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Maps, plates, charts, etc., may be filmed at different reduction ratios. Those too large to be entirely included in one exposure are filmed beginning in the upper left hand corner, left to right and top to bottom, as many frames as required. The following cfiagrams illustrate the method: Les cartes, plancKes, tableaux, etc., peuvent dtre filmds d des taux de reduction diffdrents. Lorsque le document est trop grand pour dtre reproduit en un seui clichd, il est filmd d partir de Tangle supdrieur gauche, de gauche i droite, et de haut en bas, en prenant le nombre d'images ndcessaire. Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la mdthode. 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 PLTON HAZLEWOOD LTON HAZLEWOOD , A Memoir, by his Friend Henry Vane »5 fxtbtxkk (Bmst ^coti Authot of ^^ The Sours Quest ami other Poems ., -^ Published by Messrs. Oliphant Anderson AND Ferrier, No. 30 Saint Mary Street Edinburgh, and No. 24 Old Bailey London. 1893 K Printed by Special Arrane^ement ivith the Publishers of the Atnerican EdiHon PROLOGUE. rriHE silent processes have been at work for centuries, and now they culminate, temporarily, in an cpisodo-Hazlewoocl. Down from sidereal wastes, up from green depths of ocean, centripetally from wide forests areas, forces have come, through perpetual modifications, until the supreme result for the time has been arrived at, and Hazlewood, small, red, plaintive, lies in his nurse's arms. " What interest have we in this mfant ? '' you ask. Has he lived ? Is he a real person ? Is he the writer? Is he my idea of you, Reader ? Yes, he is all these, and being all, is of course none of them. JNTevertheless, Hazlewood has been con- ceived and born, and being bom must live and thrive, he having the good fortune not to be one of the schemes for the amelioration of man's lot, which are often conceived, and even bom, and yet do not live and thrive. Hazlewood does not do much at first. He 2 PJROLOGUR wakes and cnos, and takes his natural food, and then goes to sleep again. He breathes, liis heart, beats, and the forces within him pursue their natural course in the process of development. We are not particularly interested in them, but this is simply Ixicause we cannot perceive their working. Infinitely interested we should be could we do so. What a marvellous sight, had we eyes to behold it, would be the unfoldmg of the latent intellectual powers in that little mind-world ! What a new light it would throw on the after dealings of the .^oul in life ! At what moment in the progress of the individual does the separation occur between the conscious intellectual life and the unconscious physical life? When, again, arc the different moments in ^vliich these two phases of being branch off into the ever multiplying variations which mark the progress of the individual ? All this we cannot know, but it is not useless to sug- gest these questions, inasmuch as they prove that Hazlewood even in his nurse's arms is not uninter- esting—nay, is supremely interesting, even if beyond comprehension to enquiring spirits. But Hazlewood is not to be always in his nurse's arms. PROLOOUE. The development goes on within liira. The moments are passed one by one. The grey, fixed world witliout him, and which he f(»els close upon him, close as the warm, moist kisses of Maria are upon his cheeks, he discover is subject to tem- porary eclipse by a slight voluntary act of his own ; — he l^nows nothing of eyes as yet. Again, he discovers that this fixed, grey sensation, — the world, by another volimtary act may be recalle"- it at fet, but stm ho..gI,t, a new emotion. The foundations of language are laid, ako the foundations of our ^tory, or romance, or psychical study, or biogn,phy ^ Tor most of the evils and goods in lifef ge' tk Koader, the wise man may f^, sincerely thlnkftd I pray at the beginning of my task that it may bo so earned out as to prove no exception to the general rule. i i CHAPTER r. ^riERE was Hazlewood bom ? At Langdon up leafless and drear a„d «hook their gri.zl«] arms forcbodin^lv all 'l.of „.;„ i • . , *= "'''*^' wl.- k ti , -^ ^'"''^ winter's night on P«rcn, and l)y them ran a gravel nith road. In he warm Spring days, crocuses will p.-p up round the grass plote, and the Virginia cir cl.ng,ng t« the quaint brick house w'l put forth tender bu^. Not .1.r off is the old NoJn outh, straightway into liis or her heart and felt the sun less bright when he was gone. He came with us regularly to the daily services, and chose out for himself a little seat on the left of the deep chancel, which w^as partly concealed from view by an old tomb, surmounted by the ef^gy of a knight in armour, supposed to be one of the an- cestors of the Sefton-Mallocks, the present lords of the manor, from whom my father had the living. Over this little seat was a deep-set Norman win- dow, filled with the fragments of old glass, which had been picked up in the church during its restor- ation, and put together for the sake of presentation ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 25 in what was decidedly a pleasing medley. From where I sat further down in the choir stalls, I could see the light of the late afternoon sun strike through the window at evensong, and clothe the old yellow marble tomb and the noble quiet face of Hazlewood, as with a glory not of earth. On Sunday, he came with us to the early Eu- chai'ist, and after service waited with me at the ves- try door till my father should come out. Our way to the Vicarage lay over the fields and by a little piece of water denominated, no one knew why, Solomon's Pond. The morning was clear and lovely. The air was full of the scent of flowers from the seed farms in the neighbourhood, and was doubtless doubly sweet after the musty old church, ^vhich always did smell, my father used to say, of the dark ages. The birds were singing joyously, and there Avas scarcely a cloud in the sky. Altogether it was one of those mornings on which God seems very near, and on which it is no eftbrt to lift up one's heart to Him. Nature, and even our bodily life, raise us up, as though at such times there is vouchsafed to the soul a foretaste of that transformed earth, which is one day to take the placx^ of this. n 26 ELTON UAZLEWOOD. We had not waited many minutes before my father joined us, and handing me the box contain- ing the Communion Vessels, which for safety^s sake we always kept at the Vicarage, walked on slightly in front with my friend. I was too much occupied with my thoughts to notice what conver- sation was being held by those in front, till I heard my father say, " Yes, I Avould never do or say anything to force a man to enter the priesthood. He must feel drawn towards it by the hand and voice of God. Circumstances must indicate the choice, and the in- ner call certify it. I have never forgotten one grand sermon which I heard Newman preach at 8t. Mary^s. It was on the divine guidance, and was in illustration of so simple a subject as God's leading the children of Israel by the pillar of cloud and fire. The lesson has been with me ever since, and in the smallest matters I endeavour to see God's hand. Newman drew a striking thought from the dual nature of the leading, cloud and fire, according to the necessities of the hour. Some- tunes we are guided by the light before us, some- times by that light being made a darkneas. But ELTON ITAZLEWOOD. 27 my dear Mow," (my father always spoke to a young man as though he were young himself, he never spoke down to him) " tlie responsibility of re- jecting a call to higher things is equally as great as the choifje of the higher life without the true call from God. If you have ever seriously intended to take orders, do not lightly, from fear of making a false step, lay that intention aside." " Yes, sir, I have oflen felt that," Hazlewood said, "I have prayed to be guided aright, and sometimes I feel that I must be a clergyman. I feel that to choose the lower, would have a para- lyzing effect on my whole religious life. And yet again there are moments in which all my reli- gion seems to go, and the world only appears\vortli living for. At such times the quiet, uneventful life of a clergyman fills me with dread. I fancy I should die under the monotony. If I coiUd live such days as I have lived here, all my life, I should have no fear. But I am going back to the world and to temptation, and from past experience I know that I shall fall. Surely it is almost a dishonour to God for one so weak and changeable to think of setting himself up as a guide to others." 28 ELTON IIAZLEWOOD, " Well," my father said, "I fancy that wavering of spirit between God and the world, is a trial to every beginner in the Christian fight ; but if the heart be right and pure, it gets less and less a trouble, and faith grows stronger and more fixed. I do not condone the evil or sin, for of course it is an evil, but I say it is natural, and therefore may be remedied by God's grace. Pray, my dear fellow, pray for light and strength, and then believe that both will be granted." " Thank you, sir," said Hazlewood, as they entered the gate which led into the Vicarage garden, " I will think over what you have said. I hope it will all come right, rather I hope that I shall come all right." That afternoon as Elton and I were lying out on the grass near the summer house, smoking, he said to me, "Did you hear om- conversation as we came home from church this morning? I love to talk to your father about religion. I have never heard anyone speak A\ith such sincerity of heart. There is something in his manner which makes you feel at once that the man is giving utterance to the real feelings in his soul." ELTON IIAZLEWOOD, 29 " Yes, I have often felt that," I said, << I wonder at times what I should have been like, if I had not had such a father/* " In our talk this morning," he continued, " I am afraid I nuist have secuned a thorough hypo- crite. I know that I led him to think me better than I am. But somehow or other, I could not tell him what was in my mind. Do you know my alternative course, if I do not enter the Chm-ch? It is not journalism, as I once thought, but the stage." " The stage ! " i ^ "Yes, I think I should make a better actor than parson. And you know, Hany, there is a grand opening there for a good work. I certainly tliink that the power of the stage, were it used rightly, would do more to revive religion in Eng- land than almost anj-thing else." " This is only one of your dreams, Elton." " No, it isn't. Of course I have not decided ; I may even yet be a parson. This pure life here has done me a world of good, but I must see how I feel after I get back to town. One thing I have settled and that is, that if I am not a parson, I shall be an actor." 3 80 ELTON UAZLEWOOD, He appeared to lx» bent upon this course, and the next day as I drove him to the station, he was full of what was to me, this new idea of the stage. He spoke hoi^efully of the future, and was entlnisi- astic on the subject of the moral power for good of which the stasic is capable. It was with deep sorrow that the family bid him farewell. They all loved him, the elders as a son, the children as a brother, and that night at prayers, my father, in his old-fashioned way, introduced a collect which each one felt w^as intended as a prayer for the departed guest . CHAPTER IV. . rpHERE are three ^vays in which we may get to know a human soul — love, pci-sonal con- verse, and correspondence. Love opens the door of the heai-t, and puts the eyes on the watch to catch what is good and noble, and even the symp- toms of wrong, Avhich give us pain, in the beloved one. Pei-sonal converse enables us to trace the subtle changes to which the character is subject, and to note the harmony of proportions, and gen- eral tone which distinguish it. Correspondence gives us an insight into the settled habits of thought, Avhen the mind plays freely without check or stimulus from contact with another mind. We cannot truly be said to know anyone until in addi- tion to our personal converse, we have had experi- ence of him in a long course of letter writing. I have often been struck by the startling difierence between the image conceived in my mind of one whom I had known only l)y meeting him, and the 31 82 ULTON IIAZLEWOOD. image coRVcyod to mc aftonvardn in his <»,rre- spondcnce. Though the two letters that follow cannot of course reveal all Ilazlewood's niontal characteristics, they nevertheless let as see his state of mind at the time, and the tt)pies whieh were then chiefly interesting to him. The fii-st letter was written from London, a day or iwo ailer his return to town from his visit to us. London. Jtly, 18— Mij dear old fellow. Since I left you there has been a rapid change of plans, and instead of goinp; to tlie Lakes for the summer on a walking tour, as I had at first intended, Byrne and I are to start to-morrow for St. Maddo on the Cornish coast, where his uncle ha.s a place. Afterwards, we shall pro- ceed to the continent. We intend to make Switzerland our goal, and work up to it through France. Paris for a time will be our headquarters, and from thence we shall make pilgrim- ages into the country rov.nd about. It will be my first visit to the continent, and T im almost wild with anticipation. The flavour of your sw ct home life is still round me, and I shall never forget those happy peaceful days I passed with you. They did me a world of good. They shewed me what life may be to those who love God. It is such a pity that religion is set before men primarily as a means to righteous- ness, instead of a means to happiness. It loses by this. Few men want to be righteous, unless already under the influence of religion, whereas all men, bad and good, want to be happy. In this age when the light of reason and science is focussed ELTOy IIAZLEWOOD. sa nn the present world, human linppincss stands out as a far more itnportant factor in the mundane organization than human righteousness. Therefore, I am sure, religion would gam in popularity if its votaries set it before men as the road to happiness, and if they themselves made it a prime duty to reveal practically to a sorrowful world, the happiness which it bestows. Perhaps you do not think that the worhl is sorrowful. Perhaps you do not feel the weariness and blankness which at times steal over the soul, and make it void. But that only proves what I say. You live in an at- mosphere of religion. It is interwoven with your daily life. But think of the millions of starved souls who crave satisfac- tion and find it only in the gratification of the senses, those lower channels of pleasure which dci)end upon the state of the bodily system. In strength, in the exuberance of health, the vicious may for a time find satisfaction through the iiidul- gcneo of passion, but the day comes when the channels are relentlessly shui, and in the darkness of the end, just when the soul would have something to fall back upon, it lies there h^lples.s, facing death and the black horror of despair. I believe if we could only sec into the inner hearts of men, especially of those who are living without God in the world, and making a fair show of gaiety, we should find, that behind all the lightsome foreground of pleasure, there loomed up per- petually, this background of darkness, like a thunder cloud which rolls over the city at evening and makes the world colourless. Don't say that this is only my morbid tempera- ment coming out. Ask any one you like to strike on a piano or organ the chord that best represents the undertones of emotion, which in a perpetual harmony make up the separate moments of hia consciousness, and in nine cases out of ten, you will find it will be a minor one. By the by, perhaps he won't give you a minor cue, because he will say it makes him u ELTON UAZLEWOOD, feel sad. But that again proves what I say. Had there not lurked this sorrow in his soul, the minor chord would not have called it forth. What this note of sadness is caused by, I do not know. I think it is the consciousueso of never end- ing change, and the Nemesis that must overtake all we love, all we do, all we are. In the experience of every thoughtful man there comes a moment when the soul realizes life and death as they are in themselves, apart from the thoughts and aspirations which fill our waking as well as our dreaming hours. From that moment the man is a changed being ; life is in a measure spoilt to him. The words '' What shall it profit ?" " What shall it profit ?" ring in his ears like a death-knell, ai.d form a solemn undertone amid the laughter of mirth, and the plaudits of success. You remember how Mill in his autobiography describea his experience of such a state of mind. He believes that among Evangelical Protestants it is such a spiritual condition which precedes the phenomenal exaltation of so-called conversion. In my own life, I can distinctly remember such a moment of awakening. It was at the sea side, when I was about seventeen. I was reading "My Novel" and had arrived at that part where Audley Egerton feels himself grasped in the power of an incurable disease. Suddenly, by some spiritual lexjcrdemain, his sen- sations became mine, and dropping the book, I sat in blank horror, facing death. All pleasure, all hope, all ambition were blighted in an instant, and the exceeding narrowness of my cofliu and the load of earth above, oppressed and stifled me. It was days before the feeling wore away, and it has never completely gone, but returns at unexpected moments, oftentimes when I should have imagined it was farthest off. Life has never been the same to me since. I fancy that most men are haunted in this way by phantoms in the soul. Per- haps it is just as well that they are. It was never intended ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 35 that earthly life should satisfy us. Here, then, the province of religion comes in. Though all else change, it will abide. " Siat cj^x dum volvitur orbis" that thought is full of com- fort. In a world in which the whole of our mental life is but states of consciousness produced by phtuics of being in nature or ourselves, it is a grand privilege for the soul to realize that there is an external absolute fact — God, unchang- ing, unending, " the same yesterday, to-day and forever," to ■which it may turn in emergencies, to whom it may cling in death. The life of one who can do this must be nobler, purer, and above all happier, than that of other men. Your own family life in its peace and purity has brought this truth liome to me. Never shall I forget it and I hope the good it did me will be lasting. But I am so miserably weak and wavering, and am so naturally bad, everything seems to pull me down so easily. However, some day I hope it will all come right. In the meantime, to return from airy abstractions, plea.se give my kindest remembrances, may I say love ? to your dear f- ther and mother, and every other member of your family. It is strange you don't like Byrne. I know you don't, so you need not say that you do. I also know why, you cannot trust him. I had that feeling at first but it has worn away. He is one of the most fascinating fellows I have ever met. Don't get jealous, old man, he and you aflect me differently. [ don't like him in the same way at all I but still I like him and he sticks close to me. We have a great deal in com- mon, too much perhaps. I think if I might classify you two, I should put you down as my good, and Byrne as my evil genius. And yet I know this is hard and unjust. What I mean is, each of you in friendbhip, satisfi.es one part of my character, you the higher and B. the lower. Yet I feel that even this is unjust to him. I had better say no more. Good- '-msmmesmmm 36 £:LTOy IIAZLEWOOD. night, old man, and forgive this rambling epistle, which is more of an essay on religion, or ethics, or anything else than a letter to a friend. But I like to pour out my ideas to you as you know. I enclose some verses which I wrote in a pious mood on the train to town. Your mother may like to see them. Again good-night. Your affectionate friend, E. II. The verses enclosed were the following. I am not a judge of poetry, so I cannot pronounce on their literary merit, but they seem to me to be very beautiful, and because they come from they go to the heart. " Behold I stand at the door and knock." Rev. III. 20. " I heard a voice at midnight, and it cried, O weary heart, O soul for which I died. Why wilt thou spurn my wounded hands and side? " Is there a heart more tender, more divine, Than that sad heart which gave itself for thine ? Could there be love more warm, more full than mine ? " AVhat other touch can still thy trembling breath What other hand can hold thee after death ? Wiiat bread so sweet to him that hungereth ? " Warm is thy chamber, soft and warm thy bed, Bleak howling winds are round the path I tread, The son of man can nowhere lay his head, i 1 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 37 " Wilt thou not open to me ? To and fro I wander weary through the driving snow, But colder still that thou wouldst spurn me so. " 1 have a crown more bright than all that be, I have a kingdom wider than the sea, But both have I abandoned, seeking thee. " Poor weary heart so worn and sad within, Oh, open to thy friend, thy stay from sin,' That I with all my love may c-itor in." "I heard a voice at midnight and I cried, Lord, I need thy wounded hands and side, 1 need thy love, Lord enter and abide." Of the man Byrne, whom lie mentions, I must say this much in passing, that I did not like him. I thought him untrustworthy from the moment I saw him. How far my judgment was correct and my feai-s for his influence over Hazlcwood were justified, future chapters in this biography will show. It was at his rooms in Oxford the wine party was held which I have mentioned. What there was about the man that made me dis- trust him, I did not know. He was clever and handsome, but I instinctively shrank from him. I 38 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. felt at once that he was bad. I conld not under- stand how Ilazlewood had succumbed to his in- fluence. I see it all clearer now, but at that time it was a mystery to me. I should have said that, were sucli a thing possible, Byrne was a man created without a soul. He had the highest human bodixj ' velopment, he had veiy high mental powers, but he was only a beautiful animal, he was not a man. There appeared to be in him no trace of the image of God, however defaced. He had passion, without love; intellect, without reason; beauty, without grace; the faculty of speech, without the sense of truth ; freedom of will, without the sense of moral responsibility; the power of hate, without the power to sympathize. However I must not anticipate. I merely say this here in order to explain Hazlewood's letter and also the presentiment of coming evil which haunted rae for days after hearing that Byrne was to ac- company him to the continent. The letter whicli follows I received about a fortnight or so after- Avards. It may perhaps be thought a trifle too long to have been inserted in full, but I print it nevertheless as it reveals the other side of Hazle- ( ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. 39 wood's character, the artistic side, which it would be unjust in a biographer to pass over. August, 18— The Louvre, Paris. Mtj dear old fellow. Here f am, pen in hand, before that master piece of human art — the Venus of Mile. I have taken out my tablet to write to you, and at the same time while away the hour and a half to dinner when I expect Byrne to turn up. He was out some where or other all hist night. We do not enquire into each other's movements. I think it is wiser not to do so when two fellows are travelling together. How- ever, exit Byrne, and now let me have you all to myself. First, let me describe my surroundings in order to explain this letter and what called it forth. I am sitting at one end of a bench, tolerably comfortable (a matter of no interest to you and of much to me). Before me, within a little railing, is the Venus. She stands out white and lovely against a rich crimson plush curtain. At the other end of the bench on which I sit (it is a very long bench you may be sure) is an old peasant woman, waiting for her octogenarian husband who is hobbling about in juvenile inquisitivcness, among the Greek crudities and nudities in the other rooms. Here then, I am alone in the presence of two females. Both arc old, both bear traces of time's blighting touch. Both are silent, and seem wrapped in the contemplation of objects beyond our ken. One is cold and hard but beautiful and white. The flesh of the other is warm and soft but it is ugly and brown. The breasts of the one have suckled no children as the long years have died away, while theot'ier beai-s all the evidences of maternity and her now poor withered bosom has many times over been the cradle of future nations. The brow of ' 40 ELTON UAZLEWOOD. the one is calm, cloudless and stamped with Immortal serenity ; the face of the other is ruffled into a thousand little furrows, as though the cares and troubles of eighty years had run hither and thither over it, blighting the flesh and eating their way through it like sparks in a piece of burnt paper. The medita- tion of one is rapt, majestic, the uplifting of the soul towards the ideal and unattainable; the meditation of the other is rapt and calm, but it is the outcome of vacuity of thought, the oppression of fatigue. One stands out in semi-nudity, but withal 'haste and grand, the other is wrapped bountifully in blue homespun, with even the head, all, save the brown wrinkled face and its crown of silvery hair, bound tightly in the white folds of a grandmother's cap. To comj^ lete the difierence, one has arms and the other has not. Surely here is a splendid contrast. What could be better ! Before me is ideality, beside me on the bench, (flavoured with garlic, by €.lq by,) is reality. To sit here is an inspiration. Here is life, there is art. Tliis is a grand opportunity to sketch to you my theory (it may be the theory of others for all I know, but I call it my theory because I thought it out for myself) of the origin and true function of art. Let us start then at the bot- tom of the ladder, at that point in the evolution of man in which sexual generation took the place of cellular germina- tion from within. As soon as life was made to depend on sexual instincts, the power of sympathy, the power to respond to the feelings of others, to experience the same passions at the same moment, was made a prime necessity of existence. In time, this power of sympathy became intensified by natural selection ; it became widened in its range, it became elevated above the mere natural animal instincts in their grossest forms. Other desires and emotions, than merely sexual ones began to be imparted to the more sensitive of our ancestors. Grace, ease, comfort, happiness were reflected back to them ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 41 from others. All this of course must have taken ages to bring about. Then comes a further step when by generalization men began to abstract mentally, the particular motions, atti- tudes, gestures, colours and facial expressions the perception of which in others caused certain sensations in themselves. Then ages afterwards, sculptors began to represent these symbols, or what I will call concrete equivalents of emotion, on creations of their own in order to stir up the emotions they desired to produce in the minds of others by the power of sympathy. But these equivalents of emotion were not only embodied in the creations of the sculptor, painter and poet. Even in architecture, that form of art which seems furthest removed from analogy to human conditions, success depends upon their proper adjustment and use. The architecture of each nation reveals to us those emotions which it is the habit of its people to enjoy most. Gothic is the architecture of nations who demand ease, vastness, variety and power, but power only as the result of intelligent arrangement and proportion, for a waste of power is an evidence of weakness. The emotions wliich these qualities inspire in man are produced by the flowing tracery, the perpetual suggestion by the arches of in- finite curves, the wise adaptation of slender columns and vaulted roof, as adequate means to an end. Oriental nations enjoy rich and gorgeous colouring, huge pillars and oppres- sive domes, for among them power is despotic and presses down upon the foundations of society, without restraint from reason or proportion, and the people love to have it so. Let us come to the conclusion to which I was bringing you, or wanted to bring you, for I feel that what I have said is very crude. It is for that reason I wrote it to you. I wanted to arrange the matter more clearly in my own mind. To con- clude, in sculpture, painting, poetry, and even in architecture, the work of the artist is the expressing of forms of emotion m^ 42 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. by the presentment of their concrete equivalents, in order to stir up, tlirough the innate power of sympathy, these emotions in other men. Here then we see the difTerence between life and art. Life is complete in itself, art can never be, should never be. The scope of art is not the world of matter, it is the world of mind. Matter is only needful to art as the vehicle for conveying thoughts and emotions from mind to mind. Realism is not true art, because it makes more of the vehicle conveying, than of the message conveyed. It attempts to create living things in the world of life, instead of living things in the world of mind. Life and art are therefore essentially opposite. In life we work with numbers, in art with x's and y's. Life is arithmetic, art algebra ; one concrete the other abstract. But I am getting further and further out of my depth ; and the poor, old woman has gone without my knowing it, and the rooms are being deserted, and A^enus stands out silent and spectral. I must go before I am turned out. Byrne and I have made some nice acquaintances here, though nearly everybody is away. I had the great privilege of an introduction the other day to H. Errington. He was over liere getting up some part in Louis XI. which is to be pro- duced in London next winter. He has asked me to call on him when I return, and has partly promised me an opening in his company, if I can satisfy his requirements. This loolis as if I were in earnest, doesn't it ? By the by, Errington is an old friend of Lady Massy's in my father's parish, so I may have interest there. With love to you and yours, Your affectionate friend, E. II. CHAPTER V. rilHERE was nothing surprising in Hazlewood's ■^ success as an actor. He had all the exterior (jualifications for liis art, personal beauty, grace and majesty of bearing. He had also all the requisite mental poAvers, intellectual mobility, quick sympathy, clearness of vision, imagination and self confidence. The actor^s life bv its excitement and applause supplied to him, as no other profession could, that continual stimulus Avhich his nature required. From his first entrance upon it there- fore, he trod the stage with a firm step, the step of a master. His rise was rapid. In a few years he was at the head of liis profession. His pieces ran on for hundreds of nights. The old Tragedy Theatre in the Strand, which he had renovated and made his own, was crowded nightly. Statesmen, musicians, poets, sculptoi-s, sat in wonder at the youthful hero who seemed the embodiment of their dreams of greatness and beauty. Their souls were 43 44 ELTON JIAZLEWOOD. caught up by his, as in a uiagic whirlwind, and he bore them far a^vay Ix^yond the confines of earth, to a paradise where all was young and beautiful, where desire never failed, where glorious visions never faded, and where he reigned king over the sky and earth, the land and sea, the flowers and loves of pei'petual spring. There was no con- scious effort in his work. As soon as he had con- ceived a character as a whole, he became it, he lived and moved and breathed it. Every gesture, every act, had a new significance. Hazlewood had melted away, and a new being, a knight of the middle ages, a crusader king, an Egyptian priest, an old Roman, a Greek hero, a Norse demi-god, or whatever was the role he was playing, stood before you. You were a^^'ed in his presence. As he moved across the stage, you felt the earth shake with the tread of medieval armies, you smelt the dry hot smells of Syrian plains, or you gazed Avondcringly into far depths of sky from the peaks of Olympus, or you heard the plash and roar of ocean round the bleak Northern headlands. Be- cause he felt and saw these things, you felt and saw them through him. Out of the dull common ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 45 places of existence, men and women were caught up into this world of ai-t. They lived ibr a time in a different atmosphere. Their hearts throbbed with bursts of divine passion and scorn, which they had never dreamt of in their stiff black and white social life. Their l)eings vibrated under his power as the dull wood and metal of an organ quiver to the glorious conceptions of harmony which a master mind and touch i^our through them. The reader must not suppose that this was accomplished with- out continual study on Hazlewood's part. Doubt- less he worked in the same fierce and all-consum- ing manner which generally characterized the ac- tions of his genius. The chief difficulty he ex- perienced in acquiring his mastei-ship as an actor was in overcoming that defect in his composition to which I have alluded, his lack of the power of con- tinuity. He found it difficult- to sustain the level of his acting. On one night, when the mood bore him away and lifted him to supreme success, he was magnificent. But on the next night, when the mood came not, it was hard not to fail. By study, this difficulty was gradually overcome, and he obtained a mastery over his moods, by which in a 46 ELTON HAZLEWOOD, jneasiirc he could control and even induce them. To the end, Iiowcver, friends have assured me, that by the presence or absence of a magnetic power which kept the audience spell-bound for hours, they could always tell whether Ilazlewood was in the mood or not. The piece which made the greatest impres- sion upon me was Henry the Fifth. I do not know whether there is much in the play as it stands, for it is impossible for me to judge imj^artially of it now, because I can see it only as Ilazlewood re- vealed it. To me, his acting was the incc ^ion of nobility. His youth and grace were charming and his kingly bearing made you feel better and nobler for having beheld it. He was no longer Hazlcwood, he was Henry the Fifth, the crown of chivalry, the conqueror of France. Had he called me I would have rushed on the stage and kissed his hand, or knelt before him and and received the badge of knighthood. Every attitude and move- ment was in perfect consonance with his part. The effect produced upon the mind by his shining armour and his dark earnest face, I shall never forget, when in the charge before Harfleur, the king, fired with courage, and the determination bred of ELTON nAZLEWOOD. 47 the consciousness of a right cause, cries to his ibllowers, his voice half drownccl in the roar of cannon, his sword ht'ld alol^ flinging back through the smoke of battle the liames of the beleaguered city ; " And you, good yeomen, Whose limbs were made in England, show us here The mettle of your pasture : Let us swear That you are worth your breeding, which 1 doubt not, For there is none of you so mean and base That hath n \ noble lustre in his eyes, I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips Straining upon the start ; the game's afoot. Follow your spirit and upon this charge Cry — " God for Harry, England, and St. George." I could have followed him on such a charge up to the very flaming breach of a forlorn hope. And never shall I forget the look of heroism and devo- tion, so full of melancholy, and the loneliness of greatness, when in the open field at Agineourt, on the eve of the battle, the king, left alone, lifts up his face to the dark sky and prays to the King of kings, in whase hands are the issues of life and death ; 48 ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. ft " God of battles, steal my soldiers' hearts, Possess them not with fear, take from them row, The sense of reckoning, if the opposed numbers Pluck their hearts from them ; not to-day O Lord, O, not to-day, think not upon the fault My father made in compassing the crown." One curious coincidence, as the reader will see it to be afterwards, was that Byrne took the part of Lord Scroop, one of the consj^irators against Henry in the pay of France. It is only a very minor pait, but so real was the tender scorn with which the king upbraidal his friend's perfidy, that at the time, it was to me unaccountably touching. Now, as I look back upon it, it seems a curious fore- shadowing of the end, and my belief inclines me to acknowledge such prophecies going before, to be not unusual in the course of life. The more I think of it, the stranger the scene becomes. Scroop, the convicted villain, stood there before the king, and Henry, who had dismissed the cases of the other conspirators, could hardly repress the out- burst of anger and disappointment which shook his frame. He almost crial, tears certainly stood in his eyes, as in a slow and bnjken voice he sai(^ while the audience were hushed and silent as the grave : il ELTON IIAZLEWOOD, 49 " But oh, What shall I say to theo, Lord .Scroop, thou cruel, Ingrateful savage and inhuman creature, Thou that didst bear the key of all my counsels, That knewst the very bottom of my soul. That almost might have coined mo into goluld have watched the motion, trifling and ridic- ulous as it would have been, with the eagerness with which men in Parliament, at a critical moment, scan the expression of their leader's face. " I have given you now a description of an actor's feelings. Can anything be more delightful ? Can power ever be more absorbing ? Can any work, less, of course, than cleric's work, be more noble than to lift up, as I know I did to-night, gross, sordid hearts with emotions whicli must, as a grand memory, cling to them in after life ? Don't you ELTON lUZLEWOOD. 57 think me very conceited to be talking to you in this wav ? '' " No, I don't, Elton, I know you are just open- ing up to me your inner feelings, and in some way, as you were acting this evening, a dim conscious- ness of what they were came over me. As you say, this subtle power must be intoxicating." " Yes, it is. But do you remember that 1 used to toll you that my brain was haunted by a thought, or the ghost of a thought, which spoilt all life to me at the pinnacle of its successes ? " " Yes, perfectly." " Well, the thought or the feeling came over me to-night, in the midst of the play. It came upon me suddenly, with a click, as I used to say. It was in that scene between Henry and Catherine. Just when all eyes were upon me, I felt the ice of the shadow fall across my soul." He raised himself on his elbow and looked across at me as he said this with an expression of intense melancholy. ''Yes, it was icy," he continued, "it almost staggered me. For a moment I could not speak, but it passed away again, leaving my soul tired 58 ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. and ompty. And what do you think It was ? It was the thought of the end, the tedious death-lnxl, the fading daylight, the rattle in my throat, the final agony, the struggle and the dark grave." He spoke very solemnly and with an absent air, as though while talking to me he was looking at something else. "Yes, Harry, after all, you have chosen the better part." CHAPTER VI. TTAZLEWOOD'S marriage was as much a sur- prise to me, I had almost said shock, as anything which liapi)ened in his checquered his- tory. Why it should have suri)riscd me, I do not know, but it seemed to bring him down to earth. He had been to me before an ethereal being, one set apart above our ordinary commonplace life and affections. J was a world in which love min to have become oj)pres- sively patent. It wa.s like the face of the dead when the sheet is pulled back, and the very resem- blance of death to life suggests to us overpower- iiigly the diilerence between life and death. I was in my study writing, ^^'hen a carriage drove up to the door ; there was a ring at the bell and Mr. Hazlewood, two ladies and a gentleman (the gentleman was Byrne) were anuounced by the maid. I was astonished beyond measure at the arrival, but the ladies entered and were introduced to my wife. They were a Miss Ingoldsby and a Mrs. Carter-Savage. We sat chatting together as pleasantly as we could, while the carriage was kept waiting at the door, but we were none of us at our 5 INI 62 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. ease. I did not like tht3 women and I could see that my wife did not. Bynie, as I have said, I alwav s distrusted and devested. Even Haziewood did not appear at his best. Both ladies had a great deal of manner. They were very enthusias- tic about the country and the " charming, old church,'* and the " cosy, little Vicarage.'' But on my life I could not discern the meaning of this early morning call. Suddenly, Haziewood turned to me and said, " Harry, old man, do you know what we have come for ? " The ladies, especially Miss Ingoldsby, appeared self conscious and looked on the ground, and then Mrs. Carter-Savage, raising her eyes, smiled feebly at Byrne. " No, I don't, exactly," said I, somewhat rudely. " Well, I, rather we, have come to get you to marry us." " What, all four ? " " Oh, no, no thank you," said Byrne, dryly. Whereat Mrs. Cai'ter-Savage tossed back her daiaty little head and laughed musically. ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. 63 " Byrne, don't ha rude/' said Hazlewood, « you are fearfully jealous, you know you are." Byrne smiled softly at this. " No, Hariy, not four, two. Miss Ingoldsby and myself. ^X(i wanted our marriage to Ix; quiet, without any fuss, and so I thought Beaeonhui-st was the place for us. Besides, I have always prom- ised you that you should marry me. So here we are. ]S"ow, old fellow, we haven't much time to spare," (here he looked at his watch) " as it is al- ready eleven and we have to drive back to Chill- ington in time to catch the one o'clock train. I must ask you to be quick." I was terribly taken aback, and could not say any pretty things, but my wife had more presence of mind and offered her congratulations. I felt disappointed, bitterly disappointed, and Mas sure Hazlewood had been entrapped. Mi&s Ingoldsby had a pretty face, but Mrs. Savage was decidedly a woman of the world, and there was something Satanic in Byrne's look and manner. Yet what could I sav or do? As I led the way across the garden to the church, I felt like an executioner preceding his n ■;l ! 64 ELTON JIAZLEWOOD, victim to the block. Tlio duirch was Icy cold, and as I unlocked the door and entered, the warm, moist air, which ruslied in after me, was instantly condensed upon the Avails, and made the building damp. The place A\'as grey and dreary, and a sparrow, which ciime in at the open door, just as I was beginning the Psalm, disturbed us very much, the poor thing flying about desperately like an unquiet spirit which seeks to escape from itself and cannot. It darted in and out under the arches of the nave, and then up into the (chancel, where it wheeled round us several times, just escaping om' heads, and then battered itself liopelessly against the east window till it fell on the altar exhausted. My wife had draggal the gardener into her service as belloAVS-blower, and at the close of the ceremony, in order to brighten things, struck up the wedding march. But she was not familiar with the instru- ment, and the gardener was less so. She pulled out a screaming stop to begin with, and the organ crealved and groaned, as poor old John emptied his own bellows in endeavoring to fill those of the instrument. To cap the climax, the damp had affected the key-board and one of the notes ELTON HAZLEWOOD, 65 ,h cyphered with a dismal wail, which never altered or abated, till poor old John, who had nearly blown the s\\'ell-box open in his Herculean zeal, sud- denly stopped from sheer exhaustion, and all the music and wailing whistled grimly and went out. Altogether it was the most dismal wedding I ever remember. The bridal party, I think, felt de- pressed too. Poor dear Elton looked nervous, but Mrs. Elton was strangely self-possesscxl. My wife offered to improvise a breakfiist, but as none of the party would hear of this, after a glaas of wine and some cake they left. Then the sun came out and the feeling of gloom wore away, and we were thankful that the return to Chillington would be more cheery than the drive here had been. This touch of brightness seemed to have been more tridy pro])hetic than tlie gloom, for the letters which I received from time to time were overflow- ing with peace and happiness. His wife was a treasure and he the most fortunate of men. She was well received in society and Mr. and Mrs. Elton Hazlewood went everywhere. His fame as an actor increased daily. ^' Never," tlie Times said, ^< have the best traditions of the English stage G6 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. ^■B 1 been so marvellously exemplified as in the aetino^ of Mr. Hazlewood. In him the English drama touches its high water mark." Hazlewood had built himself a house on St. John's Wood Road, and furnished it like a ])alace. I dined tliere on Sun- day when I happened to be in town. Mrs. Hazle- wood was very charming, but a trifle too theatrical in her manner to please me. Byrne was also there. I cannot, however, remember that any- thing worth rejx^ating was said or done on tliat evening. About a year afterwards Hazlewood wrote in an ecstasy of joy to annouce the birth of a son. Each following letter was full of the do- ings of this wonderful child. Then about three years afler tliat a change came over his correspond- ence. His mind set^mal worried and clouded, but I could not divine the cause. Then I did not hear from him for a long time, till one Wednesday afternoon in the lx?ginning of May, I received a telegram asking me to go to him at once. It was past nme o'clock when my cab drove up before his house in toAvn. A page opened the door, and on learninij' mv lume escorted me down the long liall, wainscoatcnl in black oak and liungwith ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. 07 shields and suits of old armour, to a deep set door behind the grand staircase. My attendant knocked, and a voice said, " come in/* The boy opened the door slightly and bade me enter, then closed it at once, as soon as I was inside. The large room with its rows of book-shelves, dark hangings and sombre pictures, was dimly lit by a shaded lamp upon the table. A fire burnt low on the antiqae hearth, and a little terrier, which was curled up on a rug before it, rose and barked once at me as I entered. Then all was silent. At the table, his face burial in his hands, sat Elton Hazlewood. He made no movement, he uttered no word of welcome. I was so filled with alarm that I stood there speechless, unable to move hand or foot. I suppose the silence only lasted a few seconds, but it seemed ages to me. Then Elton raised his head. His face gave me a shock. He looked as if he had died and come to life again, and the shadow of death had not quite worn away. His features were ashy pale, his eyes were hollow and sunken, and burnt with an unnatural and consuming fire, but he was calm, very calm. It was the calnniess which horrified me more than anything. I ran 68 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. I J toward him impulsively and put my arm round him. " Elton, my dear old fellow, Avhat has happened ? Do tell me." He smiled cynically, and rof?o and stood with his back to the fire place, giving me the chair he had left. The smile was horrible, so forcal, but it was nothing to the suppressed passion of the hollow voice. ^' Oh, nothing much, old man, only a domestic episode, a society scandal. We shouldn't take these things too seriously, you know. Of course we shouldn't, but it's damned hard not to. Excuse me, Harry, I forgot you were a parson." , " Don't mind, for Heaven's sake go on." *• Oh, it's only a domestic episode, nothing more. Don't be so impatient, you will know it all in time. The papers will be full of it. Little street arabs will ha>vk it about town. Broken down news-vendors will scribble it in coloured chalks upon the pavements. You will know it all in time. Do you find it warm in here ? I was self- ish in asking you to come to-night. Your wife, I am afraid; will never forgive me for bothering you. f f ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. 69 It was vory -^^cak of me, but I needed you. I could not trust myself alone. What nonsense ! of course I eould. It^s nothing, it's positively noth- ing, but it's damned hard. Ha, ha, swearing again. Pardonnez moi. Monsieur Ic Pasteur." " Elton, what has hai)pencd ? Do tell me and don't talk in this wild way." " Tell you ?" he said, standing ereet, his eyes flashing fire, '^ tell you ? Do you think, you fool, that I am going to tell you more than I have ? Do you think my throat is iron to utter the burning words w4iich proclaim my shame ? Do you think I could trumpet my dishonour, even to you? Guess what has happened yourself, I cannot tell you more than I have. AMiat is it which in an instant would crush you do\vn in youth and strength and blight your life and make you curse God? Think, say, what is it? For that is what has hajjpened to me." His voice rose to its full force as he said this, and his anger was so terrible that I felt a sensation of cold creeping through my veins. " I know now, Elton," I said, to calm him, " your wife," " Has gone," he added. 70 ELTON ITAZLEWOOD, \ « By herself?" " No.'* '•With Byrne f' " Yes." I do not know what made me say Byrne's name, but it came to my lips spontaneously, as by that mesmeric suggestiveness Avhich we experience in moments of over excitement. " When did it hap- pen, Elton ?" " God knows, last night, I think, while I was courting and kissing poor Marguarit-e's painted cheeks in Faust. She was not here when I got home. They fled at once, I have since found out, to the continent." " But what are you going to do about it ?" " Do ? Why, let them hug and kiss each other as much as they please, and slide smoothly into damnation for it." "Oh, Elton, don't talk in that way." " Now don't begin a homily, young man. I am not myself to-night. You wouldn't be if you had gone through what I have. No man would.. The whole universe has been blasted, the world and God wiped out, and I only am left, shattered ( ELTON HAZLEVrOOD. 71 by the lightning which unfortunately does not always kill when it strikes.'^ " And the child f " Yes, she left him ; poor degraded wi-etch, she had not even brute instinct enough to mind having him.'' " Surely for itho. child's sake, you will make some movement in the matter." " No, Harry, I wont, not even for the child's sake. Wait a minuute and I will tell you why." He went to a table and poured out a glass of brandy and water, which he tossed off at a gulp, and then returned to his former position before the fire. ''Why not? this is why, and it is sufBcient reason to me-^ecause she loves kirn. I found that out by accident about a month ago. Up to that time, I had loved her devotedly, I had believed in her implicitly, but with the discovery, my love vanished. I was chilled to the heart. A statue could not have been more incapable of love than I was. I was cold to her, fiendishly cold and cniel. I could not help it. T did not like to see her touch my child. She was nu'ne no longer, she was ( 72 ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. , his. The true roots of marriage are in the sonl. I knew ^vhat was coming, so I took the old nurse into my confidence, and bribwl lier to guard the boy. My wife noticed ihe (-hange in me, and on her pai-t, tok'ration turned to liate. Byrne continual to visit the house, and I did not even take the trouble to turn him out or keep them apart. Then came a scene. Harry, do you remember my making a sort of confession to you once at Oxford as we stood on Magdalen >ridge ?" ^^ I do, distinctlv.'^ " Did you know, I did not, till I heard it from my wife's lips, that I was a murderer ? I loved a young girl there, a girl in humble circumstances ; her father drove a brewer's cart, but she herself was one of those delicately refined beings who are sometimes found in the houses of the poor. My love killed her. I did not know this till my wife told me. Byrne knew it, for he left Oxford the year after I did. He told my wife. He has car- ried the dread secret about with him for years. It was through him that I got to know the girl. He had plotted a vile and diabolical plot from the be- ginning and I in my weakness and folly fell a vie- ELTON llAZLEWOOD. 78 tim to it, and hocamo an infitrumont in his hands. You were ri,o«ht about that man. He has boon a serix^nt in my path for ycai-s, and I liavo been too l)lind lo see it. U ever a devil walks in human form, it is Byrne. I know him now. The thought of him fills me with a horror whieh 1 eannot ac- count for. I feel as if some day, he Avill work my doom. It was doubtless becau.se of his part in the affiiir, that lie never dared to tell me the end. He alone knew it, till he told my wife, and when her lips hurled the story at me, and cut into my soul with the taunts of feminine jealousy, impotence and hate, I cowered before her, like a convicted felon, and could not utter a word in my defence. From that moment my doom was sealed. It was only a question of time. My wife and I never spoke again, and never shall. Oh, Harry, be- tween the sense of guilt which, believe me, has haunted me night and day wnth a ])ersistencc that would have been impossible in the case of other men, nine out of ten of whom would have tossed it from them as a bygone folly, and the sense of present anguish as a just retribution, I am utterly crushed. AVhen you get home, not here, I am too i It 14 ELTON ITAZLEWOOD. > i i Avickcd, you mi«;lit siiy a prayer for mo, and alter the Lord's prayer if you can " Forgive us our tres- j)asses, even if as yet we cannot foricive them that tres])ass a«j;ainst us ?'' " 1 will, Elton, but it can only he lor a short time, the prayer nuist soon return t(j the exact words of Christ." He did not notice this remark, but added " I leave the stage at once. AVlien a man has once played in a r(»al drama, he docs not care for mock ones. Some men of course would not mind. That is what I have been saying to myself all day, over and over again till the noon turned to twilight and the twilight faded into dark. But I am not like other men. It would kill me. I must go, I have made my plans, and shall sell off the house and settle in the country. If there is a place near you, I will take it, and the diild and I can live there in retirement. I will write for the magazines and de- vote myself to my boy and his education. Let us go out now, this heat and silence are insufl'crable. It is i)ast twelve already, but I cannot sloop, and do not want to be left alone ; so if you are not too tired, take a glass of sherry and come with me." ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. 75 The disburdening of Jiis soul had done Iiini good. He was k^eoming more like himself again. The night was elear and very cliilly, and the stars were shining brilliantly. As wc went down the street, we turned \\\) our eoat-eollars and Malked for a time in silenee. Hazlewood wore a soil, felt hat, whieh he drew down over his eves. and whenever we met any one he lifted his shoulders till his face was half hidden in the collar of his coat, making recognition impossible. His step was quick and nervous, and mc walked on down interminable streets, till I, who was not borne up b}' the same mental agony as he, felt thoroughly exhausted. At last we reached Oxford Street, and turnal down Bond Street to Piccadilly, and then on to the HaN - market, ^Yliitehall and Westminster Bridge. There we stopped and rested, looking over the j)arapet at the dark river that rushed b}^ under- neath us. All this time Hazlewood had spoken little, and that only at intervals. Now, the grandeur of this midnight scene aroused him. The clock tower of the parliament buildings sto(jd up dark and distinct against the starlit sky, and HP 76 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 'il ': \\ ■ ^ when the half-lionr cliimod — it was half past one — the vibrations floated oif as if on angePi wings over the sleeping city. The river was black, so black as to look absolutely solid, but the rov/s of lights opposite and the reflections of sev- eral stars danced upon its surface. We stood in the centre of the human world, and the majesty of the place, which to me is incomparably greater than that which any other city can present, over- whelmed us. " Thank God for this place," Hazlewood said, " and thank God for that river. It is my refuge in time of trouble. Over and over again I have come here in houi^s of anxiety or depression, and the solemn, soundless language of that dark stream, which once, ages ago, rolkd by imder these winds and stars through wood(Kl soli- tudes, has been to me the voice of God. It told me of the passing away of time, of the nothingness of man, of the vanity of human wishes, and now it tells me of the vanity of human anguish. It is death and yet it is life, and life because it is per- j)etual deatli. We speak of tlie river as being changeless. We think of it as of a living thing. It is not What is a river ? It is the perpetual ELTON UAZLEWOOD. tr sweeping away toward.-j the unknown sea of parti- cles of water never to return. What an extraordi- nary lesson this teaches us ! We see decay and change around us here, in that abbey, w here tlie dust of dead monarchs lie** softly under the tawdry jewels that were ' /Uried with it ; in tliose long, low buildings by the water\s edge, where the lines of liuman power over the globe converge and paii: again. But in tlie river under us, the soul fancies it has found an eternity, when behold, it looks and the river too is seen to be but an eternity of death. It is all \vondcrfid, inscrutable, it passes knowledge, we cannot grasp it, the thought is overwhelming. It is so fidl of sorrow that it liglitens sorrow. If God coidd be to me again as He once was, the aeons to come would j>erha|)s not Ikj so mysterious and dark. I do not fear hell, I fear the unknown, the drifting on and on down the rivers oi oceans of iK?q)etiial change. Tl e thought of annihilation would be heaven to me. Y(^t these emotions, what are thev after all ? The vibrations of nerve fibres in the bmin. How many a grand sunset has been spoilt Ut me by my realizing in moments of the most rapt, spiritual exaltatiuu, that the glories 6 78 ELTON HAZLEWOOD, which were to me the domes and ramparts of heaven, '\vcre l)ut the mechanical action upon the retina of rays of hght refracted by the acpieous vapours in the air. Yet I cannot believe that tliat is all. I love to think of the soul as having size, of our dim and underlying consciousness as of a realm \'ast and eternal over which the years roll, bringing with them germs of further powere and glories of the coming hglit, till somewhere in the future the dav-dawn shall break, and the shadows flee away, and the souFs wide empire of land and sea, of thought and emotion, be unveiled forever. And so the river rolls by, and wc roll by, and it and wc are nothing, and everything is nothing, save the relentless whirlwind which bears us on« ward into notliingness. Harry, I leel better for the walk or the river. I did not think I could have talked as I have to-night. We had better return, it will soon be getting light." Day had actually dawned as we turned up St. John^s Wootl Koad. Before Hazlewood showed me to my room, he took off his shoes in the u])per passage and told me to do the same. Then he led me softly into the nui'sery, to the cot in which his boy lay. The ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 79 little head was thrown back, and the long, dark ringlets lay in confiLsion over the pillow. He was a lovely child. Hazlewood bent over and kissed him, and the little fellow opened his eyes for a moment in his sleep. He was the image of his father, but with chubby baby features. "Hush, darling," Hazlewood said, as he rose and we crept away. " Poor little shamed mother- less boy. God help us both. Good-night, my dear old friend. I have been cruel and unkind to you to drag you out and burden you with my sorrow, but, Harry, you have saved my life, you and that innocent little angel in there." He shook my hand warmly as we parted, and my heart was full of thankfulness that I had been of any use to him, or what was just the same, that he should think I had. His voice had softened as he said " good-night," and his face had lost its hard, unnatural lines, and I thought his eyes were full of tears. m-'^ \i CHAPTER VII I n 1 il A T Beaconhtrrjsf, abonf a quarter of a mile from ■"^^ the Yicara^*, frks f... out over the sea, and is a consj/icw/us object to sailors and fishermen in tjjc vimmidi. The noise vi' the sea penetrates its mgmive wtMn *od nndlionc*! win- dows, and at niglj< ;/ • F ]mv*t naf in the old librar}" and listened in the MUidm^ some curious cave-for- mation in the rocks below, so split and hurled bade the breakers that ihere came round me through the w^alls :ind floors a solenm undertone, like the deep notes of .a oi'gan. This house Hazlewood took for himj^h and his little bov. He brouijht with hiui lh<' < lithful old mu'se who 80 ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. 81 became also his housekeeper and ruled his estab- lishment for him. Ilazlewood's love for his child Ix^came the one paasion of his life. So completely had it mastered him, tliat I believe, and so he al- ways declared, that he left the world with its gains and applause without a pang. Of that other love, the love for his wife, which at one time had been so strong, he never spoke. I think it never re- turned. That there mn^i have been a void in his heart, I do not dou})t, but the discovery that she loved another see; I to have blighted the love instantly, and seareti into numbness the spot wlirre it had lx'( n. ^e<»ple often sjX'ak won- derinirlv uf a mother's love for her child, thev look upon it as the height of devotion, Imt I think tin's is a mistake. T think that wlien w mini lovcw iiis child, he loves it with a strength and intensity of which a woman can have no idea. I 2:rant vou that such cases are raiw Thcv are not natuiaL That is just tlu» reason why the love is so absorb- ing. AfTcctlons which do not arise from natural instincts, Init nre the result of jiei^sonal aftinity l)e- tween individuals, are of all the most intense. In the bond between a mothc>r and child this higher i ir i r 1^ f ' 82 ELTON JIAZLEWOOD. Ill i !| love is frequently superadded to the natiu'al ma- ternal and filial instinct, and the relationship is thereby strengthened. Most of us have known instances in which a grown man's love for his mother lias IxMin so full, as to leave no room for ordinary conjugal aifection. There was something inexpressibly painful in observing Hazlewood's devotion to his child. It was too absorbing, it gave him no ease, he was per- petually anxious about him. It was the one bright spot in the whole world to him. I could not fail to note however that it had a marvellous effect upon his character. Had it been less intense, and more reasonable, more healthy, in other words, and exerted the same influence over him, it would have been only an unmixed good. It gave him that which his nature most needed — a continuous im- pulse in one settled direction. It supplied that motive power ^vhich he had lacked. He worked at his writing regularly now. not by fits and staits as hitlu^rto. He was less carried away by impulse, and his moods were subordinated to and controlled by love for his child, the thought of his boy's future, and anxiety i^)r his welfare. But, as I I ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 83 have said, this love \\ as too strong, too uncontrol- able. Hazlewood was conscious of this, as he always was of his weak points. ^' I love that child too much," he said to me once. " It is very wicked of me, but I cannot help it. He seems to me to take the ])lacc of God. I never feel so near Heaven, as when I kneel down with him at night by his bedside, and he prays in his sweet innocent way for us both. In fact, I don't seem to feel any need for God or Heaven, so so long as I have the love of him to guide and console and purify me." " That isn't right, Elton, we ought to love our dear ones in God, and onlv in subordination to our love for Him." "I wish I could do that; but it is different with you, Harry. You have your wife and your home and your little children, so many outlets for your affection. I have one, only one. You think I am foolish to be so nervous and to worry about little Elton so much, don't you ? " " I do, rather." ** Harry," he said, " I don't want to shock you, but do you know what my child is to me ? He is ■ i 84 ELTON HAZLEWOCD. \v i! I :, 41 i:! tlie one anchor which holds my reason firm amid the shocks and storms of seas that won Id have borne down many a saner man to horrible ship- wreck. I am not a sane man, my impulses and passions are too violent. With a strong love for another I am ail right, but without that, after wliat has passed, without that " he hesitated as he uttered these words and his eyes had an ab- sent look ; then he added " Harry, let us change the subject.'' Little Elton certainly returned his father's de- votion, and as he grew into a handsome boy the likeness to his father increased almost every day. This resemblance was not merely an external one ; it stamped equally his inner mental nature. He had the same quick outbursts of intellectual power, the same passionate tenderness, and also the same weakness of moral fibre as characterized his father. To know the chikl was to love him, and to love him was to sorrow for him, to be filled with a painful wonder. When Hazlewood has run up to town for a day, I have often taken the b^y with my little ones along the sands that skirt the base of the clifts. ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. 85 At such times, I remember, his conversation has surprised me beyond measure ; it revealed such in- tense thought and imagination. He was always glad to have a talk with me as a clergyman, when his father was not by to make him feel bashful, or reprove him for his inquisitivene , He ^ )oked upon me as the people (^f Isra< i looked upon the twelve spies after their return, as one who could give minute and particular information of the promised land. He asked me one day if there WTre any roofs in Heaven, and if so why ? because there would not be anv rain or cold there. Then he wanted to know how, if it were day there all the time, we should be able to see the stars, " for I like to look at the stars," he said. He wondered if there were any horses there, and if God ever drove out with grand armies and processions, as the kings do in his story books. One day, he asked me if he had any mother. He had asked Hannah this once, he said, but she had told him not to ask questions. Of coiu'se I had to say yes, and tried to change the subject ; but he -was not to \yd turned off in this way. If he had a mother ought not he to pray for her, as my little boys did ■■■ I 86 ELTON TTAZLEWOOD. for their mother? The chil(h'on liad evidently h(M a e-ouncil on the siibjeot. Then lie ^vanted to know if his mother would go to Heaven, and if ho would see her there. We had a sur})lieed ehoir at Beaconhui'st and in order to delight Hazlewood, J had a cassock and surplice made for little Elton, as soon as he was old enough, and he regularly, at the morning and afternoon services on Sunday, led the choir into the chancel from the vestry under the tower. The old people in the congregation would turn and look at the little fellow as he led the way up the aisle with all the dignity of a mas- ter of ceremonies, his grave spirituelle face fixed earnestly upon the altar, and his dark ringlets fail- ing over his shoulders. He never looked to the right hand or to the left, but walked on slowly to his seat which was next to mine. Hazlewood I know used to be in ecstasies over his little white- robed angel, and he did all he could to foster the idea, which the boy had himself suggestal, that he should be a clergymen Avlien he grew up. But the inherited defect in the little fellow's nature did not escape the anxious father's eyes, and many a deep musing and sleepless night did the symptoms I ELTOX UAZLEWOOl). 87 i of it caiiso liim. But, as I oflon told him, it is easy to correct when young the tendencies of a child's disposition. A wise and firm governor can bend and mould them to what is good and noble, and start his charge fair in the race with his face to the goal. " No, Harry," Elton would say, " not easily, not when the defect is a deficiency ; only God in his future guidance through life can make up for that. You may train and cultivate a child's mind but you cannot supply to it w^hat is not tliere." I do not suppose that I could fully sympathize v>ith Hazle wood's fears as a father. My chubby little ones, dearly as I loved them, hardly cost me one anxious moment. But his na- ture w^as deeper than mine and he could therefore read more deei:>ly into that of his boy. However, in spite of care and occasional gloomy forebodings, that period, all too short, in w^hich Hazlewood and his boy were our close neighbours, was an exceed- ingly happy one. To be sure, thcrf^ always loomed up in the background that terrible skel- eton w^liich we felt w^as never far off although we did not allude to it. Haz'ewood w^as an exquisite rider and as he kept tw^o hoi-scs, I often accom- IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-S) /. LO III M 1.25 I !| Ilia t'- IIIIIM .8 U ill 1.6 <^ 'm^ /a h,. om, A w <% J^ *c?: -(S # 3^> O / PhotDgraphic Sciences Corporation rV ^ % A'"^ W" :\ \ ^\^s \^ ■I 'A i 88 ELTON JIAZLEWOOD. panled him in deliglitful excursions to places in the neighbourhood. The motion and excitement of riding, no matter in what mood he had started out, would soon throw his spirits into the maddest joy. I have often pulled in my horee after a gallop and watched him ride madly on, and then turn and come back to me, his cheeks flushed, his eyes dancing with sheer animal glee, and his face radiant as it had been at school. He rose early and generally did his "svTiting for the day Ixiforc breakfast. Pie spent the rest of the morning in reading, and the afternoons he gave to his boy, while the evenings were usually passed with me either at his house or mine, where my dear wife ever made him a welcome guest. It was very rarely that ^\c did not see him every day. Once two days passed without his coming to the Vicar- age. I was very busy at the time and so did not notice his absence, but my wife, with feminine in- stinct, divined that something was wrong, and so at her instigation, on tlie second day I walked over the tields to Hazlewood Castle, as we used to play- fully call my friend's house. It was about five o'clock of an afternoon in the ? - I I ■■ ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. 89 early part of September. The air was clear and cool. I heard the children's voices, the clink of the blacksmith's hammer, the lowing of cattle, and other sounds from the little \ illage which lay in a hol- low beyond the chm'ch and was now obscured from view save for a few roofs and chimneys with their wreaths of blue curling smoke. Hazlewood, I found, was not at home, but Mrs. Haimali told me she thought that he was out on " the point." The point was at the edge of the bluff on which the castle stood. It was a slight plateau of grass and ferns, which overhung the cliff, and Avas reached by a zigzag path about twenty feet in descent. In olden times it had evidently been used as a place of signalling, and had given the name of Beaconhurst to the village. Hazlewood was lying on the grass, his head resting on his hand, and his eyes fixed on the glorious purple and gold mists that hid the distant shores of France. He did not hear me come, and started when he saw me. His eyes were sad and his features looked haggard. " Ah," he said, as I came, " who told you ? " *' Told me what ? I don't know anything. I 90 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. only came to see why you had not been over to our house for two whole days ; my wife feared you might be ill." " It was very goc>d of her to tliink of mc. No, it was not that — something else/' He paused, and I sat on the grass beside him and waited, without speaking, looking at the sea which lay at our feet. Presently he said, " Harry, look out over there." He pointed with his hand to the purple mists before us, which were dulling into gray, while the streaks of water beneath them were a translucent and fairy green. " Over there, beyond those mists, miles away, there is a grave ; some one I was once very proud of and loved bet- ter than anything else in the whole world, lies in it. She died last week in childbirth. I only heard yesterday. Don't ask me any more. She is dead to me now, forever, forever." He turned over and hid his face down under the long tufts of grass. I felt that even my pres- ence was an intrusion, so I crept noiselessly away, and my wife and I kept the secret to ourselves. When we next saw Hazlewood, the traces of a shadow were still over him, but he appeared to be ELTON HAZLEWOOD, 91 just the same as l^efore; and soon the incident passed from our ordinary thoughts. But the deepest lines which the chisel of God graved upon his heai-t and soul, and which fixed the i^ermanept expression of that souFs life, were not made tnca but after. It was the February after, and a, wild, dark Febiiiary it was. Never have I experienced such winds and storms or heard the sea so boisterous. Many sad hearts there were along the ccast, for almost every mail brought its tidings of shipwTcck and disaster. There was much sickness too in the parish, for the Winter had been a wai-m and unhealthy one, and all contagious diseases showed a tendency to become epidemic. A kind of low fever had broken out in the place, and my children had been down with it, but thanks to my dear wife's motherly watchftil- ness, the little ones had all recovered. The fifteenth of February was little Elton's seventh birthday. He had been an exception to the general run of the children in the parish, and had escaped all illness during \he Winter. His father took every possible care of him, and he had not l)een allowed to come neav our house for over 92 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. , \l a month, nor did our children go to see liim. But his birthday, his father told me, would be nothing to him unless I went up and had dinner at the castle, in place of the party which was usually given to celebrate the event. The clouds were dark and lowering, and the evening strangely still, as I started off to the six o^clock dinner. Hazlewood had not yet returned from riding, but on my entering the hall, little Elton looked down at me from the curving stair- case, and putting his face through a hole in the bannisters, called out : " la that you. Uncle Harry? I*m so glad you have come. Daddy has given me a pony, a real, live pony, that I am to learn to ride. Come out to the stable and see him." I thought I had never seen so sweet a boyish face, save perhaps one, and that long ago at school. His cheeks were flushed with the deepest rose, and his eyes were unusually large and brilliant. He was dressed in a new tight-fitting velvet suit, with wide lace collar, and with his dark wavy hair looked like a sweet little boy courtier from the canvass of Vandvke. I went to the stable with i ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. 93 him and saw the new Shetland. It was a i^rfoet beauty, and I promised to let him often accompany us when his father and I Avent out together. The dinner was little Elton's, so the evening was given up to his amusement, and we two old boys romped with him aftenvards, and even condescended to take off our coats and wrestle together for his gratification. I was also, as a great treat for him, taken up-stairs to the little room adjoining his father's, and acted as a .sort of superintending chamberlain as he undressed and said his prayers and got into bed. Hazlewood and I then went down to the library, and while we smoked, talked over old times and the days when we were boys, which now appeared to us so like a dream. The next morning Hazlewood was not at church, and in the afterooon one of the servants from the Castle told me that Master Elton was very ill. She said he had been " taken bad " in the night. I did not think it was very serious and jokingly sent Iiim word that he had eaten too much birthday cake, and that I should have to go up to him with my medicine chest. About half-past one o'clock, at night, however, I was roused by a loud knocking /n^ 94 ii: ELTON IIAZLEWOOD, fill at the door, the bell had been broken by a deaf, old parishioner in the afternoon. I went down and to my surprise found the visitor was old Dr. Jack- son, the village doctor. " I am sorry to disturb you," he said " but I have very serious news for you ; poor Hazlewood^s little boy has diphtheria." " Diphtheria ?" " Yes, a very bad case, in fact all but a hopeless case. I don't think he can possibly get over it. The disease has developed so rapidly and taken such hold of his constitution. I wish you would go up to his father. He seems stunned and cannot realize the seriousness of the case." Not many minutes passed ere I was standing in the wind and rain before Hazlewood's door. The house was brilliantly lit up and when I entered I found that the servants were evidently in terrible consternation. Upstairs, in the little room, Hazle- wood was sitting by the bed holding his child's burning hand. The boy was asleep, and lay with his head far back on the pillow, his hair all tossed, and one deep fiery spot, about the size of a crown, on each cheek. His throat was terribly swollen, I t I! I Hi (I! ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 95 and I had licai-d the sound of his brcatlilng as I ascended the stairs. His face wore a troubled, pained look, and the lids of his large dark eyes were slightly open, and showed the whites under- neath. Elton turned towards me as I came in, but his face was a riddle to me. He did not look like himself. He looked hard and defiant, but not worn or anxious. " Well, Harry, did the doctor tell you to come ? He is a perfect old woman ; the child is better, he sleeps. You should have seen how bad he was this afternoon ; but now the crisis is past, I know it is. Do you suppose that I Lave watchal Elton, so carefully all these years and not known how ill- ness affects him ? He goes down very rapidly, and then turns a comer and comes up again, just as rapidly. I am never anxious about him, when he has these attacks, because I have watched him too narrowly, and I know what to expect. A stranger might be, who did not know him." All this was whispered out to me in broken sen- tences, liis head turning between each towards the pained little face on the pillow. " If it were some I n 96 ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. iiii !»l H! regular disease, the course of which 1 did nut under- stand, 1 should be more disturbed." "Did not the doctor tell you what it was?'' I asked. "No, he said he could not say to-night, he would be able to tell better in the morning.'' There was a pause ; the little fellow moaned in his sleep. Then Elton turned to me and fixing his eyes upon my face, said : " Did he tell you what it was ?" Generally speaking, I tell the truth, but then the devil of fear got the better of me and I could not ntter the truth, or even half the truth. I cleared my throat a little, and told a deliberate falsehood. " No," I said. "That's a lie, Harry," said Hazlewood, still watching me narrowly ; " Thank you for it, but it's a lie. He did tell you. He told you that it was diphtheria, and that he would not get over it ; I read it in your face. Don't deny it. I have known the dreadful truth all day but could not face it." " O, Elton, my dear old fellow, put your trust in God." ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. 97 f " I do, Harry, I have no one else but you and God now." " Put God's name first, Elton." He pressed his lips tightly and turned his pale face towards the bed. I tried to say something to comfort him, but I could not, my voice chokeil me, my head throbbed and I — I, God's minister, struck with sheer madness of sorrow at his awful calm- ness, stole into the next room and sobbed like a child. All that night, at brief inten-als, the little fellow would wake and cry out for his father, whom in his delirium he fancied was far away. His mv- ings were all about the angels and the church and Heaven. And once, about four o'clock, he awoke from a longer sleep than usual and called three times for his mother, " Mamma, Mamma, Mamma, oh, where have they put my Mamma ?" Hazlewood bent over him. "Here is Daddie, darling, you are all right. Do you want anything ? " " I want to see my Mamma." Then he fell to rambling about other things, more or less incoherently, but the incident revealed ■t 98 ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. 11 £i 'I'i the son'ow and questionings which had lain hid- den all this time in the child's heart. I was glad that, as I had gone to a table to wet a cloth with cologne and water, my back was turned to Hazlewood when it happened. The only sign Elton gave that he felt this new wound was a deep sigh like a sob, " O, God help me," so low that I could not bo said to have heard it, I over- heard it. On the next day the boy rallied slightly, but in the afternoon grew worse again. A Lon- don physician had been sent for and had confirmed our worst fears. Hazlewood now knew that the case was hopeless, but he bore up without a tear, never leaving the child's side and suffering no one to touch him but himself. All that night and the next the fever raged and the disease pursued its dreadful course, till on the fourth day, early in the morning, I was sent for to go to the castle and specially requested to bring the Communion ves- sels with me. On entering the child's room, I found him choking, but he was perfectly sensible, and I could distinctly understand his whispere, which came slowly and in gasps. " Uncle Harry, I want the Bread, the Bread of . '! i til J ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. 99 Heaven. I am going there, I am very weak, I cannot take any food. Give me the Comm.union." " You could not swallow it, dear, I am afraid. It would not be right when you can't swallow. Jesus is the Bread of Heaven and He will feed you Himself when you go to Him." " Uncle,'' then came a gasp, " don't they always have it, they, dying people, I mean, don't tJiey al- Avays have it ? " " No, dear, not when they can't swallow." Then a bright thought flashed upon me. '' But I will tell you what I ^vill do. Your father and I will take it for you. I will put on my surplice and we shall have the service just as we do in church." " Daddie," he gasped, looking for his father, and his eyes closed from sL r exhaustion, then they opened and he said, " Daadie, lay my surplice over me too." His father went to a closet and fetched it, and spread it out over him, hiding all but the swollen, suffering face, on which death had already cast his shadow. Then in the grey of the morning we had Conmiunion, the sweetest and solemnest I ever re- N t 100 ELTON HAZLEWOOD, !f I 4 ^i ili member. Hazlewood knelt bv the bedside hold- ing the child's hand still. The little fellow had shut his eyes and his breathing was painful to listen to, but he seemed to be full of a strange and heavenly peace, and to be wholly conscious of what was going on. We had each communicated and I had just begun the "Gloria in Excelsis," " Glory to God in *he highest and on earth peace, good will towards men," ^^hen the little fellow's face suddenly changed, a convulsive tremour shook his frame, he choked slightly, then curled himself back, and his breathing stopped. In an instant Elton had jumped up, and before I could divine his intention, he had put his mouth to the child's mouth and tried to force air into the lungs and break the membrane which filled the throat. But it was of no avail; the Spirit had gone. Ti j Heavenly Host who had but now filled the room in adoration of the Divine Presence, had born it back with them to the bosom of the God who gave it. The servants, all but old Mrs. Hannah, who was prostrate with grief, had left the house, so Elton and I, robing the sweet child's form in the I 11 ELTON HAZLEWOOD, 101 I sno\\y surj)lice, fittest emblem of its innocence, with cur own hands, hiid it in the rough deal coffin, which was all that the village could supply at 80 short a notice. The undertaker would not come near the house, so, as it would have been im- possible to have kept the body longer, the doctor and I bore out the little coffin to the churchyard at sunset on that very afternoon. Hazlewood, pallid and broken doAvn, and evidently sickening for the disease, wrapped in a long cloak, his face muffled in a wide black scarf, followed slowly, as chief and only mourner. mBBsmm^amBmmmma ^ li ;i Si CHAPTER YIII. rpHROUGH long nights and days my wife and "*- I and good old Mrs. Hannah watched in cum at the bedside of my friend. The delirium which at first had been very severe, gradually abated and was succeeded by terrible and tedious prostration. Gradually, ho>'vever, strength returned to the wasted form. But little by little, as Hazlewood regained a measu'^e of his former health, it became apparent that a change had passed over him. During the weeks of convalescence, while he lay back in his bed with his face turned to the grand view of sea and sky which his window afforded, his spirit seemed to be passing through a transfor- mation as extraordinary as it was radical. He spoke little, scarcely ever, unless addressed by others. He was wonderfully patient and gentle. He did not appear to be lonely, when left by him- self, and though he seldom joined in it, he never seemed to be disturlxxl or annoyed by the conver- 102 ELTON HAZLEWOOD, 103 sation of his attendants. He never referred to the past, and sometimes my wife and I have wondered if it were at all clear to him. That it was, we dis- covered later. When he wa3 well enough to go out, I used to take him for short walks up and down in front of the castle. He tottered like an old man and felt so slight as he leant upon my arm. One dreaded excursion passed off quite otherwise than I had expected, I mean the first visit to his boy^s grave. We went there one after- noon in the end of May. The churchyard was looking its best, the birds were full of music, and the scent of the fresh leaves and flowei-s was de- lightful. Little Elton's grave had been lovingly tended by my wife, and was prettily aiTanged with forget-me-nots and heartsease do^vn its centre in the form of three Maltese crosses. Elton was evi- dently pleased to find it in this condition. He knelt beside it and I turned away, so as not to hear the sobs that shook liis being. After a short time he rose slowly and came and took my arm, and we strolled n^ and down the wide gravel path in front of the Church. He was quite calm then. w 104 ELTON JIAZLEWOOD. I ill " 'Wliat an inscrutable mystery it all is ! " he said. "What is life? What is death? Why cannot that poor child under there answer, as he once did, to my call ? Why cannot his little eyes open and look up into mine and his arms be thrown round my neck? There the little body lies out in the cold and damp earth, the body that I guarded so carefully and loved so distractedly. I wonder if the ancients loved their families as we love ours. I think not. I think Christianity has intensified, as it has purified our domestic affec- tions. The cultivation of the emotional side of man's nature in religion has developed its sensibil- ity and its need of love. Some people nay think this is not to be commended. They deplore the deterioration of the physical constitution of man, which, to a large extent the development of his nervous organization implies. Over-sensitiveness certainly is to be deplored, as being incompatible with a condition of health, but we must remember that science is more and more making life and health possible to mental organizations so fine and sensitive, that it would have been impossible for them to have endured existence under the rough ELTON JTAZLEWOOD. 105 conditions of old. Evolution in man, having brought his body to a certain degree of perfection, now acts along the line of mental and emotional progress. Man is daily becoming more man, more spiritual. It is the work of God, and the revel- ation of God's Son has helped it on. Some think that evolution contradicts the doctrine of design in nature ; I cannot see it. I would illustrate tlm gradual accomplishment of God's purposes in nature by the course of a stream down the face of a hill The water does not flo^v directly to its goal in the valley below, as it would were it poured down through the air. No, it nnis here and there into little crevices in the earth, skirting each obstruction, filling tiny lakes, which are no sooner filled than abandoned, until in time the end of its course is attained, and the stream is finally absorbed into the grand river at the base. Through it all, how- ever, even when the stream went this way and that, the impelling force was that of gravitation which acted downwards in a straight line. So, from the beginning of time, there has been a con- stant flowing on of created life through nature to- wards some goal which is the fulfillment of God's 106 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. purpose. There have been obstacles in its course which hindered its direct advance ; there have been wide, deep lakes, in which no advance has been apparent for long periods ; there have been smooth and steep declines where progress was made with a bound, but in whatever way the evolution pro- ceeded, the impelling force was the will of God acting in a straight line through nature. What hope this gives us for ourselves, for the whole race ! How it keeps us in time with the forward march of thought ! And when we have this hope, we can work quietly and contentedly and suffer patiently under the dispensations of God. Yes, we are not a worn-out race, battering vainly with stunted strength against the bars which inexorable law has set round man^s domain, but a race still in child- hood, still pressing on to the unknown and the ideal, to the fulfillment of our hopes, the attain- ment of our highest aspirations. " Yes, on we press, forever on Through death to other deaths and life, To brighter lights when these are gone To broader thought, more glorious strife. ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 107 To vistas opening out of these, To wonders shining from afax, Above the surging of the seas, Above the course of sun and star. To higher powers of will and deed, All bounds, all limits left behind. To truths undreamt in any creed, To deeper love more Godlike mind. Great God, we move into the vast, All questions vain — the shadows come, We hear no answer from the past, The years before us all are dumb. We trust thy purpose and thy will, We see afar the shining goal, Forgive us, if there linger still Some human fear within the soul. Forgive us, if with thouj^^hts too wild And eyes too dim to pierce the gloom. We shudder like a frightened child That enters at a darkened room. Forgive us, if when dies away. All human sound upon our ears, We hear not in the swift decay Thy loving voice to calm our fears. But lo, the dawn of fuller days. Horizon glories fringe the sky, Our feet would climb the shining ways To meet man's widest destinv." 108 ELTON BAZLEWOOD. " Yes, that is life, and that is death— progress, progress. It is hard to sec it now, the gloom is very deep, but we shall see more clearly some day. In that white morning when, side by side you and I, and hand in hand that sweet child and I, stand among the risen dead, in the world that is to be, no clouds will obscure our perfect vision. Harry," he said, suddenly breaking off, " I have a gi-eat favour to ask of you." " Well, what is it ? you know it will be granted as oon as you make it, if it is in my power to do )) so. " I know that, but I hesitate to make it." "Why should you? will it be very hard to grant?" " I don't know, there may be a struggle in your mind bet^veen your sense of right and your desire to do me a favour. Promise me one thing first." << What is that ?" " That if you don't think it is wise or right, or even convenient to do what I ask, you will not try to do it." *' All right, I can easily promise that." « Then I— no, I cannot ask it, I will write you ELTON UAZLEWOOD. 109 a letter in explanation. If you don't like my proposition, just put my letter in the fire and say no more about it." I left Hazlewood '^t his house, and returned to do some parish work in the village. The next morning at church, I found a letter for me in my friend's handwriting on the vestry table. After service, shutting the doors in the quaint old room, that I might be undisturbed, I broke the seal and read it. It ran as follows : " My dear oldjelhw. I could not tell you what was in my mind tliis afternoon for two reasons. First, because I experience great difficulty in opening up to another the inner workings of the soul, and I have an objection on principle to doing so ; and secondly, because my broaching the matter in conversation would have made your conscientious refusal of my request more trying to you. I am going to put my whole case before you now quite fully, and I shall accept your decision as fmal. Perhaps you may have noticed and yet very likely you may not, that a change has passed over me. Something has made me a different man. It is very hard for me to write this, it sounds so methodistical and presumptuous, but you will under- stand my motive. That which has made me different, is the realizing, as I have never realized before, the Incarnation of God the Son—' The Word was made Flesh: During those terrible hours of pain and mental anguish, into which God in his mercy plunged me, the truth flashed upon me with start- 8 fi ( 110 ELTON UAZLEWOOD. \\ I ; ^1 ling force. I believe that but for it I should have lost my reason. Night after night, when sleep would not come, and I have turned and turned and found no bodily ease, those wonderful words have given me comfort. When all was dark and my weak mind borne hither and thither on currents of thought which set on all sides towards the encompassing sea of despair, the only safety my reason found, was to cling to the cradle of Jesus, and to kneel in imagination between St. !Mary and St. Joseph as they looked down upon the face of tlie Holy Child. In that cradle tliere [was man, there was human love, human emotion, and there was God. It was all a fact, it was a rock on which to anchor the soul amid the storm. I could face death fearlessly from such a vantage ground. Then as I grew stronger the personal love of Jesus filled me with a restful joy, a joy and peace it had never been mine to know. I see now how God has led me in the past, from the world and self up to the higher love of my child, which concentrated all my thoughts and inconstant impulses into one strong, settled passion ; and now I can see how, by bereavement, he has lifted my heart to a love higher and holier still — the love of Himself, who cannot pass away, but is the same yesterday, to-day and forever. Divine love does not preclude earthly love, when pure and good, it intensifies it, it takes awav the sting which must be in it to those who look for no life beyond death. How wonderfully true St. Augustine's words are, * The soul of man can find no true rest till it rests in God.' I have found that rest now, and by God's grace and transforming power I mean to try and keep it. Please forgive me again for writing so egotistically. Now let me make my request. It is that you should write for me to the Bishop and influence him to ordain me, and then let me live here and work with you as your curate. At one time, I had thought seriously of taking orders, but I was not f;! ;! I ..■% li ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. Ill fit then. God has prepared mo for it since. Now, I think, I could give my lieart unreservedly to Him, and spend the closing years of ray life cheerfully in his service. Jf only I had been able to overcome that fatal weakness and irresolu- tion in my character, which first led me into sin, and then led to the rejection of the divine call, and if I had been able, like you, to serve God from the first, how different my life would have been. But there is no use in vain regrets. I have suf- fered, and shall still sutler, for the past. If 1 work with you, you will find me obedient and loyal, for as you nmst know, I owe you more than I can express in words. I leave the matter entirely in your hands, and if you approve, do you set it all before the Bishop. You must weigh carefully the reasons for and against my proposition, but if you can take it up, it will be the begiuning of a new life to me. Ever your affectionate friend, Elton Hazlewood. I read this letter twice and thanked God ^'^^ tlic marvellous workings of His providence. Then with heart overjoyed, I almost ran through the spring fields up to the castle, bearing my unwritten answer in the very gladness of my face. i" ) ■ ( !i II 11! i i - « f - * t M i • ? : 4 •■^ .*• 2 '^ "n ,J ■ CHAPTER IX. rilllE five yeai-s of his diaoonatc which Ilazle- "*" wood spent with me as curate, were without exception the liappiest of my life. A fellowsliip of sentiment and aim, such as nothing but union of religious thought and work can give, drew our hearts together in yet stronger bonds of love. The people )f the j)arish almost worshipped him. No trouble Mas too great tor him. In sickness and in health he was their friend and guide, but it was in sorrow that he was most helpful. His tender gentleness made him at once the accepted coun- sellor of all in distress. Hih quick sympathy con- soled and soothed in cases when no alleviation could be offered. The very grasp of his hand ai)^ "ed you of his willingness to share your burden with you. After all he had gone through in life, one might have expected that he would have been broken down, that his ministiy would have been a sorrowful crucifixion of self, but it was not so. 112 ELTON IIAZLEWOOD, 113 The most marvellous fbaturc of the chanrro he had imdergone was that it had conferred npon him mental health. There was nothing morbid or melodramatic about it. He was manly, fmnk and cheerful, even boyish. He spoke and thought much less of his inner feelings than he had Ixx^^n wont to do. He even referred calmly to his sorrow, although every day he made a pilgrimage to his boy^s grave. The world seemed to have a new in- terest for him. All his former intellectual powers were there, but they were brought into a healthy proportion and subordination to the sense of duty to God and the personal love of Jesus, which had become the main spring of his life. Perhaps, if in anything he was liable to be misunuei-stood it was in the magazine articles which he wrote from time to time, and in his sermons. Old-fashioned peoj^le, whose minds moved in a rut, and who loved the rut, were sometimes startlal by the new and strange way he had of putting things. The fact was, Hazlewood was a genius, and when he had ac- cepted a truth he gave it back, coloured with his wonderfiU personality. Tnith in his mind was analyzed and reasoneil out into all its ways and by- ur ^i;;! 'J I 114 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. ! ■I ; [ 1 1 ways. He had absolutely no fear of possible con- sequences in his statement of what he conceived to be truth. He w£iS frankness itself, and to this was owing his singular power in dealing wdth those who knew and trusted him. In noting these characteristics, it must be remembered that Hazle- wood came to his work with a mature mind, and with a deep knowledge of the world and men. But it is not my purpose to give a detailed account of his life, only to indicate its main features, and descrilxi more minutely the various turning points in his histoiy and mental development. As part of his spiritual experience, and not without its future bearing upon this story, I may here record a remarkable dream which Hazlewood had towards the close of his residence at Beaconhurst. On the Sunday evening before he left for his ordination to the priesthood at Winchester, it being a brilliant moonlight night, we strolled together down to the shore. The great waves rolled slowly in without ruffling the surface of the ocean and the black cliffs stood up behind us like giants who bid defiance to the encroaching deep. There was no other sound to be heard but the plash of the rollers, as tliey broke ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 115 along the shore. We stood silent? listening to that wonderful sea-language. I was reminded of those lines of Tennvson, " And rolling far along the rocky shore The voice of days of old and days to be," and quoted them. "How glorious those verses are/^ said Hazlc- wood, " and what a scene tJiey call up in the mind. All the splendour and subtle mystery of a night like this are stored up in them. What the soul feels to-night i^ vastne&s, the vastness of the world, the vastness of eternity. The sea always apjx^ars to me to be the emotional part of physical nature, or the world's soul. It is always the same ; but the same because always changing. The winds like jmssioiis sweep over it and lash it into fury ; the sun looks down upon it and it is still. Its sympathetic bosom reflects the coloui-s of the sky and the changes in the clouds and atmosphere. As in man, memor}^ beai-s on to the limits of age softened echoes of the soul's past pains and struggles, so the billows which re-echo the shock and anguish of tempests in mid ocean, roll off in subdued ;» i I i II 116 ELTON ITAZLEWOOD. I grandeur towards the distant coast. And in nights like these, surely the sea sleeps and dreams. Down in its mysterious mile depths of water the great impulses and tides are like ihe underlying currents of thought in the soul which rest not day nor night." We had turned as he was talking and walked on to the cave in the cliff under the point on which his house stood. "We sat down for a while on the rocks. Then Hazlewood said : " The other night I had such a curious dream. I don't often remember my dreams, but this one made a great impression upon me. I dreamt thai I was out riding by myself at night on that road to Insworth which you and I have so often travelled together. I was very lonely and very sad as I rode. Then I felt that some one was rid- ing after me and trying to overtake me, and after a time I became conscious that it was she, my poor lost wife. She seemed to be crying out to me and begging me to turn and wait for her, but I would not. Then I heard her say distinctly, * We shall meet there,' but I did not look round or ask her where. Suddenly, as I rode, never slack- .im ii m m [ ELTON HAZLEWOOD, 117 ing my speed, I came to a large jwnd by the way- side, and I reined in my horse and dismounted, and looked into the water among the rushes, and there I found it — the body of my dead child. As I lifted him out all cold and wet, she came up, and I was angry with her no longer, and she and I kissed each other, and we kissed the child, and the child revived and stood betw^een us. Then long streamers of a wonderful Aurora rolled out over the heavens, like the unfurling of the flag of victory, and it grew as light as day. We looked up over the water, and behold, it was a sea of glass, and I turned to my wife, from whose face all sorrow, all earthliness were passed awa}-, and bending down to her I said, ^ For ever ! ' " It was partly the scene, and partly the music of Hazlewood's voice, and the soft, absent wiy in which he related the dream, which thrilled me so strangely. I sat there on the rocks looking at his profile, as he gazed out to sea, entranced by that curious spiritual charm which he at all times exer- cised over me. He carried me with him into the mysterious dreamland of his vision. I saw it all, the long, dim road, the jwnd, the dead child, and I s- n H 'k' ■ ■ } i 3'' a ■'■■ : ■ i ^^^^^' 118 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. the reunion by the shining water. I felt it was prophetic, even while I dared not hope so, dared not pray so. When I bid him farewell at the Vicar£^e gate, light, ruffled clouds had spread over the moon, and its rays were dim, and I could not see his features clearly. The outline was vague, he seemed to be already merging into the shadows. Had I known then that this was to be our last meeting on this side of eternity, and that never again should I see that wonderful face, as it had been through boyhood, youth, and in the prime of manhood, till I shall see it glorified in the Kingdom of God, how I should have gazed lovingly through the darkness, till I had traced the outline of each remembered feature. CHAPTER X. TT had been arranged that I should go down to ^ Winchester for Elton's ordination. I was to ptay at the Abbey of St. Cross, about a mile or so out of the city, with old Dr. Buxton, a college friend of my father's. Owing to a case of serious illness in the parish, I was unable to leave home till Saturday afternoon, and when I arrived at Winchester, it w^as raining in torrents. Dr. Bux- ton had sent his carriage for me, so I drove com- fortably to the Abbey. I had expected that Elton would have come to see me in the evening, as I had asked him to do, but there were so many pos- sible reasons why he should not, that, beyond a feeling of disappointment at not being able to wish him Godspeed before his ordination, his absence cost me no thought. The night was dark and wet, he would probably have some business to transact, he would be tired after the examinations and would want to rest before the solemn ordeal of the next 119 I if (S S. 1 ■j-i-^ 120 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. day, one or more of these reasons occurred to my mind as sufficient excuse for his non-appearance. Sunday was a glorious day. I Avas awakened shortly after sunrise by the noise of birds in a tree near my window. A soft sweet wind came in through the open casement, and from where I lay in bed, I could catch a glimpse of the distant river through the meadows, and a hill be- yond. The part of the Master^s Lodge in which my room was situated was covered with ivy, and some straggling leaves, as the sun shone through them, made a bright green bordure to one side of my window. The walls and ceiling of the room were panelled in black oak, and evidently hun- dreds of years had passed since human hands carved those quaint figures over the fireplace. I lay still for a time, thinking about the manifokl changes in man and life which these walls had seen. In the house there was absolute silence, but the notes of birds filled my room with melody. The stillness of the chamber, however, the scent of the breeze, the singing of the birds, and the old liistorical associations of the place, aJQPected me only as a sweet dream, till of a sudden, my eye caught ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 121 the reflexion of the sun from a small flaw in one of the lozenged window panes. The thing shone like a dewdi'op or diamond. It was very small, but sent to me a tiny brilliant ray. Straightway, as though I had heard a note of music, the com- bined effect of sight and sound, which had soothed me but a moment before in a pleasing reverie, was intensified, and in a thrilling trance my mind was carried back to my dear old boyhood's home. Sometimes the veriest trifle will strike in this way a nerve of emotional association and electrify at once our whole being. It may have been that the brilliant speck in the glass reminded me of the shin- ing of the sun on the pond at home, on the Sunday morning on which Hazlewood and my father had the conversation I have narrated. Perhaps it brought back memories of the medley of colours in the little old Norman window by the Knight's tomb. The point of light carried me back in a world of dreams to Hazlewood and his visit to us. How^ it was, I do not know, but so real was this spiritual resurrection of the past, that as I gazed upon the scene with closed eyes, I could have averred that it was before me. I heard the voices 122 ELTON IIAZLEWOOD, \'-' 1) W : I i of those long dead, and had I been a painter, I could have depicted their faces and, what is more difficult to do from memory, the clothes they wore of bygone fashion. The centre of the dream was of course Hazlewood. I saw him as he had been, the brilliant, handsome youth with the world spread dazzlingly before him. I went fishing with him in the brook which ran through the Mallocks' Park. I drove him in our little pony cai-t through the summer lanes. I could hear him speak, I could hear the ring of his laugh. Then, as I lay awake in this entrancing exaltation of feelmg, a church bell in the distance began to toll, and reminded me of the day and the sol- emn consecration of my friend. His time life was only about to begin in all its fullness. The past with its failures, its sorrows, its worldly triumphs, had been put away, and the soldier strong, well- knit and fully equipped was to enter the battle as the champion of God. I did not sleep again, but was out in the garden long before the other mem- bers of the family were stirring. Dr. Buxton accompanied me to the Cathedral and procured me a seat in the Choir. The place ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 123 was full of people, and the organ played softly as we waited for the clergy to enter. Presently we heard an " Amen'' sung by the choir in one of the ti-ansepts, and we rose as the choristers entered from the nave. They took their places two by two in the old stalls, and my eyes anxiously scanned the long line of faces to see where Hazle- wood was. But I looked in vain, he was not there. The service proceeded ; I thought that I must have been mistaken ; but no, the candidates sat in a place by themselves, and 1 could make out their features distinctly. Elton ^vas not among them. What could have happened to him? During the sermon, I could hardly sit still. Somehow or other, I had a sense that the end had come, I did not attempt to say what end, but I felt that the crisis of his life had been passed. He w^as to liave no part here. The paths which to-day were opened up to the feet of those young men, paths of duty and love and self-sacrifice, were closed to him. The future I had imagined for him was never to be realized. But what was that future now to be ? Why had he not come ? Was he ill ? Had his heart failed him at the last ? ■I J 'i i il i 124 ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. If this ordination had been liold ten years ago, such an occurrence would have been possible and even probable. But no, Elton now, the strong earnest man, purified and tempered by God's fiery trials, was not one to turn back at the last. Once the thought crossed my mind, that perhaps in some way his old sin had found him out, and a threat of exposure Ix^en made through revenge. At any rate, why had he not called on me, or written, or sent word that he was not coming? The suspense was temble, and yet through it all, as I have said, I had a sort of consciousness that the end had come. O, Elton, noble and good and true, lonely and so battered, but not broken, by life's stomis, I felt that the fight had been won, that thou hadst received thy crown ! As the white-robed candidates knelt before the Bishop, and a boy's voice, clear as an angel's, be- gan the ^' Veni Creator " to Attwood's lovely set^ ting, I made it rather a prayer for myself than for my absent friend. After the service I went to the hotel at which Hazlewood had stayed, and my anxiety w^as still further increased on learning that he had not been seen since Thui-sday. He had ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 125 received a letter early on the morning of tliat day by the post and had gone out shortly after- wards. He told no one where he was going, but he had never returned. As he had left his desk and portmanteau in his room, the hotel people had expected him daily. Later on in the aftemoon, I saw the Bishop's chaplain and secre- tary, but they were as much at a loss to under- stand the sudden disappearance as I was. Acting on their advice, I put the matter into the hands of the police, and telegraphed to his lawyer in town. Every conceivable device was then resorted to by which we might obtain information. We adver- tised, ^ye offered rewards, we employed detectives, but in vain. Day after day passed away and no tidings came. At the end of a week I returned home, and there the silence and suspense were harder to bear, where every scene recalled so vividly the missing one. At first the sympathy of the people was aroused, they feared foul play. Soon however, a reaction of feeling set in, under the in- fluence of the parish gossips, and reports damag- ing to Elton's character were circulated freely. , r - -^ s 126 ELTON IIAZLEWOOD, Li i. \m The story was that a tlireatcned revelation of some old crime in the past had caused his flight. Most of the people, I was told, came to tliink by and by that the parish was well rid of the hand- some and clever curate, who had already got the Vicar too much under his finger and thumb. So malevolent and ungrateful is the world that I do not think there were ten individuals in the l)lace who really mourned, or sympathized with, or prayed for their late friend, whose self-sacrifice and de\'otion had but yesterday been proverbial. Very little was said to me on the subject, but I could pretty clearly discern the public sentiment. The knowledge of it stung me to the quick, and made me hate the place and my fellowmen, and only the thought of our Saviour wearing so pa- tiently the tl V rn-crown of the world^s ingratitude, reconciled u\o to continue my work in the parish. Weeks and months and years went by and still we heard no Avord of my friend, and to the mys- tery which shrouded his disappearance w^as added the stain of the world's reproach. Bitterly did the thought of this add to my bereavement, yet I never doubted him, never mistrusted him, and m 1 ELTON IIAZLEWOOD, 127 often, when some incident in my work, some old recollection, some anniversary^ has forced on me a double portion of my sorrow, I have gone and stood out in the churchyard beside his boy^s grave and prayed to the God of justice and love to right the wrong, and clear up the mystery before the eyes of the cruel world. But the answer came not, and year after year the stain restcKl upon the memory of one of the noblest and most generous of those hearts, who from time to time come into being under a fellowship with the unreeognition and rejection of their Master, of whom it is said that <^ He cime into the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not/' i 1^ i ; I i it ¥ h i? I if iii; i 'r I i i . I CHAPTER XI. 1~\0WN on a wild stretch of the Cornish coast, ^-^^ about a mile from the little village of St. Maddo, there is a long low promontory which Juts out from the cliffs into the ocean, as though the shore in its slumber had lain one unconquerable arm upon the deep. On the end of this promon- tory stands up boldly a curious rock, so flat and square and clear-cut that it looks like a giant altar on wliich past races were wont to sacrifice to the Gods of land and sea. The storms of ages have beaten against its sides and thundered at its iron base in vain. It is scarred, it is water-stained. It has heard lightnings split the rocks around, it has felt the earthquakes of centuries, but it stands imshaken still, as though caiTed for some special pm'pose by the hand of God. The tides as they ebb and flow, sweep round it with tremendous force, and the long Atlantic breakers dash madly against it and pile high their foam in air. And 12S E ■! i f: If ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 129 on this natural altar when years had passed, and dear old Elton\s name had become a bygone tale when a cloud had darkenal his memory before the world, in a marvellous way, my prayer was answered and the mystery cleared. My wife and I had gone for a short holiday into Cornwall, and while there, finding ourselves in the neighborhood of St. Maddo, and recalling its connexion with Hazlewood, who, as the reader will remember, had gone there with Byrne in the same summer in which he had visited us in Essex, we determined to make it for a time our abode. Something seemed to draw me thither, it may have been a presentiment, it may have been merely that my love for Hazlewood gave everj-thing connected with him a peculiar interest to me. The place, though easy of access, is unfrequented by tourists, and is therefore specially charming to those who love nature and the simple rural life of our vil- lages. My favourite walk every afternoon was to the rock I have described. It had a weird charm for me. Hour after hour I liave stood with my face to the west at sunset, and gazed at the long y \ N 1 i t I ■ 1 ; i 1 i ■ i \ 1 1 1 .' i i ; 1 ^ ' 130 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. golden pathway, which stretched far out over the infinite sea as though it were the road to Heaven. Again and again, as I have looked at the Avide ex- panse and heard the waves breaking under me, I have thought of Hazlewood and prayed for light. Little did 1 dream then that the place whereon I stood was holy ground, consecrated as the last spot on earth on \A'hich his feet had rested. It may be that in some occult way, it was his spiritual pres- ence which pervaded the place and made it so wonderful to me. No doubt I was in the hands of God, and he had directed me to the answering of my prayer. There is nothing strange in the coincidences of life, but at every moment we are upheld and guided by the Divine Hand. The events of life are linked together in a golden chain and each instant is made to be the true preparation for the next. We cannot be rid of mysteries, but to those who believe, all mysteries are harmonized and solved by the ultimate mysteiy of God. Late on the last afternoon of our stay at St. Maddo, I went out by myself along the shore to bid farewell to the rock and the view from it with which I had grown so familiar. The sun A\'as *i p. ELTON HAZLEWOOI). 131 4. almost on the horizon, not a breath ^vas stiiTin i 132 ELTON JIAZLEWOOD. scending from the mount of the transfiguration. It was with a start, that I discovered I had not been alone upon the rock. At a short distance, gazing at me intently and curiously, stood a man. He was deeply bent, and he leaned feebly upon his sticl His hat was pushed back from his fore- head and V his features bare. The face was blanched and haggard, and looked as though pre- maturely aged by acute suffering or former dissi- pation. His gaze ^vas fixed earnestly upon me, and as I stood regarding him, a dim sense of recognition came over me. I had seen that face before. It was mixed up with old associations in my soul. The thought of it was bound up mys- teriously with the love of someone in the })ast, and the knowledge of a great wrong. Then the consciousness of recognition deepened, my heart suddenly stopped beating, my breath came short and quick, the whole scene, all save the bowed fig- ure l)efore me, melted instantly away, and recoil- ing, I said, " Byrne ! " " Yes," he said slowly, in a dcop hollow voice, " We have met at last, and for the last time. I ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. 133 heard at the village you were here and I said I will go and meet him there, and now he shall know the truth. It has been kept too long but it shall be kept no longer. There is no need to do so, for the lips that now speak to you will soon bo silent forever, and I shall be beyond the power of human blame and human vengeance. Let my last act be one of justice to the dead.'' He spoke slowly and with a solemn precision, as though ihQ utterance of every word gave him a stab of pain. The voice was as much the shadow of a human voice as the man was the shadow of a man. Voice and man on that lone rock, with the dark cliffs in Hiq background, filled me with an midefinable dread, and I stood speechles.s, as though a\ved by some ghostly apparition. Ne\'er, for a moment, did he change his position nor with- draw his gaze from mine, but continued in the same hollow tones. " The burden of a gi'cat guilt, intensified by the guilt of silence from year to year, has crushed me down and destroyed my manhood." He paused, and then continued. '' Do vou know what jealousy is ? Yes, you do ; it is classed imder the head of I ! It % 134 ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. envy among the seven deadly sins, but you do not know it as I know it, as sometliing which is never absent from you for a moment, as something which turns even the sweets of life into gall and wormwood, which drags you into hate and crime, as a demoniacal impulse which grows more master- ing and morbid as life goes on. It is well you do not. I was born under the curse ; it is an inherit- ance in my blood, and the stings of it even now as I stand on the brink of the grave, fasten with serpent fangs upon my soul. And yet it is sweet too, yes, very, verj^ sweet. There was one girl I loved long, long ago. She was an angel. She might have made something godlike of me, had I had her love in return. There was one man whom I loved long, long ago. He ivas godlike. I loved him passionately as one man seldom loves another. I brought the two together. The moment their eyes met, I saw that my doom was sealed. She gave him what she had refused to me. But do vou think I let them know that I saw it ? No, I w^as not such a fool. I bided my time. Since the sweetness of love could not be mine, the sweetness of hate could. At one time, I had l)een willing to ELTON JIAZLEWOOD, 135 sacrifice ever}i:hlng for the sake of the girl, and offered to waive social questions and marry her honourably, if she would take me ; but when I saw that she loved him, I thought and [)lotted and lied, till my plans were successful, and her life was ruined. Then I plotted and lied till 1 had got him to loathe her, and refuse to marry her. I had hard work to do this, lor my friend was not like me, he had a conscience. The next year I had the supreme satisfaction of her deatli. But did this quiet the devil in my heart ? Not a whit. The man who had blighted my life was at large and prosperous. I did not tell him that the woman was dead. Outwardly, I continued his friend, for even while I hated him, by a curious paradox, not unknown to those who make a study of mental phenomena, I still loved him, and could not bear to leave him. Once more, after many yeare, again I loved, not with the old, pure love which comes only once in a life time, but with a strong, if lower, attachment. A second time my friend crossed my path and took my coveted prize from me. You know what my revenge was then. Oh, it was sweet, that lovely stolen hone\Tnoon 136 ELT02^ JIAZLEWOOD. I i; t, : among the Swiss Mountains. It was glorious to think of him, this time conquered and humbled, while I was in triumph. But it was all a delu- sion, she never loved me, she had left him in jealousy and spite. His cursed influence followed me even there, and the woman loved him, after she had left him, as she had never loved him before. I knew it, so I watched her. I gave her no money. One dark October night, in a wild moun- tain region, she fled from me penniless and thinly clad, alone over the Simplon Pass. She >\'as soon to become a mother, and ^vas not in a condition to stand fatigue. Two days after, she died raving mad in a little Ursuline convent at Vi^ge. She had confessed to a Roman Catholic priest and re- ceived the sacraments the day before. Again I was humbled and my friend had triumphed, he who had not only stolen from me the two women I had loved, but who had been admired and applauded and given the first place, Avhile I was passed over at college and upon the stage. The thing was intolerable to me. I returned to England after some yeai's, and heard of his ap- proaching ordination. It was my last chance. I ELTON HAZLEWOOD. 137 was living near here then with an old uncle. 1 -ivrote to the man at Winchester to come to me at once, or if he prefeiTcd it I would go to him, for I had a message for him from the dead. He came and waited for me here. Away from all human sights and sounds on a wild, windy day, I met him on this rock. He was changed, he was calm and self controlled. I felt from the first that my power over him was gone, but I did my best, for I knew the over sensitiveness of his nature. I told him that my message was one of midying hate. I said his wife had gone down, down, down, till even I had been forced at last to turn her out on the street. It stung him to the quick, he grew pale, but he answered not my taunts. Then I told him why I had sent for him. I threatened exposure, I paintal his past sin in its most hideous and revolting colours. I laughed at the very idea of his setting himself up to preach to others, but it was in vain. He heard me out and then said, shaking from head to foot, but not with fear. " Byrne, I know what you are and your mo- tives, and they are so despicable that they do not even move me to anger. You may do your worst, 138 ELTON ITAZLEWOOD, i i the threat of exposure docs not alarm me. The facts of the case are already known to those who have a right to know them, and years of bitter re- pentance have in a measure wiped out my guilt in the eyes of the world. I do not fear you, you are too contemptible ; nay, if it is any satisfaction for you to know it, I have forgiven and forgotten you. There is not a word of truth in w^hat you say about my wife ; something tells me it is false. If that is all you have to say to me, I must go ; my train leaves in an hour." He brushed me aside and walked away erect and proud. I shrank from him as though he had spurned and crashed me under his heel. Then my fuiy overmastered me, and blind with passion I stiTick him from behind. He faced me, and we closed. He was strong, stronger than I, and shook me off. Humbled, baifled, and foaming with rage, I sprang up, as he turned to go, and catching liis arm, dragged him back violently. I do not suppose that I had any definite intention. It was all done in a few seconds, but the sudden- ness of the action or the force of the gale which was blowing oil shore, made him lose his balance. ELTON ITAZLEWOOD. 139 We were close to the edge of the rock. He stag- gered backwards and catching involuntarily at me to save himself, fell over into the water, drag- ging me with him. I felt the awful plunge, the shock of the cold waves, and the despair. Wo rose to the surface side by side and struggled for life. We were not far from the rock, but in the huge seas that dashed against it, our efforts were wellnigh hopeless. Hazlewood was a better swim- mer than I. He made for a little ledge which far down projects from the face of this rock. It was the only foothold that presented itself, but it was so small that it could barely afford shelter for one. He reached it and by a supreme effort drew himself up and mounted upon it. I saw that he was safe ; I was drowning. I could keep up no longer. My breath was gone. I tried to cry to him for help, but the water sucked me under and as I sank I put up my hands in des- pair. When I rose again, Hazlewood was at my side. He had dived into the waves to save me. I caught him frantically by the arm. " Let go," he said, " let go of my arm or we shall both drown." . ^ ,_^„_„. „._ _ ._ . _ I" '" V 1 140 ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. I did so, and held him round the body. Then with superhuman strength, against the wind and tide, he made once more for the ledge. I thought we should never reach it, for the sea heaved up and down, at one time dashing us against the rock, at another tcai'ing us from it. But he saved me. All torn and bleeding, and choked with the salt water, he succeeded in catching hold of a piece of Beaweed in a crevice, and a\ hile a wave for a mo- ment raised us to a level with the ledg crawled upon it. Then I knew^ what he had aone, that he had given his life for mine. But there Avas no time to think. " Quick, quick, hold on there," Hazlew^ood gasped, " you arc safe. Climb down at low water. There is no room fur t^vo. I must try for the shore." "Don't," I cried, "don't, you will be lost. The cove is too far off. The rocks here are like walls and run down sheer to the water." " I must," he said, " I lose time. Stay where you are, you will be safe. I do not fear death." He said something else, but his voice was drowned in the roar of the winds and waves. He .1 Mi m ELTON IIAZLEWOOn. 141 lot go of tho rook and })liingccl back into thc8oa, and a great wave curled round him with strong white arms. He breasted it and I watched him as he struggled on. I knew that it was hopeless. He was exhausted by his efforts to save me. Little hy little the tide bore him out beyond the lea of tho rock. Suddenly the full force of the gale struck him and a cloud of spray hid him from view. I looked and thought he had gone, when again on the crest of a wave, I saw his pale face. He was still trying to swim, but his eyes were closed. I thought he was praying, for there was a look of resignation on his features which they had never worn before. I only saw him for a moment, for the wind howled and the spray beat upon me and blinded me, and when I looked again he was gone. All that night long, weak, and chattering with the cold, I clung to the rock. I shrank from the sea in horror, not because it meant death to mo, but because it held Hazlewood's body. The roar of the breakei-s was full of the reverberations of his voice. In the white eddies of the waves, as they curled below me, I saw his dead face. His eyes opened and looked up at me. The phosphores- 10 ^ ( ,. » X MT 142 ELTON HAZLEWOOD. m 1 1 cence of the spray was the shining of a spectral glory. The cold flakes of foam lapping the black rock beneath me were his white hands put forth to touch me. The horror drove me to madness, and when I was rescued by some fishermen at dawn, I was dazed and almost insensible, and I cried like a child. I only sobbed when they asked me how I had got there. The thing was a mystery then and a mystery it has since remained. I tell it to you now, for the truth has been hid too long. Publish it abroad, and let the world know the man as he was." He paused, as if struggling to suppress his emotion, then added ; "the shadows darken round me and my feet draw nigh to the iron gate which has so often shut relentlessly from human sight so much that was grand and noble, as well as so much that was mean and defiled, in the millions that havu gone. If there could be hope for me, if I could yet find light, it would be owing to the light which the noblest and grandest soul I have ever met has cast upon my miserable heai-t. Farewell for ever." He said no more and the darkness -'vhich had fallen blurred from view his retreating form. A ELTON IIAZLEWOOD. 143 load had been lifted from me. The place seemed full of angels with shining wings, and I was caught up nearer to the starlit heavens. Shed- ding childlike, happy tears, I turned my face to the sea, over which the spirit of Hazlewood still brooded, and kneeling I poured forth my thank- fulness to God. i m t ii eri I » .1 i i ( ! .( t U if i 11. If! 'I i US 11 I 1(11' Mi CHAPTER XII. "VTEARS and years have passed since I penned ""- this memoir, and the hand I write now looks feeble and shaky beside that of the closing sentences of the last chapter. Here I sit in the old room in which Elton and I have so often sat together. The window is open, the moon is full, and over the perfect stillness of the summer fields comes the murmur of the sea. To-day T have spent in correcting this manuscript. It seems to me that the time has now come for giving it to the world. I have waited and waited conscious of its shortcomings, and how inadequately I liave fid- filled my task. But now age is dulling my facul- ties, and I must accept this imperfection as inevi- table. Let the book go forth as it is. It was to me when I wrote it, a labour of love for one whoso love was passing the love of women, and it is to me now, as I re-read it, a source of tender solici- tude and tears. To-night amid the scenes once so ELTON JTAZLEWOOD. 145 familiar to Lim, in which he once lived and moved, he is to me real and living as he was of old. His face is lovely and fresh, his eyes full of spiritual light, and his hand gives the firm gener- ous grasp it once gave. Out there, under the still shadow of the church, is little Elton's grave with its message of hope to mankind " The Word was made Flesh," graven on the stone, round which the flowers are regularly tended, for the sake of the beloved dead, by a white-haired old clergyman and his wife. There, at the foot of the gard( i, is the gate where I last saw him over-shac^ ved by clouds that were pro- phetic of yet deeper gloom. The whole place still breathes of him, and the > ciirs as th. ha\ e die» New Edition. With Portrait of the Author. ** The subject of Miss Swan's ' Gates of Eden ' is one which demands, and receives from her hand, a skilful treatment. John Bethune rears his motherless boys in accordance with a preconceived plan. The elder is to be a minister, the younger is to follow the plough. Circum- stances seem to favour his scheme ; for the future minister has, it appears, the advantage in appearance, in manners, and in ability. But the real truth is different. The depth of character and the best mental gifts really belong to the latter. How the young man, conscious of his power, yet stedfastly walks along the appointed path till he is free to choose, and how, once free, he enters on his own way and overcomes all its difficulties, is very well told in these pages. We have not often seen a better portraiture than is that of the two brothers. 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Where t^ Sky Falls. Adventures of King Clo. A Princess in Disguise. A Stranger in the Tea. The House that Jack Built. Nellie at the Cave. SPECIAL 2s. 6d. BOOKS. "PLEASANT HOUR" LIBRARY. th I, ise A Series of Lari;e Popular Books by well • known Authors^ in Special Cloth Bindings^ a>ui oj some of Annie S. Swanks Books^ uound two Volumes in one^ price 2s. dd. Noel Chetwynd's Fall. By Mrs J. H. Necdell. A Haiidful of Silver. By L. r. Meadr. By Adverse Winds. By Olifihant Smeaton. One False Step. By Andrew Stewart. Unequsuiy Yoked. By Mrs J. II. Nce.Jell. My Brother Basil. Py Mrs E, Neal. M 1 lili SPECIAL 2s. 6d. BOOKS. '♦PLEASANT HOUR LIBRARY "--continued. An Old Clironicle of Leighton. By Sarah Selina Hamer. Richard Tregellas. By D. Lawson Johnstone. Aleph the Chaldean. By E. F. Burr, LL.D. Comrades True, By Ellinor Davenport Adams. Preston Tower. By Jessie M. E. Saxby. Sundered Hearts and Shadowed Lives. By Annie S. Swan. Twice Tried and Across her Path. By Annie S. Swan. 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