ingenious (the old lady shakes her head regrettingly) can't please everybody-the living members of these families, that they refused to pay the poor man for his researches, so he was forced to resort to a suit at law. And to this day (I don't say it disparagingly of them!) both families stubbornly refuse to accept the pedigree. They are both rich grocers, you see! and on this account we were very particular about ours." The young man thought it well not to interrupt the old woman's display of weakness, inasmuch as it might produce a favorable change in her feelings. "And now, young man, what mission have you besides love?" she inquires, adding an encouraging look through her spectacles. "I am come to intercede--" "You needn't talk of interceding with me; no you needn't! I've nothing to intercede about"--she twitches her head spitefully. "In behalf of your son." "There-there! I knew there was some mischief. You're a Catholic! I knew it. Never saw one of your black-coated flock about that there wasn't mischief brewing-never! I can't read my Milton in peace for you--" "But your son is in prison, Madam, among criminals, and subject to the influence of their habits--" "Precisely where I put him-where he won't disgrace the family; yes, where he ought to be, and where he shall rot, for all me. Now, go your way, young man; and read your Bible at home, and keep out of prisons; and don't be trying to make Jesuits of hardened scamps like that Tom of mine." "I am a Christian: I would like to extend a Christian's hand to your son. I may replace him on the holy pedestal he has fallen from--" "You are very aggravating, young man. Do you live in South Carolina?" The young man says he does. He is proud of the State that can boast so many excellent families. "I am glad of that," she says, looking querulously over her spectacles, as she twitches her chin, and increases the velocity of her rocking. "I wonder how folks can live out of it." "As to that, Madam, permit me to say, I am happy to see and appreciate your patriotism; but if you will grant me an order of release--" "I won't hear a word now! You're very aggravating, young man-very! He has disgraced the family; I have put him where he is seven times; he shall rot were he is! He never shall disgrace the family again. Think of Sir Sunderland Swiggs, and then think of him, and see what a pretty level the family has come to! That's the place for him. I have told him a dozen times how I wished him gone. The quicker he is out of the way, the better for the name of the family." The young man waits the end of this colloquy with a smile on his countenance. "I have no doubt I can work your son's reform-perhaps make him an honor to the family--" "He honor the family!" she interrupts, twitches the shawl about her shoulders, and permits herself to get into a state of general excitement. "I should like to see one who has disgraced the family as much as he has think of honoring it--" "Through kindness and forbearance, Madam, a great deal may be done," the young man replies. Now, you are very provoking, young man-very. Let other people alone; go your way home, and study your Bible." And with this the old lady calls Rebecca, the decrepit slave who opened the door, and directs her to show the young man out. "There now!" she says testily, turning to the marked page of her Milton. The young man contemplates her for a few moments, but, having no alternative, leaves reluctantly. On reaching the stoop he encounters the tall, handsome figure of a man, whose face is radiant with smiles, and his features ornamented with neatly-combed Saxon hair and beard, and who taps the old negress under the chin playfully, as she says, "Missus will be right glad to see you, Mr. Snivel-that she will." And he bustles his way laughing into the presence of the old lady, as if he had news of great importance for her. CHAPTER IV. A FEW REFLECTIONS ON THE CURE OF VICE. DISAPPOINTED, and not a little chagrined, at the failure of his mission, the young man muses over the next best course to pursue. He has the inebriate's welfare at heart; he knows there is no state of degradation so low that the victim cannot, under proper care, be reclaimed from it; and he feels duty calling loudly to him not to stand trembling on the brink, but to enter the abode of the victim, and struggle to make clean the polluted. Vice, he says to himself, is not entailed in the heart; and if you would modify and correct the feelings inclined to evil, you must first feed the body, then stimulate the ambition; and when you have got the ambition right, seek a knowledge of the heart, and apply to it those mild and judicious remedies which soften its action, and give life to new thoughts and a higher state of existence. Once create the vine of moral rectitude, and its branches will soon get where they can take care of themselves. But to give the vine creation in poor soil, your watching must exhibit forbearance, and your care a delicate hand. The stubbornly-inclined nature, when coupled with ignorance, is that in which vice takes deepest root, as it is, when educated, that against which vice is least effectual. To think of changing the natural inclination of such natures with punishment, or harsh correctives, is as useless as would be an attempt to stop the ebbing and flowing of the tide. You must nurture the feelings, he thought, create a susceptibility, get the heart right, by holding out the value of a better state of things, and make the head to feel that you are sincere in your work of love; and, above all, you must not forget the stomach, for if that go empty crime will surely creep into the head. You cannot correct moral infirmity by confining the victim of it among criminals, for no greater punishment can be inflicted on the feelings of man; and punishment destroys rather than encourages the latent susceptibility of our better nature. In nine cases out of ten, improper punishment makes the hardened criminals with which your prisons are filled, destroying forever that spark of ambition which might have been fostered into a means to higher ends. And as the young man thus muses, there recurs to his mind the picture of old Absalom McArthur, a curious old man, but excessively kind, and always ready to do "a bit of a good turn for one in need," as he would say when a needy friend sought his assistance. McArthur is a dealer in curiosities, is a venerable curiosity himself, and has always something on hand to meet the wants of a community much given to antiquity and broken reputations. The young theologian will seek this good old man. He feels that time will work a favorable revolution in the feelings of Tom's mother; and to be prepared for that happy event he will plead a shelter for him under McArthur's roof. And now, generous reader, we will, with your permission, permit him to go on his errand of mercy, while we go back and see how Tom prospers at the old prison. You, we well know, have not much love of prisons. But unless we do now and then enter them, our conceptions of how much misery man can inflict upon man will be small indeed. The man of sailor-like deportment, and whom the prisoners salute with the sobriquet of "Old Spunyarn," entered, you will please remember, the cell, as the young theologian left in search of Mrs. Swiggs. "I thought I'd just haul my tacks aboard, run up a bit, and see what sort of weather you were making, Tom," says he, touching clumsily his small-brimmed, plait hat, as he recognizes the young man, whom he salutes in that style so frank and characteristic of the craft. "He's a bit better, sir-isn't he?" inquires Spunyarn, his broad, honest face, well browned and whiskered, warming with a glow of satisfaction. Receiving an answer in the affirmative, he replies he is right glad of it, not liking to see a shipmate in a drift. And he gives his quid a lurch aside, throws his hat carelessly upon the floor, shrugs his shoulders, and as he styles it, nimbly brings himself to a mooring, at Tom's side. "It's a hard comforter, this state. I don't begrudge your mother the satisfaction she gets of sending you here. In her eyes, ye see, yeer fit only to make fees out on, for them ar lawyer chaps. They'd keep puttin' a body in an' out here during his natural life, just for the sake of gettin' the fees. They don't care for such things as you and I. We hain't no rights; and if we had, why we hain't no power. This carryin' too much head sail, Tom, won't do-'twon't!" Spunyarn shakes his head reprovingly, fusses over Tom, turns him over on his wales, as he has it, and finally gets him on his beam's ends, a besotted wreck unable to carry his canvas. "Lost yeer reckonin', eh, Tom?" he continues as that bewildered individual stares vacantly at him. The inebriate contorts painfully his face, presses and presses his hands to his burning forehead, and says they are firing a salute in his head, using his brains for ammunition. "Well, now Tom, seein' as how I'm a friend of yourn--" "Friend of mine?" interrupts Tom, shaking his head, and peering through his fingers mistrustfully. "And this is a hard lee shore you've beached upon; I'll lend ye a hand to get in the head sail, and get the craft trimmed up a little. A dash of the same brine will help keep the ballast right, then a skysail-yard breakfast must be carefully stowed away, in order to give a firmness to the timbers, and on the strength of these two blocks for shoring up the hull, you must begin little by little, and keep on brightening up until you have got the craft all right again. And when you have got her right you must keep her right. I say, Tom!--it won't do. You must reef down, or the devil 'll seize the helm in one of these blows, and run you into a port too warm for pea-jackets." For a moment, Spunyarn seems half inclined to grasp Tom by his collarless coat and shake the hydrophobia, as he calls it, out of him; then, as if incited by a second thought, he draws from his shirt-bosom a large, wooden comb, and humming a tune commences combing and fussing over Tom's hair, which stands erect over his head like marline-spikes. At length he gets a craft-like set upon his foretop, and turning his head first to the right, then to the left, as a child does a doll, he views him with an air of exultation. "I tell you what it is, Tom," he continues, relieving him of the old coat, "the bright begins to come! There's three points of weather made already." "God bless you, Spunyarn," replies Tom, evidently touched by the frankness and generosity of the old sailor. Indeed there was something so whole-hearted about old Spunyarn, that he was held in universal esteem by every one in jail, with the single exception of Milman Mingle, the vote-cribber. "Just think of yourself, Tom-don't mind me," pursues the sailor as Tom squeezes firmly his hand. "You've had a hard enough time of it--" Tom interrupts by saying, as he lays his hands upon his sides, he is sore from head to foot. "Don't wonder," returns the sailor. "It's a great State, this South Carolina. It seems swarming with poor and powerless folks. Everybody has power to put everybody in jail, where the State gives a body two dog's-hair and rope-yarn blankets to lay upon, and grants the sheriff, Mr. Hardscrable, full license to starve us, and put the thirty cents a day it provides for our living into his breeches pockets. Say what you will about it, old fellow, it's a brief way of doing a little profit in the business of starvation. I don't say this with any ill-will to the State that regards its powerless and destitute with such criminal contempt-I don't." And he brings water, gets Tom upon his feet, forces him into a clean shirt, and regards him in the light of a child whose reformation he is determined on perfecting. He sees that in the fallen man which implies a hope of ultimate usefulness, notwithstanding the sullen silence, the gloomy frown on his knitted brow, and the general air of despair that pervades the external man. "There!" he exclaims, having improved the personal of the inebriate, and folding his arms as he steps back apace to have a better view of his pupil--"now, don't think of being triced up in this dreary vault. Be cheerful, brace up your resolution-never let the devil think you know he is trying to put the last seal on your fate-never!" Having slipped the black kerchief from his own neck, he secures it about Tom's, adjusts the shark's bone at the throat, and mounts the braid hat upon his head with a hearty blow on the crown. "Look at yourself! They'd mistake you for a captain of the foretop," he pursues, and good-naturedly he lays his broad, browned hands upon Tom's shoulders, and forces him up to a triangular bit of glass secured with three tacks to the wall. Tom's hands wander down his sides as he contemplates himself in the glass, saying: "I look a shade up, I reckon! And I feel-I have to thank you for it, Spunyarn-something different all over me. God bless you! I won't forget you. But I'm hungry; that's all that ails me now. "I may thank my mother--" "Thank yourself, Tom," interposes the sailor. "For all this. She has driven me to this; yes, she has made my soul dead with despair!" And he bursts into a wild, fierce laugh. A moment's pause, and he says, in a subdued voice, "I'm a slave, a fool, a wanderer in search of his own distress." The kind-hearted sailor seats his pupil upon a board bench, and proceeds down stairs, where, with the bribe of a glass of whiskey, he induces the negro cook to prepare for Tom a bowl of coffee and a biscuit. In truth, we must confess, that Spunyarn was so exceedingly liberal of his friendship that he would at times appropriate to himself the personal effects of his neighbors. But we must do him justice by saying that this was only when a friend in need claimed his attention. And this generous propensity he the more frequently exercised upon the effects-whiskey, cold ham, crackers and cheese- of the vote-cribber, whom he regards as a sort of cold-hearted land-lubber, whose political friends outside were not what they should be. If the vote-cribber's aristocratic friends (and South Carolina politicians were much given to dignity and bad whiskey) sent him luxuries that tantalized the appetites of poverty-oppressed debtors, and poor prisoners starving on a pound of bread a-day, Spunyarn held this a legitimate plea for holding in utter contempt the right to such gifts. And what was more singular of this man was, that he always knew the latitude and longitude of the vote-cribber's bottle, and what amount of water was necessary to keep up the gauge he had reduced in supplying his flask. And now that Tom's almost hopeless condition presents a warrantable excuse, (the vote-cribber has this moment passed into the cell to take a cursory glance at Tom,) Spunyarn slips nimbly into the vote-cribber's cell, withdraws a brick from the old chimney, and seizing the black neck of a blacker bottle, drags it forth, holds it in the shadow of the doorway, squints exultingly at the contents, shrugs his stalwart shoulders, and empties a third of the liquid, which he replaces with water from a bucket near by, into his tin-topped flask. This done, he ingeniously replaces the bottle, slides the flask suspiciously into his bosom, saying, "It'll taste just as strong to a vote-cribber," and seeks that greasy potentate, the prison cook. This dignitary has always laid something aside for Spunyarn; he knows Spunyarn has something laid aside for him, which makes the condition mutual. "A new loafer let loose on the world!" says the vote-cribber, entering the domain of the inebriate with a look of fierce scorn. "The State is pestered to death with such things as you. What do they send you here for?-disturbing the quiet and respectability of the prison! You're only fit to enrich the bone-yard-hardly that; perhaps only for lawyers to get fees of. The State 'll starve you, old Hardscrabble 'll make a few dollars out of your feed-but what of that? We don't want you here." There was something so sullen and mysterious in the coarse features of this stalwart man-something so revolting in his profession, though it was esteemed necessary to the elevation of men seeking political popularity-something so at variance with common sense in the punishment meted out to him who followed it, as to create a deep interest in his history, notwithstanding his coldness towards the inebriate. And yet you sought in vain for one congenial or redeeming trait in the character of this man. "I always find you here; you're a fixture, I take it--" The vote-cribber interrupts the inebriate--"Better have said a patriot!" "Well," returns the inebriate, "a patriot then; have it as you like it. I'm not over-sensitive of the distinction." The fallen man drops his head into his hands, stabbed with remorse, while the vote-cribber folds his brawny arms leisurely, paces to and fro before him, and scans him with his keen, gray eyes, after the manner of one mutely contemplating an imprisoned animal. "You need not give yourself so much concern about me--" "I was only thinking over in my head what a good subject to crib, a week or two before fall election, you'd be. You've a vote?" Tom good-naturedly says he has. He always throws it for the "old Charleston" party, being sure of a release, as are some dozen caged birds, just before election. "I have declared eternal hatred against that party; never pays its cribbers!" Mingle scornfully retorts; and having lighted his pipe, continues his pacing. "As for this jail," he mutters to himself, "I've no great respect for it; but there is a wide difference between a man who they put in here for sinning against himself, and one who only violates a law of the State, passed in opposition to popular opinion. However, you seem brightened up a few pegs, and, only let whiskey alone, you may be something yet. Keep up an acquaintance with the pump, and be civil to respectable prisoners, that's all." This admonition of the vote-cribber had a deeper effect on the feelings of the inebriate than was indicated by his outward manner. He had committed no crime, and yet he found himself among criminals of every kind; and what was worse, they affected to look down upon him. Had he reached a stage of degradation so low that even the felon loathed his presence? Was he an outcast, stripped of every means of reform-of making himself a man? Oh no! The knife of the destroyer had plunged deep-disappointment had tortured his brain-he was drawn deeper into the pool of misery by the fatal fascinations of the house of Madame Flamingo, where, shunned by society, he had sought relief-but there was yet one spark of pride lingering in his heart. That spark the vote-cribber had touched; and with that spark Tom resolved to kindle for himself a new existence. He had pledged his honor to the young theologian; he would not violate it. The old sailor, with elated feelings, and bearing in his hands a bowl of coffee and two slices of toasted bread, is accosted by several suspicious-looking prisoners, who have assembled in the corridor for the purpose of scenting fresh air, with sundry questions concerning the state of his pupil's health. "He has had a rough night," the sailor answers, "but is now a bit calm. In truth, he only wants a bit of good steering to get him into smooth weather again." Thus satisfying the inquirers, he hurries up stairs as the vote-cribber hurries down, and setting his offering on the window-sill, draws from his bosom the concealed flask. "There, Tom!" he says, with childlike satisfaction, holding the flask before him--"only two pulls. To-morrow reef down to one; and the day after swear a dissolution of copartnership, for this chap (he points to the whiskey) is too mighty for you." Tom hesitates, as if questioning the quality of the drug he is about to administer. "Only two!" interrupts the sailor. "It will reduce the ground-swell a bit." The outcast places the flask to his lips, and having drank with contorted face passes it back with a sigh, and extends his right hand. "My honor is nothing to the world, Spunyarn, but it is yet something to me; and by it I swear (here he grasps tighter the hand of the old sailor, as a tear moistens his suffused cheeks) never to touch the poison again. It has grappled me like a fierce animal I could not shake off; it has made me the scoffed of felons-I will cease to be its victim; and having gained the victory, be hereafter a friend to myself." "God bless you-may you never want a friend, Tom-and may He give you strength to keep the resolution. That's my wish." And the old sailor shook Tom's hand fervently, in pledge of his sincerity. CHAPTER V. IN WHICH MR. SNIVEL, COMMONLY CALLED THE ACCOMMODATION MAN, IS INTRODUCED, AND WHAT TAKES PLACE BETWEEN HIM AND MRS. SWIGGS. READER! have you ever witnessed how cleverly one of our mob-politicians can, through the all-soothing medium of a mint-julep, transpose himself from a mass of passion and bad English into a child of perfect equanimity? If not, perhaps you have witnessed in our halls of Congress the sudden transition through which some of our Carolina members pass from a state of stupidity to a state of pugnacity? (We refer only to those members who do their own "stumping," and as a natural consequence, get into Congress through abuse of the North, bad whiskey, and a profusion of promises to dissolve the Union.) And if you have, you may form some idea of the suddenness with which Lady Swiggs, as she delights in having her friends call her, transposes herself from the incarnation of a viper into a creature of gentleness, on hearing announced the name of Mr. Soloman Snivel. What!--my old friend! I wish I had words to say how glad I am to see you, Lady Swiggs!" exclaims a tall, well-proportioned and handsome-limbed man, to whose figure a fashionable claret-colored frock coat, white vest, neatly-fitting dark-brown trowsers, highly-polished boots, a cluster of diamonds set in an avalanche of corded shirt-bosom, and carelessly-tied green cravat, lend a respectability better imagined than described. A certain reckless dash about him, not common to a refined gentleman, forces us to set him down as one of those individuals who hold an uncertain position in society; and though they may now and then mingle with men of refinement, have their more legitimate sphere in a fashionable world of doubtful character. "Why!--Mr. Snivel. Is it you?" responds the old woman, reciprocating his warm shake of the hand, and getting her hard face into a smile. "I am so glad-But (Mr. Snivel interrupts himself) never mind that!" "You have some important news?" hastily inquires Mrs. Swiggs, laying a bit of muslin carefully between the pages of her Milton, and returning it to the table, saying she has just been grievously provoked by one of that black-coated flock who go about the city in search of lambs. They always remind her of light-houses pointing the road to the dominions of the gentleman in black. "Something very important!" parenthesises Soloman--"very." And he shakes his head, touches her significantly on the arm with his orange-colored glove,--he smiles insidiously. "Pray be seated, Mr. Snivel. Rebecca!--bring Mr. Snivel the rocking-chair." "You see, my good Madam, there's such a rumor about town this morning! (Soloman again taps her on the arm with his glove.) The cat has got out of the bag-it's all up with the St. Cecilia!--" "Do, Rebecca, make haste with the rocking-chair!" eagerly interrupts the old woman, addressing herself to the negress, who fusses her way into the room with a great old-fashioned rocking-chair. "I am so sensitive of the character of that society," she continues with a sigh, and wipes and rubs her spectacles, gets up and views herself in the glass, frills over her cap border, and becomes very generally anxious. Mrs. Swiggs is herself again. She nervously adjusts the venerable red shawl about her shoulders, draws the newly-introduced arm-chair near her own, ("I'm not so old, but am getting a little deaf," she says), and begs her visitor will be seated. Mr. Soloman, having paced twice or thrice up and down the little room, contemplating himself in the glass at each turn, now touching his neatly-trimmed Saxon mustache and whiskers, then frisking his fingers through his candy-colored hair, brings his dignity into the chair. "I said it was all up with the St. Cecilia--" "Yes!" interrupts Mrs. Swiggs, her eyes glistening like balls of fire, her lower jaw falling with the weight of anxiety, and fretting rapidly her bony hands. Soloman suddenly pauses, says that was a glorious bottle of old Madeira with which he enjoyed her hospitality on his last visit. The flavor of it is yet fresh in his mouth. "Thank you-thank you! Mr. Soloman. I've a few more left. But pray lose no time in disclosing to me what hath befallen the St. Cecilia." "Well then-but what I say must be in confidence. (The old woman says it never shall get beyond her lips-never!) An Englishman of goodly looks, fashion, and money-and, what is more in favor with our first families, a Sir attached to his name, being of handsome person and accomplished manners, and travelling and living after the manner of a nobleman, (some of our first families are simple enough to identify a Baronet with nobility!) was foully set upon by the fairest and most marriageable belles of the St. Cecilia. If he had possessed a dozen hearts, he could have had good markets for them all. There was such a getting up of attentions! Our fashionable mothers did their very best in arraying the many accomplishments of their consignable daughters, setting forth in the most foreign but not over-refined phraseology, their extensive travels abroad--" "Yes!" interrupts Mrs. Swiggs, nervously--"I know how they do it. It's a pardonable weakness." And she reaches out her hand and takes to her lap her inseparable Milton. "And the many marked attentions-offers, in fact-they have received at the hands of Counts and Earls, with names so unpronounceable that they have outlived memory--" "Perhaps I have them in my book of autographs!" interrupts the credulous old woman, making an effort to rise and proceed to an antique sideboard covered with grotesque-looking papers. Mr. Soloman urbanely touches her on the arm-begs she will keep her seat. The names only apply to things of the past. He proceeds, "Well-being a dashing fellow, as I have said-he played his game charmingly. Now he flirted with this one, and then with that one, and finally with the whole society, not excepting the very flirtable married ladies;--that is, I mean those whose husbands were simple enough to let him. Mothers were in a great flutter generally, and not a day passed but there was a dispute as to which of their daughters he would link his fortunes with and raise to that state so desirable in the eyes of our very republican first families-the State-Militant of nobility--" "I think none the worse of 'em for that," says the old woman, twitching her wizard-like head in confirmation of her assertion. "My word for it, Mr. Soloman, to get up in the world, and to be above the common herd, is the grand ambition of our people; and our State has got the grand position it now holds before the world through the influence of this ambition." "True!--you are right there, my dear friend. You may remember, I have always said you had the penetration of a statesman, (Mrs. Swiggs makes a curt bow, as a great gray cat springs into her lap and curls himself down on her Milton;) and, as I was going on to say of this dashing Baronet, he played our damsels about in agony, as an old sportsman does a covey of ducks, wounding more in the head than in the heart, and finally creating no end of a demand for matrimony. To-day, all the town was positive, he would marry the beautiful Miss Boggs; to-morrow it was not so certain that he would not marry the brilliant and all-accomplished Miss Noggs; and the next day he was certain of marrying the talented and very wealthy heiress, Miss Robbs. Mrs. Stepfast, highly esteemed in fashionable society, and the very best gossipmonger in the city, had confidentially spread it all over the neighborhood that Mr. Stepfast told her the young Baronet told him (and he verily believed he was head and ears in love with her!) Miss Robbs was the most lovely creature he had seen since he left Belgravia. And then he went into a perfect rhapsody of excitement while praising the poetry of her motion, the grace with which she performed the smallest offices of the drawing-room, her queenly figure, her round, alabaster arms, her smooth, tapering hands, (so chastely set off with two small diamonds, and so unlike the butchers' wives of this day, who bedazzle themselves all the day long with cheap jewelry,)--the beautiful swell of her marble bust, the sweet smile ever playing over her thoughtful face, the regularity of her Grecian features, and those great, languishing eyes, constantly flashing with the light of irresistible love. Quoth ye! according to what Mr. Stepfast told Mrs. Stepfast, the young Baronet would, with the ideal of a real poet, as was he, have gone on recounting her charms until sundown, had not Mr. Stepfast invited him to a quiet family dinner. And to confirm what Mr. Stepfast said, Miss Robbs had been seen by Mrs. Windspin looking in at Mrs. Stebbins', the fashionable dress-maker, while the young Baronet had twice been at Spears', in King Street, to select a diamond necklace of great value, which he left subject to the taste of Miss Robbs. And putting them two and them two together there was something in it!" "I am truly glad it's nothing worse. There has been so much scandal got up by vulgar people against our St. Cecilia." "Worse, Madam?" interpolates our hero, ere she has time to conclude her sentence, "the worst is to come yet." "And I'm a member of the society!" Mrs. Swiggs replies with a languishing sigh, mistaking the head of the cat for her Milton, and apologizing for her error as that venerable animal, having got well squeezed, sputters and springs from her grasp, shaking his head, "elected solely on the respectability of my family." Rather a collapsed member, by the way, Mr. Soloman thinks, contemplating her facetiously. "Kindly proceed-proceed," she says, twitching at her cap strings, as if impatient to get the sequel. "Well, as to that, being a member of the St. Cecilia myself, you see, and always-(I go in for a man keeping up in the world)-maintaining a high position among its most distinguished members, who, I assure you, respect me far above my real merits, (Mrs. Swiggs says we won't say anything about that now!) and honor me with all its secrets, I may, even in your presence, be permitted to say, that I never heard a member who didn't speak in high praise of you and the family of which you are so excellent a representative." "Thank you-thank you. O thank you, Mr. Soloman!" she rejoins. "Why, Madam, I feel all my veneration getting into my head at once when I refer to the name of Sir Sunderland Swiggs." "But pray what came of the young Baronet?" "Oh!--as to him, why, you see, he was what we call-it isn't a polite word, I confess-a humbug." "A Baronet a humbug!" she exclaims, fretting her hands and commencing to rock herself in the chair. "Well, as to that, as I was going on to say, after he had beat the bush all around among the young birds, leaving several of them wounded on the ground-you understand this sort of thing-he took to the older ones, and set them polishing up their feathers. And having set several very respectable families by the ears, and created a terrible flutter among a number of married dames-he was an adept in this sort of diplomacy, you see-it was discovered that one very distinguished Mrs. Constance, leader of fashion to the St. Cecilia, (and on that account on no very good terms with the vulgar world, that was forever getting up scandal to hurl at the society that would not permit it to soil, with its common muslin, the fragrant atmosphere of its satin and tulle), had been carrying on a villanous intrigue-yes, Madam! villanous intrigue! I said discovered: the fact was, this gallant Baronet, with one servant and no establishment, was f�ted and fooled for a month, until he came to the very natural and sensible conclusion, that we were all snobbs-yes, snobbs of the very worst kind. But there was no one who fawned over and flattered the vanity of this vain man more than the husband of Mrs. Constance. This poor man idolized his wife, whom he regarded as the very diamond light of purity, nor ever mistrusted that the Baronet's attentions were bestowed with any other than the best of motives. Indeed, he held it extremely condescending on the part of the Baronet to thus honor the family with his presence. "And the Baronet, you see, with that folly so characteristic of Baronets, was so flushed with his success in this little intrigue with Madame Constance-the affair was too good for him to keep!--that he went all over town showing her letters. Such nice letters as they were-brim full of repentance, love, and appointments. The Baronet read them to Mr. Barrows, laughing mischievously, and saying what a fool the woman must be. Mr. Barrows couldn't keep it from Mrs. Barrows, Mrs. Barrows let the cat out of the bag to Mrs. Simpson, and Mrs. Simpson would let Mr. Simpson have no peace till he got on the soft side of the Baronet, and, what was not a difficult matter, got two of the letters for her to have a peep into. Mrs. Simpson having feasted her eyes on the two Mr. Simpson got of the Baronet, and being exceedingly fond of such wares as they contained, must needs-albeit, in strict confidence-whisper it to Mrs. Fountain, who was a very fashionable lady, but unfortunately had a head very like a fountain, with the exception that it ejected out double the amount it took in. Mrs. Fountain-as anybody might have known-let it get all over town. And then the vulgar herd took it up, as if it were assafotida, only needing a little stirring up, and hurled it back at the St. Cecilia, the character of which it would damage without a pang of remorse. "Then the thing got to Constance's ears; and getting into a terrible passion, poor Constance swore nothing would satisfy him but the Baronet's life. But the Baronet--" "A sorry Baronet was he-not a bit like my dear ancestor, Sir Sunderland," Mrs. Swiggs interposes. "Not a bit, Madam," bows our hero. "Like a sensible gentleman, as I was about to say, finding it getting too hot for him, packed up his alls, and in the company of his unpaid servant, left for parts westward of this. I had a suspicion the fellow was not what he should be; and I made it known to my select friends of the St. Cecilia, who generally pooh-poohed me. A nobleman, they said, should receive every attention. And to show that he wasn't what he should be, when he got to Augusta his servant sued him for his wages; and having nothing but his chivalry, which the servant very sensibly declined to accept for payment, he came out like a man, and declared himself nothing but a poor player. "But this neither satisfied Constance nor stayed the drifting current of slander--" "Oh! I am so glad it was no worse," Mrs. Swiggs interrupts again. "True!" Mr. Soloman responds, laughing heartily, as he taps her on the arm. "It might have been worse, though. Well, I am, as you know, always ready to do a bit of a good turn for a friend in need, and pitying poor Constance as I did, I suggested a committee of four most respectable gentlemen, and myself, to investigate the matter. The thing struck Constance favorably, you see. So we got ourselves together, agreed to consider ourselves a Congress, talked over the affairs of the nation, carried a vote to dissolve the Union, drank sundry bottles of Champagne, (I longed for a taste of your old Madeira, Mrs. Swiggs,) and brought in a verdict that pleased Mrs. Constance wonderfully-and so it ought. We were, after the most careful examination, satisfied that the reports prejudicial to the character and standing of Mrs. Constance had no foundation in truth, being the base fabrications of evil-minded persons, who sought, while injuring an innocent lady, to damage the reputation of the St. Cecilia Society. Mr. Constance was highly pleased with the finding; and finally it proved the sovereign balm that healed all their wounds. Of course, the Knight, having departed, was spared his blood." Here Mr. Soloman makes a pause. Mrs. Swiggs, with a sigh, says, "Is that all?" "Quite enough for once, my good Madam," Mr. Soloman bows in return. "Oh! I am so glad the St. Cecilia is yet spared to us. You said, you know, it was all up with it--" "Up? up?-so it is! That is, it won't break it up, you know. Why-oh, I see where the mistake is-it isn't all over, you know, seeing how the society can live through a score of nine-months scandals. But the thing's in every vulgar fellow's lips-that is the worst of it." Mrs. Swiggs relishes this bit of gossip as if it were a dainty morsel; and calling Rebecca, she commands her to forthwith proceed into the cellar and bring a bottle of the old Madeira-she has only five left-for Mr. Soloman. And to Mr. Soloman's great delight, the old negress hastily obeys the summons; brings forth a mass of cobweb and dust, from which a venerable black bottle is disinterred, uncorked, and presented to the guest, who drinks the health of Mrs. Swiggs in sundry well-filled glasses, which he declares choice, adding, that it always reminds him of the age and dignity of the family. Like the State, dignity is Mrs. Swiggs' weakness-her besetting sin. Mr. Soloman, having found the key to this vain woman's generosity, turns it when it suits his own convenience. "By-the-bye," he suddenly exclaims, "you've got Tom locked up again." "As safe as he ever was, I warrant ye!" Mrs. Swiggs replies, resuming her Milton and rocking-chair. "Upon my faith I agree with you. Never let him get out, for he is sure to disgrace the family when he does--" "I've said he shall rot there, and he shall rot! He never shall get out to disgrace the family--no, not if I live to be as gray as Methuselah, I warrant you!" And Mr. Soloman, having made his compliments to the sixth glass, draws from his breast pocket a legal-looking paper, which he passes to Mrs. Swiggs, as she ejaculates, "Oh! I am glad you thought of that." Mr. Soloman, watching intently the changes of her face, says, "You will observe, Madam, I have mentioned the cripples. There are five of them. We are good friends, you see; and it is always better to be precise in those things. It preserves friendship. This is merely a bit of a good turn I do for you." Mr. Soloman bows, makes an approving motion with his hands, and lays at her disposal on the table, a small roll of bills. "You will find two hundred dollars there," he adds, modulating his voice. You will find it all right; I got it for you of Keepum. We do a little in that way; he is very exact, you see--" "Honor is the best security between people of our standing," she rejoins, taking up a pen and signing the instrument, which her guest deposits snugly in his pocket, and takes his departure for the house of Madame Flamingo. CHAPTER VI. CONTAINING SUNDRY MATTERS APPERTAINING TO THIS HISTORY. IF, generous reader, you had lived in Charleston, we would take it for granted that you need no further enlightening on any of our very select societies, especially the St. Cecilia; but you may not have enjoyed a residence so distinguished, rendering unnecessary a few explanatory remarks. You must know that we not only esteem ourselves the quintessence of refinement, as we have an undisputed right to do, but regard the world outside as exceedingly stupid in not knowing as much of us as we profess to know of ourselves. Abroad, we wonder we are not at once recognized as Carolinians; at home, we let the vulgar world know who we are. Indeed, we regard the outside world-of these States we mean-very much in that light which the Greeks of old were wont to view the Romans in. Did we but stop here, the weakness might be pardonable. But we lay claim to Grecian refinement of manners, while pluming all our mob-politicians Roman orators. There is a profanity about this we confess not to like; not that danger can befall it, but because it hath about it that which reminds us of the oyster found in the shell of gold. Condescending, then, to believe there exists outside of our State a few persons silly enough to read books, we will take it for granted, reader, that you are one of them, straightway proceeding with you to the St. Cecilia. You have been a fashionable traveller in Europe? You say-yes! rummaged all the feudal castles of England, sought out the resting places of her kings, heard some one say "that is poet's corner," as we passed into Westminster Abbey, thought they couldn't be much to have such a corner,--"went to look" where Byron was buried, moistened the marble with a tear ere we were conscious of it, and saw open to us the gulf of death as we contemplated how greedy graveyard worms were banqueting on his greatness. A world of strange fancies came over us as we mused on England's poets. And we dined with several Dukes and a great many more Earls, declining no end of invitations of commoners. Very well! we reply, adding a sigh. And on your return to your home, that you may not be behind the fashion, you compare disparagingly everything that meets your eye. Nothing comes up to what you saw in Europe. A servant doesn't know how to be a servant here; and were we to see the opera at Covent Garden, we would be sure to stare our eyes out. It is become habitual to introduce your conversation with, "when I was in Europe." And you know you never write a letter that you don't in some way bring in the distinguished persons you met abroad. There is something (no matter what it is) that forcibly reminds you of what occurred at the table of my Lady Clarendon, with whom you twice had the pleasure and rare honor of dining. And by implication, you always give us a sort of lavender-water description of the very excellent persons you met there, and what they were kind enough to say of America, and how they complimented you, and made you the centre and all-absorbing object of attraction-in a word, a truly wonderful person. And you will not fail, now that it is become fashionable, to extol with fulsome breath the greatness of every European despot it hath been your good fortune to get a bow from. And you are just vain enough to forever keep this before your up-country cousins. You say, too, that you have looked in at Almacks. Almacks! alas! departed greatness. With the rise of the Casino hath it lain its aristocratic head in the dust. Well!--the St. Cecilia you must know (its counterparts are to be found in all our great cities) is a miniature Almacks-a sort of leach-cloth, through which certain very respectable individuals must pass ere they can become the elite of our fashionable world. To become a member of the St. Cecilia-to enjoy its recherch assemblies-to luxuriate in the delicate perfumes of its votaries, is the besetting sin of a great many otherwise very sensible people. And to avenge their disappointment at not being admitted to its precious precincts, they are sure to be found in the front rank of scandal-mongers when anything in their line is up with a member. And it is seldom something is not up, for the society would seem to live and get lusty in an atmosphere of perpetual scandal. Any amount of duels have come of it; it hath made rich no end of milliners; it hath made bankrupt husbands by the dozen; it hath been the theatre of several distinguished romances; it hath witnessed the first throbbings of sundry hearts, since made happy in wedlock; it hath been the shibolath of sins that shall be nameless here. The reigning belles are all members (provided they belong to our first families) of the St. Cecilia, as is also the prettiest and most popular unmarried parson. And the parson being excellent material for scandal, Mother Rumor is sure to have a dash at him. Nor does this very busy old lady seem over-delicate about which of the belles she associates with the parson, so long as the scandal be fashionable enough to afford her a good traffic. There is continually coming along some unknown but very distinguished foreigner, whom the society adopts as its own, flutters over, and smothers with attentions, and drops only when it is discovered he is an escaped convict. This, in deference to the reputation of the St. Cecilia, we acknowledge has only happened twice. It has been said with much truth that the St. Cecilia's worst sin, like the sins of its sister societies of New York, is a passion for smothering with the satin and Honiton of its assemblies a certain supercilious species of snobby Englishmen, who come over here, as they have it (gun and fishing-rod in hand), merely to get right into the woods where they can have plenty of bear-hunting, confidently believing New York a forest inhabited by such animals. As for our squaws, as Mr. Tom Toddleworth would say, (we shall speak more at length of Tom!) why! they have no very bad opinion of them, seeing that they belong to a race of semi-barbarians, whose sayings they delight to note down. Having no society at home, this species of gentry the more readily find themselves in high favor with ours. They are always Oxonians, as the sons of green grocers and fishmongers are sure to be when they come over here (so Mr. Toddleworth has it, and he is good authority), and we being an exceedingly impressible people, they kindly condescend to instruct us in all the high arts, now and then correcting our very bad English. They are clever fellows generally, being sure to get on the kind side of credulous mothers with very impressible-headed daughters. There was, however, always a distinguished member of the St. Cecilia society who let out all that took place at its assemblies. The vulgar always knew what General danced with the lovely Miss A., and how they looked, and what they said to each other; how many jewels Miss A. wore, and the material her dress was made of; they knew who polked with the accomplished Miss B., and how like a duchess she bore herself; they had the exact name of the colonel who dashed along so like a knight with the graceful and much-admired Mrs. D., whose husband was abroad serving his country; what gallant captain of dragoons (captains of infantry were looked upon as not what they might be) promenaded so imperiously with the vivacious Miss E.; and what distinguished foreigner sat all night in the corner holding a suspicious and very improper conversation with Miss F., whose skirts never were free of scandal, and who had twice got the pretty parson into difficulty with his church. Hence there was a perpetual outgoing of scandal on the one side, and pelting of dirt on the other. When Mr. Soloman sought the presence of Mrs. Swiggs and told her it was all up with the St. Cecilia, and when that august member of the society was so happily disappointed by his concluding with leaving it an undamaged reputation, the whole story was not let out. In truth the society was at that moment in a state of indignation, and its reputation as well-nigh the last stage of disgrace as it were possible to bring it without being entirely absorbed. The Baronet, who enjoyed a good joke, and was not over-scrupulous in measuring the latitude of our credulity, had, it seems, in addition to the little affair with Mrs. Constance, been imprudent enough to introduce at one of the assemblies of the St. Cecilia, a lady of exceedingly fair but frail import: this loveliest of creatures-this angel of fallen fame--this jewel, so much sought after in her own casket-this child of gentleness and beauty, before whom a dozen gallant knights were paying homage, and claiming her hand for the next waltz, turned out to be none other than the Anna Bonard we have described at the house of Madame Flamingo. The discovery sent the whole assembly into a fainting fit, and caused such a fluttering in the camp of fashion. Reader! you may rest assured back-doors and smelling-bottles were in great demand. The Baronet had introduced her as his cousin; just arrived, he said, in the care of her father-the cousin whose beauty he had so often referred to. So complete was her toilet and disguise, that none but the most intimate associate could have detected the fraud. Do you ask us who was the betrayer, reader? We answer,-- One whose highest ambition did seem that of getting her from her paramour, George Mullholland. It was Judge Sleepyhorn. Reader! you will remember him-the venerable, snowy-haired man, sitting on the lounge at the house of Madame Flamingo, and on whom George Mullholland swore to have revenge. The judge of a criminal court, the admonisher of the erring, the sentencer of felons, the habitue of the house of Madame Flamingo-no libertine in disguise could be more scrupulous of his standing in society, or so sensitive of the opinion held of him by the virtuous fair, than was this daylight guardian of public morals. The Baronet got himself nicely out of the affair, and Mr. Soloman Snivel, commonly called Mr. Soloman, the accommodation man, is at the house of Madame Flamingo, endeavoring to effect a reconciliation between the Judge and George Mullholland. CHAPTER VII. IN WHICH IS SEEN A COMMINGLING OF CITIZENS. NIGHT has thrown her mantle over the city. There is a great gathering of denizens at the house of Madame Flamingo. She has a bal-masque to-night. Her door is beset with richly-caparisoned equipages. The town is on tip-toe to be there; we reluctantly follow it. An hundred gaudily-decorated drinking saloon are filled with gaudier-dressed men. In loudest accent rings the question--"Do you go to Madame Flamingo's to-night?" Gentlemen of the genteel world, in shining broadcloth, touch glasses and answer--"yes!" It is a wonderful city-this of ours. Vice knows no restraint, poverty hath no friends here. We bow before the shrine of midnight revelry; we bring licentiousness to our homes, but we turn a deaf ear to the cries of poverty, and we gloat over the sale of men. The sickly gaslight throws a sicklier glare over the narrow, unpaved streets. The city is on a frolic, a thing not uncommon with it. Lithe and portly-figured men, bearing dominos in their hands, saunter along the sidewalk, now dangling ponderous watch-chains, then flaunting highly-perfumed cambrics--all puffing the fumes of choice cigars. If accosted by a grave wayfarer--they are going to the opera! They are dressed in the style of opera-goers. And the road to the opera seems the same as that leading to the house of the old hostess. A gaily-equipped carriage approaches. We hear the loud, coarse laughing of those it so buoyantly bears, then there comes full to view the glare of yellow silks and red satins, and doubtful jewels-worn by denizens from whose faded brows the laurel wreath hath fallen. How shrunken with the sorrow of their wretched lives, and yet how sportive they seem! The pale gaslight throws a spectre-like hue over their paler features; the artificial crimson with which they would adorn the withered cheek refuses to lend a charm to features wan and ghastly. The very air is sickly with the odor of their cosmetics. And with flaunting cambrics they bend over carriage sides, salute each and every pedestrian, and receive in return answers unsuited to refined ears. They pass into the dim vista, but we see with the aid of that flickering gas, the shadow of that polluting hand which hastens life into death. Old Mr. McArthur, who sits smoking his long pipe in the door of his crazy-looking curiosity shop, (he has just parted company with the young theologian, having assured him he would find a place to stow Tom Swiggs in,) wonders where the fashionable world of Charleston can be going? It is going to the house of the Flamingo. The St. Cecilia were to have had a ball to-night; scandal and the greater attractions here have closed its doors. A long line of carriages files past the door of the old hostess. An incessant tripping of feet, delicately encased in bright-colored slippers; an ominous fluttering of gaudy silks and satins; an inciting glare of borrowed jewelry, mingling with second-hand lace; an heterogeneous gleaming of bare, brawny arms, and distended busts, all lend a sort of barbaric splendor to that mysterious group floating, as it were, into a hall in one blaze of light. A soft carpet, over-lain with brown linen, is spread from the curbstone into the hall. Two well-developed policemen guard the entrance, take tickets of those who pass in, and then exchange smiles of recognition with venerable looking gentlemen in masks. The hostess, a clever "business man" in her way, has made the admission fee one dollar. Having paid the authorities ten dollars, and honored every Alderman with a complimentary ticket, who has a better right? No one has a nicer regard for the Board of Aldermen than Madame Flamingo; no one can reciprocate this regard more condescendingly than the honorable Board of Aldermen do. Having got herself arrayed in a dress of sky-blue satin, that ever and anon streams, cloudlike, behind her, and a lace cap of approved fashion, with pink strings nicely bordered in gimp, and a rich Honiton cape, jauntily thrown over her shoulders, and secured under the chin with a great cluster of blazing diamonds, and rows of unpolished pearls at her wrists, which are immersed in crimped ruffles, she doddles up and down the hall in a state of general excitement. A corpulent colored man, dressed in the garb of a beadle,--a large staff in his right hand, a cocked hat on his head, and broad white stripes down his flowing coat, stands midway between the parlor doors. He is fussy enough, and stupid enough, for a Paddington beadle. Now Madame Flamingo looks scornfully at him, scolds him, pushes him aside; he is only a slave she purchased for the purpose; she commands that he gracefully touch his hat (she snatches it from his head, and having elevated it over her own, performs the delicate motion she would have him imitate) to every visitor. The least neglect of duty will incur (she tells him in language he cannot mistake) the penalty of thirty-nine well laid on in the morning. In another minute her fat, chubby face glows with smiles, her whole soul seems lighted up with childlike enthusiasm; she has a warm welcome for each new comer, retorts saliently upon her old friends, and says--"you know how welcome you all are!" Then she curtsies with such becoming grace. "The house, you know, gentlemen, is a commonwealth to-night." Ah! she recognizes the tall, comely figure of Mr. Soloman, the accommodation man. He did not spring from among the bevy of coat-takers, and hood-retainers, at the extreme end of the great hall, nor from among the heap of promiscuous garments piled in one corner; and yet he is here, looking as if some magic process had brought him from a mysterious labyrinth. "Couldn't get along without me, you see. It's an ambition with me to befriend everybody. If I can do a bit of a good turn for a friend, so much the better!" And he grasps the old hostess by the hand with a self-satisfaction he rather improves by tapping her encouragingly on the shoulder. "You'll make a right good thing of this!--a clear thousand, eh?" "The fates have so ordained it," smiles naively the old woman. "Of course the fates could not ordain otherwise--" "As to that, Mr. Soloman, I sometimes think the gods are with me, and then again I think they are against me. The witches-they have done my fortune a dozen times or more-always predict evil (I consult them whenever a sad fit comes over me), but witches are not to be depended upon! I am sure I think what a fool I am for consulting them at all." She espies, for her trade of sin hath made keen her eye, the venerable figure of Judge Sleepyhorn advancing up the hall, masked. "Couldn't get along without you," she lisps, tripping towards him, and greeting him with the familiarity of an intimate friend. "I'm rather aristocratic, you'll say!--and I confess I am, though a democrat in principle!" And Madame Flamingo confirms what she says with two very dignified nods. As the Judge passes silently in she pats him encouragingly on the back, saying,--"There ain't no one in this house what'll hurt a hair on your head." The Judge heeds not what she says. "My honor for it, Madame, but I think your guests highly favored, altogether! Fine weather, and the prospect of a bal-masque of Pompeian splendor. The old Judge, eh?" "The gods smile-the gods smile, Mr. Soloman!" interrupts the hostess, bowing and swaying her head in rapid succession. "The gods have their eye on him to-night-he's a marked man! A jolly old cove of a Judge, he is! Cares no more about rules and precedents, on the bench, than he does for the rights and precedents some persons profess to have in this house. A high old blade to administer justice, eh?" "But, you see, Mr. Soloman," the hostess interrupts, a gracious bow keeping time with the motion of her hand, "he is such an aristocratic prop in the character of my house." "I rather like that, I confess, Madame. You have grown rich off the aristocracy. Now, don't get into a state of excitement!" says Mr. Soloman, fingering his long Saxon beard, and eyeing her mischievously. She sees a bevy of richly-dressed persons advancing up the hall in high glee. Indeed her house is rapidly filling to the fourth story. And yet they come! she says. "The gods are in for a time. I love to make the gods happy." Mr. Soloman has lain his hand upon her arm retentively. "It is not that the aristocracy and such good persons as the Judge spend so much here. But they give eclat to the house, and eclat is money. That's it, sir! Gold is the deity of our pantheon! Bless you (the hostess evinces the enthusiasm of a politician), what better evidence of the reputation of my house than is before you, do you want? I've shut up the great Italian opera, with its three squalling prima donnas, which in turn has shut up the poor, silly Empresario, as they call him; and the St. Cecilia I have just used up. I'm a team in my way, you see;--run all these fashionable oppositions right into bankruptcy." Never were words spoken with more truth. Want of patronage found all places of rational amusement closed. Societies for intellectual improvement, one after another, died of poverty. Fashionable lectures had attendance only when fashionable lecturers came from the North; and the Northman was sure to regard our taste through the standard of what he saw before him. The house of the hostess triumphs, and is corpulent of wealth and splendor. To-morrow she will feed with the rich crumbs that fall from her table the starving poor. And although she holds poor virtue in utter contempt, feeding the poor she regards a large score on the passport to a better world. A great marble stairway winds its way upward at the further end of the hall and near it are two small balconies, one on each side, presenting barricades of millinery surmounted with the picturesque faces of some two dozen denizens, who keep up an incessant gabbling, interspersed here and there with jeers directed at Mr. Soloman. "Who is he seeking to accommodate to-night?" they inquire, laughing merrily. The house is full, the hostess has not space for one friend more; she commands the policemen to close doors. An Alderman is the only exception to her fiat. "You see," she says, addressing herself to a courtly individual who has just saluted her with urbane deportment, "I must preserve the otium cum dignitate of my (did I get it right?) standing in society. I don't always get these Latin sayings right. Our Congressmen don't. And, you see, like them, I ain't a Latin scholar, and may be excused for any little slips. Politics and larnin' don't get along well together. Speaking of politics, I confess I rather belong to the Commander and Quabblebum school-I do!" At this moment (a tuning of instruments is heard in the dancing-hall) the tall figure of the accommodation man is seen, in company of the venerable Judge, passing hurriedly into a room on the right of the winding stairs before described. "Judge!" he exclaims, closing the door quickly after him, "you will be discovered and exposed. I am not surprised at your passion for her, nor the means by which you seek to destroy the relations existing between her and George Mullholland. It is an evidence of taste in you. But she is proud to a fault, and, this I say in friendship, you so wounded her feelings, when you betrayed her to the St. Cecilia, that she has sworn to have revenge on you. George Mullholland, too, has sworn to have your life. "I tell you what it is, Judge, (the accommodation man assumes the air of a bank director,) I have just conceived-you will admit I have an inventive mind!--a plot that will carry you clean through the whole affair. Your ambition is divided between a passion for this charming creature and the good opinion of better society. The resolution to retain the good opinion of society is doing noble battle in your heart; but it is the weaker vessel, and it always will be so with a man of your mould, inasmuch as such resolutions are backed up by the less fierce elements of our nature. Put this down as an established principle. Well, then, I will take upon myself the betrayal. I will plead you ignorant of the charge, procure her forgiveness, and reconcile the matter with this Mullholland. It's worth an hundred or more, eh?" The venerable man smiles, shakes his head as if heedless of the admonition, and again covers his face with his domino. The accommodation man, calling him by his judicial title, says he will yet repent the refusal! It is ten o'clock. The gentleman slightly colored, who represents a fussy beadle, makes a flourish with his great staff. The doors of the dancing hall are thrown open. Like the rushing of the gulf stream there floods in a motley procession of painted females and masked men-the former in dresses as varied in hue as the fires of remorse burning out their unuttered thoughts. Two and two they jeer and crowd their way along into the spacious hall, the walls of which are frescoed in extravagant mythological designs, the roof painted in fret work, and the cornices interspersed with seraphs in stucco and gilt. The lights of two massive chandeliers throw a bewitching refulgence over a scene at once picturesque and mysterious; and from four tall mirrors secured between the windows, is reflected the forms and movements of the masquers. Reader! you have nothing in this democratic country with which to successfully compare it. And to seek a comparison in the old world, where vice, as in this city of chivalry, hath a license, serves not our office. Madame Flamingo, flanked right and left by twelve colored gentlemen, who, their collars decorated with white and pink rosettes, officiate as masters of ceremony, and form a crescent in front of the thronging procession, steps gradually backward, curtsying and bowing, and spreading her hands to her guests, after the manner of my Lord Chamberlain. Eight colored musicians, (everything is colored here,) perched on a raised platform covered with maroon-colored plush; at the signal of a lusty-tongued call-master, strike up a march, to which the motley throng attempt to keep time. It is martial enough, and discordant enough for anything but keeping time to. The plush-covered benches filing along the sides and ends of the hall are eagerly sought after and occupied by a strange mixture of lookers on in Vienna. Here the hoary-headed father sits beside a newly-initiated youth, who is receiving his first lesson of dissipation. There the grave and chivalric planter sports with the nice young man, who is cultivating a beard and his way into the by-ways. A little further on the suspicious looking gambler sits freely conversing with the man whom a degrading public opinion has raised to the dignity of the judicial bench. Yonder is seen the man who has eaten his way into fashionable society, (and by fashionable society very much caressed in return,) the bosom companion of the man whose crimes have made him an outcast. Generous reader! contemplate this grotesque assembly; study the object Madame Flamingo has in gathering it to her fold. Does it not present the accessories to wrong doing? Does it not show that the wrong-doer and the criminally inclined, too often receive encouragement by the example of those whose duty it is to protect society? The spread of crime, alas! for the profession, is too often regarded by the lawyer as rather a desirable means of increasing his trade. Quadrille follows quadrille, the waltz succeeds the schottish, the scene presents one bewildering maze of flaunting gossamers and girating bodies, now floating sylph-like into the foreground, then whirling seductively into the shadowy vista, where the joyous laugh dies out in the din of voices. The excitement has seized upon the head and heart of the young,--the child who stood trembling between the first and second downward step finds her reeling brain a captive in this snare set to seal her ruin. Now the music ceases, the lusty-tongued call-master stands surveying what he is pleased to call the oriental splendor of this grotesque assembly. He doesn't know who wouldn't patronize such a house! It suddenly forms in platoon, and marshalled by slightly-colored masters of ceremony, promenades in an oblong figure. Here, leaning modestly on the arm of a tall figure in military uniform, and advancing slowly up the hall, is a girl of some sixteen summers. Her finely-rounded form is in harmony with the ravishing vivacity of her face, which is beautifully oval. Seen by the glaring gaslight her complexion is singularly clear and pale. But that freshness which had gained her many an admirer, and which gave such a charm to the roundness of early youth, we look for in vain. And yet there is a softness and delicacy about her well-cut and womanly features-a child-like sweetness in her smile-a glow of thoughtfulness in those great, flashing black eyes-an expression of melancholy in which at short intervals we read her thoughts-an incessant playing of those long dark eyelashes, that clothes her charms with an irresistible, a soul-inspiring seductiveness. Her dress, of moire antique, is chasteness itself; her bust exquisite symmetry; it heaves as softly as if touched by some gentle zephyr. From an Haidean brow falls and floats undulating over her marble-like shoulders, the massive folds of her glossy black hair. Nature had indeed been lavish of her gifts on this fair creature, to whose charms no painter could give a touch more fascinating. This girl, whose elastic step and erect carriage contrasts strangely with the languid forms about her, is Anna Bonard, the neglected, the betrayed. There passes and repasses her, now contemplating her with a curious stare, then muttering inaudibly, a man of portly figure, in mask and cowl. He touches with a delicate hand his watch-guard, we see two sharp, lecherous eyes peering through the domino; he folds his arms and pauses a few seconds, as if to survey the metal of her companion, then crosses and recrosses her path. Presently his singular demeanor attracts her attention, a curl of sarcasm is seen on her lip, her brow darkens, her dark orbs flash as of fire,--all the heart-burnings of a soul stung with shame are seen to quicken and make ghastly those features that but a moment before shone lambent as summer lightning. He pauses as with a look of withering scorn she scans him from head to foot, raises covertly her left hand, tossing carelessly her glossy hair on her shoulder, and with lightning quickness snatches with her right the domino from his face. "Hypocrite!" she exclaims, dashing it to the ground, and with her foot placed defiantly upon the domino, assumes a tragic attitude, her right arm extended, and the forefinger of her hand pointing in his face. "Ah!" she continues, in biting accents, "it is against the perfidy of such as you I have struggled. Your false face, like your heart, needed a disguise. But I have dragged it away, that you may be judged as you are. This is my satisfaction for your betrayal. Oh that I could have deeper revenge!" She has unmasked Judge Sleepyhorn, who stands before the anxious gaze of an hundred night revellers, pressing eagerly to the scene of confusion. Madame Flamingo's house, as you may judge, is much out in its dignity, and in a general uproar. There was something touching-something that the graver head might ponder over, in the words of this unfortunate girl--"I have struggled!" A heedless and gold-getting world seldom enters upon the mystery of its meaning. But it hath a meaning deep and powerful in its appeal to society- one that might serve the good of a commonwealth did society stoop and take it by the hand. So sudden was the motion with which this girl snatched the mask from the face of the Judge, (he stood as if appalled,) that, ere he had gained his self-possession, she drew from her girdle a pearl-hilted stiletto, and in attempting to ward off the dreadful lunge, he struck it from her hand, and into her own bosom. The weapon fell gory to the floor-the blood trickled down her bodice-a cry of "murder" resounded through the hall! The administrator of justice rushed out of the door as the unhappy girl swooned in the arms of her partner. A scene so confused and wild that it bewilders the brain, now ensued. Madame Flamingo calls loudly for Mr. Soloman; and as the reputation of her house is uppermost in her thoughts, she atones for its imperiled condition by fainting in the arms of a grave old gentleman, who was beating a hasty retreat, and whose respectability she may compromise through this uncalled-for act. A young man of slender form, and pale, sandy features, makes his way through the crowd, clasps Anna affectionately in his arms, imprints a kiss on her pallid brow, and bears her out of the hall. By the aid of hartshorn and a few dashes of cold water, the old hostess is pleased to come to, as we say, and set about putting her house in order. Mr. Soloman, to the great joy of those who did not deem it prudent to make their escape, steps in to negotiate for the peace of the house and the restoration of order. "It is all the result of a mistake," he says laughingly, and good-naturedly, patting every one he meets on the shoulder. "A little bit of jealousy on the part of the girl. It all had its origin in an error that can be easily rectified. In a word, there's much ado about nothing in the whole of it. Little affairs of this kind are incident to fashionable society all over the world! The lady being only scratched, is more frightened than hurt. Nobody is killed; and if there were, why killings are become so fashionable, that if the killed be not a gentleman, nobody thinks anything of it," he continues. And Mr. Soloman being an excellent diplomatist, does, with the aid of the hostess, her twelve masters of ceremony, her beadle, and two policemen, forthwith bring the house to a more orderly condition. But night has rolled into the page of the past, the gray dawn of morning is peeping in at the half-closed windows, the lights burning in the chandeliers shed a pale glow over the wearied features of those who drag, as it were, their languid bodies to the stifled music of unwilling slaves. And while daylight seems modestly contending with the vulgar glare within, there appears among the pale revellers a paler ghost, who, having stalked thrice up and down the hall, preserving the frigidity and ghostliness of the tomb, answering not the questions that are put to him, and otherwise deporting himself as becometh a ghost of good metal, is being taken for a demon of wicked import. Now he pauses at the end of the hall, faces with spectre-like stare the alarmed group at the opposite end, rests his left elbow on his scythe-staff, and having set his glass on the floor, points to its running sands warningly with his right forefinger. Not a muscle does he move. "Truly a ghost!" exclaims one. "A ghost would have vanished before this," whispers another. "Speak to him," a third responds, as the musicians are seen to pale and leave their benches. Madame Flamingo, pale and weary, is first to rush for the door, shrieking as his ghostship turns his grim face upon her. Shriek follows shriek, the lights are put out, the gray dawn plays upon and makes doubly frightful the spectre. A Pandemonium of shriekings and beseechings is succeeded by a stillness as of the tomb. Our ghost is victor. CHAPTER VIII. WHAT TAKES PLACE BETWEEN GEORGE MULLHOLLAND AND MR. SNIVEL. THE man who kissed and bore away the prostrate girl was George Mullholland. "Oh! George-George!" she whispers imploringly, as her eyes meet his; and turning upon the couch of her chamber, where he hath lain her, awakes to consciousness, and finds him watching over her with a lover's solicitude. "I was not cold because I loved you less-oh no! It was to propitiate my ambition-to be free of the bondage of this house-to purge myself of the past-to better my future!" And she lays her pale, nervous hand gently on his arm-then grasps his hand and presses it fervently to her lips. Though placed beyond the pale of society-though envied by one extreme and shunned by the other-she finds George her only true friend. He parts and smooths gently over her polished shoulders her dishevelled hair; he watches over her with the tenderness of a brother; he quenches and wipes away the blood oozing from her wounded breast; he kisses and kisses her flushed cheek, and bathes her Ion-like brow. He forgives all. His heart would speak if his tongue had words to represent it. He would the past were buried-the thought of having wronged him forgotten. She recognizes in his solicitude for her the sincerity of his heart. It touches like sweet music the tenderest chords of her own; and like gushing fountains her great black eyes fill with tears. She buries her face in her hands, crying, "Never, never, George, (I swear it before the God I have wronged, but whose forgiveness I still pray,) will I again forget my obligation to you! I care not how high in station he who seeks me may be. Ambitious!--I was misled. His money lured me away, but he betrayed me in the face of his promises. Henceforth I have nothing for this deceptive world; I receive of it nothing but betrayal--" "The world wants nothing more of either of us," interrupts George. More wounded in her feelings than in her flesh, she sobs and wrings her hands like one in despair. "You have ambition. I am too poor to serve your ambition!" That word, too "poor," is more than her already distracted brain can bear up under. It brings back the terrible picture of their past history; it goads and agonizes her very soul. She throws her arms frantically about his neck; presses him to her bosom; kisses him with the fervor of a child. Having pledged his forgiveness with a kiss, and sealed it by calling in a witness too often profaned on such occasions, George calms her feelings as best he can; then he smooths with a gentle hand the folds of her uplifted dress, and with them curtains the satin slippers that so delicately encase her small feet. This done, he spreads over her the richly-lined India morning- gown presented to her a few days ago by the Judge, who, as she says, so wantonly betrayed her, and on whom she sought revenge. Like a Delian maid, surrounded with Oriental luxury, and reclining on satin and velvet, she flings her flowing hair over her shoulders, nestles her weary head in the embroidered cushion, and with the hand of her only true friend firmly grasped in her own, soothes away into a calm sleep-that sovereign but too transient balm for sorrowing hearts. Our scene changes. The ghost hath taken himself to the grave-yard; the morning dawns soft and sunny on what we harmlessly style the sunny city of the sunny South. Madame Flamingo hath resolved to nail another horse-shoe over her door. She will propitiate (so she hath it) the god of ghosts. George Mullholland, having neither visible means of gaining a livelihood nor a settled home, may be seen in a solitary box at Baker's, (a coffee-house at the corner of Meeting and Market streets,) eating an humble breakfast. About him there is a forlornness that the quick eye never fails to discover in the manners of the homeless man. "Cleverly done," he says, laying down the Mercury newspaper, in which it is set forth that "the St. Cecilia, in consequence of an affliction in the family of one of its principal members, postponed its assembly last night. The theatre, in consequence of a misunderstanding between the manager and his people, was also closed. The lecture on comparative anatomy, by Professor Bones, which was to have been delivered at Hibernian Hall, is, in consequence of the indisposition of the learned Professor, put off to Tuesday evening next, when he will have, as he deserves, an overflowing house. Tickets, as before, may be had at all the music and bookstores." The said facetious journal was silent on the superior attractions at the house of the old hostess; nor did it deem it prudent to let drop a word on the misunderstanding between the patrons of the drama and the said theatrical manager, inasmuch as it was one of those that are sure to give rise to a very serious misunderstanding between that functionary and his poor people. In another column the short but potent line met his eye: "An overflowing and exceedingly fashionable house greeted the Negro Minstrels last night. First-rate talent never goes begging in our city." George sips his coffee and smiles. Wonderfully clever these editors are, he thinks. They have nice apologies for public taste always on hand; set the country by the ears now and then; and amuse themselves with carrying on the most prudent description of wars. His own isolated condition, however, is uppermost in his mind. Poverty and wretchedness stare him in the face on one side; chivalry, on the other, has no bows for him while daylight lasts. Instinct whispers in his ear-where one exists the other is sure to be. To the end that this young man will perform a somewhat important part in the by-ways of this history, some further description of him may be necessary. George Mullholland stands some five feet nine, is wiry-limbed, and slender and erect of person. Of light complexion, his features are sharp and irregular, his face narrow and freckled, his forehead small and retreating, his hair sandy and short-cropped. Add to these two small, dull, gray eyes, and you have features not easily described. Nevertheless, there are moments when his countenance wears an expression of mildness-one in which the quick eye may read a character more inoffensive than intrusive. A swallow-tail blue coat, of ample skirts, and brass buttons; a bright-colored waistcoat, opening an avalanche of shirt-bosom, blossoming with cheap jewelry; a broad, rolling shirt-collar, tied carelessly with a blue ribbon; a steeple-crowned hat, set on the side of his head with a challenging air; and a pair of broadly-striped and puckered trowsers, reaching well over a small-toed and highly-glazed boot, constitutes his dress. For the exact set of those two last-named articles of his wardrobe he maintains a scrupulous regard. We are compelled to acknowledge George an importation from New York, where he would be the more readily recognized by that vulgar epithet, too frequently used by the self-styled refined--"a swell." Life with George is a mere drift of uncertainty. As for aims and ends, why he sees the safer thing in having nothing to do with them. Mr. Tom Toddleworth once advised this course, and Tom was esteemed good authority in such matters. Like many others, his character is made up of those yielding qualities which the teachings of good men may elevate to usefulness, or bad men corrupt by their examples. There is a stage in the early youth of such persons when we find their minds singularly susceptible, and ready to give rapid growth to all the vices of depraved men; while they are equally apt in receiving good, if good men but take the trouble to care for them, and inculcate lessons of morality. Not having a recognized home, we may add, in resuming our story, that George makes Baker's his accustomed haunt during the day, as do also numerous others of his class-a class recognized and made use of by men in the higher walks of life only at night. "Ah! ha, ha! into a tight place this time, George," laughs out Mr. Soloman, the accommodation man, as he hastens into the room, seats himself in the box with George, and seizes his hand with the earnestness of a true friend. Mr. Soloman can deport himself on all occasions with becoming good nature. "It's got out, you see." "What has got out?" interrupts George, maintaining a careless indifference. "Come now! none of that, old fellow." "If I understood you--" "That affair last night," pursues Mr. Soloman, his delicate fingers wandering into his more delicately-combed beard. "It'll go hard with you. He's a stubborn old cove, that Sleepyhorn; administers the law as C�sar was wont to. Yesterday he sent seven to the whipping-post; to-day he hangs two 'niggers' and a white man. There is a consolation in getting rid of the white. I say this because no one loses a dollar by it." George, continuing to masticate his bread, says it has nothing to do with him. He may hang the town. "If I can do you a bit of a good turn, why here's your man. But you must not talk that way--you must not, George, I assure you!" Mr. Soloman assumes great seriousness of countenance, and again, in a friendly way, takes George by the hand. "That poignard, George, was yours. It was picked up by myself when it fell from your hand--" "My hand! my hand!" George quickly interposes, his countenance paling, and his eyes wandering in excitement. "Now don't attempt to disguise the matter, you know! Come out on the square-own up! Jealousy plays the devil with one now and then. I know-I have had a touch of it; had many a little love affair in my time--" George again interrupts by inquiring to what he is coming. "To the attempt (the accommodation man assumes an air of sternness) you made last night on the life of that unhappy girl. It is needless," he adds, "to plead ignorance. The Judge has the poignard; and what's more, there are four witnesses ready to testify. It'll go hard with you, my boy." He shakes his head warningly. "I swear before God and man I am as innocent as ignorant of the charge. The poignard I confess is mine; but I had no part in the act of last night, save to carry the prostrate girl-the girl I dearly love-away. This I can prove by her own lips." Mr. Soloman, with an air of legal profundity, says: "This is all very well in its way, George, but it won't stand in law. The law is what you have got to get at. And when you have got at it, you must get round it; and then you must twist it and work it every which way-only be careful not to turn its points against yourself; that, you know, is the way we lawyers do the thing. You'll think we're a sharp lot; and we have to be sharp, as times are." "It is not surprising," replies George, as if waking from a fit of abstraction, "that she should have sought revenge of one who so basely betrayed her at the St. Cecilia--" "There, there!" Mr. Soloman interrupts, changing entirely the expression of his countenance, "the whole thing is out! I said there was an unexplained mystery somewhere. It was not the Judge, but me who betrayed her to the assembly. Bless you, (he smiles, and crooking his finger, beckons a servant, whom he orders to bring a julep,) I was bound to do it, being the guardian of the Society's dignity, which office I have held for years. But you don't mean to have it that the girl attempted--(he suddenly corrects himself)--Ah, that won't do, George. Present my compliments to Anna--I wouldn't for the world do aught to hurt her feelings, you know that--and say I am ready to get on my knees to her to confess myself a penitent for having injured her feelings. Yes, I am ready to do anything that will procure her forgiveness. I plead guilty. But she must in return forgive the Judge. He is hard in law matters--that is, we of the law consider him so--now and then; but laying that aside, he is one of the best old fellows in the world, loves Anna to distraction; nor has he the worst opinion in the world of you, George. Fact is, I have several times heard him refer to you in terms of praise. As I said before, being the man to do you a bit of a good turn, take my advice as a friend. The Judge has got you in his grasp, according to every established principle of law; and having four good and competent witnesses, (you have no voice in law, and Anna's won't stand before a jury,) will send you up for a twelve-months' residence in Mount Rascal." It will be almost needless here to add, that Mr. Soloman had, in an interview with the Judge, arranged, in consideration of a goodly fee, to assume the responsibility of the betrayal at the St. Cecilia; and also to bring about a reconciliation between him and the girl he so passionately sought. "Keep out of the way a few days, and everything will blow over and come right. I will procure you the Judge's friendship--yes, his money, if you want. More than that, I will acknowledge my guilt to Anna; and being as generous of heart as she is beautiful, she will, having discovered the mistake, forgive me and make amends to the Judge for her foolish act. It is almost superfluous to add, that the apparent sincerity with which the accommodation man pleaded, had its effect on the weak-minded man. He loved dearly the girl, but poverty hung like a leaden cloud over him. Poverty stripped him of the means of gratifying her ambition; poverty held him fast locked in its blighting chains; poverty forbid his rescuing her from the condition necessity had imposed upon her; poverty was goading him into crime; and through crime only did he see the means of securing to himself the cherished object of his love. "I am not dead to your friendship, but I am too sad at heart to make any pledge that involves Anna, at this moment. We met in wretchedness, came up in neglect and crime, sealed our love with the hard seal of suffering. Oh! what a history of misery my heart could unfold, if it had but a tongue!" George replies, in subdued accents, as a tear courses down his cheek. Extending his hand, with an air of encouragement, Mr. Soloman says nothing in the world would so much interest him as a history of the relations existing between George and Anna. Their tastes, aims, and very natures, are different. To him their connection is clothed in mystery. CHAPTER IX. IN WHICH A GLEAM OF LIGHT IS SHED ON THE HISTORY OF ANNA BONARD. A BOTTLE of wine, and the mild, persuasive manner of Mr. Snivel, so completely won over George's confidence, that, like one of that class always too ready to give out their heart-achings at the touch of sympathy, and too easily betrayed through misplaced confidence, he commences relating his history. That of Anna is identified with it. "We will together proceed to New York, for it is there, among haunts of vice and depravity--" "In depth of degradation they have no counterpart on our globe," Mr. Soloman interrupts, filling his glass. "We came up together-knew each other, but not ourselves. That was our dark age." George pauses for a moment. "Bless you," again interrupts Mr. Soloman, tipping his glass very politely, "I never-that is, when I hear our people who get themselves laced into narrow-stringed Calvinism, and long-founded foreign missions, talk-think much could have come of the dark ages. I speak after the manner of an attorney, when I say this. We hear a deal of the dark ages, the crimes of the dark ages, the dark idolatry of darker Africa. My word for it, and it's something, if they had anything darker in Sodom; if they had in Babylon a state of degradation more hardened of crime; if in Egypt there existed a benightedness more stubbornly opposed to the laws of God-than is to be found in that New York; that city of merchant princes with princely palaces; that modern Pompeii into which a mighty commerce teems its mightier gold, where a coarse throng revel in coarser luxury, where a thousand gaudy churches rear heavenward their gaudier steeples, then I have no pity for Sodom, not a tear to shed over fallen Babylon, and very little love for Egypt." Mr. Snivel concludes, saying--"proceed, young man." "Of my mother I know nothing. My father (I mean the man I called father, but who they said was not my father, though he was the only one that cared anything for me) was Tom English, who used to live here and there with me about the Points. He was always looking in at Paddy Pie's, in Orange street, and Paddy Pie got all his money, and then Paddy Pie and him quarrelled, and we were turned out of Paddy Pie's house. So we used to lodge here and there, in the cellars about the Points, in 'Cut Throat Alley,' or 'Cow Bay,' or 'Murderer's Alley,' or in 'The House of the Nine Nations,' or wherever we could get a sixpenny rag to lay down upon. Nobody but English seemed to care for me, and English cared for nobody but me. And English got thick with Mrs. McCarty and her three daughters--they kept the Rookery in 'Cow Bay,' which we used to get to up a long pair of stairs outside, and which God knows I never want to think of again,--where sometimes fourteen or fifteen of us, men and women, used to sleep in a little room Mrs. McCarty paid eight dollars a month for. And Mr. Crown, who always seemed a cross sort of man, and was agent for all the houses on the Points I thought, used to say she had it too cheap. And English got to thinking a good deal of Mrs. McCarty, and Mrs. McCarty's daughters got to thinking a good deal of him. And Boatswain Bill, who lived at the house of the 'Nine Nations'-the house they said had a bottomless pit-and English used to fight a deal about the Miss McCartys, and Bill one night threw English over the high stoop, down upon the pavement, and broke his arms. They said it was a wonder it hadn't a broken his neck. Fighting Mary (Mary didn't go by that name then) came up and took English's part, and whipped Boatswain Bill, and said she'd whip the whole house of the 'Nine Nations' if it had spunk enough in it to come on. But no one dare have a set-to with Mary. Mary used to drink a deal of gin, and say-'this gin and the devil 'll get us all one of these days. I wonder if Mr. Crown 'll sell bad gin to his highness when he gets him?" Well, Bill was sent up for six months, so the McCartys had peace in the house, and Mrs. McCarty got him little things, and did for English until his arms got well. Then he got a little money, (I don't know how he got it,) and Paddy Pie made good friends with him, and got him from the Rookery, and then all his money. I used to think all the money in the Points found its way either to the house of Paddy Pie, or the Bottomless Pit at the house of the 'Nine Nations,' and all the clothes to the sign of the 'Three Martyrs,' which the man with the eagle face kept round the corner. "English used to say in one of his troubled fits, 'I'd like to be a respectable man, and get out of this, if there was a chance, and do something for you, George. There's no chance, you see.' And when we went into Broadway, which we did now and then, and saw what another world it was, and how rich everything looked, English used to shake his head and say, 'they don't know how we live, George.' "Paddy Pie soon quarrelled with English, and being penniless again we had to shift for ourselves. English didn't like to go back to Mrs. McCarty, so we used to sleep at Mrs. Sullivan's cellar in 'Cut Throat Alley.' And Mrs. Sullivan's cellar was only about twelve feet by twenty, and high enough to stand up in, and wet enough for anything, and so overrun with rats and vermin that we couldn't sleep. There were nine rag-beds in the cellar, which as many as twenty-three would sometimes sleep on, or, if they were not too tipsy, try to sleep on. And folks used to come into the cellar at night, and be found dead in the morning. This made such a fuss in the neighborhood (there was always a fuss when Old Bones, the coroner, was about), and frightened so many, that Mrs. Sullivan couldn't get lodgers for weeks. She used to nail no end of horse-shoes over the door to keep out the ghosts of them that died last. But it was a long while before her lodgers got courage enough to come back. Then we went to the house of the Blazers, in 'Cow Bay,' and used to lodge there with Yellow Bill. They said Bill was a thief by profession; but I wasn't old enough to be a judge. Little Lizza Rock, the nondescript, as people called her, used to live at the Blazers. Poor Lizza had a hard time of it, and used to sigh and say she wished she was dead. Nobody thought of her, she said, and she was nothing because she was deformed, and a cripple. She was about four feet high, had a face like a bull-dog, and a swollen chest, and a hunchback, a deformed leg, and went with a crutch. She never combed her hair, and what few rags she had on her back hung in filth. What few shillings she got were sure to find their way either into Bill's pocket, or send her tipsy into the 'Bottomless Pit' of the house of the 'Nine Nations.' There was in the Bottomless Pit a never-ending stream of gin that sent everybody to the Tombs, and from the Tombs to the grave. But Lizza was good to me, and used to take care of me, and steal little things for me from old Dan Sullivan, who begged in Broadway, and let Yellow Bill get his money, by getting him tipsy. And I got to liking Lizza, for we both seemed to have no one in the world who cared for us but English. And there was always some trouble between the Blazers and the people at the house of the 'Nine Nations.' "Well, English was hard to do for some time, and through necessity, which he said a deal about, we were driven out of every place we had sought shelter in. And English did something they sent him up for a twelve-month for, and I was left to get on as I could. I was took in by 'Hard-Fisted Sall,' who always wore a knuckle-duster, and used to knock everybody down she met, and threatened a dozen times to whip Mr. Fitzgerald, the detective, and used to rob every one she took in tow, and said if she could only knock down and rob the whole pumpkin-headed corporation she should die easy, for then she would know she had done a good thing for the public, whose money they were squandering without once thinking how the condition of such wretches as herself could be bettered. "English died before he had been up two months. And death reconciled the little difficulty between him and the McCartys; and old Mrs. McCarty's liking for him came back, and she went crying to the Bellevue and begged them, saying she was his mother, to let her take his body away and bury it. They let her have it, and she brought it away to the rookery, in a red coffin, and got a clean sheet of the Blazers, and hung it up beside the coffin, and set four candles on a table, and a little cross between them, and then borrowed a Bible with a cross on it, and laid it upon the coffin. Then they sent for me. I cried and kissed poor English, for poor English was the only father I knew, and he was good to me. I never shall forget what I saw in that little room that night. I found a dozen friends and the McCartys there, forming a half-circle of curious and demoniacal faces, peering over the body of English, whose face, I thought, formed the only repose in the picture. There were two small pictures-one of the Saviour, and the other of Kossuth-hung at the head and feet of the corpse; and the light shed a lurid paleness over the living and the dead. And detective Fitzgerald and another gentleman looked in. "'Who's here to-night?' says Fitzgerald, in a friendly sort of way. "'God love ye, Mr. Fitzgerald, poor English is gone! Indeed, then, it was the will of the Lord, and He's taken him from us-poor English!' says Mrs. McCarty. And Fitzgerald, and the gentleman with him, entered the den, and they shuddered and sat down at the sight of the face in the coffin. 'Sit down, Mr. Fitzgerald, do!--and may the Lord love ye! There was a deal of good in poor English. He's gone-so he is!' said Mrs. McCarty, begging them to sit down, and excuse the disordered state of her few rags. She had a hard struggle to live, God knows. They took off their hats, and sat a few minutes in solemn silence. The rags moved at the gentleman's side, which made him move towards the door. 'What is there, my good woman?' he inquired. 'She's a blessed child, Mr. Fitzgerald knows that same:' says Mrs. McCarty, turning down the rags and revealing the wasted features of her youngest girl, a child eleven years old, sinking in death. 'God knows she'll be better in heaven, and herself won't be long out of it,' Mrs. McCarty twice repeated, maintaining a singular indifference to the hand of death, already upon the child. The gentleman left some money to buy candles for poor English, and with Mr. Fitzgerald took himself away. "Near midnight, the tall black figure of solemn-faced Father Flaherty stalked in. He was not pleased with the McCartys, but went to the side of the dying child, fondled her little wasted hand in his own, and whispered a prayer for her soul. Never shall I forget how innocently she looked in his face while he parted the little ringlets that curled over her brow, and told her she would soon have a better home in a better world. Then he turned to poor English, and the cross, and the candles, and the pictures, and the living faces that gave such a ghastliness to the picture. Mrs. McCarty brought him a basin of water, over which he muttered, and made it holy. Then he again muttered some unintelligible sentences, and sprinkled the water over the dying child, over the body of poor English, and over the living-warning Mrs. McCarty and her daughters, as he pointed to the coffin. Then he knelt down, and they all knelt down, and he prayed for the soul of poor English, and left. What holy water then was left, Mrs. McCarty placed near the door, to keep the ghosts out. "The neighbors at the Blazers took a look in, and a few friends at the house of the 'Nine Nations' took a look in, and 'Fighting Mary,' of Murderer's Alley, took a look in, and before Father Flaherty had got well out of 'Cow Bay,' it got to be thought a trifle of a wake would console Mrs. McCarty's distracted feelings. 'Hard-fisted Sall' came to take a last look at poor English; and she said she would spend her last shilling over poor English, and having one, it would get a drop, and a drop dropped into the right place would do Mrs. McCarty a deal of good. "And Mrs. McCarty agreed that it wouldn't be amiss, and putting with Sall's shilling the money that was to get the candles, I was sent to the 'Bottomless Pit' at the house of the 'Nine Nations,' where Mr. Crown had a score with the old woman, and fetched away a quart of his gin, which they said was getting the whole of them. The McCartys took a drop, and the girls took a drop, and the neighbors took a drop, and they all kept taking drops, and the drops got the better of them all. One of the Miss McCartys got to having words with 'Fighting Mary,' about an old affair in which poor English was concerned, and the words got to blows, when Mr. Flanegan at the Blazers stepped in to make peace. But the whole house got into a fight, and the lights were put out, the corpse knocked over, and the child (it was found dead in the morning) suffocated with the weight of bodies felled in the melee. The noise and cries of murder brought the police rushing in, and most of them were dragged off to the Station; and the next day being Sunday, I wandered homeless and friendless into Sheriff street. Poor English was taken in charge by the officers. They kept him over Monday to see if any one would come up and claim him. No one came for him; no one knew more of him than that he went by the name of English; no one ever heard him say where he came from-he never said a word about my mother, or whether he had a relation in the world. He was carted off to Potter's Field and buried. That was the last of poor English. "We seldom got much to eat in the Points, and I had not tasted food for twenty-four hours. I sat down on the steps of a German grocery, and was soon ordered away by the keeper. Then I wandered into a place they called Nightmare's Alley, where three old wooden buildings with broken-down verandas stood, and were inhabited principally by butchers. I sat down on the steps of one, and thought if I only had a mother, or some one to care for me, and give me something to eat, how happy I should be. And I cried. And a great red-faced man came out of the house, and took me in, and gave me something to eat. His name was Mike Mullholland, and he was good to me, and I liked him, and took his name. And he lived with a repulsive looking woman, in a little room he paid ten dollars a month for. He had two big dogs, and worked at day work, in a slaughter-house in Staunton street. The dogs were known in the neighborhood as Mullholland's dogs, and with them I used to sleep on the rags of carpet spread for us in the room with Mullholland and his wife, who I got to calling mother. This is how I took the name of Mullholland. I was glad to leave the Points, and felt as if I had a home. But there was a 'Bottomless Pit' in Sheriff street, and though not so bad as the one at the house of the "Nine Nations," it gave out a deal of gin that the Mullhollands had a liking for. I was continually going for it, and the Mullhollands were continually drinking it; and the whole neighborhood liked it, and in 'Nightmare's Alley' the undertaker found a profitable business. "In the morning I went with the dogs to the slaughter-house, and there fed them, and took care of the fighting cocks, and brought gin for the men who worked there. In the afternoon I joined the newsboys, as ragged and neglected as myself, gambled for cents, and watched the policemen, whom we called the Charleys. I lived with Mullholland two years, and saw and felt enough to make hardened any one of my age. One morning there came a loud knocking at the door, which was followed by the entrance of two officers. The dogs had got out and bitten a child, and the officers, knowing who owned them, had come to arrest Mullholland. We were all surprised, for the officers recognized in Mullholland and the woman two old offenders. And while they were dragged off to the Tombs, I was left to prey upon the world as best I could. Again homeless, I wandered about with urchins as ragged and destitute as myself. It seemed to me that everybody viewed me as an object of suspicion, for I sought in vain for employment that would give me bread and clothing. I wanted to be honest, and would have lived honest; but I could not make people believe me honest. And when I told who I was, and where I sheltered myself, I was ordered away. Everybody judged me by the filthy shreds on my back; nobody had anything for me to do. "I applied at a grocer's, to sweep his store and go errands. When I told him where I had lived, he shook his head and ordered me away. Knowing I could fill a place not unknown to me, I applied at a butcher's in Mott street; but he pointed his knife-which left a wound in my feelings-and ordered me away. And I was ordered away wherever I went. The doors of the Chatham theatre looked too fine for me. My ragged condition rebuked me wherever I went, and for more than a week I slept under a cart that stood in Mott street. Then Tom Farley found me, and took me with him to his cellar, in Elizabeth street, where we had what I thought a good bed of shavings. Tom sold Heralds, gambled for cents, and shared with me, and we got along. Then Tom stole a dog, and the dog got us into a deal of trouble, which ended with getting us both into the Tombs, where Tom was locked up. I was again adrift, as we used to call it, and thought of poor Tom a deal. Every one I met seemed higher up in the world than I was. But I got into Centre Market, carried baskets, and did what I could to earn a shilling, and slept in Tom's bed, where there was some nights fifteen and twenty like myself. "One morning, while waiting a job, my feet and hands benumbed with the cold, a beautiful lady slipped a shilling into my hand and passed on. To one penniless and hungry, it seemed a deal of money. Necessity had almost driven me to the sign of the 'Three Martyrs,' to see what the man of the eagle face would give me on my cap, for they said the man at the 'Three Martyrs' lent money on rags such as I had. I followed the woman, for there was something so good in the act that I could not resist it. She entered a fine house in Leonard street. "You must now go with me into the den of Hag Zogbaum, in 'Scorpion Cove;' and 'Scorpion Cove' is in Pell street. Necessity next drove me there. It is early spring, we will suppose; and being in the Bowery, we find the streets in its vicinity reeking with putrid matter, hurling pestilence into the dark dwellings of the unknown poor, and making thankful the coffin-maker, who in turn thanks a nonundertaking corporation for the rich harvest. The muck is everywhere deep enough for hogs and fat aldermen to wallow in, and would serve well the purposes of a supper-eating corporation, whose chief business it was to fatten turtles and make Presidents. "We have got through the muck of the mucky Bowery. Let us turn to the left as we ascend the hill from Chatham street, and into a narrow, winding way, called Doyer's street. Dutch Sophy, then, as now, sits in all the good nature of her short, fat figure, serving her customers with ices, at three cents. Her cunning black eyes and cheerful, ruddy face, enhance the air of pertness that has made her a favorite with her customers. We will pass the little wooden shop, where Mr. Saunders makes boots of the latest style, and where old lapstone, with curious framed spectacles tied over his bleared eyes, has for the last forty years been seen at the window trimming welts, and mending every one's sole but his own; we will pass the four story wooden house that the landlord never paints-that has the little square windows, and the little square door, and the two little iron hand rails that curl so crabbedly at the ends, and guard four crabbeder steps that give ingress and egress to its swarm of poor but honest tenants; we will pass the shop where a short, stylish sign tells us Mr. Robertson makes bedsteads; and the little, slanting house a line of yellow letters on a square of black tin tells us is a select school for young ladies, and the bright, dainty looking house with the green shutters, where lives Mr. Vredenburg the carpenter, who, the neighbors say, has got up in the world, and paints his house to show that he feels above poor folks-and find we have reached the sooty and gin-reeking grocery of Mr. Korner, who sells the devil's elixir to the sootier devils that swarm the cellars of his neighbors. The faded blue letters, on a strip of wood nailed to the bricks over his door, tell us he is a dealer in "Imported and other liquors." Next door to Mr. Korner's tipsy looking grocery lives Mr. Muffin, the coffin-maker, who has a large business with the disciples who look in at Korner's. Mrs. Downey, a decent sort of body, who lives up the alley, and takes sixpenny lodgers by the dozen, may be seen in great tribulation with her pet pig, who, every day, much to the annoyance of Mr. Korner, manages to get out, and into the pool of decaying matter opposite his door, where he is sure to get stuck, and with his natural propensity, squeals lustily for assistance. Mrs. Downey, as is her habit, gets distracted; and having well abused Mr. Korner for his interference in a matter that can only concern herself and the animal, ventures to her knees in the mire, and having seized her darling pig by the two ears, does, with the assistance of a policeman, who kindly takes him by the tail, extricate his porkship, to the great joy of herself. The animal scampers, grunting, up the alley, as Mr. Korner, in his shirt sleeves, throws his broom after him, and the policeman surlily says he wishes it was the street commissioner. "We have made the circle of Doyer's street, and find it fortified on Pell street, with two decrepit wooden buildings, that the demand for the 'devil's elixir,' has converted into Dutch groceries, their exteriors presenting the appearance of having withstood a storm of dilapidated clapboards, broken shutters, red herrings, and onions. Mr. Voss looks suspiciously through the broken shutters of his Gibraltar, at his neighbor of the opposite Gibraltar, and is heard to say of his wares that they are none of the best, and that while he sells sixpence a pint less, the article is a shilling a pint better. And there the two Gibraltars stand, apparently infirm, hurling their unerring missiles, and making wreck of everything in the neighborhood. "We have turned down Pell street toward Mott, and on the north side a light-colored sign, representing a smith in the act of shoeing a horse, attracts the eye, and tells us the old cavern-like building over which it swings, is where Mr. Mooney does smithwork and shoeing. And a little further on, a dash of yellow and white paint on a little sign-board at the entrance of an alley, guarded on one side by a broken-down shed, and on the other, by a three-story, narrow, brick building (from the windows of which trail long water-stains, and from the broken panes a dozen curious black heads, of as many curious eyed negroes protrude), tells us somewhat indefinitely, that Mister Mills, white-washer and wall-colorer, may be found in the neighborhood, which, judging from outward appearances, stands much in need of this good man's services. Just keep your eye on the sign of the white-washer and wall-colorer, and passing up the sickly alley it tells you Mister Mills may be found in, you will find yourself (having picked your way over putrid matter, and placed your perfumed cambric where it will protect your lungs from the inhalation of pestilential air,) in the cozy area of 'Scorpion Cove.' Scorpion Cove is bounded at one end by a two-story wooden house, with two decayed and broken verandas in front, and rickety steps leading here and there to suspicious looking passages, into which, and out of which a never-ending platoon of the rising generation crawl and toddle, keep up a cheap serenade, and like rats, scamper away at the sight of a stranger; and on the other, by the back of the brick house with the negro-headed front. At the sides are two broken-down board fences, and forming a sort of net-work across the cove, are an innumerable quantity of unoccupied clothes-lines, which would seem only to serve the mischievous propensities of young negroes and the rats. There is any quantity of rubbish in 'Scorpion Cove,' and any amount of disease-breeding cesspools; but the corporation never heard of 'Scorpion Cove,' and wouldn't look into it if it had. If you ask me how it came to be called 'Scorpion Cove,' I will tell you. The brick house at one end was occupied by negroes; and the progeny of these negroes swarmed over the cove, and were called scorpions. The old house of the verandas at the other end, and which had an air of being propped up after a shock of paralysis, was inhabited by twenty or more families, of the Teutonic race, whose numerous progeny, called the hedge-hogs, were more than a match for the scorpions, and with that jealousy of each other which animates these races did the scorpions and hedge-hogs get at war. In the morning the scorpions would crawl up through holes in the cellar, through broken windows, through the trap-doors, down the long stairway that wound from the second and third stories over the broken pavilion, and from nobody could tell where-for they came, it seems, from every rat-hole, and with rolling white eyes, marshalled themselves for battle. The hedgehogs mustering in similar strength, and springing up from no one could tell where, would set upon the scorpions, and after a goodly amount of wallowing in the mire, pulling hair and wool, scratching faces and pommeling noses, the scorpions being alternately the victors and vanquished, the war would end at the appearance of Hag Zogbaum, who, with her broom, would cause the scorpions to beat a hasty retreat. The hedge-hogs generally came off victorious, for they were the stronger race. But the old hedge-hogs got much shattered in time by the broadsides of the two Gibraltars, which sent them broadside on into the Tombs. And this passion of the elder hedge-hogs for getting into the Tombs, caused by degrees a curtailing of the younger hedge-hogs. And this falling off in the forces of the foe, singularly inspirited the scorpions, who mustered courage, and after a series of savage battles, in which there was a notorious amount of wool-pulling gained the day. And this is how 'Scorpion Cove' got its name. "Hag Zogbaum lived in the cellar of the house with the verandas; and old Dan Sullivan and the rats had possession of the garret. In the cellar of this woman, whose trade was the fostering of crime in children as destitute as myself, there was a bar and a back cellar, where as many as twenty boys and girls slept on straw and were educated in vice. She took me into her nursery, and I was glad to get there, for I had no other place to go. "In the morning we were sent out to pilfer, to deceive the credulous, and to decoy others to the den. Some were instructed by Hag Zogbaum to affect deaf and dumb, to plead the starving condition of our parents, to, in a word, enlist the sympathies of the credulous with an hundred different stories. We were all stimulated by a premium being held out to the most successful. Some were sent out to steal pieces of iron, brass, copper, and old junk; and these Hag Zogbaum would sell or give to the man who kept the junk-shop in Stanton street, known as the rookery at the corner. (This man lived with Hag Zogbaum.) We returned at night with our booty, and re- ceived our wages in gin or beer. The unsuccessful were set down as victims of bad luck. Now and then the old woman would call us a miserable lot of wretches she was pestered to take care of. At one time there were in this den of wretchedness fifteen girls from seven to eleven years old, and seven boys under eleven-all being initiated into the by-ways of vice and crime. Among the girls were Italians, Germans, Irish, and-shall I say it?-Americans! It was curious to see what means the old hag would resort to for the purpose of improving their features after they had arrived at a certain age. She had a purpose in this; and that purpose sprang from that traffic in depravity caused by the demands of a depraved society, a theme on her lips continually." CHAPTER X. A CONTINUATION OF GEORGE MULLHOLLAND'S HISTORY. "HAVING served well the offices of felons and impostors, Hag Zogbaum would instruct her girls in the mysteries of licentiousness. When they reached a certain age, their personal appearance was improved, and one by one they were passed into the hands of splendidly- dressed ladies, as we then took them to be, who paid a sum for them to Hag Zogbaum, and took them away; and that was the last we saw of them. They had no desire to remain in their miserable abode, and were only too glad to get away from it. In most cases they were homeless and neglected orphans; and knowing no better condition, fell easy victims to the snares set for them. "It was in this dark, cavern-like den--in this mysterious caldron of precocious depravity, rioting unheeded in the very centre of a great city, whose boasted wealth and civilization it might put to shame, if indeed it were capable of shame, I first met the child of beauty, Anna Bonard. Yes!--the Anna Bonard you now see at the house of Madame Flamingo. At that time she was but seven years old--a child of uncommon beauty and aptness, of delicate but well-proportioned features, of middle stature, and a face that care might have made charming beyond comparison. But vice hardens, corrodes, and gives a false hue to the features. Anna said she was an orphan. How far this was true I know not. A mystery shrouded the way in which she fell into the hands of Hag Zogbaum. Hag Zogbaum said she got her of an apple-woman; and the apple-woman kept a stand in West street, but never would disclose how she came by Anna. And Mr. Tom Toddleworth, who was the chronicle of the Points, and used to look into 'Scorpion Cove' now and then, and inquire about Anna, as if he had a sort of interest in her, they said knew all about her. But if he did, he always kept it a secret between himself and Hag Zogbaum. "She was always of a melancholy turn, used to say life was but a burden to her-that she could see nothing in the future that did not seem dark and tortuous. The lot into which she was cast of necessity others might have mistaken for that which she had chosen. It was not. The hard hand of necessity had forced her into this quicksand of death; the indifference of a naturally generous community, robbed her of the light of intelligence, and left her a helpless victim in the hands of this cultivator of vice. How could she, orphan as she was called, and unencouraged, come to be a noble and generous-hearted woman? No one offered her the means to come up and ornament her sex; but tyrannical society neither forgets her misfortunes nor forgives her errors. Once seal the death-warrant of a woman's errors, and you have none to come forward and cancel it; the tomb only removes the seal. Anna took a liking to me, and was kind to me, and looked to me to protect her. And I loved her, and our love grew up, and strengthened; and being alike neglected in the world, our condition served as the strongest means of cementing our attachment. "Hag Zogbaum then sent Anna away to the house up the alley, in Elizabeth street, where she sent most of her girls when they had reached the age of eleven and twelve. Hag Zogbaum had many places for her female pupils. The very best looking always went a while to the house in the alley; the next best looking were sure to find their way into the hands of Miss Brown, in Little Water street, and Miss Brown, they said, sold them to the fairies of the South, who dressed them in velvet and gold; and the 'scrubs,' as the old woman used to call the rest, got, by some mysterious process, into the hands of Paddy Pie and Tim Branahan, who kept shantees in Orange street. "Anna had been away some time, and Mr. Tom Toddleworth had several times been seen to look in and inquire for her. Mr. Toddleworth said he had a ripping bid for her. At that time I was ignorant of its meaning. Harry Rooney and me were sent to the house in Elizabeth street, one morning, to bring Anna and another girl home. The house was large, and had an air of neatness about it that contrasted strangely with the den in 'Scorpion Cove.' We rang the bell and inquired for the girls, who, after waiting nearly an hour, were sent down to us, clean and neatly dressed. In Anna the change was so great, that though I had loved her, and thought of her day and night during her absence, I scarce recognized her. So glad did she seem to see me that she burst into tears, flung her arms about my neck, and kissed me with the fondness of a sister. Then she recounted with childlike enthusiasm the kind treatment she had received at the house of Madame Harding (for such it was called), between whom and Hag Zogbaum there was carried on a species of business I am not inclined to designate here. Two kind and splendidly-dressed ladies, Anna said, called to see them nearly every day, and were going to take them away, that they might live like fairies all the rest of their lives. "When we got home, two ladies were waiting at the den. It was not the first time we had seen them at the den. Anna recognized them as the ladies she had seen at Madame Harding's. One was the woman who so kindly gave me the shilling in the market, when I was cold and hungry. A lengthy whispering took place between Hag Zogbaum and the ladies, and we were ordered into the back cellar. I knew the whispering was about Anna; and watching through the boards I heard the Hag say Anna was fourteen and nothing less, and saw one of the ladies draw from her purse numerous pieces of gold, which were slipped into her hand. In a few minutes more I saw poor little Anna follow her up the steps that led into 'Scorpion Cove.' When we were released Hag was serving ragged and dejected-looking men with gin and beer. Anna, she said when I inquired, had gone to a good home in the country. I loved her ardently, and being lonesome was not content with the statement of the old woman. I could not read, but had begun to think for myself, and something told me all was not right. For weeks and months I watched at the house in Leonard street, into which I had followed the woman who gave me the shilling. But I neither saw her nor the woman. Elegant carriages, and elegantly-dressed men drove to and from the door, and passed in and out of the house, and the house seemed to have a deal of fashionable customers, and that was all I knew of it then. "As I watched one night, a gentleman came out of the house, took me by the arm and shook me, said I was a loitering vagrant, that he had seen me before, and having a suspicious look he would order the watch to lock me up. He inquired where my home was; and when I told him it was in 'Scorpion Cove,' he replied he didn't know where that was. I told him it wasn't much of a home, and he said I ought to have a better one. It was all very well to say so; but with me the case was different. That night I met Tom Farley, who was glad to see me, and told how he got out of the lock-up, and what he thought of the lock-up, and the jolly old Judge who sent him to the lock-up, and who he saw in the lock-up, and what mischief was concocted in the lock-up, and what he got to eat in the lock-up, and how the lock-up wasn't so bad a place after all. "The fact was I was inclined to think the lock-up not so bad a place to get into, seeing how they gave people something good to eat, and clothes to wear. Tom and me went into business together. We sold Heralds and Sunday papers, and made a good thing of it, and shared our earnings, and got enough to eat and some clothes. I took up my stand in Centre Market, and Tom took up his at Peck Slip. At night we would meet, count our earnings, and give them to Mr. Crogan, who kept the cellar in Water street, where we slept. I left Hag Zogbaum, who we got to calling the wizard. She got all we could earn or pilfer, and we got nothing for our backs but a few rags, and unwholesome fish and beer for our bellies. I thought of Anna day and night; I hoped to meet in Centre Market the woman who took her away. "I said no one ever looked in at the den in 'Scorpion Cove,' but there was a kind little man, with sharp black eyes, and black hair, and an earnest olive-colored face, and an earnester manner about him, who used to look in now and then, talk kindly to us, and tell us he wished he had a home for us all, and was rich enough to give us all enough to eat. He hated Hag Zogbaum, and Hag Zogbaum hated him; but we all liked him because he was kind to us, and used to shake his head, and say he would do something for us yet. Hag Zogbaum said he was always meddling with other people's business. At other times a man would come along and throw tracts in at the gate of the alley. We were ignorant of what they were intended for, and used to try to sell them at the Gibraltars. Nobody wanted them, and nobody could read at the den, so Hag Zogbaum lighted the fire with them, and that was the end of them. "Well, I sold papers for nearly two years, and learned to read a little by so doing, and got up in the world a little; and being what was called smart, attracted the attention of a printer in Nassau street, who took me into his office, and did well by me. My mind was bent on getting a trade. I knew I could do well for myself with a trade to lean upon. Two years I worked faithfully at the printer's, was approaching manhood, and with the facilities it afforded me had not failed to improve my mind and get a tolerable good knowledge of the trade. But the image of Anna, and the singular manner in which she disappeared, made me unhappy. "On my return from dinner one day I met in Broadway the lady who took Anna away. The past and its trials flashed across my brain, and I turned and followed her-found that her home was changed to Mercer street, and this accounted for my fruitless watching in Leonard street. "The love of Anna, that had left its embers smouldering in my bosom, quickened, and seemed to burn with redoubled ardor. It was my first and only love; the sufferings of our childhood had made it lasting. My very emotion rose to action as I saw the woman I knew took her away. My anxiety to know her fate had no bounds. Dressing myself up as respectably as it was possible with my means, I took advantage of a dark and stormy night in the month of November to call at the house in Mercer street, into which I had traced the lady. I rung the bell; a sumptuously-dressed woman came to the door, which opened into a gorgeously-decorated hall. She looked at me with an inquiring eye and disdainful frown, inquired who I was and what I wanted. I confess I was nervous, for the dazzling splendor of the mansion produced in me a feeling of awe rather than admiration. I made known my mission as best I could; the woman said no such person had ever resided there. In that moment of disappointment I felt like casting myself away in despair. The associations of Scorpion Cove, of the house of the Nine Nations, of the Rookery, of Paddy Pie's-or any other den in that desert of death that engulphs the Points, seemed holding out a solace for the melancholy that weighed me down. But when I got back into Broadway my resolution gained strength, and with it I wept over the folly of my thoughts. "Led by curiosity, and the air of comfort pervading the well-furnished room, and the piously-disposed appearance of the persons who passed in and out, I had several times looked in at the house of the 'Foreign Missions,' as we used to call it. A man with a good-natured face used to sit in the chair, and a wise-looking little man in spectacles (the Secretary) used to sit a bit below him, and a dozen or two well-disposed persons of both sexes, with sharp and anxious countenances, used to sit round in a half circle, listening. The wise-looking man in the spectacles would, on motion of some one present, read a long report, which was generally made up of a list of donations and expenditures for getting up a scheme to evangelize the world, and get Mr. Singleton Spyke off to Antioch. It seemed to me as if a deal of time and money was expended on Mr. Singleton Spyke, and yet Mr. Spyke never got off to Antioch. When the man of the spectacles got through reading the long paper, and the good-natured man in the chair got through explaining that the heavy amount of twenty-odd thousand dollars had been judiciously expended for the salary of officers of the society, and the getting Brothers Spurn and Witherspoon off to enlighten the heathen, Brother Singleton Spyke's mission would come up. Every one agreed that there ought to be no delay in getting Brother Spyke off to Antioch; but a small deficiency always stood in the way. And Brother Spyke seemed spiked to this deficiency; for notwithstanding Mrs. Slocum, who was reckoned the strongest-minded woman, and best business-man of the society, always made speeches in favor of Brother Spyke and his mission (a special one), he never got off to Antioch. "Feeling forlorn, smarting under disappointment, and undecided where to go after I left the house in Mercer street, I looked in at the house of the 'Foreign Missions.' Mrs. Slocum, as I had many times before seen her, was warmly contesting a question concerning Brother Spyke, with the good-natured man in the chair. It was wrong, she said, so much money should be expended, and Brother Spyke not got off to Antioch. So leaving them debating Mr. Spyke's mission to Antioch, I proceeded back to the house in Mercer street, and inquired for the landlady of the house. The landlady, the woman that opened the door said, was engaged. The door was shut in my face, and I turned away more wounded in my feelings than before. Day and night I contemplated some plan by which to ascertain Anna's place of abode, her pursuit in life, her wants. When we parted she could neither write nor read: I had taken writing lessons, by which I could communicate tolerably well, while my occupation afforded me the means of improvement. A few weeks passed (I continued to watch the house), and I recognized her one afternoon, by her black, floating hair, sitting at a second-story window of the house in Mercer street, her back toward me. The sight was like electricity on my feelings; a transport of joy bore away my thoughts. I gazed, and continued to gaze upon the object, throwing, as it were, new passion into my soul. But it turned, and there was a changed face, a face more lovely, looking eagerly into a book. Looking eagerly into a book did not betray one who could not read. But there was that in my heart that prompted me to look on the favorable side of the doubt-to try a different expedient in gaining admittance to the house. When night came, I assumed a dress those who look on mechanics as vulgar people, would have said became a gentleman; and approaching the house, gained easy admittance. As I was about entering the great parlors, a familiar but somewhat changed voice at the top of the circling stairs that led from the hall caught my ear. I paused, listened, became entranced with suspense. Again it resounded-again my heart throbbed with joy. It was Anna's voice, so soft and musical. The woman who opened the door turned from me, and attempted to hush it. But Anna seemed indifferent to the admonition, for she tripped buoyantly down stairs, accompanying a gentleman to the door. I stood before her, a changed person. Her recognition of me was instantaneous. Her color changed, her lips quivered, her eyes filled with tears, her very soul seemed fired with emotions she had no power to resist. 'George Mullholland!' she exclaimed, throwing her arms about my neck, kissing me, and burying her head in my bosom, and giving vent to her feelings in tears and quickened sobs-'how I have thought of you, watched for you, and hoped for the day when we would meet again and be happy. Oh, George! George! how changed everything seems since we parted! It seems a long age, and yet our sufferings, and the fondness for each other that was created in that suffering, freshens in the mind. Dear, good George-my protector!' she continued, clinging to me convulsively. I took her in my arms (the scene created no little excitement in the house) and bore her away to her chamber, which was chastely furnished, displaying a correct taste, and otherwise suited to a princess. Having gained her presence of mind, and become calm, she commenced relating what had occurred since we parted at Scorpion Cove. I need not relate it at length here, for it was similar in character to what might be told by a thousand others if they were not powerless. For months she had been confined to the house, her love of dress indulged to the furthest extent, her mind polluted and initiated into the mysteries of refined licentiousness, her personal appearance scrupulously regarded, and made to serve the object of which she was a victim in the hands of the hostess, who made her the worse than slave to a banker of great respectability in Wall street. This good man and father was well down in the vale of years, had a mansion on Fifth Avenue, and an interesting and much-beloved family. He was, in addition, a prominent member of the commercial community; but his example to those more ready to imitate the errors of men in high positions, than to improve by the examples of the virtuous poor, was not what it should be. Though a child of neglect, and schooled to licentiousness under the very eye of a generous community, her natural sensibility recoiled at the thought that she was a mere object of prey to the passions of one she could not love. "She resolved to remain in this condition no longer, and escaped to Savannah with a young man whose acquaintance she had made at the house in Mercer street. For a time they lived at a respectable hotel, as husband and wife. But her antecedents got out, and they got notice to leave. The same fate met them in Charleston, to which city they removed. Her antecedents seemed to follow her wherever she went, like haunting spirits seeking her betrayal. She was homeless; and without a home there was nothing open to her but that vortex of licentiousness the world seemed pointing her to. Back she went to the house in Mercer street-was glad to get back; was at least free from the finger of scorn. Henceforward she associated with various friends, who sought her because of her transcendent charms. She had cultivated a natural intelligence, and her manners were such as might have become one in better society. But her heart's desire was to leave the house. I took her from it; and for a time I was happy to find that the contaminating weeds of vice had not overgrown the more sensitive buds of virtue. "I provided a small tenement in Centre street, such as my means would afford, and we started in the world, resolved to live respectably. But what had maintained me respectably was now found inadequate to the support of us both. Life in a house of sumptuous vice had rendered Anna incapable of adapting herself to the extreme of economy now forced upon us. Anna was taken sick; I was compelled to neglect my work, and was discharged. Discontent, embarrassment, and poverty resulted. I struggled to live for six months; but my prospects, my hopes of gaining an honest living, were gone. I had no money to join the society, and the trade being dull, could get nothing to do. Fate seemed driving us to the last stage of distress. One by one our few pieces of furniture, our clothing, and the few bits of jewelry Anna had presented her at the house in Mercer street, found their way to the sign of the Three Martyrs. The man of the eagle face would always lend something on them, and that something relieved us for the time. I many times thought, as I passed the house of the Foreign Missions in Centre street, where there was such an air of comfort, that if Mrs. Abijah Slocum, and the good-natured man who sat in the chair, and the wise little man in the spectacles, would condescend to look in at our little place, and instead of always talking about getting Mr. Singleton Spyke off to Antioch, take pity on our destitution, what a relief it would be. It would have made more hearts happy than Mr. Spyke, notwithstanding the high end of his mission, could have softened in ten years at Antioch. "Necessity, not inclination, forced Anna back into the house in Mercer street, when I became her friend, her transient protector. Her hand was as ready to bestow as her heart was warm and generous. She gave me money, and was kind to me; but the degraded character of my position caused me to despond, to yield myself a victim to insidious vice, to become the associate of men whose only occupation was that of gambling and 'roping-in' unsuspecting persons. I was not long in becoming an efficient in the arts these men practiced on the unwary. We used to meet at the 'Subterranean,' in Church street, and there concoct our mode of operations. And from this centre went forth, daily, men who lived by gambling, larceny, picking pockets, counterfeiting, and passing counterfeit money. I kept Anna ignorant of my associations. Nevertheless I was forced to get money, for I found her affections becoming perverted. At times her manner towards me was cold, and I sought to change it with money. "While thus pursuing a life so precarious and exciting, I used to look in at the 'Empire,' in Broadway, to see whom I could 'spot,' as we called it at the 'Subterranean.' And it was here I met poor Tom Swiggs, distracted and giving himself up to drink, in the fruitless search after the girl of his love, from whom he had been separated, as he said, by his mother. He had loved the girl, and the girl returned his love with all the sincerity and ardor of her soul. But she was poor, and of poor parents. And as such people were reckoned nothing in Charleston, his mother locked him up in jail, and she was got out of the way. Tom opened his heart to me, said foul means had been resorted to, and the girl had thrown herself away, because, while he was held in close confinement, falsehoods had been used to make her believe he had abandoned her. To have her an outcast on his account, to have her leading the life of an abandoned woman, and that with the more galling belief that he had forsaken her, was more than he could bear, and he was sinking under the burden. Instead of making him an object of my criminal profession, his story so touched my feelings that I became his protector, saw him to his lodgings in Green street, and ultimately got him on board a vessel bound to Charleston. "Not many weeks after this, I, being moneyless, was the principal of a plot by which nearly a thousand dollars was got of the old man in Wall street, who had been Anna's friend; and fearing it might get out, I induced her to accompany me to Charleston, where she believed I had a prospect of bettering my condition, quitting my uncertain mode of living, and becoming a respectable man. Together we put up at the Charleston Hotel. But necessity again forced me to reveal to her my circumstances, and the real cause of my leaving New York. Her hopes of shaking off the taint of her former life seemed blasted; but she bore the shock with resignation, and removed with me to the house of Madame Flamingo, where we for a time lived privately. But the Judge sought her out, followed her with the zeal of a knight, and promised, if she would forsake me, to be her protector; to provide for her and maintain her like a lady during her life. What progress he has made in carrying out his promise you have seen. The English baronet imposed her upon the St. Cecilia, and the Judge was the first to betray her." CHAPTER XI. IN WHICH THE READER IS INTRODUCED TO MR. ABSALOM M'ARTHUR. You must know, reader, that King street is our Boulevard of fashion; and though not the handsomest street in the world, nor the widest, nor the best paved, nor the most celebrated for fine edifices, we so cherish its age and dignity that we would not for the world change its provincial name, or molest one of the hundred old tottering buildings that daily threaten a dissolution upon its pavement, or permit a wench of doubtful blood to show her head on the "north sidewalk" during promenade hours. We are, you see, curiously nice in matters of color, and we should be. You may not comprehend the necessity for this scrupulous regard to caste; others do not, so you are not to blame for your ignorance of the customs of an atmosphere you have only breathed through novels written by steam. We don't (and you wouldn't) like to have our wives meet our slightly-colored mistresses. And we are sure you would not like to have your highly-educated and much-admired daughters meet those cream-colored material evidences of your folly-called by Northern "fanatics" their half-sisters! You would not! And your wives, like sensible women, as our wives and daughters are, would, if by accident they did meet them, never let you have a bit of sleep until you sent them to old Graspum's flesh-market, had them sold, and the money put safely into their hands. We do these things just as you would; and our wives being philosophers, and very fashionable withal, put the money so got into fine dresses, and a few weeks' stay at some very select watering-place in the North. If your wife be very accomplished, (like ours,) and your daughters much admired for their beauty, (like ours,) they will do as ours did-put wisely the cash got for their detestable relatives into a journey of inspection over Europe. So, you see, we keep our fashionable side of King street; and woe be to the shady mortal that pollutes its bricks! Mr. Absalom McArthur lives on the unfashionable side of this street, in a one-story wooden building, with a cottage roof, covered with thick, black moss, and having two great bow windows, and a very lean door, painted black, in front. It is a rummy old house to look at, for the great bow windows are always ornamented with old hats, which Mr. McArthur makes supply the place of glass; and the house itself, notwithstanding it keeps up the dignity of a circular window over the door, reminds one of that valiant and very notorious characteristic of the State, for it has, during the last twenty or more years, threatened (but never done it) to tumble upon the unfashionable pavement, just in like manner as the State has threatened (but never done it!) to tumble itself out of our unfashionable Union. We are a great people, you see; but having the impediment of the Union in the way of displaying our might, always stand ready to do what we never intended to do. We speak in that same good-natured sense and metaphor used by our politicians, (who are become very distinguished in the refined arts of fighting and whiskey-drinking,) when they call for a rope to put about the neck of every man not sufficiently stupid to acknowledge himself a secessionist. We imagine ourselves the gigantic and sublime theatre of chivalry, as we have a right to do; we raise up heroes of war and statesmanship, compared with whom your Napoleons, Mirabeaus, and Marats-yes, even your much-abused Roman orators and Athenian philosophers, sink into mere insignificance. Nor are we bad imitators of that art displayed by the Roman soldiers, when they entered the Forum and drenched it with Senatorial blood! Pardon this digression, reader. Of a summer morning you will see McArthur, the old Provincialist, as he is called, arranging in his great bow windows an innumerable variety of antique relics, none but a Mrs. Toodles could conceive a want for--such as broken pots, dog-irons, fenders, saws, toasters, stew-pans, old muskets, boxing-gloves and foils, and sundry other odds and ends too numerous to mention. At evening he sits in his door, a clever picture of a by-gone age, on a venerable old sofa, supported on legs tapering into feet of lion's paws, and carved in mahogany, all tacked over with brass-headed nails. Here the old man sits, and sits, and sits, reading the "Heroes of the Revolution," (the only book he ever reads,) and seemingly ready at all times to serve the "good wishes" of his customers, who he will tell you are of the very first families, and very distinguished! He holds distinguished people in high esteem; and several distinguished persons have no very bad opinion of him, but a much better one of his very interesting daughter, whose acquaintance (though not a lady, in the Southern acceptation of the term) they would not object to making-provided! His little shop is lumbered with boxes and barrels, all containing relics of a by-gone age--such as broken swords, pistols of curious make, Revolutionary hand-saws, planes, cuirasses, broken spurs, blunderbusses, bowie, scalping, and hunting-knives; all of which he declares our great men have a use for. Hung on a little post, and over a pair of rather suspicious-looking buckskin breeches, is a rusty helmet, which he sincerely believes was worn by a knight of the days of William the Conqueror. A little counter to the left staggers under a pile of musty old books and mustier papers, all containing valuable matter relating to the old Continentals, who, as he has it, were all Carolinians. (Dispute this, and he will go right into a passion.) Resting like good-natured policemen against this weary old counter are two sympathetic old coffins, several second-hand crutches, and a quantity of much-neglected wooden legs. These Mr. McArthur says are in great demand with our first families. No one, except Mr. Soloman Snivel, knows better what the chivalry stand in need of to prop up its declining dignity. His dirty little shelves, too, are stuffed with those cheap uniforms the State so grudgingly voted its unwilling volunteers during the Revolution. See Senator Sumner's speech in Congress on Plantation manners. Tucked in here and there, at sixes and sevens, are the scarlet and blue of several suits of cast-off theatrical wardrobe he got of Abbott, and now loans for a small trifle to Madame Flamingo and the St. Cecilia Society-the first, when she gives her very seductive bal-masques; the second, when distinguished foreigners with titles honor its costume balls. As for Revolutionary cocked hats, epaulettes, plumes, and holsters, he has enough to supply and send off, feeling as proud as peacocks, every General and Colonel in the State-and their name, as you ought to know, reader, is legion. The stranger might, indeed, be deceived into the belief that Absalom McArthur's curiosity shop was capable of furnishing accoutrements for that noble little army, (standing army we call it!) on which the State prides itself not a little, and spends no end of money. For ourselves, (if the reader but permit us,) we have long admired this little Spartan force, saying all the good things of it our prosy brain could invent, and in the kindest manner recommending its uniform good character as a model for our very respectable society to fashion after. Indeed, we have, in the very best nature of a modern historian, endeavored to enlighten the barbarian world outside of South Carolina as to the terrible consequences which might accrue to the Union did this noble little army assume any other than a standing character. Now that General Jackson is out of the way, and our plebeian friends over the Savannah, whom we hold in high esteem, (the Georgians,) kindly consent to let us go our own road out of the Union, nothing can be more grateful than to find our wise politicians sincerely believing that when this standing army, of which other States know so little, shall have become allied with those mighty men of Beaufort, dire consequences to this young but very respectable Federal compact will be the result. Having discharged the duties of a historian, for the benefit of those benighted beings unfortunate enough to live out of our small but highly-civilized State, we must return to McArthur. He is a little old-maidish about his age, which for the last twenty years has not got a day more than fifty-four. Being as sensitive of his veracity as the State is of its dignity, we would not, either by implication or otherwise, lay an impeachment at his door, but rather charge the discrepancy to that sin (a treacherous memory) the legal gentry find so convenient for their purposes when they knock down their own positions. McArthur stood five feet eight exactly, when young, but age has made him lean of person, and somewhat bent. His face is long and corrugated; his expression of countenance singularly serious. A nose, neither aquiline nor Grecian, but large enough, and long enough, and red enough at the end, to make both; a sharp and curiously-projecting chin, that threatens a meeting, at no very distant day, with his nasal organ; two small, watchful blue eyes deep-set under narrow arches, fringed with long gray lashes; a deeply-furrowed, but straight and contracted forehead, and a shaggy red wig, poised upon the crown of his head, and, reader, if you except the constant working of a heavy, drooping lower lip, and the diagonal sight with which his eyes are favored, you have his most prominent features. Fashion he holds in utter contempt, nor has he the very best opinion in the world of our fashionable tailors, who are grown so rich that they hold mortgages on the very best plantations in the State, and offer themselves candidates for the Governorship. Indeed, Mr. McArthur says, one of these knights of the goose, not long since, had the pertinacity to imagine himself a great General. And to show his tenacious adherence to the examples set by the State, he dresses exactly as his grandfather's great-grandfather used to, in a blue coat, with small brass buttons, a narrow crimpy collar, and tails long enough and sharp enough for a clipper-ship's run. The periods when he provided himself with new suits are so far apart that they formed special episodes in his history; nevertheless there is always an air of neatness about him, and he will spend much time arranging a dingy ruffled shirt, a pair of gray trowsers, a black velvet waistcoat, cut in the Elizabethan style, and a high, square shirt collar, into which his head has the appearance of being jammed. This collar he ties with a much-valued red and yellow Spittlefields, the ends of which flow over his ruffle. Although the old man would not bring much at the man-shambles, we set a great deal of store by him, and would not exchange him for anything in the world but a regiment or two of heroic secessionists. Indeed we are fully aware that nothing like him exists beyond the highly perfumed atmosphere of our State. And to many other curious accomplishments the old man adds that of telling fortunes. The negroes seriously believe he has a private arrangement with the devil, of whom he gets his wisdom, and the secret of propitiating the gods. Two days have passed since the emeute at the house of the old hostess. McArthur has promised the young missionary a place for Tom Swiggs, when he gets out of prison (but no one but his mother seems to have a right to let him out), and the tall figure of Mister Snivel is seen entering the little curiosity shop. "I say!--my old hero, has she been here yet?" inquires Mr. Snivel, the accommodation man. "Nay, good friend," returns the old man, rising from his sofa, and returning the salutation, "she has not yet darkened the door." The old man draws the steel-bowed spectacles from his face, and watches with a patriarchal air any change that comes over the accommodation man's countenance. "Now, good friend, if I did but know the plot," pursues the old man. "The plot you are not to know! I gave you her history yesterday-- that is, as far as I know it. You must make up the rest. You know how to tell fortunes, old boy. I need not instruct you. Mind you flatter her beauty, though-extend on the kindness of the Judge, and be sure you get it in that it was me who betrayed her at the St. Cecelia. All right old boy, eh?" and shaking McArthur by the hand warmly, he takes his departure, bowing himself into the street. The old man says he will be all ready when she comes. Scarcely has the accommodation man passed out of sight when a sallow-faced stripling makes his appearance, and with that characteristic effrontery for borrowing and never returning, of the property-man of a country theatre, "desires" to know if Mr. McArthur will lend him a skull. "A skull!" ejaculates the old man, his bony fingers wandering to his melancholy lip--"a skull!" and he fusses studiously round the little cell-like place, looking distrustfully at the property-man, and then turning an anxious eye towards his piles of rubbish, as if fearing some plot is on foot to remove them to the infernal regions. "You see," interrupts Mr. Property, "we play Hamlet to-night--expect a crammed house--and our star, being scrupulous of his reputation, as all small stars are, won't go on for the scene of the grave-digger, without two skulls-he swears he won't! He raised the very roof of the theatre this morning, because his name wasn't in bigger type on the bill. And if we don't give him two skulls and plenty of bones to-night, he swears-and such swearing as it is!--he'll forfeit the manager, have the house closed, and come out with a card to the public in the morning. We are in a fix, you see! The janitor only has one, and he lent us that as if he didn't want to." Mr. McArthur says he sees, and with an air of regained wisdom stops suddenly, and takes from a shelf a dingy old board, on which is a dingier paper, bearing curious inscriptions, no one but the old man himself would have supposed to be a schedule of stock in trade. Such it is, nevertheless. He rubs his spectacles, places them methodically upon his face, wipes and wipes the old board with his elbow. "It's here if it's anywhere!" says the old man, with a sigh. "It comes into my head that among the rest of my valuables I've Yorick's skull." "The very skull we want!" interrupts Property. And the old man quickens the working of his lower jaw, and continues to rub at the board until he has brought out the written mystery. "My ancestors were great people," he mumbles to himself, "great people!" He runs the crusty forefinger of his right hand up and down the board, adding, "and any customers are all of the first families, which is some consolation in one's poverty. Ah! I have it here!" he exclaims, with childlike exultation, frisking his fingers over the board. "One Yorick's skull-a time-worn, tenantless, and valuable relic, in which graveyard worms have banqueted more than once. Yes, young man, presented to my ancestors by the elder Stuarts, and on that account worth seven skulls, or more." "One Yorick's skull," is written on the paper, upon which the old man presses firmly his finger. Then turning to an old box standing in the little fire-place behind the counter, saying, "it's in here-as my name's Absalom McArthur, it is," he opens the lid, and draws forth several old military coats (they have seen revolutionary days! he says, exultingly), numerous scales of brass, such as are worn on British soldiers' hats, a ponderous chapeau and epaulets, worn, he insists, by Lord Nelson at the renowned battle of Trafalgar. He has not opened, he adds, this box for more than twelve long years. Next he drags forth a military cloak of great weight and dimensions. "Ah!" he exclaims, with nervous joy, "here's the identical cloak worn by Lord Cornwallis-how my ancestors used to prize it." And as he unrolls its great folds there falls upon the floor, to his great surprise, an old buff-colored silk dress, tied firmly with a narrow, green ribbon. "Maria! Maria! Maria!" shouts the old man, as if suddenly seized with a spasm. And his little gray eyes flash with excitement, as he says--"if here hasn't come to light at last, poor Mag Munday's dress. God forgive the poor wretch, she's dead and gone, no doubt." In response to the name of "Maria" there protrudes from a little door that opens into a passage leading to a back-room, the delicate figure of a female, with a face of great paleness, overcast by a thoughtful expression. She has a finely-developed head, intelligent blue eyes, light auburn hair, and features more interesting than regular. Indeed, there is more to admire in the peculiar modesty of her demeanor than in the regularity of her features, as we shall show. "My daughter!" says the old man, as she nervously advances, her pale hand extended. "Poor woman! how she would mourn about this old dress; and say it contained something that might give her a chance in the world," she rather whispers than speaks, disclosing two rows of small white teeth. She takes from the old man's hand the package, and disappears. The anxiety she evinces over the charge discloses the fact that there is something of deep interest connected with it. Mr. McArthur was about to relate how he came by this seemingly worthless old package, when the property-man, becoming somewhat restless, and not holding in over high respect the old man's rubbish, as he called it in his thoughts, commences drawing forth, piece after piece of the old relics. The old man will not allow this. "There, young man!" he says, touching him on the elbow, and resuming his labor. At length he draws forth the dust-tenanted skull, coated on the outer surface with greasy mould. "There!" he says, with an unrestrained exclamation of joy, holding up the wasting bone, "this was in its time poor Yorick's skull. It was such a skull, when Yorick lived! Beneath this filthy remnant of past greatness (I always think of greatness when I turn to the past), this empty tenement, once the domain of wisdom, this poor bone, what thoughts did not come out?" And the old man shakes his head, mutters inarticulately, and weeps with the simplicity of a child. "The Star'll have skulls and bones enough to make up for his want of talent now-I reckon," interposes the property-man. "But!--I say, mister, this skull couldn't a bin old Yorick's, you know--" "Yorick's!--why not?" interrupts the old man. "Because Yorick-Yorick was the King's jester, you see-no nigger; and no one would think of importing anything but a nigger's skull into Charleston--" "Young man!--if this skull had consciousness; if this had a tongue it would rebuke thee;" the old man retorts hastily, "for my ancestors knew Yorick, and Yorick kept up an intimate acquaintance with the ancestors of the very first families in this State, who were not shoemakers and milliners, as hath been maliciously charged, but good and pious Huguenots." To the end that he may convince the unbelieving Thespian of the truth of his assertion, he commences to rub away the black coating with the sleeve of his coat, and there, to his infinite delight, is written, across the crown, in letters of red that stand out as bold as the State's chivalry--"Alas! poor Yorick." Tears of sympathy trickle down the old man's cheeks, his eyes sparkle with excitement, and with womanly accents he mutters: "the days of poetry and chivalry are gone. It is but a space of time since this good man's wit made Kings and Princes laugh with joy." This skull, and a coral pin, which he said was presented to his ancestors by Lord Cornwallis, who they captured, now became his hobby; and he referred to it in all his conversation, and made them as much his idol as our politicians do secession. In this instance, he dare not entrust his newly-discovered jewel to the vulgar hands of Mr. Property, but pledged his honor-a ware the State deals largely in notwithstanding it has become exceedingly cheap-it would be forthcoming at the requisite time. CHAPTER XII. IN WHICH ARE MATTERS THE READER MAY HAVE ANTICIPATED. MR. SOLOMAN SNIVEL has effected a reconciliation between old Judge Sleepyhorn and the beautiful Anna Bonard, and he has flattered the weak-minded George Mullholland into a belief that the old Judge, as he styles him, is his very best friend. So matters go on swimmingly at the house of Madame Flamingo. Indeed Mr. Soloman can make himself extremely useful in any affair requiring the exercise of nice diplomatic skill-no matter whether it be of love or law. He gets people into debt, and out of debt; into bankruptcy and out of bankruptcy; into jail and out of jail; into society and out of society. He has officiated in almost every capacity but that of a sexton. If you want money, Mr. Soloman can always arrange the little matter for you. If you have old negroes you want to get off your hands at a low figure, he has a customer. If you want to mortgage your negro property, a thing not uncommon with our very first families, Mr. Soloman is your man. Are you worth a fee, and want legal advice, he will give it exactly to your liking. Indeed, he will lie you into the most hopeless suit, and with equal pertinacity lie you out of the very best. Every judge is his friend and most intimate acquaintance. He is always rollicking, frisking, and insinuating himself into something, affects to be the most liberal sort of a companion, never refuses to drink when invited, but never invites any one unless he has a motive beyond friendship. Mr. Keepum, the wealthy lottery broker, who lives over the way, in Broad street, in the house with the mysterious signs, is his money-man. This Keepum, the man with the sharp visage and guilty countenance, has an excellent standing in society, having got it as the reward of killing two men. Neither of these deeds of heroism, however, were the result of a duel. Between these worthies there exists relations mutually profitable, if not the most honorable. And notwithstanding Mr. Soloman is forever sounding Mr. Keepum's generosity, the said Keepum has a singular faculty for holding with a firm grasp all he gets, the extent of his charities being a small mite now and then to Mr. Hadger, the very pious agent for the New York Presbyterian Tract Society. Mr. Hadger, who by trading in things called negroes, and such like wares, has become a man of great means, twice every year badgers the community in behalf of this society, and chuckles over what he gets of Keepum, as if a knave's money was a sure panacea for the cure of souls saved through the medium of those highly respectable tracts the society publishes to suit the tastes of the god slavery. Mr. Keepum, too, has a very high opinion of this excellent society, as he calls it, and never fails to boast of his contributions. It is night. The serene and bright sky is hung with brighter stars. Our little fashionable world has got itself arrayed in its best satin-and is in a flutter. Carriages, with servants in snobby coats, beset the doors of the theatre. A flashing of silks, satins, brocades, tulle and jewelry, distinguished the throng pressing eagerly into the lobbies, and seeking with more confusion than grace seats in the dress circle. The orchestra has played an overture, and the house presents a lively picture of bright-colored robes. Mr. Snivel's handsome figure is seen looming out of a private box in the left-hand procenium, behind the curtain of which, and on the opposite side, a mysterious hand every now and then frisks, makes a small but prudent opening, and disappears. Again it appears, with delicate and chastely-jeweled fingers. Cautiously the red curtain moves aside apace, and the dark languishing eyes of a female, scanning over the dress-circle, are revealed. She recognizes the venerable figure of Judge Sleepyhorn, who has made a companion of George Mullholland, and sits at his side in the parquette. Timidly she closes the curtain. In the right-hand procenium box sits, resplendent of jewels and laces, and surrounded by her many admirers, the beautiful and very fashionable Madame Montford, a woman of singularly regular features, and more than ordinary charms. Opinion is somewhat divided on the early history of Madame Montford. Some have it one thing, some another. Society is sure to slander a woman of transcendent beauty and intellect. There is nothing in the world more natural, especially when those charms attract fashionable admirers. It is equally true, too, that if you would wipe out any little taint that may hang about the skirts of your character you must seek the panacea in a distant State, where, with the application of a little diplomacy you may become the much sought for wonder of a new atmosphere and new friends, as is the case with Madame Montford, who rebukes her New York neighbors of the Fifth Avenue (she has a princely mansion there), with the fact that in Charleston she is, whenever she visits it, the all-absorbing topic with fashionable society. For four successive winters Madame Montford has honored the elite of Charleston with her presence. The advent of her coming, too, has been duly heralded in the morning papers-to the infinite delight of the St. Cecilia Society, which never fails to distinguish her arrival with a ball. And this ball is sure to be preceded with no end of delicately-perfumed cards, and other missives, as full of compliments as it is capable of cramming them. There is, notwithstanding all these ovations in honor of her coming, a mystery hanging over her periodical visits, for the sharp-eyed persist that they have seen her disguised, and in suspicious places; making singular inquiries about a woman of the name of Mag Munday. And these suspicions have given rise to whisperings, and these whisperings have crept into the ears of several very old and highly-respectable "first families," which said families have suddenly dropped her acquaintance. But what is more noticeable in the features of Madame Montford, is the striking similarity between them and Anna Bonard's. Her most fervent admirers have noticed it; while strangers have not failed to discover it, and to comment upon it. And the girl who sits in the box with Mr. Snivel, so cautiously fortifying herself with the curtain, is none other than Anna. Mr. Snivel has brought her here as an atonement for past injuries. Just as the curtain is about to rise, Mr. McArthur, true to his word, may be seen toddling to the stage door, his treasure carefully tied up in a handkerchief. He will deliver it to no one but the manager, and in spite of his other duties that functionary is compelled to receive it in person. This done, the old man, to the merriment of certain wags who delight to speculate on his childlike credulity, takes a seat in the parquette, wipes clean his venerable spectacles, and placing them methodically over his eyes, forms a unique picture in the foreground of the audience. McArthur, with the aid of his glasses, can recognize objects at a distance; and as the Hamlet of the night is decidedly Teutonic in his appearance and pronunciation, he has no great relish for the Star, nor a hand of applause to bestow on his genius. Hamlet, he is sure, never articulated with a coarse brogue. So turning from the stage, he amuses himself with minutely scanning the faces of the audience, and resolving in his mind that something will turn up in the grave-digger's scene, of which he is an enthusiastic admirer. It is, indeed, he thinks to himself, very doubtful, whether in this wide world the much-abused William Shakspeare hath a more ardent admirer of this curious but faithful illustration of his genius. Suddenly his attention seems riveted on the private box, in which sits the stately figure of Madame Montford, flanked in a half-circle by her perfumed and white-gloved admirers. "What!" exclaims the old man, in surprise, rubbing and replacing his glasses, "if I'm not deceived! Well-I can't be. If there isn't the very woman, a little altered, who has several times looked into my little place of an evening. Her questions were so curious that I couldn't make out what she really wanted (she never bought anything); but she always ended with inquiring about poor Mag Munday. People think because I have all sorts of things, that I must know about all sorts of things. I never could tell her much that satisfied her, for Mag, report had it, was carried off by the yellow fever, and nobody ever thought of her afterwards. And because I couldn't tell this woman any more, she would go away with tears in her eyes." Mr. McArthur whispers to a friend on his right, and touches him on the arm, "Pooh! pooh!" returns the man, with measured indifference, "that's the reigning belle of the season-Madame Montford, the buxom widow, who has been just turned forty for some years." The play proceeds, and soon the old man's attention is drawn from the Widow Montford by the near approach to the scene of the grave-digger. And as that delineator enters the grave, and commences his tune, the old man's anxiety increases. A twitching and shrugging of the shoulders, discovers Mr. McArthur's feelings. The grave-digger, to the great delight of the Star, bespreads the stage with a multiplicity of bones. Then he follows them with a skull, the appearance of which causes Mr. McArthur to exclaim, "Ah! that's my poor Yorick." He rises from his seat, and abstractedly stares at the Star, then at the audience. The audience gives out a spontaneous burst of applause, which the Teutonic Hamlet is inclined to regard as an indignity offered to superior talent. A short pause and his face brightens with a smile, the grave-digger shoulders his pick, and with the thumb of his right hand to his nasal organ, throws himself into a comical attitude. The audience roar with delight; the Star, ignorant of the cause of what he esteems a continued insult, waves his plumes to the audience, and with an air of contempt walks off the stage. CHAPTER XIII. MRS. SWIGGS COMES TO THE RESCUE OF THE HOUSE OF THE FOREIGN MISSIONS. "AN excellent society-excellent, I assure you, Madame--" "Truly, Mr. Hadger," interrupted Mrs. Swiggs, "your labors on behalf of this Tract Society will be rewarded in heaven--" "Dear--a--me," Mr. Hadger returns, ere Mrs. Swiggs can finish her sentence, "don't mention such a thing. I assure you it is a labor of love." "Their tracts are so carefully got up. If my poor old negro property could only read--(Mrs. Swiggs pauses.) I was going to say-if it wasn't for the law (again she pauses), we couldn't prejudice our cause by letting our negroes read them--" "Excuse the interruption," Mr. Hadger says, "but it wouldn't do, notwithstanding (no one can be more liberal than myself on the subject of enlightening our negro property!) the Tract Society exhibits such an unexceptionable regard to the requirements of our cherished institution." This conversation passes between Mrs. Swiggs and Mr. Hadger, who, as he says with great urbanity of manner, just dropped in to announce joyous tidings. He has a letter from Sister Abijah Slocum, which came to hand this morning, enclosing one delicately enveloped for Sister Swiggs. "The Lord is our guide," says Mrs. Swiggs, hastily reaching out her hand and receiving the letter. "Heaven will reward her for the interest she takes in the heathen world." "Truly, if she hath not now, she will have there a monument of gold," Mr. Hadger piously pursues, adding a sigh. "There! there!--my neuralgy; it's all down my left side. I'm not long for this world, you see!" Mrs. Swiggs breaks out suddenly, then twitches her head and oscillates her chin. And as if some electric current had changed the train of her thoughts, she testily seizes hold of her Milton, and says: "I have got my Tom up again-yes I have, Mr. Hadger." Mr. Hadger discovers the sudden flight her thoughts have taken: "I am sure," he interposes, "that so long as Sister Slocum remains a member of the Tract Society we may continue our patronage." Mrs. Swiggs is pleased to remind Mr. Hadger, that although her means have been exceedingly narrowed down, she has not, for the last ten years, failed to give her mite, which she divides between the house of the "Foreign Missions," and the "Tract Society." A nice, smooth-faced man, somewhat clerically dressed, straight and portly of person, and most unexceptionable in his morals, is Mr. Hadger. A smile of Christian resignation and brotherly love happily ornaments his countenance; and then, there is something venerable about his nicely-combed gray whiskers, his white cravat, his snowy hair, his mild brown eyes, and his pleasing voice. One is almost constrained to receive him as the ideal of virtue absolved in sackcloth and ashes. As an evidence of our generosity, we regard him an excellent Christian, whose life hath been purified with an immense traffic in human--(perhaps some good friend will crack our skull for saying it). In truth (though we never could find a solution in the Bible for it), as the traffic in human property increased Mr. Hadger's riches, so also did it in a corresponding ratio increase his piety. There is, indeed, a singular connection existing between piety and slavery; but to analyze it properly requires the mind of a philosopher, so strange is the blending. Brother Hadger takes a sup of ice-water, and commences reading Sister Slocum's letter, which runs thus: "NEW YORK, May -, 1850. "DEAR BROTHER HADGER: "Justice and Mercy is the motto of the cause we have lent our hands and hearts to promote. Only yesterday we had a gathering of kind spirits at the Mission House in Centre street, where, thank God, all was peace and love. We had, too, an anxious gathering at the 'Tract Society's rooms.' There it was not so much peace and love as could have been desired. Brother Bight seemed earnest, but said many unwise things; and Brother Scratch let out some very unwise indiscretions which you will find in the reports I send. There was some excitement, and something said about what we got from the South not being of God's chosen earnings. And there was something more let off by our indiscreet Brothers against the getting up of the tracts. But we had a majority, and voted down our indiscreet Brothers, inasmuch as it was shown to be necessary not to offend our good friends in the South. Not to give offence to a Brother is good in the sight of the Lord, and this Brother Primrose argued in a most Christian speech of four long hours or more, and which had the effect of convincing every one how necessary it was to free the tracts of everything offensive to your cherished institution. And though we did not, Brother Hadger, break up in the continuance of that love we were wont to when you were among us, we sustained the principle that seemeth most acceptable to you-we gained the victory over our disaffected Brothers. And I am desired on behalf of the Society, to thank you for the handsome remittance, hoping you will make it known, through peace and love, to those who kindly contributed toward it. The Board of 'Foreign Missions,' as you will see by the report, also passed a vote of thanks for your favor. How grateful to think what one will do to enlighten the heathen world, and how many will receive a tract through the medium of the other. "We are now in want of a few thousand dollars, to get the Rev. Singleton Spyke, a most excellent person, off to Antioch. Aid us with a mite, Brother Hadger, for his mission is one of God's own. The enclosed letter is an appeal to Sister Swiggs, whose yearly mites have gone far, very far, to aid us in the good but mighty work now to be done. Sister Swiggs will have her reward in heaven for these her good gifts. How thankful should she be to Him who provides all things, and thus enableth her to bestow liberally. "And now, Brother, I must say adieu! May you continue to live in the spirit of Christian love. And may you never feel the want of these mites bestowed in the cause of the poor heathen. "SISTER ABIJAH SLOCUM." "May the good be comforted!" ejaculates Mrs. Swiggs, as Mr. Hadger concludes. She has listened with absorbed attention to every word, at times bowing, and adding a word of approval. Mr. Hadger hopes something may be done in this good cause, and having interchanged sundry compliments, takes his departure, old Rebecca opening the door. "Glad he's gone!" the old lady says to herself. "I am so anxious to hear the good tidings Sister Slocum's letter conveys." She wipes and wipes her venerable spectacles, adjusts them piquantly over her small, wicked eyes, gives her elaborate cap-border a twitch forward, frets her finger nervously over the letter, and gets herself into a general state of confritteration. "There!" she says, entirely forgetting her Milton, which has fallen on the floor, to the great satisfaction of the worthy old cat, who makes manifest his regard for it by coiling himself down beside it, "God bless her. It makes my heart leap with joy when I see her writing," she pursues, as old Rebecca stands contemplating her, with serious and sullen countenance. Having prilled and fussed over the letter, she commences reading in a half whisper: "NO. -, 4TH AVENUE, NEW YORK, May -, 1850. "MUCH BELOVED SISTER: "I am, as you know, always overwhelmed with business; and having hoped the Lord in his goodness yet spares you to us, and gives you health and bounty wherewith to do good, must be pardoned for my brevity. The Lord prospers our missions among the heathen, and the Tract Society continues to make its labors known throughout the country. It, as you will see by the tracts I send here--with, still continues that scrupulous regard to the character of your domestic institution which has hitherto characterized it. Nothing is permitted to creep into them that in any way relates to your domestics, or that can give pain to the delicate sensibilities of your very excellent and generous people. We would do good to all without giving pain to any one. Oh! Sister, you know what a wicked world this is, and how it becomes us to labor for the good of others. But what is this world compared with the darkness of the heathen world, and those poor wretches ('Sure enough!' says Mrs. Swiggs) who eat one another, never have heard of a God, and prefer rather to worship idols of wood and stone. When I contemplate this dreadful darkness, which I do night and day, day and night, I invoke the Spirit to give me renewed strength to go forward in the good work of bringing from darkness ('Just as I feel,' thinks Mrs. Swiggs) unto light those poor benighted wretches of the heathen world. How often I have wished you could be here with us, to add life and spirit to our cause-to aid us in beating down Satan, and when we have got him down not to let him up. The heathen world never will be what it should be until Satan is bankrupt, deprived of his arts, and chained to the post of humiliation-never! ('I wish I had him where my Tom is!' Mrs. Swiggs mutters to herself.) Do come on here, Sister. We will give you an excellent reception, and make you so happy while you sojourn among us. And now, Sister, having never appealed to you in vain, we again extend our hand, hoping you will favor the several very excellent projects we now have on hand. First, we have a project-a very excellent one, on hand, for evangelizing the world; second, in consideration of what has been done in the reign of the Seven Churches-Pergamos Thyatira, Magnesia, Cassaba, Demish, and Baindir, where all is darkness, we have conceived a mission to Antioch; and third, we have been earnestly engaged in, and have spent a few thousand dollars over a project of the 'Tract Society,' which is the getting up of no less than one or two million of their excellent tracts, for the Dahomy field of missionary labor-such as the Egba mission, the Yoruba mission, and the Ijebu missions. Oh! Sister, what a field of labor is here open to us. And what a source of joy and thankfulness it should be to us that we have the means to labor in those fields of darkness. We have selected brother Singleton Spyke, a young man of great promise, for this all-important mission to Antioch. He has been for the last four years growing in grace and wisdom. No expense has been spared in everything necessary to his perfection, not even in the selection of a partner suited to his prospects and future happiness. We now want a few thousand dollars to make up the sum requisite to his mission, and pay the expenses of getting him off. Come to our assistance, dear Sister-do come! Share with us your mite in this great work of enlightening the heathen, and know that your deeds are recorded in heaven. ('Verily!' says the old lady.) And now, hoping the Giver of all good will continue to favor you with His blessing, and preserve you in that strength of intellect with which you have so often assisted us in beating down Satan, and hoping either to have the pleasure of seeing you, or hearing from you soon, I will say adieu! subscribing myself a servant in the cause of the heathen, and your sincere Sister, "MRS. ABIJAH SLOCUM. "P.S.--Remember, dear Sister, that the amount of money expended in idol-worship--in erecting monster temples and keeping them in repair, would provide comfortable homes and missions for hundreds of our very excellent young men and women, who are now ready to buckle on the armor and enter the fight against Satan. "A.S." "Dear-a-me," she sighs, laying the letter upon the table, kicking the cat as she resumes her rocking, and with her right hand restoring her Milton to its accustomed place on the table. "Rebecca," she says, "will get a pillow and place it nicely at my back." Rebecca, the old slave, brings the pillow. "There, there! now, not too high, nor too low, Rebecca!" her thin, sharp voice echoes, as she works her shoulders, and permits her long fingers to wander over her cap-border. "When 'um got just so missus like, say-da he is!" mumbles the old negress in reply. "Well, well-a little that side, now--" The negress moves the pillow a little to the left. "That's too much, Rebecca-a slight touch the other way. You are so stupid, I will have to sell you, and get Jewel to take care of me. I would have done it before but for the noise of her crutch-I would, Rebecca! You never think of me-you only think of how much hominy you can eat." The old negress makes a motion to move the pillow a little to the right, when Mrs. Swiggs settles her head and shoulders into it, saying, "there!" "Glad 'um suit-fo'h true!" retorts the negress, her heavy lips and sullen face giving out the very incarnation of hatred. "Now don't make a noise when you go out." Rebecca in reply says she is "gwine down to da kitchen to see Isaac," and toddles out of the room, gently closing the door after her. Resignedly Mrs. Swiggs closes her eyes, moderates her rocking, and commences evolving and revolving the subject over in her mind. "I haven't much of this world's goods-no, I haven't; but I'm of a good family, and its name for hospitality must be kept up. Don't see that I can keep it up better than by helping Sister Slocum and the Tract Society out," she muses. But the exact way to effect this has not yet come clear to her mind. Times are rather hard, and, as we have said before, she is in straightened circumstances, having, for something more than ten years, had nothing but the earnings of eleven old negroes, five of whom are cripples, to keep up the dignity of the house of the Swiggs. "There's old Zeff," she says, "has took to drinking, and Flame, his wife, ain't a bit better; and neither one of them have been worth anything since I sold their two children-which I had to do, or let the dignity of the family suffer. I don't like to do it, but I must. I must send Zeff to the workhouse-have him nicely whipped, I only charge him eighteen dollars a month for himself, and yet he will drink, and won't pay over his wages. Yes!--he shall have it. The extent of the law, well laid on, will learn him a lesson. There's old Cato pays me twenty dollars a month, and Cato's seventy-four-four years older than Zeff. In truth, my negro property is all getting careless about paying wages. Old Trot runs away whenever he can get a chance; Brutus has forever got something the matter with him; and Cicero has come to be a real skulk. He don't care for the cowhide; the more I get him flogged the worse he gets. Curious creature! And his old woman, since she broke her leg, and goes with a crutch, thinks she can do just as she pleases. There is plenty of work in her-plenty; she has no disposition to let it come out, though! And she has kept up a grumbling ever since I sold her girls. Well, I didn't want to keep them all the time at the whipping-post; so I sold them to save their characters." Thus Mrs. Swiggs muses until she drops into a profound sleep, in which she remains, dreaming that she has sold old Mumma Molly, Cicero's wife, and with the proceeds finds herself in New York, hob-nobbing it with Sister Slocum, and making one extensive donation to the Tract Society, and another to the fund for getting Brother Singleton Spyke off to Antioch. Her arrival in Gotham, she dreams, is a great event. The Tract Society (she is its guest) is smothering her with its attentions. Indeed, a whole column and a half of the very conservative and highly respectable old Observer is taken up with an elaborate and well-written history of her many virtues. The venerable old lady dreams herself into dusky evening, and wakes to find old Rebecca summoning her to tea. She is exceedingly sorry the old slave disturbed her. However, having great faith in dreams, and the one she has just enjoyed bringing the way to aid Sister Slocum in carrying out her projects of love so clear to her mind, she is resolved to lose no time in carrying out its principles. Selling old Molly won't be much; old Molly is not worth much to her; and the price of old Molly (she'll bring something!) will do so much to enlighten the heathen, and aid the Tract Society in giving out its excellent works. "And I have for years longed to see Sister Slocum, face to face, before I die," she says. And with an affixed determination to carry out this pious resolve, Mrs. Swiggs sips her tea, and retires to her dingy little chamber for the night. A bright and cheerful sun ushers in the following morning. The soft rays steal in at the snuffy door, at the dilapidated windows, through the faded curtains, and into the "best parlor," where, at an early hour, sits the antique old lady, rummaging over some musty old papers piled on the centre-table. The pale light plays over and gives to her features a spectre-like hue; while the grotesque pieces of furniture by which she is surrounded lend their aid in making complete the picture of a wizard's abode. The paper she wants is nowhere to be found. "I must exercise a little judgment in this affair," she mutters, folding a bit of paper, and seizing her pen. Having written--"TO THE MASTER OF THE WORKHOUSE: "I am sorry I have to trouble you so often with old Cicero. He will not pay wages all I can do. Give him at least thirty-well laid on. I go to New York in a few days, and what is due you from me for punishments will be paid any time you send your bill. "SARAH PRINGLE HUGHES SWIGGS." "Well! he deserves what he gets," she shakes her head and ejaculates. Having summoned Rebecca, Master Cicero, a hard-featured old negro, is ordered up, and comes tottering into the room, half-bent with age, his hair silvered, and his face covered with a mossy-white beard-the picture of a patriarch carved in ebony. "Good mornin', Missus," he speaks in a feeble and husky voice, standing hesitatingly before his august owner. "You are--well, I might as well say it--you're a miserable old wretch!" Cicero makes a nervous motion with his left hand, as the fingers of his right wander over the bald crown of his head, and his eyes give out a forlorn look. She has no pity for the poor old man-none. "You are, Cicero-you needn't pretend you ain't," she pursues; and springing to her feet with an incredible nimbleness, she advances to the window, tucks up the old curtain, and says, "There; let the light reflect on your face. Badness looks out of it. Cicero! you never was a good nigger--" "Per'aps not, Missus; but den I'se old. "Old! you ain't so old but you can pay wages," the testy old woman interrupts, tossing her head. "You're a capital hand at cunning excuses. This will get you done for, at the workhouse." She hands him a delicately enveloped and carefully superscribed billet, and commands him to proceed forthwith to the workhouse. A tear courses slowly down his time-wrinkled face, he hesitates, would speak one word in his own defence. But the word of his owner is absolute, and in obedience to the wave of her hand he totters to the door, and disappears. His tears are only those of a slave. How useless fall the tears of him who has no voice, no power to assert his manhood! And yet, in that shrunken bosom-in that figure, bent and shattered of age, there burns a passion for liberty and hatred of the oppressor more terrible than the hand that has made him the wretch he is. That tear! how forcibly it tells the tale of his sorrowing soul; how eloquently it foretells the downfall of that injustice holding him in its fierce chains! Cicero has been nicely got out of the way. Molly, his wife, is summoned into the presence of her mistress, to receive her awful doom. "To be frank with you, Molly, and I am always outspoken, you know, I am going to sell you. We have been long enough together, and necessity at this moment forces me to this conclusion," says our venerable lady, addressing herself to the old slave, who stands before her, leaning on her crutch, for she is one of the cripples. "You will get a pious owner, I trust; and God will be merciful to you." The old slave of seventy years replies only with an expression of hate in her countenance, and a drooping of her heavy lip. "Now," Mrs. Swiggs pursues, "take this letter, go straight to Mr. Forcheu with it, and he will sell you. He is very kind in selling old people-very!" Molly inquires if Cicero may go. Mrs. Swiggs replies that nobody will buy two old people together. The slave of seventy years, knowing her entreaties will be in vain, approaches her mistress with the fervency of a child, and grasping warmly her hand, stammers out: "Da-da-dah Lord bless um, Missus. Tan't many days fo'h we meet in t'oder world-good-bye." "God bless you-good-bye, Molly. Remember what I have told you so many times-long suffering and forbearance make the true Christian. Be a Christian-seek to serve your Master faithfully; such the Scripture teacheth. Now tie your handkerchief nicely on your head, and get your clean apron on, and mind to look good-natured when Mr. Forcheu sells you." This admonition, methodically addressed to the old slave, and Mrs. Swiggs waves her hand, resumes her Milton, and settles herself back into her chair. Reader! if you have a heart in the right place it will be needless for us to dwell upon the feelings of that old slave, as she drags her infirm body to the shambles of the extremely kind vender of people. CHAPTER XIV. MR. M'ARTHUR MAKES A DISCOVERY. ON his return from the theatre, Mr. McArthur finds his daughter, Maria, waiting him in great anxiety. "Father, father!" she says, as he enters his little back parlor, "this is what that poor woman, Mag Munday, used to take on so about; here it is." She advances, her countenance wearing an air of great solicitude, holds the old dress in her left hand, and a stained letter in her right. "It fell from a pocket in the bosom," she pursues. The old man, with an expression of surprise, takes the letter and prepares to read it. He pauses. "Did it come from the dress I discovered in the old chest?" he inquires, adjusting his spectacles. Maria says it did. She has no doubt it might have relieved her suffering, if it had been found before she died. "But, father, was there not to you something strange, something mysterious about the manner she pursued her search for this old dress? You remember how she used to insist that it contained something that might be a fortune to her in her distress, and how there was a history connected with it that would not reflect much credit on a lady in high life!" The old man interrupts by saying he well remembers it; remembers how he thought she was a maniac to set so much value on the old dress, and make so many sighs when it could not be found. "It always occurred to me there was something more than the dress that made her take on so," the old man concludes, returning the letter to Maria, with a request that she will read it. Maria resumes her seat, the old man draws a chair to the table, and with his face supported in his left hand listens attentively as she reads: "WASHINGTON SQUARE, NEW YORK, May 14, 18-- "I am glad to hear from Mr. Sildon that the child does well. Poor little thing, it gives me so many unhappy thoughts when I think of it; but I know you are a good woman, Mrs. Munday, and will watch her with the care of a mother. She was left at our door one night, and as people are always too ready to give currency to scandal, my brother and I thought that it would not be prudent to adopt it at once, more especially as I have been ill for the last few months, and have any quantity of enemies. I am going to close my house, now that my deceased husband's estate is settled, and spend a few years in Europe. Mr. Thomas Sildon is well provided with funds for the care of the child during my absence, and will pay you a hundred dollars every quarter. Let no one see this letter, not even your husband. And when I return I will give you an extra remuneration, and adopt the child as my own. Mr. Sildon will tell you where to find me when I return. Your friend, "C. A. M." "There, father," says Maria, "there is something more than we know about, connected with this letter. One thing always discovers another-don't you think it may have something to do with that lady who has two or three times come in here, and always appeared so nervous when she inquired about Mag Munday? and you recollect how she would not be content until we had told her a thousand different things concerning her. She wanted, she said, a clue to her; but she never could get a clue to her. There is something more than we know of connected with this letter," and she lays the old damp stained and crumpled letter on the table, as the old servant enters bearing on a small tray their humble supper. "Now, sit up, my daughter," says the old man, helping her to a sandwich while she pours out his dish of tea, "our enjoyment need be none the less because our fare is humble. As for satisfying this lady about Mag Munday, why, I have given that up. I told her all I knew, and that is, that when she first came to Charleston-one never knows what these New Yorkers are--she was a dashing sort of woman, had no end of admirers, and lived in fine style. Then it got out that she wasn't the wife of the man who came with her, but that she was the wife of a poor man of the name of Munday, and had quit her husband; as wives will when they take a notion in their heads. And as is always the way with these sort of people, she kept gradually getting down in the world, and as she kept getting more and more down so she took more and more to drink, and drink brought on grief, and grief soon wasted her into the grave. I took pity on her, for she seemed not a bad woman at heart, and always said she was forced by necessity into the house of Madame Flamingo-a house that hurries many a poor creature to her ruin. And she seemed possessed of a sense of honor not common to these people; and when Madame Flamingo turned her into the street,--as she does every one she has succeeded in making a wretch of,--and she could find no one to take her in, and had nowhere to lay her poor head, as she used to say, I used to lend her little amounts, which she always managed somehow to repay. As to there being anything valuable in the dress, I never gave it a thought; and when she would say if she could have restored to her the dress, and manage to get money enough to get to New York, I thought it was only the result of her sadness." "You may remember, father," interrupts Maria, "she twice spoke of a child left in her charge; and that the child was got away from her. If she could only trace that poor child, she would say, or find out what had become of it, she could forget her own sufferings and die easy. But the thought of what had become of that child forever haunted her; she knew that unless she atoned in some way the devil would surely get her." The old man says, setting down his cup, it all comes fresh to his mind. Mr. Soloman (he has not a doubt) could let some light upon the subject; and, as he seems acquainted with the lady that takes so much interest in what became of the woman Munday, he may relieve her search. "I am sure she is dead, nevertheless; I say this, knowing that having no home she got upon the Neck, and then associated with the negroes; and the last I heard of her was that the fever carried her off. This must have been true, or else she had been back here pleading for the bundles we could not find." Thus saying, Mr. McArthur finishes his humble supper, kisses and fondles his daughter, whom he dotingly loves, and retires for the night. CHAPTER XV. WHAT MADAME FLAMINGO WANTS TO BE. TOM SWIGGS has enjoyed, to the evident satisfaction of his mother, a seven months' residence in the old prison. The very first families continue to pay their respects to the good old lady, and she in return daily honors them with mementoes of her remembrance. These little civilities, exchanging between the stately old lady and our first families, indicate the approach of the fashionable season. Indeed, we may as well tell you the fashionable season is commencing in right good earnest. Our elite are at home, speculations are rife as to what the "Jockey Club" will do, we are recounting our adventures at northern watering-places, chuckling over our heroism in putting down those who were unwise enough to speak disrespectful of our cherished institutions, and making very light of what we would do to the whole north. You may know, too, that our fashionable season is commenced by what is taking place at the house of Madame Flamingo on the one side, and the St. Cecilia on the other. We recognize these establishments as institutions. That they form the great fortifications of fashionable society, flanking it at either extreme, no one here doubts. We are extremely sensitive of two things-fashion, and our right to sell negroes. Without the former we should be at sea; without the latter, our existence would indeed be humble. The St. Cecilia Society inaugurates the fashionable season, the erudite Editor of the Courier will tell you, with an entertainment given to the elite of its members and a few very distinguished foreigners. Madame Flamingo opens her forts, at the same time, with a grand supper, which she styles a very select entertainment, and to which she invites none but "those of the highest standing in society." If you would like to see what sort of a supper she sets to inaugurate the fashionable season, take our arm for a few minutes. Having just arrived from New York, where she has been luxuriating and selecting her wares for the coming season, (New York is the fountain ejecting its vice over this Union,) Madame looks hale, hearty, and exceedingly cheerful. Nor has she spared any expense to make herself up with becoming youthfulness-as the common people have it. She has got her a lace cap of the latest fashion, with great broad striped blue and red strings; and her dress is of orange- colored brocade, trimmed with tulle, and looped with white blossoms. Down the stomacher it is set with jewels. Her figure seems more embonpoint than when we last saw her; and as she leans on the arm of old Judge Sleepyhorn, forms a striking contrast to the slender figure of that singular specimen of judicial infirmity. Two great doors are opened, and Madame leads the way into what she calls her upper and private parlor, a hall of some fifty feet by thirty, in the centre of which a sumptuously-decorated table is set out. Indeed there is a chasteness and richness about the furniture and works of art that decorate this apartment, singularly at variance with the bright-colored furniture of the room we have described in a former chapter. "Ladies and gentlemen!" ejaculates the old hostess, "imagine this a palace, in which you are all welcome. As the legal gentry say (she casts a glance at the old Judge), when you have satisfactorily imagined that, imagine me a princess, and address me--" "High ho!" interrupts Mr. Soloman. "I confess," continues the old woman, her little, light-brown curls dangling across her brow, and her face crimsoning, "I would like to be a princess." "You can," rejoins the former speaker, his fingers wandering to his chin. "Well! I have my beadle-beadles, I take, are inseparable from royal blood-and my servants in liveries. After all (she tosses her head) what can there be in beadles and liveries? Why! the commonest and vulgarest people of New York have taken to liveries. If you chance to take an elegant drive up the 'Fifth Avenue,' and meet a dashing equipage-say with horses terribly caparisoned, a purloined crest on the carriage-door, a sallow-faced footman covered up in a green coat, all over big brass buttons, stuck up behind, and a whiskey-faced coachman half-asleep in a great hammercloth, be sure it belongs to some snob who has not a sentence of good English in his head. Yes! perhaps a soap-chandler, an oil-dealer, or a candy-maker. Brainless people always creep into plush-always! People of taste and learning, like me, only are entitled to liveries and crests." This Madame says, inviting her guests to take seats at her banquet-table, at the head of which she stands, the Judge on her right, Mr. Soloman on her left. Her china is of the most elaborate description, embossed and gilt; her plate is of pure silver, and massive; she has vases and candelabras of the same metal; and her cutlery is of the most costly description. No house in the country can boast a more exact taste in their selection. At each plate a silver holder stands, bearing a bouquet of delicately-arranged flowers. A trellise of choice flowers, interspersed here and there with gorgeous bouquets in porcelain vases, range along the centre of the table; which presents the appearance of a bed of fresh flowers variegated with delicious fruits. Her guests are to her choicer than her fruits; her fruits are choicer than her female wares. No entertainment of this kind would be complete without Judge Sleepyhorn and Mr. Soloman. They countenance vice in its most insidious form-they foster crime; without crime their trade would be damaged. The one cultivates, that the other may reap the harvest and maintain his office. "I see," says Mr. Soloman, in reply to the old hostess, "not the slightest objection to your being a princess-not the slightest! And, to be frank about the matter, I know of no one who would better ornament the position." "Your compliments are too liberally bestowed, Mr. Soloman." "Not at all! 'Pon my honor, now, there is a chance for you to bring that thing about in a very short time. There is Grouski, the Polish exile, a prince of pure blood. Grouski is poor, wants to get back to Europe. He wants a wife, too. Grouski is a high old fellow-a most celebrated man, fought like a hero for the freedom of his country; and though an exile here, would be received with all the honors due to a prince in either Italy, France or England. "A very respectable gentleman, no doubt; but a prince of pure blood, Mr. Soloman, is rather a scarce article these days." "Not a bit of it-why there is lots of exiled Princes all over this country. They are modest men, you know, like me; and having got it into their heads that we don't like royal blood, rather keep the fact of their birth to themselves. As for Grouski! why his history is as familiar to every American who takes any interest in these things, as is the history of poor Kossuth. I only say this, Madame Flamingo, to prove to you that Grouski is none of your mock articles. And what is more, I have several times heard him speak most enthusiastically of you." "Of me!" interrupts the old hostess, blushing. "I respect Grouski, and the more so for his being a poor prince in exile." Madame orders her servants, who are screwed into bright liveries, to bring on some sparkling Moselle. This done, and the glasses filled with the sparkling beverage, Mr. Soloman rises to propose a toast; although, as he says, it is somewhat out of place, two rounds having only succeeded the soup: "I propose the health of our generous host, to whom we owe so much for the superb manner in which she has catered for our amusement. Here's that we may speedily have the pleasure of paying our respects to her as the Princess Grouski." Madame Flamingo bows, the toast is drunk with cheers, and she begins to think there is something in it after all. "Make as light of it as you please, ladies and gentlemen-many stranger things have come to pass. As for the exile, Grouski, I always esteemed him a very excellent gentleman." "Exactly!" interposes the Judge, tipping his glass, and preparing his appetite for the course of game-broiled partridges, rice-birds, and grouse-which is being served by the waiters. "No one more worthy," he pursues, wiping his sleepy face with his napkin, "of being a princess. Education, wealth, and taste, you have; and with Grouski, there is nothing to prevent the happy consummation-nothing! I beg to assure you." Madame Flamingo makes a most courteous bow, and with an air of great dignity condescends to say she hopes gentlemen of the highest standing in Charleston have for ten years or more had the strongest proofs of her ability to administer the offices of a lady of station. "But you know," she pursues, hoping ladies and gentlemen will be kind enough to keep their glasses full, "people are become so pious now-a-days that they are foolish enough to attach a stigma to our business." "Pooh, pooh!" interrupts the accommodation man, having raised his glass in compliment to a painted harlot. "Once in Europe, and under the shadow of the wife of Prince Grouski, the past would be wiped out; your money would win admirers, while your being a princess would make fashionable society your tool. The very atmosphere of princesses is full of taint; but it is sunk in the rank, and rather increases courtiers. In France your untainted princess would prognosticate the second coming of--, well, I will not profane." "Do not, I beg of you," says Madame, blushing. "I am scrupulously opposed to profanity." And then there breaks upon the ear music that seems floating from an enchanted chamber, so soft and dulcet does it mingle with the coarse laughing and coarser wit of the banqueters. At this feast of flowers may be seen the man high in office, the grave merchant, the man entrusted with the most important affairs of the commonwealth-the sage and the charlatan. Sallow-faced and painted women, more undressed than dressed, sit beside them, hale companions. Respectable society regards the Judge a fine old gentleman; respectable society embraces Mr. Soloman, notwithstanding he carries on a business, as we shall show, that brings misery upon hundreds. Twice has he received a large vote as candidate for the General Assembly. A little removed from the old Judge (excellent man) sits Anna Bonard, like a jewel among stones less brilliant, George Mullholland on her left. Her countenance wears an expression of gentleness, sweet and touching. Her silky black hair rolls in wavy folds down her voluptuous shoulders, a fresh carnatic flush suffuses her cheeks, her great black eyes, so beautifully arched with heavy lashes, flash incessantly, and to her bewitching charms is added a pensive smile that now lights up her features, then subsides into melancholy. "What think you of my statuary?" inquired the old hostess, "and my antiques? Have I not taste enough for a princess?" How soft the carpet, how rich its colors! Those marble mantel-pieces, sculptured in female figures, how massive! How elegantly they set off each end of the hall, as we shall call this room; and how sturdily they bear up statuettes, delicately executed in alabaster and Parian, of Byron, Goethe, Napoleon, and Charlemagne-two on each. And there, standing between two Gothic windows on the front of the hall, is an antique side-table, of curious design. The windows are draped with curtains of rich purple satin, with embroidered cornice skirts and heavy tassels. On this antique table, and between the undulating curtains, is a marble statue of a female in a reclining posture, her right hand supporting her head, her dishevelled hair flowing down her shoulder. The features are soft, calm, and almost grand. It is simplicity sleeping, Madame Flamingo says. On the opposite side of the hall are pedestals of black walnut, with mouldings in gilt, on which stand busts of Washington and Lafayette, as if they were unwilling spectators of the revelry. A venerable recline, that may have had a place in the propyl�a, or served to decorate the halls of Versailles in the days of Napoleon, has here a place beneath the portrait of Jefferson. This humble tribute the old hostess says she pays to democracy. And at each end of the hall are double alcoves, over the arches of which are great spread eagles, holding in their beaks the points of massive maroon-colored drapery that falls over the sides, forming brilliant depressions. In these alcoves are groups of figures and statuettes, and parts of statuettes, legless and armless, and all presenting a rude and mutilated condition. What some of them represented it would have puzzled the ancient Greeks to decypher. Madame, nevertheless, assures her guests she got them from among the relics of Italian and Grecian antiquity. You may do justice to her taste on living statuary; but her rude and decrepit wares, like those owned and so much valued by our New York patrons of the arts, you may set down as belonging to a less antique age of art. And there are chairs inlaid with mosaic and pearl, and upholstered with the richest and brightest satin damask,--revealing, however, that uncouthness of taste so characteristic of your Fifth Avenue aristocrat. Now cast your eye upward to the ceiling. It is frescoed with themes of a barbaric age. The finely-outlined figure of a female adorns the centre. Her loins are enveloped in what seems a mist; and in her right hand, looking as if it were raised from the groundwork, she holds gracefully the bulb of a massive chandelier, from the jets of which a refulgent light is reflected upon the flowery banquet table. Madame smilingly says it is the Goddess of Love, an exact copy of the one in the temple of Jupiter Olympus. Another just opposite, less voluptuous in its outlines, she adds, is intended for a copy of the fabled goddess, supposed by the ancients to have thrown off her wings to illustrate the uncertainty of fortune. Course follows course, of viands the most delicious, and sumptuously served. The wine cup now flows freely, the walls reecho the coarse jokes and coarser laughs of the banqueters, and leaden eyelids, languid faces, and reeling brains, mark the closing scene. Such is the gorgeous vice we worship, such the revelries we sanction, such the insidious debaucheries we shield with the mantle of our laws-laws made for the accommodation of the rich, for the punishment only of the poor. And a thousand poor in our midst suffer for bread while justice sleeps. Midnight is upon the banqueters, the music strikes up a last march, the staggering company retire to the stifled air of resplendent chambers. The old hostess contemplates herself as a princess, and seriously believes an alliance with Grouski would not be the strangest thing in the world. There is, however, one among the banqueters who seems to have something deeper at heart than the transitory offerings on the table-one whose countenance at times assumes a thoughtfulness singularly at variance with those around her. It is Anna Bonard. Only to-day did George Mullholland reveal to her the almost hopeless condition of poor Tom Swiggs, still confined in the prison, with criminals for associates, and starving. She had met Tom when fortune was less ruthless; he had twice befriended her while in New York. Moved by that sympathy for the suffering which is ever the purest offspring of woman's heart, no matter how low her condition, she resolved not to rest until she had devised the means of his release. Her influence over the subtle-minded old Judge she well knew, nor was she ignorant of the relations existing between him and the accommodation man. On the conclusion of the feast she invites them to her chamber. They are not slow to accept the invitation. "Be seated, gentlemen, be seated," she says, preserving a calmness of manner not congenial to the feelings of either of her guests. She places chairs for them at the round table, upon the marble top of which an inlaid portfolio lies open. "Rather conventional," stammers Mr. Snivel, touching the Judge significantly on the arm, as they take seats. Mr. Snivel is fond of good wine, and good wine has so mellowed his constitution that he is obliged to seek support for his head in his hands. "I'd like a little light on this 'ere plot. Peers thar's somethin' a foot," responds the Judge. Anna interposes by saying they shall know quick enough. Placing a pen and inkstand on the table, she takes her seat opposite them, and commences watching their declining consciousness. "Thar," ejaculates the old Judge, his moody face becoming dark and sullen, "let us have the wish." "You owe me an atonement, and you can discharge it by gratifying my desire." "Women," interposes the old Judge, dreamily, "always have wishes to gratify. W-o-l, if its teu sign a warrant, hang a nigger, tar and feather an abolitionist, ride the British Consul out a town, or send a dozen vagrants to the whipping-post-I'm thar. Anything my hand's in at!" incoherently mumbles this judicial dignitary. Mr. Snivel having reminded the Judge that ten o'clock to-morrow morning is the time appointed for meeting Splitwood, the "nigger broker," who furnishes capital with which they start a new paper for the new party, drops away into a refreshing sleep, his head on the marble. "Grant me, as a favor, an order for the release of poor Tom Swiggs. You cannot deny me this, Judge," says Anna, with an arch smile, and pausing for a reply. "Wol, as to that," responds this high functionary, "if I'd power, 'twouldn't be long afore I'd dew it, though his mother'd turn the town upside down; but I hain't no power in the premises. I make it a rule, on and off the bench, never to refuse the request of a pretty woman. Chivalry, you know." "For your compliment, Judge, I thank you. The granting my request, however, would be more grateful to my feelings." "It speaks well of your heart, my dear girl; but, you see, I'm only a Judge. Mr. Snivel, here, probably committed him ('Snivel! here, wake up!' he says, shaking him violently), he commits everybody. Being a Justice of the Peace, you see, and justices of the peace being everything here, I may prevail on him to grant your request!" pursues the Judge, brightening up at the earnest manner in which Anna makes her appeal. "Snivel! Snivel!--Justice Snivel, come, wake up. Thar is a call for your sarvices." The Judge continues to shake the higher functionary violently. Mr. Snivel with a modest snore rouses from his nap, says he is always ready to do a bit of a good turn. "If you are, then," interposes the fair girl, "let it be made known now. Grant me an order of release for Tom Swiggs. Remember what will be the consequence of a refusal!" "Tom Swiggs! Tom Swiggs!--why I've made a deal of fees of that fellow. But, viewing it in either a judicial or philosophical light, he's quite as well where he is. They don't give them much to eat in jail I admit, but it is a great place for straightening the morals of a rum-head like Tom. And he has got down so low that all the justices in the city couldn't make him fit for respectable society." Mr. Snivel yawns and stretches his arms athwart. "But you can grant me the order independent of what respectable society will do." Mr. Snivel replies, bowing, a pretty woman is more than a match for the whole judiciary. He will make a good amount of fees out of Tom yet; and what his testy old mother declines to pay, he will charge to the State, as the law gives him a right to do. "Then I am to understand!" quickly retorts Anna, rising from her chair, with an expression of contempt on her countenance, and a satirical curl on her lip, "you have no true regard for me then; your friendship is that of the knave, who has nothing to give after his ends are served. I will leave you!" The Judge takes her gently by the arm; indignantly she pushes him from her, as her great black eyes flash with passion, and she seeks for the door. Mr. Snivel has placed himself against it, begs she will be calm. "Why," he says, "get into a passion at that which was but a joke." The Judge touches him on the arm significantly, and whispers in his ear, "grant her the order-grant it, for peace sake, Justice Snivel." "Now, if you will tell me why you take so deep an interest in getting them fellows out of prison, I will grant the order of release," Mr. Snivel says, and with an air of great gallantry leads her back to her chair. "None but friendship for one who served me when he had it in his power." "I see! I see!" interrupts our gallant justice; "the renewal of an old acquaintance; you are to play the part of Don Quixote,--he, the mistress. It's well enough there should be a change in the knights, and that the stripling who goes about in the garb of the clergy, and has been puzzling his wits how to get Tom out of prison for the last six months--" "Your trades never agree;" parenthesises Anna. "Should yield the lance to you." "Who better able to wield it in this chivalrous atmosphere? It only pains my own feelings to confess myself an abandoned woman; but I have a consolation in knowing how powerful an abandoned woman may be in Charleston." An admonition from the old Judge, and Mr. Snivel draws his chair to the table, upon which he places his left elbow, rests his head on his hand. "This fellow will get out; his mother-I have pledged my honor to keep him fast locked up-will find it out, and there'll be a fuss among our first families," he whispers. Anna pledges him her honor, a thing she never betrays, that the secret of Tom's release shall be a matter of strict confidence. And having shook hands over it, Mr. Snivel seizes the pen and writes an order of release, commanding the jailer to set at liberty one Tom Swiggs, committed as a vagrant upon a justice's warrant, &c., &c., &c. "There," says Justice Snivel, "the thing is done-now for a kiss;" and the fair girl permits him to kiss her brow. "Me too; the bench and the bar!" rejoins the Judge, following the example of his junior. And with an air of triumph the victorious girl bears away what at this moment she values a prize. CHAPTER XVI. IN WHICH TOM SWIGGS GAINS HIS LIBERTY, AND WHAT BEFALLS HIM. ANNA gives George Mullholland the letter of release, and on the succeeding morning he is seen entering at the iron gate of the wall that encloses the old prison. "Bread! give me bread," greets his ear as soon as he enters the sombre old pile. He walks through the debtors' floor, startles as he hears the stifled cry for bread, and contemplates with pained feelings the wasting forms and sickly faces that everywhere meet his eye. The same piercing cry grates upon his senses as he sallies along the damp, narrow aisle of the second floor, lined on both sides with small, filthy cells, in which are incarcerated men whose crime is that of having committed "assault and battery," and British seamen innocent of all crime except that of having a colored skin. If anything less than a gentleman commit assault and battery, we punish him with imprisonment; we have no law to punish gentlemen who commit such offences. Along the felon's aisle-in the malarious cells where "poor" murderers and burglars are chained to die of the poisonous atmosphere, the same cry tells its mournful tale. Look into the dark vista of this little passage, and you will see the gleaming of flabby arms and shrunken hands. Glance into the apertures out of which they protrude so appealingly, you will hear the dull clank of chains, see the glare of vacant eyes, and shudder at the pale, cadaverous faces of beings tortured with starvation. A low, hoarse whisper, asks you for bread; a listless countenance quickens at your footfall. Oh! could you but feel the emotion that has touched that shrunken form which so despondingly waits the coming of a messenger of mercy. That system of cruelty to prisoners which so disgraced England during the last century, and which for her name she would were erased from her history, we preserve here in all its hideousness. The Governor knows nothing, and cares nothing about the prison; the Attorney-General never darkens its doors; the public scarce give a thought for those within its walls-and to one man, Mr. Hardscrabble, is the fate of these wretched beings entrusted. And so prone has become the appetite of man to speculate on the misfortunes of his fellow-man, that this good man, as we shall call him, tortures thus the miserable beings entrusted to his keeping, and makes it a means of getting rich. Pardon, reader, this digression. George, elated with the idea of setting Tom at liberty, found the young theologian at the prison, and revealed to him the fact that he had got the much-desired order. To the latter this seemed strange-not that such a person as George could have succeeded in what he had tried in vain to effect, but that there was a mystery about it. It is but justice to say that the young theologian had for six months used every exertion in his power, without avail, to procure an order of release. He had appealed to the Attorney-General, who declared himself powerless, but referred him to the Governor. The Governor could take no action in the premises, and referred him to the Judge of the Sessions. The Judge of the Sessions doubted his capacity to interfere, and advised a petition to the Clerk of the Court. The Clerk of the Court, who invariably took it upon himself to correct the judge's dictum, decided that the judge could not interfere, the case being a committal by a Justice of the Peace, and not having been before the sessions. And against these high functionaries-the Governor, Attorney-General, Judge of the Sessions, and Clerk of the Court, was Mr. Soloman and Mrs. Swiggs all-powerful. There was, however, another power superior to all, and that we have described in the previous chapter. Accompanied by the brusque old jailer, George and the young theologian make their way to the cell in which Tom is confined. "Hallo! Tom," exclaims George, as he enters the cell, "boarding at the expense of the State yet, eh?" Tom lay stretched on a blanket in one corner of the cell, his faithful old friend, the sailor, watching over him with the solicitude of a brother. "I don't know how he'd got on if it hadn't bin for the old sailor, yonder," says the jailer, pointing to Spunyarn, who is crouched down at the great black fire-place, blowing the coals under a small pan. "He took to Tom when he first came in, and hasn't left him for a day. He'll steal to supply Tom's hunger, and fight if a prisoner attempts to impose upon his charge. He has rigged him out, you see, with his pea-coat and overalls," continues the man, folding his arms. "I am sorry, Tom--" "Yes," says Tom, interrupting the young theologian, "I know you are. You don't find me to have kept my word; and because I haven't you don't find me improved much. I can't get out; and if I can't get out, what's the use of my trying to improve? I don't say this because I don't want to improve. I have no one living who ought to care for me, but my mother. And she has shown what she cares for me." "Everything is well. (The young theologian takes Tom by the hand.) We have got your release. You are a free man, now." "My release!" exclaims the poor outcast, starting to his feet, "my release?" "Yes," kindly interposes the jailer, "you may go, Tom. Stone walls, bolts and chains have no further use for you." The announcement brings tears to his eyes; he cannot find words to give utterance to his emotions. He drops the young theologian's hand, grasps warmly that of George Mullholland, and says, the tears falling fast down his cheeks, "now I will be a new man." "God bless Tom," rejoins the old sailor, who has left the fire-place and joined in the excitement of the moment. "I alwas sed there war better weather ahead, Tom." He pats him encouragingly on the shoulder, and turns to the bystanders, continuing with a childlike frankness: "he's alwas complained with himself about breaking his word and honor with you, sir--" The young theologian says the temptation was more than he could withstand. "Yes sir!--that was it. He, poor fellow, wasn't to blame. One brought him in a drop, and challenged him; then another brought him in a drop, and challenged him; and the vote-cribber would get generous now and then, and bring him a drop, saying how he would like to crib him if he was only out, on the general election coming on, and make him take a drop of what he called election whiskey. And you know, sir, it's hard for a body to stand up against all these things, specially when a body's bin disappointed in love. It's bin a hard up and down with him. To-day he would make a bit of good weather, and to-morrow he'd be all up in a hurricane." And the old sailor takes a fresh quid of tobacco, wipes Tom's face, gets the brush and fusses over him, and tells him to cheer up, now that he has got his clearance. "Tom would know if his mother ordered it." "No! she must not know that you are at large," rejoins George. "Not that I am at large?" "I have," interposes the young theologian, "provided a place for you. We have a home for you, a snug little place at the house of old McArthur--" "Old McArthur," interpolates Tom, smiling, "I'm not a curiosity." George Mullholland says he may make love to Maria, that she will once more be a sister. Touched by the kindly act on his behalf, Tom replies saying she was always kind to him, watched over him when no one else would, and sought with tender counsels to effect his reform, to make him forget his troubles. "Thank you!--my heart thanks you more forcibly than my tongue can. I feel a man. I won't touch drink again: no I won't. You won't find me breaking my honor this time. A sick at heart man, like me, has no power to buffet disappointment. I was a wretch, and like a wretch without a mother's sympathy, found relief only in drinks--" "And such drinks!" interposes the old sailor, shrugging his shoulders. "Good weather, and a cheer up, now and then, from a friend, would have saved him." Now there appears in the doorway, the stalwarth figure of the vote-cribber, who, with sullen face, advances mechanically toward Tom, pauses and regards him with an air of suspicion. "You are not what you ought to be, Tom," he says, doggedly, and turns to the young Missionary. "Parson," he continues, "this 'ere pupil of yourn's a hard un. He isn't fit for respectable society. Like a sponge, he soaks up all the whiskey in jail." The young man turns upon him a look more of pity than scorn, while the jailer shakes his head admonishingly. The vote-cribber continues insensible to the admonition. He, be it known, is a character of no small importance in the political world. Having a sort of sympathy for the old jail he views his transient residences therein rather necessary than otherwise. As a leading character is necessary to every grade of society, so also does he plume himself the aristocrat of the prison. Persons committed for any other than offences against the election laws, he holds in utter contempt. Indeed, he says with a good deal of truth, that as fighting is become the all necessary qualification of our Senators and Representatives to Congress, he thinks of offering himself for the next vacancy. The only rival he fears is "handsome Charley." An election bully, the ugliest man in Charleston, and the deadly foe of Mingle. The accommodations are not what they might be, but, being exempt from rent and other items necessary to a prominent politician, he accepts them as a matter of economy. The vote-cribber is sure of being set free on the approach of an election. We may as well confess it before the world-he is an indispensable adjunct to the creating of Legislators, Mayors, Congressmen, and Governors. Whiskey is not more necessary to the reputation of our mob-politicians than are the physical powers of Milman Mingle to the success of the party he honors with his services. Nor do his friends scruple at consulting him on matters of great importance to the State while in his prison sanctuary. "I'm out to-morrow, parson," he resumes; the massive fingers of his right hand wandering into his crispy, red beard, and again over his scarred face. "Mayor's election comes off two weeks from Friday-couldn't do without me-can knock down any quantity of men-you throw a plumper, I take it?" The young Missionary answers in the negative by shaking his head, while the kind old sailor continues to fuss over and prepare Tom for his departure. "Tom is about to leave us," says the old sailor, by way of diverting the vote-cribber's attention. That dignitary, so much esteemed by our fine old statesmen, turns to Tom, and inquires if he has a vote. Tom has a vote, but declares he will not give it to the vote-cribber's party. The politician says "p'raps," and draws from his bosom a small flask. "Whiskey, Tom," he says,--"no use offering it to parsons, eh? (he casts an insinuating look at the parson.) First-chop election whiskey-a sup and we're friends until I get you safe under the lock of my crib. Our Senators to Congress patronize this largely." The forlorn freeman, with a look of contempt for the man who thus upbraids him, dashes the drug upon the floor, to the evident chagrin of the politician, who, to conceal his feelings, turns to George Mulholland, and mechanically inquires if he has a vote. Being answered in the negative, he picks up his flask and walks away, saying: "what rubbish!" Accompanied by his friends and the old sailor, Tom sallies forth into the atmosphere of sweet freedom. As the old jailer swings back the outer gate, Spunyarn grasps his friend and companion in sorrow warmly by the hand, his bronzed face brightens with an air of satisfaction, and like pure water gushing from the rude rock his eyes fill with tears. How honest, how touching, how pure the friendly lisp-good bye! "Keep up a strong heart, Tom,--never mind me. I don't know by what right I'm kept here, and starved; but I expect to get out one of these days; and when I do you may reckon on me as your friend. Keep the craft in good trim till then; don't let the devil get master. Come and see us now and then, and above all, never give up the ship during a storm." Tom's emotions are too deeply touched. He has no reply to make, but presses in silence the hand of the old sailor, takes his departure, and turns to wave him an adieu. CHAPTER XVII. IN WHICH THERE IS AN INTERESTING MEETING. OUR very chivalric dealers in human merchandise, like philosophers and philanthropists, are composed merely of flesh and blood, while their theories are alike influenced by circumstances. Those of the first, we (the South) are, at times, too apt to regard as sublimated and refined, while we hold the practices of the latter such as divest human nature of everything congenial. Nevertheless we can assure our readers that there does not exist a class of men who so much pride themselves on their chivalry as some of our opulent slave-dealers. Did we want proof to sustain what we have said we could not do better than refer to Mr. Forsheu, that very excellent gentleman. Mrs. Swiggs held him in high esteem, and so far regarded his character for piety and chivalry unblemished, that she consigned to him her old slave of seventy years-old Molly. Molly must be sold, the New York Tract Society must have a mite, and Sister Abijah Slocum's very laudable enterprise of getting Brother Singleton Spyke off to Antioch must be encouraged. And Mr. Forsheu is very kind to the old people he sells. It would, indeed, be difficult for the distant reader to conceive a more striking instance of a man, grown rich in a commerce that blunts all the finer qualities of our nature, preserving a gentleness, excelled only by his real goodness of heart. When the old slave, leaning on her crutch, stood before Mr. Forsheu, her face the very picture of age and starvation, his heart recoiled at the thought of selling her in her present condition. He read the letter she bore, contemplated her with an air of pity, and turning to Mr. Benbow, his methodical book-keeper of twenty years, who had added and subtracted through a wilderness of bodies and souls, ordered him to send the shrunken old woman into the pen, on feed. Mr. Forsheu prided himself on the quality of people sold at his shambles, and would not for the world hazard his reputation on old Molly, till she was got in better condition. Molly rather liked this, inasmuch as she had been fed on corn and prayers exclusively, and more prayers than corn, which is become the fashion with our much-reduced first families. For nearly four months she enjoyed, much to the discomfiture of her august owner, the comforts of Mr. Forsheu's pen. Daily did the anxious old lady study her Milton, and dispatch a slave to inquire if her piece of aged property had found a purchaser. The polite vender preserved, with uncommon philosophy, his temper. He enjoined patience. The condition and age of the property were, he said, much in the way of sale. Then Mrs. Swiggs began questioning his ability as a merchant. Aspersions of this kind, the polite vender of people could not bear with. He was a man of enormous wealth, the result of his skill in the sale of people. He was the president of an insurance company, a bank director, a commissioner of the orphan asylum, and a steward of the jockey club. To his great relief, for he began to have serious misgivings about his outlay on old Molly, there came along one day an excellent customer. This was no less a person than Madame Flamingo. What was singular of this very distinguished lady was, that she always had a use for old slaves no one else ever thought of. Her yard was full of aged and tottering humanity. One cleaned knives, another fetched ice from the ice-house, a third blacked boots, a fourth split wood, a fifth carried groceries, and a sixth did the marketing. She had a decayed negro for the smallest service; and, to her credit be it said, they were as contented and well fed a body of tottering age as could be found in old Carolina. Her knife-cleaning machine having taken it into his head to die one day, she would purchase another. Mr. Forsheu, with that urbanity we so well understand how to appreciate, informed the distinguished lady that he had an article exactly suited to her wants. Forthwith, Molly was summoned into her presence. Madame Flamingo, moved almost to tears at the old slave's appearance, purchased her out of pure sympathy, as we call it, and to the great relief of Mr. Forsheu, lost no time in paying one hundred and forty dollars down in gold for her. In deference to Mr. Hadger, the House of The Foreign Missions, and the very excellent Tract Society, of New York, we will not here extend on how the money was got. The transaction was purely commercial: why should humanity interpose? We hold it strictly legal that institutions created for the purpose of enlightening the heathen have no right to ask by what means the money constituting their donations is got. The comforts of Mr. Forsheu's pen,--the hominy, grits, and rest, made the old slave quite as reluctant about leaving him as she had before been in parting with Lady Swiggs. Albeit, she shook his hand with equal earnestness, and lisped "God bless Massa," with a tenderness and simplicity so touching, that had not Madame Flamingo been an excellent diplomat, reconciling the matter by assuring her that she would get enough to eat, and clothes to wear, no few tears would have been shed. Madame, in addition to this incentive, intimated that she might attend a prayer meeting now and then-perhaps see Cicero. However, Molly could easily have forgotten Cicero, inasmuch as she had enjoyed the rare felicity of thirteen husbands, all of whom Lady Swiggs had sold when it suited her own convenience. Having made her purchase, Madame very elegantly bid the gallant merchant good morning, hoping he would not forget her address, and call round when it suited his convenience. Mr. Forsheu, his hat doffed, escorted her to her carriage, into the amber-colored lining of which she gracefully settled her majestic self, as a slightly-browned gentleman in livery closed the bright door, took her order with servile bows, and having motioned to the coachman, the carriage rolled away, and was soon out of sight. Monsieur Grouski, it may be well to add here, was discovered curled up in one corner; he smiled, and extended his hand very graciously to Madame as she entered the carriage. Like a pilgrim in search of some promised land, Molly adjusted her crutch, and over the sandy road trudged, with truculent face, to her new home, humming to herself "dah-is-a-time-a-comin, den da Lor' he be good!!" On the following morning, Lady Swiggs received her account current, Mr. Forsheu being exceedingly prompt in business. There was one hundred and twenty-nine days' feed, commissions, advertising, and sundry smaller charges, which reduced the net balance to one hundred and three dollars. Mrs. Swiggs, with an infatuation kindred to that which finds the State blind to its own poverty, stubbornly refused to believe her slaves had declined in value. Hence she received the vender's account with surprise and dissatisfaction. However, the sale being binding, she gradually accommodated her mind to the result, and began evolving the question of how to make the amount meet the emergency. She must visit the great city of New York; she must see Sister Slocum face to face; Brother Spyke's mission must have fifty dollars; how much could she give the Tract Society? Here was a dilemma-one which might have excited the sympathy of the House of the "Foreign Missions." The dignity of the family, too, was at stake. Many sleepless nights did this difficult matter cause the august old lady. She thought of selling another cripple! Oh! that would not do. Mr. Keepum had a lien on them; Mr. Keepum was a man of iron-heart. Suddenly it flashed upon her mind that she had already been guilty of a legal wrong in selling old Molly. Mr. Soloman had doubtless described her with legal minuteness in the bond of security for the two hundred dollars. Her decrepid form; her corrugated face; her heavy lip; her crutch, and her piety-everything, in a word, but her starvation, had been set down. Well! Mr. Soloman might, she thought, overlook in the multiplicity of business so small a discrepancy. She, too, had a large circle of distinguished friends. If the worst came to the worst she would appeal to them. There, too, was Sir Sunderland Swiggs' portrait, very valuable for its age; she might sell the family arms, such things being in great demand with the chivalry; her antique furniture, too, was highly prized by our first families. Thus Lady Swiggs contemplated these mighty relics of past greatness. Our celtic Butlers and Brookses never recurred to the blood of their querulous ancestors with more awe than did this memorable lady to her decayed relics. Mr. Israel Moses, she cherished a hope, would give a large sum for the portrait; the family arms he would value at a high figure; the old furniture he would esteem a prize. But to Mr. Moses and common sense, neither the blood of the Butlers, nor Lady Swiggs' rubbish, were safe to loan money upon. The Hebrew gentleman was not so easily beguiled. The time came when it was necessary to appeal to Mr. Hadger. That gentleman held the dignity of the Swiggs family in high esteem, but shook his head when he found the respectability of the house the only security offered in exchange for a loan. Ah! a thought flashed to her relief, the family watch and chain would beguile the Hebrew gentleman. With these cherished mementoes of the high old family, (she would under no other circumstance have parted with for uncounted gold,) she in time seduced Mr. Israel Moses to make a small advance. Duty, stern and demanding, called her to New York. Forced to reduce her generosity, she, not without a sigh, made up her mind to give only thirty dollars to each of the institutions she had made so many sacrifices to serve. And thus, with a reduced platform, as our politicians have it, she set about preparing for the grand journey. Regards the most distinguished were sent to all the first families; the St. Cecilia had notice of her intended absence; no end of tea parties were given in honor of the event. Apparently happy with herself, with every one but poor Tom, our august lady left in the Steamer one day. With a little of that vanity the State deals so largely in, Mrs. Swiggs thought every passenger on board wondering and staring at her. While then she voyages and dreams of the grand reception waiting her in New York,--of Sister Slocum's smiles, of the good of the heathen world, and of those nice evening gatherings she will enjoy with the pious, let us, gentle reader, look in at the house of Absalom McArthur. To-day Tom Swiggs feels himself free, and it is high noon. Downcast of countenance he wends his way along the fashionable side of King-street. The young theologian is at his side. George Mullholland has gone to the house of Madame Flamingo. He will announce the glad news to Anna. The old antiquarian dusts his little counter with a stubby broom, places various curiosities in the windows, and about the doors, stands contemplating them with an air of satisfaction, then proceeds to drive a swarm of flies that hover upon the ceiling, into a curiously-arranged trap that he has set. "What!--my young friend, Tom Swiggs!" exclaims the old man, toddling toward Tom, and grasping firmly his hand, as he enters the door. "You are welcome to my little place, which shall be a home." Tom hangs down his head, receives the old man's greeting with shyness. "Your poor father and me, Tom, used to sit here many a time. (The old man points to an old sofa.) We were friends. He thought much of me, and I had a high opinion of him; and so we used to sit for hours, and talk over the deeds of the old continentals. Your mother and him didn't get along over-well together; she had more dignity than he could well digest: but that is neither here nor there." "I hope, in time," interrupts Tom, "to repay your kindness. I am willing to ply myself to work, though it degrades one in the eyes of our society." "As to that," returns the old man, "why, don't mention it. Maria, you know, will be a friend to you. Come away now and see her." And taking Tom by the hand, (the theologian has withdrawn,) he becomes enthusiastic, leads him through the dark, narrow passage into the back parlor, where he is met by Maria, and cordially welcomed. "Why, Tom, what a change has come over you," she ejaculates, holding his hand, and viewing him with the solicitude of a sister, who hastens to embrace a brother returned after a long absence. Letting fall his begrimed hand, she draws up the old-fashioned rocking chair, and bids him be seated. He shakes his head moodily, says he is not so bad as he seems, and hopes yet to make himself worthy of her kindness. He has been the associate of criminals; he has suffered punishment; he feels himself loathed by society; he cannot divest himself of the odium clinging to his garments. Fain would he go to some distant clime, and there seek a refuge from the odium of felons. "Let no such thoughts enter your mind, Tom," says the affectionate girl; "divest yourself at once of feelings that can only do you injury. You have engaged my thoughts during your troubles. Twice I begged your mother to honor me with an interview. We were humble people; she condescended at last. But she turned a deaf ear to me when I appealed to her for your release, merely inquiring if-like that other jade-I had become enamored of--" Maria pauses, blushing. "I would like to see my mother," interposes Tom. "Had I belonged to our grand society, the case had been different," resumes Maria. "Truly, Maria," stammers Tom, "had I supposed there was one in the world who cared for me, I had been a better man." "As to that, why we were brought up together, Tom. We knew each other as children, and what else but respect could I have for you? One never knows how much others think of them, for the--" Maria blushes, checks herself, and watches the changes playing over Tom's countenance. She was about to say the tongue of love was too often silent. It must be acknowledged that Maria had, for years, cherished a passion for Tom. He, however, like many others of his class, was too stupid to discover it. The girl, too, had been overawed by the dignity of his mother. Thus, with feelings of pain did she watch the downward course of one in whose welfare she took a deep interest. "Very often those for whom we cherish the fondest affections, are coldest in their demeanor towards us," pursues Maria. "Can she have thought of me so much as to love me?" Tom questions within himself; and Maria put an end to the conversation by ringing the bell, commanding the old servant to hasten dinner. A plate must be placed at the table for Tom. The antiquarian, having, as he says, left the young people to themselves, stands at his counter furbishing up sundry old engravings, horse-pistols, pieces of coat-of-mail, and two large scimitars, all of which he has piled together in a heap, and beside which lay several chapeaus said to have belonged to distinguished Britishers. Mr. Soloman suddenly makes his appearance in the little shop, much to Mr. McArthur's surprise. "Say-old man! centurion!" he exclaims, in a maudlin laugh, "Keepum's in the straps-is, I do declare; Gadsden and he bought a lot of niggers-a monster drove of 'em, on shares. He wants that trifle of borrowed money-must have it. Can have it back in a few days." "Bless me," interrupts the old man, confusedly, "but off my little things it will be hard to raise it. Times is hard, our people go, like geese, to the North. They get rid of all their money there, and their fancy-you know that, Mr. Snivel-is abroad, while they have, for home, only a love to keep up slavery." "I thought it would come to that," says Mr. Snivel, facetiously. The antiquarian seems bewildered, commences offering excuses that rather involve himself deeper, and finally concludes by pleading for a delay. Scarce any one would have thought a person of Mr. McArthur's position, indebted to Mr. Keepum; but so it was. It is very difficult to tell whose negroes are not mortgaged to Mr. Keepum, how many mortgages of plantation he has foreclosed, how many high old families he has reduced to abject poverty, or how many poor but respectable families he has disgraced. He has a reputation for loaning money to parents, that he may rob their daughters of that jewel the world refuses to give them back. And yet our best society honor him, fawn over him, and bow to him. We so worship the god of slavery, that our minds are become debased, and yet we seem unconscious of it. Mr. Keepum did not lend money to the old antiquarian without a purpose. That purpose, that justice which accommodates itself to the popular voice, will aid him in gaining. Mr. Snivel affects a tone of moderation, whispers in the old man's ear, and says: "Mind you tell the fortune of this girl, Bonard, as I have directed. Study what I have told you. If she be not the child of Madame Montford, then no faith can be put in likenesses. I have got in my possession what goes far to strengthen the suspicions now rife concerning the fashionable New Yorker." "There surely is a mystery about this woman, Mr. Snivel, as you say. She has so many times looked in here to inquire about Mag Munday, a woman in a curious line of life who came here, got down in the world, as they all do, and used now and then to get the loan of a trifle from me to keep her from starvation." (Mr. Snivel says, in parentheses, he knows all about her.) "Ha! ha! my old boy," says Mr. Snivel, frisking his fingers through his light Saxon beard, "I have had this case in hand for some time. It is strictly a private matter, nevertheless. They are a bad lot-them New Yorkers, who come here to avoid their little delicate affairs. I may yet make a good thing out of this, though. As for that fellow, Mullholland, I intend getting him the whipping post. He is come to be the associate of gentlemen; men high in office shower upon him their favors. It is all to propitiate the friendship of Bonard-I know it." Mr. Snivel concludes hurriedly, and departs into the street, as our scene changes. CHAPTER XVIII. ANNA BONARD SEEKS AN INTERVIEW WITH THE ANTIQUARY. IT is night. King street seems in a melancholy mood, the blue arch of heaven is bespangled with twinkling stars, the moon has mounted her high throne, and her beams, like messengers of love, dance joyously over the calm waters of the bay, so serenely skirted with dark woodland. The dull tramp of the guardman's horse now breaks the stillness; then the measured tread of the heavily-armed patrol, with which the city swarms at night, echoes and reoches along the narrow streets. A theatre reeking with the fumes of whiskey and tobacco; a sombre-looking guard-house, bristling with armed men, who usher forth to guard the fears of tyranny, or drag in some wretched slave; a dilapidated "Court House," at the corner, at which lazy-looking men lounge; a castellated "Work House," so grand without, and so full of bleeding hearts within; a "Poor House" on crutches, and in which infirm age and poverty die of treatment that makes the heart sicken-these are all the public buildings we can boast. Like ominous mounds, they seem sleeping in the calm and serene night. Ah! we had almost forgotten the sympathetic old hospital, with its verandas; the crabbed looking "City Hall," with its port holes; and the "Citadel," in which, when our youths have learned to fight duels, we learn them how to fight their way out of the Union. Duelling is our high art; getting out of the Union is our low. And, too, we have, and make no small boast that we have, two or three buildings called "Halls." In these our own supper-eating men riot, our soldiers drill (soldiering is our presiding genius), and our mob-politicians waste their spleen against the North. Unlike Boston, towering all bright and vigorous in the atmosphere of freedom, we have no galleries of statuary; no conservatories of paintings; no massive edifices of marble, dedicated to art and science; no princely school-houses, radiating their light of learning over a peace and justice-loving community; no majestic exchange, of granite and polished marble, so emblematic of a thrifty commerce;--we have no regal "State House" on the lofty hill, no glittering colleges everywhere striking the eye. The god of slavery-the god we worship, has no use for such temples; public libraries are his prison; his civilization is like a dull dead march; he is the enemy of his own heart, vitiating and making drear whatever he touches. He wages war on art, science, civilization! he trembles at the sight of temples reared for the enlightening of the masses. Tyranny is his law, a cotton-bag his judgment-seat. But we pride ourselves that we are a respectable people-what more would you have us? The night is chilly without, in the fire-place of the antiquary's back parlor there burns a scanty wood fire. Tor has eaten his supper and retired to a little closet-like room overhead, where, in bed, he muses over what fell from Maria's lips, in their interview. Did she really cherish a passion for him? had her solicitude in years past something more than friendship in it? what did she mean? He was not one of those whose place in a woman's heart could never be supplied. How would an alliance with Maria affect his mother's dignity? All these things Tom evolves over and over in his mind. In point of position, a mechanic's daughter was not far removed from the slave; a mechanic's daughter was viewed only as a good object of seduction for some nice young gentleman. Antiquarians might get a few bows of planter's sons, the legal gentry, and cotton brokers (these make up our aristocracy), but practically no one would think of admitting them into decent society. They, of right, belong to that vulgar herd that live by labor at which the slave can be employed. To be anything in the eyes of good society, you must only live upon the earnings of slaves. "Why," says Tom, "should I consult the dignity of a mother who discards me? The love of this lone daughter of the antiquary, this girl who strives to know my wants, and to promote my welfare, rises superior to all. I will away with such thoughts! I will be a man! Maria, with eager eye and thoughtful countenance, sits at the little antique centre-table, reading Longfellow's Evangeline, by the pale light of a candle. A lurid glare is shed over the cavern-like place. The reflection plays curiously upon the corrugated features of the old man, who, his favorite cat at his side, reclines on a stubby little sofa, drawn well up to the fire. The poet would not select Maria as his ideal of female loveliness; and yet there is a touching modesty in her demeanor, a sweet smile ever playing over her countenance, an artlessness in her conversation that more than makes up for the want of those charms novel writers are pleased to call transcendent. "Father!" she says, pausing, "some one knocks at the outer door." The old man starts and listens, then hastens to open it. There stands before him the figure of a strange female, veiled. "I am glad to find you, old man. Be not suspicious of my coming at this hour, for my mission is a strange one." The old man's crooked eyes flash, his deep curling lip quivers, his hand vibrates the candle he holds before him. "If on a mission to do nobody harm," he responds, "then you are welcome." "You will pardon me; I have seen you before. You have wished me well," she whispers in a musical voice. Gracefully she raises her veil over her Spanish hood, and advances cautiously, as the old man closes the door behind her. Then she uncovers her head, nervously. The white, jewelled fingers of her right hand, so delicate and tapering, wander over and smooth her silky black hair, that falls in waves over her Ion-like brow. How exquisite those features just revealed; how full of soul those flashing black eyes; her dress, how chaste! "They call me Anna Bonard," she speaks, timorously, "you may know me?--" "Oh, I know you well," interrupts the old man, "your beauty has made you known. What more would you have?" "Something that will make me happy. Old man, I am unhappy. Tell me, if you have the power, who I am. Am I an orphan, as has been told me; or have I parents yet living, affluent, and high in society? Do they seek me and cannot find me? Oh! let the fates speak, old man, for this world has given me nothing but pain and shame. Am I--" she pauses, her eyes wander to the floor, her cheeks crimson, she seizes the old man by the hand, and her bosom heaves as if a fierce passion had just been kindled within it. The old man preserves his equanimity, says he has a fortune to tell her. Fortunes are best told at midnight. The stars, too, let out their secrets more willingly when the night-king rules. He bids her follow him, and totters back to the little parlor. With a wise air, he bids her be seated on the sofa, saying he never mistakes maidens when they call at this hour. Maria, who rose from the table at the entrance of the stranger, bows, shuts her book mechanically, and retires. Can there be another face so lovely? she questions within herself, as she pauses to contemplate the stranger ere she disappears. The antiquary draws a chair and seats himself beside Anna. "Thy life and destiny," he says, fretting his bony fingers over the crown of his wig. "Blessed is the will of providence that permits us to know the secrets of destiny. Give me your hand, fair lady." Like a philosopher in deep study, he wipes and adjusts his spectacles, then takes her right hand and commences reading its lines. "Your history is an uncommon one--" "Yes," interrupts the girl, "mine has been a chequered life." "You have seen sorrow enough, but will see more. You come of good parents; but, ah!--there is a mystery shrouding your birth." ("And that mystery," interposes the girl, "I want to have explained.") "There will come a woman to reclaim you-a woman in high life; but she will come too late--" (The girl pales and trembles.) "Yes," pursues the old man, looking more studiously at her hand, "she will come too late." You will have admirers, and even suitors; but they will only betray you, and in the end you will die of trouble. Ah! there is a line that had escaped me. You may avert this dark destiny-yes, you may escape the end that fate has ordained for you. In neglect you came up, the companion of a man you think true to you. But he is not true to you. Watch him, follow him-you will yet find him out. Ha! ha! ha! these men are not to be trusted, my dear. There is but one man who really loves you. He is an old man, a man of station. He is your only true friend. I here see it marked." He crosses her hand, and says there can be no mistaking it. "With that man, fair girl, you may escape the dark destiny. But, above all things, do not treat him coldly. And here I see by the sign that Anna Bonard is not your name. The name was given you by a wizard." "You are right, old man," speaks Anna, raising thoughtfully her great black eyes, as the antiquary pauses and watches each change of her countenance; "that name was given me by Hag Zogbaum, when I was a child in her den, in New York, and when no one cared for me. What my right name was has now slipped my memory. I was indeed a wretched child, and know little of myself." "Was it Munday?" inquires the old man. Scarce has he lisped the name before she catches it up and repeats it, incoherently, "Munday! Monday! Munday!" her eyes flash with anxiety. "Ah, I remember now. I was called Anna Munday by Mother Bridges. I lived with her before I got to the den of Hag Zogbaum. And Mother Bridges sold apples at a stand at the corner of a street, on West street. It seems like a dream to me now. I do not want to recall those dark days of my childhood. Have you not some revelation to make respecting my parents?" The old man says the signs will not aid him further. "On my arm," she pursues, baring her white, polished arm, "there is a mark. I know not who imprinted it there. See, old man." The old man sees high up on her right arm two hearts and a broken anchor, impressed with India ink blue and red. "Yes," repeats the antiquary, viewing it studiously, "but it gives out no history. If you could remember who put it there." Of that she has no recollection. The old man cannot relieve her anxiety, and arranging her hood she bids him good night, forces a piece of gold into his hand, and seeks her home, disappointed. The antiquary's predictions were founded on what Mr. Soloman Snivel had told him, and that gentleman got what he knew of Anna's history from George Mullholland. To this, however, he added what suggestions his suspicions gave rise to. The similarity of likeness between Anna and Madame Montford was striking; Madame Montford's mysterious searches and inquiries for the woman Monday had something of deep import in them. Mag Munday's strange disappearance from Charleston, and her previous importuning for the old dress left in pawn with McArthur, were not to be overlooked. These things taken together, and Mr. Snivel saw a case there could be no mistaking. That case became stronger when his fashionable friend engaged his services to trace out what had become of the woman Mag Munday, and to further ascertain what the girl Anna Bonard knew of her own history. CHAPTER XIX. A SECRET INTERVIEW. WHILE the scene we have related in the foregoing chapter was being enacted, there might be seen pacing the great colonnade of the Charleston hotel, the tall figure of a man wrapped in a massive talma. Heedless of the throng of drinkers gathered in the spacious bar-room, making the very air echo with their revelry, he pauses every few moments, watches intently up and then down Meeting street, now apparently contemplating the twinkling stars, then turning as if disappointed, and resuming his sallies. "He will not come to night," he mutters, as he pauses at the "Ladies' door," then turns and rings the bell. The well dressed and highly-perfumed servant who guards the door, admits him with a scrutinizing eye. "Beg pardon," he says, with a mechanical bow. He recognizes the stranger, bows, and motions his hands. "Twice," continues the servant, "she has sent a messenger to inquire of your coming." The figure in the talma answers with a bow, slips something into the hand of the servant, passes softly up the great stairs, and is soon lost to sight. In another minute he enters, without knocking, a spacious parlor, decorated and furnished most sumptuously. "How impatiently I have waited your coming," whispers, cautiously, a richly-dressed lady, as she rises from a velvet covered lounge, on which she had reclined, and extends her hand to welcome him. "Madame, your most obedient," returns the man, bowing and holding her delicate hand in his. "You have something of importance,--something to relieve my mind?" she inquires, watching his lips, trembling, and in anxiety. "Nothing definite," he replies, touching her gently on the arm, as she begs him to be seated in the great arm-chair. He lays aside his talma, places his gloves on the centre-table, which is heaped with an infinite variety of delicately-enveloped missives and cards, all indicative of her position in fashionable society. "I may say, Madame, that I sympathize with you in your anxiety; but as yet I have discovered nothing to relieve it." Madame sighs, and draws her chair near him, in silence. "That she is the woman you seek I cannot doubt. While on the Neck, I penetrated the shanty of one Thompson, a poor mechanic-our white mechanics, you see, are very poor, and not much thought of-who had known her, given her a shelter, and several times saved her from starvation. Then she left the neighborhood and took to living with a poor wretch of a shoemaker." "Poor creature," interrupts Madame Montford, for it is she whom Mr. Snivel addresses. "If she be dead-oh, dear! That will be the end. I never shall know what became of that child. And to die ignorant of its fate will--" Madame pauses, her color changes, she seems seized with some violent emotion. Mr. Snivel perceives her agitation, and begs she will remain calm. "If that child had been my own," she resumes, "the responsibility had not weighed heavier on my conscience. Wealth, position, the pleasures of society-all sink into insignificance when compared with my anxiety for the fate of that child. It is like an arrow piercing my heart, like a phantom haunting me in my dreams, like an evil spirit waking me at night to tell me I shall die an unhappy woman for having neglected one I was bound by the commands of God to protect-to save, perhaps, from a life of shame." She lets fall the satin folds of her dress, buries her face in her hands, and gives vent to her tears in loud sobs. Mr. Snivel contemplates her agitation with unmoved muscle. To him it is a true index to the sequel. "If you will pardon me, Madame," he continues, "as I was about to say of this miserable shoemaker, he took to drink, as all our white mechanics do, and then used to abuse her. We don't think anything of these people, you see, who after giving themselves up to whiskey, die in the poor house, a terrible death. This shoemaker, of whom I speak, died, and she was turned into the streets by her landlord, and that sent her to living with a 'yellow fellow,' as we call them. Soon after this she died-so report has it. We never know much, you see, about these common people. They are a sort of trash we can make nothing of, and they get terribly low now and then." Madame Montford's swelling breast heaves, her countenance wears an air of melancholy; again she nervously lays aside the cloud-like skirts of her brocade dress. "Have you not," she inquires, fretting her jewelled fingers and displaying the massive gold bracelets that clasp her wrists, "some stronger evidence of her death?" Mr. Snivel says he has none but what he gathered from the negroes and poor mechanics, who live in the by-lanes of the city. There is little dependence, however, to be placed in such reports. Madame, with an air of composure, rises from her chair, and paces twice or thrice across the room, seemingly in deep study. "Something," she speaks, stopping suddenly in one of her sallies--"something (I do not know what it is) tells me she yet lives: that this is the child we see, living an abandoned life." "As I was going on to say, Madame," pursues Mr. Snivel, with great blandness of manner, "when our white trash get to living with our negroes they are as well as dead. One never knows what comes of them after that. Being always ready to do a bit of a good turn, as you know, I looked in at Sam Wiley's cabin. Sam Wiley is a negro of some respectability, and generally has an eye to what becomes of these white wretches. I don't-I assure you I don't, Madame-look into these places except on professional business. Sam, after making inquiry among his neighbors-our colored population view these people with no very good opinion, when they get down in the world-said he thought she had found her way through the gates of the poor man's graveyard." "Poor man's graveyard!" repeats Madame Montford, again resuming her chair. "Exactly! We have to distinguish between people of position and those white mechanics who come here from the North, get down in the world, and then die. We can't sell this sort of people, you see. No keeping their morals straight without you can. However, this is not to the point. (Mr. Solomon Snivel keeps his eyes intently fixed upon the lady.) "I sought out the old Sexton, a stupid old cove enough. He had neither names on his record nor graves that answered the purpose. In a legal sense, Madame, this would not be valid testimony, for this old cove being only too glad to get rid of our poor, and the fees into his pocket, is not very particular about names. If it were one of our 'first families,' the old fellow would be so obsequious about having the name down square--" Mr. Snivel frets his fingers through his beard, and bows with an easy grace. "Our first families!" repeats Madame Montford. "Yes, indeed! He is extremely correct over their funerals. They are of a fashionable sort, you see. Well, while I was musing over the decaying dead, and the distinction between poor dead and rich dead, there came along one Graves, a sort of wayward, half simpleton, who goes about among churchyards, makes graves a study, knows where every one who has died for the last century is tucked away, and is worth six sextons at pointing out graves. He never knows anything about the living, for the living, he says, won't let him live; and that being the case, he only wants to keep up his acquaintance with the dead. He never has a hat to his head, nor a shoe to his foot; and where, and how he lives, no one can tell. He has been at the whipping-post a dozen times or more, but I'm not so sure that the poor wretch ever did anything to merit such punishment. Just as the crabbed old sexton was going to drive him out of the gate with a big stick, I says, more in the way of a joke than anything else: 'Graves, come here!--I want a word or two with you.' He came up, looking shy and suspicious, and saying he wasn't going to harm anybody, but there was some fresh graves he was thinking over." "Some fresh graves!" repeats Madame Montford, nervously. "Bless you!--a very common thing," rejoins Mr. Snivel, with a bow. "Well, this lean simpleton said they (the graves) were made while he was sick. That being the case, he was deprived-and he lamented it bitterly-of being present at the funerals, and getting the names of the deceased. He is a great favorite with the grave-digger, lends him a willing hand on all occasions, and is extremely useful when the yellow fever rages. But to the sexton he is a perfect pest, for if a grave be made during his absence he will importune until he get the name of the departed. 'Graves,' says I, 'where do they bury these unfortunate women who die off so, here in Charleston?' 'Bless you, my friend,' says Graves, accompanying his words with an idiotic laugh, 'why, there's three stacks of them, yonder. They ship them from New York in lots, poor things; they dies here in droves, poor things; and we buries them yonder in piles, poor things. They go-yes, sir, I have thought a deal of this thing-fast through life; but they dies, and nobody cares for them-you see how they are buried.' I inquired if he knew all their names. He said of course he did. If he didn't, nobody else would. In order to try him, I desired he would show me the grave of Mag Munday. He shook his head, smiled, muttered the name incoherently, and said he thought it sounded like a dead name. 'I'll get my thinking right,' he pursued, and brightening up all at once, his vacant eyes flashed, then he touched me cunningly on the arm, and with a wink and nod of the head there was no mistaking, led the way to a great mound located in an obscure part of the graveyard--" "A great mound! I thought it would come to that," sighs Madame Montford, impatiently. "We bury these wretched creatures in an obscure place. Indeed, Madame, I hold it unnecessary to have anything to distinguish them when once they are dead. Well, this poor forlorn simpleton then sat down on a grave, and bid me sit beside him. I did as he bid me, and soon he went into a deep study, muttering the name of Mag Munday the while, until I thought he never would stop. So wild and wandering did the poor fellow seem, that I began to think it a pity we had not a place, an insane hospital, or some sort of benevolent institution, where such poor creatures could be placed and cared for. It would be much better than sending them to the whipping-post--" "I am indeed of your opinion-of your way of thinking, most certainly," interpolates Madame Montford, a shadow of melancholy darkening her countenance. "At length, he went at it, and repeated over an infinite quantity of names. It was wonderful to see how he could keep them all in his head. 'Well, now,' says he, turning to me with an inoffensive laugh, 'she ben't dead. You may bet on that. There now!' he spoke, as if suddenly becoming conscious of a recently-made discovery. 'Why, she runned wild about here, as I does, for a time; was abused and knocked about by everybody. Oh, she had a hard time enough, God knows that.' 'But that is not disclosing to me what became of her,' says I; 'come, be serious, Graves.' (We call him this, you see, Madame, for the reason that he is always among graveyards.) Then he went into a singing mood, sang two plaintive songs, and had sung a third and fourth, if I had not stopped him. 'Well,' he says, 'that woman ain't dead, for I've called up in my mind the whole graveyard of names, and her's is not among them. Why not, good gentleman, (he seized me by the arm as he said this,) inquire of Milman Mingle, the vote-cribber? He is a great politician, never thinks of poor Graves, and wouldn't look into a graveyard for the world. The vote-cribber used to live with her, and several times he threatened to hang her, and would a hanged her-yes, he would, sir-if it hadn't a been for the neighbors. I don't take much interest in the living, you know. But I pitied her, poor thing, for she was to be pitied, and there was nobody but me to do it. Just inquire of the vote-cribber.' I knew the simpleton never told an untruth, being in no way connected with our political parties." "Never told an untruth, being in no way connected with our political parties!" repeats Madame Montford, who has become more calm. "I gave him a few shillings, he followed me to the gate, and left me muttering, 'Go, inquire of the vote-cribber.'" "And have you found this man?" inquires the anxious lady. "I forthwith set about it," replies Mr. Snivel, "but as yet, am unsuccessful. Nine months during the year his residence is the jail--" "The jail!" "Yes, Madame, the jail. His profession, although essential to the elevation of our politicians and statesmen, is nevertheless unlawful. And he being obliged to practice it in opposition to the law, quietly submits to the penalty, which is a residence in the old prison for a short time. It's a nominal thing, you see, and he has become so habituated to it that I am inclined to the belief that he prefers it. I proceeded to the prison and found he had been released. One of our elections comes off in a few days. The approach of such an event is sure to find him at large. I sought him in all the drinking saloons, in the gambling dens, in the haunts of prostitution-in all the low places where our great politicians most do assemble and debauch themselves. He was not to be found. Being of the opposite party, I despatched a spy to the haunt of the committee of the party to which he belongs, and for which he cribs. I have paced the colonnade for more than an hour, waiting the coming of this spy. He did not return, and knowing your anxiety in the matter I returned to you. To-morrow I will seek him out; to-morrow I will get from him what he knows of this woman you seek. "And now, Madame, here is something I would have you examine." (Mr. Snivel methodically says he got it of McArthur, the antiquary.) "She made a great ado about a dress that contained this letter. I have no doubt it will tell a tale." Mr. Snivel draws from his breast-pocket the letter found concealed in the old dress, and passes it to Madame Montford, who receives it with a nervous hand. Her eyes become fixed upon it, she glances over its defaced page with an air of bewilderment, her face crimsons, then suddenly pales, her lips quiver-her every nerve seems unbending to the shock. "Heavens! has it come to this?" she mutters, confusedly. Her strength fails her; the familiar letter falls from her fingers. For a few moments she seems struggling to suppress her emotions, but her reeling brain yields, her features become like marble, she shrieks and swoons ere Mr. Snivel has time to clasp her in his arms. CHAPTER XX. LADY SWIGGS ENCOUNTERS DIFFICULTIES ON HER ARRIVAL IN NEW YORK. A PLEASANT passage of sixty hours, a good shaking up at the hands of that old tyrant, sea-sickness, and Lady Swiggs finds the steamer on which she took passage gliding majestically up New York Bay. There she sits, in all her dignity, an embodiment of our decayed chivalry, a fair representative of our first families. She has taken up her position on the upper deck, in front of the wheel house. As one after another the objects of beauty that make grand the environs of that noble Bay, open to her astonished eyes, she contrasts them favorably or unfavorably with some familiar object in Charleston harbor. There is indeed a similarity in the conformation. And though ours, she says, may not be so extensive, nor so grand in its outlines, nor so calm and soft in its perspective, there is a more aristocratic air about it. Smaller bodies are always more select and respectable. The captain, to whom she has put an hundred and one questions which he answers in monosyllables, is not, she thinks, so much of a gentleman as he might have been had he been educated in Charleston. He makes no distinction in favor of people of rank. Lady Swiggs wears that same faded silk dress; her black crape bonnet, with two saucy red artificial flowers tucked in at the side, sits so jauntily; that dash of brown hair is smoothed so exactly over her yellow, shrivelled forehead; her lower jaw oscillates with increased motion; and her sharp, gray eyes, as before, peer anxiously through her great-eyed spectacles. And, generous reader, that you may not mistake her, she has brought her inseparable Milton, which she holds firmly grasped in her right hand. "You have had a tedious time of it, Madam," says a corpulent lady, who is extensively dressed and jewelled, and accosts her with a familiar air. Lady Swiggs says not so tedious as it might have been, and gives her head two or three very fashionable twitches. "Your name, if you please?" "The Princess Grouski. My husband, the Prince Grouski," replies the corpulent lady, turning and introducing a fair-haired gentleman, tall and straight of person, somewhat military in his movements, and extremely fond of fingering his long, Saxon moustache. Lady Swiggs, on the announcement of a princess, rises suddenly to her feet, and commences an unlimited number of courtesies. She is, indeed, most happy to meet, and have the honor of being fellow-voyager with their Royal Highnesses-will remember it as being one of the happiest events of her life,--and begs to assure them of her high esteem. The corpulent lady gives her a delicate card, on which is described the crown of Poland, and beneath, in exact letters, "The Prince and Princess Grouski." The Prince affects not to understand English, which Lady Swiggs regrets exceedingly, inasmuch as it deprives her of an interesting conversation with a person of royal blood. The card she places carefully between the leaves of her Milton, having first contemplated it with an air of exultation. Again begging to thank the Prince and Princess for this mark of their distinguished consideration, Lady Swiggs inquires if they ever met or heard of Sir Sunderland Swiggs. The rotund lady, for herself and the prince, replies in the negative. "He was," she pursues, with a sigh of disappointment, "he was very distinguished, in his day. Yes, and I am his lineal descendant. Your highnesses visited Charleston, of course?" "O dear," replies the rotund lady, somewhat laconically, "the happiest days of my life were spent among the chivalry of South Carolina. Indeed, Madam, I have received the attention and honors of the very first families in that State." This exclamation sets the venerable lady to thinking how it could be possible that their highnesses received the attentions of the first families and she not know it. No great persons ever visited the United States without honoring Charleston with their presence, it was true; but how in the world did it happen that she was kept in ignorance of such an event as that of the Prince and Princess paying it a visit. She began to doubt the friendship of her distinguished acquaintances, and the St. Cecilia Society. She hopes that should they condescend to pay the United States a second visit, they will remember her address. This the rotund lady, who is no less a person than the distinguished Madame Flamingo, begs to assure her she will. Let not this happy union between Grouski and the old hostess, surprise you, gentle reader. It was brought about by Mr. Snivel, the accommodation man, who, as you have before seen, is always ready to do a bit of a good turn. Being a skilful diplomatist in such matters, he organized the convention, superintended the wooing, and for a lusty share of the spoils, secured to him by Grouski, brought matters to an issue "highly acceptable" to all parties. A sale of her palace of licentiousness, works of art, costly furniture, and female wares, together with the good will of all concerned, (her friends of the "bench and bar" not excepted,) was made for the nice little sum of sixty-seven thousand dollars, to Madame Grace Ashley, whose inauguration was one of the most gorgeous f�tes the history of Charleston can boast. The new occupant was a novice. She had not sufficient funds to pay ready money for the purchase, hence Mr. Doorwood, a chivalric and very excellent gentleman, according to report, supplies the necessary, taking a mortgage on the institution, which proves to be quite as good property as the Bank, of which he is president. It is not, however, just that sort of business upon which an already seared conscience can repose in quiet, hence he applies that antidote too frequently used by knaves-he never lets a Sunday pass without piously attending church. The money thus got, through this long life of iniquity, was by Madame Flamingo handed over to the Prince, in exchange for his heart and the title she had been deluded to believe him capable of conferring. Her reverence for Princes and exiled heroes, (who are generally exiled humbugs,) was not one jot less than that so pitiably exhibited by our self-dubbed fashionable society all over this Union. It may be well to add, that this distinguished couple, all smiling and loving, are on their way to Europe, where they are sure of receiving the attentions of any quantity of "crowned heads." Mr. Snivel, in order not to let the affair lack that eclat which is the crowning point in matters of high life, got smuggled into the columns of the highly respectable and very authentic old "Courier," a line or two, in which the fashionable world was thrown into a flutter by the announcement that Prince Grouski and his wealthy bride left yesterday, en route for Europe. This bit of gossip the "New York Herald" caught up and duly itemised, for the benefit of its upper-ten readers, who, as may be easily imagined, were all on tip-toe to know the address of visitors so distinguished, and leave cards. Mrs. Swiggs has (we must return to her mission) scarcely set foot on shore, when, thanks to a little-headed corporation, she is fairly set upon by a dozen or more villanous hack-drivers, each dangling his whip in her face, to the no small danger of her bonnet and spectacles. They jostle her, utter vile imprecations, dispute for the right of carrying her, each in his turn offering to do it a shilling less. Lady Swiggs is indeed an important individual in the hands of the hack-drivers, and by them, in a fair way of being torn to pieces. She wonders they do not recognize her as a distinguished person, from the chivalric State of South Carolina. The captain is engaged with his ship, passengers are hurrying ashore, too anxious to escape the confinement of the cabin; every one seems in haste to leave her, no one offers to protect her from the clutches of those who threaten to tear her into precious pieces. She sighs for Sister Slocum, for Mr. Hadger, for any one kind enough to raise a friendly voice in her behalf. Now one has got her black box, another her corpulent carpet-bag-a third exults in a victory over her band-box. Fain would she give up her mission in disgust, return to the more aristocratic atmosphere of Charleston, and leave the heathen to his fate. All this might have been avoided had Sister Slocum sent her carriage. She will stick by her black box, nevertheless. So into the carriage with it she gets, much discomfited. The driver says he would drive to the Mayor's office "and 'ave them ar two coves what's got the corpulent carpet-bag and the band-box, seed after, if it wern't that His Honor never knows anything he ought to know, and is sure to do nothing. They'll turn up, Mam, I don't doubt," says the man, "but it's next to los'in' on 'em, to go to the Mayor's office. Our whole corporation, Mam, don't do nothin' but eats oysters, drinks whiskey, and makes presidents;--them's what they do, Marm." Lady Swiggs says what a pity so great a city was not blessed with a bigger-headed corporation. "That it is, Marm," returns the methodical hack-driver, "he an't got a very big head, our corporation." And Lady Swiggs, deprived of her carpet-bag and band-box, and considerably out of patience, is rolled away to the mansion of Sister Slocum, on Fourth Avenue. Instead of falling immediately into the arms and affections of that worthy and very enterprising lady, the door is opened by a slatternly maid of all work-her greasy dress, and hard, ruddy face and hands-her short, flabby figure, and her coarse, uncombed hair, giving out strong evidence of being overtaxed with labor. "Is it Mrs. Slocum hersel' ye'd be seein'?" inquires the maid, wiping her soapy hands with her apron, and looking querulously in the face of the old lady, who, with the air of a Scotch metaphysician, says she is come to spend a week in friendly communion with her, to talk over the cause of the poor, benighted heathen. "Troth an' I'm not as sure ye'll do that same, onyhow; sure she'd not spend a week at home in the blessed year; and the divil another help in the house but mysel' and himsel', Mr. Slocum. A decent man is that same Slocum, too," pursues the maid, with a laconic indifference to the wants of the guest. A dusty hat-stand ornaments one side of the hall, a patched and somewhat deformed sofa the other. The walls wear a dingy air; the fumes of soapsuds and stewed onions offend the senses. Mrs. Swiggs hesitates in the doorway. Shall I advance, or retreat to more congenial quarters? she asks herself. The wily hack-driver (he agreed for four and charged her twelve shillings) leaves her black box on the step and drives away. She may be thankful he did not charge her twenty. They make no allowance for distinguished people; Lady Swiggs learns this fact, to her great annoyance. To the much- confused maid of all work she commences relating the loss of her luggage. With one hand swinging the door and the other tucked under her dowdy apron, she says, "Troth, Mam, and ye ought to be thankful, for the like of that's done every day." Mrs. Swiggs would like a room for the night at least, but is told, in a somewhat confused style, that not a room in the house is in order. That a person having the whole heathen world on her shoulders should not have her house in order somewhat surprises the indomitable lady. In answer to a question as to what time Mr. Slocum will be home, the maid of all work says: "Och! God love the poor man, there's no tellin'. Sure there's not much left of the poor man. An' the divil a one more inoffensive than poor Slocum. It's himsel' works all day in the Shurance office beyant. He comes home dragged out, does a dale of writing for Mrs. Slocum hersel', and goes to bed sayin' nothin' to nobody." Lady Swiggs says: "God bless me. He no doubt labors in a good cause-an excellent cause-he will have his reward hereafter." It must here be confessed that Sister Slocum, having on hand a newly-married couple, nicely suited to the duties of a mission to some foreign land, has conceived the very laudable project of sending them to Aleppo, and is now spending a few weeks among the Dutch of Albany, who are expected to contribute the necessary funds. A few thousand dollars expended, a few years' residence in the East, a few reports as to what might have been done if something had not interposed to prevent it, and there is not a doubt that this happy couple will return home crowned with the laurels of having very nearly Christianized one Turk and two Tartars. The maid of all work suddenly remembers that Mrs. Slocum left word that if a distinguished lady arrived from South Carolina she could be comfortably accommodated at Sister Scudder's, on Fourth Street. Not a little disappointed, the venerable old lady calls a passing carriage, gets herself and black box into it, and orders the driver to forthwith proceed to the house of Sister Scudder. Here she is-and she sheds tears that she is-cooped up in a cold, closet-like room, on the third story, where, with the ends of her red shawl, she may blow and warm her fingers. Sister Scudder is a crispy little body, in spectacles. Her features are extremely sharp, and her countenance continually wears a wise expression. As for her knowledge of scripture, it is truly wonderful, and a decided improvement when contrasted with the meagre set-out of her table. Tea time having arrived, Lady Swiggs is invited down to a cup by a pert Irish servant, who accosts her with an independence she by no means approves. Entering the room with an air of stateliness she deems necessary to the position she desires to maintain, Sister Scudder takes her by the hand and introduces her to a bevy of nicely- conditioned, and sleek-looking gentlemen, whose exactly-combed mutton chop whiskers, smoothly-oiled hair, perfectly-tied white cravats, cloth so modest and fashionable, and mild, studious countenances, discover their profession. Sister Scudder, motioning Lady Swiggs aside, whispers in her ear: "They are all very excellent young men. They will improve on acquaintance. They are come up for the clergy." They, in turn, receive the distinguished stranger in a manner that is rather abrupt than cold, and ere she has dispensed her stately courtesy, say: "how do you do marm," and turn to resume with one another their conversation on the wicked world. It is somewhat curious to see how much more interested these gentry become in the wicked world when it is afar off. Tea very weak, butter very strong, toast very thin, and religious conversation extremely thick, make up the repast. There is no want of appetite. Indeed one might, under different circumstances, have imagined Sister Scudder's clerical boarders contesting a race for an extra slice of her very thin toast. Not the least prominent among Sister Scudder's boarders is Brother Singleton Spyke, whom Mrs. Swiggs recognizes by the many compliments he lavishes upon Sister Slocum, whose absence is a source of great regret with him. She is always elbow deep in some laudable pursuit. Her presence sheds a radiant light over everything around; everybody mourns her when absent. Nevertheless, there is some satisfaction in knowing that her absence is caused by her anxiety to promote some mission of good: Brother Spyke thus muses. Seeing that there is come among them a distinguished stranger, he gives out that to-morrow evening there will be a gathering of the brethren at the "House of the Foreign Missions," when the very important subject of funds necessary to his mission to Antioch, will be discussed. Brother Spyke, having levelled this battery at the susceptibility of Mrs. Swiggs, is delighted to find some fourteen voices chiming in-all complimenting his peculiar fitness for, and the worthy object of the mission. Mrs. Swiggs sets her cup in her saucer, and in a becoming manner, to the great joy of all present, commences an eulogium on Mr. Spyke. Sister Slocum, in her letters, held him before her in strong colors; spoke in such high praise of his talent, and gave so many guarantees as to what he would do if he only got among the heathen, that her sympathies were enlisted-she resolved to lose no time in getting to New York, and, when there, put her shoulder right manfully to the wheel. This declaration finds her, as if by some mysterious transport, an object of no end of praise. Sister Scudder adjusts her spectacles, and, in mildest accents, says, "The Lord will indeed reward such disinterestedness." Brother Mansfield says motives so pure will ensure a passport to heaven, he is sure. Brother Sharp, an exceedingly lean and tall youth, with a narrow head and sharp nose (Mr. Sharp's father declared he made him a preacher because he could make him nothing else), pronounces, with great emphasis, that such self-sacrifice should be written in letters of gold. A unanimous sounding of her praises convinces Mrs. Swiggs that she is indeed a person of great importance. There is, however, a certain roughness of manner about her new friends, which does not harmonize with her notions of aristocracy. She questions within herself whether they represent the "first families" of New York. If the "first families" could only get their heads together, the heathen world would be sure to knock under. No doubt, it can be effected in time by common people. If Sister Slocum, too, would evangelize the world-if she would give the light of heaven to the benighted, she must employ willing hearts and strong hands. Satan, she says, may be chained, subdued, and made to abjure his wickedness. These cheering contemplations more than atone for the cold reception she met at the house of Sister Slocum. Her only regret now is that she did not sell old Cicero. The money so got would have enabled her to bestow a more substantial token of her soul's sincerity. Tea over, thanks returned, a prayer offered up, and Brother Spyke, having taken a seat on the sofa beside Mrs. Swiggs, opens his batteries in a spiritual conversation, which he now and then spices with a few items of his own history. At the age of fifteen he found himself in love with a beautiful young lady, who, unfortunately, had made up her mind to accept only the hand of a clergyman: hence, she rejected his. This so disturbed his thoughts, that he resolved on studying theology. In this he was aided by the singular discovery, that he had a talent, and a "call to preach." He would forget his amour, he thought, become a member of the clergy, and go preach to the heathen. He spent his days in reading, his nights in the study of divine truths. Then he got on the kind side of a committee of very excellent ladies, who, having duly considered his qualities, pronounced him exactly suited to the study of theology. Ladies were generally good judges of such matters, and Brother Spyke felt he could not do better than act up to their opinions. To all these things Mrs. Swiggs listens with delight. Spyke, too, is in every way a well made-up man, being extremely tall and lean of figure, with nice Saxon hair and whiskers, mild but thoughtful blue eyes, an anxious expression of countenance, a thin, squeaking voice, and features sufficiently delicate and regular for his calling. His dress, too, is always exactly clerical. If he be cold and pedantic in his manner, the fault must be set down to the errors of the profession, rather than to any natural inclination of his own. But what is singular of Brother Spyke is, that, notwithstanding his passion for delving the heathen world, and dragging into Christian light and love the benighted wretches there found, he has never in his life given a thought for that heathen world at his own door-a heathen world sinking in the blackest pool of misery and death, in the very heart of an opulent city, over which it hurls its seething pestilence, and scoffs at the commands of high heaven. No, he never thought of that Babylon of vice and crime-that heathen world pleading with open jaws at his own door. He had no thought for how much money might be saved, and how much more good done, did he but turn his eyes, go into this dark world (the Points) pleading at his feet, nerve himself to action, and lend a strong hand to help drag off the film of its degradation. In addition to this, Brother Spyke was sharp enough to discover the fact that a country parson does not enjoy the most enviable situation. A country parson must put up with the smallest salary; he must preach the very best of sermons; he must flatter and flirt with all the marriageable ladies of his church; he must consult the tastes, but offend none of the old ladies; he must submit to have the sermon he strained his brain to make perfect, torn to pieces by a dozen wise old women, who claim the right of carrying the church on their shoulders; he must have dictated to him what sort of dame he may take for wife;--in a word, he must bear meekly a deal of pestering and starvation, or be in bad odor with the senior members of the sewing circle. Duly appreciating all these difficulties, Brother Spyke chose a mission to Antioch, where the field of his labors would be wide, and the gates not open to restraints. And though he could not define the exact character of his mission to Antioch, he so worked upon the sympathies of the credulous old lady, as to well-nigh create in her mind a resolve to give the amount she had struggled to get and set apart for the benefit of those two institutions ("the Tract Society," and "The Home of the Foreign Missions"), all to the getting himself off to Antioch. CHAPTER XXI. MR. SNIVEL PURSUES HIS SEARCH FOR THE VOTE-CRIBBER. WHILE Mrs. Swiggs is being entertained by Sister Scudder and her clerical friends in New York, Mr. Snivel is making good his demand on her property in Charleston. As the agent of Keepum, he has attached her old slaves, and what few pieces of furniture he could find; they will in a few days be sold for the satisfaction of her debts. Mrs. Swiggs, it must be said, never had any very nice appreciation of debt-paying, holding it much more legitimate that her creditors accept her dignity in satisfaction of any demand they chanced to have against her. As for her little old house, the last abode of the last of the great Swiggs family,--that, like numerous other houses of our "very first families," is mortgaged for more than it is worth, to Mr. Staple the grocer. We must, however, turn to Mr. Snivel. Mr. Snivel is seen, on the night after the secret interview at the Charleston Hotel, in a happy mood, passing down King street. A little, ill-featured man, with a small, but florid face, a keen, lecherous eye, leans on his arm. They are in earnest conversation. "I think the mystery is nearly cleared up, Keepum" says Snivel. "There seems no getting a clue to the early history of this Madame Montford, 'tis true. Even those who introduced her to Charleston society know nothing of her beyond a certain period. All anterior to that is wrapped in suspicion," returns Keepum, fingering his massive gold chain and seals, that pend from his vest, then releasing his hold of Mr. Snivel's arm, and commencing to button closely his blue dress coat, which is profusely decorated with large gilt buttons. "She's the mother of the dashing harlot, or I'm no prophet, nevertheless," he concludes, shaking his head significantly. "You may almost swear it-a bad conscience is a horrid bore; d-n me, if I can't see through the thing. (Mr. Snivel laughs.) Better put our female friends on their guard, eh?" "They had better drop her as quietly as possible," rejoins Mr. Keepum, drawing his white glove from off his right hand, and extending his cigar case. Mr. Snivel having helped himself to a cigar, says: "D-n me, if she didn't faint in my arms last night. I made a discovery that brought something of deep interest back to her mind, and gave her timbers such a shock! I watched, and read the whole story in her emotions. One accustomed to the sharps of the legal profession can do this sort of thing. She is afraid of approaching this beautiful creature, Anna Bonard, seeing the life she lives, and the suspicions it might create in fashionable society, did she pursue such a course to the end of finding out whether she be really the lost child of the relative she refers to so often. Her object is to find one Mag Munday, who used to knock about here, and with whom the child was left. But enough of this for the present." Thus saying, they enter the house of the old antiquary, and finding no one but Maria at home, Mr. Snivel takes the liberty of throwing his arms about her waist. This done, he attempts to drag her across the room and upon the sofa. "Neither your father nor you ever had a better friend," he says, as the girl struggles from his grasp, shrinks at his feet, and, with a look of disdain, upbraids him for his attempt to take advantage of a lone female. "High, ho!" interposes Keepum, "what airs these sort of people put on, eh? Don't amount to much, no how; they soon get over them, you know. A blasted deal of assumption, as you say. Ha, ha, ha! I rather like this sort of modesty. 'Tis n't every one can put it on cleverly." Mr. Snivel winks to Keepum, who makes an ineffectual attempt to extinguish the light, which Maria seizes in her hand, and summoning her courage, stands before them in a defiant attitude, an expression of hate and scorn on her countenance. "Ah, fiend! you take this liberty-you seek to destroy me because I am poor-because you think me humble-an easy object to prey upon. I am neither a stranger to the world nor your cowardly designs; and so long as I have life you shall not gloat over the destruction of my virtue. Approach me at your peril-knaves! You have compromised my father; you have got him in your grasp, that you may the more easily destroy me. But you will be disappointed, your perfidy will recoil on yourselves: though stripped of all else, I will die protecting that virtue you would not dare to offend but for my poverty." This unexpected display of resolution has the effect of making the position of the intruders somewhat uncomfortable. Mr. Keepum, whose designs Snivel would put in execution, sinks, cowardly, upon the sofa, while his compatriot (both are celebrated for their chivalry) stands off apace endeavoring to palliate the insult with facetious remarks. (This chivalry of ours is a mockery, a convenient word in the foul mouths of fouler ruffians.) Mr. Snivel makes a second attempt to overcome the unprotected girl. With every expression of hate and scorn rising to her face, she bids him defiance. Seeing himself thus firmly repulsed, he begs to assure her, on the word of a gentleman-a commodity always on hand, and exceedingly cheap with us-he was far from intending an insult. He meant it for a bit of a good turn-nothing more. "Always fractious at first-these sort of people are," pursues Keepum, relighting his cigar as he sits on the sofa, squinting his right eye. "Take bravely to gentlemen after a little display of modesty-always! Try her again, Squire." Mr. Snivel dashes the candle from her hand, and in the darkness grasps her wrists. The enraged girl shrieks, and calls aloud for assistance. Simultaneously a blow fells Mr. Snivel to the floor. The voice of Tom Swiggs is heard, crying: "Wretch! villain!--what brings you here? (Mr. Keepum, like the coward, who fears the vengeance he has merited, makes good his escape.) Will you never cease polluting the habitations of the poor? Would to God there was justice for the poor, as well as law for the rich; then I would make thee bite the dust, like a dying viper. You should no longer banquet on poor virtue. Wretch!--I would teach thee that virtue has its value with the poor as well as the rich;--that with the true gentleman it is equally sacred." Tom stands a few moments over the trembling miscreant, Maria sinks into a chair, and with her elbows resting on the table, buries her face in her hands and gives vent to her tears. "Never did criminal so merit punishment; but I will prove thee not worth my hand. Go, wretch, go! and know that he who proves himself worthy of entering the habitations of the humble is more to be prized than kings and princes." Tom relights the candle in time to see Mr. Snivel rushing into the street. The moon sheds a pale light over the city as the two chivalric gentlemen, having rejoined and sworn to have revenge, are seen entering a little gate that opens to a dilapidated old building, fronted by a neglected garden, situate on the north side of Queen street, and in days gone by called "Rogues' Retreat." "Rogues' Retreat" has seared vines creeping over its black, clap-boarded front, which viewed from the street appears in a squatting mood, while its broken door, closed shutters-the neglected branches of grape vines that depend upon decayed trellice and arbors, invest it with a forlorn air: indeed, one might without prejudicing his faculties imagine it a fit receptacle for our deceased politicians and our whiskey-drinking congressmen-the last resting-place of our departed chivalry. Nevertheless, generous reader, we will show you that "Rogues' Retreat" serves a very different purpose. Our mob-politicians, who make their lungs and fists supply the want of brains, use it as their favorite haunt, and may be seen on the eve of an election passing in and out of a door in the rear. Hogsheads of bad whiskey have been drunk in "Rogues' Retreat;" it reeks with the fumes of uncounted cigars; it has been the scene of untold villanies. Follow us; we will forego politeness, and peep in through a little, suspicious-looking window, in the rear of the building. This window looks into a cavern-like room, some sixteen feet by thirty, the ceiling of which is low, and blotched here and there with lamp-smoke and water-stains, the plastering hanging in festoons from the walls, and lighted by the faint blaze of a small globular lamp, depending from the centre, and shedding a lurid glare over fourteen grotesque faces, formed round a broad deal-table. Here, at one side of the table sits Judge Sleepyhorn, Milman Mingle, the vote-cribber, on his right; there, on the other, sits Mr. Snivel and Mr. Keepum. More conspicuous than anything else, stands, in the centre of the table, bottles and decanters of whiskey, of which each man is armed with a stout glass. "I am as well aware of the law as my friend who has just taken his seat can be. But we all know that the law can be made subordinate; and it must be made subordinate to party ends. We must not (understand me, I do not say this in my judicial capacity) be too scrupulous when momentous issues are upon us. The man who has not nerve enough to make citizens by the dozen-to stuff double-drawered ballot-boxes, is not equal to the times we live in;--this is a great moral fact." This is said by the Judge, who, having risen with an easy air, sits down and resumes his glass and cigar. "Them's my sentiments-exactly," interposes the vote-cribber, his burly, scarred face, and crispy red hair and beard, forming a striking picture in the pale light. "I have given up the trade of making Presidents, what I used to foller when, you see, I lived in North Caroliner; but I tell you on the faith of my experience, that to carry the day we must let the law slide, and crib with a free chain: there's no gettin' over this." "It is due," interrupts the Judge, again rising to his feet and bowing to the cribber, "to this worthy man, whose patriotism has been tried so often within prison-walls, that we give weight to his advice. Hie bears the brunt of the battle like a hero-he is a hero!" (The vote-cribber acknowledges the compliment by filling his glass and drinking to the Judge.) "Of this worthy gentleman I have, as a member of the learned profession, an exalted opinion. His services are as necessary to our success as steam to the speed of a locomotive. I am in favor of leaving the law entirely out of the question. What society sanctions as a means to party ends, the law in most cases fails to reach," rejoins a tall, sandy-complexioned man, of the name of Booper, very distinguished among lawyers and ladies. Never was truth spoken with stronger testimony at hand. Mr. Keepum could boast of killing two poor men; Mr. Snivel could testify to the fallacy of the law by gaining him an honorable acquittal. There were numerous indictments against Mr. Keepum for his dealings in lottery tickets, but they found their way into the Attorney-General's pocket, and it was whispered he meant to keep them there. It was indeed pretty well known he could not get them out in consequence of the gold Keepum poured in. Not a week passes but men kill each other in the open streets. We call these little affairs, "rencontres;" the fact is, we are become so accustomed to them that we rather like them, and regard them as evidences of our advanced civilization. We are infested with slave-hunters, and slave-killers, who daily disgrace us with their barbarities; yet the law is weak when the victor is strong. So we continue to live in the harmless belief that we are the most chivalrous people in the world. "Mr. Booper!" ejaculates Mr. Snivel, knocking the ashes from his cigar and rising to his feet, "you have paid no more than a merited compliment to the masterly completeness of this excellent man's cribbing. (He points to the cribber, and bows.) Now, permit me to say here, I have at my disposal a set of fellows, (he smiles,) who can fight their way into Congress, duplicate any system of sharps, and stand in fear of nothing. Oh! gentlemen, (Mr. Snivel becomes enthusiastic,) I was-as I have said, I believe-enjoying a bottle of champagne with my friend Keepum here, when we overheard two Dutchmen-the Dutch always go with the wrong party-discoursing about a villanous caucus held to-night in King street. There is villany up with these Dutch! But, you see, we-that is, I mean I-made some forty or more citizens last year. We have the patent process; we can make as many this year." Mr. Sharp, an exceedingly clever politician, who has meekly born any number of cudgellings at the polls, and hopes ere long to get the appointment of Minister to Paris, interrupts by begging that Mr. Soloman will fill his glass, and resume his seat. Mr. Snivel having taking his seat, Mr. Sharp proceeds: "I tell you all what it is, says I, the other day to a friend-these ponderous Dutch ain't to be depended on. Then, says I, you must separate the Irish into three classes, and to each class you must hold out a different inducement, says I. There's the Rev. Father Flaherty, says I, and he is a trump card at electioneering. He can form a breach between his people and the Dutch, and, says I, by the means of this breach we will gain the whole tribe of Emeralds over to our party. I confess I hate these vagabonds right soundly; but necessity demands that we butter and sugar the mover until we carry our ends. You must not look at the means, says I, when the ends are momentous." "The staunch Irish," pursues the Judge, rising as Mr. Sharp sits down, "are noble fellows, and with us. To the middle class-the grocers and shopkeepers-we must, however, hold out flattering inducements; such as the reduction of taxes, the repeal of our oppressive license laws, taking the power out of the hands of our aristocracy-they are very tender here-and giving equal rights to emigrants. These points we must put as Paul did his sermons-with force and ingenuity. As for the low Irish, all we have to do is to crib them, feed and pickle them in whiskey for a week. To gain an Irishman's generosity, you cannot use a better instrument than meat, drink, and blarney. I often contemplate these fellows when I am passing sentence upon them for crime." "True! I have the same dislike to them personally; but politically, the matter assumes quite a different form of attraction. The laboring Irish-the dull-headed-are what we have to do with. We must work them over, and over, and over, until we get them just right. Then we must turn them all into legal voting citizens--" "That depends on how long they have been in the country," interrupts a brisk little man, rising quickly to his feet, and assuming a legal air. "Mr. Sprig! you are entirely behind the age. It matters not how long these gentlemen from Ireland have been in the country. They take to politics like rats to good cheese. A few months' residence, and a little working over you know, and they become trump voters. The Dutch are a different sort of animal; the fellows are thinkers," resumes the Judge. Mr. Snivel, who has been sipping his whiskey, and listening very attentively to the Judge, rises to what he calls the most important order. He has got the papers all ready, and proposes the gentlemen he thinks best qualified for the naturalization committee. This done, Mr. Snivel draws from his pocket a copy of the forged papers, which are examined, and approved by every one present. This instrument is surmounted with the eagle and arms of the United States, and reads thus: "STATE OF NEW YORK. "In the Court of Common Pleas for the city and county of New York: "I--do declare on oath, that it is bona fide my intention to become a citizen of the United States, and to renounce forever all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, State or sovereignty whatever, and particularly to the Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, of whom I am a subject. "Signed this --day of --184-. "JAMES CONNOR, Clerk. Clerk's office, Court of Common Pleas for the city and county of New York." "I hereby certify that the foregoing is a true copy of an original declaration of intention remaining on record in my office, &c., &c., &c." "There! it required skill and practice to imitate like that" Mr. Snivel exultingly exclaims. "We require to make thirty-seven citizens, and have prepared the exact number of papers. If the cribbers do their duty, the day is ours." Thus is revealed one of the scenes common to "Rogues' Retreat." We shrink at the multiplicity of crime in our midst; we too seldom trace the source from whence it flows. If we did but turn our eyes in the right direction we would find the very men we have elected our guardians, protecting the vicious, whose power they covet-sacrificing their high trust to a low political ambition. You cannot serve a political end by committing a wrong without inflicting a moral degradation on some one. Political intrigue begets laxity of habits; it dispels that integrity without which the unfixed mind becomes vicious; it acts as a festering sore in the body politic. Having concluded their arrangements for the Mayor's election, the party drinks itself into a noisy mood, each outshouting the other for the right to speak, each refilling and emptying his glass, each asserting with vile imprecations, his dignity as a gentleman. Midnight finds the reeling party adjourning in the midst of confusion. Mr. Snivel winks the vote-cribber into a corner, and commences interrogating him concerning Mag Munday. The implacable face of the vote-cribber reddens, he contorts his brows, frets his jagged beard with the fingers of his left hand, runs his right over the crown of his head, and stammers: "I know'd her, lived with her-she used to run sort of wild, and was twice flogged. She got crazed at last!" He shrugs his stalworth shoulders and pauses. "Being a politician, you see, a body can't divest their minds of State affairs sufficiently to keep up on women matters," he pursues: "She got into the poor-house, that I knows--" "She is dead then?" interposes Mr. Snivel. "As like as not. The poor relatives of our 'first families' rot and die there without much being said about it. Just look in at that institution-it's a terrible place to kill folks off!--and if she be not there then come to me. Don't let the keepers put you off. Pass through the outer gate, into and through the main building, then turn sharp to the left, and advance some twenty feet up a filthy passage, then enter a passage on the right, (have a light with you,) that leads to a dozen or fourteen steps, wet and slippery. Then you must descend into a sort of grotto, or sickly vault, which you will cross and find yourself in a spacious passage, crawling with beetles and lizards. Don't be frightened, sir; keep on till you hear moanings and clankings of chains. Then you will come upon a row of horrid cells, only suited for dog kennels. In these cells our crazy folks are chained and left to die. Give Glentworthy few shillings for liquor, sir, and he, having these poor devils in charge, will put you through. It's a terrible place, sir, but our authorities never look into it, and few of our people know of its existence." Mr. Snivel thanks the vote-cribber, who pledges his honor he would accompany him, but for the reason that he opens crib to-morrow, and has in his eye a dozen voters he intends to look up. He has also a few recently-arrived sons of the Emerald Isle he purposes turning into citizens. CHAPTER XXII. MRS. SWIGGS FALLS UPON A MODERN HEATHEN WORLD. PURGED of all the ill-humors of her mind, Mrs. Swiggs finds herself, on the morning following the excellent little gathering at Sister Scudder's, restored to the happiest of tempers. The flattery administered by Brother Spyke, and so charmingly sprinkled with his pious designs on the heathen world, has had the desired effect. This sort of drug has, indeed, a wonderful efficacy in setting disordered constitutions to rights. It would not become us to question the innocence, or the right to indulge in such correctives; it is enough that our venerable friend finds herself in a happy vein, and is resolved to spend the day for the benefit of that heathen world, the darkness of which Brother Spyke pictured in colors so terrible. Breakfast is scarcely over when Sister Slocum, in great agitation, comes bustling into the parlor, offers the most acceptable apologies for her absence, and pours forth such a vast profusion of solicitude for Mrs. Swiggs' welfare, that that lady is scarce able to withstand the kindness. She recounts the numerous duties that absorb her attention, the missions she has on hand, the means she uses to keep up an interest in them, the amount of funds necessary to their maintenance. A large portion of these funds she raises with her own energy. She will drag up the heathen world; she will drag down Satan. Furnishing Mrs. Swiggs with the address of the House of the Foreign Missions, in Centre street, she excuses herself. How superlatively happy she would be to accompany Mrs. Swiggs. A report to present to the committee on finance, she regrets, will prevent this. However, she will join her precisely at twelve o'clock, at the House. She must receive the congratulations of the Board. She must have a reception that will show how much the North respects her co-laborers of the South. And with this, Sister Slocum takes leave of her guest, assuring her that all she has to do is to get into the cars in the Bowery. They will set her down at the door. Ten o'clock finds our indomitable lady, having preferred the less expensive mode of walking, entering a strange world. Sauntering along the Bowery she turns down Bayard street. Bayard street she finds lined with filthy looking houses, swarming with sickly, ragged, and besotted poor; the street is knee-deep with corrupting mire; carts are tilted here and there at intervals; the very air seems hurling its pestilence into your blood. Ghastly-eyed and squallid children, like ants in quest of food, creep and swarm over the pavement, begging for bread or uttering profane oaths at one another. Mothers who never heard the Word of God, nor can be expected to teach it to their children, protrude their vicious faces from out reeking gin shops, and with bare breasts and uncombed hair, sweep wildly along the muddy pavement, disappear into some cavern-like cellar, and seek on some filthy straw a resting place for their wasting bodies. A whiskey-drinking Corporation might feast its peculative eyes upon hogs wallowing in mud; and cellars where swarming beggars, for six cents a night, cover with rags their hideous heads--where vice and crime are fostered, and into which your sensitive policeman prefers not to go, are giving out their seething miasma. The very neighborhood seems vegetating in mire. In the streets, in the cellars, in the filthy lanes, in the dwellings of the honest poor, as well as the vicious, muck and mire is the predominating order. The besotted remnants of depraved men, covered with rags and bedaubed with mire, sit, half sleeping in disease and hunger on decayed door-stoops. Men with bruised faces, men with bleared eyes; men in whose every feature crime and dissipation is stamped, now drag their waning bodies from out filthy alleys, as if to gasp some breath of air, then drag themselves back, as if to die in a desolate hiding-place. Engines of pestilence and death the corporation might see and remove, if it would, are left here to fester--to serve a church-yard as gluttonous as its own belly. The corporation keeps its eyes in its belly, its little sense in its big boots, and its dull action in the whiskey-jug. Like Mrs. Swiggs, it cannot afford to do anything for this heathen world in the heart of home. No, sir! The corporation has the most delicate sense of its duties. It is well paid to nurture the nucleus of a pestilence that may some day break out and sweep over the city like an avenging enemy. It thanks kind Providence, eating oysters and making Presidents the while, for averting the dire scourge it encourages with its apathy. Like our humane and very fashionable preachers, it contents itself with looking into the Points from Broadway. What more would you ask of it? Mrs. Swiggs is seized with fear and trembling. Surely she is in a world of darkness. Can it be that so graphically described by Brother Syngleton Spyke? she questions within herself. It might, indeed, put Antioch to shame: but the benighted denizens with which it swarms speak her own tongue. "It is a deal worse in Orange street." "Now called Baxter street Marm-a deal, I assure you!" speaks a low, muttering voice. Lady Swiggs is startled. She only paused a moment to view this sea of vice and wretchedness she finds herself surrounded with. Turning quickly round she sees before her a man, or what there is left of a man. His tattered garments, his lean, shrunken figure, his glassy eyes, and pale, haggard face, cause her to shrink back in fright. He bows, touches his shattered hat, and says, "Be not afraid, good Madam. May I ask if you have not mistaken your way?" Mrs. Swiggs looks querulously through her spectacles and says, "Do tell me where I am?" "In the Points, good Madam. You seem confused, and I don't wonder. It's a dreadful place. I know it, madam, to my sorrow." There is a certain politeness in the manner of this man-an absence of rudeness she is surprised to find in one so dejected. The red, distended nose, the wild expression of his countenance, his jagged hair, hanging in tufts over his ragged coat collar, give him a repulsiveness not easily described. In answer to an inquiry he says, "They call me, Madam, and I'm contented with the name,--they call me Tom Toddleworth, the Chronicle. I am well down-not in years, but sorrow. Being sick of the world I came here, have lived, or rather drifted about, in this sea of hopeless misery, homeless and at times foodless, for ten years or more. Oh! I have seen better days, Madam. You are a stranger here. May God always keep you a stranger to the sufferings of those who dwell with us. I never expect to be anything again, owe nothing to the world, and never go into Broadway." "Never go into Broadway," repeats Mrs. Swiggs, her fingers wandering to her spectacles. Turning into Orange street, Mr. Toddleworth tenders his services in piloting Mrs. Swiggs into Centre street, which, as he adds, will place her beyond harm. As they advance the scene becomes darker and darker. Orange street seems that centre from which radiates the avenues of every vice known to a great city. One might fancy the world's outcasts hurled by some mysterious hand into this pool of crime and misery, and left to feast their wanton appetites and die. "And you have no home, my man?" says Mrs. Swiggs, mechanically. "As to that, Madam," returns the man, with a bow, "I can't exactly say I have no home. I kind of preside over and am looked up to by these people. One says, 'come spend a night with me, Mr. Toddleworth;' another says, 'come spend a night with me, Mr. Tom Toddleworth.' I am a sort of respectable man with them, have a place to lay down free, in any of their houses. They all esteem me, and say, come spend a night with me, Mr. Toddleworth. It's very kind of them. And whenever they get a drop of gin I'm sure of a taste. Surmising what I was once, they look up to me, you see. This gives me heart." And as he says this he smiles, and draws about him the ragged remnants of his coat, as if touched by shame. Arrived at the corner of Orange street, Mr. Toddleworth pauses and begs his charge to survey the prospect. Look whither she will nothing but a scene of desolation-a Babylon of hideous, wasting forms, mucky streets, and reeking dens, meet her eye. The Jews have arranged themselves on one side of Orange street, to speculate on the wasted harlotry of the other. "Look you, Madam!" says Mr. Toddleworth, leaning on his stick and pointing towards Chatham street. "A desert, truly," replies the august old lady, nervously twitching her head. She sees to the right ("it is wantonness warring upon misery," says Mr. Toddleworth) a long line of irregular, wooden buildings, black and besmeared with mud. Little houses with decrepid door-steps; little houses with decayed platforms in front; little dens that seem crammed with rubbish; little houses with black-eyed, curly-haired, and crooked-nosed children looking shyly about the doors; little houses with lusty and lecherous-eyed Jewesses sitting saucily in the open door; little houses with open doors, broken windows, and shattered shutters, where the devil's elixir is being served to ragged and besotted denizens; little houses into which women with blotched faces slip suspiciously, deposit their almost worthless rags, and pass out to seek the gin-shop; little houses with eagle-faced men peering curiously out at broken windows, or beckoning some wayfarer to enter and buy from their door; little houses piled inside with the cast-off garments of the poor and dissolute, and hung outside with smashed bonnets, old gowns, tattered shawls; flaunting-red, blue, and yellow, in the wind, emblematic of those poor wretches, on the opposite side, who have pledged here their last offerings, and blazed down into that stage of human degradation, which finds the next step the grave-all range along, forming a picturesque but sad panorama. Mr. Moses, the man of the eagle face, who keeps the record of death, as the neighbors call it, sits opulently in his door, and smokes his cigar; while his sharp-eyed daughters estimate exactly how much it is safe to advance on the last rag some lean wretch would pledge. He will tell you just how long that brawny harlot, passing on the opposite side, will last, and what the few rags on her back will be worth when she is "shoved into Potters' Field." At the sign of the "Three Martyrs" Mr. Levy is seen, in his fashionable coat, and a massive chain falling over his tight waistcoat, registering the names of his grotesque customers, ticketing their little packages, and advancing each a shilling or two, which they will soon spend at the opposite druggery. Thus bravely wages the war. London has nothing so besotted, Paris nothing so vicious, Naples nothing so dark and despairing, as this heathen world we pass by so heedlessly. Beside it even the purlieus of Rome sink into insignificance. Now run your eye along the East side of Orange street. A sidewalk sinking in mire; a long line of one-story wooden shanties, ready to cave-in with decay; dismal looking groceries, in which the god, gin, is sending his victims by hundreds to the greedy grave-yard; suspicious looking dens with dingy fronts, open doors, and windows stuffed with filthy rags-in which crimes are nightly perpetrated, and where broken-hearted victims of seduction and neglect, seeking here a last refuge, are held in a slavery delicacy forbids our describing; dens where negro dancers nightly revel, and make the very air re-echo their profaning voices; filthy lanes leading to haunts up alleys and in narrow passages, where thieves and burglars hide their vicious heads; mysterious looking steps leading to cavern-like cellars, where swarm and lay prostrate wretched beings made drunk by the "devil's elixir"--all these beset the East side of Orange street. Wasted nature, blanched and despairing, ferments here into one terrible pool. Women in gaudy-colored dresses, their bared breasts and brawny arms contrasting curiously with their wicked faces, hang lasciviously over "half-doors," taunt the dreamy policeman on his round, and beckon the unwary stranger into their dens. Piles of filth one might imagine had been thrown up by the devil or the street commissioners and in which you might bury a dozen fat aldermen without missing one; little shops where unwholesome food is sold; corner shops where idlers of every color, and sharpers of all grades, sit dreaming out the day over their gin-are here to be found. Young Ireland would, indeed, seem to have made this the citadel from which to vomit his vice over the city. "They're perfectly wild, Madam-these children are," says Mr. Toddleworth, in reply to a question Mrs. Swiggs put respecting the immense number of ragged and profaning urchins that swarm the streets. "They never heard of the Bible, nor God, nor that sort of thing. How could they hear of it? No one ever comes in here-that is, they come in now and then, and throw a bit of a tract in here and there, and are glad to get out with a whole coat. The tracts are all Greek to the dwellers here. Besides that, you see, something must be done for the belly, before you can patch up the head. I say this with a fruitful experience. A good, kind little man, who seems earnest in the welfare of these wild little children that you see running about here-not the half of them know their parents-looks in now and then, acts as if he wasn't afraid of us, (that is a good deal, Madam,) and the boys are beginning to take to him. But, with nothing but his kind heart and earnest resolution, he'll find a rugged mountain to move. If he move it, he will deserve a monument of fairest marble erected to his memory, and letters of gold to emblazon his deeds thereon. He seems to understand the key to some of their affections. It's no use mending the sails without making safe the hull." "At this moment Mrs. Swiggs' attention is attracted by a crowd of ragged urchins and grotesque-looking men, gathered about a heap of filth at that corner of Orange street that opens into the Points. "They are disinterring his Honor, the Mayor," says Mr. Toddleworth. "Do this sort of thing every day, Madam; they mean no harm, you see." Mrs. Swiggs, curious to witness the process of disinterring so distinguished a person, forgets entirely her appointment at the House of the Foreign Missions, crowds her way into the filthy throng, and watches with intense anxiety a vacant-looking idiot, who has seen some sixteen sumers, lean and half clad, and who has dug with his staff a hole deep in the mud, which he is busy piling up at the edges. "Deeper, deeper!" cries out a dozen voices, of as many mischievous urchins, who are gathered round in a ring, making him the victim of their sport. Having cast his glassy eyes upward, and scanned vacantly his audience, he sets to work again, and continues throwing out dead cats by the dozen, all of which he exults over, and pauses now and then for the approbation of the bystanders, who declare they bear no resemblance to his Honor, or any one of the Board of Aldermen. One chubby urchin, with a bundle of Tribunes under his arm, looks mischievously into the pit, and says, "His 'Onor 'ill want the Tribune." Another, of a more taciturn disposition, shrugs his shoulders, gives his cap a pull over his eyes, and says, spicing his declaration with an oath, "He'll buy two Heralds!--he will." The taciturn urchin draws them from his bundle with an air of independence, flaunts them in the face of his rival, and exults over their merits. A splashing of mud, followed by a deafening shout, announces that the persevering idiot has come upon the object he seeks. One proclaims to his motley neighbors that the whole corporation is come to light; another swears it is only his Honor and a dead Alderman. A third, more astute than the rest, says it is only the head and body of the Corporation-a dead pig and a decaying pumpkin! Shout after shout goes up as the idiot, exultingly, drags out the prostrate pig, following it with the pumpkin. Mr. Toddleworth beckons Lady Swiggs away. The wicked-faced harlots are gathering about her in scores. One has just been seen fingering her dress, and hurrying away, disappearing suspiciously into an Alley. "You see, Madam," says Mr. Toddleworth, as they gain the vicinity of Cow Bay, "it is currently reported, and believed by the dwellers here, that our Corporation ate itself out of the world not long since; and seeing how much they suffer by the loss of such--to have a dead Corporation in a great city, is an evil, I assure you--an institution, they adopt this method of finding it. It affords them no little amusement. These swarming urchins will have the filthy things laid out in state, holding with due ceremony an inquest over them, and mischievously proposing to the first policeman who chances along, that he officiate as coroner. Lady Swiggs has not a doubt that light might be valuably reflected over this heathen world. Like many other very excellent ladies, however, she has no candles for a heathen world outside of Antioch." Mr. Toddleworth escorts her safely into Centre street, and directs her to the House of the Foreign Missions. "Thank you! thank you!--may God never let you want a shilling," he says, bowing and touching his hat as Mrs. Swiggs puts four shillings into his left hand. "One shilling, Madam," he pursues, with a smile, "will get me a new collar. A clean collar now and then, it must be said, gives a body a look of respectability." Mr. Toddleworth has a passion for new collars, regards them as a means of sustaining his respectability. Indeed, he considers himself in full dress with one mounted, no matter how ragged the rest of his wardrobe. And when he walks out of a morning, thus conditioned, his friends greet him with: "Hi! ho!--Mister Toddleworth is uppish this morning." He has bid his charge good morning, and hurries back to his wonted haunts. There is a mysterious and melancholy interest in this man's history, which many have attempted but failed to fathom. He was once heard to say his name was not Toddleworth-that he had sunk his right name in his sorrows. He was sentimental at times, always used good language, and spoke like one who had seen better days and enjoyed a superior education. He wanted, he would say, when in one of his melancholy moods, to forget the world, and have the world forget him. Thus he shut himself up in the Points, and only once or twice had he been seen in the Bowery, and never in Broadway during his sojourn among the denizens who swarm that vortex of death. How he managed to obtain funds, for he was never without a shilling, was equally involved in mystery. He had no very bad habits, seemed inoffensive to all he approached, spoke familiarly on past events, and national affairs, and discovered a general knowledge of the history of the world. And while he was always ready to share his shilling with his more destitute associates, he ever maintained a degree of politeness and civility toward those he was cast among not common to the place. He was ready to serve every one, would seek out the sick and watch over them with a kindness almost paternal, discovering a singular familiarity with the duties of a physician. He had, however, an inveterate hatred of fashionable wives; and whenever the subject was brought up, which it frequently was by the denizens of the Points, he would walk away, with a sigh. "Fashionable wives," he would mutter, his eyes filling with tears, "are never constant. Ah! they have deluged the world with sorrow, and sent me here to seek a hiding place." CHAPTER XXIII. IN WHICH THE VERY BEST INTENTIONS ARE SEEN TO FAIL. THE city clock strikes one as Mrs. Swiggs, nervous and weary, enters the House of the Foreign Missions. Into a comfortably-furnished room on the right, she is ushered by a man meekly dressed, and whose countenance wears an expression of melancholy. Maps and drawings of Palestine, Hindostan, and sundry other fields of missionary labor, hang here and there upon the walls. These are alternated with nicely-framed engravings and lithographs of Mission establishments in the East, all located in some pretty grove, and invested with a warmth and cheerfulness that cannot fail to make a few years' residence in them rather desirable than otherwise. These in turn are relieved with portraits of distinguished missionaries. Earnest-faced busts, in plaster, stand prominently about the room, periodicals and papers are piled on little shelves, and bright bookcases are filled with reports and various documents concerning the society, all bound so exactly. The good-natured man of the kind face sits in refreshing ease behind a little desk; the wise-looking lean man, in the spectacles, is just in front of him, buried in ponderous folios of reports. In the centre of the room stands a highly-polished mahogany table, at which Brother Spyke is seated, his elbow rested, and his head leaning thoughtfully in his hand. The rotund figure and energetic face of Sister Slocum is seen, whisking about conspicuously among a bevy of sleek but rather lean gentlemen, studious of countenance, and in modest cloth. For each she has something cheerful to impart; each in his turn has some compliment to bestow upon her. Several nicely-dressed, but rather meek-looking ladies, two or three accompanied by their knitting work, have arranged themselves on a settee in front of the wise man in the spectacles. Scarcely has the representative of our chivalry entered the room when Sister Slocum, with all the ardor of a lover of seventeen, runs to her with open arms, embraces her, and kisses her with an affection truly grateful. Choking to relate her curious adventure, she is suddenly heaped with adulations, told how the time of her coming was looked to, as an event of no common occurrence-how Brothers Sharp, Spyke, and Phills, expressed apprehensions for her safety this morning, each in turn offering in the kindest manner to get a carriage and go in pursuit. The good-natured fat man gets down from his high seat, and receives her with pious congratulations; the man in the spectacles looks askant, and advances with extended hand. To use a convenient phrase, she is received with open arms; and so meek and good is the aspect, that she finds her thoughts transported to an higher, a region where only is bliss. Provided with a seat in a conspicuous place, she is told to consider herself the guest of the society. Sundry ovations, Sister Slocum gives her to understand, will be made in her honor, ere long. The fact must here be disclosed that Sister Slocum had prepared the minds of those present for the reception of an embodiment of perfect generosity. No sooner has Lady Swiggs time to breathe freely, than she changes the wondrous kind aspect of the assembly, and sends it into a paroxysm of fright, by relating her curious adventure among the denizens of the Points. Brother Spyke nearly makes up his mind to faint; the good-natured fat man turns pale; the wise man in the spectacles is seen to tremble; the neatly-attired females, so pious-demeanored, express their horror of such a place; and Sister Slocum stands aghast. "Oh! dear, Sister Swiggs," she says, "your escape from such a vile place is truly marvellous! Thank God you are with us once more." The good-natured fat man says, "A horrible world, truly!" and sighs. Brother Spyke shrugs his shoulders, adding, "No respectable person here ever thinks of going into such a place; the people there are so corrupt." Brother Sharp says he shudders at the very thought of such a place. He has heard much said of the dark deeds nightly committed in it-of the stubborn vileness of the dwellers therein. God knows he never wants to descend into it. "Truly," Brother Phills interposes, "I walked through it once, and beheld with mine eyes such sights, such human deformity! O, God! Since then, I am content to go to my home through Broadway. I never forget to shudder when I look into the vile place from a distance, nevertheless." Brother Phills says this after the manner of a philosopher, fretting his fingers, and contorting his comely face the while. Sister Slocum, having recovered somewhat from the shock (the shock had no permanent effect on any of them), hopes Sister Swiggs did not lend an ear to their false pleadings, nor distribute charity among the vile wretches. "Such would be like scattering chaff to the winds," a dozen voices chime in. "Indeed!" Lady Swiggs ejaculates, giving her head a toss, in token of her satisfaction, "not a shilling, except to the miserable wretch who showed me the way out. And he seemed harmless enough. I never met a more melancholy object, never!" Brother Spyke raises his eyes imploringly, and says he harbors no ill-will against these vile people, but melancholy is an art with them-they make it a study. They affect it while picking one's pocket. The body now resolves itself into working order. Brother Spyke offers up a prayer. He thanks kind Providence for the happy escape of Sister Swiggs-this generous woman whose kindness of heart has brought her here-from among the hardened wretches who inhabit that slough of despair, so terrible in all its aspects, and so disgraceful to a great and prosperous city. He thanks Him who blessed him with the light of learning-who endowed him with vigor and resolution-and told him to go forth in armor, beating down Satan, and raising up the heathen world. A mustering of spectacles follows. Sister Slocum draws from her bosom a copy of the report the wise man in the spectacles rises to read. A fashionable gold chain and gold-framed eye-glass is called to her aid; and with a massive pencil of gold, she dots and points certain items of dollars and cents her keen eye rests upon every now and then. The wise man in the spectacles rises, having exchanged glances with Sister Slocum, and commences reading a very long, and in nowise lean report. The anxious gentlemen draw up their chairs, and turn attentive ears. For nearly an hour, he buzzes and bores the contents of this report into their ears, takes sundry sips of water, and informs those present, and the world in general, that nearly forty thousand dollars have recently been consumed for missionary labor. The school at Corsica, the missions at Canton, Ningpo, Pu-kong, Cassaba, Abheokuta, and sundry other places, the names of which could not, by any possibility, aid the reader in discovering their location-all, were doing as well as could be expected, under the circumstances. After many years labor, and a considerable expenditure of money, they were encouraged to go forward, inasmuch as the children of the school at Corsica were beginning to learn to read. At Casaba, Droneyo, the native scholar, had, after many years' teaching, been made conscious of the sin of idol-worship, and had given his solemn promise to relinquish it as soon as he could propitiate two favorite gods bequeathed to him by his great uncle. The furnace of "Satanic cruelty" had been broken down at Dahomey. Brother Smash had, after several years' labor, and much expense-after having broken down his health, and the health of many others-penetrated the dark regions of Arabia, and there found the very seat of Satanic power. It was firmly pegged to Paganism and Mahomedan darkness! This news the world was expected to hail with consternation. Not one word is lisped about that terrible devil holding his court of beggary and crime in the Points. He had all his furnaces in full blast there; his victims were legion! No Brother Spyke is found to venture in and drag him down. The region of the Seven Churches offers inducements more congenial. Round about them all is shady groves, gentle breezes, and rural habitations; in the Points the very air is thick with pestilence! A pause follows the reading. The wise man in the spectacles-his voice soft and persuasive, and his aspect meekness itself-would like to know if any one present be inclined to offer a remark. General satisfaction prevails. Brother Sharp moves, and Brother Phills seconds, that the report be accepted. The report is accepted without a dissenting voice. A second paper is handed him by Sister Slocum, whose countenance is seen to flash bright with smiles. Then there follows the proclaiming of the fact of funds, to the amount of three thousand six hundred dollars, having been subscribed, and now ready to be appropriated to getting Brother Syngleton Spyke off to Antioch. A din of satisfaction follows; every face is radiant with joy. Sister Swiggs twitches her head, begins to finger her pocket, and finally readjusts her spectacles. Having worked her countenance into a good staring condition, she sets her eyes fixedly upon Brother Spyke, who rises, saying he has a few words to offer. The object of his mission to Antioch, so important at this moment, he would not have misunderstood. Turks, Greeks, Jews, Arabs, Armenians, and Kurds, and Yesedees-yes, brethren, Yesedees! inhabit this part of Assyria, which opens up an extensive field of missionary labor, even yet. Much had been done by the ancient Greeks for the people who roamed in these Eastern wilds-much remained for us to do; for it was yet a dark spot on the missionary map. Thousands of these poor souls were without the saving knowledge of the Gospel. He could not shrink from a duty so demanding-wringing his very heart with its pleadings! Giving the light of the Gospel to these vicious Arabs and Kurds was the end and aim of his mission. (A motion of satisfaction was here perceptible.) And while there, he would teach the Jews a just sense of their Lord's design-which was the subjugation of the heathen world. Inward light was very good, old prophecies were very grand; but Judaism was made of stubborn metal, had no missionary element in it, and could only be forced to accept light through strong and energetic movement. He had read with throbbing heart how Rome, while in her greatness, protected those Christian pilgrims who went forth into the East, to do battle with the enemy. Would not America imitate Rome, that mighty mother of Republics? A deeper responsibility rested on her at this moment. Rome, then, was semi-barbarous; America, now, was Christianized and civilized. Hence she would be held more accountable for the dissemination of light. In those days the wandering Christian Jews undertook to instruct the polished Greeks-why could not Americans at this day inculcate the doctrines of Jesus to these educated heathen? It was a bold and daring experiment, but he was willing to try it. The All-wise worked his wonders in a mysterious way. In this irrelevant and somewhat mystical style, Brother Spyke continues nearly an hour, sending his audience into a highly-edified state. We have said mystical, for, indeed, none but those in the secret could have divined, from Brother Spyke's logic, what was the precise nature of his mission. His speech was very like a country parson's model sermon; one text was selected, and a dozen or more (all different) preached from; while fifty things were said no one could understand. Brother Spyke sits down-Sister Slocum rises. "Our dear and very generous guest now present," she says, addressing the good-natured fat man in the chair, as Lady Swiggs bows, "moved by the goodness that is in her, and conscious of the terrible condition of the heathen world, has come nobly to our aid. Like a true Christian she has crossed the sea, and is here. Not only is she here, but ready to give her mite toward getting Brother Spyke off to Antioch. Another donation she proposes giving the 'Tract Society,' an excellent institution, in high favor at the South. Indeed I may add, that it never has offended against its social--" Sister Slocum hesitates. Social slavery will not sound just right, she says to her herself. She must have a term more musical, and less grating to the ear. A smile flashes across her countenance, her gold-framed eye-glasses vibrate in her fingers: "Well! I was going to say, their social arrangements," she pursues. The assembly is suddenly thrown into a fit of excitement. Lady Swiggs is seen trembling from head to foot, her yellow complexion changing to pale white, her features contorting as with pain, and her hand clutching at her pocket. "O heavens!" she sighs, "all is gone, gone, gone: how vain and uncertain are the things here below." She drops, fainting, into the arms of Sister Slocum, who has overset the wise man in the spectacles, in her haste to catch the prostrate form. On a bench the august body is laid. Fans, water, camphor, hartshorn, and numerous other restoratives are brought into use. Persons get in each other's way, run every way but the right way, causing, as is common in such cases, very unnecessary alarm. The stately representative of the great Swiggs family lies motionless. Like the last of our chivalry, she has nothing left her but a name. A dash or two of cold water, and the application of a little hartshorn, and that sympathy so necessary to the fainting of distinguished people-proves all-efficient. A slight heaving of the bosom is detected, the hands-they have been well chaffed-quiver and move slowly, her face resumes its color. She opens her eyes, lays her hand solicitously on Sister Slocum's arm: "It must be the will of Heaven," she lisps, motioning her head, regretfully; "it cannot now be undone--" "Sister! sister! sister!" interrupts Sister Slocum, grasping her hand, and looking inquiringly in the face of the recovering woman, "is it an affection of the heart?-where is the pain?-what has befallen you? We are all so sorry!" "It was there, there, there! But it is gone now." Regaining her consciousness, she lays her hand nervously upon her pocket, and pursues: "Oh! yes, sister, it was there when I entered that vile place, as you call it. What am I to do? The loss of the money does not so much trouble my mind. Oh! dear, no. It is the thought of going home deprived of the means of aiding these noble institutions." Had Lady Swiggs inquired into the character of the purchaser of old Dolly she might now have become conscious of the fact, that whatever comes of evil seldom does good. The money she had so struggled to get together to aid her in maintaining her hypocrisy, was the result of crime. Perhaps it were better the wretch purloined it, than that the fair name of a noble institution be stained with its acceptance. Atonement is too often sought to be purchased with the gold got of infamy. The cause of this fainting being traced to Lady Swiggs' pocket book instead of her heart, the whole scene changes, Sister Slocum becomes as one dumb, the good fat man is seized with a nervous fit, the man in the spectacles hangs his head, and runs his fingers through his crispy hair, as Brother Spyke elongates his lean body, and is seen going into a melancholy mood, the others gathering round with serious faces. Lady Swiggs commences describing with great minuteness the appearance of Mr. Tom Toddleworth. That he is the person who carried off the money, every one is certain. "He is the man!" responds a dozen voices. And as many more volunteer to go in search of Mr. Detective Fitzgerald. Brother Spyke pricks up his courage, and proceeds to initiate his missionary labors by consulting Mr. Detective Fitzgerald, with whom he starts off in pursuit of Mr. Tom Toddleworth. CHAPTER XXIV. MR. SNIVEL ADVISES GEORGE MULLHOLLAND HOW TO MAKE STRONG LOVE. LET us leave for a time the pursuit with which we concluded the foregoing chapter, and return to Charleston. It is the still hour of midnight. There has been a ball at the fashionable house of the Flamingo, which still retains its name. In the great parlour we have before described, standing here and there upon massive tables with Egyptian marble-tops, are half-empty bottles of wine, decanters, tumblers, and viands of various descriptions. Bits of artificial flowers are strewn about the carpet, a shawl is seen thrown over one chair, a mantle over another; the light is half shut off-everything bears evidence of the gaieties of luxurious life, the sumptuous revel and the debauch. The gilded mirrors reflect but two faces, both hectic and moody of dissipation. George Mullholland and Mr. Snivel face each other, at a pier-table. Before them are several half filled bottles, from one of which Mr. Snivel fills George's glass. "There is something in this champaign (one only gets rubbish in these houses) that compounds and elevates one's ideas," says Mr. Snivel, holding his glass in the light, and squinting his blood-shotten eyes, the lids of which he has scarce power to keep open. "Drink, George-drink! You have had your day-why let such nonsense trouble you? The whole city is in love with the girl. Her beauty makes her capricious; if the old Judge has got her, let him keep her. Indeed, I'm not so sure that she doesn't love him, and (well, I always laugh when I think of it), it is a well laid down principle among us lawyers, that no law stands good against love." Mr. Snivel's leaden eyelids close, and his head drops upon his bosom. "She never can love him-never! His wealth, and some false tale, has beguiled her. He is a hoary-headed lecher, with wealth and position to aid him in his hellish pursuits; I am poor, and an outcast! He has flattered me and showered his favors upon me, only to affect my ruin. I will have--" "Pshaw! George," interrupts Mr. Snivel, brightening up, "be a philosopher. Chivalry, you know-chivalry! A dashing fellow like you should doff the kid to a knight of his metal: challenge him." Mr. Snivel reaches over the table and pats his opponent on the arm. "These women, George! Funny things, eh? Make any kind of love-have a sample for every sort of gallant, and can make the quantity to suit the purchaser. 'Pon my soul this is my opinion. I'm a lawyer, know pretty well how the sex lay their points. As for these unfortunate devils, as we of the profession call them (he pauses and empties his glass, saying, not bad for a house of this kind), there are so many shades of them, life is such a struggle with them; they dream of broken hopes, and they die sighing to think how good a thing is virtue. You only love this girl because she is beautiful, and beautiful women, at best, are the most capricious things in the world. D-n it, you have gone through enough of this kind of life to be accustomed to it. We think nothing of these things, in Charleston-bless you, nothing! Keep the Judge your friend-his position may give him a means to serve you. A man of the world ought at all times to have the private friendship of as many judges as he can." "Never! poor as I am-outcast as I feel myself! I want no such friendship. Society may shun me, the community may fear me, necessity may crush me-yea! you may regard me as a villain if you will, but, were I a judge, I would scorn to use my office to serve base ends." As he says this he draws a pistol from his pocket, and throwing it defiantly upon the table, continues as his lip curls with scorn, "poor men's lives are cheap in Charleston-let us see what rich men's are worth!" "His age, George!--you should respect that!" says Mr. Snivel, laconically. "His age ought to be my protection." "Ah!--you forget that the follies of our nature too often go with us to the grave." "And am I to suffer because public opinion honors him, and gives him power to disgrace me? Can he rob me of the one I love-of the one in whose welfare my whole soul is staked, and do it with impunity?" "D--d inconvenient, I know, George. Sympathize with you, I do. But, you see, we are governed here by the laws of chivalry. Don't let your (I am a piece of a philosopher, you see) temper get up, keep on a stiff upper lip. You may catch him napping. I respect your feelings, my dear fellow; ready to do you a bit of a good turn-you understand! Now let me tell you, my boy, he has made her his adopted, and to-morrow she moves with him to his quiet little villa near the Magnolia." "I am a poor, forlorn wretch," interrupts George, with a sigh. "Those of whom I had a right to expect good counsel, and a helping hand, have been first to encourage me in the ways of evil--" "Get money, Mullholland-get money. It takes money to make love strong. Say what you will, a woman's heart is sure to be sound on the gold question. Mark ye, Mullholland!--there is an easy way to get money. Do you take? (His fingers wander over his forehead, as he watches intently in George's face.) You can make names? Such things are done by men in higher walks, you know. Quite a common affair in these parts. The Judge has carried off your property; make a fair exchange-you can use his name, get money with it, and make it hold fast the woman you love. There are three things, George, you may set down as facts that will be of service to you through life, and they are these: when a man eternally rings in your ears the immoralities of the age, watch him closely; when a man makes what he has done for others a boast, set him down a knave; and when a woman dwells upon the excellent qualities of her many admirers, set her down as wanting. But, get money, and when you have got it, charm back this beautiful creature." Such is the advice of Mr. Soloman Snivel, the paid intriguer of the venerable Judge. CHAPTER XXV. A SLIGHT CHANGE IN THE PICTURE. THE two lone revellers remain at the pier-table; moody and hectic. Mr. Snivel drops into a sound sleep, his head resting on the marble. Weak-minded, jealous, contentious-with all the attendants natural to one who leads an unsettled life, sits George Mullholland, his elbow resting on the table, and his head poised thoughtfully in his hand. "I will have revenge-sweet revenge; yes, I will have revenge to-night!" he mutters, and sets his teeth firmly. In Anna's chamber all is hushed into stillness. The silvery moonbeams play softly through the half-closed windows, lighting up and giving an air of enchantment to the scene. Curtains hang, mist-like, from massive cornices in gilt. Satin drapery, mysteriously underlaid with lace, and floating in bewitching chasteness over a fairy-like bed, makes more voluptuous that ravishing form calmly sleeping-half revealed among the snowy sheets, and forming a picture before which fancy soars, passion unbends itself, and sentiment is led away captive. With such exquisite forms strange nature excites our love;--that love that like a little stream meanders capriciously through our feelings, refreshing life, purifying our thoughts, exciting our ambition, and modulating our actions. That love, too, like a quick-sand, too often proves a destroyer to the weak-minded. Costly chairs, of various styles, carved in black walnut, stand around the chamber: lounges covered with chastely-designed tapestry are seen half concealed by the gorgeous window curtains. The foot falls upon a soft, Turkey carpet; the ceiling-in French white, and gilt mouldings-is set off with two Cupids in a circle, frescoed by a skilled hand. On a lounge, concealed in an alcove masked by curtains pending from the hands of a fairy in bronze, and nearly opposite Anna's bed, the old Judge sleeps in his judicial dignity. To-day he sentenced three rogues to the whipping-post, and two wretched negroes-one for raising his hand to a white man-to the gallows. Calmly Anna continues to sleep, the lights in the girandoles shedding a mysterious paleness over the scene. To the eye that scans only the exterior of life, how dazzling! Like a refulgent cloud swelling golden in the evening sky, how soon it passes away into darkness and disappointment! Suddenly there appears, like a vision in the chamber, the stately figure of a female. Advancing slowly to the bed-side, for a minute she stands contemplating the sleeping beauty before her. A dark, languishing eye, an aquiline nose, beautifully-cut mouth, and a finely-oval face, is revealed by the shadow in which she stands. "How willingly," she mutters, raising the jewelled fingers of her right hand to her lips, as her eyes become liquid with emotion, and her every action betokens one whose very soul is goaded with remorse, "would I exchange all these worldly pleasures for one single day in peace of mind." She lays aside her mantle, and keeps her eyes fixed upon the object before her. A finely-rounded shoulder and exactly-developed bust is set off with a light satin boddice or corsage, cut low, opening shawl-fashion at the breast, and relieved with a stomacher of fine Brussels lace. Down the edges are rows of small, unpolished pearls, running into points. A skirt of orange-colored brocade, trimmed with tulle, and surrounded with three flounces, falls, cloud-like, from her girdle, which is set with cameos and unpolished pearls. With her left hand she raises slightly her skirts, revealing the embroidered gimps of a white taffeta underskirt, flashing in the moonlight. Small, unpolished pearls ornament the bands of her short sleeves; on her fingers are rings, set with diamonds and costly emeralds; and her wrists are clasped with bracelets of diamonds, shedding a modest lustre over her marble-like arms. "Can this be my child? Has this crime that so like a demon haunts me-that curses me even in my dreams, driven her, perhaps against her will, to seek this life of shame?" She takes the sleeper's hand gently in her own, as the tears gush down her cheeks. The sleeper startles, half raises herself from her pillow, parts her black, silky hair, that lays upon her gently-swelling bosom, and throws it carelessly down her shoulders, wildly setting her great black orbs on the strange figure before her. "Hush, hush!" says the speaker, "I am a friend. One who seeks you for a good purpose. Give me your confidence-do not betray me! I need not tell you by what means I gained access to you." A glow of sadness flashes across Anna's countenance. With a look of suspicion she scans the mysterious figure from head to foot. "It is the Judge's wife!" she says within herself. "Some one has betrayed me to her; and, as is too often the case, she seeks revenge of the less guilty party." But the figure before her is in full dress, and one seeking revenge would have disguised herself. "Why, and who is it, that seeks me in this mysterious manner?" whispers Anna, holding her delicate hand in the shadow, over her eyes. "I seek you in the hope of finding something to relieve my troubled spirit. I am a mother who has wronged her child-I have no peace of mind-my heart is lacerated--" "Are you, then, my mother?" inerrupts Anna, with a look of scorn. "That I would answer if I could. You have occupied my thoughts day and night. I have traced your history up to a certain period. ("What I know of my own, I would fain not contemplate," interrupts Anna.) Beyond that, all is darkness. And yet there are circumstances that go far to prove you the child I seek. Last night I dreamed I saw a gate leading to a dungeon, that into the dungeon I was impelled against my will. While there I was haunted with the figure of a woman of the name of Mag Munday-a maniac, and in chains! My heart bled at the sight, for she, I thought, was the woman in whose charge I left the child I seek. I spoke-I asked her what had become of the child! She pointed with her finger, told me to go seek you here, and vanished as I awoke. I spent the day in unrest, went to the ball to-night, but found no pleasure in its gay circle. Goaded in my conscience, I left the ball-room, and with the aid of a confidant am here." "I recognize-yes, my lady, I recognize you! You think me your abandoned child, and yet you are too much the slave of society to seek me as a mother ought to do. I am the supposed victim of your crime; you are the favored and flattered ornament of society. Our likenesses have been compared many times:-I am glad we have met. Go, woman, go! I would not, outcast as I am, deign to acknowledge the mother who could enjoy the luxuries of life and see her child a wretch." "Woman! do not upbraid me. Spare, oh! spare my troubled heart this last pang," (she grasps convulsively at Anna's hand, then shrinks back in fright.) "Tell me! oh, tell me!" she pursues, the tears coursing down her cheeks-- Anna Bonard interrupts by saying, peremptorily, she has nothing to tell one so guilty. To be thus rebuked by an abandoned woman, notwithstanding she might be her own child, wounded her feelings deeply. It was like poison drying up her very blood. Tormented with the thought of her error, (for she evidently labored under the smart of an error in early life,) her very existence now seemed a burden to her. Gloomy and motionless she stood, as if hesitating how best to make her escape. "Woman! I will not betray your coming here. But you cannot give me back my virtue; you cannot restore me untainted to the world-the world never forgives a fallen woman. Her own sex will be first to lacerate her heart with her shame." These words were spoken with such biting sarcasm, that the Judge, whose nap the loudness of Anna's voice had disturbed, protruded his flushed face and snowy locks from out the curtains of the alcove. "The gay Madame Montford, as I am a Christian," he exclaims in the eagerness of the moment, and the strange figure vanishes out of the door. "A fashionable, but very mysterious sort of person," pursues the Judge, confusedly. "Ah! ha,--her case, like many others, is the want of a clear conscience. Snivel has it in hand. A great knave, but a capital lawyer, that Snivel--" The Judge is interrupted in his remarks by the entrance of Mr. Snivel, who, with hectic face, and flushed eyes, comes rushing into the chamber. "Hollo!--old boy, there's a high bid on your head to-night. Ready to do you a bit of a good turn, you see." Mr. Snivel runs his fingers through his hair, and works his shoulders with an air of exultation. "If," he continues, "that weak-minded fellow-that Mullholland we have shown some respect to, hasn't got a pistol! He's been furbishing it up while in the parlor, and swears he will seriously damage you with it. Blasted assurance, those Northerners have. Won't fight, can't make 'em gentlemen; and if you knock 'em down they don't understand enough of chivalry to resent it. They shout to satisfy their fear and not to maintain their honor. Keep an eye out!" The Judge, in a tone of cool indifference, says he has no fears of the renegade, and will one of these days have the pleasure of sending him to the whipping-post. "As to that, Judge," interposes Mr. Snivel, "I have already prepared the preliminaries. I gave him the trifle you desired-to-morrow I will nail him at the Keno crib." With this the Judge and the Justice each take an affectionate leave of the frail girl, and, as it is now past one o'clock in the morning, an hour much profaned in Charleston, take their departure. Armed with a revolver Mullholland has taken up his position in the street, where he awaits the coming of his adversaries. In doubt and anxiety, he reflects and re-reflects, recurs to the associations of his past life, and hesitates. Such reflections only bring more vividly to his mind the wrong he feels himself the victim of, and has no power to resent except with violence. His contemplations only nerve him to revenge. A click, and the door cautiously opens, as if some votary of crime was about to issue forth in quest of booty. The hostess' heed protrudes suddenly from the door, she scans first up and then down the street, then withdraws it. The Judge and Mr. Snivel, each in turn, shake the landlady by the hand, and emerge into the street. They have scarce stepped upon the sidepath when the report of a pistol resounds through the air. The ball struck a lamp-post, glanced, passed through the collar of Judge Sleepyhorn's coat, and brushed Mr. Snivel's fashionable whiskers. Madame Ashley, successor to Madame Flamingo, shrieks and alarms the house, which is suddenly thrown into a state of confusion. Acting upon the maxim of discretion being the better part of valor, the Judge and the Justice beat a hasty retreat into the house, and secrete themselves in a closet at the further end of the back-parlor. As if suddenly moved by some strange impulse, Madame Ashley runs from room to room, screaming at the very top of her voice, and declaring that she saw the assassin enter her house. Females rush from their rooms and into the great parlor, where they form groups of living statuary, strange and grotesque. Anxious faces-faces half painted, faces hectic of dissipation, faces waning and sallow, eyes glassy and lascivious, dishevelled hair floating over naked shoulders;--the flashing of bewitching drapery, the waving and flitting of embroidered underskirts, the tripping of pretty feet and prettier ankles, the gesticulating and swaying of half-draped bodies-such is the scene occasioned by the bench and the bar. Madame Ashley, having inherited of Madame Flamingo the value of a scrupulous regard for the good reputation of her house, must needs call in the watch to eject the assassin, whom she swears is concealed somewhere on the premises. Mr. Sergeant Stubbs, a much respected detective, and reputed one of the very best officers of the guard, inasmuch as he never troubles his head about other people's business, and is quite content to let every one fight their own battles,--provided they give him a "nip" of whiskey when they are through, lights his lantern and goes bobbing into every room in the house. We must here inform the reader that the cause of the emeute was kept a profound secret between the judicial gentry. Madame Ashley, at the same time, is fully convinced the ball was intended for her, while Anna lays in a terrible fright in her chamber. "Ho," says Mr. Stubbs, starting back suddenly as he opened the door of the closet in which the two gentlemen had concealed themselves. "I see! I see!--beg your pardon, gentlemen!" Mr. Stubbs whispers, and bows, and shuts the door quickly. "An infernal affair this, Judge! D-n me if I wouldn't as soon be in the dock. It will all get out tomorrow," interposes Mr. Snivel, facetiously. "Blast these improper associations!" the high functionary exclaims, fussily shrugging his shoulders, and wiping the sweat from his forehead. "I love the girl, though, I confess it!" "Nothing more natural. A man without gallantry is like a pilgrim in the South-West Pass. You can't resist this charming creature. In truth it's a sort of longing weakness, which even the scales of justice fail to bring to a balance." Mr. Stubbs fails to find the assassin, and enters Madame Ashley's chamber, the door of which leads into the hall. Here Mr. Stubbs's quick eye suddenly discerns a slight motion of the curtains that enclose the great, square bed, standing in one corner. "I ax your pardon, Mam, but may I look in this 'ere bed?" Mr. Stubbs points to the bed, as Madame, having thrown herself into a great rocking chair, proceeds to sway her dignity backward and forward, and give out signs of making up her mind to faint. Mr. Stubbs draws back the curtains, when, behold! but tell it not in the by-ways, there is revealed the stalworth figure of Simon Patterson, the plantation parson. Our plantation parsons, be it known, are a singular species of depraved humanity, a sort of itinerant sermon-makers, holding forth here and there to the negroes of the rich planters, receiving a paltry pittance in return, and having in lieu of morals an excellent taste for whiskey, an article they invariably call to their aid when discoursing to the ignorant slave-telling him how content with his lot he ought to be, seeing that God intended him only for ignorance and servitude. The parson did, indeed, cut a sorry figure before the gaze of this indescribable group, as it rushed into the room and commenced heaping upon his head epithets delicacy forbids our inserting here-calling him a clerical old lecher, an assassin, and a disturber of the peace and respectability of the house. Indeed, Madame Ashley quite forgot to faint, and with a display of courage amounting almost to heroism, rushed at the poor parson, and had left him in the state he was born but for the timely precautions of Mr. Stubbs, who, finding a revolver in his possession, and wanting no better proof of his guilt, straightway took him off to the guardhouse. Parson Patterson would have entered the most solemn and pious protestations of his innocence but the evidence was so strong against him, and the zeal of Mr. Sargeant Stubbs so apparent, that he held it the better policy to quietly submit to the rough fare of his new lodgings. "I have a terror of these brawls!" says Mr. Snivel, emerging from his hiding-place, and entering the chamber, followed by the high legal functionary. "A pretty how-do-ye-do, this is;" returns Madame Ashley, cooling her passion in the rocking-chair, "I never had much respect for parsons--" "Parsons?" interrupts Mr. Snivel, inquiringly, "you don't mean to say it was all the doings of a parson?" "As I'm a lady it was no one else. He was discovered behind the curtain there, a terrible pistol in his pocket-the wretch!" Mr. Snivel exchanges a wink with the Judge, points his thumb over his left shoulder, and says, captiously: "I always had an implacable hatred of that old thief. A bad lot! these plantation parsons." Mr. Stubbs having discovered and removed the assassin, the terrified damsels return to their chambers, and Madame Ashley proceeds to close her house, as the two legal gentlemen take their departure. Perhaps it would be well to inform the reader that a principal cause of Anna's preference for the Judge, so recently manifested, was the deep impression made on her already suspicious mind by Mr. McArthur, the antiquary, who revealed to her sincerely, as she thought, her future dark destiny. CHAPTER XXVI. IN WHICH A HIGH FUNCTIONARY IS MADE TO PLAY A SINGULAR PART. THE morning following the events detailed in the foregoing chapter, finds the august Sleepyhorn seated on his judgment-seat. The clock strikes ten as he casts his heavy eyes over the grotesque group gathered into his little, dingy court-room; and he bows to his clerk, of whom he gets his law knowledge, and with his right hand makes a sign that he is ready to admonish the erring, or pass sentence on any amount of criminals. History affords no record of a judge so unrelenting of his judgments. A few dilapidated gentlemen of the "learned profession," with sharp features and anxious faces, fuss about among the crowd, reeking of whiskey and tobacco. Now they whisper suspiciously in the ears of forlorn prisoners, now they struggle to get a market for their legal nostrums. A few, more respectably clothed and less vicious of aspect, sit writing at a table inside the bar, while a dozen or more punch-faced policemen, affecting an air of superiority, drag themselves lazily through the crowd of seedy humanity, looking querulously over the railing encircling the dock, or exchanging recognitions with friends. Some twenty "negro cases" having been disposed of without much respect to law, and being sent up for punishment (the Judge finds it more convenient to forego testimony in these cases), a daughter of the Emerald Isle, standing nearly six feet in her bare soles, and much shattered about the dress, is, against her inclination, arraigned before his Honor. "I think I have seen you before, Mrs. Donahue?" says the Judge, inquiringly. "Arrah, good-morning, yer 'onher! Shure, it's only the sixth time these three weeks. Doesn't meself like to see yer smiling face, onyhow!" Here Mrs. Donahue commences complimenting the Judge in one breath, and laying no end of charges at the door of the very diminutive and harmless Mister Donahue in the next. "This being the sixth time," returns his Honor, somewhat seriously, "I would advise you to compromise the matter with Donahue, and not be seen here again. The state of South Carolina cannot pay your fees so often--" "Och, bad luck to Donahue! Troth, an' if yer onher'd put the fees down to Donahue, our acquaintance 'ouldn't be so fraquent." Mrs. Donahue says this with great unction, throwing her uncombed hair back, then daintily raising her dress apace, and inquiring of Mr. Sheriff Hardscrabble, who sits on his Honor's left, peering sharply through his spectacles, how he likes the spread of her broad, flat foot; "the charging the fees to Donahue, yer onher, 'd do it!" There was more truth in this remark than his Honor seemed to comprehend, for having heard the charge against her (Mr. Donahue having been caught in the act of taking a drop of her gin, she had well-nigh broken his head with the bottle), and having listened attentively while poor Donahue related his wrongs, and exhibited two very well blacked eyes and a broken nose, he came to the very just conclusion that it were well to save the blood of the Donahues. And to this end did he grant Mrs. Donahue board and lodging for one month in the old prison. Mrs. Donahue is led away, heaping curses on the head of Donahue, and compliments on that of his Honor. A pale, sickly looking boy, some eleven years old, is next placed upon the stand. Mr. Sergeant Stubbs, who leans his corpulent figure against the clerk's desk, every few minutes bowing his sleepy head to some friend in the crowd, says: "A hard 'un-don't do no good about here. A vagrant; found him sleeping in the market." His Honor looks at the poor boy for some minutes, a smile of kindliness seems lighting up his face; he says he would there were some place of refuge-a place where reformation rather than punishment might be the aim and end, where such poor creatures could be sent to, instead of confining them in cells occupied by depraved prisoners. Mr. Sheriff Hardscrabble, always eager to get every one into jail he can, inasmuch as it pays him twenty-two cents a day clear profit on each and every person confined, says: "A hard customer. Found sleeping in the market, eh? Well, we must merge him in a tub of water, and scrub him up a little." Mr. Hardscrabble views him with an air of satisfaction, touches him with a small cane he holds in his hand, as if he were something very common. Indeed, Mr. Hardscrabble seems quite at a loss to know what species of animal he is, or whether he be really intended for any other use than filling up his cells and returning him twenty-two cents a day clear profit. "Probably an incendiary," mutters the sagacious sheriff. The helpless boy would explain how he came to sleep in the market-how he, a poor cabin-boy, walked, foot-sore and hungry, from Wilmington, in the hope of getting a ship; and being moneyless and friendless he laid down in the market to sleep. Mr. Hardscrabble, however, suggests that such stories are extremely common. His Honor thinks it not worth while to differ from this opinion, but to the end that no great legal wisdom may be thrown away, he orders the accused to be sent to the common jail for three months. This, in the opinion of Judge Sleepyhorn, is an extremely mild penalty for being found sleeping in the market. Next there comes forward a lean, up-country Cracker, (an half-civilized native,) who commences telling his story with commendable simplicity, the Judge in the meanwhile endeavoring to suppress a smile, which the quaintness of his remarks excite. Making a tenement of his cart, as is usual with these people when they visit the city, which they do now and then for the purpose of replenishing their stock of whiskey, he had, about eleven o'clock on the previous night, been set upon by three intoxicated students, who, having driven off his mule, overturned his cart, landing him and his wife prostrate in the ditch. A great noise was the result, and the guard, with their accustomed zeal for seizing upon the innocent party, dragged up the weaker (the Cracker and his wife) and let the guilty go free. He had brought the good wife, he added, as a living evidence of the truth of what he said, and would bring the mule if his honor was not satisfied. The good wife commences a volley of what she is pleased to call voluntary testimony, praising and defending all the good qualities of her much-abused husband, without permitting any one else an opposing word. No sufficient charge being brought against the Cracker (he wisely slipped a five dollar bill into the hands of Stubbs), he joins his good wife and goes on his way rejoicing. During this little episode between the court and the Cracker's wife, Madame Grace Ashley, arrayed in her most fashionable toilet, comes blazing into Court, bows to the Judge and a few of her most select friends of the Bar. A seat for Madame is provided near his Honor's desk. His Honor's blushes seem somewhat overtaxed; Madame, on the other hand, is not at all disconcerted; indeed, she claims an extensive acquaintance with the most distinguished of the Bar. The Judge suggests to Mr. Stubbs that it would be as well to waive the charge against the clergyman. Somewhat the worse for his night in the guard-house, Parson Patterson comes forward and commences in the most unintelligible manner to explain the whole affair, when the Judge very blandly interrupts by inquiring if he is a member of the clergy at this moment. "Welle," returns the parson, with characteristic drawl, "can't zactly say I am." The natural seediness of the parson excites suspicion, nevertheless he is scrupulous of his white cravat, and preserves withal a strictly clerical aspect. Having paused a few moments and exchanged glances with the Judge, he continues: "I do nigger preaching on Sunday-that is (Parson Patterson corrects himself), I hold forth, here and there-we are all flesh and blood-on plantations when I have a demand for my services. Our large planters hold it good policy to encourage the piety of their property." "You make a good thing of it?" inquires the Judge, jocosely. The parson replies, with much meekness of manner, that business is not so good as it was, planters having got it into their heads that sermons can be got at a very low figure. Here he commences to explain his singular position. He happened to meet an old and much-esteemed friend, whom he accompanied home, and while spending the evening conversing on spiritual matters-it was best not to lie-he took a little too much. On his way to the hotel he selected Beresford street as a short cut, and being near the house where he was unfortunately found when the shooting took place, he ran into it to escape the police--" "Don't believe a word he says," interrupts Madame Ashley, springing suddenly to her feet, and commencing to pour out her phials of wrath on the head of the poor parson, whom she accuses of being a suspicious and extremely unprofitable frequenter of her house, which she describes as exceedingly respectable. "Your Honor can bear me out in what I say!" pursues Madame, bowing with an air of exultation, as the sheriff demands order. "A sorry lot, these plantation preachers! Punish him right soundly, your honor. It is not the first time he has damaged the respectability of my house!" again interrupts Madame Ashley. His Honor replies only with a blush. Mr. Snivel, who watches with quisical countenance, over the bar, enjoys the joke wonderfully. Order being restored, the Judge turns to address the parson. "I see, my friend-I always address my prisoners familiarly-you place but little value on the fact of your being a clergyman, on the ground that you only preach to slaves. This charge brought against you is a grave one-I assure you! And I cannot incline to the view you take of your profession. I may not be as erudite as some; however, I hold it that the ignorant and not the learned have most need of good example." "Aye! I always told the old reprobate so," interposes Madam Ashley, with great fervor. "A charge," resumes the Judge, "quite sufficient to warrant me in committing you to durance vile, might be preferred. You may thank my generosity that it is not. These houses, as you know, Mr. Patterson, are not only dangerous, but damaging to men of potent morality like you." "But, your Honor knows they are much frequented," meekly drawls the parson. "It affords no palliation," sharply responds the Judge, his face crimsoning with blushes. "Mark ye, my friend of the clergy, these places make sad destruction of our young men. Indeed I may say with becoming sincerity and truth, that they spread a poison over the community, and act as the great enemy of our social system." "Heigh ho!" ejaculates Madame Ashley, to the great delight of the throng assembled, "Satan has come to rebuke sin." Madame bids his Honor a very polite good morning, and takes her departure, looking disdainfully over her shoulder as she disappears out of the door. Not a little disturbed in his equanimity, the Judge pursues his charge. "The clergy ought to keep their garments clear of such places, for being the source of all evil, the effect on the community is not good-I mean when such things are brought to light! I would address you frankly and admonish you to go no more into such places. Let your ways merit the approbation of those to whom you preach the Gospel. You can go. Henceforth, live after the ways of the virtuous." Parson Patterson thanks his Honor, begs to assure him of his innocence, and seems only too anxious to get away. His Honor bows to Mr. Patterson, Mr. Patterson returns it, and adds another for the audience, whereupon the court adjourns, and so ends the episode. His Honor takes Mr. Snivel's arm, and together they proceed to the "most convenient" saloon, where, over a well-compounded punch, "the bench and the bar" compliment each other on the happy disposal of such vexatious cases. CHAPTER XXVII. THE HOUSE OF THE NINE NATIONS, AND WHAT MAY BE SEEN IN IT. ON the corner of Anthony street and the Points, Now Worth street and Mission Place. in New York, there stands, like a grim savage, the house of the Nine Nations, a dingy wooden tenement, that for twenty years has threatened to tumble away from its more upright neighbor, and before which the stranger wayfarer is seen to stop and contemplate. In a neighborhood redolent of crime, there it stands, its vices thick upon its head, exciting in the mind of the observer its association with some dark and terrible deed. On the one side, opens that area of misery, mud and sombre walls, called "Cow Bay;" on the other a triangular plot, reeking with the garbage of the miserable cellars that flank it, and in which swarms of wasting beings seek a hiding-place, inhale pestilential air, and die. Gutters running with seething matter; homeless outcasts sitting, besotted, on crazy door-steps; the vicious, with savage visage, and keen, watchful eye, loitering at the doors of filthy "groceries;" the sickly and neglected child crawling upon the side-pave, or seeking a crust to appease its hunger-all are found here, gasping, in rags, a breath of air by day, or seeking a shelter, at night, in dens so abject that the world can furnish no counterpart. And this forlorn picture of dilapidated houses, half-clad, squabbish women, blistered-faced men, and sickly children, the house of the Nine Nations overlooks. And yet this house, to the disgrace of an opulent people be it said, is but the sample of an hundred others standing in the same neighborhood. With its basement-doors opening into its bottomless pit; with its continual outgoing and ingoing of sooty and cruel-visaged denizens; with its rickety old steps leading to the second story; with its battered windows, begrimed walls, demolished shutters, clapboards hanging at sixes and sevens-with its suspicious aspect;--there it stands, with its distained sign over the doors of its bottomless pit. You may read on this sign, that a gentleman from Ireland, who for convenience' sake we will call Mr. Krone, is licensed to sell imported and other liquors. Indeed the house of the Nine Nations would seem to say within itself: "I am mother of this banquet of death you behold with your eyes." There it stands, its stream of poison hurrying its victims to the grave; its little dark passages leading to curious hiding-places; its caving roof, and its ominous-looking back platform, overlooking the dead walls of Murderers' Yard. How it mocks your philanthropy, your regal edifices, your boasted charities-your gorgeous churches! Everybody but the corporation knows the house of the Nine Nations, a haunt for wasted prostitutes, assassins, burglars, thieves-every grade of criminals known to depraved nature. The corporation would seem either to have a charming sympathy for it, or to look upon it with that good-natured indifference so happily illustrated while eating its oysters and drinking its whiskey. An empty-headed corporation is sure always to have its hands very full, which is the case with yours at this moment. Having the people's money to waste, its own ambition to serve, and its hat to fill with political waste paper-what more would you ask of it? The man of the house of the Nine Nations, you ought to know, makes criminals by the hundred, deluges your alms houses with paupers, and makes your Potters' field reek with his victims: for this he is become rich. Mr. Krone is an intimate friend of more than one Councilman, and a man of much measure in the political world-that is, Mr. Krone is a politician-maker. When you say there exists too close an intimacy between the pugilist and the politician, Mr. Krone will bet twenty drinks with any one of his customers that he can prove such doctrines at fault. He can secure the election of his favorite candidate with the same facility that he can make an hundred paupers per week. You may well believe him a choice flower in the bouquet of the corporation; we mean the corporation that banquets and becomes jubilant while assassins stab their victims in the broad street-that becomes befogged while bands of ruffians disgrace the city with their fiendish outrages-that makes presidents and drinks whiskey when the city would seem given over to the swell-mobsman-when no security is offered to life, and wholesale harlotry, flaunting with naked arms and bared bosoms, passes along in possession of Broadway by night. It is the night succeeding the day Lady Swiggs discovered, at the house of the Foreign Missions, the loss of her cherished donations. As this is a world of disappointments, Lady Swiggs resigns herself to this most galling of all, and with her Milton firmly grasped in her hand, may be seen in a little room at Sister Scudder's, rocking herself in the arm-chair, and wondering if Brother Spyke has captured the robber-wretch. A chilly wind howls, and a drizzling rain falls thick over the dingy dwellings of the Points, which, sullen and dark, seem in a dripping mood. A glimmering light, here and there, throws curious shadows over the liquid streets. Now the drenched form of some half-naked and homeless being is reflected, standing shivering in the entrance to some dark and narrow alley; then the half-crazed inebriate hurries into the open door of a dismal cellar, or seeks eagerly a shelter for his bewildered head, in some suspicious den. Flashing through the shadow of the police lamp, in "Cow Bay," a forlorn female is seen, a bottle held tightly under her shawl. Sailing as it were into the bottomless pit of the house of the Nine Nations, then suddenly returning with the drug, seeking the cheerless garret of her dissolute partner, and there striving to blunt her feelings against the horrors of starvation. Two men stand, an umbrella over their heads, at the corner, in the glare of the bottomless pit, which is in a blaze of light, and crowded with savage-faced figures, of various ages and colors,--all habited in the poison-seller's uniform of rags. "I don't think you'll find him here, sir," says one, addressing the other, who is tall and slender of person, and singularly timid. "God knows I am a stranger here. To-morrow I leave for Antioch," is the reply, delivered in nervous accents. The one is Brother Syngleton Spyke, the other Mr. Detective Fitzgerald, a man of more than middle stature, with compact figure, firmly-knit limbs, and an expression of countenance rather pleasant. "You see, sir, this Toddleworth is a harmless creature, always aims to be obliging and civil. I don't, sir-I really don't think he'll steal. But one can't tell what a man will do who is driven to such straits as the poor devils here are. We rather like Toddleworth at the station, look upon him as rather wanting in the head, and for that reason rather incline to favor him. I may say we now and then let him 'tie up' all night in the station. And for this he seems very thankful. I may say," continues Mr. Fitzgerald, touching the visor of his cap, "that he always repays with kindness any little attention we may extend to him at the station, and at times seems too anxious to make it his home. We give him a shirt and a few shillings now and then; and when we want to be rid of him we begin to talk about fashionable wives. He is sure to go then. Can't stand such a topic, I assure you, sir, and is sure togo off in a huff when Sergeant Pottle starts it." They enter the great door of the bottomless pit; the young missionary hesitates. His countenance changes, his eyes scan steadily over the scene. A room some sixty feet by twenty opens to his astonished eyes. Its black, boarded walls, and bare beams, are enlivened here and there with extravagant pictures of notorious pugilists, show-bills, and illustrated advertisements of lascivious books, in which the murder of an unfortunate woman is the principal feature. Slippery mud covers the floor. Mr. Krone sits on an empty whiskey-barrel, his stunted features betraying the hardened avarice of his character. He smokes his black pipe, folds his arms deliberately, discoursing of the affairs of the nation to two stupefied negroes and one blear-eyed son of the Emerald Isle. Three uncouth females, with hair hanging matted over their faces, and their features hidden in distortion, stand cooling their bared limbs at a running faucet just inside the door, to the left. A group of half-naked negroes lie insensible on the floor, to the right. A little further on two prostrate females, shivering, and reeking of gin, sleep undisturbed by the profanity that is making the very air resound. "The gin gets a-many of us," is the mournful cry of many a wasting inebriate. Mr. Krone, however, will tell you he has no sympathy with such cries. You arraign, and perhaps punish, the apothecary who sells by mistake his deadly drug. With a philosophical air, Mr. Krone will tell you he deals out his poison without scruple, fills alms-houses without a pang of remorse, and proves that a politician-maker may do much to degrade society and remain in high favor with his friends of the bench of justice. On one side of the dungeon-like place stands a rickety old counter, behind which three savage-faced men stand, filling and serving incessant potions of deleterious liquor to the miserable beings, haggard and ragged, crowding to be first served. Behind the bar, or counter, rises a pyramid of dingy shelves, on which are arranged little painted kegs, labelled, and made bright by the glaring gas- light reflected upon them. On the opposite side, on rows of slab benches, sit a group of motley beings,--the young girl and the old man, the negro and the frail white,--half sleeping, half conscious; all imbibing the stifling draught. Like revelling witches in rags, and seen through the bedimmed atmosphere at the further end of the den, are half-frantic men, women, and girls, now sitting at deal tables, playing for drinks, now jostling, jeering, and profaning in wild disorder. A girl of sixteen, wasted and deformed with dissipation, approaches Brother Spyke, extends her blanched hand, and importunes him for gin. He shudders, and shrinks from her touch, as from a reptile. A look of scorn, and she turns from him, and is lost among the grotesque crowd in the distance. "This gin," says Mr. Fitzgerald, turning methodically to Brother Spyke, "they make do for food and clothing. We used to call this the devil's paradise. As to Krone, we used to call him the devil's bar-tender. These ragged revellers, you see, beg and steal during the day, and get gin with it at night. Krone thinks nothing of it! Lord bless your soul, sir! why, this man is reckoned a tip-top politician; on an emergency he can turn up such a lot of votes!" Mr. Fitzgerald, approaching Mr. Krone, says "you're a pretty fellow. Keeping such a place as this!" The detective playfully strikes the hat of the other, crowding it over his eyes, and inquiring if he has seen Tom Toddleworth during the day. Mr. Toddleworth was not seen during the day. No one in the bottomless pit knows where he may be found. A dozen husky voices are heard to say, he has no home-stores himself away anywhere, and may be found everywhere. Brother Spyke bows, and sighs. Mr. Fitzgerald says: "he is always harmless-this Toddleworth." As the two searchers are about to withdraw, the shrunken figure of a woman rushes wildly into the pit. "Devils! devils!--hideous devils of darkness! here you are-still hover-hover-hovering; turning midnight into revelling, day into horrid dreaming!" she shrieks at the top of her voice. Now she pauses suddenly, and with a demoniacal laugh sets her dull, glassy eyes on Mr. Krone, then walks round him with clenched fists and threatening gestures. The politician-maker sits unmoved. Now she throws her hair about her bare breasts, turns her eyes upward, imploringly, and approaches Brother Spyke, with hand extended. Her tale of sorrow and suffering is written in her very look. "She won't hurt you-never harms anybody;" says Mr. Fitzgerald, methodically, observing Brother Spyke's timidity. "No, no, no," she mutters incoherently, "you are not of this place-you know, like the rich world up-town, little of these revelling devils. Cling! yes, cling to the wise one-tell him to keep you from this, and forever be your teacher. Tell him! tell him! oh! tell him!" She wrings her hands, and having sailed as it were into the further end of the pit, vaults back, and commences a series of wild gyrations round Mr. Krone. "Poor wretch!" says Brother Spyke, complacently, "the gin has dried up her senses-made her what she is." "Maniac Munday! Maniac Munday!" suddenly echoes and re-echoes through the pit. She turns her ear, and with a listless countenance listens attentively, then breaks out into an hysterical laugh. "Yes! ye loathsome denizens. Like me, no one seeks you, no one cares for you. I am poor, poor maniac Munday. The maniac that one fell error brought to this awful end." Again she lowers her voice, flings her hair back over her shoulders, and gives vent to her tears. Like one burdened with sorrow she commences humming an air, that even in this dark den floats sweetly through the polluted atmosphere. "Well, I am what I am," she sighs, having paused in her tune. "That one fatal step-that plighted faith! How bitter to look back." Her bony fingers wander to her lips, which she commences biting and fretting, as her countenance becomes pale and corpse-like. Again her reason takes its flight. She staggers to the drenched counter, holds forth her bottle, lays her last sixpence tauntingly upon the board, and watches with glassy eyes the drawing of the poisonous drug. Meanwhile Mr. Krone, with an imprecation, declares he has power to elect his candidate to the Senate. The man behind the counter-the man of savage face, has filled the maniac's bottle, which he pushes toward her with one hand, as with the other he sweeps her coin into a drawer. "Oh! save poor maniac Munday-save poor maniac Munday!" the woman cries, like one in despair, clutching the bottle, and reels out of the pit. CHAPTER XXVIII. IN WHICH IS PRESENTED ANOTHER PICTURE OF THE HOUSE OF THE NINE NATIONS. PALE and hesitating, Brother Spyke says: "I have no passion for delving into such places; and having seen enough for one night, am content to leave the search for this vile old man to you." The valiant missionary addresses Mr. Fitzgerald, who stands with one foot upon the rickety old steps that lead to the second story of the House of the Nine Nations. This morning, Brother Spyke was ready to do battle with the whole heathen world, to drag it up into light, to evangelize it. Now he quails before this heathen world, so terribly dark, at his own door. "You have, sir," says the detective, "seen nuthin' as yet. The sights are in these 'ere upper dens; but, I may say it, a body wants nerve. Some of our Aldermen say ye can't see such sights nowhere else." The missionary replies, holding tenaciously to his umbrella, "That may be true; but I fear they will be waiting me at home." Again he scans inquiringly into the drenched area of the Points; then bidding the officer good-night, is soon out of sight, on his way into Centre Street. Reaching the old stoop, the detective touches a spring, and the shattered door opens into a narrow, gloomy passage, along which he gropes his way, over a floor cobbled with filth, and against an atmosphere thick of disease. Now a faint light flashes through a crevice in the left wall, plays fantastically upon the black surface of the opposite, then dies away. The detective lights his lantern, stands a moment with his ear turned, as if listening to the revelry in the bottomless pit. A door opens to his touch, he enters a cave-like room-it is the one from out which the light stole so curiously, and in which all is misery and sadness. A few embers still burn in a great brick fire-place, shedding a lurid glow over the damp, filthy walls, the discolored ceiling, and the grotesque group upon the floor. "You needn't come at this time of night-we are all honest people;" speaks a massive negro, of savage visage, who (he is clothed in rags) sits at the left side of the fireplace. He coaxes the remnant of his fire to cook some coarse food he has placed in a small, black stew-pan, he watches with steady gaze. Three white females (we blush to say it), their bare, brawny arms resting on their knees, and their disfigured faces drooped into their hands, form an half circle on the opposite side. "The world don't think nothin' of us down here-we haven't had a bite to eat to-night," gruffly resumes the negro. "May them that have riches enjoy them, for to be supperless is no uncommon thing wid us," interrupts one of the women, gathering about her the shreds of her tattered garment, parting the matted hair over her face, and revealing her ghastly features. The detective turns his light full upon her. "If we live we live, if we die we die-nobody cares! Look you yonder, Mr. Fitzgerald," continues the negro, with a sarcastic leer. Turning his light to where the negro points, the detective casts a glance into the shadow, and there discovers the rags move. A dozen pair of glassy eyes are seen peering from out the filthy coverings, over which lean arms and blanched hands keep up an incessant motion. Here an emaciated and heart-sick Welsh girl, of thirteen (enciente) lays shivering on the broken floor; there an half-famished Scotch woman, two moaning children nestling at her heart, suffers uncovered upon a pallet of straw. The busy world without would seem not to have a care for her; the clergy have got the heathen world upon their shoulders. Hunger, like a grim tyrant, has driven her to seek shelter in this wretched abode. Despair has made her but too anxious that the grave or prison walls should close the record of her sorrows. How tightly she with her right hand presses her babe to her bosom; how appealingly with her left she asks a pittance of the detective! Will he not save from death her starving child? He has nothing to give her, turns his head, answers only with a look of pity, and moves slowly towards the door. "You have not been long off the Island, Washington?" inquires the detective, with an air of familiarity. "I wish," replies the negro, sullenly, "I was back. An honest man as I is, can't get on in this world. Necessity makes rascals of better men than me, Mr. Fitzgerald. Mr. Krone (he's a white man, though) makes all the politicians for the district, and charges me eight dollars a month for this hole. Just measure them two things together, Mr. Fitzgerald: then see if takin' in sixpenny lodgers pays." Mr. Fitzgerald commences counting them. "You needn't count," pursues the negro, uncovering his stew-pan, "there's only eighteen in to-night. Have twenty, sometimes! Don't get nothin' for that poor Scotch woman an' her children. Can't get it when they haint got it-you know that, Mr. Fitzgerald." The detective inquires if any of them have seen Mr. Toddleworth to-day. Washington has not seen him, and makes no scruple of saying he thinks very little of him. "Faith an' it's hard times with poor Tom," speaks up one of the women, in a deep brogue. "It was only last night-the same I'm tellin' is true, God knows-Mrs. McCarty took him to the Rookery-the divil a mouthful he'd ate durin' the day-and says, bein' a ginerous sort of body, come, take a drop, an' a bite to ate. Mister Toddleworth did that same, and thin lay the night on the floor. To-night-it's the truth, God knows-Tom Downey took him above. An' it's Tom who woundn't be the frind of the man who hadn't a shillin' in his pocket." The detective shrugs his shoulders, and having thanked the woman, withdraws into the passage, to the end of which he cautiously picks his way, and knocks at a distained door that fronts him. A voice deep and husky bids him enter, which he does, as the lurid glare of his lantern reveals a room some twelve by sixteen feet, the plaster hanging in festoons from the black walls, and so low of ceiling that he scarce can stand upright. Four bunk-beds, a little bureau, a broken chair or two, and a few cheap pictures, hung here and there on the sombre walls, give it an air of comfort in grateful contrast with the room just left. "Who lives here?" inquires the detective, turning his light full upon each object that attracts his attention. "Shure it's only me-Mrs. Terence Murphy-and my three sisters (the youngest is scarce fourteen), and the two English sisters: all honest people, God knows," replies Mrs. Murphy, with a rapid tongue. "It's not right of you to live this way," returns the detective, continuing to survey the prostrate forms of Mrs. Murphy, her three sisters, and the two fair-haired English girls, and the besotted beings they claim as husbands. Alarm is pictured in every countenance. A browned face withdraws under a dingy coverlid, an anxious face peers from out a pallet on the floor, a prostrate figure in the corner inquires the object of Mr. Detective Fitzgerald's visit-and Mrs. Murphy, holding it more becoming of respectable society, leaves the bed in which she had accommodated five others, and gets into one she calls her own. A second thought, and she makes up her mind not to get into bed, but to ask Mr. Fitzgerald if he will be good enough, when next he meets his Onher, the Mayor, just to say to him how Mr. Krone is bringing disgrace upon the house and every one in it, by letting rooms to negroes. Here she commences pouring out her pent-up wrath upon the head of Mr. Krone, and the colored gentleman, whom she declares has a dozen white females in his room every night. The detective encourages her by saying it is not right of Mr. Krone, who looks more at the color of his money than the skin of his tenants. "To come of a dacint family-and be brought to this!" says Mrs. Murphy, allowing her passion to rise, and swearing to have revenge of the negro in the next room. "You drink this gin, yet-I have warned you against it," interposes the detective, pointing to some bottles on the bureau. "Faith, an' it's the gin gets a many of us," returns the woman, curtly, as she gathers about her the skirts of her garments. "Onyhow, yerself wouldn't deprive us of a drop now and then, jist to keep up the spirits." The detective shakes his head, then discloses to them the object of his search, adding, in parenthesis, that he does not think Mr. Toddleworth is the thief. A dozen tongues are ready to confirm the detective's belief. "Not a shillin' of it did the poor crature take-indeed he didn't, now, Mr. Fitzgerald. 'Onor's 'onor, all over the wurld!" says Mrs. Murphy, grasping the detective by the hand. "Stay till I tell ye all about it. Mary Maguire-indeed an' ye knows her, Mr. Fitzgerald-this same afternoon looked in to say--'how do ye do, Mrs. Murphy. See this! Mrs. Murphy,' says she, 'an' the divil a sich a pocket of money I'd see before, as she held in her right hand, jist. 'Long life to ye, Mary,' says I. 'We'll have a pint, Mrs. Murphy,' says she. 'May ye niver want the worth of it,' says I. And the pint was not long in, when Mary got a little the worse of it, and let all out about the money. 'You won't whisper it, Mrs. Murphy,' says she, 'if I'd tell ye in confidence by what manes I got the lift?'" "'Not in the wide world, Mary,' says I; 'ye may trust me for that same.' 'Shure didn't I raise it from the pocket of an auld woman in spectacles, that watched the fool beyant dig up the corporation.' 'An' it'll not do yerself much good,' says I, liftin' the same, and cuttin' away to the house. 'You won't whisper it?' says she." "I can confirm the truth of that same," rejoins a brusque-figured man, rising from his pallet, and speaking with regained confidence. "Mary looked in at the Blazers, and being the worse of liquor, showed a dale of ready money, and trated everybody, and gave the money to everybody, and was wilcome wid everybody. Then Mrs. McCarty got aboard of her ginerosity, and got her into the Rookery, where the Miss McCartys thought it would not be amiss to have a quart. The same was brought in, and Mary hersel' was soon like a dead woman oh the floor, jist--" "And they got the money all away?" interrupts the detective. "Faith, an' she'll not have a blessed dollar come daylight," continues the man, resuming his pallet. The detective bids Mrs. Murphy good night, and is soon groping his way over a rickety old floor, along a dark, narrow passage, scarce high enough to admit him, and running at right angles with the first. A door on the left opens into a grotto-like place, the sickly atmosphere of which seems hurling its poison into the very blood. "Who's here?" inquires the detective, and a voice, feeble and hollow, responds: "Lodgers!" The damp, greasy walls; the broken ceilings; the sooty fireplace, with its shattered bricks; the decayed wainscoating-its dark, forlorn aspect, all bespeak it the fit abode of rats. And yet Mr. Krone thinks it comfortable enough (the authorities think Mr. Krone the best judge) for the accommodation of thirteen remnants of human misery, all of whom are here huddled together on the wet, broken floor, borrowing warmth of one another. The detective's light falls curiously upon the dread picture, which he stands contemplating. A pale, sickly girl, of some eleven summers, her hair falling wildly over her wan features, lays upon some rags near the fireplace, clinging to an inebriated mother. Here a father, heartsick and prostrate with disease, seeks to keep warm his three ragged children, nestling about him. An homeless outcast, necessity forces him to send them out to prey upon the community by day, and to seek in this wretched hovel a shelter at night. Yonder the rags are thrown back, a moving mass is disclosed, and there protrudes a disfigured face, made ghostly by the shadow of the detective's lantern. At the detective's feet a prostrate girl, insensible of gin, is seized with convulsions, clutches with wasted hands at the few rags about her poor, flabby body, then with fingers grasping, and teeth firmly set, her whole frame writhes in agony. Your missionary never whispered a kind, encouraging word in her ear; his hand never pressed that blanched bone with which she now saddens your heart! Different might it have been with her had some gentle- tongued Brother Spyke sought her out, bore patiently with her waywardness, snatched her from this life of shame, and placed her high in an atmosphere of light and love. It is here, gentle shepherds, the benighted stand most in need of your labors. Seek not to evangelize the Mahomedan world until you have worked a reform here; and when you have done it, a monument in heaven will be your reward. "Mr. Toddleworth is not here," says the detective, withdrawing into the passage, then ascending a broken and steep stairs that lead into the third story. Nine shivering forms crouched in one dismal room; four squabbish women, and three besotted men in another; and in a third, nine ragged boys and two small girls-such are the scenes of squalid misery presented here. In a little front room, Mr. Tom Downey, his wife, and eight children, lay together upon the floor, half covered with rags. Mr. Downey startles at the appearance of the detective, rises nervously from his pallet, and after the pause of a moment, says: "Indeed, yer welcome, Mr. Fitzgerald. Indeed, I have not-an' God knows it's the truth I tell-seen Mr. Toddleworth the week;" he replies, in answer to a question from the detective. "You took a drop with him this afternoon?" continues the detective, observing his nervousness. "God knows it's a mistake, Mr. Fitzgerald." Mr. Downey changes the subject, by saying the foreigners in the garret are a great nuisance, and disturb him of his rest at night. A small, crooked stair leads into "Organ-grinders' Roost," in the garret. To "Organ-grinders' Roost" the detective ascends. If, reader, you have ever pictured in your mind the cave of despair, peopled by beings human only in shape, you may form a faint idea of the wretchedness presented in "Organ-grinders' Roost," at the top of the house of the Nine Nations. Seven stalworth men shoot out from among a mass of rags on the floor, and with dark, wandering eyes, and massive, uncombed beards, commence in their native Italian a series of interrogatories, not one of which the detective can understand. They would inquire for whom he seeks at this strange hour. He (the detective) stands unmoved, as with savage gesture-he has discovered his star-they tell him they are famishing of hunger. A pretty black-eyed girl, to whose pale, but beautifully oval face an expression of sorrow lends a touching softness, lays on the bare floor, beside a mother of patriarchal aspect. Now she is seized with a sharp cough that brings blood at every paroxysm. As if forgetting herself, she lays her hand gently upon the cheek of her mother, anxious to comfort her. Ah! the hard hand of poverty has been upon her through life, and stubbornly refuses to relax its grip, even in her old age. An organ forms here and there a division between the sleepers; two grave-visaged monkeys sit chattering in the fireplace, then crouch down on the few charred sticks. A picture of the crucifix is seen conspicuous over the dingy fireplace, while from the slanting roof hang several leathern girdles. Oh, what a struggle for life is their's! Mothers, fathers, daughters, and little children, thus promiscuously grouped, and coming up in neglect and shame. There an old man, whom remorseless death is just calling into eternity, with dull, glassy eyes, white, flowing beard, bald head, sunken mouth, begrimed and deeply-wrinkled face, rises, spectre-like, from his pallet. Now he draws from his breast a small crucifix, and commences muttering to it in a guttural voice. "Peace, peace, good old man-the holy father will come soon-the holy virgin will come soon: he will receive the good spirit to his bosom," says a black-eyed daughter, patting him gently upon the head, then looking in his face solicitously, as he turns his eyes upward, and for a few moments seems invoking the mercy of the Allwise. "Yes, father," she resumes, lightening up the mat of straw upon which he lays, "the world has been unkind to you, but you are passing from it to a better-you will be at peace soon." "Soon, soon, soon," mumbles the old man, in a whisper; and having carefully returned the crucifix to his bosom, grasps fervently the hand of the girl and kisses it, as her eyes swim in tears. Such, to the shame of those who live in princely palaces, and revel in luxury, are but faintly-drawn pictures of what may be seen in the house of the Nine Nations. The detective is about to give up the search, and turns to descend the stairs, when suddenly he discerns a passage leading to the north end of the garret. Here, in a little closet-like room, on the right, the rats his only companions, lies the prostrate form of poor Toddleworth. "Well, I persevered till I found you," says the detective, turning his light full upon the body. Another minute, and his features become as marble; he stands aghast, and his whole frame seems struggling under the effect of some violent shock. "What, what, what!" he shouts, in nervous accents, "Murder! murder! murder! some one has murdered him." Motionless the form lies, the shadow of the light revealing the ghastly spectacle. The head lies in a pool of blood, the bedimmed eyes, having taken their last look, remain fixedly set on the black roof. "He has died of a blow-of a broken skull!" says the frightened official, feeling, and feeling, and pressing the arms and hands that are fast becoming rigid. Life is gone out; a pauper's grave will soon close over what remains of this wretched outcast. The detective hastens down stairs, spreads the alarm over the neighborhood, and soon the House of the Nine Nations is the scene of great excitement. CHAPTER XXIX. IN WHICH MAY BE SEEN A FEW OF OUR COMMON EVILS. LEAVING for a time the scenes in the House of the Nine Nations, let us return to Charleston, that we may see how matters appertaining to this history are progressing. Mr. Snivel is a popular candidate for the Senate of South Carolina; and having shot his man down in the street, the question of his fighting abilities we regard as honorably settled. Madame Montford, too, has by him been kept in a state of nervous anxiety, for he has not yet found time to search in the "Poor-house for the woman Munday." All our very first, and best-known families, have dropped Madame, who is become a wet sheet on the fashionable world. A select committee of the St. Cecilia has twice considered her expulsion, while numerous very respectable and equally active old ladies have been shaking their scandal-bags at her head. Sins have been laid at her door that would indeed damage a reputation with a fairer endorsement than New York can give. Our city at this moment is warmed into a singular state of excitement. A Georgia editor (we regard editors as belonging to a very windy class of men), not having the mightiness of our chivalry before him, said the Union would have peace if South Carolina were shut up in a penitentiary. And for this we have invited the indiscreet gentleman to step over the border, that we may hang him, being extremely fond of such common-place amusements. What the facetious fellow meant was, that our own State would enjoy peace and prosperity were our mob-politicians all in the penitentiary. And with this sensible opinion we heartily agree. We regard our state of civilization as extremely enviable. To-day we made a lion of the notorious Hines, the forger. Hines, fashioning after our hapless chivalry, boasts that South Carolina is his State-his political mother. He has, nevertheless, graced with his presence no few penitentiaries. We feasted him in that same prison where we degrade and starve the honest poor; we knew him guilty of an henious crime-yet we carried him jubilantly to the "halls of justice." And while distinguished lawyers tendered their services to the "clever villain," you might have witnessed in sorrow a mock trial, and heard a mob sanction with its acclamations his release. Oh, truth and justice! how feeble is thy existence where the god slavery reigns. And while men are heard sounding the praises of this highwayman at the street corners, extolling men who have shot down their fellow-men in the streets, and calling those "Hon. gentlemen," who have in the most cowardly manner assassinated their opponents, let us turn to a different picture. Two genteely-dressed men are seen entering the old jail. "I have twice promised them a happy surprise," says one, whose pale, studious features, wear an expression of gentleness. The face of the other is somewhat florid, but beaming with warmth of heart. They enter, having passed up one of the long halls, a room looking into the prison-yard. Several weary-faced prisoners are seated round a deal table, playing cards; among them is the old sailor described in the early part of this history. "You don't know my friend, here?" says the young man of the studious face, addressing the prisoners, and pointing to his companion. The prisoners look inquiringly at the stranger, then shake their heads in response. "No, you don't know me: you never knew me when I was a man," speaks the stranger, raising his hat, as a smile lights up his features. "You don't know Tom Swiggs, the miserable inebriate--" A spontaneaus shout of recognition, echoing and re-echoing through the old halls, interrupts this declaration. One by one the imprisoned men grasp him by the hand, and shower upon him the warmest, the heartiest congratulations. A once fallen brother has risen to a knowledge of his own happiness. Hands that raised him from that mat of straw, when the mental man seemed lost, now welcome him restored, a purer being. "Ah, Spunyarn," says Tom, greeting the old sailor with child-like fondness, as the tears are seen gushing into the eyes, and coursing down the browned face of the old mariner, "I owe you a debt I fear I never can pay. I have thought of you in my absence, and had hoped on my return to see you released. I am sorry you are not--" "Well, as to that," interrupts the old sailor, his face resuming its wonted calm, "I can't-you know I can't, Tom,--sail without a clearance. I sometimes think I'm never going to get one. Two years, as you know, I've been here, now backing and then filling, in and out, just as it suits that chap with the face like a snatch-block. They call him a justice. 'Pon my soul, Tom, I begin to think justice for us poor folks is got aground. Well, give us your hand agin' (he seizes Tom by the hand); its all well wi' you, anyhows.' "Yes, thank God," says Tom, returning his friendly shake, "I have conquered the enemy, and my thanks for it are due to those who reached my heart with kind words, and gave me a brother's hand. I was not dead to my own degradation; but imprisonment left me no hope. The sting of disappointment may pain your feelings; hope deferred may torture you here in a prison; the persecutions of enemies may madden your very soul; but when a mother turns coldly from you--No, I will not say it, for I love her still--" he hesitates, as the old sailor says, with touching simplicity, he never knew what it was to have a mother or father. Having spread before the old man and his companions sundry refreshments he had ordered brought in, and received in return their thanks, he inquires of Spunyarn how it happened that he got into prison, and how it is that he remains here a fixture. "I'll tell you, Tom," says the old sailor, commencing his story. "We'd just come ashore-had a rough passage-and, says I to myself, here's lay up ashore awhile. So I gets a crimp, who takes me to a crib. 'It's all right here-you'll have snug quarters, Jack,' says he, introducing me to the chap who kept it. I gives him twenty dollars on stack, and gets up my chest and hammock, thinking it was all fair and square. Then I meets an old shipmate, who I took in tow, he being hard ashore for cash. 'Let us top the meetin' with a glass,' says I. 'Agreed,' says Bill, and I calls her on, the very best. 'Ten cents a glass,' says the fellow behind the counter, giving us stuff that burnt as it went. 'Mister,' says I, 'do ye want to poison a sailor?' 'If you no like him,' says he, 'go get better somewhere else.' I told him to give me back the twenty, and me dunnage. "'You don't get him-clear out of mine 'ouse,' says he, "'Under the peak,' says I, fetching him a but under the lug that beached him among his beer-barrels. He picked himself up, and began talking about a magistrate. And knowing what sort of navigation a fellow'd have in the hands of that sort of land-craft, I began to think about laying my course for another port. 'Hold on here,' says a big-sided land-lubber, seizing me by the fore-sheets. 'Cast off there,' says I, 'or I'll put ye on yer beam-ends.' "'I'm a constable,' says he, pulling out a pair of irons he said must go on my hands." "I hope he did not put them on," interrupts the young theologian, for it is he who accompanies Tom. "Avast! I'll come to that. He said he'd only charge me five dollars for going to jail without 'em, so rather than have me calling damaged, I giv him it. It was only a trifle. 'Now, Jack,' says the fellow, as we went along, in a friendly sort of way, 'just let us pop in and see the justice. I think a ten 'll get ye a clearance.' 'No objection to that,' says I, and in we went, and there sat the justice, face as long and sharp as a marlinspike, in a dirty old hole, that looked like our forecastle. 'Bad affair this, Jack,' says he, looking up over his spectacles. 'You must be locked up for a year and a day, Jack.' "'You'll give a sailor a hearin', won't ye?' says I. 'As to that,--well, I don't know, Jack; you musn't break the laws of South Carolina when you get ashore. You seem like a desirable sailor, and can no doubt get a ship and good wages-this is a bad affair. However, as I'm not inclined to be hard, if you are disposed to pay twenty dollars, you can go.' 'Law and justice,' says I, shaking my fist at him-'do ye take this salt-water citizen for a fool?' "'Take him away, Mr. Stubble-lock him up!--lock him up!' says the justice, and here I am, locked up, hard up, hoping. I'd been tied up about three weeks when the justice looked in one day, and after inquiring for me, and saying, 'good morning, Jack,' and seeming a little by the head: 'about this affair of yourn, Jack,' says he, 'now, if you'll mind your eye when you get out--my trouble's worth ten dollars-and pay me, I'll discharge you, and charge the costs to the State.' "'Charge the cost to the State!' says I. 'Do you take Spunyarn for a marine?' At this he hauled his wind, and stood out." "You have had a hearing before the Grand Jury, have you not?" inquires Tom, evincing a deep interest in the story of his old friend. "Not I. This South Carolina justice is a hard old craft to sail in. The Grand Jury only looks in once every six months, and then looks out again, without inquiring who's here. And just before the time it comes round, I'm shuffled out, and just after it has left, I'm shuffled in again-fees charged to the State! That's it. So here I am, a fee-making machine, bobbing in and out of jail to suit the conveniences of Mister Justice. I don't say this with any ill will-I don't." Having concluded his story, the old sailor follows his visitors to the prison gate, takes an affectionate leave of Tom Swiggs, and returns to join his companions. On the following day, Tom intercedes with Mr. Snivel, for it is he who thus harvests fees of the State by retaining the old sailor in prison, and procures his release. And here, in Mr. Snivel, you have an instrument of that debased magistracy which triumphs over the weak, that sits in ignorance and indolence, that invests the hypocritical designer with a power almost absolute, that keeps justice muzzled on her throne-the natural offspring of that demon-making institution that scruples not to brunt the intellect of millions, while dragging a pall of sloth over the land. CHAPTER XXX. CONTAINING VARIOUS THINGS APPERTAINING TO THIS HISTORY. MARIA MCARTHUR having, by her womanly sympathy, awakened the generous impulses of Tom Swiggs, he is resolved they shall have a new channel for their action. Her kindness touched his heart; her solicitude for his welfare gained his affections, and a recognition of that love she so long and silently cherished for him, is the natural result. The heart that does not move to woman's kindness, must indeed be hard. But there were other things which strengthened Tom's affections for Maria. The poverty of her aged father; the insults offered her by Keepum and Snivel; the manner in which they sought her ruin while harassing her father; the artlessness and lone condition of the pure-minded girl; and the almost holy affection evinced for the old man on whom she doated-all tended to bring him nearer and nearer to her, until he irresistibly found himself at her feet, pledging that faith lovers call eternal. Maria is not of that species of being the world calls beautiful; but there is about her something pure, thoughtful, even noble; and this her lone condition heightens. Love does not always bow before beauty. The singularities of human nature are most strikingly blended in woman. She can overcome physical defects; she can cultivate attractions most ap- preciated by those who study her worth deepest. Have you not seen those whose charms at first-sight found no place in your thoughts, but as you were drawn nearer and nearer to them, so also did your esteem quicken, and that esteem, almost unconsciously, you found ripening into affection, until in turn you were seized with an ardent passion? You have. And you have found yourself enamored of the very one against whom you had endeavored most to restrain your generous impulses. Like the fine lines upon a picture with a repulsive design, you trace them, and recur to them until your admiration is carried away captive. So it is with woman's charms. Tom Swiggs, then, the restored man, bows before the simple goodness of the daughter of the old Antiquary. Mr. Trueman, the shipowner, gave Tom employment, and has proved a friend to him. Tom, in turn, has so far gained his confidence and respect that Mr. Trueman contemplates sending him to London, on board one of his ships. Nor has Tom forgotten to repay the old Antiquary, who gave him a shelter when he was homeless; this home is still under the roof of the old man, toward whose comfort he contributes weekly a portion of his earnings. If you could but look into that little back-parlor, you would see a picture of humble cheerfulness presented in the old man, his daughter, and Tom Swiggs, seated round the tea-table. Let us, however, turn and look into one of our gaudy saloons, that we may see how different a picture is presented there. It is the night previous to an election for Mayor. Leaden clouds hang threatening over the city; the gaslight throws out its shadows at an early hour; and loud-talking men throng our street-corners and public resorts. Our politicians tell us that the destiny of the rich and the poor is to forever guard that institution which employs all our passions, and absorbs all our energies. In a curtained box, at the St. Charles, sits Mr. Snivel and George Mullholland-the latter careworn and downcast of countenance. "Let us finish this champaign, my good fellow," says the politician, emptying his glass. "A man-I mean one who wants to get up in the world-must, like me, have two distinct natures. He must have a grave, moral nature-that is necessary to the affairs of State. And he must, to accommodate himself to the world (law and society, I mean), have a terribly loose nature-a perfect quicksand, into which he can drag everything that serves himself. You have seen how I can develop both these, eh?" The downcast man shakes his head, as the politician watches him with a steady gaze. "Take the advice of a friend, now, let the Judge alone-don't threaten again to shoot that girl. Threats are sometimes dragged in as testimony against a man (Mr. Snivel taps George admonishingly on the arm); and should anything of a serious nature befall her-the law is curious-why, what you have said might implicate you, though you were innocent." "You," interrupts George, "have shot your man down in the street." "A very different affair, George. My position in society protects me. I am a member of the Jockey-Club, a candidate for the State Senate--a Justice of the Peace--yes, a politician! You are--Well, I was going to say-nothing! We regard northerners as enemies; socially, they are nothing. Come, George, come with me. I am your best friend. You shall see the power in my hands." The two men saunter out together, pass up a narrow lane leading from King Street, and are soon groping their way up the dark stairway of an old, neglected-looking wooden building, that for several years has remained deserted by everything but rats and politicians,--one seeming to gnaw away at the bowels of the nation, the other at the bowels of the old building. Having ascended to the second floor, Mr. Snivel touches a spring, a suspicious little trap opens, and two bright eyes peer out, as a low, whispering voice inquires, "Who's there?" Mr. Snivel has exchanged the countersign, and with his companion is admitted into a dark vestibule, in which sits a brawny guardsman. "Cribs are necessary, sir-I suppose you never looked into one before?" George, in a voice discovering timidity, says he never has. "You must have cribs, and crib-voters; they are necessary to get into high office-indeed, I may say, to keep up with the political spirit of the age." Mr. Snivel is interrupted by the deep, coarse voice of Milman Mingle, the vote-cribber, whose broad, savage face looks out at a small guard trap. "All right," he says, recognizing Mr. Snivel. Another minute, and a door opens into a long, sombre-looking room, redolent of the fumes of whiskey and tobacco. "The day is ours. We'll elect our candidate, and then my election is certain; naturalized thirteen rather green ones to-day-to-morrow they will be trump cards. Stubbs has attended to the little matter of the ballot-boxes." Mr. Snivel gives the vote-cribber's hand a warm shake, and turns to introduce his friend. The vote-cribber has seen him before. "There are thirteen in," he says, and two more he has in his eye, and will have in to-night, having sent trappers out for them. Cold meats, bread, cheese, and crackers, and a bountiful supply of bad whiskey, are spread over a table in the centre of the room; while the pale light of two small lamps, suspended from the ceiling, throws a curious shadow over the repulsive features of thirteen forlorn, ragged, and half-drunken men, sitting here and there round the room, on wooden benches. You see ignorance and cruelty written in their very countenances. For nearly three weeks they have not scented the air of heaven, but have been held here in a despicable bondage. Ragged and filthy, like Falstaff's invincibles, they will be marched to the polls to-morrow, and cast their votes at the bid of the cribber. "A happy lot of fellows," says Mr. Snivel, exultingly. "I have a passion for this sort of business-am general supervisor of all these cribs, you understand. We have several of them. Some of these 'drifts' we kidnap, and some come and be locked up of their own accord-merely for the feed and drink. We use them, and then snuff them out until we want them again." Having turned from George, and complimented the vote-cribber for his skill, he bids him good-night. Together George and the politician wend their way to an obscure part of the city, and having passed up two flight of winding stairs, into a large, old-fashioned house on the Neck, are in a sort of barrack-room, fitted up with bunks and benches, and filled with a grotesque assembly, making night jubilant-eating, drinking, smoking, and singing. "A jolly set of fellows," says Mr. Snivel, with an expression of satisfaction. "This is a decoy crib-the vagabonds all belong to the party of our opponents, but don't know it. We work in this way: we catch them-they are mostly foreigners-lock them up, give them good food and drink, and make them-not the half can speak our language-believe we belong to the same party. They yield, as submissive as curs. To morrow, we-this is in confidence-drug them all, send them into a fast sleep, in which we keep them till the polls are closed, then, not wanting them longer, we kick them out for a set of drunkards. Dangerous sort of cribbing, this. I let you into the secret out of pure friendship." Mr. Snivel pauses. George has at heart something of deeper interest to him than votes and vote-cribbers. But why, he says to himself, does Mr. Snivel evince this anxiety to befriend me? This question is answered by Mr. Snivel inviting him to take a look into the Keno den. CHAPTER XXXI. THE KENO DEN, AND WHAT MAY BE SEEN IN IT. THE clock has just struck twelve. Mr. Snivel and George, passing from the scenes of our last chapter, enter a Keno den, A gambling den. situated on Meeting street. "You must get money, George. Here you are nothing without money. Take this, try your hand, make your genius serve you." Mr. Snivel puts twenty dollars into George's hand. They are in a room some twenty by thirty feet in dimensions, dimly-lighted. Standing here and there are gambling tables, around which are seated numerous mechanics, losing, and being defrauded of that for which they have labored hard during the week. Hope, anxiety, and even desperation is pictured on the countenances of the players. Maddened and disappointed, one young man rises from a table, at which sits a craven-faced man sweeping the winnings into his pile, and with profane tongue, says he has lost his all. Another, with flushed face and bloodshot eyes, declares it the sixth time he has lost his earnings here. A third reels confusedly about the room, says a mechanic is but a dog in South Carolina; and the sooner he comes to a dog's end the better. Mr. Snivel points George to a table, at which he is soon seated. "Blank-blank-blank!" he reiterates, as the numbers turn up, and one by one the moody bank-keeper sweeps the money into his fast-increasing heap. "Cursed fate!--it is against me," mutters the forlorn man. "Another gone, and yet another! How this deluding, this fascinating money tortures me." With hectic face and agitated nerve, he puts down his last dollar. "Luck's mysterious!" exclaims Mr. Snivel, looking on unmoved, as the man of the moody face declares a blank, and again sweeps the money into his heap. "Gone!" says George, "all's gone now." He rises from his seat, in despair. "Don't get frantic, George-be a philosopher-try again-here's a ten. Luck 'll turn," says Mr. Snivel, patting the deluded man familiarly on the shoulder, as he resumes his seat. "Will poverty never cease torturing me? I have tried to be a man, an honest man, a respectable man. And yet, here I am, again cast upon a gambler's sea, struggling with its fearful tempests. How cold, how stone-like the faces around me!" he muses, watching with death-like gaze each number as it turns up. Again he has staked his last dollar; again fortune frowns upon him. Like a furnace of livid flame, the excitement seems burning up his brain. "I am a fool again," he says, throwing the blank number contemptuously upon the table. "Take it-take it, speechless, imperturbable man! Rake it into your pile, for my eyes are dim, and my fortune I must seek elsewhere." A noise at the door, as of some one in distress, is heard, and there rushes frantically into the den a pale, dejected-looking woman, bearing in her arms a sick and emaciated babe. "Oh, William! William!--has it come to this?" she shrieks, casting a wild glance round the den, until, with a dark, sad expression, her eye falls upon the object of her search. It is her husband, once a happy mechanic. Enticed by degrees into this den of ruin, becoming fascinated with its games of chance, he is now an habitue. To-night he left his suffering family, lost his all here, and now, having drank to relieve his feelings, lies insensible on the floor. "Come home!--come home! for God's sake come home to your suffering family," cries the woman, vaulting to him and taking him by the hand, her hair floating dishevelled down her shoulders. "I sent Tommy into the street to beg-I am ashamed-and he is picked up by the watch for a thief, a vagrant!" The prostrate man remains insensible to her appeal. Two policemen, who have been quietly neglecting their duties while taking a few chances, sit unmoved. Mr. Snivel thinks the woman better be removed. "Our half-starved mechanics," he says, "are a depraved set; and these wives they bring with them from the North are a sort of cross between a lean stage-driver and a wildcat. She seems a poor, destitute creature-just what they all come to, out here." Mr. Snivel shrugs his shoulders, bids George good night, and takes his departure. "Take care of yourself, George," he says admonitiously, as the destitute man watches him take his leave. The woman, frantic at the coldness and apathy manifested for her distress, lays her babe hurriedly upon the floor, and with passion and despair darting from her very eyes, makes a lunge across the keno table at the man who sits stoically at the bank. In an instant everything is turned into uproar and confusion. Glasses, chairs, and tables, are hurled about the floor; shriek follows shriek--"help! pity me! murder!" rises above the confusion, the watch without sound the alarm, and the watch within suddenly become conscious of their duty. In the midst of all the confusion, a voice cries out: "My pocket book-my pocket book!--I have been robbed." A light flashes from a guardsman's lantern, and George Mullholland is discovered with the forlorn woman in his arms-she clings tenaciously to her babe-rushing into the street. CHAPTER XXXII. WHICH A STATE OF SOCIETY IS SLIGHTLY REVEALED. A WEEK has rolled into the past since the event at the Keno den. Madame Montford, pale, thoughtful, and abstracted, sits musing in her parlor. "Between this hope and fear-this remorse of conscience, this struggle to overcome the suspicions of society, I have no peace. I am weary of this slandering-this unforgiving world. And yet it is my own conscience that refuses to forgive me. Go where I will I see the cold finger of scorn pointed at me: I read in every countenance, 'Madame Montford, you have wronged some one-your guilty conscience betrays you!' I have sought to atone for my error-to render justice to one my heart tells me I have wronged, yet I cannot shake off the dread burden; and there seems rest for me only in the grave. Ah! there it is. The one error of my life, and the means used to conceal it, may have brought misery upon more heads than one." She lays her hand upon her heart, and shakes her head sorrowfully. "Yes! something like a death-knell rings in my ears-'more than one have you sent, unhappy, to the grave.' Rejected by the one I fancy my own; my very touch scorned; my motives misconstrued-all, perhaps, by-a doubt yet hangs between us-an abandoned stranger. Duty to my conscience has driven me to acts that have betrayed me to society. I cannot shake my guilt from me even for a day; and now society coldly cancels all my claims to its attentions. If I could believe her dead; if I but knew this girl was not the object of all my heart's unrest, then the wearying doubt would be buried, and my heart might find peace in some remote corner of the earth. Well, well-perhaps I am wasting all this torture on an unworthy object. I should have thought of this sooner, for now foul slander is upon every tongue, and my misery is made thrice painful by my old flatterers. I will make one more effort, then if I fail of getting a certain clue to her, I will remove to some foreign country, shake off these haunting dreams, and be no longer a victim to my own thoughts." Somewhat relieved, Madame is roused from her reverie by a gentle tap at the door. "I have waited your coming, and am glad to see you;" she says, extending her hand, as a servant, in response to her command, ushers into her presence no less a person than Tom Swiggs. "I have sent for you," she resumes, motioning him gracefully to a chair, in which she begs he will be seated, "because I feel I can confide in you--" "Anything in my power is at your service, Madame," modestly interposes Tom, regaining confidence. "I entrusted something of much importance to me, to Mr. Snivel--" "We call him the Hon. Mr. Snivel now, since he has got to be a great politician," interrupts Tom. "And he not only betrayed my confidence," pursues Madame Montford, "but retains the amount I paid him, and forgets to render the promised service. You, I am told, can render me a service--" "As for Mr. Snivel," pursues Tom, hastily, "he has of late had his hands full, getting a poor but good-natured fellow, by the name of George Mullholland, into trouble. His friend, Judge Sleepyhorn, and he, have for some time had a plot on hand to crush this poor fellow. A few nights ago Snivel drove him mad at a gambling den, and in his desperation he robbed a man of his pocket-book. He shared the money with a poor woman he rescued at the den, and that is the way it was discovered that he was the criminal. He is a poor, thoughtless man, and he has been goaded on from one thing to another, until he was driven to commit this act. First, his wife was got away from him--" Tom pauses and blushes, as Madame Montford says: "His wife was got away from him?" "Yes, Madame," returns Tom, with an expression of sincerity. "The Judge got her away from him; and this morning he was arraigned before that same Judge for examination, and Mr. Snivel was a principal witness, and there was enough found against him to commit him for trial at the Sessions." Discovering that this information is exciting her emotions, Tom pauses, and contemplates her with steady gaze. She desires he will be her guide to the Poor-House, and there assist her in searching for Mag Munday, whom, report says, is confined in a cell. Tom having expressed his readiness to serve her, they are soon on their way to that establishment. A low, squatty building, with a red, moss-covered roof, two lean chimneys peeping out, the windows blockaded with dirt, and situated in one of the by-lanes of the city, is our Poor-House, standing half hid behind a crabbed old wall, and looking very like a much-neglected Quaker church in vegetation. We boast much of our institutions, and this being a sample of them, we hold it in great reverence. You may say that nothing so forcibly illustrates a state of society as the character of its institutions for the care of those unfortunate beings whom a capricious nature has deprived of their reason. We agree with you. We see our Poor-House crumbling to the ground with decay, yet imagine it, or affect to imagine it, a very grand edifice, in every way suited to the wants of such rough ends of humanity as are found in it. Like Satan, we are brilliant believers in ourselves, not bad sophists, and singularly clever in finding apologies for all great crimes. At the door of the Poor-House stands a dilapidated hearse, to which an old gray horse is attached. A number of buzzards have gathered about him, turn their heads suspiciously now and then, and seem meditating a descent upon his bones at no very distant day. Madame casts a glance at the hearse, and the poor old horse, and the cawing buzzards, then follows Tom, timidly, to the door. He has rung the bell, and soon there stands before them, in the damp doorway, a fussy old man, with a very broad, red face, and a very blunt nose, and two very dull, gray eyes, which he fortifies with a pair of massive-framed spectacles, that have a passion for getting upon the tip-end of his broad blunt nose. "There, you want to see somebody! Always somebody wanted to be seen, when we have dead folks to get rid of," mutters the old man, querulously, then looking inquiringly at the visitors. Tom says they would like to go over the premises. "Yes-know you would. Ain't so dull but I can see what folks want when they look in here." The old man, his countenance wearing an expression of stupidity, runs his dingy fingers over the crown of his bald head, and seems questioning within himself whether to admit them. "I'm not in a very good humor to-day," he rather growls than speaks, "but you can come in--I'm of a good family-and I'll call Glentworthy. I'm old-I can't get about much. We'll all get old." The building seems in a very bad temper generally. Mr. Glentworthy is called. Mr. Glentworthy, with a profane expletive, pops his head out at the top of the stairs, and inquires who wants him. The visitors have advanced into a little, narrow passage, lumbered with all sorts of rubbish, and swarming with flies. Mr. Saddlerock (for this is the old man's name) seems in a declining mood, the building seems in a declining mood, Mr. Glentworthy seems in a declining mood-everything you look at seems in a declining mood. "As if I hadn't enough to do, gettin' off this dead cribber!" interpolates Mr. Glentworthy, withdrawing his wicked face, and taking himself back into a room on the left. "He's not so bad a man, only it doesn't come out at first;" pursues Mr. Saddlerock, continuing to rub his head, and to fuss round on his toes. His mind, Madame Montford verily believes stuck in a fog. "We must wait a bit," says the old man, his face seeming to elongate. "You can look about-there's not much to be seen, and what there is-well, it's not the finest." Mr. Saddlerock shuffles his feet, and then shuffles himself into a small side room. Through the building there breathes a warm, sickly atmosphere; the effect has left its marks upon the sad, waning countenances of its unfortunate inmates. Tom and Madame Montford set out to explore the establishment. They enter room after room, find them small, dark, and filthy beyond description. Some are crowded with half-naked, flabby females, whose careworn faces, and well-starved aspect, tells a sorrowful tale of the chivalry. An abundant supply of profane works, in yellow and red covers, would indeed seem to have been substituted for food, which, to the shame of our commissioners, be it said, is a scarce article here. Cooped up in another little room, after the fashion of wild beasts in a cage, are seven poor idiots, whose forlorn condition, sad, dull countenances, as they sit round a table, staring vacantly at one another, like mummies in contemplation, form a wild but singularly touching picture. Each countenance pales before the seeming study of its opponent, until, enraptured and amazed, they break out into a wild, hysterical laugh. And thus, poisoned, starved, and left to die, does time with these poor mortals fleet on. The visitors ascend to the second story. A shuffling of feet in a room at the top of the stairs excites their curiosity. Mr. Glentworthy's voice grates harshly on the ear, in language we cannot insert in this history. "Our high families never look into low places-chance if the commissioner has looked in here for years," says Tom, observing Madame Montford protect her inhaling organs with her perfumed cambric. "There is a principle of economy carried out-and a very nice principle, too, in getting these poor out of the world as quick as possible." Tom pushes open a door, and, heavens! what a sight is here. He stands aghast in the doorway-Madam, on tip-toe, peers anxiously in over his shoulders. Mr. Glentworthy and two negroes-the former slightly inebriated, the latter trembling of fright-are preparing to box up a lifeless mass, lying carelessly upon the floor. The distorted features, the profusion of long, red hair, curling over a scared face, and the stalworth figure, shed some light upon the identity of the deceased. "Who is it?" ejaculates Mr. Glentworthy, in response to an inquiry from Tom. Mr. Glentworthy shrugs his shoulders, and commences whistling a tune. "That cove!" he resumes, having stopped short in his tune, "a man what don't know that cove, never had much to do with politics. Stuffed more ballot boxes, cribbed more voters, and knocked down more slip-shod citizens-that cove has, than, put 'em all together, would make a South Carolina regiment. A mighty man among politicians, he was! Now the devil has cribbed him-he'll know how good it is!" Mr. Glentworthy says this with an air of superlative satisfaction, resuming his tune. The dead man is Milman Mingle, the vote-cribber, who died of a wound he received at the hands of an antagonist, whom he was endeavoring to "block out" while going to the polls to cast his vote. "Big politician, but had no home!" says Madame, with a sigh. Mr. Glentworthy soon had what remained of the vote-cribber-the man to whom so many were indebted for their high offices-into a deal box, and the deal box into the old hearse, and the old hearse, driven by a mischievous negro, hastening to that great crib to which we must all go. "Visitors," Mr. Glentworthy smiles, "must not question the way we do business here, I get no pay, and there's only old Saddlerock and me to do all the work. Old Saddlerock, you see, is a bit of a miser, and having a large family of small Saddlerocks to provide for, scrapes what he can into his own pocket. No one is the wiser. They can't be-they never come in." Mr. Glentworthy, in reply to a question from Madame Montford, says Mag Munday (he has some faint recollection of her) was twice in the house, which he dignifies with the title of "Institution." She never was in the "mad cells"--to his recollection. "Them what get there, mostly die there." A gift of two dollars secures Mr. Glentworthy's services, and restores him to perfect good nature. "You will remember," says Tom, "that this woman ran neglected about the streets, was much abused, and ended in becoming a maniac." Mr. Glentworthy remembers very well, but adds: "We have so many maniacs on our hands, that we can't distinctly remember them all. The clergymen take good care never to look in here. They couldn't do any good if they did, for nobody cares for the rubbish sent here; and if you tried to Christianize them, you would only get laughed at. I don't like to be laughed at. Munday's not here now, that's settled-but I'll-for curiosity's sake-show you into the 'mad cells.'" Mr. Glentworthy leads the way, down the rickety old stairs, through the lumbered passage, into an open square, and from thence into a small out-building, at the extreme end of which some dozen wet, slippery steps, led into a dark subterranean passage, on each side of which are small, dungeon-like cells. "Heavens!" exclaims Madame Montford, picking her way down the steep, slippery steps. "How chilling! how tomb-like! Can it be that mortals are confined here, and live?" she mutters, incoherently. The stifling atmosphere is redolent of disease. "It straightens 'em down, sublimely-to put 'em in here," says Mr. Glentworthy, laconically, lighting his lamp. "I hope to get old Saddlerock in here. Give him such a mellowing!" He turns his light, and the shadows play, spectre-like, along a low, wet aisle, hung on each side with rusty bolts and locks, revealing the doors of cells. An ominous stillness is broken by the dull clank of chains, the muttering of voices, the shuffling of limbs; then a low wail breaks upon the ear, and rises higher and higher, shriller and shriller, until in piercing shrieks it chills the very heart. Now it ceases, and the echoes, like the murmuring winds, die faintly away. "Look in here, now," says Mr. Glentworthy--"a likely wench-once she was!" He swings open a door, and there issues from a cell about four feet six inches wide, and nine long, the hideous countenance of a poor, mulatto girl, whose shrunken body, skeleton-like arms, distended and glassy eyes, tell but too forcibly her tale of sorrow. How vivid the picture of wild idiocy is pictured in her sad, sorrowing face. No painter's touch could have added a line more perfect. Now she rushes forward, with a suddenness that makes Madame Montford shrink back, appalled-now she fixes her eyes, hangs down her head, and gives vent to her tears. "My soul is white-yes, yes, yes! I know it is white; God tells me it is white-he knows-he never tortures. He doesn't keep me here to die-no, I can't die here in the dark. I won't get to heaven if I do. Oh! yes, yes, yes, I have a white soul, but my skin is not," she rather murmurs than speaks, continuing to hold down her head, while parting her long, clustering hair over her shoulders. Notwithstanding the spectacle of horror presented in this living skeleton, there is something in her look and action which bespeaks more the abuse of long confinement than the result of natural aberration of mind. "She gets fierce now and then, and yells," says the unmoved Glentworthy, "but she won't hurt ye--" Can it be possible that such things as are here pictured have an existence among a people laying any claim to a state of civilization? the reader may ask. The author would here say that to the end of fortifying himself against the charge of exaggeration, he submitted the MS. of this chapter to a gentleman of the highest respectability in Charleston, whose unqualified approval it received, as well as enlisting his sympathies in behalf of the unfortunate lunatics found in the cells described. Four years have passed since that time. He subsequently sent the author the following, from the "Charleston Courier," which speaks for itself. "FROM THE REPORTS OF COUNCIL. "January 4th, 1843. "The following communication was received from William M. Lawton, Esq., Chairman of the Commissioners of the Poor-house. "'Charleston, Dec. 17th, 1852. "'To the Honorable, the City Council of Charleston: "'By a resolution of the Board of Commissioners of this City, I have been instructed to communicate with your honorable body in relation to the insane paupers now in Poor-house', (the insane in a poorhouse!) 'and to request that you will adopt the necessary provision for sending them to the Lunatic Asylum at Columbia. * * * * There are twelve on the list, many of whom, it is feared, have already remained too long in an institution quite unsuited to their unfortunate situation. "'With great respect, your very obedient servant, "'(Signed) WM. M. LAWTON, "'Chairman of the Board of Commissioners.'" "How long," inquires Madame Montford, who has been questioning within herself whether any act of her life could have brought a human being into such a place, "has she been confined here?" Mr. Glentworthy says she tells her own tale. "Five years,--five years,--five long, long years, I have waited for him in the dark, but he won't come," she lisps in a faltering voice, as her emotions overwhelm her. Then crouching back upon the floor, she supports her head pensively in her left hand, her elbow resting on her knee, and her right hand poised against the brick wall. "Pencele!" says Mr. Glentworthy, for such is the wretched woman's name, "cannot you sing a song for your friends?" Turning aside to Madame Montford, he adds, "she sings nicely. We shall soon get her out of the way-can't last much longer." Mr. Glentworthy, drawing a small bottle from his pocket, places it to his lips, saying he stole it from old Saddlerock, and gulps down a portion of the contents. His breath is already redolent of whiskey. "Oh, yes, yes, yes! I can sing for them, I can smother them with kisses. Good faces seldom look in here, seldom look in here," she rises to her feet, and extends her bony hand, as the tears steal down Madame Montford's cheeks. Tom stands speechless. He wishes he had power to redress the wrongs of this suffering maniac-his very soul fires up against the coldness and apathy of a people who permit such outrages against humanity. "There!--he comes! he comes! he comes!" the maniac speaks, with faltering voice, then strikes up a plaintive air, which she sings with a voice of much sweetness, to these words: When you find him, speed him to me, And this heart will cease its bleeding, &c. The history of all this poor maniac's sufferings is told in a few simple words that fall incautiously from Mr. Glentworthy's lips: "Poor fool, she had only been married a couple of weeks, when they sold her husband down South. She thinks if she keeps mad, he'll come back." There was something touching, something melancholy in the music of her song, as its strains verberated and reverberated through the dread vault, then, like the echo of a lover's lute on some Alpine hill, died softly away. CHAPTER XXXIII. IN WHICH THERE IS A SINGULAR REVELATION. MADAME MONTFORD returns, unsuccessful, to her parlor. It is conscience that unlocks the guilty heart, that forces mortals to seek relief where there is no chance of finding it. It was this irresistible emotion that found her counciling Tom Swiggs, making of him a confidant in her search for the woman she felt could remove the doubt, in respect to Anna's identity, that hung so painfully in her mind. And yet, such was her position, hesitating as it were between her ambition to move in fashionable society, and her anxiety to atone for a past error, that she dare not disclose the secret of all her troubles even to him. She sought him, not that he could soften her anxiety, but that being an humble person, she could pursue her object through him, unobserved to society-in a word, that he would be a protection against the apprehensions of scandal-mongers. Such are the shifts to which the ambitious guilty have recourse. What she has beheld in the poorhouse, too, only serves to quicken her thoughts of the misery she may have inflicted upon others, and to stimulate her resolution to persevere in her search for the woman. Conscious that wealth and luxury does not always bring happiness, and that without a spotless character, woman is but a feeble creature in this world, she would now sacrifice everything else for that one ennobling charm. It may be proper here to add, that although Tom Swiggs could not enter into the repentant woman's designs, having arranged with his employer to sail for London in a few days, she learned of him something that reflected a little more light in her path. And that was, that the woman Anna Bonard, repined of her act in leaving George Mullholland, to whom she was anxious to return-that she was now held against her will; that she detested Judge Sleepyhorn, although he had provided lavishly for her comfort. Anna knew George loved her, and that love, even to an abandoned woman (if she could know it sincere), was dearer to her than all else. She learned, too, that high up on Anna's right arm, there was imprinted in blue and red ink, two hearts and a broken anchor. And this tended further to increase her anxiety. And while evolving all these things in her mind, and contemplating the next best course to pursue, her parlor is invaded by Mr. Snivel. He is no longer Mr. Soloman, nor Mr. Snivel. He is the Hon. Mr. Snivel. It is curious to contemplate the character of the men to whose name we attach this mark of distinction. "I know you will pardon my seeming neglect, Madame," he says, grasping her hand warmly, as a smile of exultation lights up his countenance. "The fact is, we public men are so absorbed in the affairs of the nation, that we have scarce a thought to give to affairs of a private nature. We have elected our ticket. I was determined it should be so, if Jericho fell. And, more than all, I am made an honorable, by the popular sentiment of the people--" "To be popular with the people, is truly an honor," interrupts the lady, facetiously. "Thank you-O, thank you, for the compliment," pursues our hero. "Now, as to this unfortunate person you seek, knowing it was of little use to search for her in our institutions of charity-one never can find out anything about the wretches who get into them-I put the matter into the hands of one of our day-police-a plaguey sharp fellow-and he set about scenting her out. I gave him a large sum, and promised him more if successful. Here, then, after a long and tedious search-I have no doubt the fellow earned his money-is what he got from New York, this morning." The Hon. Mr. Snivel, fixing his eye steadily upon her, hands her a letter which reads thus: "NEW YORK, Dec. 14th, 18-. "Last night, while making search after a habitant of the Points, a odd old chip what has wandered about here for some years, some think he has bin a better sort of man once, I struck across the woman you want. She is somewhere tucked away in a Cow Bay garret, and is awful crazy; I'll keep me eye out till somethin' further. If her friends wants to give her a lift out of this place, they'd better come and see me at once. "Yours, as ever, "M. FITZGERALD." Mr. Snivel ogles Madame Montford over the page of a book he affects to read. "Guilt! deep and strong," he says within himself, as Madame, with flushed countenance and trembling hand, ponders and ponders over the paper. Then her emotions quicken, her eyes exchange glances with Mr. Snivel, and she whispers, with a sigh, "found-at last! And yet how foolish of me to give way to my feelings? The affair, at best, is none of mine." Mr. Snivel bows, and curls his Saxon mustache. "To do good for others is the natural quality of a generous nature." Madame, somewhat relieved by this condescension of the Hon. gentleman, says, in reply, "I am curious at solving family affairs." "And I!" says our hero, with refreshing coolness--"always ready to do a bit of a good turn." Madame pauses, as if in doubt whether to proceed or qualify what she has already said. "A relative, whose happiness I make my own," she resumes, and again pauses, while the words tremble upon her lips. She hears the words knelling in her ears: "A guilty conscience needs no betrayer." "You have," pursues our hero, "a certain clue; and of that I may congratulate you." Madame says she will prepare at once to return to her home in New York, and-and here again the words hang upon her lips. She was going to say, her future proceedings would be governed by the paper she holds so nervously in her fingers. Snivel here receives a nostrum from the lady's purse. "Truly,!--Madame," he says, in taking leave of her, "the St. Cecilia will regret you-we shall all regret you; you honored and graced our assemblies so. Our first families will part with you reluctantly. It may, however, be some satisfaction to know how many kind things will be said of you in your absence." Mr. Snivel makes his last bow, a sarcastic smile playing over his face, and passes into the street. On the following day she encloses a present of fifty dollars to Tom Swiggs, enjoins the necessity of his keeping her visit to the poor-house a secret, and takes leave of Charleston. And here our scene changes, and we must transport the reader to New York. It is the day following the night Mr. Detective Fitzgerald discovered what remained of poor Toddleworth, in the garret of the House of the Nine Nations. The City Hall clock strikes twelve. The goodly are gathered into the House of the Foreign Missions, in which peace and respectability would seem to preside. The good-natured fat man is in his seat, pondering over letters lately received from the "dark regions" of Arabia; the somewhat lean, but very respectable-looking Secretary, is got nicely into his spectacles, and sits pondering over lusty folios of reports from Hindostan, and various other fields of missionary labor, all setting forth the various large amounts of money expended, how much more could be expended, and what a blessing it is to be enabled to announce the fact that there is now a hope of something being done. The same anxious-faced bevy of females we described in a previous chapter, are here, seated at a table, deeply interested in certain periodicals and papers; while here and there about the room, are several contemplative gentlemen in black. Brother Spyke, having deeply interested Brothers Phills and Prim with an account of his visit to the Bottomless Pit, paces up and down the room, thinking of Antioch, and the evangelization of the heathen world. "Truly, brother," speaks the good-natured fat man, "his coming seemeth long." "Eleven was the hour; but why he tarryeth I know not," returns Brother Spyke, with calm demeanor. "There is something more alarming in Sister Slocum's absence," interposes one of the ladies. The house seems in a waiting mood, when suddenly Mr. Detective Fitzgerald enters, and changes it to one of anxiety. Several voices inquire if he was successful. He shakes his head, and having recounted his adventures, the discovery of where the money went to, and the utter hopelessness of an effort to recover it; "as for the man, Toddleworth," he says, methodically, "he was found with a broken skull. The Coroner has had an inquest over him; but murders are so common. The verdict was, that he died of a broken skull, by the hands of some one to the jury unknown. Suspicions were strong against one Tom Downey, who is very like a heathen, and is mistrusted of several murders. The affair disturbed the neighborhood a little, and the Coroner tried to get something out concerning the man's history; but it all went to the wind, for the people were all so ignorant. They all knew everything about him, which turned out to be just nothing, which they were ready to swear to. One believed Father Flaherty made the Bible, another believed the Devil still chained in Columbia College-a third believed the stars were lanterns to guide priests-the only angels they know-on their way to heaven." "Truly!" exclaims the man of the spectacles, in a moment of abstraction. Brother Spyke says: "the Lord be merciful." "On the body of the poor man we found this document. It was rolled carefully up in a rag, and is supposed to throw some light on his history." Mr. Fitzgerald draws leisurely from his pocket a distained and much-crumpled paper, written over in a bold, business-like hand, and passes it to the man in the spectacles, as a dozen or more anxious faces gather round, eager to explore the contents. "He went out of the Points as mysteriously as he came in. We buried him a bit ago, and have got Downey in the Tombs: he'll be hanged, no doubt," concludes the detective, laying aside his cap, and setting himself, uninvited, into a chair. The man in the spectacles commences reading the paper, which runs as follows: "I have been to you an unknown, and had died such an unknown, but that my conscience tells me I have a duty to perform. I have wronged no one, owe no one a penny, harbor no malice against any one; I am a victim of a broken heart, and my own melancholy. Many years ago I pursued an honorable business in this city, and was respected and esteemed. Many knew me, and fortune seemed to shed upon me her smiles. I married a lady of wealth and affluence, one I loved and doted on. Our affections seemed formed for our bond; we lived for one another; our happiness seemed complete. But alas! an evil hour came. Ambitious of admiration, she gradually became a slave to fashionable society, and then gave herself up to those flatterers who hang about it, and whose chief occupation it is to make weak-minded women vain of their own charms. Coldness, and indifference to home, soon followed. My house was invaded, my home-that home I regarded so sacredly-became the resort of men in whose society I found no pleasure, with whom I had no feeling in common. I could not remonstrate, for that would have betrayed in me a want of confidence in the fidelity of one I loved too blindly. I was not one of those who make life miserable in seeing a little and suspecting much. No! I forgave many things that wounded my feelings; and my love for her would not permit a thought to invade the sanctity of her fidelity. Business called me into a foreign country, where I remained several months, then returned-not, alas! to a home made happy by the purity of one I esteemed an angel;--not to the arms of a pure, fond wife, but to find my confidence betrayed, my home invaded-she, in whom I had treasured up my love, polluted; and slander, like a desert wind, pouring its desolating breath into my very heart. In my blindness I would have forgiven her, taken her back to my distracted bosom, and fled with her to some distant land, there still to have lived and loved her. But she sought rather to conceal her guilt than ask forgiveness. My reason fled me, my passion rose above my judgment, I sank under the burden of my sorrow, attempted to put an end to her life, and to my own misery. Failing in this, for my hand was stayed by a voice I heard calling to me, I fled the country and sought relief for my feelings in the wilds of Chili. I left nearly all to my wife, took but little with me, for my object was to bury myself from the world that had known me, and respected me. Destitution followed me; whither I went there seemed no rest, no peace of mind for me. The past floated uppermost in my mind. I was ever recurring to home, to those with whom I had associated, to an hundred things that had endeared me to my own country. Years passed-years of suffering and sorrow, and I found myself a lone wanderer, without friend or money. During this time it was reported at home, as well as chronicled in the newspapers, that I was dead. The inventor of this report had ends, I will not name them here, to serve. I was indeed dead to all who had known me happy in this world. Disguised, a mere shadow of what I was once, I wandered back to New York, heart-sick and discouraged, and buried myself among those whose destitution, worse, perhaps, than my own, afforded me a means of consolation. My life has long been a burden to me; I have many times prayed God, in his mercy, to take me away, to close the account of my misery. Do you ask my name? Ah! that is what pains me most. To live unknown, a wretched outcast, in a city where I once enjoyed a name that was respected, is what has haunted my thoughts, and tortured my feelings. But I cannot withhold it, even though it has gone down, tainted and dishonored. It is Henry Montford. And with this short record I close my history, leaving the rest for those to search out who find this paper, at my death, which cannot be long hence. "HENRY MONTFORD. "New York, Nov. -, 184-." A few sighs follow the reading of the paper, but no very deep interest, no very tender emotion, is awakened in the hearts of the goodly. Nevertheless, it throws a flood of light upon the morals of a class of society vulgarly termed fashionable. The meek females hold their tears and shake their heads. Brother Spyke elongates his lean figure, draws near, and says the whole thing is very unsatisfactory. Not one word is let drop about the lost money. Brother Phills will say this-that the romance is very cleverly got up, as the theatre people say. The good-natured fat man, breathing somewhat freer, says: "Truly! these people have a pleasant way of passing out of the world. They die of their artful practices-seeking to devour the good and the generous." "There's more suffers than imposes-an' there's more than's written meant in that same bit of paper. Toddleworth was as inoffensive a creature as you'd meet in a day. May God forgive him all his faults;" interposes Mr. Detective Fitzgerald, gathering up his cap and passing slowly out of the room. And this colloquy is put an end to by the sudden appearance of Sister Slocum. A rustling silk dress, of quiet color, and set off with three modest flounces; an India shawl, loosely thrown over her shoulders; a dainty little collar, of honiton, drawn neatly about her neck, and a bonnet of buff-colored silk, tastefully set off with tart-pie work without, and lined with virtuous white satin within, so saucily poised on her head, suggests the idea that she has an eye to fashion as well as the heathen world. Her face, too, always so broad, bright, and benevolent in its changes-is chastely framed in a crape border, so nicely crimped, so nicely tucked under her benevolent chin at one end, and so nicely pinned under the virtuous white lining at the other. Goodness itself radiates from those large, earnest blue eyes, those soft, white cheeks, that large forehead, with those dashes of silvery hair crossing it so smoothly and so exactly-that well-developed, but rather broad nose, and that mouth so expressive of gentleness. Sister Slocum, it requires no very acute observer to discover, has got something more than the heathen world at heart, for all those soft, congenial features are shadowed with sadness. Silently she takes her seat, sits abstracted for a few minutes-the house is thrown into a wondering mood-then looks wisely through her spectacles, and having folded her hands with an air of great resignation, shakes, and shakes, and shakes her head. Her eyes sud- denly fill with tears, her thoughts wander, or seem to wander, she attempts to speak, her voice choaks, and the words hang upon her lips. All is consternation and excitement. Anxious faces gather round, and whispering voices inquire the cause. The lean man in the spectacles having applied his hartshorn bottle, Sister Slocum, to the great joy of all present, is so far restored as to be able to announce the singular, but no less melancholy fact, that our dear guest, Sister Swiggs, has passed from this world to a better. She retired full of sorrow, but came not in the morning. And this so troubled Sister Scudder that there was no peace until she entered her room. But she found the angel had been there before her, smoothed the pillow of the stranger, and left her to sleep in death. On earth her work was well done, and in the arms of the angel, her pure spirit now beareth witness in heaven. Sister Slocum's emotions forbid her saying more. She concludes, and buries her face in her cambric. Then an outpouring of consoling words follow. "He cometh like a thief in the night: His works are full of mystery; truly, He chasteneth; He giveth and taketh away." Such are a few of the sentiments lisped, regrettingly, for the departed. How vain are the hopes with which we build castles in the air; how strange the motives that impel us to ill-advised acts. We leave untouched the things that call loudest for our energies, and treasure up our little that we may serve that which least concerns us. In this instance it is seen how that which came of evil went in evil; how disapointment stepped in and blew the castle down at a breath. There could not be a doubt that the disease of which Sister Smiggs died, and which it is feared the State to which she belongs will one day die, was little dignity. Leaving her then in the arms of the House of the Foreign Mission, and her burial to the Secretary of the very excellent "Tract Society" she struggled so faithfully to serve, we close this chapter of events, the reader having, no doubt, discovered the husband of Madame Montford in the wretched man, Mr. Toddleworth. CHAPTER XXXIV. THE TWO PICTURES. WE come now to another stage of this history. Six months have glided into the past since the events recorded in the foregoing chapter. The political world of Charleston is resolved to remain in the Union a few months longer. It is a pleasant evening in early May. The western sky is golden with the setting sun, and the heavens are filled with battlements of refulgent clouds, now softening away into night. Yonder to the East, reposes a dark grove. A gentle breeze fans through its foliage, the leaves laugh and whisper, the perfumes of flowers are diffusing through the air birds make melodious with their songs, the trilling stream mingles its murmurs, and nature would seem gathering her beauties into one enchanting harmony. In the foreground of the grove, and looking as if it borrowed solitude of the deep foliage, in which it is half buried, rises a pretty villa, wherein may be seen, surrounded by luxuries the common herd might well envy, the fair, the beautiful siren, Anna Bonard. In the dingy little back parlor of the old antiquary, grim poverty looking in through every crevasse, sits the artless and pure-minded Maria McArthur. How different are the thoughts, the hopes, the emotions of these two women. Comfort would seem smiling on the one, while destitution threatens the other. To the eye that looks only upon the surface, how deceptive is the picture. The one with every wish gratified, an expression of sorrow shadowing her countenance, and that freshness and sweetness for which she was distinguished passing away, contemplates herself a submissive captive, at the mercy of one for whom she has no love, whose gold she cannot inherit, and whose roof she must some day leave for the street. The other feels poverty grasping at her, but is proud in the possession of her virtue; and though trouble would seem tracing its lines upon her features, her heart remains untouched by remorse;--she is strong in the consciousness that when all else is gone, her virtue will remain her beacon light to happiness. Anna, in the loss of that virtue, sees herself shut out from that very world that points her to the yawning chasm of her future; she feels how like a slave in the hands of one whose heart is as cold as his smiles are false, she is. Maria owes the world no hate, nor are her thougnts disturbed by such contemplations. Anna, with embittered and remorseful feelings-with dark and terrible passions agitating her bosom, looks back over her eventful life, to a period when even her own history is shut to her, only to find the tortures of her soul heightened. Maria looks back upon a life of fond attachment to her father, to her humble efforts to serve others, and to know that she has borne with Christian fortitude those ills which are incident to humble life. With her, an emotion of joy repays the contemplation. To Anna, the future is hung in dark forebodings. She recalls to mind the interview with Madame Montford, but that only tends to deepen the storm of anguish the contemplation of her parentage naturally gives rise to. With Maria, the present hangs dark and the future brightens. She thinks of the absent one she loves-of how she can best serve her aged father, and how she can make their little home cheerful until the return of Tom Swiggs, who is gone abroad. It must be here disclosed that the old man had joined their hands, and invoked a blessing on their heads, ere Tom took his departure. Maria looks forward to the day of his return with joyous emotions. That return is the day dream of her heart; in it she sees her future brightening. Such are the cherished thoughts of a pure mind. Poverty may gnaw away at the hearthstone, cares and sorrow may fall thick in your path, the rich may frown upon you, and the vicious sport with your misfortunes, but virtue gives you power to overcome them all. In Maria's ear something whispers: Woman! hold fast to thy virtue, for if once it go neither gold nor false tongues can buy it back. Anna sees the companion of her early life, and the sharer of her sufferings, shut up in a prison, a robber, doomed to the lash. "He was sincere to me, and my only true friend--am I the cause of this?" she muses. Her heart answers, and her bosom fills with dark and stormy emotions. One small boon is now all she asks. She could bow down and worship before the throne of virgin innocence, for now its worth towers, majestic, before her. It discovers to her the falsity of her day-dream; it tells her what an empty vessel is this life of ours without it. She knows George Mullholland loves her passionately; she knows how deep will be his grief, how revengeful his feelings. It is poverty that fastens the poison in the heart of the rejected lover. The thought of this flashes through her mind. His hopeless condition, crushed out as it were to gratify him in whose company her pleasures are but transitory, and may any day end, darkens as she contemplates it. How can she acquit her conscience of having deliberately and faithlessly renounced one who was so true to her? She repines, her womanly nature revolts at the thought-the destiny her superstition pictured so dark and terrible, stares her in the face. She resolves a plan for his release, and, relieved with a hope that she can accomplish it while propitiating the friendship of the Judge, the next day seeks him in his prison cell, and with all that vehemence woman, in the outpouring of her generous impulses, can call to her aid, implores his forgiveness. But the rust of disappointment has dried up his better nature; his heart is wrung with the shafts of ingratitude--all the fierce passions of his nature, hate, scorn and revenge, rise up in the one stormy outburst of his soul. He casts upon her a look of withering scorn, the past of that life so chequered flashes vividly through his thoughts, his hate deepens, he hurls her from him, invokes a curse upon her head, and shuts her from his sight. "Mine will be the retribution!" he says, knitting his dark brow. How is it with the Judge-that high functionary who provides thus sumptuously for his mistress? His morals, like his judgments, are excused, in the cheap quality of our social morality. Such is gilded vice; such is humble virtue. A few days more and the term of the Sessions commences. George is arraigned, and the honorable Mr. Snivel, who laid the plot, and furthered the crime, now appears as a principal witness. He procures the man's conviction, and listens with guilty heart to the sentence, for he is rearrainged on sentence day, and Mr. Snivel is present. And while the culprit is sentenced to two years imprisonment, and to receive eighty lashes, laid on his bare back, while at the public whipping-post, at four stated times, the man who stimulated the hand of the criminal, is honored and flattered by society. Such is the majesty of the law. CHAPTER XXXV. IN WHICH A LITTLE LIGHT IS SHED UPON THE CHARACTER OF OUR CHIVALRY. MR. MCARTHUR has jogged on, in the good old way but his worldly store seems not to increase. The time, nevertheless, is arrived when he is expected to return the little amount borrowed of Keepum, through the agency of Mr. Snivel. Again and again has he been notified that he must pay or go to that place in which we lock up all our very estimable "first families," whose money has taken wings and flown away. Not content with this, the two worthy gentlemen have more than once invaded the Antiquary's back parlor, and offered, as we have described in a former chapter, improper advances to his daughter. Mr. Keepum, dressed in a flashy coat, his sharp, mercenary face, hectic of night revels, and his small but wicked eyes wandering over Mr. McArthur's stock in trade, is seen in pursuit of his darling object. "I don't mind so much about the pay, old man! I'm up well in the world. The fact is, I am esteemed-and I am!--a public benefactor. I never forget how much we owe to the chivalric spirit of our ancestors, and in dealing with the poor-money matters and politics are different from anything else-I am too generous. I don't mind my own interests enough. There it is!" Mr. Keepum says this with an evident relief to himself. Indeed it must here be acknowledged that this very excellent member of the St. Cecilia Society, and profound dealer in lottery tickets, like our fine gentlemen who are so scrupulous of their chivalry while stabbing men behind their backs, fancies himself one of the most disinterested beings known to generous nature. Bent and tottering, the old man recounts the value of his curiosities; which, like our chivalry, is much talked of but hard to get at. He offers in apology for the nonpayment of the debt his knowledge of the old continentals, just as we offer our chivalry in excuse for every disgraceful act-every savage law. In fine, he follows the maxims of our politicians, recapitulating a dozen or more things (wiping the sweat from his brow the while) that have no earthly connection with the subject. "They are all very well," Mr. Keepum rejoins, with an air of self-importance, dusting the ashes from his cigar. He only wishes to impress the old man with the fact that he is his very best friend. And having somewhat relieved the Antiquary's mind of its apprehensions, for McArthur stood in great fear of duns, Mr. Keepum pops, uninvited, into the "back parlor," where he has not long been when Maria's screams for assistance break forth. "Ah! I am old-there is not much left me now. Yes, I am old, my infirmities are upon me. Pray, good man, spare me my daughter. Nay, you must not break the peace of my house;" mutters the old man, advancing into the room, with infirm step, and looking wistfully at his daughter, as if eager to clasp her in his arms. Maria stands in a defiant attitude, her left hand poised on a chair, and her right pointing scornfully in the face of Keepum, who recoils under the look of withering scorn that darkens her countenance. "A gentleman! begone, knave! for your looks betray you. You cannot buy my ruin with your gold; you cannot deceive me with your false tongue. If hate were a noble passion, I would not vent that which now agitates my bosom on you. Nay, I would reserve it for a better purpose--" "Indeed, indeed-now I say honestly, your daughter mistakes me. I was only being a little friendly to her," interrupts the chopfallen man. He did not think her capable of summoning so much passion to her aid. Maria, it must be said, was one of those seemingly calm natures in which resentment takes deepest root, in which the passions are most violent when roused. Solitude does, indeed, tend to invest the passionate nature with a calm surface. A less penetrating observer than the chivalrous Keepum, might have discovered in Maria a spirit he could not so easily humble to his uses. It is the modest, thoughtful woman, you cannot make lick the dust in sorrow and tears. "Coward! you laid ruffian hands on me!" says Maria, again towering to her height, and giving vent to her feelings. "Madam, Madam," pursues Keepum, trembling and crouching, "you asperse my honor,--my sacred honor, Madam. You see-let me say a word, now-you are leting your temper get the better of you. I never, and the public know I never did-I never did a dishonorable thing in my life." Turning to the bewildered old man, he continues: "to be called a knave, and upbraided in this manner by your daughter, when I have befriended you all these days!" His wicked eyes fall guilty to the floor. "Out man!--out! Let your sense of right, if you have it, teach you what is friendship. Know that, like mercy, it is not poured out with hands reeking of female dishonor." Mr. Keepum, like many more of our very fine gentlemen, had so trained his thoughts to look upon the poor as slaves created for a base use, that he neither could bring his mind to believe in the existence of such things as noble spirits under humble roofs, nor to imagine himself-even while committing the grossest outrages-doing aught to sully the high chivalric spirit he fancied he possessed. The old Antiquary, on the other hand, was not a little surprised to find his daughter displaying such extraordinary means of repulsing an enemy. Trembling, and child-like he stands, conscious of being in the grasp of a knave, whose object was more the ruin of his daughter than the recovery of a small amount of money, the tears glistening in his eyes, and the finger of old age marked on his furrowed brow. "Father, father!" says Maria, and the words hang upon her quivering lips, her face becomes pale as marble, her strength deserts her,--she trembles from head to foot, and sinks upon the old man's bosom, struggling to smother her sobs. Her passion has left her; her calmer nature has risen up to rebuke it. The old man leads her tenderly to the sofa, and there seeks to sooth her troubled spirit. "As if this hub bub was always to last!" a voice speaks suddenly. It is the Hon. Mr. Snivel, who looks in at the eleventh hour, as he says, to find affairs always in a fuss. "Being a man of legal knowledge-always ready to do a bit of a good turn-especially in putting a disordered house to rights-I thought it well to look in, having a leisure minute or two (we have had a convention for dissolving the Union, and passed a vote to that end!) to give to my old friends," Mr. Snivel says, in a voice at once conciliating and insinuating. "I always think of a border feud when I come here-things that find no favor with me." Mr. Snivel, having first patted the old man on the shoulder, exchanges a significant wink with his friend Keepum, and then bestows upon him what he is pleased to call a little wholesome advice. "People misunderstand Mr. Keepum," he says, "who is one of the most generous of men, but lacks discretion, and in trying to be polite to everybody, lets his feelings have too much latitude now and then." Maria buries her face in her handkerchief, as if indifferent to the reconciliation offered. "Now let this all be forgotten-let friendship reign among friends: that's my motto. But! I say,--this is a bad piece of news we have this morning. Clipped this from an English paper," resumes the Hon. gentleman, drawing coolly from his pocket a bit of paper, having the appearance of an extract. "You are never without some kind of news-mostly bad!" says Keepum, flinging himself into a chair, with an air of restored confidence. Mr. Snivel bows, thanks the gentleman for the compliment, and commences to read. "This news," he adds, "may be relied upon, having come from Lloyd's List: 'Intelligence was received here (this is, you must remember, from a London paper, he says, in parentheses) this morning, of the total loss of the American ship--, bound from this port for Charleston, U.S., near the Needles. Every soul on board, except the Captain and second mate, perished. The gale was one of the worst ever known on this coast-'" "The worst ever known on this coast!" ejaculates Mr. Keepum, his wicked eyes steadily fixed upon Maria. "One of Trueman's ships," Mr. Snivel adds. "Unlucky fellow, that Trueman--second ship he has lost." "By-the-bye," rejoins Keepum, as if a thought has just flashed upon him, "your old friend, Tom Swiggs, was supercargo, clerk, or whatever you may call it, aboard that ship, eh?" It is the knave who can most naturally affect surprise and regret when it suits his purposes, and Mr. Snivel is well learned in the art. "True!" he says, "as I'm a Christian. Well, I had made a man of him-I don't regret it, for I always liked him-and this is the end of the poor fellow, eh?" Turning to McArthur, he adds, rather unconcernedly: "You know somewhat of him?" The old man sits motionless beside his daughter, the changes of whose countenance discover the inward emotions that agitate her bosom. Her eyes fill with tears; she exchanges inquiring glances, first with Keepum, then with Snivel; then a thought strikes her that she received a letter from Tom, setting forth his prospects, and his intention to return in the ship above named. It was very natural that news thus artfully manufactured, and revealed with such apparent truthfulness, should produce a deep impression in the mind of an unsuspecting girl. Indeed, it was with some effort that she bore up under it. Expressions of grief she would fain suppress before the enemy gain a mastery over her-and ere they are gone the cup flows over, and she sinks exhausted upon the sofa. "There! good as far as it goes. You have now another mode of gaining the victory," Mr. Snivel whispers in the ear of his friend, Keepum; and the two gentlemen pass into the street. CHAPTER XXXVI. IN WHICH A LAW IS SEEN TO SERVE BASE PURPOSES. MARIA has passed a night of unhappiness. Hopes and fears are knelling in the morning, which brings nothing to relieve her anxiety for the absent one; and Mr. Snivel has taken the precaution to have the news of the lost ship find its way into the papers. And while our city seems in a state of very general excitement; while great placards on every street corner inform the wondering stranger that a mighty Convention (presided over by the Hon. S. Snivel) for dissolving the Union, is shortly to be holden; while our political world has got the Union on its shoulders, and threatens to throw it into the nearest ditch; while our streets swarm with long, lean, and very hairy-faced delegates (all lusty of war and secession), who have dragged themselves into the city to drink no end of whiskey, and say all sorts of foolish things their savage and half-civilized constituents are expected to applaud; while our more material and conservative citizens are thinking what asses we make of ourselves; while the ship-of-war we built to fight the rest of the Union, lies an ugly lump in the harbor, and "won't go over the bar;" while the "shoe-factory" we established to supply niggerdom with soles, is snuffed out for want of energy and capacity to manage it; while some of our non-slaveholding, but most active secession merchants, are moving seriously in the great project of establishing a "SOUTHERN CANDLE-FACTORY"--a thing much needed in the "up-country;" while our graver statesmen (who don't get the State out of the Union fast enough for the ignorant rabble, who have nothing but their folly at stake) are pondering over the policy of spending five hundred thousand dollars for the building of another war-ship-one that "will go over the bar;" and while curiously-written letters from Generals Commander and Quattlebum, offering to bring their allied forces into the field-to blow this confederation down at a breath whenever called upon, are being published, to the great joy of all secessiondom; while saltpetre, broadswords, and the muskets made for us by Yankees to fight Yankees, and which were found to have wood instead of flint in their hammers, (and which trick of the Yankees we said was just like the Yankees,) are in great demand-and a few of our mob-politicians, who are all "Kern'ls" of regiments that never muster, prove conclusively our necessity for keeping a fighting-man in Congress; while, we assert, many of our first and best known families have sunk the assemblies of the St. Cecilia in the more important question of what order of government will best suit-in the event of our getting happily out of the Union!--our refined and very exacting state of society;--whether an Empire or a Monarchy, and whether we ought to set up a Quattlebum or Commander dynasty?-whether the Bungle family or the Jungle family (both fighting families) will have a place nearest the throne; what sort of orders will be bestowed, who will get them, and what colored liveries will best become us (all of which grave questions threaten us with a very extensive war of families)?--while all these great matters find us in a sea of trouble, there enters the curiosity-shop of the old Antiquary a suspicious-looking individual in green spectacles. "Mr. Hardscrabble!" says the man, bowing and taking a seat, leisurely, upon the decrepid sofa. Mr. McArthur returns his salutation, contemplates him doubtingly for a minute, then resumes his fussing and brushing. The small, lean figure; the somewhat seedy broadcloth in which it is enveloped; the well-browned and very sharp features; the straight, dark-gray hair, and the absent manner of Mr. Hardscrabble, might, with the uninitiated, cause him to be mistaken for an "up-country" clergyman of the Methodist denomination. "Mr. Hardscrabble? Mr. Hardscrabble? Mr. Hardscrabble?" muses the Antiquary, canting his head wisely, "the Sheriff, as I'm a man of years!" Mr. Hardscrabble comforts his eyes with his spectacles, and having glanced vacantly over the little shop, as if to take an inventory of its contents, draws from his breast-pocket a paper containing very ominous seals and scrawls. "I'm reluctant about doing these things with an old man like you," Mr. Hardscrabble condescends to say, in a sharp, grating voice; "but I have to obey the demands of my office." Here he commences reading the paper to the trembling old man, who, having adjusted his broad-bowed spectacles, and arrayed them against the spectacles of Mr. Hardscrabble, says he thinks it contains a great many useless recapitulations. Mr. Hardscrabble, his eyes peering eagerly through his glasses, and his lower jaw falling and exposing the inner domain of his mouth, replies with an--"Umph." The old Antiquary was never before called upon to examine a document so confusing to his mind. Not content with a surrender of his property, it demands his body into the bargain-all at the suit of one Keepum. He makes several motions to go show it to his daughter; but that, Mr. Hardscrabble thinks, is scarce worth while. "I sympathize with you-knowing how frugal you have been through life. A list of your effects-if you have one-will save a deal of trouble. I fear (Mr. Hardscrabble works his quid) my costs will hardly come out of them." "There's a fortune in them-if the love of things of yore--" The old man hesitates, and shakes his head dolefully. "Yore!--a thing that would starve out our profession." "A little time to turn, you know. There's my stock of uniforms." "Well-I-know," Mr. Hardscrabble rejoins, with a drawl; "but I must lock up the traps. Yes, I must lock you up, and sell you out-unless you redeem before sale day; that you can't do, I suppose?" And while the old man totters into the little back parlor, and, giving way to his emotions, throws himself upon the bosom of his fond daughter, to whom he discloses his troubles, Mr. Hardscrabble puts locks and bolts upon his curiosity-shop. This important business done, he leads the old man away, and gives him a lodging in the old jail. CHAPTER XXXVII. A SHORT CHAPTER OF ORDINARY EVENTS. TO bear up against the malice of inexorable enemies is at once the gift and the shield of a noble nature. And here it will be enough to say, that Maria bore the burden of her ills with fortitude and resignation, trusting in Him who rights the wronged, to be her deliverer. What took place when she saw her aged father led away, a prisoner; what thoughts invaded that father's mind when the prison bolt grated on his ear, and he found himself shut from all that had been dear to him through life, regard for the feelings of the reader forbids us recounting here. Naturally intelligent, Maria had, by close application to books, acquired some knowledge of the world. Nor was she entirely ignorant of those arts designing men call to their aid when seeking to effect the ruin of the unwary female. Thus fortified, she fancied she saw in the story of the lost ship a plot against herself, while the persecution of her father was only a means to effect the object. Launched between hope and fear, then-hope that her lover still lived, and that with his return her day would brighten-fear lest the report might be founded in truth, she nerves herself for the struggle. She knew full well that to give up in despair-to cast herself upon the cold charities of a busy world, would only be to hasten her downfall. Indeed, she had already felt how cold, and how far apart were the lines that separated our rich from our poor. The little back parlor is yet spared to Maria, and in it she may now be seen plying at her needle, early and late. It is the only means left her of succoring the parent from whom she has been so ruthlessly separated. Hoping, fearing, bright to-day and dark to-morrow, willing to work and wait-here she sits. A few days pass, and the odds and ends of the Antiquary's little shop, like the "shirts" of the gallant Fremont, whom we oppressed while poor, and essayed to flatter when a hero, are gazetted under the head of "sheriff's sale." Hope, alas! brings no comfort to Maria. Time rolls on, the month's rent falls due, her father pines and sinks in confinement, and her needle is found inadequate to the task undertaken. Necessity demands, and one by one she parts with her few cherished mementos of the past, that she may save an aged father from starvation. The "prisoner" has given notice that he will take the benefit of the act-commonly called "an act for the relief of poor debtors." But before he can reach this boon, ten days must elapse. Generous-minded legislators, no doubt, intended well when they constructed this act, but so complex are its provisions that any legal gentleman may make it a very convenient means of oppression. And in a community where laws not only have their origin in the passions of men, but are made to serve popular prejudices-where the quality of justice obtained depends upon the position and sentiments of him who seeks it,--the weak have no chance against the powerful. The multiplicity of notices, citations, and schedules, necessary to the setting free of this "poor debtor" (for these fussy officials must be paid), Maria finds making a heavy drain on her lean purse. The Court is in session, and the ten days having glided away, the old man is brought into "open Court" by two officials with long tipstaffs, and faces looking as if they had been carefully pickled in strong drinks. "Surely, now, they'll set me free-I can give them no more-I am old and infirm-they have got all-and my daughter!" he muses within himself. Ah! he little knows how uncertain a thing is the law. The Judge is engaged over a case in which two very fine old families are disputing for the blood and bones of a little "nigger" girl. The possession of this helpless slave, the Judge (he sits in easy dignity) very naturally regards of superior importance when compared with the freedom of a "poor debtor." He cannot listen to the story of destitution-precisely what was sought by Keepum-to-day, and to-morrow the Court adjourns for six months. The Antiquary is remanded back to his cell. No one in Court cares for him; no one has a thought for the achings of that heart his release would unburden; the sorrows of that lone girl are known only to herself and the One in whom she puts her trust. She, nevertheless, seeks the old man in his prison, and there comforts him as best she can. Five days more, and the "prisoner" is brought before the Commissioner for Special Bail, who is no less a personage than the rosy-faced Clerk of the Court, just adjourned. And here we cannot forbear to say, that however despicable the object sought, however barren of right the plea, however adverse to common humanity the spirit of the action, there is always to be found some legal gentleman, true to the lower instincts of the profession, ready to lend himself to his client's motives. And in this instance, the cunning Keepum finds an excellent instrument of furthering his ends, in one Peter Crimpton, a somewhat faded and rather disreputable member of the learned profession. It is said of Crimpton, that he is clever at managing cases where oppression rather than justice is sought, and that his present client furnishes the larger half of his practice. And while Maria, too sensitive to face the gaze of the coarse crowd, pauses without, silent and anxious, listening one moment and hoping the next will see her old father restored to her, the adroit Crimpton rises to object to "the Schedule." To the end that he may substantiate his objections, he proposes to examine the prisoner. Having no alternative, the Commissioner grants the request. The old Antiquary made out his schedule with the aid of the good-hearted jailer, who inserted as his effects, "Necessary wearing apparel." It was all he had. Like the gallant Fremont, when he offered to resign his shirts to his chivalric creditor, he could give them no more. A few questions are put; the old man answers them with childlike simplicity, then sits down, his trembling fingers wandering into his beard. Mr. Crimpton produces his paper, sets forth his objections, and asks permission to file them, that the case may come before a jury of "Special Bail." Permission is granted. The reader will not fail to discover the object of this procedure. Keepum hopes to continue the old man in prison, that he may succeed in breaking down the proud spirit of his daughter. The Commissioner listens attentively to the reading of the objections. The first sets forth that Mr. McArthur has a gold watch; Our Charleston readers will recognize the case here described, without any further key. the second, that he has a valuable breast-pin, said to have been worn by Lord Cornwallis; and the third, that he has one Yorick's skull. All of these, Mr. Crimpton regrets to say, are withheld from the schedule, which virtually constitutes fraud. The facile Commissioner bows; the assembled crowd look on unmoved; but the old man shakes his head and listens. He is surprised to find himself accused of fraud; but the law gives him no power to show his own innocence. The Judge of the Sessions was competent to decide the question now raised, and to have prevented this reverting to a "special jury"--this giving the vindictive plaintiff a means of torturing his infirm victim. Had he but listened to the old man's tale of poverty, he might have saved the heart of that forlorn girl many a bitter pang. The motion granted, a day is appointed-ten days must elapse-for a hearing before the Commissioner of "Special Bail," and his special jury. The rosy-faced functionary, being a jolly and somewhat flexible sort of man, must needs give his health an airing in the country. What is the liberty of a poor white with us? Our Governor, whom we esteem singularly sagacious, said it were better all our poor were enslaved, and this opinion finds high favor with our first families. The worthy Commissioner, in addition to taking care of his health, is expected to make any number of speeches, full of wind and war, to several recently called Secession Conventions. He will find time (being a General by courtesy) to review the up-country militia, and the right and left divisions of the South Carolina army. He will be feted by some few of our most distinguished Generals, and lecture before the people of Beaufort (a very noisy town of forty-two inhabitants, all heroes), to whom he will prove the necessity of our State providing itself with an independent steam navy. The old Antiquary is remanded back to jail-to wait the coming day. Maria, almost breathless with anxiety, runs to him as he comes tottering out of Court in advance of the official, lays her trembling hand upon his arm, and looks inquiringly in his face. "Oh! my father, my father!--released? released?" she inquires, with quivering lips and throbbing heart. A forced smile plays over his time-worn face, he looks upward, shakes his head in sorrow, and having patted her affectionately on the shoulder, throws his arms about her neck and kisses her. That mute appeal, that melancholy voucher of his sorrows, knells the painful answer in her ears, "Then you are not free to come with me? Oh, father, father!" and she wrings her hands and gives vent to her tears. "The time will come, my daughter, when my Judge will hear me-will judge me right. My time will come soon--" And here the old man pauses, and chokes with his emotions. Maria returns the old man's kiss, and being satisfied that he is yet in the hands of his oppressors, sets about cheering up his drooping spirits. "Don't think of me, father," she says--"don't think of me! Let us put our trust in Him who can shorten the days of our tribulation." She takes the old man's arm, and like one who would forget her own troubles in her anxiety to relieve another, supports him on his way back to prison. It is high noon. She stands before the prison gate, now glancing at the serene sky, then at the cold, frowning walls, and again at the old pile, as if contemplating the wearying hours he must pass within it. "Don't repine-nerve yourself with resolution, and all will be well!" Having said this with an air of confidence in herself, she throws her arms about the old man's neck, presses him to her bosom, kisses and kisses his wrinkled cheek, then grasps his hand warmly in her own. "Forget those who persecute you, for it is good. Look above, father-to Him who tempers the winds, who watches over the weak, and gives the victory to the right!" She pauses, as the old man holds her hand in silence. "This life is but a transient sojourn at best; full of hopes and fears, that, like a soldier's dream, pass away when the battle is ended." Again she fondly shakes his hand, lisps a sorrowing "good-bye," watches him, in silence, out of sight, then turns away in tears, and seeks her home. There is something so pure, so earnest in her solicitude for the old man, that it seems more of heaven than earth. CHAPTER XXXVIII. A STORY WITHOUT WHICH THIS HISTORY WOULD BE FOUND WANTING. ON taking leave of her father, Maria, her heart overburdened with grief, and her mind abstracted, turned towards the Battery, and continued, slowly and sadly, until she found herself seated beneath a tree, looking out upon the calm bay. Here, scarce conscious of those who were observing her in their sallies, she mused until dusky evening, when the air seemed hushed, and the busy hum of day was dying away in the distance. The dark woodland on the opposite bank gave a bold border to the soft picture; the ships rode sluggishly upon the polished waters; the negro's touching song echoed and re-echoed along the shore; and the boatman's chorus broke upon the stilly air in strains so dulcet. And as the mellow shadows of night stole over the scene-as the heavens looked down in all their sereneness, and the stars shone out, and twinkled, and laughed, and danced upon the blue waters, and coquetted with the moonbeams--for the moon was up, and shedding a halo of mystic light over the scene-making night merry, nature seemed speaking to Maria in words of condolence. Her heart was touched, her spirits gained strength, her soul seemed in a loftier and purer atmosphere. "Poor, but virtuous-virtue ennobles the poor. Once gone, the world never gives it back!" she muses, and is awakened from her reverie by a sweet, sympathizing voice, whispering in her ear. "Woman! you are in trouble,--linger no longer here, or you will fall into the hands of your enemies." She looks up, and there stands at her side a young female, whose beauty the angels might envy. The figure came upon her so suddenly that she hesitates for a reply to the admonition. "Take this, it will do something toward relieving your wants (do not open it now), and with this (she places a stiletto in her hand) you can strike down the one who attempts your virtue. Nay, remember that while you cling to that, you are safe-lose it, and you are gone forever. Your troubles will soon end; mine are for a life-time. Yours find a relaxation in your innocence; mine is seared into my heart with my own shame. It is guilt-shame! that infuses into the heart that poison, for which years of rectitude afford no antidote. Go quickly-get from this lone place! You are richer than me." She slips something into Maria's hand, and suddenly disappears. Maria rises from her seat, intending to follow the stranger, but she is out of sight. Who can this mysterious messenger, this beautiful stranger be? Maria muses. A thought flashes across her mind; it is she who sought our house at midnight, when my father revealed her dark future! "Yes," she says to herself, "it is the same lovely face; how oft it has flitted in my fancy!" She reaches her home only to find its doors closed against her. A ruthless landlord has taken her all, and forced her into the street. You may shut out the sterner sex without involving character or inviting insult; but with woman the case is very different. However pure her character, to turn her into the street, is to subject her to a stigma, if not to fasten upon her a disgrace. You may paint, in your imagination, the picture of a woman in distress, but you can know little of the heart-achings of the sufferer. The surface only reflects the faint gleams, standing out here and there like the lesser objects upon a dark canvas. Maria turns reluctantly from that home of so many happy associations, to wander about the streets and by-ways of the city. The houses of the rich seem frowning upon her; her timid nature tells her they have no doors open to her. The haunts of the poor, at this moment, infuse a sanguine joyousness into her soul. How glad would she be, if they did but open to her. Is not the Allwise, through the beauties of His works, holding her up, while man only is struggling to pull her down? And while Maria wanders homeless about the streets of Charleston, we must beg you, gentle reader, to accompany us into one of the great thoroughfares of London, where is being enacted a scene appertaining to this history. It is well-nigh midnight, the hour when young London is most astir in his favorite haunts; when ragged and well-starved flower-girls, issuing from no one knows where, beset your path through Trafalgar and Liecester squares, and pierce your heart with their pleadings; when the Casinoes of the Haymarket and Picadilly are vomiting into the streets their frail but richly-dressed women; when gaudy supper-rooms, reeking of lobster and bad liquor, are made noisy with the demands of their flauntily-dressed customers; when little girls of thirteen are dodging in and out of mysterious courts and passages leading to and from Liecester square; when wily cabmen, ranged around the "great globe," importune you for a last fare; and when the aristocratic swell, with hectic face and maudlin laugh, saunters from his club-room to seek excitement in the revels at Vauxhall. A brown mist hangs over the dull area of Trafalgar square. The bells of old St. Martin's church have chimed merrily out their last night peal; the sharp voice of the omnibus conductor no longer offends the ear; the tiny little fountains have ceased to give out their green water, and the lights of the Union Club on one side, and Morley's hotel on the other, throw pale shadows into the open square. The solitary figure of a man, dressed in the garb of a gentleman, is seen sauntering past Northumberland house, then up the east side of the square. Now he halts at the corner of old St. Martin's church, turns and contemplates the scene before him. On his right is that squatty mass of freestone and smoke, Englishmen exultingly call the Royal Academy, but which Frenchmen affect contempt for, and uninitiated Americans mistake for a tomb. An equestrian statue of one of the Georges rises at the east corner; Morley's Hotel, where Americans get poor fare and enormous charges, with the privilege of fancying themselves quite as good as the queen, on the left; the dead walls of Northumberland House, with their prisonlike aspect, and the mounted lion, his tail high in air, and quite as rigid as the Duke's dignity, in front; the opening that terminates the Strand, and gives place to Parliament street, at the head of which an equestrian statue of Charles the First, much admired by Englishmen, stands, his back, on Westminster; the dingy shops of Spring Garden, and the Union Club to the right; and, towering high over all, Nelson's Column, the statue looking as if it had turned its back in pity on the little fountains, to look with contempt, first upon the bronze face of the unfortunate Charles, then upon Parliament, whose parsimony in withholding justice from his daughter, he would rebuke-and the picture is complete. The stranger turns, walks slowly past the steps of St. Martin's church, crosses to the opposite side of the street, and enters a narrow, wet, and dimly-lighted court, on the left. Having passed up a few paces, he finds himself hemmed in between the dead walls of St. Martin's "Work-house" on one side, and the Royal Academy on the other. He hesitates between fear and curiosity. The dull, sombre aspect of the court is indeed enough to excite the fears of the timid; but curiosity being the stronger impulse, he proceeds, resolved to explore it-to see whence it leads. A short turn to the right, and he has reached the front wall of the Queen's Barracks, on his left, and the entrance to the "Work-house," on his right; the one overlooking the other, and separated by a narrow street. Leave men are seen reluctantly returning in at the night-gate; the dull tramp of the sentinel within sounds ominously on the still air; and the chilly atmosphere steals into the system. Again the stranger pauses, as if questioning the safety of his position. Suddenly a low moan grates upon his ear, he starts back, then listens. Again it rises, in a sad wail, and pierces his very heart. His first thought is, that some tortured mortal is bemoaning his bruises in a cell of the "Work-house," which he mistakes for a prison. But his eyes fall to the ground, and his apprehensions are dispelled. The doors of the "Work-house" are fast closed; but there, huddled along the cold pavement, and lying crouched upon its doorsteps, in heaps that resemble the gatherings of a rag-seller, are four-and- thirty shivering, famishing, and homeless human beings-- An institution for the relief of the destitute. (mostly young girls and aged women), who have sought at this "institutution of charity" shelter for the night, and bread to appease their hunger. This sight may be seen at any time. Alas! its ruthless keepers have refused them bread, shut them into the street, and left them in rags scarce sufficient to cover their nakedness, to sleep upon the cold stones, a mute but terrible rebuke to those hearts that bleed over the sorrows of Africa, but have no blood to give out when the object of pity is a poor, heart-sick girl, forced to make the cold pavement her bed. The stranger shudders. "Are these heaps of human beings?" he questions within himself, doubting the reality before him. As if counting and hesitating what course to pursue for their relief, he paces up and down the grotesque mass, touching one, and gazing upon the haggard features of another, who looks up to see what it is that disturbs her. Again the low moan breaks on his ear, as the sentinel cries the first hour of morning. The figure of a female, her head resting on one of the steps, moves, a trembling hand steals from under her shawl, makes an effort to reach her head, and falls numb at her side. "Her hand is cold-her breathing like one in death--oh! God!--how terrible-what, what am I to do?" he says, taking the sufferer's hand in his own. Now he rubs it, now raises her head, makes an effort to wake a few of the miserable sleepers, and calls aloud for help. "Help! help! help!" he shouts, and the shout re-echoes through the air and along the hollow court. "A woman is dying,--dying here on the cold stones-with no one to raise a hand for her!" He seizes the exhausted woman in his arms, and with herculean strength rushes up the narrow street, in the hope of finding relief at the Gin Palace he sees at its head, in a blaze of light. But the body is seized with spasms, an hollow, hysteric wail follows, his strength gives way under the burden, and he sets the sufferer down in the shadow of a gas light. Her dress, although worn threadbare, still bears evidence of having belonged to one who has enjoyed comfort, and, perhaps, luxury. Indeed, there is something about the woman which bespeaks her not of the class generally found sleeping on the steps of St. Martin's Work-house. "What's here to do?" gruffly inquires a policeman, coming up with an air of indifference. The stranger says the woman is dying. The policeman stoops down, lays his hand upon her temples, then mechanically feels her arms and hands. "And I-must die-die-die in the street," whispers the woman, her head falling carelessly from the policeman's hand, in which it had rested. "Got her a bit below, at the Work'ouse door, among them wot sleeps there, eh?" The stranger says he did. "A common enough thing," pursues the policeman; "this a bad lot. Anyhow, we must give her a tow to the station." He rubs his hands, and prepares to raise her from the ground. "Hold! hold," interrupts the other, "she will die ere you get her there." "Die,--ah! yes, yes," whispers the woman. The mention of death seems to have wrung like poison into her very soul. "Don't-don't move me-the spell is almost broken. Oh! how can I die here, a wretch. Yes, I am going now-let me rest, rest, rest," the moaning supplicant mutters in a guttural voice, grasps spasmodically at the policeman's hand, heaves a deep sigh, and sets her eyes fixedly upon the stranger. She seems recognizing in his features something that gives her strength. "There-there-there!" she continues, incoherently, as a fit of hysterics seize upon her; "you, you, you, have-yes, you have come at the last hour, when my sufferings close. I see devils all about me-haunting me-torturing my very soul-burning me up! See them! see them!--here they come-tearing, worrying me-in a cloud of flame!" She clutches with her hands, her countenance fills with despair, and her body writhes in agony. "Bring brandy! warm,--stimulant! anything to give her strength! Quick! quick!--go fetch it, or she is gone!" stammers out the stranger. In another minute she calms away, and sinks exhausted upon the pavement. Policeman shakes his head, and says, "It 'ont do no good-she's done for." The light of the "Trumpeter's Arms" still blazes into the street, while a few greasy ale-bibbers sit moody about the tap room. The two men raise the exhausted woman from the ground and carry her to the door. Mine host of the Trumpeter's Arms shrugs his shoulders and says, "She can't come in here." He fears she will damage the respectability of his house. "The Work-house is the place for her," he continues, gruffly. A sight at the stranger's well-filled purse, however, and a few shillings slipped into the host's hand, secures his generosity and the woman's admittance. "Indeed," says the host, bowing most servilely, "gentlemen, the whole Trumpeter's Arms is at your service." The woman is carried into a lonely, little back room, and laid upon a cot, which, with two wooden chairs, constitutes its furniture. And while the policeman goes in search of medical aid, the host of the Trumpeter's bestirs himself right manfully in the forthcoming of a stimulant. The stranger, meanwhile, lends himself to the care of the forlorn sufferer with the gentleness of a woman. He smoothes her pillow, arranges her dress tenderly, and administers the stimulant with a hand accustomed to the sick. A few minutes pass, and the woman seems to revive and brighten up. Mine host has set a light on the chair, at the side of the cot, and left her alone with the stranger. Slowly she opens her eyes, and with increasing anxiety sets them full upon him. Their recognition is mutual. "Madame Flamingo!" ejaculates the man, grasping her hand. "Tom Swiggs!" exclaims the woman, burying her face for a second, then pressing his hand to her lips, and kissing it with the fondness of a child, as her eyes swim in tears. "How strange to find you thus--" continues Tom, for truly it is he who sits by the forlorn woman. "More strange," mutters the woman, shaking her head sorrowfully, "that I should be brought to this terrible end. I am dying-I cannot last long-the fever has left me only to die a neglected wretch. Hear me-hear me, while I tell you the tale of my troubles, that others may take warning. And may God give me strength. And you,--if I have wronged you, forgive me-it is all I can ask in this world." Here Tom administers another draught of warm brandy and water, the influence of which is soon perceptible in the regaining strength of the patient. CHAPTER XXXIX. A STORY WITH MANY COUNTERPARTS. A VERY common story is this of Madame Flamingo's troubles. It has counterparts enough, and though they may be traced to a class of society less notorious than that with which she moved, are generally kept in the dark chamber of hidden thoughts. We are indeed fast gaining an unenviable fame for snobbery, for affecting to be what we never can be, and for our sad imitation of foreign flunkydom, which, finding us rivals in the realm of its tinsil, begins to button up its coat and look contemptuously at us over the left shoulder. If, albeit, the result of that passion for titles and plush (things which the empty-headed of the old world would seem to have consigned to the empty-headed of the new), which has of late so singularly discovered itself among our "best-known families," could be told, it would unfold many a tale of misery and betrayal. Pardon this digression, generous reader, and proceed with us to the story of Madame Flamingo. "And now," says the forlorn woman, in a faint, hollow voice, "when my ambition seemed served-I was ambitious, perhaps vain-I found myself the victim of an intrigue. I ask forgiveness of Him who only can forgive the wicked; but how can I expect to gain it?" She presses Tom's hand, and pauses for a second. "Yes, I was ambitious," she continues, "and there was something I wanted. I had money enough to live in comfort, but the thought that it was got of vice and the ruin of others, weighed me down. I wanted the respect of the world. To die a forgotten wretch; to have the grave close over me, and if remembered at all, only with execration, caused me many a dark thought." Here she struggles to suppress her emotions. "I sought to change my condition; that, you see, has brought me here. I married one to whom I intrusted my all, in whose rank, as represented to me by Mr. Snivel, and confirmed by his friend, the Judge, I confided. I hoped to move with him to a foreign country, where the past would all be wiped out, and where the associations of respectable society would be the reward of future virtue. "In London, where I now reap the fruits of my vanity, we enjoyed good society for a time, were sought after, and heaped with attentions. But I met those who had known me; it got out who I was; I was represented much worse than I was, and even those who had flattered me in one sphere, did not know me. In Paris it was the same. And there my husband said it would not do to be known by his titles, for, being an exile, it might be the means of his being recognized and kidnapped, and carried back a prisoner to his own dear Poland. In this I acquiesced, as I did in everything else that lightened his cares. Gradually he grew cold and morose towards me, left me for days at a time, and returned only to abuse and treat me cruelly. He had possession of all my money, which I soon found he was gambling away, without gaining an entr�e for me into society. "From Paris we travelled, as if without any settled purpose, into Italy, and from thence to Vienna, where I discovered that instead of being a prince, my husband was an impostor, and I his dupe. He had formerly been a crafty shoemaker; was known to the police as a notorious character, who, instead of having been engaged in the political struggles of his countrymen, had fled the country to escape the penalty of being the confederate of a desperate gang of coiners and counterfeiters. We had only been two days in Vienna when I found he had disappeared, and left me destitute of money or friends. My connection with him only rendered my condition more deplorable, for the police would not credit my story; and while he eluded its vigilance, I was suspected of being a spy in the confidence of a felon, and ruthlessly ordered to leave the country." "Did not your passport protect you?" interrupts Tom, with evident feeling. "No one paid it the least regard," resumes Madame Flamingo, becoming weaker and weaker. "No one at our legations evinced sympathy for me. Indeed, they all refused to believe my story. I wandered back from city to city, selling my wardrobe and the few jewels I had left, and confidently expecting to find in each place I entered, some one I had known, who would listen to my story, and supply me with means to reach my home. I could soon have repaid it, but my friends had gone with my money; no one dare venture to trust me-no one had confidence in me-every one to whom I appealed had an excuse that betrayed their suspicion of me. Almost destitute, I found myself back in London-how I got here, I scarce know-where I could make myself understood. My hopes now brightened, I felt that some generous-hearted captain would give me a passage to New York, and once home, my troubles would end. But being worn down with fatigue, and my strength prostrated, a fever set in, and I was forced to seek refuge in a miserable garret in Drury-Lane, and where I parted with all but what now remains on my back, to procure nourishment. I had begun to recover somewhat, but the malady left me broken down, and when all was gone, I was turned into the street. Yes, yes, yes, (she whispers,) they gave me to the streets; for twenty-four hours I have wandered without nourishment, or a place to lay my head. I sought shelter in a dark court, and there laid down to die; and when my eyes were dim, and all before me seemed mysterious and dark with curious visions, a hand touched me, and I felt myself borne away." Here her voice chokes, she sinks back upon the pillow, and closes her eyes as her hands fall careless at her side. "She breathes! she breathes yet!" says Tom, advancing his ear to the pale, quivering lips of the wretched woman. Now he bathes her temples with the vinegar from a bottle in the hand of the host, who is just entered, and stands looking on, his countenance full of alarm. "If she deys in my 'ouse, good sir, w'oat then?" "You mean the expense?" "Just so-it 'll be nae trifle, ye kno'!" The host shakes his head, doubtingly. Tom begs he will not be troubled about that, and gives another assurance from his purse that quite relieves the host's apprehensions. A low, heavy breathing, followed by a return of spasms, bespeaks the sinking condition of the sufferer. The policeman returns, preceded by a physician-the only one to be got at, he says-in very dilapidated broadcloth, and whose breath is rather strong of gin. "An' whereabutes did ye pick the woman up,--an, an, wha's teu stond the bill?" he inquires, in a deep Scotch brogue, then ordering the little window opened, feels clumsily the almost pulseless hand. Encouraged on the matter of his bill, he turns first to the host, then to Tom, and says, "the wuman's nae much, for she's amast dede wi' exhaustion." And while he is ordering a nostrum he knows can do no good, the woman makes a violent struggle, opens her eyes, and seems casting a last glance round the dark room. Now she sets them fixedly upon the ceiling, her lips pale, and her countenance becomes spectre-like-a low, gurgling sound is heard, the messenger of retribution is come-Madame Flamingo is dead! CHAPTER XL. IN WHICH THE LAW IS SEEN TO CONFLICT WITH OUR CHERISHED CHIVALRY. "WHAT could the woman mean, when on taking leave of me she said, 'you are far richer than me?'" questions Maria McArthur to herself, when, finding she is alone and homeless in the street, she opens the packet the woman Anna slipped so mysteriously into her hand, and finds it contains two twenty-dollar gold pieces. And while evolving in her mind whether she shall appropriate them to the relief of her destitute condition, her conscience smites her. It is the gold got of vice. Her heart shares the impulse that prompted the act, but her pure spirit recoils from the acceptance of such charity. "You are far richer than me!" knells in her ears, and reveals to her the heart-burnings of the woman who lives in licentious splendor. "I have no home, no friend near me, and nowhere to lay my head; and yet I am richer than her;" she says, gazing at the moon, and the stars, and the serene heavens. And the contemplation brings to her consolation and strength. She wanders back to the gate of the old prison, resolved to return the gold in the morning, and, was the night not so far spent, ask admittance into the cell her father occupies. But she reflects, and turns away; well knowing how much more painful will be the smart of his troubles does she disclose to him what has befallen her. She continues sauntering up a narrow by-lane in the outskirts of the city. A light suddenly flashes across her path, glimmers from the window of a little cabin, and inspires her with new hopes. She quickens her steps, reaches the door, meets a welcome reception, and is made comfortable for the night by the mulatto woman who is its solitary tenant. The woman, having given Maria of her humble cheer, seems only too anxious to disclose the fact that she is the slave and cast-off mistress of Judge Sleepyhorn, on whose head she invokes no few curses. It does not touch her pride so much that he has abandoned her, as that he has taken to himself one of another color. She is tall and straight of figure, with prominent features, long, silky black hair, and a rich olive complexion; and though somewhat faded of age, it is clear that she possessed in youth charms of great value in the flesh market. Maria discloses to her how she came in possession of the money, as also her resolve to return it in the morning. Undine (for such is her name) applauds this with great gusto. "Now, thar!" she says, "that's the spirit I likes." And straightway she volunteers to be the medium of returning the money, adding that she will show the hussy her contempt of her by throwing it at her feet, and "letting her see a slave knows all about it." Maria fully appreciates the kindness, as well as sympathizes with the wounded pride of this slave daughter; nevertheless, there is an humiliation in being driven to seek shelter in a negro cabin that touches her feelings. For a white female to seek shelter under the roof of a negro's cabin, is a deep disgrace in the eyes of our very refined society; and having subjected herself to the humiliation, she knows full well that it may be used against her-in fine, made a means to defame her character. Night passes away, and the morning ushers in soft and sunny, but brings with it nothing to relieve her situation. She, however, returns the gold to Anna through a channel less objectionable than that Undine would have supplied, and sallies out to seek lodgings. In a house occupied by a poor German family, she seeks and obtains a little room, wherein she continues plying at her needle. The day set apart for the trial before a jury of "special bail" arrives. The rosy-faced commissioner is in his seat, a very good-natured jury is impanelled, and the feeble old man is again brought into court. Maria saunters, thoughtful, and anxious for the result, at the outer door. Peter Crimpton rises, addresses the jury at great length, sets forth the evident intention of fraud on the part of the applicant, and the enormity of the crime. He will now prove his objections by competent witnesses. The proceedings being in accordance with what Mr. Snivel facetiously terms the strict rules of special pleading, the old man's lips are closed. Several very respectable witnesses are called, and aver they saw the old Antiquary with a gold watch mounted, at a recent date; witnesses quite as dependable aver they have known him for many years, but never mounted with anything so extravagant as a gold watch. So much for the validity of testimony! It is very clear that the very respectable witnesses have confounded some one else with the prisoner. The Antiquary openly confesses to the possession of a pin, and the curious skull (neither of which are valuable beyond their associations), but declares it more an over-sight than an intention that they were left out of the schedule. For the virtue of the schedule, Mr. Crimpton is singularly scrupulous; nor does it soften his aspersions that the old man offers to resign them for the benefit of the State. Mr. Crimpton gives his case to the jury, expressing his belief that a verdict will be rendered in his favor. A verdict of guilty (for so it is rendered in our courts) will indeed give the prisoner to him for an indefinite period. In truth, the only drawback is that the plaintiff will be required to pay thirty cents a day to Mr. Hardscrabble, who will starve him rightly soundly. The jury, very much to Mr. Crimpton's chagrin, remain seated, and declare the prisoner not guilty. Was this sufficient-all the law demanded? No. Although justice might have been satisfied, the law had other ends to serve, and in the hands of an instrument like Crimpton, could be turned to uses delicacy forbids our transcribing here. The old man's persecutors were not satisfied; the verdict of the jury was with him, but the law gave his enemies power to retain him six months longer. Mr. Crimpton demands a writ of appeal to the sessions. The Commissioner has no alternative, notwithstanding the character of the pretext upon which it is demanded is patent on its face. Such is but a feeble description of one of the many laws South Carolina retains on her statute book to oppress the poor and give power to the rich. If we would but purge ourselves of this distemper of chivalry and secession, that so blinds our eyes to the sufferings of the poor, while driving our politicians mad over the country (we verily believe them all coming to the gallows or insane hospital), how much higher and nobler would be our claim to the respect of the world! Again the old man is separated from his daughter, placed in the hands of a bailiff, and remanded back to prison, there to hope, fear, and while away the time, waiting six, perhaps eight months, for the sitting of the Court of Appeals. The "Appeal Court," you must know, would seem to have inherited the aristocracy of our ancestors, for, having a great aversion to business pursuits, it sits at very long intervals, and gets through very little business. When the news of her father's remand reaches Maria, it overwhelms her with grief. Varied are her thoughts of how she shall provide for the future; dark and sad are the pictures of trouble that rise up before her. Look whichever way she will, her ruin seems sealed. The health of her aged father is fast breaking-her own is gradually declining under the pressure of her troubles. Rapidly forced from one extreme to another, she appeals to a few acquaintances who have expressed friendship for her father; but their friendship took wings when grim poverty looked in. Southern hospitality, though bountifully bestowed upon the rich, rarely condescends to shed its bright rays over the needy poor. Maria advertises for a situation, in some of our first families, as private seamstress. Our first families having slaves for such offices, have no need of "poor white trash." She applies personally to several ladies of "eminent standing," and who busy themselves in getting up donations for northern Tract Societies. They have no sympathy to waste upon her. Her appeal only enlists coldness and indifference. The "Church Home" had lent an ear to her story, but that her address is very unsatisfactory, and it is got out that she is living a very suspicious life. The "Church Home," so virtuous and pious, can do nothing for her until she improves her mode of living. Necessity pinches Maria at every turn. "To be poor in a slave atmosphere, is truly a crime," she says to herself, musing over her hard lot, while sitting in her chamber one evening. "But I am the richer! I will rise above all!" She has just prepared to carry some nourishment to her father, when Keepum enters, his face flushed, and his features darkened with a savage scowl. "I have said you were a fool-all women are fools!--and now I know I was not mistaken!" This Mr. Keepum says while throwing his hat sullenly upon the floor. "Well," he pursues, having seated himself in a chair, looked designingly at the candle, then contorted his narrow face, and frisked his fingers through his bright red hair, "as to this here wincing and mincing-its all humbuggery of a woman like you. Affecting such morals! Don't go down here; tell you that, my spunky girl. Loose morals is what takes in poor folks." Maria answers him only with a look of scorn. She advances to the door to find it locked. "It was me-I locked it. Best to be private about the matter," says Keepum, a forced smile playing over his countenance. Unresolved whether to give vent to her passion, or make an effort to inspire his better nature, she stands a few moments, as if immersed in deep thought, then suddenly falls upon her knees at his feet, and implores him to save her this last step to her ruin. "Hear me, oh, hear me, and let your heart give out its pity for one who has only her virtue left her in this world;" she appeals to him with earnest voice, and eyes swimming in tears. "Save my father, for you have power. Give him his liberty, that I, his child, his only comfort in his old age, may make him happy. Yes! yes!--he will die where he is. Will you, can you-you have a heart-see me struggle against the rude buffets of an unthinking world! Will you not save me from the Poor-house-from the shame that awaits me with greedy clutches, and receive in return the blessing of a friendless woman! Oh!--you will, you will-release my father!--give him back to me and make me happy. Ah, ha!--I see, I see, you have feelings, better feelings--feelings that are not seared. You will have pity on me; you will forgive, relent-you cannot see a wretch suffer and not be moved to lighten her pain!" The calm, pensive expression that lights up her countenance is indeed enough to inspire the tender impulses of a heart in which every sense of generosity is not dried up. Her appeal, nevertheless, falls ineffectual. Mr. Keepum has no generous impulses to bestow upon beings so sensitive of their virtue. With him, it is a ware of very little value, inasmuch as the moral standard fixed by a better class of people is quite loose. He rises from his chair with an air of self-confidence, seizes her by the hand, and attempts to drag her upon his knee, saying, "you know I can and will make you a lady. Upon the honor of a gentleman, I love you-always have loved you; but what stands in the way, and is just enough to make any gentleman of my standing mad, is this here squeamishness--" "No! no! go from me. Attempt not again to lay your cruel hands upon me!" The goaded woman struggles from his grasp, and shrieks for help at the very top of her voice. And as the neighbors come rushing up stairs, Mr. Keepum valorously betakes himself into the street. Mad- dened with disappointment, and swearing to have revenge, he seeks his home, and there muses over the "curious woman's" unswerving resolution. "Cruelty!" he says to himself--"she charges me with cruelty! Well," (here he sighs) "it's only because she lacks a bringing up that can appreciate a gentleman." (Keepum could never condescend to believe himself less than a very fine gentleman.) "As sure as the world the creature is somewhat out in the head. She fancies all sorts of things-shame, disgrace, and ruin!--only because she don't understand the quality of our morality-that's all! There's no harm, after all, in these little enjoyments-if the girl would only understand them so. Our society is free from pedantry; and there-no damage can result where no one's the wiser. It's like stealing a blush from the cheek of beauty-nobody misses it, and the cheek continues as beautiful as ever." Thus philosophizes the chivalric gentleman, until he falls into a fast sleep. CHAPTER XLI. IN WHICH JUSTICE IS SEEN TO BE VERY ACCOMMODATING. A FEW days have elapsed, Maria has just paid a visit to her father, still in prison, and may be seen looking in at Mr. Keepum's office, in Broad street. "I come not to ask a favor, sir; but, at my father's request, to say to you that, having given up all he has in the world, it can do no good to any one to continue him in durance, and to ask of you-in whom the sole power rests-that you will grant him his release ere he dies?" She addresses Mr. Keepum, who seems not in a very good temper this morning, inasmuch as several of his best negroes, without regard to their value to him, got a passion for freedom into their heads, and have taken themselves away. In addition to this, he is much put out, as he says, at being compelled to forego the pleasure held out on the previous night, of tarring and feathering two northerners suspected of entertaining sentiments not exactly straight on the "peculiar question." A glorious time was expected, and a great deal of very strong patriotism wasted; but the two unfortunate individuals, by some means not yet discovered, got the vigilance committee, to whose care they were entrusted, very much intoxicated, and were not to be found when called for. Free knives, and not free speech, is our motto. And this Mr. Keepum is one of the most zealous in carrying out. Mr. Keepum sits, his hair fretted back over his lean forehead, before a table covered with papers, all indicating an immense business in lottery and other speculations. Now he deposits his feet upon it; leans back in his chair, puffs his cigar, and says, with an air of indifference to the speaker: "I shall not be able to attend to any business of yours to-day, Madam!" His clerk, a man of sturdy figure, with a broad, red face, and dressed in rather dilapidated broadcloth, is passing in and out of the front office, bearing in his fingers documents that require a signature or mark of approval. "I only come, sir, to tell you that we are destitute--" Maria pauses, and stands trembling in the doorway. "That's a very common cry," interrupts Keepum, relieving his mouth of the cigar. "The affair is entirely out of my hands. Go to my attorney, Peter Crimpton, Esq.,--what he does for you will receive my sanction. I must not be interrupted to-day. I might express a thousand regrets; yes, pass an opinion on your foolish pride, but what good would it do." And while Maria stands silent and hesitating, there enters the office abrubtly a man in the garb of a mechanic. "I have come," speaks the man, in a tone of no very good humor, "for the last time. I asks of you-you professes to be a gentleman-my honest rights. If the law don't give it to me, I mean to take it with this erehand." (He shakes his hand at Keepum.) "I am a poor man who ain't thought much of because I works for a living; you have got what I had worked hard for, and lain up to make my little family comfortable. I ask a settlement and my own-what is due from one honest man to another!" He now approaches the table, strikes his hand upon it, and pauses for a reply. Mr. Keepum coolly looks up, and with an insidious leer, says, "There, take yourself into the street. When next you enter a gentleman's office, learn to deport yourself with good manners." "Pshaw! pshaw!" interrupts the man. "What mockery! When men like you-yes, I say men like you-that has brought ruin on so many poor families, can claim to be gentlemen, rogues may get a patent for their order." The man turns to take his departure, when the infuriated Keepum, who, as we have before described, gets exceedingly put out if any one doubts his honor, seizes an iron bar, and stealing up behind, fetches him a blow over the head that fells him lifeless to the floor. Maria shrieks, and vaults into the street. The mass upon the floor fetches a last agonizing shrug, and a low moan, and is dead. The murderer stands over him, exultant, as the blood streams from the deep fracture. In fine, the blood of his victim would seem rather to increase his satisfaction at the deed, than excite a regret. Call you this murder? Truly, the man has outraged God's law. And the lover of law and order, of social good, and moral honesty, would find reasons for designating the perpetrator an assassin. For has he not first distressed a family, and then left it bereft of its protector? You may think of it and designate it as you please. Nevertheless we, in our fancied mightiness, cannot condescend to such vulgar considerations. We esteem it extremely courageous of Mr. Keepum, to defend himself "to the death" against the insults of one of the common herd. Our first families applaud the act, our sensitive press say it was "an unfortunate affair," and by way of admonition, add that it were better working people be more careful how they approach gentlemen. Mr. Snivel will call this, the sublime quality of our chivalry. What say the jury of inquest? Duly weighing the high position of Mr. Keepum, and the very low condition of the deceased, the good-natured jury return a verdict that the man met his death in consequence of an accidental blow, administered with an iron instrument, in the hands of one Keepum. From the testimony-Keepum's clerk-it is believed the act was committed in self-defence. Mr. Keepum, as is customary with our fine gentlemen, and like a hero (we will not content ourselves with making him one jot less), magnanimously surrenders himself to the authorities. The majesty of our laws is not easily offended by gentlemen of standing. Only the poor and the helpless slave can call forth the terrible majesty of the law, and quicken to action its sensitive quality. The city is shocked that Mr. Keepum is subjected to a night in jail, notwithstanding he has the jailer's best parlor, and a barricade of champaign bottles are strewn at his feet by flattering friends, who make night jubilant with their carousal. Southern society asks no repentance of him whose hands reek with the blood of his poor victim; southern society has no pittance for that family Keepum has made lick the dust in tears and sorrow. Even while we write-while the corpse of the murdered man, followed by a few brother craftsmen, is being borne to its last resting-place, the perpetrator, released on a paltry bail, is being regaled at a festive board. Such is our civilization! How had the case stood with a poor man! Could he have stood up against the chivalry of South Carolina, scoffed at the law, or bid good-natured justice close her eyes? No. He had been dragged to a close cell, and long months had passed ere the tardy movements of the law reached his case. Even then, popular opinion would have turned upon him, pre-judged him, and held him up as dangerous to the peace of the people. Yes, pliant justice would have affected great virtue, and getting on her high throne, never ceased her demands until he had expiated his crime at the gallows. A few weeks pass: Keepum's reputation for courage is fully endorsed, the Attorney-General finds nothing in the act to justify him in bringing it before a Grand Jury, the law is satisfied (or ought to be satisfied), and the rich murderer sleeps without a pang of remorse. CHAPTER XLII. IN WHICH SOME LIGHT IS THROWN ON THE PLOT OF THIS HISTORY. JUNE, July, and August are past away, and September, with all its autumnal beauties, ushers in, without bringing anything to lighten the cares of that girl whose father yet pines in prison. She looks forward, hoping against hope, to the return of her lover (something tells her he still lives), only to feel more keenly the pangs of hope deferred. And now, once more, New York, we are in thy busy streets. It is a pleasant evening in early September. The soft rays of an autumn sun are tinging the western sky, and night is fast drawing her sable mantle over the scene. In Washington Square, near where the tiny fountain jets its stream into a round, grassy-bordered basin, there sits a man of middle stature, apparently in deep study. His dress is plain, and might be taken for that of either a working man, or a somewhat faded inspector of customs. Heedless of those passing to and fro, he sits until night fairly sets in, then rises, and faces towards the East. Through the trunks of trees he sees, and seems contemplating the gray walls of the University, and the bold, sombre front of the very aristocratic church of the Reformed Dutch. "Well!" he mutters to himself, resuming his seat, and again facing to the west, "this ere business of ourn is a great book of life-'tis that! Finds us in queer places; now and then mixed up curiously." He rises a second time, advances to a gas-light, draws a letter from his pocket, and scans, with an air of evident satisfaction, over the contents. "Umph!" he resumes, and shrugs his shoulders, "I was right on the address-ought to have known it without looking." Having resumed his seat, he returns the letter to his pocket, sits with his elbow upon his knee, and his head rested thoughtfully in his right hand. The picture before him, so calm and soft, has no attractions for him. The dusky hues of night, for slowly the scene darkens, seem lending a softness and calmness to the foliage. The weeping branches of the willow, interspersed here and there, as if to invest the picture with a touching melancholy, sway gently to and fro; the leaves of the silvery poplar tremble and reflect their shadows on the fresh waters; and the flitting gas-lights mingle their gleams, play and sport over the rippled surface, coquet with the tripping star-beams, then throw fantastic lights over the swaying foliage; and from beneath the massive branches of trees, there shines out, in bold relief, the marble porticoes and lintels of stately--looking mansions. Such is the calm grandeur of the scene, that one could imagine some Thalia investing it with a poetic charm the gods might muse over. "It is not quite time yet," says the man, starting suddenly to his feet. He again approaches a gas-light, looks attentively at his watch, then saunters to the corner of Fourth and Thompson streets. An old, dilapidated wooden building, which some friend has whitewashed into respectability, and looking as if it had a strong inclination to tumble either upon the sidewalk, or against the great trunk of a hoary-headed tree at the corner, arrests his attention. "Well," he says, having paused before it, and scanned its crooked front, "this surely is the house where the woman lived when she was given the child. Practice, and putting two things together to find what one means, is the great thing in our profession. Like its old tenant, the house has got down a deal. It's on its last legs." Again he consults his watch, and with a quickened step recrosses the Square, and enters -- Avenue. Now he halts before a spacious mansion, the front of which is high and bold, and deep, and of brown freestone. The fluted columns; the elegantly-chiselled lintels; the broad, scrolled window-frames; the exactly-moulded arches; the massive steps leading to the deep, vaulted entrance, with its doors of sombre and highly-polished walnut; and its bold style of architecture, so grand in its outlines,--all invest it with a regal air. The man casts a glance along the broad avenue, then into the sombre entrance of the mansion. Now he seems questioning within himself whether to enter or retrace his steps. One-half of the outer door, which is in the Italian style, with heavy fluted mouldings, stands ajar; while from out the lace curtains of the inner, there steals a faint light. The man rests his elbow on the great stone scroll of the guard-rail, and here we leave him for a few moments. The mansion, it may be well to add here, remains closed the greater part of the year; and when opened seems visited by few persons, and those not of the very highest standing in society. A broken-down politician, a seedy hanger-on of some "literary club," presided over by a rich, but very stupid tailor, and now and then a lady about whose skirts something not exactly straight hangs, and who has been elbowed out of fashionable society for her too ardent love of opera-singers, and handsome actors, may be seen dodging in now and then. Otherwise, the mansion would seem very generally deserted by the neighborhood. Everybody will tell you, and everybody is an individual so extremely busy in other people's affairs, that he ought to know, that there is something that hangs so like a rain-cloud about the magnificent skirts of those who live so secluded "in that fine old pile," (mansion,) that the virtuous satin of the Avenue never can be got to "mix in." Indeed, the Avenue generally seems to have set its face against those who reside in it. They enjoy none of those very grand assemblies, balls, and receptions, for which the Avenue is become celebrated, and yet they luxuriate in wealth and splendor. Though the head of the house seems banished by society, society makes her the subject of many evil reports and mysterious whisperings. The lady of the mansion, however, as if to retort upon her traducers, makes it known that she is very popular abroad, every now and then during her absence honoring them with mysterious clippings from foreign journals-all setting forth the admiration her appearance called forth at a grand reception given by the Earl and Countess of --. Society is made of inexorable metal, she thinks, for the prejudices of the neighborhood have not relaxed one iota with time. That she has been presented to kings, queens, and emperors; that she has enjoyed the hospitalities of foreign embassies; that she has (and she makes no little ado that she has) shone in the assemblies of prime ministers; that she has been invited to court concerts, and been the flattered of no end of fashionable coteries, serves her nothing at home. They are events, it must be admitted, much discussed, much wondered at, much regretted by those who wind themselves up in a robe of stern morality. In a few instances they are lamented, lest the morals and manners of those who make it a point to represent us abroad should reflect only the brown side of our society. As if with regained confidence, the man, whom we left at the door scroll, is seen slowly ascending the broad steps. He enters the vaulted vestibule, and having touched the great, silver bell-knob of the inner door, stands listening to the tinkling chimes within. A pause of several minutes, and the door swings cautiously open. There stands before him the broad figure of a fussy servant man, wedged into a livery quite like that worn by the servants of an English tallow-chandler, but which, it must be said, and said to be regretted, is much in fashion with our aristocracy, who, in consequence of its brightness, belive it the exact style of some celebrated lord. The servant receives a card from the visitor, and with a bow, inquires if he will wait an answer. "I will wait the lady's pleasure-I came by appointment," returns the man. And as the servant disappears up the hall, he takes a seat, uninvited, upon a large settee, in carved walnut. "Something mysterious about this whole affair!" he muses, scanning along the spacious hall, into the conservatory of statuary and rare plants, seen opening away at the extreme end. The high, vaulted roof; the bright, tesselated floor; the taste with which the frescoes decorating the walls are designed; the great winding stairs, so richly carpeted-all enhanced in beauty by the soft light reflected upon them from a massive chandelier of stained glass, inspire him with a feeling of awe. The stillness, and the air of grandeur pervading each object that meets his eye, reminds him of the halls of those medi�val castles he has read of in his youth. The servant returns, and makes his bow. "My leady," he says, in a strong Lincolnshire brogue, "as weated ye an 'our or more." The visitor, evincing some nervousness, rises quickly to his feet, follows the servant up the hall, and is ushered into a parlor of regal dimensions, on the right. His eye falls upon one solitary occupant, who rises from a lounge of oriental richness, and advances towards him with an air of familiarity their conditions seem not to warrant. Having greeted the visitor, and bid him be seated (he takes his seat, shyly, beside the door), the lady resumes her seat in a magnificent chair. For a moment the visitor scans over the great parlor, as if moved by the taste and elegance of everything that meets his eye. The hand of art has indeed been lavishly laid on the decorations of this chamber, which presents a scene of luxury princes might revel in. And though the soft wind of whispering silks seemed lending its aid to make complete the enjoyment of the occupant, it might be said, in the words of Crabbe: "But oh, what storm was in that mind!" The person of the lady is in harmony with the splendor of the apartment. Rather tall and graceful of figure, her complexion pale, yet soft and delicate, her features as fine and regular as ever sculptor chiselled, her manner gentle and womanly. In her face, nevertheless, there is an expression of thoughtfulness, perhaps melancholy, to which her large, earnest black eyes, and finely-arched brows, fringed with dark lashes, lend a peculiar charm. While over all there plays a shadow of languor, increased perhaps by the tinge of age, or a mind and heart overtaxed with cares. "I received your note, which I hastened to answer. Of course you received my answer. I rejoice that you have persevered, and succeeded in finding the object I have so long sought. Not hearing from you for so many weeks, I had begun to fear she had gone forever," says the lady, in a soft, musical voice, raising her white, delicate hand to her cheek, which is suffused with blushes. "I had myself almost given her over, for she disappeared from the Points, and no clue could be got of her," returns the man, pausing for a moment, then resuming his story. "A week ago yesterday she turned up again, and I got wind that she was in a place we call 'Black-beetle Hole'--" "Black-beetle Hole!" ejaculates the lady, whom the reader will have discovered is no less a person than Madame Montford. Mr. Detective Fitzgerald is the visitor. "Yes, there's where she's got, and it isn't much of a place, to say the best. But when a poor creature has no other place to get a stretch down, she stretches down there--" "Proceed to how you found her, and what you have got from her concerning the child," the lady interrupts, with a deep sigh. "Well," proceeds the detective, "I meets-havin' an eye out all the while-Sergeant Dobbs one morning-Dobbs knows every roost in the Points better than me!--and says he, 'Fitzgerald, that are woman, that crazy woman, you've been in tow of so long, has turned up. There was a row in Black-beetle Hole last night. I got a force and descended into the place, found it crammed with them half-dead kind of women and men, and three thieves, what wanted to have a fuss with the hag that keeps it. One on 'em was thrashing the poor crazy woman. They had torn all the rags off her back. Howsever, if you wants to fish her out, you'd better be spry about it-'" The lady interrupts by saying she will disguise, and with his assistance, go bring her from the place-save her! Mr. Fitzgerald begs she will take the matter practically. She could not breathe the air of the place, he says. "'Thank you Dobbs,' says I," he resumes, "and when it got a bit dark I went incog. to Black-beetle's Hole--" "And where is this curious place?" she questions, with an air of anxiety. "As to that, Madame-well, you wouldn't know it was lived in, because its underground, and one not up to the entrance never would think it led to a place where human beings crawled in at night. I don't wonder so many of 'em does things what get 'em into the Station, and after that treated to a short luxury on the Island. As I was goin' on to say, I got myself fortified, started out into the Points, and walked-we take these things practically-down and up the east sidewalk, then stopped in front of the old rotten house that Black-beetle Hole is under. Then I looks down the wet little stone steps, that ain't wide enough for a big man to get down, and what lead into the cellar. Some call it Black-beetle Hole, and then again some call it the Hole of the Black-beetles. 'Yer after no good, Mr. Fitzgerald,' says Mrs. McQuade, whose husband keeps the junk-shop over the Hole, putting her malicious face out of the window. "'You're the woman I want, Mrs. McQuade,' says I. 'Don't be puttin' your foot in the house,' says she. And when I got her temper a little down by telling her I only wanted to know who lived in the Hole, she swore by all the saints it had niver a soul in it, and was hard closed up. Being well up to the dodges of the Points folks, I descended the steps, and gettin' underground, knocked at the Hole door, and then sent it smash in. 'Well! who's here?' says I. 'It's me,' says Mrs. Lynch, a knot of an old woman, who has kept the Hole for many years, and says she has no fear of the devil." Madame Montford listens with increasing anxiety; Mr. Detective Fitzgerald proceeds: "'Get a light here, then;' says I. You couldn't see nothing, it was so dark, but you could hear 'em move, and breathe. And then the place was so hot and sickly. Had to stand it best way I could. There was no standing straight in the dismal place, which was wet and nasty under foot, and not more nor twelve by fourteen. The old woman said she had only a dozen lodgers in; when she made out to get a light for me I found she had twenty-three, tucked away here and there, under straw and stuff. Well, it was curious to see 'em (here the detective wipes his forehead with his handkerchief) rise up, one after another, all round you, you know, like fiends that had been buried for a time, then come to life merely to get something to eat." "And did you find the woman-and was she one of them?" "That's what I'm comin' at. Well, I caught a sight at the woman; knew her at the glance. I got a sight at her one night in the Pit at the House of the Nine Nations. 'Here! I wants you,' says I, takin' what there was left of her by the arm. She shrieked, and crouched down, and begged me not to hurt her, and looked wilder than a tiger at me. And then the whole den got into a fright, and young women, and boys, and men-they were all huddled together-set up such a screaming. 'Munday!' says I, 'you don't go to the Tombs-here! I've got good news for you.' This quieted her some, and then I picked her up-she was nearly naked-and seeing she wanted scrubbing up, carried her out of the Hole, and made her follow me to my house, where we got her into some clothes, and seeing that she was got right in her mind, I thought it would be a good time to question her." "If you will hasten the result of your search, it will, my good sir, relieve my feelings much!" again interposes the lady, drawing her chair nearer the detective. "'You've had,' I says to her, 'a hard enough time in this world, and now here's the man what's going to be a friend to ye-understand that!' says I, and she looked at me bewildered. We gave her something to eat, and a pledge that no one would harm her, and she tamed down, and began to look up a bit. 'Your name wasn't always Munday?' says I, in a way that she couldn't tell what I was after. She said she had taken several names, but Munday was her right name. Then she corrected herself-she was weak and hoarse-and said it was her husband's name. 'You've a good memory, Mrs. Munday,' says I; 'now, just think as far back as you can, and tell us where you lived as long back as you can think.' She shook her head, and began to bury her face in her hands. I tried for several minutes, but could get nothing more out of her. Then she quickened up, shrieked out that she had just got out of the devil's regions, and made a rush for the door." CHAPTER XLIII. IN WHICH IS REVEALED THE ONE ERROR THAT BROUGHT SO MUCH SUFFERING UPON MANY. MR. FITZGERALD sees that his last remark is having no very good effect on Madame Montford, and hastens to qualify, ere it overcome her. "That, I may say, Madame, was not the last of her. My wife and me, seeing how her mind was going wrong again, got her in bed for the night, and took what care of her we could. Well, you see, she got rational in the morning, and, thinking it a chance, I 'plied a heap of kindness to her, and got her to tell all she knew of herself. She went on to tell where she lived-I followed your directions in questioning her-at the time you noted down. She described the house exactly. I have been to it to-night; knew it at a sight, from her description. Some few practical questions I put to her about the child you wanted to get at, I found frightened her so that she kept shut-for fear, I take it, that it was a crime she may be punished for at some time. I says, 'You was trusted with a child once, wasn't you?' 'The Lord forgive me,' she says, 'I know I'm guilty-but I've been punished enough in this world haven't I?' And she burst out into tears, and hung down her head, and got into the corner, as if wantin' nobody to see her. She only wanted a little good care, and a little kindness, to bring her to. This we did as well as we could, and made her understand that no one thought of punishing her, but wanted to be her friends. Well, the poor wretch began to pick up, as I said before, and in three days was such another woman that nobody could have told that she was the poor crazy thing that ran about the lanes and alleys of the Points. And now, Madame, doing as you bid me, I thought it more practical to come to you, knowing you could get of her all you wanted. She is made comfortable. Perhaps you wouldn't like to have her brought here-I may say I don't think it would be good policy. If you would condescend to come to our house, you can see her alone. I hope you are satisfied with my services." The detective pauses, and again wipes his face. "My gratitude for your perseverance I can never fully express to you. I owe you a debt I never can repay. To-morrow, at ten o'clock, I will meet you at your house; and then, if you can leave me alone with her--" "Certainly, certainly, everything will be at your service, Madame," returns the detective, rising from his seat and thanking the lady, who rewards him bountifully from her purse, and bids him good night. The servant escorts him to the door, while Madame Montford buries her face in her hands, and gives vent to her emotions. On the morning following, a neatly-caparisoned carriage is seen driving to the door of a little brick house in Crosby street. From it Madame Montford alights, and passes in at the front door, while in another minute it rolls away up the street and is lost to sight. A few moments' consultation, and the detective, who has ushered the lady into his humbly-furnished little parlor, withdraws to give place to the pale and emaciated figure of the woman Munday, who advances with faltering step and downcast countenance. "Oh! forgive me, forgive me! have mercy upon me! forgive me this crime!" she shrieks. Suddenly she raises her eyes, and rushing forward throws herself at Madame Montford's feet, in an imploring attitude. Dark and varied fancies crowd confusedly on Madame Montfort's mind at this moment. "Nay, nay, my poor sufferer, rather I might ask forgiveness of you." She takes the woman by the hand, and, with an air of regained calmness, raises her from the floor. With her, the outer life seems preparing the inner for what is to come. "But I have long sought you-sought you in obedience to the demands of my conscience, which I would the world gave me power to purify; and now I have found you, and with you some rest for my aching heart. Come, sit down; forget what you have suffered; tell me what befell you, and what has become of the child; tell me all, and remember that I will provide for you a comfortable home for the rest of your life." Madame motions her to a chair, struggling the while to suppress her own feelings. "I loved the child you intrusted to my care; yes, God knows I loved it, and watched over it for two years, as carefully as a mother. But I was poor, and the brother, in whose hands you intrusted the amount for its support (this, the reader must here know, was not a brother, but the paramour of Madame Montford), failed, and gave me nothing after the first six months. I never saw him, and when I found you had gone abroad--" The woman hesitates, and, with weeping eyes and trembling voice, again implores forgiveness. "My husband gave himself up to drink, lost his situation, and then he got to hating the child, and abusing me for taking it, and embarrassing our scanty means of living. Night and day, I was harassed and abused, despised and neglected. I was discouraged, and gave up in despair. I clung to the child as long as I could. I struggled, and struggled, and struggled--" Here the woman pauses, and with a submissive look, again hangs down her head and sobs. "Be calm, be calm," says Madame Montford, drawing nearer to her, and making an effort to inspirit her. "Throw off all your fears, forget what you have suffered, for I, too, have suffered. And you parted with the child?" "Necessity forced me," pursues the woman, shaking her head. "I saw only the street before me on one side, and felt only the cold pinchings of poverty on the other. You had gone abroad--" "It was my intention to have adopted the child as my own when I returned," interrupts Madame Montford, still clinging to that flattering hope in which the criminal sees a chance of escape. "And I," resumes the woman, "left the husband who neglected me, and who treated me cruelly, and gave myself,--perhaps I was to blame for it,--up to one who befriended me. He was the only one who seemed to care for me, or to have any sympathy for me. But he, like myself, was poor; and, being compelled to flee from our home, and to live in obscurity, where my husband could not find me out, the child was an incumbrance I had no means of supporting. I parted with her-yes, yes, I parted with her to Mother Bridges, who kept a stand at a corner in West street--" "And then what became of her?" again interposes Madame Montford. The woman assumes a sullenness, and it is some time before she can be got to proceed. "My conscience rebuked me," she resumes, as if indifferent about answering the question, "for I loved the child as my own; and the friend I lived with, and who followed the sea, printed on its right arm two hearts and a broken anchor, which remain there now. My husband died of the cholera, and the friend I had taken to, and who treated me kindly, also died, and I soon found myself an abandoned woman, an outcast-yes, ruined forever, and in the streets, leading a life that my own feelings revolted at, but from which starvation only seemed the alternative. My conscience rebuked me again and again, and something--I cannot tell what it was--impelled me with an irresistible force to watch over the fortunes of the child I knew must come to the same degraded life necessity-perhaps it was my own false step-had forced upon me. I watched her a child running neglected about the streets, then I saw her sold to Hag Zogbaum, who lived in Pell street; I never lost sight of her-no, I never lost sight of her, but fear of criminating myself kept me from making myself known to her. When I had got old in vice, and years had gone past, and she was on the first step to the vice she had been educated to, we shared the same roof. Then she was known as Anna Bonard--" "Anna Bonard!" exclaims Madame Montford. "Then truly it is she who now lives in Charleston! There is no longer a doubt. I may seek and claim her, and return her to at least a life of comfort." "There you will find her. Ah, many times have I looked upon her, and thought if I could only save her, how happy I could die. I shared the same roof with her in Charleston, and when I got sick she was kind to me, and watched over me, and was full of gentleness, and wept over her condition. She has sighed many a time, and said how she wished she knew how she came into the world, to be forced to live despised by the world. But I got down, down, down, from one step to another, one step to another, as I had gone up from one step to another in the splendor of vice, until I found myself, tortured in mind and body, a poor neglected wretch in the Charleston Poor-house. In it I was treated worse than a slave, left, sick and heart-broken, and uncared-for, to the preying of a fever that destroyed my mind. And as if that were not enough, I was carried into the dungeons-the 'mad cells,'-and chained. And this struck such a feeling of terror into my soul that my reason, as they said, was gone forever. But I got word to Anna, and she came to me, and gave me clothes and many little things to comfort me, and got me out, and gave me money to get back to New York, where I have been ever since, haunted from place to place, with scarce a place to lay my head. Surely I have suffered. Shall I be forgiven?" Her voice here falters, she becomes weak, and seems sinking under the burden of her emotions. "If,--if-if," she mutters, incoherently, "you can save me, and forgive me, you will have the prayers of one who has drank deep of the bitter cup." She looks up with a sad, melancholy countenance, again implores forgiveness, and bursts into loud sobs. "Mine is the guilty part-it is me who needs forgiveness!" speaks Madame Montford, pressing the hand of the forlorn woman, as the tears stream down her cheeks. She has unburdened her emotions, but such is the irresistible power of a guilty conscience that she finds her crushed heart and smitten frame sinking under the shock-that she feels the very fever of remorse mounting to her brain. "Be calm, be calm-for you have suffered, wandered through the dark abyss; truly you have been chastened enough in this world. But while your heart is only bruised and sore, mine is stung deep and lacerated. The image of that child now rises up before me. I see her looking back over her chequered life, and pining to know her birthright. Mine is the task of seeking her out, reconciling her, saving her from this life of shame. I must sacrifice the secrets of my own heart, go boldly in pursuit of her--" She pauses a moment. There is yet a thin veil between her and society. Society only founds its suspicions upon the mystery involved in the separation from her husband, and the doubtful character of her long residence in Europe. Society knows nothing of the birth of the child. The scandal leveled at her in Charleston, was only the result of her own indiscretion. "Yes," she whispers, attempting at the same time to soothe the feelings of the poor disconsolate woman, "I must go, and go quickly-I must drag her from the terrible life she is leading;--but, ah! I must do it so as to shield myself. Yes, I must shield myself!" And she puts into the woman's hand several pieces of gold, saying: "take this!--to-morrow you will be better provided for. Be silent. Speak to no one of what has passed between us, nor make the acquaintance of any one outside the home I shall provide for you." Thus saying, she recalls Mr. Detective Fitzgerald, rewards him with a nostrum from her purse, and charges him to make the woman comfortable at her expense. "Her mind, now I do believe," says the detective, with an approving toss of the head, "her faculties 'll come right again,--they only wants a little care and kindness, mum." The detective thanks her again and again, then puts the money methodically into his pocket. The carriage having returned, Madame Montford vaults into it as quickly as she alighted, and is rolled away to her mansion. CHAPTER XLIV. IN WHICH IS RECORDED EVENTS THE READER MAY NOT HAVE EXPECTED. WHILE the events we have recorded in the foregoing chapter, confused, hurried, and curious, are being enacted in New York, let us once more turn to Charleston. You must know that, notwithstanding our high state of civilization, we yet maintain in practice two of the most loathsome relics of barbarism-we lash helpless women, and we scourge, at the public whipping-post, the bare backs of men. George Mullholland has twice been dragged to the whipping-post, twice stripped before a crowd in the market-place, twice lashed, maddened to desperation, and twice degraded in the eyes of the very negroes we teach to yield entire submission to the white man, however humble his grade. Hate, scorn, remorse-every dark passion his nature can summon-rises up in one torturing tempest, and fills his bosom with a mad longing for revenge. "Death!" he says, while looking out from his cell upon the bright landscape without, "what is death to me? The burnings of an outraged soul subdue the thought of death." The woman through whom this dread finale was brought upon him, and who now repines, unable to shake off the smarts old associations crowd upon her heart, has a second and third time crept noiselessly to his cell, and sought in vain his forgiveness. Yea, she has opened the door gently, but drew back in terror before his dark frown, his sardonic scorn, his frenzied rush at her. Had he not loved her fondly, his hate had not taken such deep root in his bosom. Two or three days pass, he has armed himself "to the death," and is resolved to make his escape, and seek revenge of his enemies. It is evening. Dark festoons of clouds hang over the city, lambent lightning plays along the heavens in the south. Now it flashes across the city, the dull panorama lights up, the tall, gaunt steeples gleam out, and the surface of the Bay flashes out in a phosphoric blaze. Patiently and diligently has he filed, and filed, and filed, until he has removed the bar that will give egress to his body. The window of his cell overlooks the ditch, beyond which is the prison wall. Noiselessly he arranges the rope, for he is in the third story, then paces his cell, silent and thoughtful. "Must it be?" he questions within himself, "must I stain these hands with the blood of the woman I love? Revenge, revenge-I will have revenge. I will destroy both of them, for to-morrow I am to be dragged a third time to the whipping-post." Now he casts a glance round the dark cell, now he pauses at the window, now the lightning courses along the high wall, then reflects back the deep ditch. Another moment, and he has commenced his descent. Down, down, down, he lowers himself. Now he holds on tenaciously, the lightning reflects his dangling figure, a prisoner in a lower cell gives the alarm, he hears the watchword of his discovery pass from cell to cell, the clashing of the keeper's door grates upon his ear like thunder-he has reached the end of his rope, and yet hangs suspended in the air. A heavy fall is heard, he has reached the ditch, bounds up its side to the wall, seizes a pole, and places against it, and, with one vault, is over into the open street. Not a moment is to be lost. Uproar and confusion reigns throughout the prison, his keepers have taken the alarm, and will soon be on his track, pursuing him with ferocious hounds. Burning for revenge, and yet bewildered, he sets off at full speed, through back lanes, over fields, passing in his course the astonished guardmen. He looks neither to the right nor the left, but speeds on toward the grove. Now he reaches the bridge that crosses the millpond, pauses for breath, then proceeds on. Suddenly a light from the villa Anna occupies flashes out. He has crossed the bridge, bounds over the little hedge-grown avenue, through the garden, and in another minute stands before her, a pistol pointed at her breast, and all the terrible passions of an enraged fiend darkening his countenance. Her implorings for mercy bring an old servant rushing into the room, the report of a pistol rings out upon the still air, shriek after shriek follows, mingled with piercing moans, and death-struggles. "Ha, ha!" says the avenger, looking on with a sardonic smile upon his face, and a curl of hate upon his lip, "I have taken the life to which I gave my own-yes, I have taken it-I have taken it!" And she writhes her body, and sets her eyes fixedly upon him, as he hastens out of the room. "Quick! quick!" he says to himself. "There, then! I am pursued!" He recrosses the millpond over another bridge, and in his confusion turns a short angle into a lane leading to the city. The yelping of dogs, the deep, dull tramp of hoofs, the echoing of voices, the ominous baying and scenting of blood-hounds-all break upon his ear in one terrible chaos. Not a moment is to be lost. The sight at the villa will attract the attention of his pursuers, and give him time to make a distance! The thought of what he has done, and the terrible death that awaits him, crowds upon his mind, and rises up before him like a fierce monster of retribution. He rushes at full speed down the lane, vaults across a field into the main road, only to find his pursuers close upon him. The patrol along the streets have caught the alarm, which he finds spreading with lightning-speed. The clank of side-arms, the scenting and baying of the hounds, coming louder and louder, nearer and nearer, warns him of the approaching danger. A gate at the head of a wharf stands open, the hounds are fast gaining upon him, a few jumps more and they will have him fast in their ferocious grasp. He rushes through the gate, down the wharf, the tumultuous cry of his pursuers striking terror into his very heart. Another instant and the hounds are at his feet, he stands on the capsill at the end, gives one wild, despairing look into the abyss beneath--"I die revenged," he shouts, discharges a pistol into his breast, and with one wild plunge, is buried forever in the water beneath. The dark stream of an unhappy life has run out. Upon whom does the responsibility of this terrible closing rest? In the words of Thomson, the avenger left behind him only "Gaunt Beggary, and Scorn, with many hell-hounds more." When the gray dawn of morning streamed in through the windows of the little villa, and upon the parlor table, that had so often been adorned with caskets and fresh-plucked flowers, there, in their stead, lay the lifeless form of the unhappy Anna, her features pale as marble, but beautiful even in death. There, rolled in a mystic shroud, calm as a sleeper in repose, she lay, watched over by two faithful slaves. The Judge and Mr. Snivel have found it convenient to make a trip of pleasure into the country. And though the affair creates some little comment in fashionable society, it would be exceedingly unpopular to pry too deeply into the private affairs of men high in office. We are not encumbered with scrutinizing morality. Being an "unfortunate woman," the law cannot condescend to deal with her case. Indeed, were it brought before a judge, and the judge to find himself sitting in judgment upon a judge, his feelings would find some means of defrauding his judgment, while society would carefully close the shutter of its sanctity. At high noon there comes a man of the name of Moon, commonly called Mr. Moon, the good-natured Coroner. In truth, a better-humored man than Mr. Moon cannot be found; and what is more, he has the happiest way in the world of disposing of such cases, and getting verdicts of his jury exactly suited to circumstances. Mr. Moon never proceeds to business without regaling his jury with good brandy and high-flavored cigars. In this instance he has bustled about and got together six very solemn and seriously-disposed gentlemen, who proceed to deliberate. "A mystery hangs over the case," says one. A second shakes his head, and views the body as if anxious to get away. A third says, reprovingly, that "such cases are coming too frequent." Mr. Moon explains the attendant circumstances, and puts a changed face on the whole affair. One juryman chalks, and another juryman chalks, and Mr. Moon says, by way of bringing the matter to a settled point, "It is a bad ending to a wretched life." A solemn stillness ensues, and then follows the verdict. The body being identified as that of one Anna Bonard, a woman celebrated for her beauty, but of notorious reputation, the jury are of opinion (having duly weighed the circumstances) that she came to her melancholy death by the hands of one George Mullholland, who was prompted to commit the act for some cause to the jury unknown. And the jury, in passing the case over to the authorities, recommend that the said Mullholland be brought to justice. This done, Mr. Moon orders her burial, and the jury hasten home, fully confident of having performed their duty unswerved. When night came, when all was hushed without, and the silence within was broken only by the cricket's chirp, when the lone watcher, the faithful old slave, sat beside the cold, shrouded figure, when the dim light of the chamber of death seemed mingling with the shadows of departed souls, there appeared in the room, like a vision, the tall figure of a female, wrapped in a dark mantle. Slowly and noiselessly she stole to the side of the deceased, stood motionless and statue-like for several minutes, her eyes fixed in mute contemplation on the face of the corpse. The watcher looked and started back, still the figure remained motionless. Raising her right hand to her chin, pensively, she lifted her eyes heavenward, and in that silent appeal, in those dewy tears that glistened in her great orbs, in those words that seemed freezing to her quivering lips, the fierce struggle waging in that bosom was told. She heard the words, "You cannot redeem me now!" knelling in her ears, her thoughts flashed back over years of remorse, to the day of her error, and she saw rising up as it were before her, like a spectre from the tomb, seeking retribution, the image of the child she had sacrificed to her vanity. She pressed and pressed the cold hand, so delicate, so like her own; she unbared the round, snowy arm, and there beheld the imprinted hearts, and the broken anchor! Her pent-up grief then burst its bounds, the tears rolled down her cheeks, her lips quivered, her hand trembled, and her very blood seemed as ice in her veins. She cast a hurried glance round the room, a calm and serene smile seemed lighting up the features of the lifeless woman, and she bent over her, and kissed and kissed her cold, marble-like brow, and bathed it with her burning tears. It was a last sad offering; and having bestowed it, she turned slowly away, and disappeared. It was Madame Montford, who came a day too late to save the storm-tossed girl, but returned to think of the hereafter of her own soul. CHAPTER XLV. ANOTHER SHADE OF THE PICTURE. WHILE the earth of Potter's Field is closing over all that remains of Anna Bonard, Maria McArthur may be seen, snatching a moment of rest, as it were, seated under the shade of a tree on the Battery, musing, as is her wont. The ships sail by cheerily, there is a touching beauty about the landscape before her, all nature seems glad. Even the heavens smile serenely; and a genial warmth breathes through the soft air. "Truly the Allwise," she says within herself, "will be my protector, and is chastising me while consecrating something to my good. Mr. Keepum has made my father's release the condition of my ruin. But he is but flesh and blood, and I--no, I am not yet a slave! The virtue of the poor, truly, doth hang by tender threads; but I am resolved to die struggling to preserve it." And a light, as of some future joy, rises up in her fancy, and gives her new strength. The German family have removed from the house in which she occupies a room, and in its place are come two women of doubtful character. Still, necessity compels her to remain in it; for though it is a means resorted to by Keepum to effect his purpose, she cannot remove without being followed, and harassed by him. Strong in the consciousness of her own purity, and doubly incensed at the proof of what extremes the designer will condescend to, she nerves herself for the struggle she sees before her. True, she was under the same roof with them; she was subjected to many inconveniencies by their presence; but not all their flattering inducements could change her resolution. Nevertheless, the resolution of a helpless female does not protect her from the insults of heartless men. She returns home to find that Mother Rumor, with her thousand tongues, is circulating all kinds of evil reports about her. It is even asserted that she has become an abandoned woman, and is the occupant of a house of doubtful repute. And this, instead of enlisting the sympathies of some kind heart, rather increases the prejudice and coldness of those upon whom she has depended for work. It is seldom the story of suffering innocence finds listeners. The sufferer is too frequently required to qualify in crime, before she becomes an object of sympathy. She returns, one day, some work just finished for one of our high old families, the lady of which makes it a boast that she is always engaged in "laudable pursuits of a humane kind." The lady sends her servant to the door with the pittance due, and begs to say she is sorry to hear of the life Miss McArthur is leading, and requests she will not show herself at the house again. Mortified in her feelings, Maria begs an interview; but the servant soon returns an answer that her Missus cannot descend to anything of the kind. Our high old families despise working people, and wall themselves up against the poor, whose virtue they regard as an exceedingly cheap commodity. Our high old families choose rather to charge guilt, and deny the right to prove innocence. With the four shillings, Maria, weeping, turns from the door, procures some bread and coffee, and wends her way to the old prison. But the chords of her resolution are shaken, the cold repulse has gone like poison to her heart. The ray of joy that was lighting up her future, seems passing away; whilst fainter and fainter comes the hope of once more greeting her lover. She sees vice pampered by the rich, and poor virtue begging at their doors. She sees a price set upon her own ruin; she sees men in high places waiting with eager passion the moment when the thread of her resolution will give out. The cloud of her night does, indeed, seem darkening again. But she gains the prison, and falters as she enters the cell where the old Antiquary, his brow furrowed deep of age, sleeps calmly upon his cot. Near his hand, which he has raised over his head, lays a letter, with the envelope broken. Maria's quick eye flashes over the superscription, and recognizes in it the hand of Tom Swiggs. A transport of joy fills her bosom with emotions she has no power to constrain. She trembles from head to foot; fancies mingled with joys and fears crowd rapidly upon her thoughts. She grasps it with feelings frantic of joy, and holds it in her shaking hand; the shock has nigh overcome her. The hope in which she has so long found comfort and strength-that has so long buoyed her up, and carried her safely through trials, has truly been her beacon light. "Truly," she says within herself, "the dawn of my morning is brightening now." She opens the envelope, and finds a letter enclosed to her. "Oh! yes, yes, yes! it is him-it is from him!" she stammers, in the exuberance of her wild joy. And now the words, "You are richer than me," flash through her thoughts with revealed significance. Maria grasps the old man's hand. He starts and wakes, as if unconscious of his situation, then fixes his eyes upon her with a steady, vacant gaze. Then, with childlike fervor, he presses her hand to his lips, and kisses it. "It was a pleasant dream--ah! yes, I was dreaming all things went so well!" Again a change comes over his countenance, and he glances round the room, with a wild and confused look. "Am I yet in prison?-well, it was only a dream. If death were like dreaming, I would crave it to take me to its peace, that my mind might no longer be harassed with the troubles of this life. Ah! there, there!"--(the old man starts suddenly, as if a thought has flashed upon him)--" there is the letter, and from poor Tom, too! I only broke the envelope. I have not opened it." "It is safe, father; I have it," resumes Maria, holding it before him, unopened, as the words tremble upon her lips. One moment she fears it may convey bad news, and in the next she is overjoyed with the hope that it brings tidings of the safety and return of him for whose welfare she breathed many a prayer. Pale and agitated, she hesitates a moment, then proceeds to open it. "Father, father! heaven has shielded me-heaven has shielded me! Ha! ha! ha! yes, yes, yes! He is safe! he is safe!" And she breaks out into one wild exclamation of joy, presses the letter to her lips, and kisses it, and moistens it with her tears. "It was all a plot-a dark plot set for my ruin!" she mutters, and sinks back, overcome with her emotions. The old man fondles her to his bosom, his white beard flowing over her suffused cheeks, and his tears mingling with hers. And here she remains, until the anguish of her joy runs out, and her mind resumes its wonted calm. Having broken the spell, she reads the letter to the enraptured old man. Tom has arrived in New York; explains the cause of his long absence; speaks of several letters he has transmitted by post, (which she never received;) and his readiness to proceed to Charleston, by steamer, in a few days. His letter is warm with love and constancy; he recurs to old associations; he recounts his remembrance of the many kindnesses he received at the hands of her father, when homeless; of the care, to which he owes his reform, bestowed upon him by herself, and his burning anxiety to clasp her to his bosom. A second thought flashes upon her fevered brain. Am I not the subject of slander! Am I not contaminated by associations? Has not society sought to clothe me with shame? Truth bends before falsehood, and virtue withers under the rust of slandering tongues. Again a storm rises up before her, and she feels the poisoned arrow piercing deep into her heart. Am I not living under the very roof that will confirm the slanders of mine enemies? she asks herself. And the answer rings back in confirmation upon her too sensitive ears, and fastens itself in her feelings like a reptile with deadly fangs. No; she is not yet free from her enemies. They have the power of falsifying her to her lover. The thought fills her bosom with sad emotions. Strong in the consciousness of her virtue, she feels how weak she is in the walks of the worldly. Her persecutors are guilty, but being all-powerful may seek in still further damaging her character, a means of shielding themselves from merited retribution. It is the natural expedient of bad men in power to fasten crime upon the weak they have injured. Only a few days have to elapse, then, and Maria will be face to face with him in whom her fondest hopes have found refuge; but even in those few days it will be our duty to show how much injury may be inflicted upon the weak by the powerful. The old Antiquary observes the change that has come so suddenly over Maria's feelings, but his entreaties fail to elicit the cause. Shall she return to the house made doubtful by its frail occupants; or shall she crave the jailer's permission to let her remain and share her father's cell? Ah! solicitude for her father settles the question. The alternative may increase his apprehensions, and with them his sufferings. Night comes on; she kisses him, bids him a fond adieu, and with an aching heart returns to the house that has brought so much scandal upon her. On reaching the door she finds the house turned into a bivouac of revelry; her own chamber is invaded, and young men and women are making night jubilant over Champagne and cigars. Mr. Keepum and the Hon. Mr. Snivel are prominent among the carousers; and both are hectic of dissipation. Shall she flee back to the prison? Shall she go cast herself at the mercy of the keeper? As she is about following the thought with the act, she is seized rudely by the arms, dragged into the scene of carousal, and made the object of coarse jokes. One insists that she must come forward and drink; another holds an effervescing glass to her lips; a third says he regards her modesty out of place, and demands that she drown it with mellowing drinks. The almost helpless girl shrieks, and struggles to free herself from the grasp of her enemies. Mr. Snivel, thinking it highly improper that such cries go free, catches her in his arms, and places his hand over her mouth. "Caught among queer birds at last," he says, throwing an insidious wink at Keepum. "Will flock together, eh?" As if suddenly invested with herculean strength, Maria hurls the ruffian from her, and lays him prostrate on the floor. In his fall the table is overset, and bottles, decanters and sundry cut glass accompaniments, are spread in a confused mass on the floor. Suddenly Mr. Keepum extinguishes the lights. This is the signal for a scene of uproar and confusion we leave the reader to picture in his imagination. The cry of "murder" is followed quickly by the cry of "watch, watch!" and when the guardmen appear, which they are not long in doing, it is seen that the very chivalric gentlemen have taken themselves off-left, as a prey for the guard, only Maria and three frail females. Cries, entreaties, and explanations, are all useless with such men as our guard is composed of. Her clothes are torn, and she is found rioting in disreputable company. The sergeant of the guard says, "Being thus disagreeably caught, she must abide the penalty. It may teach you how to model your morals," he adds; and straightway, at midnight, she is dragged to the guard-house, and in spite of her entreaties, locked up in a cell with the outcast women. "Will you not hear me? will you not allow an innocent woman to speak in her own behalf? Do, I beg, I beseech, I implore you-listen but for a minute-render me justice, and save me from this last step of shame and disgrace," she appeals to the sergeant, as the cell door closes upon her. Mr. Sergeant Stubble, for such is his name, shakes his head in doubt. "Always just so," he says, with a shrug of the shoulders: "every one's innocent what comes here 'specially women of your sort. The worst rioters 'come the greatest sentimentalists, and repents most when they gets locked up-does! You'll find it a righteous place for reflection, in there." Mr. Sergeant Stubble shuts the door, and smothers her cries. CHAPTER XLVI. THE SOUL MAY GAIN STRENGTH IN A DREARY CELL. IT is Bulwer, the prince of modern novelists, who says: "There is in calumny a rank poison that, even when the character throws off the slander, the heart remains diseased beneath the effect." And this is the exact condition in which Maria finds herself. The knaves who have sought her ruin would seem to have triumphed; the ears of the charitable are closed to her; her judgment seems sealed. And yet when all is dark and still; when her companions sleep in undisturbed tranquillity; when her agitated feelings become calmed; when there seems speaking to her, through the hushed air of midnight, the voice of a merciful providence-her soul quickens, and she counsels her self-command, which has not yet deserted her. Woman's nature is indeed strung in delicate threads, but her power of endurance not unfrequently puts the sterner sex to the blush. "Slander has truly left my heart diseased, but I am innocent, and to-morrow, perhaps, my star will brighten. These dark struggles cannot last forever!" she muses, as her self-command strengthens, and gives her new hopes. Her betrothed may return to-morrow, and his generous nature will not refuse her an opportunity to assert her innocence. And while she thus muses in the cell of the guard-house, the steamer in which Tom proceeds to Charleston is dashing through the waves, speeding on, like a thing of life, leaving a long train of phosphoric brine behind her. As might naturally have been expected, Tom learns from a fellow-passenger all that has befallen the old Antiquary. This filled his mind with gloomy forebodings concerning the fate of Maria. There was, too, something evasive in the manner of the man who conveyed to him this intelligence, and this excited his apprehensions, and prompted him to make further inquiries. His confidence in her faith animated and encouraged his heart. But when he remembered that the old man was, even when he left, in the clutches of Snivel and Keepum (men whose wealth and influence gave them power to crush the poor into the dust), an abyss, terrible and dark, opened to him, his whole nature seemed changed, and his emotions became turbulent. He again sought the passenger, and begging him to throw off all restraint, assured him that it would relieve his feelings to know what had become of Maria. The man hesitated for a few moments, then, with reluctant lips, disclosed to him that she had fallen a victim of necessity-more, that she was leading the life of an outcast. Tom listened attentively to the story, which lost nothing in the recital; then, with passions excited to frenzy, sought his state-room. At first it seemed like a sentence of eternal separation ringing through his burning brain. All the dark struggles of his life rose up before him, and seemed hastening him back into that stream of dissipation in which his mind had found relief when his mother forsook him. But no! something-he knew not what-whispered in his ear, "Do not reject her. Faith and hope remains to you; let truth be the judge." He stretched himself in his berth, but not to sleep. On the following morning Maria, with the frail companions of her cell, is brought into court, and arraigned before His Honor, Judge Sleepyhorn, who, be it said to his credit, though terrible in his dealings with the harder sex, and whose love of hanging negroes is not to be outdone, is exceedingly lenient with female cases, as he is pleased to style them. Though her virtue is as chaste as the falling snow, Maria is compelled to suffer, for nearly an hour, the jeers and ribald insinuations of a coarse crowd, while the fact of her being in the guard-house is winged over the city by exultant scandal-mongers. Nevertheless, she remains calm and resolute. She sees the last struggle of an eventful life before her, and is resolved to meet it with womanly fortitude. The Judge smiles, casts a glance over his assembly, and takes his seat, as Mr. Sergeant Stubble commences to read over the charges against the accused. "Business," says the Judge, "will proceed." "Now, Judge!" speaks up one of the frail women, coming forward in a bold, off-hand manner to speak for her companions, "I don't exactly see what we have done so much out of the way. No ladies of our standing have been up here before. The law's comin' very nice all at once. There's a heap, as you know, Judge--" "No, no, no! I know nothing about such places!" quickly interrupts the Judge, his face full of virtuous indignation, and his hands raised in horror. "Then I may be pardoned for not wearing spectacles," resumes the woman, with a curtsy. Finding the judgment-seat becoming a little too warm for his nerves, the Judge very prudently dismisses the damsels, with an admonition to go and do better-in fine, to tighten their tongues as well as their morality. With the aid of Mr. Sergeant Stubble, Maria is brought forward, pale and trembling, and struggling with the war of grief waging in her heart. Calmly she looks up at the Judge for a moment, then hangs down her head in silence. "There is a Judge above who knows the circumstances, gives me now His hand, and will judge me in the balance of truth and mercy, when my enemies are at my feet," flashes through her thoughts, and strengthens the inner nature. But her tongue has lost its power; her feelings unbend to the thought that she is in a criminal court, arraigned before a Judge. She has no answer to make to the Judge's questions, but gives way to her emotions, and breaks out into loud sobs. Several minutes, during which a sympathizing silence is manifest, pass, when she raises slowly her head, and makes an attempt to mutter a few words in her defence. But her voice chokes, and the words hang, inarticulate, upon her lips. She buries her face in her hands, and shakes her head, as if saying, "I have said all." His Honor seems moved to mercy by the touching spectacle before him. He whispers in the ear of Mr. Sergeant Stubble, and that functionary brightens up, and with an attempt to be kind, says: "Pray, Miss McArthur--it's a duty we have to perform, you see--where is your father? the Judge says." Ah! That question has touched the fountain-spring of all her troubles, and the waters come gushing forth, as if to engulph the last faint shadow of hope in darkness. Almost simultaneously she falls to the floor in a fit of violent hysterics. The Judge orders the court-room cleared of its spectators, and if the reader has ever witnessed the painful sight of a female suffering such paroxysms, he may picture more forcibly in his imagination than we can describe, the scene that follows. For some fifteen minutes the sufferer struggles, and when her mind resumes its calm, she casts a wild, despairing look round the room, then fixes her eyes upon those who are gathered about her. There was a kind impulse yet left in the Judge. He discovers a sympathy for her condition, holds her weak, trembling hand in his own, and bathes her temples with cologne. "You are free to go home-there is no charge against you," he whispers in her ear. "I have ordered a carriage, and will send you to your home-where is it?" This is, indeed, cruel kindness. "If I had a home," responds Maria, in a low voice, as she rises, and rests herself on her elbow, "it would shelter me from this distress. Yes, I would then be happy once more." A carriage soon arrives, she is put into it, and with a few consoling words from the Judge, is driven back, as hastily as possible, to the house from which she was dragged only last night. She has nowhere else to go to-day, but resolves to-morrow to seek a shelter elsewhere. Through the whisperings of that unaccountable human telegraph, the news of her shame, made great and terrible with a thousand additions, is flown into the family secrets of the city. How strange and yet how true of human nature is it, that we stand ever ready to point the finger of scorn at those we fancy in the downward path, while refusing ourselves to receive the moralist's lessons. CHAPTER XLVII. IN WHICH IS A HAPPY MEETING, AND SOMETHING PLEASING. IT is night-Mr. Keepum is seen seated before a table in his drawing-room, finishing a sumptuous supper, and asking himself: "Who dares to question me, the opulent Keepum?" Mr. Snivel enters, joins him over a glass of wine, and says, "this little matter must be settled tonight, Keepum, old fellow-been minced long enough." And the two chivalric gentlemen, after a short conversation, sally into the street. Yonder, in the harbor, just rounding the frowning walls of Fort Sumpter, blazes out the great red light of the steamer, on which the impatient lover fast approaches Charleston city. "She can do nothing at law--against our influence she is powerless!" ejaculates Keepum, as the two emerge from the house and stroll along up Broad street. Maria, pale and exhausted with the fatigues and excitements of the day, sits in her solitary chamber, fearing lest each footstep she hears advancing, may be that of her enemies, or hoping that it may announce the coming of her lover and rescuer. "You are richer than me!" still tinkles its silvery music in her ear, and brings comfort to her agitated heart. The clock strikes ten, and suddenly her room is entered by Keepum and Snivel. The former, with an insinuating leer, draws a chair near her, while the latter, doffing his coat, flings himself upon the cot. Neither speak for some minutes; but Maria reads in their looks and actions the studied villany they have at heart. "Inconsistency adorned!" exclaims Keepum, drawing his chair a little nearer. "Now, I say, you have stuck stubbornly to this ere folly." Mr. Keepum's sharp, red face, comes redder, and his small, wicked eyes flash like orbs of fire. "Better come down off that high horse-live like a lady. The devil's got Tom, long ago." "So you have said before, Mr. Keepum," rejoins Maria, turning upon him a look of disdain. "You may persecute me to the death; you may continue to trample me into the dust; but only with my death shall your lust be gratified on me!" This declaration is made with an air of firmness Mr. Keepum seems to understand. "D-n it," rejoins Mr. Snivel, with a sardonic laugh, "these folks are affecting to be something." Maria raises her right hand, and motions Mr. Keepum away. It does indeed seem to her that the moment when nature in her last struggle unbends before the destroyer-when the treasure of a life passes away to give place to dark regrets and future remorse, is come. Let us pause here for a moment, and turn to another part of the city. The steamer has scarce reached her berth at the wharf, when the impatient lover springs ashore, dashes through the throng of spectators, and, bewildered as it were, and scarce knowing which way he is proceeding, hurries on, meeting no one he knows, and at length reaching Meeting street. Here he pauses, and to his great joy meets an old negro, who kindly offers to escort him to the distant quarter of the city where Maria resides. Again he sets out, his mind hung in suspense, and his emotions agitated to the highest degree. He hurries on into King street, pauses for a moment before the house of the old Antiquary, now fast closed, and as if the eventful past were crowding upon his fancy, he turns away with dizzy eyes, and follows the old negro, step by step-faint, nervous, and sinking with excitement-until they reach the cabin of Undine, the mulatto woman, under whose roof Maria once sought refuge for the night. Ready to exclaim, "Maria, I am here!" his heart is once more doomed to disappointment. The question hangs upon his lips, as his wondering eyes glance round the room of the cabin. Undine tells him she is not here; but points him to a light, nearly half a mile distant, and tells him she is there! there! The faithful old negro sets off again, and at full speed they proceed up the lane in the direction of the light. And while they vault as it were o'er the ground, let us again turn to the chamber of Maria. With a sudden spring, Keepum, who had been for several minutes keeping his eyes fixedly set upon Maria, and endeavoring to divert her attention, seized her arms, and was about to drag her down, when Snivel put out the light and ran to his assistance. "Never! never!" she shrieks, at the very top of her voice. "Only with my life!" A last struggle, a stifled cry of "never! never!" mingled with the altercation of voices, rang out upon the air, and grated upon the impatient lover's ear like death-knells. "Up stairs, up stairs!" shouts the old negro, and in an instant he has burst the outer door in, mounts the stairs with the nimbleness of a catamount, and is thundering at the door, which gives way before his herculean strength. "I am here! I am here! Maria, I am here!" he shouts, at the top of his voice, and with an air of triumph stands in the door, as the flashing light from without reveals his dilating figure. "Foul villains! fiends in human form! A light! a light! Merciful heavens-a light!" He dashes his hat from his brow, turns a revengeful glance round the room, and grasps Maria in his arms, as the old negro strikes a light and reveals the back of Mr. Snivel escaping out of a window. Keepum, esteeming discretion the better part of valor, has preceded him. Tightly Tom clasps Maria to his bosom, and with a look of triumph says: "Maria! speak, speak! They have not robbed you?" She shakes her head, returns a look of sweet innocence, and mutters: "It was the moment of life or death. Thank heaven-merciful heaven, I am yet guiltless. They have not robbed me of my virtue-no, no, no. I am faint, I am weak-set me down-set me down. The dawn of my morning has brightened." And she seems swooning in his arms. Gently he bears her to the cot, lays her upon it, and with the solicitude of one whose heart she has touched with a recital of her troubles, smooths her pillow and watches over her until her emotions come subdued. "And will you believe me innocent? Will you hear my story, and reject the calumny of those who have sought my ruin?" speaks Maria, impressing a kiss upon the fevered lips of her deliverer, and, having regained her self-command, commences to recount some of the ills she has suffered. "Maria!" rejoins Tom, returning her embrace, "you, whom I have loved so sincerely, so quietly but passionately, have no need of declaring your innocence. I have loved you-no one but you. My faith in your innocence has never been shaken. I hastened to you, and am here, your protector, as you have been mine. Had I not myself suffered by those who have sought your ruin, my pride might be touched at the evil reports that have already been rung in my ears. Grateful am I to Him who protects the weak, that I have spared you from the dread guilt they would have forced upon you." Again and again he declares his eternal love, and seals it with a kiss. His, nature is too generous to doubt her innocence. He already knows the condition of her father, hence keeps silent on that point, lest it might overcome her. He raises her gently from the cot and seats her in a chair; and as he does so, Mr. Snivel's coat falls upon the floor, and from the pocket there protrudes four of his (Tom's) letters, addressed to Maria. "Here! here!" says Tom, confusedly, "here is the proof of their guilt and your innocence." And he picks up the letters and holds them before her. "I was not silent, though our enemies would have had it so." And she looks up again, and with a sweet smile says: "There truly seems a divine light watching over me and lightening the burdens of a sorrowing heart." The excitement of the meeting over, Maria rapidly recounts a few of the trials she has been subjected to. Tom's first impulse is, that he will seek redress at law. Certainly the law will give an injured woman her rights. But a second thought tells him how calmly justice sits on her throne when the rights of the poor are at stake. Again, Mr. Keepum has proceeded strictly according to law in prosecuting her father, and there is no witness of his attempts upon her virtue. The law, too, has nothing to do with the motives. No! he is in an atmosphere where justice is made of curious metal. "And now, Maria," says Tom, pressing her hand in his own, "I, whom you rescued when homeless-I, who was loathed when a wretched inebriate, am now a man. My manhood I owe to you. I acknowledge it with a grateful heart. You were my friend then-I am your friend now. May I, nay! am I worthy of retaining this hand for life?" "Rather, I might ask," she responds, in a faltering voice, "am I worthy of this forgiveness, this confidence, this pledge of eternal happiness?" It is now the image of a large and noble heart reflects itself in the emotions of the lovers, whose joys heaven seems to smile upon. "Let us forget the past, and live only for the future-for each other's happiness; and heaven will reward the pure and the good!" concludes Tom, again sealing his faith with an ardent embrace. "You are richer than me!" now, for the last time, rings its gladdening music into her very soul. Tom recompenses the faithful old negro, who has been a silent looker on, and though the night is far spent, he leads Maria from the place that has been a house of torment to her, provides her a comfortable residence for the night, and, as it is our object not to detain the reader longer with any lengthened description of what follows, may say that, ere a few days have passed, leads Maria to the altar and makes her his happy Bride. CHAPTER XLVIII. A FEW WORDS WITH THE READER. THE abruptness with which we were compelled to conclude this history, may render it necessary to make a few explanations. Indeed, we fancy we hear the reader demanding them. By some mysterious process, known only to Keepum and Snivel, the old Antiquary was found at large on the day following Tom Swiggs' return, notwithstanding the Appeal Court did not sit for some six weeks. It is some months since Tom returned, and although he has provided a comfortable home for the Antiquary, the queer old man still retains a longing for the old business, and may be seen of a fine morning, his staff in his right hand, his great-bowed spectacles mounted, and his infirm step, casting many an anxious look up at his old shop, and thinking how much more happy he would be if he were installed in business, selling curiosities to his aristocratic customers, and serving the chivalry in general. As for Keepum, why he lost no time in assuring Tom of his high regard for him, and has several times since offered to lend him a trifle, knowing full well that he stands in no need of it. Snivel is a type of our low, intriguing politician and justice, a sort of cross between fashionable society and rogues, who, notwithstanding they are a great nuisance to the community, manage to get a sort of windy popularity, which is sure to carry them into high office. He is well thought of by our ignorant crackers, wire-grassmen, and sand-pitters, who imagine him the great medium by which the Union is to be dissolved, and South Carolina set free to start a species of government best suited to her notions of liberty, which are extremely contracted. It may here be as well to add, that he is come rich, but has not yet succeeded in his darling project of dissolving the Union. Judge Sleepyhorn thinks of withdrawing into private life, of which he regards himself an exquisite ornament. This, some say, is the result of the tragic death of Anna Bonard, as well as his love of hanging negroes having somewhat subsided. Madame Montford takes her journeys abroad, where she finds herself much more popular than at home. Nevertheless, she suffers the punishment of a guilty heart, and this leaves her no peace in body or mind. It is, however, some relief to her that she has provided a good, comfortable home for the woman Munday. Tenacious of her character, she still finds a refuge for her pride in the hope that the public is ignorant on the score of the child. Brother Spyke is in Antioch, and writes home that he finds the Jews the most intractable beings he ever had to deal with. He, however, has strong hopes of doing much good. The field is wide, and with a few thousand dollars more-well, a great deal of light may be reflected over Antioch. Sister Slocum is actively employed in the good cause of dragging up and evangelizing the heathen world generally. She has now on hand fourteen nice couples, young, earnest, and full of the best intentions. She hopes to get them all off to various dark fields of missionary labor as soon as the requisite amount of funds is scraped up. There came very near being a little misunderstanding between the House of the Foreign Missions and the House of the Tract Society, in reference to the matter of burying Mrs. Swiggs. The Secretary of the Tract Society, notwithstanding he had strong leanings to the South, and would not for the world do aught to offend the dignity of the "peculiar institution," did not see his way so clearly in the matter of contributing to the burial expenses of the sister who had so long labored in the cause of their tracts. However, the case was a peculiar one, and called for peculiar generosity; hence, after consulting "The Board," the matter was compromised by the "Tract Society" paying a third of the amount. If you would have strong arguments in favor of reform in the Points just look in at the House of the Nine Nations. There you will find Mr. Krone and his satellites making politicians, and deluging your alms-houses and graveyards with his victims, while he himself is one of the happiest fellows in the world. And after you have feasted your eyes on his den, then come out and pay your homage to the man who, like a fearless Hercules, has sacrificed his own comfort, and gone nobly to work to drag up this terrible heathen world at your own door. Give him of your good gifts, whisper an encouraging word in his ear (he has multiplied the joys of the saved inebriate), and bid him God-speed in his labor of love. A word in reference to the young theologian. He continues his visits to the old jail, and has rendered solace to many a drooping heart. But he is come a serious obstacle to Mr. Sheriff Hardscrabble, who, having an eye to profit, regards a "slim goal" in anything but a favorable light. Old Spunyarn has made a voyage to the Mediterranean, and returned with a bag full of oranges for Tom Swiggs; but now that he sees him in possession of such a fine craft as Maria, he proposes that she have the oranges, while his hearty good wishes can just as well be expressed over a bumper of wine. He hopes Tom may always have sunshine, a gentle breeze, and a smooth sea. Farther, he pledges that he will hereafter keep clear of the "land-sharks," nor ever again give the fellow with the face like a snatch-block a chance to run him aboard the "Brig Standfast." As for Mr. Detective Fitzgerald, he still pursues his profession, and is one of the kindest and most efficient officers of his corps. And now, ere we close our remarks, and let the curtain fall, we must say a word of Tom and Maria. Tom, then, is one of the happiest fellows of the lot. He occupies a nice little villa on the banks of the "mill-dam." And here his friends, who having found wings and returned with his fortunes, look in now and then, rather envy the air of comfort that reigns in his domicil, and are surprised to find Maria really so beautiful. Tom so far gained the confidence of his employer, that he is now a partner in the concern; and, we venture to say, will never forfeit his trust. About Maria there is an air of self-command-a calmness and intelligence of manner, and a truthfulness in her devotion to Tom, that we can only designate with the word "nobleness." And, too, there is a sweetness and earnestness in her face that seems to bespeak the true woman, while leaving nothing that can add to the happiness of him she now looks up to and calls her deliverer. THE END.