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The following diagrams illustrate the method: Les cartes, planches, tableaux, etc., peuvent dtre filmds d des taux de reduction diffdrents. Lorsque le document est trop grand pour dtre reproduit en un seul cliche, il est film6 d partir de Tangle supdrieur gauche, de gauche d droite, at de haut en bas, en prenant le nombre d'images ndcessaire. Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la m^thode. rrata :o pelure, 1 d D 32X 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 •^mm THE (jUEHNSBl RRY CUP Ki-*»i*,,-»...i:«i^. , ,,^_ , •Uf u^ ■JW >L'« *'f i^^i >'» «.h FERxMEY AND THE FURIES It was a lovely winter morning, crisp and dry, with several inches of snow upon the ground, and even Gyp, our Skye terrier, was more full of life than usual as we walked home. Unluckily the service at Treby was over half an hour before that at Scarsley, so that when we reached the public -house which faces St. Andrews, the sermon there was still in full swing. In the >-.ird or open square in front of the inn when we passed it there were a couple of loafing yokels, accompanied by two nmch-be- ribboned lasses, who had no doubt driven with them into Scarsley in the waggons still standing in the road. I suppose that the yokels having come from Treby were statutory travellers, and as such had been allowed to quench their thirst with somewhat injudicious freedom at the tap-room of the Goat, which would satisfactorily account for wh.at followed. "Bill," said the smaller of the yokels, as we passed, to his t'ellow, "see me knock tl'at bl'iomin' da\\g over." 29 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP " You canna hit un, mon ; he biiina long enough for thee," giggled one of the lasses. " I canna ? Wait till I show thee, then," letorted her beau, filling his great paws with snow, and adding a piece of road stone to the mass to give it wcipht. Meanwhile poor old Gyp had no suspicion of foul play. He was a dog of much dignity of demeanour, and accustomed, like his masters, from his youth up to be treated with some consideration in Scarsley village, so that he paced by the yokels with his tail held very high indeed, and his long Dundreary whiskers almost sweeping the snow. Wow the lass was wrong. A Skye terrier is an exceptionally long dog, long enough for anyone to hit, who can throw a stone at all, and perhaps that carter was a good shot ; but be that as it may, on this occasion, at any rate, he shot well, planting his snowball fairly on Gyp's ribs, and turning him head over heels, to ihc huge delight of his companions. The next moment, before he could close his great laughing mouth, he was himself flat upon his back, with an uncomfortable suspicion that the earth had FERNEY AND THE FURIES risen up and kicked him between the eyes. A minute later the action had become general, and a small tinkling bell, which none of us had time to notice, began to ring over the way. The man whom I had floored rose slowly from his feet, brushed the snow out of his eyes, and seeing that Dick was smaller than I, put down his head, and with a roar went at him like an angry rhinoceros. " Left-hand upper cut," I heard old Dick say coolly, as he waited for the charge; but I have no idea whether he brought that little mana^uvre off successfully or not, for at that moment I was wracking my brain to remember any recipe contained in our favourite Art of Boxing, for the treatment of a gentleman twice your weight and strength, who insists upon coming to close quarters, and treats your counters as if they were mere shocks from lloi'ting thistle down. Alas ! I could think of nothing but flight, and that is 7tot recommended in the work in question. Luckily for me, my carter was as good-natured as he was big and strong ; and laving realized that he could do as he pleased 3' T THE (jUEENSBEKRY GUI' with me, contented himself with hitting mo in the chest, and knocking my hat over my eyes — treatment very exasperating to a gentleman of my Uneage, but comparatively painless, and under the circumstances unavoidable. " Master Dick ! Master Dick ! Cut it ! The judge be a comin'." It was the first warning we had ; but we both knew at once who the friendly potboy meant by the judge. Mr. Braithwaite was a churchwarden on Sundays ; on week-days he was a most energetic J.R In despair I looked at my opponent. If I did not run, Mr. Braithwaite would freeze me with his cold-grey eye ; and if I ran, the carter would think that I was running away from him, and, worse than all, I should never be quite sure that he was wrong, for I did feel a distinct inclination to bolt even before the potboy's warning. It was a horrible dilemma, but f-he carter let me out of it by turning and bolting for the fence himself Possibly he worked for some one in the congregation, and had no wish to be seen — I don't know. What I do know is, that though he started first (to that I will swear), I was '^ver the fence before 32 r T FERNEV AND THE FURIES he reached it, and yet I liad time in passing to see Dick, who had driven his man back against the horse-trough, suddenly stoop and run in, catching the fellow by the ankles, and landing him neatly on his head in the trough. By the time he had emerged therefrom, with his red tie all draggled and his greasy curls all limp, Dick too was over the fence by my side, and we should both of us have been safe, but for that idiot Ferney. Ah, well ! it is a long time ago, and I am getting old, so I suppose that I ought not to speak so hotly of Ferney, who, after all, did just what he ought to have done under the circum- stances, reminding us of the day of the week, the proximity of the church, and such other obvious matters as occurred to him. But why on earth need he have stood there arguing with the girls who had knocked his top hat off with their sunshades, instead uf getting back to covert as we had done > As 1 said, it is a long time ago, and both Dick and I must have been terribly frightened, and yet mc writhed with laughter as we peered throu-h iIk- ic„ce and saw the wlu.le cungrcg" called Crowther, after a minute. " For goodness' sake look sharp, or we shall all be 'bottled.'" To be " bottled " was the school slang for to be caught. " I 'm not going to try," came Dick's cool answer • " but I think I can carry him to the sanatorium." " To the what ? To the sanatorium ? Why, rills would peaci, and then we should all get the sack." " I don't see that that matters," came the answer from below, and we saw Dick pick up his burden and begin to stagger with it over the S3 THE OULENSBERRY CUP slippery cobble-stones towards the surgery. If he took Lytham there the expulsion of every- one concerned in the business would follow as a matter of course, and the awful consequences of such a step made Crowther's red face turn a sickly yellow in the gaslight. "If you don't come back I'll kill you, you sneaking hound ! " he cried. "Very likely you have nearly killed Lytham!" And Dick turned to go. " St. Clair, St. Clair, don't be an ass. You wouldn't peach on the whole dormitory," cried Acland, and I foolishly, perhaps, added my voice to Acland's, so that Dick hesitated. For a moment he stood thinking, and then, putting his burden down again, he said in the low tones in which we had all been talking, " If I tie him on, and let you haul him up, will you all swear that he shall neither be licked nor fagged again." "We'll swear it," came the answer in a dozen eager voices. " Make Crowthcr swear it," Dick insisted. " I swear I will not lick him," repeated Crowther. 54 THE DORMITORY BULLY " Nor fag him, nor let anyone else fag hinn," St. Clair dictatcu. " Nor fag him, nor let anyone else fag him," Crowther repeated. "All right, if you do, I promise you that I will report this to the ' Head.'" " Likely enough, you little sneak," muttered the bully, though he was too wise to say so out loud, but helped the others with all his strength to haul up the still lifeless form of poor Lythain. After he had been bundled into bed, Dick was hauled up, a wet and white- faced lad, his hand shaking, and those grey-b.uc eyes simply flaring out from under the overhanging brows. "Bravo, St. Clair, you're a good plucked one," said somebody, and I laid my hand on his shoulder, but he took no notice of word or touch, but just pushed past and faced Crowther. " You beastly coward." "What.'" cried tlie big fellow. "You call mc a coward > Oh, I see," with a sneer, " but you forget I only promised not to lick Lytham. 55 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP Beg my pardon, or I '11 break every bone in your body." Dick stepped a pace nearer until his white face was almost against Crowther's chest, and then pointing into his face he hissed out again : " You beastly, brutal coward." There was a sickening thud, and the next moment Dick St. Clair was as limp aad lifeless as the boy he had just tied on to the rope, and I, who had made a feeble dash to my friend's rescue, could only hear indistinctly hummhig, as it were, in my ears a voice that sounded like Acland's shrill treble : " By George, they 're right, Crowther. You are a brute and a covard." No doubt Aclanc was right in part, and Crowther was a bru':e, a great unthinking, un- feeling brute ; but tc do him justice he was too hard a hitter to •^Ivc a in! of my weight any chance against him, .ind 1 doubt if he ever felt much fear except wlien he saw Dick lying on the fio()r as white as his own night-shirt, the lilood flowing from his broad square forehead, whilst I staggered to my feet too dizzy to huld my head up. 5^^ 1 j ! !ww^"W!i^(r»i^F"«^'~«i"i .3 -_ rrUA-.A I Ml \U.II 1 -- «'M' 1» IMK llll Hll.l\IM. I'ai.m. /'•'V V ^M VSU'rlVF-' THE DORMITORY BULLY It was a bad night's work for tho bullying party, and I think, as Crowther saw thr^ other fellows gather round Dick and myseh', he realized that some of his power had slipped away from him. CHAPTER V. UNDER SENTENCE. THAT night when all was hushed, I, Ion Maxwell, had a very bad time of it. It was not because my head was ringing with Crowther's blow, although that was bad enough, but physical pain is a thing which any fellow ought to be able to bear. My pain was worse. I felt that I had been untrue to my creed, that I had " funked " and disgraced myself irretriev- ably in my own esteem and in Dick's. I had not had the courage to protest against Crow- ther's bullying of Lytham as Dick had done. I had let Dick show me the way there as he always did, and even when Crowther had felled my friend what had I done } 1 had of course rushed in and struck a blow for my party. Any English lad would do that, but I had waited long and done my part badly. All 5« ^ ■m UNDER SENTENCE my coolness of which I was so proud had gone in a moment, and I had been knocked down hke a ninepin, and so hurt or frightened (oh, Heavens! could it be that it was fright and not the force of the blow?) that I had made no further fight of it. Of course Crowther was a couple of years older than myself and im- mensely more powerful, but what were the odds against me in my battle as compared with the odds against which Dick's favourite heroes and my own ancestors used to fight ? Lancelot and Galahad were mere men, but they fought giants and defeated them ; Clive's army fought at seventeen to one, and gained the day ; and even my dear old father led his handful against an unbroken regiment with a shattered arm ! And I, Ion Maxwell, who had sworn to outdo my forbears, had been ignominiously defeated at one blow by a boy not six inches taller than myself It was a deep, lasting disgrace, and I wished that Crowther's blow had killed me. Then at least I could have done no more than I had done. When I had got as far as this I crept round to Dick's cubicle, half afraid to see him. He 59 THE nUEENSHF.RRY CUP was awake of course, a towel soaked with blood tied round his head, his eyes shut, and his face very pale in the dim half light of the gas jet which, though almost turned out, still threw some light into his room. As I sat down on his bedside he opetied his eyes and took my hand in his. " Well, Ion, old boy, I 'm afraid you got a terrible knock - down blow from that brute. You should not have interfered." "Not interfered! Do you suppose I could stand still after he had stunned you } Was he to have it all his own way .'" " No, I didn't say that, and I don't think it. Whose side won, do you think ? Mis or mine ?" "Hi.s, I'm afraid. If I had been worth my salt he would not have had so much the best of it," I answered bitterly. "You are more than worth your salt, Ion. You could not have done more, and we did enough. That was our battle, though we did pay the butcher's bill. Why, man, he had to make a treaty, which saves that poor little dufifer Lytham for the future, and we did more than that " 60 M undi:r sentence "More, Dick?" " Yes, m(;i-c. Those fellows sec now what bullying really looks like. When Crowther closed my eyes he opened theirs. Now good- night, Ion. I 'm nearly fourteen, I think, and you nearly fifteen. In another year, old boy, we will sec how much bullying there will be in Fernhall," and so saying he lay back and closed his eyes. If it had pleased Providence to spare Dick, l:e would have righted greater wrongs tlian the bullsing at Fernhall. But though I went to my bed cheered by knowing that I was not disgraced in Dick's eyes, I was far from content, and it was long before I slept, and even then my dreams were of that great shield at home, grown so great in my sleep that I could see nothing beyond it, while below it the one word of the motto blazeJ like white fire, " Fight."' That, I suppose, was wliy I was still thinking of fighting when the chapel bell rang, and sent me, dressing as I went, running across the quad- rangle. My boot-laces were all undone, and I tripped over them as I went up the aisle, and of course my form master saw it and disapproved. 6i THE OUEEXSBKRRY CUP But the sneer with which he glanced at my untidiness deepened into a frown as his eyes rested on my face. I could feci his eye on me all through the morning service, and I knew by instinct that he had not overlooked Dick's black facings any more than he had mine. Proser was, unluckily for us, our form master as well as our master-in-charge in the dormitory, and when we went to lecture at eleven, I was not in the least surprised to hear, " Maxwell and St. Clair, you will remain behind when the class is dismissed." I had no time to do more than exchange a glance with Dick, and thank my stars that we were to go on in Tacitus, whose meaning I had always some sort of gift for guessing, even if I had not prepared my lesson carefully, but Dick managed to whisper to me in passing, "Don't tell him anything," which I understood to mean that he considered that Crowther had purchased a right to our silence in return for his promise to Lytham. But the younger Crowther, who was in our form, had misgivings, and I noticed that when the other fellows left the class room he made a 63 UNDER SEN^hNCE bolt at top speed to his brother's study. No doubt that worthy, not knowing the stuff Dick- was made of, had a very bad quarter of an hour in consequence. He might have made his mind easy had he known his man. You might as well have tried to open a bear trap with your finccrs as Dick's mouth when honour closed it. "So, Maxwell, you and St. Clair have been fighting again ; with one another it seems this time ! Neither of us answered. "Have you nothing to say, sir.'" he added sternly to mc. " Nothing, sir," I answered. "And you, have you no excuse for your conduct.'" he asked of St. Clair. " I never make excuses," answered Dick proudly. " Do you think that your conduct needs none .' " " I am not ashamed of my conduct, sir, but I am sorry that the results offend you. They are painful," added Dick with a quaint smile, passing his hand tenderly over his swollen forehead, 63 THE OUEENSBERRY CUP "You s cm :o think this pugiHsm matter for pride," said Mr, Proser sternly ; "gentlemen con- sider it a blacki^uard's pastime." No one answered him, thont^h neither of us agreed with him. To Mr. Proser, Poikix, in a pair of weighted knuckle-dusters with Greek names to tiiem, was a deity worthy of respect, but I'-oor nineteenth century mortals playing the same game with their naked kn'.ickles were very low class cads. "This time f sec you have been fighting with each other," the master continued. We ex- changed glances which meant, "]k>l:er let him think so," but he was determined to get an answer. "Have >'0u been fightins' with each other.' St. Ciair, answer me, sir. Have \ju been fighting with Maxwell.'" " No, sir." liven to shield his schoolfellows Uick would not lie. "With whom have yc" been fighti'-.g then .'" " I can't tell )'ou, sir," Dick i «. plied steadily. "Can't! Won't, you mean !" retorted Proser. " And you won't either, I suppose, Maxwell." " No, sir." 64 UNDER SENTENCE " Then, sir, I '11 make you. I '11 make you both answer," cried Proscr, fairly losing his temper at last, "and I'll teach you not to disturb the dcmitorv and disgrace the school by your blackguardism. Report yourself to the sergeant in half an hour's time. When I find you there, you will cither make a complete statement of what occurred last night, or you will both be caned. You can go now," and Proser flung the door wide open and stalked away in hig^.i dudgeon. As soon as Proscr had disappeared into his own quarters, the little knots of loungers in the square came crowding round us. A rumour that trouble was brewing had spread, and I could see groups even of the lordly monitors standing outside their library windows, eyeing us with considerable interest. " So you have peached, you little sneaks, have you .' " "That is what you mit^ht have done," I answered hotly, "Dick St. Clair keeps his word." " Oh, then, you peached, did you > " retorted my questioner, not understanding me, P 6s THE OrEKNSBF.RTiY CUT "Leave them, Ion," said Dick; "they can't understand," and with his hand on my shoulder we turned and walked away towards, the sergeant's den, a Httle buildinf^ in chc corner of the square, consistinej of an outer room, approached by a fliglit of t'lrce or four steps, and an inner one, in which the sergeant Hved, in which the mail was received, and all canings administered. Tlic sergeant was an important functionary at Fernhall, an old soldier generally, whose duties were to receive and deliver the letters, to assist at school executions, lay information against those who broke school regulations, administer a most wearisome form of punishment known as " punny drill," and generally to lurk about, sneak round corners, and lie in wait for offenders. It was a bad system, a system of espionage, which encouraged deceit, and made boys look upon their masters as their natural enemies, belonging to the same class and having about the same gentlemanly instincts, as the sergeant or a private detective. Boys of to-day tell me that their masters treat them as friends, put them on their honour, and even try to get a personal knowledge of the 66 \ UNDER SENTENCE character and inmost thoughts of each of them. I remember a master who called up a boy whom he had watched from his study window fighting at long odds, and I remember that he gave the boy a glass of port wine to pull him together after his licking. It was distinctly affainst the school rules, but it was kindly meant, and did that boy more good, physically and mentally, than most of his interviews with the rod wieldcrs ; but it was almost the only friendly intercourse that boy ever had with a master at Fernhall. But Dick and I had no friend at court in those early days, and wc were in bitterly low spirits as we went across to our execution. Something was worrying 13ick, and I was glad when he spoke. "Ion, did your father ever cane you .'" "Once, for lying, lie never caned for any- thing else." " Like my dear old dad. Well, Ion, I 'm not going to be caned." "Not going to be caned! How can you help it.>" 67 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP " I 'm not sure, but I shall tell Proser that I have done nothing to deserve it, broken no rules, and therefore won't be caned." By George, as I remember it all now, I can almost hear the dogged resolution in Dick's " won't." " Well if you won't. I wun't," I replied, always only too ready to follow where Dick led, and so we went up the steps, reported ourselves to the sergeant to be caned at 12.30, and awaited our executioners, fully resolved not to be exe- cuted. Meanwhile the other bo}'s came in from the football field, and the racquet court, and stood about the square in groups, or loafed singly past the sergeant's office, some of the holder ones even stopping to peep in and ask how we liked the prospect of our whopping. "Ever had a caning before.-'' asked old Swann, the grizzly sergeant, who after all was not a bad fellow for such a billet as his. " No," I answered cheerily, for Dick rather resented his familiarity, " does it hurt much .''" " All depends," he answered meditatively, and then, moved perhaps by pity for our youth 68 UNDER SENTENCE and inexperience, he added, " Bend your back in a bit as it comes, and let it hit you on the slack of your trousers, and holler the first time he hits yoL'. As like as not, if you don't hoHcr the first time, Mr. I'roser will go on thrashing at you till you do. lie doii't understand the use of a stick, don't Proser," he muttered. The sergeant was himself an admirable single-stick plaj'cr, and had an idea that he himself ought to have been appointed to wield the rod, but I could not help laughing at his ide?. of the way to receive corporal punishment. I'^ancy Dick St. Clair " hollerinfj " at the first cut of the cane But my meditations were suddenly cut short. There was a hush in the square, and looking out I saw Prosei" and Johnson, a whiskered teacher of caligraphy, coming slowly across the square in our direction. Then I knew that we should not have much longer to wait, and in spite of myself felt a slight tingling down my spine, as I saw old Swann open the cupboard behind him, and taking from it a bundle of new rods, proceed to slowly unfasten the pink tape with which they were tied together. 69 CHAPTER VI. WE MAKE A DOLT OF IT "XT OVV I have no doubt but that our parents ■^ ^ were wrong in instilling any prejudices into our young niinds, but they were men of a particular stamp, bred from soldiers and reared amongst soldiers, and I suppose that they could not help themselves. There was one class of liuman beings which set their teeth on edge, in spite of themselves, comparatively harmless beasts too, like the skunk in many things. For instance, these creatures are of an effusively familiar nature, pushing themselves into all sorts of places in which they are not wanted, and so highly scented as a rule as to sicken the ordinary man. These creatures old Mr. St. Clair and my father used to call "bounders," And the Fernhall writing master was unquestion- ably a bounder. I daresay the man meant well 70 WE MAKE A BOLT OV IT "^ enough, but he could not help his nature, any more than he could help wearing brilliantly coloured shirts and gorgeous ties. His hair was always parted in the middle and plaistered down with pomatum, and Dick averred that he kept his long moustache in soak like our cricket bats. Let me do Fernhall justice, Mr. Johnson was the only one of his kind at the school, and by no means popular with his fellow masters. This, however, was the kind of man who accompanied Air. Proser to the sergeant's den, and no more unfortunate companion could he have chosen for the occasion. "Well, Maxwell, are you prepared to answer my questions ? " asked my form master. " No, sir," 1 answered as firmly as 1 could. " And you also refuse ? " he added coldly, turning to Dick. '■ Yes, sir, I do." "Then I must leach you a little wholesome discipline. Take off yuur coats." We both obeyed in silence, but as Proaer sloud nervously fmgering his cane, and Johnson, twirling his greasy moustaches, blocked the doorway at the top of the steps with his broad 71 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP shoulders, Dick turned to Mr. Proser with his coat hanging on his arm, " I don't want you to cane us, sir." " Don't want me to cane you ! Will you obey me then ? " " I can't, sir, but " "But me no buts. Obey or take your caning." " I have done nothing to deserve one, sir, nor has Maxwell." " I am the best judge of that Turn round." " One moment, Mr. Proser, and I will. I give you my word of honour that though I cannot tell you how we got these black eyes, we have done nothing that you would cane us for if you knew," said Dick earnestly. Mr. Proser wavered. ie was a weak man, and a bookworm who knew nothing of boys or men, but he was a gentleman, and Dick's appeal touched him. " Word of honour of a soldier and a gentle- man ! 'Pon my life, if he'd only put in the 'soldier ' it would have been quite theatrical. What rubbish." It was Johnson who spoke, and if a look 7a WE MAKE A BOLT OF IT could have gone through his triple layers of fat, Dick's would have killed him. ]5ut I suppose his white waistcoat turned the shaft. Certainly his words turned Proser from any kindly intention he may have entertained for a moment. " No more of this," he said coldly, " Turn your back to me, St. Clair." " I warn you, sir, I will not be caned," were Dick's last words, but as he spoke he turned his broad young shoulders to the rod, and as he did so it sang through the air and came down with a hiss across his linen shirt. As the cane touched him Dick sprang like a buck at the shot, his shoulder lowered for half a dozen inches or so, and propelled by his whole strength caught the bounder in the middle of his white waistcoat, and .sent him flying head over heels out of the doorway and down the steps into the i]uad, where he lay like a lost sheep upon his back bleating piteously, while Dick and I dashed through the open doorway, jumped over his body as he lay, took the iron railings which bound the old chapel grounds in one stride, and were well on our way down /J THE OUEENSBERRY CUl-- the Slowloii road before anyone else realized what had happened. Through the big archway we both dashed, and as we went vvc heard someone cry " Follow thcin," but we had a good start and never turned to look or stayed to list-'ii. All Fernhall boys know lliu Wild Copse Road, a good straight mile on which many a runner has been trained. Down this we raced for half a mile, and then Dick turned sharp at the hedge and went thrcvigh it with a crash. " We had better go across country here," he shouted, and I followed his lead unqucstioningly, though I had no idea where we were going or why. Uver the hedge lay a big bean field, and beyond sticky plough, through which wc toiled heavily, but we were both in excellent condition, though Dick was never much of a runner. lie always used to say that he would rather stt>p and fight than run a hundred yards. But the school was out after us. We could see them streaming down the Copse Road, and it did not need Dick's words, " The monitors are after us," to tell mc what was the matter. 74 .w» W'l-: MAKE A HOLT OF IT JO- " This will stop some of them," I cried, and shooting past Dick I led hiin at the big ditch of the country side, Jack Bacchus' dyke, a yawning chasm, eight feet deep from the top of the embankment to the water, and nearly thirty feet from top to top. As the banks sloi)ed inwards to the water, an eighteen foot jump would just land a man clear of the water at the bottom of the opposite embankment, but even alKnving for the elevation from which we took off it was a big jump, and I splashed as I landed. Dick did worse, he went slap in, and floundered out like a drowned rat. " I don't believe they want to catch us," gasped Dick, looking back. "Nixon could have cleared that like a buck, and Upcott could almost jump from top to top." "They were running hard enough when they started," I answered, putting my arms in front of my face as I dashed through a struggling bullfinch. "Yes, as long as the nixes could see them, but look at them now, they are all craning at the brook." And so they were, and, whether Dick was 75 mm THE QUEENSBERRY CUP right or not, the bevy of monitors and others fell gradually further and further behind, until when we passed to the right of Slowton there was not one of them in sight. We had come by this time to the brink of a wide river, which in a mile or two from where we stood flowed into the sea, and Dick was casting up and down it in search of a boat, but he could find none. " How wide do you suppose it is ? " he asked. "A mile, I should think," I answered, and I expect that I was under the mark, for this river spreads tremendously in the low country near the seashore. "A mile the worse for us," muttered Dick, " for we have got to cross it somehow. Do you think you can manage it. Ion ?" " I '11 try. I 'm a better swimmer than you, Dick, at any rate, but about our clothes.'" " We must stick to them, we shall want them on the other side, but I think we can wade a good way," and so saying he slid down the clay bank, and was soon up to his waist in the Swyre. I followed him with a gasp. The water 76 WE MAKE A DOLT OF U struck a chill into my vitals, for the memory of the winter was still in it, but for several hundred yards wc waded safely enough, the water barely reaching to cir middles. Then the stream grew deeper and stronger. Gradually it crept up to our waistcoat pockets, then to our armpits, and at that point we could barely keep our feet, and went down stream whether we would or no At last I saw Dick's head begin to bob, and then I heard him call to me — " Look out, I can't touch bottom now, we must swim for it." And swim v/e did, for what seemed to me, in my heavy water-logged clothes, a good half hour, though I suppose ten minutes would be nearer the mark, and all the time the current hurried us rapidly down towards the sea. But we touched bottom again, and again began to wade, half swimming, half wading at first, and later walking firmly on the bottom, until just as the early winter evening was beginning to throw a shadow over the long dreary plough- lands, we crept dripping like otters up the north bank of the river. Then we sat down on the clay exhausted, to think and squeeze what water wc could out of the legs of our trousers. 77 ■NHHIiil THE QUEENSBERKY CUP ■ Have you any money with you, Ion ?" asked Dick after awhile. " Half-a-crown and some coppers," I answered, feeling in the pond which had been my pocket. "And I have eighteen pence in silver, ?a\<] th'j lialf sovereign old Braithwaite gave me. What would old Hraithwaitc say to this, loii ; It was an awfui thought, a-id I avoided it. "What shall ^^-e do next, Dick.>" I asked rather piteously. The excitement was be.tfJnning to wear off, and I was cold. " I .suppose we must look for a place to sleep in," Dick answered. "What is that light moving up the river.'" A looked in the direction indicated, and could see in the darkness, which had come on with great rapidity, a flaring light, low down by the water, now showing up plainly, and now dis- appearing altogether. Though I watched it for a long time I could make nothing of it, It was certainly not the light of a cottage window, for it travelled from 78 ^ ■«■ WE MAKE A BOLT OF IT point to point, and always, so it scr .^ned to us, up tlie middle of the bed of the river. " We had better go and see," said Dick at last. " Where there is fire there is probably a human being, and if so we may get a hint as to where tc spend the night. Come on !" The darkness had now fallen, and wc blundered sadly as we made our way over the moorlands by the .Swyre towards the light, which was after all not on the .Swyre itself, but a good mile up one of its tributary streams. It certainly was as eerie a night as any one need want to be out in, dark and cold, with a wind beginning to rise, and the only sound besides the squelching of the water in our boots, and the dreary monotone of the river, was the cry of some bird which kept uneasily moving about over the moor- land. " It's a man in the water," said Dick at last. " What on earth is he doing .' " " I'^ishing, I should think," I answered. " Let 's watch him," and Dick agreeing, we crouched behind a thin hush and waited. The man was coming down stream towards us, and thdugh we saw him plainly enough, he 79 •amm ^Kssm^mmm'iim mm MH ■«i THE OUEENSCERRY CUP did not catch sicjht of us, probably because he held between us and him a great torch, which flared and flickered redly and made the black waters which swirled round his legs of a ruddy colour. In liis riglit hand he carried what looked like a gafi", and as he went he [)eered eagerly into the water on which his torch-light fell. It was a strange fishing, and a more evil- looking face than that of the fisherman no one need wish to sec on a lonely moor at night. The man was clad in rough ploughman's clothes, and might have passed for an honest yokel, but for the fur cap drawn over his eyes, the great handkerchief knotted round his throat, and the indescribable ferocity lent to an origin- ally hard face by its broken nose and broken jaw-bone. Suddenly we saw the fellow stop near the edge of a deep, quiet pool, into which anyone who had had less intimate knowledge of the river would [probably have blunclered headlong ; we saw him plunge his long gaff into the water, and the next moment he tossed on to the bank a long, quivering bar of what looked in tlie torch-light like ruddy gold. 80 WK MAKE A P.OLT OF IT "Bravo! that's a beauty!" I cried, forncttin;:,^ caution in my boyish keenness for sport (or poaching), but as I spoke the torch dropped with a hiss into the water, I heard a !-cramble on the bank, and the only sign of the man in the darkness was an occasional splash as he slipped into some puddle in his line of retreat. 3 1 CHAPTER VII. BILL DLXON, TOACHER AND PUGILLST. HERE! lioldhar bailiffs!" yellcc hard there ; we arc not water cd Dick after the retreating figure of the poacher, " nor the squire's keepers either ! " But only another splash in the distance was his answer, and the darkness of the March night seemed to grow solid around us. " Confound you, Ion, you have played the cat and banjo with our chance of bed and supper, I 'in afraid. That fellow is too scared to slop on this sidv the border. Give him another yell, though.," he added, and wo both yclicd in concert, assuring the man of our entire sympathy with gentlemen of his profcssba ^ntl disa\X)wing indign.iutly any connection wiih the established institutions of tiie countrj-. But it \.as no good ; tiie po.icher w.mld have " asked Bill, when the story was finished. " Well, dash me if it ain't a disgrace. A big chap like that a 'ammcrin' a feather-weight, and tlie referee givin' the feather-weight the sack for getting a licking. Why it's clean agen' the rules, let alone common sense," and the man-of-war, who poached by night, and led none too reputable a life by day, looked utterly horrified at such a violation of the principle of fair play. " Do you think- now as I could 'ajipcn across that there Crowther .' " he insinuated after a pause. '"E'll likely come to Darkpool for the fair, won't 'e ? " " No, 15111," I <5aid, laughing. " Oddly enough the Fernhall masters do not a])prove of your Darkpool fair." "They don't, don't they.? An' what's that THE QUEENSBERRY CUP got to do wi' Crovvther. A chap that size don't 'ave to ask master's leave to go to a fair, do 'e?" " As long as he is at Fcrnhall, Bill. But, I say, couldn't you give us a lesson," asked Dick, " so that wc could tackle Crovvther our- selves ? " " Couldn't I ? says you. Well, if that 's your sort I 'm on. 'Ere, Mike, Mike." Michael, the lean, was at that moment in the ditch bottom washing plates, and drying them on the grass. The knives he cleaned (and the forks) by driving them up to the hilts in the sandy soil, but the cups he did not clean at all. Somebody might have forgotten to stir up his sugar, and as sugar was scarce in camp he could not bear to waste the leavings. He was busy, but at the voice of Bill he hurried out of the ditch and came slouching up to the waggon. "'Ere, Mike, 'ere's a genlcman as wants you to larn 'im the noble hart. Will you oblige 'im by puttin' on the muffs." A grim smile spread over the skeleton's face, as he went to get the muffs referred to. Boxing was a matter of business with Mike, but he was a man who liked his business. So did his chief, 98 THE SKELETON GIVES A LESSON Bill Dixon, and sliovvcd his love for it by the keenness with which he bustled about, clearing a ring for the lesson. "Walk up, gents, walk up," he cried. "Wel- come one hand hall ! Walk up han' sec the well-known little wonder, Yankee Mike, wots agoin' to knock the stuffin' out of the Fern'all Fancy." At that moment the Yankee Wonder and the Fernhall Fancy walked into the ring, and struggled into the blood-stained, hardened gloves which Bill misnamed muffs. The suggestion of softness in the name was certainly the only softness about them. The two boxers made a very fair inatch as far as weight went, though one was as near forty as the other was near fourteen, but the old Yankee feather-weight when stripped had a perfectly sepulchral appearance. He was all bone. There was nothing else about the man. You could count his ribs through his jersey, and see the bones of his arm working through his skin. At first I think Dick believed that he could do as he pleased v.'ith this old skeleton, and after feinting once or twice he led off as 99 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP boldly at Mike's head as he would have done at mine. Dick's hand touched nothing ; his elbow got a nasty jar, and a paw pushed his head gently but firmly back. The skeleton had not moved its feet; it had only moved its head three or four inches to one side, and its paw had moved so quickly that Dick had not seen, thci^^h he had felt it. For a moment Dick looked puzzled, and then dashed in again, determined to make the little man move at any cost. But it was no good. Whenever Dick stirred, that long, bony arm flew out and a great glove lit on Dick's nose, closed his eyes or shut his mouth. Mike scarcely seemed to move, but that left hand of his was everywhere at the same tiir.c ; and the more angry Dick became the harder were the blows he received, until at last he had not a bound spot on his face or a breath left in his body, whilst Mike still smiled {)lacidly in the middle of the ring untouched. Dick was, I think, more disgusted and humiliated than I ever saw him before or since ; 100 THE SKELETON GIVES A LESSON but Bill kept applauding him, and evidently thought well of him. " E'll do, e'll do," he kept saying, " give me a young un as comes back when 'e 's 'it. I don't want none of your cautious coves. 'E don't know nothin' about it, 'e don't. But 'e '11 leain, 'e'll learn, and 'e'll make a fighter, that's what 'e'll do. 'Ere, Alike, give me them muffs," he added, and dragging them on he took Mike's place in the ring. "Now look 'ere," he said, " I want to learn you summat as you don't know. Let go at my 'ed." Dick did as he was bid, and the big man, avoiding the blow, laid the assaulted head confidingly on the young assailant's breast, and looking him in the eyes, tapped him play- fully on the nose. To the next lead Bill came forward and stopped it with his great bullet head. The effect of it ui)on him was about as great as it would have been upon a stone wall. "Now, lad, that comes of 'itting slow, and 'itting wild. Let 'er go when you 'it, ai.d put your weight into it. Now there's another thing. 'It again." lOI THE QUEENSBERRY CUP Again Dick lunged out, with all his force this time, and instead of merely missing his man, his arm came in contact with Bill's guard, and he was spun completely round so that he pre- sented the broad of his back to Bill, who, seizing the opportunity, prodded him gently in the short ribs with his great right hand. "Now that's all on account of your foot!" he cried. " Sec 'ere, 'ere 's the fust rules, and don't you fr-iget 'cm. Keep your heycs hopen, keep your mouth shut, and keep your left toe pointin' straight to the front. If you don't, the other fellow just catches you as you comes, swings you aroi'nd an' 'its you wherever 'e pleases. You '11 foUer your left toe wherever it 's a-pointin', mind that. Get back ! " and he smacked Dick smartly in the face with the back of his glove. " Now wonst agen," he went on. " This time you watch my 'and," and as he spoke he led like a flash of lightning with his left, catching Dick squarely between the eyes. " Now where was that .' Did you see it .'' " " No," replied Dick, "how could I .? " " 'Ow could you } Why not ? " I02 l\ mm ■■■■■PPVIiW^V THE SKELETON GIVES A LESSON " I couldn't sec through your fist, could I ? " "Well that's your fault. Why didn't you duck ? Try again." Dick tried again, and this time ducked quickly enough to avoid the left, but only to find his teacher's right thumping against his nose. "Now that's a hupper cut," Bi'.i exclaimed in high glee. " A very dangerous stroke. You must keep your eyes ski-med for that kind." And so the lesson went on, until I became convinced that with a past master of the noble art, your head could never be safe, no matter what position you put it in. But Dick apparently thought otherwise, and although considerably bruised and out of breath, shook hands warmly with his first teacher, and pocketed a very dirty piece of pasteboard with great care, whilst I heard Bill Dixon say : " I '11 be back again at my old stand at Slowton next term, and if you come in any time I '11 give you lessons free gratis /iet/ui for nothin'. So help me Bob, I will." Two hours later the van passed a railway which, as I knew, ran across the bottom of 103 A THE OUEENSBERRY CUP the Wild Copse Road. There was a small station near the point at which wc reached the raih-oad, and after consulting his great silver watch, Dixon announced that the morning train would soon pass by. " And look here, you two," he said, " I 've about made up my mind as you 'd better go back on it. You 'vc had two days hoff and a waggon load of fun, and I guess if you hadn't earned your caning before you 've earned it now ; better go back and take it ; maybe they won't expel you then." On consideration there seemed a good deal of sound sense in Bill's reasoning, and perhaps his argument that if Dick was expelled he could not give him any more lessons in boxing, carried some weight with my chum ; at any rate we decided to take his advice, and in consequence the old van was driven up to the station gate, and 13111 got out to wait for the train. It seemed that the guard of it was an old friend of Bill's, and very anxious to know soine- thing about the Hartlepool Pet, whoever that might be ; but being satisfied upon that point, he took us into the baggage waggon and left 104 fv mL THE SKELETON GIVES A LESSON ?v us there to meditate upon our sins and their probable consequences, until such time as the train approached the foot of the Wild Copse Road. Just before we came to this point the guard came in to us and told us to get ready. "You knows all about it, I expect," he said, " most Fernhall boys do, but your faces are new to me. When the train slows up, jump off on to the ditch bank. You can't hurt yourselves much, and if you do roll into the water it can't be helped. IJut jump when she slows. If you don't you '11 be carried on to Pulltown." It did not sound cheerful, but we had to do as we were told. The train roared through a flat land, past a village or two, and then entered upon a long loop running round a reclaimed bog. On the side nearest to us was a ditch, and the line ran along an embankment some feet above the level of the water in that ditch, but the bank of it sloped easily from us to the water. "There's your ditch," said our friend the guard, pushing back the doors of the baggage " Now get ready and don't funk. 105 waggon THE QUEENSBERRY CUP When she slows, go to the door, and when I whistle, jump. Jump the way she is going, mind, not the other way." It sounded easy enough, but it looked extremely difficult. If you remember for u moment how long it takes you to make up your mind as to where you shall take off and where you shall land, in an ordinary jump, you will realize some of the difficulties of this jump from a railway train, but even then you won't feel the horrible sensation of adhering by your feet to the train when you think that you arc doing all you can to jump out into the middle of the muddy stream which keeps gliding by you. However, we did jump when the guard whistled. I don't know what Dick did, but I confess that I shut my eyes and sprang wildly into space, and heard, as I picked myself up with my mouth full of mud and water, a ringing shout of laughter from the guard's van and the words — " No bet, William. They started even, and they 're both in head over heels." However, a wetting was only a small thing, 106 :^ THE SKELETON GIVES A LESSON The important point was that the bottom of Wild Copse Road was close at hand, and that by putting our best legs first we should just be able to report ourselves to Mr. Proser before morning school. I remember as we ran across the first field a fox stole past us into covert, and we noticed then for the first time the tree from which later on we got that great woodpecker's nest ; but all the way up to the school we went at a jog trot, and never spoke a word. As we passed through •|fc the gates Dick said — " Let us go to Swann and get him to report us, it will save bother"; and as no better plan occurred to me I consented. But old Swann was not there. He, it seems, was out after us, and the whole school was in a turmoil of excite- ment, which was not decreased when the news spread that Ion Maxwell and Dick St. Clair had come back of their own accord. I don't care to dwell upon what followed — upon the terrible interview with the Head- master, and the utter bewilderment of Proser, or the difficulty I had in persuading Dick to apologise to the ''bounder" Johnson. Of course 107 •mr^i^^'rmm THE QUEENSBERRY CUP we received our caning, and I fancy very few boys ever had a sounder one, and I ann certain no boys ever made less moan over one. But the marvel to us was that no word was said about our expulsion, and that we were trans- ferred from Crowthcr's dormitory to another. Acland was a queer little fellow, and very rarely said anything to his big brother about the private affairs of his schoolfellows, but my own opinion has always been that "brother George" was told the real reason for our black eyes and determined refusal to " peach " upon Crowther and his associates, and that old George saw the Head about it. If that is so, the mystery is explained, for our Head was a very different man to most of those who were under him. He had not forgotten the boy in the man, and I believe that he entered as thoroughly into the schoolboy's code of honour as any boy amongst us, God bless him ! As for the caning, that was a small matter. I 've often had a worse from a friend in a bout of singlestick and called it fun. 'f io8 ^^^•r^m m *■' CHArXKR IX. BEFORE THE MONITORS' COURT. f » THE rest of our first term passed away in comparative calii\ as did the year which followed it. After such a tempestuous start in Hfc wc had a right to look for a lull, and we got it. After the caning came a period of peace ; peace with the masters and peace with the boys. The masters, for some reason or other, seemed to look on both of us with a certain amount of favour, whilst our companions regarded us as desperadoes best left alone. Under these happy conditions wc both developed a good deal; Dick distinguishing himself as much in the class- rooms as I did in the playing fields. There was soon no doubt in any of his masters' minds that that fellow St. Clair could do almost anything he chose, and most of them thought that he would choose to do a good deal. But his school- 109 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP fellows as a rule did not care much for him at this time. Dick was too hard-working and too straitlaced for most of them, and then too he cared very little for cricket, and less for the milder amusements of school-life. He was a man always who had but few friends, but those would have laid down their lives for him, while though he had scores of enemies, none now dared to lay a finger upon him, at least none in our part of the school, though there was one who we both felt was only waiting for a chance, and would not miss it when it occurred. That one was Crowther major. The feud between us and the Crowthers had become a sort of school vendetta. The younger Crowther, our first enemy, had altogether retired from the lists, but his elder brother had never forgotten the insult Dick had put upon him in the dormitory after Lytham's fainting fit, and we knew that he only waited for a chance of avenging it. But he had sufficient tact to leave Dick severely alone until the proper time arrived, for though Dick was not very popular with his classmates, he was a wonderful favourite amongst the small boys, or paupers as we used to call them. no BEFORE THE MONITORS' COURT At first these little beggars used to look at him in awe and distrust, expecting that this strange being whom no one fagged, would soon become as overbearing a master as Crowther himself. But he never did. Even when he had a right, sanctioned by half a century of school traditions, to the services of a fag, he never employed one, and in time the little ones who used to regard him with awe began to regard him with love, so that when in a great football match between the houses, Dick had the ball, ^i you might hear the paupers screaming for " St. Clair! St. Clair!" as they screamed and cheered for no one else. All this Crowther knew, and therefore held his hand for awhile, for it is not pleasant even for a mon" to be too utterly detested by the whole of the lower school. But his chance came at last, as chances do to those who can wait. It was more than a year after the row in the dormitory, and Dick, who had twice got a double remove, found himself at about fifteen in the lower fourth ; that is, in the lowest form of the upper school. I had lost a lap in the race, and was at that time still in the upper third. Now just at this time a question in J. ■^< •! ■ i.«^^ff»WHWWl IIMipp^ III THE QUEENSHERRV CUP arose which was warmly debated between the sixth and the rest of the upper school. As I have said, a certain amount of fagging was legalized at Fernhall, but it had always been a disputed point as to whether a monitor had or had not a right to fag anyone in the lower forms of the upper school. The Fern- hall tradition was that the upper school was privileged ; but the monitors, whose ranks had recently been strengthened by the addition t' them of Crowther major, had, since the depar- ture of George Acland, the old school captain, asserted the reverse. Before long it began to be whispered about the quads that the monitors had determined to put this question to the test, and the name even of the subject upon whom the experiment was to be made was freely bandied about. He was, so a certain section of the upper school said, an infernal young radical, who thought that he could upset all school traditions. It was necessary to make an exhibition of him, and they had made up their minds to do it. I think in those days every one knew what was coming, except Dick, and even 112 A J ■uBWPwpi ii^m ■ ^wi^np^pi^^ I5EF0RE THE MONITORS' COT/RT he probably knew it too, but was far too |)roii(l to show it. The storm broke near the end of the term. Dick was cominfr across the (juad before dinner, and Crowther and a snail knot of monitors were loun. " Before Acland could answer Dick replied for him, " Consider that I said it. I will not fag for any one." A hum of applause greeted his words. It was the gage of battle flung boldly down, and the school was with St. Clair to a man. For a moment Crowther's evil face turned purple, and he half raised his arm to strike the speaker, but Whatcom, another monitor, caught his arm, and whispered something into his ear, and then 114 BEFORE THE MONITORS' COURT turning to St. Clair, asked him coldly, "Do you persist in refusing to fag ? " " Unless you can show mc some warrant for altering an old custom which you have known longer than I have done, yes," replied Dick. "These questions arc for the monitors, not for the school," answered Whatcom pompously. " You refuse, then } " " I refuse ! " answered Dick. " You will report yourself, then, to the monitors' court at two this afternoon ! " com- manded Whatcom, and at that moment the school dinner-bell rang, and the mob rushed in to dine off tough beef and resurrection pic. The one topic of conversation at that meal was Dick St. Clair's summons to the mon- itors' court, a dread tribunal supposed to be held only to deal with such rare cases of theft, or other low-class crime, .^s the monitors might in their wisdom consider 't better to punish than to report. In the old days a man punished by the moiu'tors left the school as a matter of course. Not only was the physical punishment adminis- tered by that court terribly severe, but the man 115 THE OUEENSBERRY CUP who was so punished was as a rule branded with disgrace for Hfe. The monitors' was a criminal court, and therefore not (so the school thought) the proper tribunal to try such an offence as Dick's. '• Shall you go, Dick ? " I asked of him as we sat at dinner together. " Certainly not," replied Dick ; " but they will fetch me." " And what then > " " It depends a good deal upon who they send to f .ch me. If Crowther comes there will be some sport." But they did not send Crowther. On the contrary, when they had given Dick a quarter of an hour's grace they sent a party of four to fetch him, and these four, monitors better known in the examinations than in the football field. " You had better come," they urged. " It is better to come willingly than to be dragged tliither, and if it takes the whole twenty to do t, St. Clair, they will make you come at last." Partly because what they urged was reason- able, and partly because there was no one amongst the four in whom Dick could find a ii6 BEFORE THE MOMTOKS' COURT decent ma*-ch, he consented at last, and followed the four to the upper row of studies. Here a couple of oionitors guarded the lower entrance, and kept the paupc.-s at a respectable distance from the buildings. The rest of the twenty were waiting for their victim upstairs. It was nearly three when some of us saw Dick St. Clair walk across the quad to the monitors' rooms — a strong, resolute lad, with firm lips and strong brown hands, which he had a habit of clenching until the knuckles of them turned white with the strain. At four the school met again, and our form assembled in its own class-room. Like the rest, and more than the rest, I had been waiting and watching anxiously for Dick, and now all eyes were turned on his empty scat. " Whore is St. Clair > " asked Proscr. " He has not come in yet," answered some- one. "I see that, Jones; perhaps you'll answer my question if ynu can. Where is he .' " At lhi« the unfortunate Jones broke down. " He iiad to go before tl-o monitors' court at "7 THE OUEENSBERRY CUV two," he blurted out, "and he has not been seen since."' I never saw a man's face change more than I'roser's changed then. He had given Dick his fn'sl caning, and had at one time entertained a sufficiently poor opinion of him, but that had worn off by degrees, until at last he had begun to regard h' n as the flower of his flock, or at any rate as the most promising intellect wliich he had to deal with. But at the mention of the monitors' court, poor Dick fell at once from the high pedestal to which he had climbed with such infinite pains, and took his place as the black sheep again. And then he came in. I said that two hours before Dick St. Clair crossed the quad a lithe, upright lad, with firm lips and a fearless eye. The Dick St. Clair who entered the class-njom and tottt:red to his seat was for the moment an old man. His face was bruised and swollen, white with pain where it was not purple and livid with bruises, his knees knocked together, his lijjs trembled, his huutls shook, and, when, forgetting where I was, I cried to him : 118 BEFORE THE MONITORS' COURT " Dick-, old fellow, what is it ? What have they done to you ? " lie did not seem to hear me. I had altogether forgotten myself, and had risen from my seat to go to him, whilst the whole form had sprung up to look at him, when I heard Troser's voice with a note in it which made it strange to me. " Maxwell, you may take him to his room, and if he wants anything let me know. I think you should get Dr. Erwell to see him." I did not wait to hear any more, but led him away like a child, unresisting and apparently uninterested even in what I was doing for him. And yet this was my hero Dick, the boy of iron whose will always ruled mine, and would be ruled by none ! In our study — a bare little room which he and I had shared since we first came to Fcrnhall — I could get nothing out of him. Along the side of the room there was a long rough lounge which we had made, and at the foot of it Dick had hung on the wall a rudely-painted copy of the St. Clair shield. For a few minutes he sat on the edge of the lounge looking fixedly at 119 ■fJffa*W»^1M.".W"»V*""'-^-U "P" 'II "U*^ M* I THE QUEEXSBERRY CUP the shield; but whether he saw it, or whether his mind was far away, and his eyes saw nothing of the ships and the h'ons of battle, I cannot tell. At last he turned away with a sigh, and lay down full length, face downwards upon the lounge. But whether he lay thus to hide his face from the shield or save his poor bruised back I cannot tell. For a while I sat and watched him, trying by little acts of service to win a word from him. Ikit it was no good. He would not speak, and at last he seemed to sleep ; seeing which I crept out on tip-toe, to find out f'-oin others if not from himself what had happened to my cousin. And oh, but my heart that day was black as hell with hate. With that bnjken figure before me I covld understand why a trampled people turned, and why it was that tyrants died. HJLi nil |i|pjM 1 J. 130 ,.1 iipi IJU** i« J I CHAPTER X. ION MAXWELL ENTERS FOR "THE STICKS." "\ 17" HEN I left the study I forgot that the ' * rest of the scliool was not "out" yet. Except Dick and I, all the fellows were of course still in the big school or in the class rooms, so that the quadrangle was apparently empty. At first I thought that it actually was so, and sauntered across to the library to get a book to distract my thoughts from my troubles; but as I vaulted over the iron railings I heard voices in the porch of the buiU^.ing, and stopped instinctively. The voices might belong to some of the masters, and I had no wish to meet any of them just then. "Well, sir, you may say what you like," said the first speaker, "and you may report me to the Head if jou choose, but I slutl! sptak my 12! THE QUEENSBERRY CUP T mind all the same. To use them broomsticks to beat a lad with is brutal. It's more. It's — it 's criminal." The voice was old Sergeant Swann's, and it fairly quivered with indi<;nation. Until then I had had no idea that there was an atom of human kindness in the old man's composition, and the revelation was so astounding that I had much ado to resist my first impulse, which was to dart round the buttress and grip the good old boy by the hand. 13ut another voice answering him chained my attention, and diverted me from my purpose. " You forget yourself, Swann," said this voice coldly; "but I suppose you mean well, and I agree with you that it would have been better not to use those confounded clubs. A cane would hurt more and do less damage. But the authority of the sixth form must be maintained at all costs." " At the cost of that boy's life, for instance," said Swann bitterly. " It will hardly come to that," replied the other. " You overrate the whole matter and the beggar's obstinacy, but if he still refuses to 122 T .V* MAXWELL ENTERS FUR "THE STICKS" fag when he comes before the court to-morrow I expect it will go hard with him." " Do you mean to say that he is to be thrashed again to-morrow ? " " If he won't fag, certainly. He will be thrashed every day until he gives in. But though he is as stubborn as a mule I don't think that he'll hold out another day. That fellow will grow into an anarchist, or some- thing oi' that kind, if he is allowed to follow his natural bent." " If you don't kill or cripple him he '11 grow into an officer more like," cried Swann, "an officer as Thomas Atkins would follow to hell and beyond. Look here, Mr. Chalmers, you '11 pardon an old soldier speaking plain, because, though you won't say so, I know as you're agen this buUyin', for buUyin' it is, monitors or no monitors. If you arc agoin to beat that St. Clair until he gives in you 're agoin to beat him till he dies. I've been in seventeen big fights, sir, in my time, and more little 'uns than I can remember, and you won't tell me as I don't know a soldier's face when I sees one " Those were the last words which I heard 123 mm 1 THE (2UEENSBERRY CUP T^ distinctly, for Swann and Clialmers moved on into the library as they spoke, their voices growing fainter as they went, but they had said enough. I understood now, as though I liad seen the whole shameful scene, why that listless, broken figure was lying on the lounge in our study, its bruised face turned away from the shield. The thought of my dauntless Dick at the mercy of those pitiless bigots well-nigh drove me mad, for I realized more fully even than the sergeant, that if they were going to beat him until he yielded, they would have to beat hiin until he died. He looked half dead I thought already. Swann of course saw only my chum's dogged pluck. That was written in every line of his face, in the strong square jaw, and the unflinching grey eyes, but I knew his heart, and the thought in it. If this had been a mere matter of personal pride, he might have yielded. I don't think that he would have done so, but he miL;ht. But Dick was fighting for something better than this, something higher and holier. A principle was involved, and poor old Dick was •24 n^ T^ ■v I ^. 'w>wm ui^VBi»«^^..jjj^t . MAXWELL ENTERS FOR "THE STICKS" death on principles. H>^ had sworn to his own conscience, that if he e^/er had the chance, he would put down bullying at I'crnhall, and some God liad heard his oath, and put him to the test. Even if it were necessary to take upon his own young shoulders the troubles of every pauper in the school Dick would do it, and if the load broke his back he would never complain, if his loss was the world's gain. His simple creed said " Fight." It said nothing about the odds, at which a man should fight. They were nothing accounted of in Dick's creed. And was I, Ion Maxwell, his cousin, to stand by and see this thing done, because the power of the monitors was forsooth a properly constituted power, and because our code of honour forbade nie to report the facts to the Head.' He, I knew would not tolerate this barbarity. But, on the other hand, I knew that the day I reported Crowther and his companions to the Head would be the last day on which Dick St. Clair would look me in the eyes as a friend. It was a cruel dilemma to be put in, and the 125 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP trouble worked strangely on me. As a rule I am a peaceful man enough, except that I love an honest fight for the fun there is in it, but on this day I was outside myself. As I crossed the quad, the door of the armoury caught my eye. It stood ajar. If I went in no one would say anything to me, even if they should happen to see me ; for was I not in the corj)s, and on trial for the Wimbledon eleven > But then, was there any powder kept there .' and if so, how much should I want, and how should I apply it in order to blow the monitors and their court, their studies and their instruments of torture to their master ? For in my agony for my friend some unsuspected current of my blood stirred, my eyes had a crimson mist before them, my mouth had dried till my lips cracked. I was for the moment a Maxwell of the sixteenth, not of the nineteenth century— one who could love and hate, fight and wreak vengeance for a friend, but to whom the words mercy and forgiveness had no meaning. At that moment a notice on the board outside the monitors' libraries caught my eye, and, thank God, turned my thoughts into 126 MAXWELL ENTERS FOR "THE STICKS" another channel. It was within a fortnight of the end of term, and the different athletic competitions were beinc( decided daily. This notice referred to one of them, and as I read it an idea formed in my brain. At least I would have some revenge. The notice was on behalf of the gymnasium, and was an invitation to competitors for the various events to inscribe their names in a certain book kept in the school of arms. There were several events, but the one which took my attention was headed "Single-stick for all comers," the notice going on to say that the Head-master, seeing how popular this exercise had become, had decided to give a silver cup to the best player, the award to be decided by points and general form in a bout of ten minutes. When I looked over the entries I found about a dozen names, of which four were scratched, the reason for this scratching being suggested by the last entry— "R. B. Crowthcr." This reminded me that Crowther was certainly the best stick player I had seen in the " Gym."; but he was the best of a poor lot, none of whom 127 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP r had, to my mind, any idea of the science of sticks. I think that I have said somewhere before in this narrative that I was somethincr of a fencer. It was, of course, no credit to me. Nothing, I think, that we have or do, can fairly be set to our own credit. Everything is either a gift at birth or the result of hicky environ- ments. I owed my sword play to both. By nature I had a quick eye, and a wrist which has sent off balls through the pavilion windows more than once in the history of Fernhall cricket, and by good luck, I had always near me as a youngster, one of the best swordsmen in Her Majesty's army — my good father, Colonel Heron Maxwell. Luckily for Dick and for mc the arm that my father lost at l^alaclava was not his sword arm ; that remained to him, and so it came about that, from our very earliest days, Dick and I were grounded in the beautiful mysteries of sword-play. Dick was a good sworasman. With the foils perhaps he was the best of the two ; but if my father's eyes were not blinded by prejudice, I was always the better stick player. And yet I had never played since I 128 MAXWE'.L ENTERS FOR "THE STICKS" had come to Fcrnhall, though my chum's name was amongst the entries for the master's cup. As a matter of fact I never was such a keen fighter all round or such a gymnast as Dick. I was a much keener cricketer. He tolerated cricket, but he would never (as he put it) waste time learning to "play ball." I was devoted to cricket, and having satisfied myself that, as far as I could see, there was no one worth playing sticks with in the gymnasium, I never went near the place again. Why then enter for the competition now .' you ask. Why not leave your friend Dick to settle with Crowther ? Surely that cup would be worth the winning to him. Yes, but his was one of the four names which had been scratched. Ik sure that I never for one moment doubted why he had done this ; but yet when he woke late in the evening, and found me sitting beside him, one of the first questions I asked him was : " Dick, why did you scratch for ' The Sticks ' .' ■' He raised his right arm painfully, and I saw that his hand drooped from his wrist. "They broke my sword arm to-day, I thin^-. I 129 T THE OUEENSRERRY CUP The broomstick caught mc across the wrist, and it 's cither broken it or made it too stifif to use. Besides, I 'm stiff all over, and may be stififer this time to-morrow.' And he tried hard to .-;•,• '!■ . : 'tis own misery, but it was a ghost of a smiie. I couldn't stand this sort of thing any longer. "Dick," I cried impetuously, " it's fair to warn you. If you go to that court to-morrow I am going to the Head." " If you do, Ion, I will never as long as I live exchange one word with you. For shame, man." I knew it, but I too could be stubborn. "That will be very sad, Dick, but it wiU not be all my loss," I answered, "aii;^ [ vv' not consent to have you murdered, o;.. i ' m* • ■ dear a thing as your friendship." "But, Ion, you can't do so mean a t' ^. .< "I can, and will, unless you promise me ." " To fag .' " " No, not to fag. I would not have you obev the monitors even as far as you do." "What do you mean.? I hav . flatly refused to obey them." T MAXWELL ENTERS FOR "THE STICKS" " And yet you go to their mock court, when they bid you, to be beaten like a coster's ass for not serving them. Why go ? " "They would drag me there if I did not go of my own free will, and that would be more degrading than the lickings I take, away from the eyes of the school." " They wouldn't drag you there if they could not find you." " Naturally," said Dick, with a faint smile, " but how am I to avoid them .'' " " If I tell you where to hide, Dick, will you do it .'' It is only twelve days now to the end of the term, and even they dare hardly take you from the class-rooms." Dick thought for a moment. " Do you think, Ion, that it would not be shirking .-• " he asked. "No," I answered. "Why should it be.' They say ^ ou shall fag, though you are a fourth fonn fell, I said ciuictly, "If Crowther doesn't min i playing ivithout a jacket, I don'*-, sir. lie is a very light hitter, and wc can't c(,mc to anj' harm with the masks on," " II;;ng his impudence," cried Crowther, too much annoyed to have the sense to conceal his '43 ■•«■««■■ THE QUEENSI3ERRY CUP vexation. " No, sir ; of course I don't mind if he doesn't ! But I think he will by-and-by," he muttered as he crammed his mask on his head. "Won't you sakite first, Crowther.?" I asked in my blandest tones, not offering to touch my helmet which lay at my feet. " Oh, hang your salutes!" he growled ; but he had to take his helmet off again and go through the whole performance, salute to the right, salute to the left, and bow ceremoniously, though he certainly did not do it with the knightly grace which the occasion demanded. I had gained my first point. My enemy had lost his temper before our swords had crossed for real business. And then we sat down and began, in nothing but our thin summer jerseys through which you could see the pink flesh, our arms even, bare to the elbow, and with nothing on but our flannels below the edge of our aprons. I made a mistake as soon as I crossed swords. My eyes were on Crowther's red beef, and my thoughts with Dick St. Clair and his wrongs, so that instead of stepping out of distance directly our sticks crossed, as I should have done, I 144 THE SWORD CUP paused a second. It was enough. The moment the sticks touched Crowther snatched a hit. It was hardly good form, hardly fair, but then Crowther knew nothing of good form, and cared nothing for fair play, but the blow which caught mc on the funny bone was a heavy one, and made mc turn sick, as that blow always does. But of course I did not show it. On the contrary I brought my hilt to my lips, and acknowledged as jauntily as if some one had paid me a compliment. But I felt that I owed one. By Geori, Is there anything better than sword-play? I am getting old and stiff now, and the gallery laughs dt mc when I try to field a ball at cricket ; but give me an ashplant, and my muscles drop into their places, the big urds swell on thigh and sword-arm, my back straightens, my eye brightens, the turf seems clastic to my feet, and my head goes up like a man's again. We have done I'm nf. ud with the soldier's trade, and not one guiiUcman in fifty would know how to use arms if he carried them, and if I dared to speak what I think to my friend Arthur, the man of business, he K 145 THE OUEEXSRERRY CUP would laugh at mc, and tell me to learn double entry, and forget all about quarte and tierce. But I can't do it, and I don't believe, in spite of the evolutionists, that we have gained anything to compensate us for the joy of battle which our fathers loved and which we have lost. There is less bloodshed now-a-days and less sudden death perhaps, but is it worse to be wounded than swindled ? Is the life-long worry about investments better than sudden death ? I don't think it ; but then at heart I am a barbarian, and if you took them out of their top hats and frock coats so are a good many other Englishmen. But all this time I ought to be on guard, and so as a matter of fact I was, with blows showering upon me as if it was raining ashplants. From the first Crowther did all the leading, and though 1 could see an opening every time he raised his hand, I never attempted to take advantage of it. I meant to humiliate him first, I would thrash him afterwards. At head and thigh and ribs he slashed and hacked, and each blow if it had come home would have brought the blood through my jersey; but the 146 T THE SWORD CUP upright guard is a good one, and though my hand Jiardly moved, my stick was always where it should be. "Bravo, Maxwell, bravo!" cried Foulkes, and that old war dog, Swann, had his eyes dim with delight; but I kept cool, muttering to myself. " Not yet, Ion, not yet." And then Crowthcr, who was really not a bad player, changed his tactics. He saw that he could not reach me with a direct attack, so he tried to draw me, l.-t his hand drop as if he was tired, and let his great coarse leg wander out beyond his guard. To oblige him I took the bait and lunged out at my full stretch, cutting at his leg as if I wou'i cut it from under him, and of course it wenc hack like a flash, and raising himself to his full height with his feet together, he dealt me a blow which might in old days have cleft me from crown to belt. But even as I lunged I raised m\' guard, and his stick, instead of cutting a deep weal down my spine, broke short on the forte of my blade, whilst I laid my own stick gently on his ribs, and smiled up confidingly in his face before I came on 147 T THE 0UEENSI5ERRY CUP guard again. I had him at my mercy, and he knew it. But when he had got himself a new stick I began in earnest. I felt that if I delayed much longer I should win the cup without striking a blow for Dick, and I would rather have lost tl.c cup than that should have happened. And first I feinted at his head, and cut him across tJie kneecap. It did not look a hard blow, but he felt it, and without acknowledging my point as a gentleman should have done, he returned furiously at my head. I stopped his cut, and came home again on his kneecap. Then he grew cautious. That kneecap ached badly, I knew. So did Dick St. Clair's back; and as he would not come to me I gained ground, drawing my left foot up to my right until I could lunge nearly twice as far as he ex[)ccted, and then again I led quick as lightning, using every muscle in my body, and again the good ash rang hollow on his kneecap. That time he dropped to his knee, and a word fell from him which made Mr. h'oulkes knit his brows. Crowther major, was not setting the example which a Fernhall monitor should liave set to 148 |\ T THE SWORD CUP the juniors, and perhaps that was why the future bishop did not interfere to stop the bout. Be very sure that if the stoijping of that bout had depended upon Sergeant Swann, it would have been going or. vntil there was not a whole spot on Crowther's h'de ; and as for the paupers, they had forgotten their fear, and the room rang with cries of: " Maxwell, Maxwell ! go it, Maxwell ! Let him have it ! " Never was a bully in worse plight before. His mask and stick were prison chains to him. He could not throw them down, and as long as he wore them they were a license for me to leather him. Having created a tender spot on his kneecap, I began to take advantage of it. My blooti was up now, and that red mist was coming into my eyes again, and I couldn't keep my thoughts from that bruised and livid face which had hidden itself from the shield in my study. ICvery time now that my wrist moved Crowther's stick came down to guard his kneecap, and seeing this I feinted there, and twice came in acro'^s his ribs, the good stick twining round 149 \ THE OUEENSBERRY CUV them like a snake, and leaving a bloody streak where it had been. I felt that they would not, could not, give nie much more time. Foulkcs would not have given me so much but that he knew his man. A whisper of the bully's doings liad reached the master's common room, and Foulkes himself had seen tne cruel way in which he had lashed into the poor, stupid Welsh boy's spine. So I prepared to give him his co/tJ> dc grace. Twice as he lunged wildly at me I met him full on the mask with my point, jarring his head till his teeth rattled, and almost dis- lodging his helmet. The second time I got what I wanted. The helmet had not quite settled back into its place again, and between it and his shoulder I could see his great bull's throat. With a quick, vigorous feint I drew his blade down to cover his knee once more, and then with a short, hoarse cry, " For Dick," I lunged and cut with all my might at his neck. I saw the ashplant reach him ; I heard his cry, " My God, he has killed me ! " and I saw him fall, and I suppose that they picked him up m i THE SVVORU CUV and said things to mc that I would rather not have heard. I don't know. The red mist was so thick then that I could not see. The Head's cup was never awarded. I was disqualified for hard hitting, and the school spoke of me ever afterwards, as long as I stayed at Fernhall, as that Scotch devil Maxwell. But what did I care. My friend was avenged. 151 CHAPTER XII. DICK ST. CLAIR'.S REVENGE. T T was prize day, the last and greatest day -'- of our summer term, and the sun was glow- ing on the green acres of the cricket field, and gleaming on the blue miles of the Irish Sea, as the sun only glows and gleams upon a dead calm sea or a level lawn in June. As a rule there was a grey sternness about Fernhall which seemed natural to the North Country — a quiet and repose worthy of a scholar's home ; but towards the end of June all this vanished, and Fernhall fell into temptation. The driving rain ceased for a season, the strong sea breezes dropped, the lads whose weather-beaten faces and great boots were normal on our west coast vanished, and in their place a lot of long-limbed luxurious fellows in flannels and straw hats appeared, fellows soft - footed and quick as 152 DICK ST. CLAIR'S REVENGE '**». panthers on the grass, always playing cricket, or stretched full length along the turf in warmth and idleness. Six weeks earlier the only men who would have dared to lie on that turf were those whom the necessities and accidents of the football field compelled to do so. Early in May there had come flowers about the place ; first the apple - blossoms in the orchard, and those were not so strange, being like the snow we were used to ; but afterwards in sheltered corners there came roses and stocks and peonies, until in June our land of storms and rainfall had become a land of brilliant coloured blossoms. Just about June too some madness got into the brain of the chapel choir. Instead of the old simple dirge - like chants which we were used to, the choir began to practise new-fangled music, and I 've known Dick to stay in chapel, even after the service was over, in a "dead haze," as we used to call it, his eyes straining, his lips parted, until the deep notes of the organ had trembled away into silence. Then, as often as not, he would start to his feet, and dash past me without knowing that ijj THE QUEENSBERRY CUP I was there, his eyes bright and dim, his lips apart, his head up, and his hat off, as if he could not brook that anything in this mood sliould come between him and Heaven. And always at such times he would make for the sea, nor would he tolerate even my conipanionship there. But the very last and worst sign of dissipation which w<''s to come at Fernhall appeared about a week before prize day. As was fitting, this sign appeared in the Head. For two or three consecutive mornings he would be five minutes late for lecture. Once or twice during school hours we would detect hirr, talking excitedly to his wife, and at last he would come to lecture in a new t ssock. At least if it was not a new cassock (and T want to be accurate on so important a point), we did not recognise it as the old robe with which we Iiad been so long familiar, for the jtHow egg stain which had graced il lil-ic an order ever since the early days of Fehiuary had disappeared altogether. After this the end came quickly. Cabs with (jueer wicker trunks upon them drove up from Slowton. Barnes, the captain of the eleven, Wore a pair oi iiglit-coloured trousers. trokes, others racing on their sides, their white arms flashing out of the water as they swam ; but all swimming as they never swam before, for the prize they knew was a comrade's life. But we were too late. 15efore the best of us had swum two score yards, Crowther's head disappeared for the second time, and the great shiny band of water swept on without a mark upon it. A human life was a small thing to it in its race to the Atlantic. When Crowther 162 DICK ST. CLAIR'S REVENGE sank the second time some paused to look, others wiser bore to their left and swam on, hoping that they might yet be in time to help. But there was other help nearer than ours. As I shook the water from my eyes I saw a figure rise from behind the Chaplet rocks, and, tossing off its coat as it ran, spring from point to point at top speed until it reached the last ledge of the Chaplet. Then it plunged like a gannet, head first into the oily swirl. Without a word we trod water and waited. One moment, two, three, ten went by, and still the smooth, sunlit stream went by unbroken. Surely those were minutes and not moments that we waited. It seemed to me as if some spell rested upon nature, all was so still. The "rip" glided by without a break in its green waters ; a gull swung down without a sound ; and a score of silent, eager men watched and waited. At last the spell was broken by a ringing cheer. " There he is, he has him, bravo ! " and all eyes turned to where the diver had reap- peared, nearly fifty yards from where he sank, supporting the drowning man with one hand, 163 f^^m «P THE OUEENSBERRY CUP whilst with the other he tried hard to fight his way across the "rip." In the middle of it some- thing happened. There was a little splashing, a cry, and then the oily current went on again unbroken. Both had sunk. But the swimmer reappeared again almost immediately. The drowning man, scared by the rapidity with which the " rip " was dragging them along, had lost his head, and clutched his would-be pre- server in that frantic grip which has cost so many lives. Most men would have given him up after that, but this man did not. Even at that distance we could see what he was doing. We could see him swimming slowly with the current, and peering about him as he went. Suddenly he saw what he wanted, a pale shadow sinking from the sunlight, and he dived as a duck dives, coming up again directly with his man in front of him. r>y George! how we cheered ! though in doing so wc swallowed quarts of salt water and did no good what- ever. But he had no time to notice us or our cheering. He had his battle to fight with that heavy water which, in spite of himself, drew 164 wm DICK ST. CLAIR'S REVENGE him away from the shore, and tugged at him for the prey of which he would rob it. Alone and with both his hands free, the swimmer from the Chaplet rocks would have won his way through the " rip," though even then he would have been carried far down the shore before he got clear of the current. Handicapped as he was he had no chance. Already the two black dots were far away towards the point, when someone at my side said, " If he doesn't leave that fellow to drown, he'll drown himself." "Then he will drown," I said, and though I hardly knew what I did, I scrambled out upon the beach and began to run across the point. In a case like this any example is followed at once; and though I could hardly have told them myself why I was running, I soon had a crowd at my heels. The bay in which Cliaplct Island lies is protected on one side by a sort of spit round which the tide-rip curls, until it strikes against a point on the other side of the base of the spit, from which it turns and runs straight away to the North Channel. It was across the base of 1G5 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP this spit and towards this point that wc were running. The tide-rip had the start of us, but we had the shorter course to run, and at that point, if anywhere, we should at least get one last look at the drowning men before they were carried out to sea. I was a fast runner in those days, and I was running as I never ran before, for I alone knew who the swimmer was who would rather drown than leave his man ; but in spite of my efforts I heard a deep breath at my shoulder, and a tall figure went by me as if I had been standing still. It was Foulkcs, the present bishop of I remembered then that he had held the half-mile record for England, and it dawned upon me for the first time what a record runner meant. But if he was first at the point I was second, and I was not sorry that he was first, for he had his wits about him, and I had not. On the shore he snatched up a piece of driftwood, and using it as a staff plunged in at once up to his waist. "Join hands," he cried, "here they come. He 's got him still " ; and one by one, as they i66 \\ys DICK ST. CLAIR'S REVENGE came panting up, visitors and masters and boys joined hands and plunged in, until we formed a living chain, the last link of which was almost afloat on the very edge of the current. Although when watching hira from one side he seemed to be hurrying so rapidly out to sea, when we were waiting for him he came to us .slowly enough. " Dick," I yelled, " Dick, try to reach us your hand," but he took no notice ; his head was half under water, and his body bobbed and swayed hideously with the motion of the current. He had lost consciousness, but he had not lost his hold. Perhaps some of the other links in that chain kept their heads to the very end, and could tell you how we got hold of him at last, just as he was sweeping by us for ever. I don't know myself, but I do know that if a certain good bishop asked me to black his boots for him, or to perform any other menial office for him, I should do it with gladness. He was the best runner of his day, and he is a great dignitary of the church now ; on a certain day in June I thought him the best man bar one, at old Fernhall. 167 \ '\\\\ THE QUEEXSBERRY CUP Between us we dragged Dick St. Clair and Crowtbcr up the beach ; Crowther apparently dead, and Dick so nearly dead that there seemed no hope, and yet, thanks to the use of proper means, we save'J them both As Fouikes turred Dick upon his face to let the water pour from his mouth, he caught sight of his shoulders, still purple and green from the blows of the broomstick ; and as his eyes wandered from those shoulders to the man lying by Dick's side, I heard him mutter oeneath his breath : " G'-eater love hath no man known than this, that a m.an should lay down his life for a friend. This lad would have laid it down for liim!" And that was Dick St. Clair's revenge! i68 CHAPTER XIII. A WALK ACROSS ENGLAND. AFTI^R four o'clock on prize day there is a - pause — next morning there is a breaking up. The whole body of taught and teachers goes to pieces. The atoms of the little world fly off from one another at a tangent, and by eleven o'clock in the morning, the only living thing left about the place is old Elizabeth, the needlewoman, and tradition has it that she is a Fcrnhall fixture. Ikeakfast even on brcaking-up day is a very perfunctory performance ; it is the only break- fast during the term when you can get as many pats of butter as you please. An active and hungry fellow might collect a dozen on his way up the hall, there are so many plates with no one in front of them. For many of the fellows, especially such as have had relatives at the 169 THE OUEENSBERRY CUT school during prize week, manage to get away on the evening of prize day. Dick and I, how- ever, were not among these lucky ones, but we had our boxes packed and corded early, and were ready to start by the first 'bus running between Fcrnhall and Slowton. What a glorious drive that alw i}' . used to be in the fresh summer morning, in a coach full of high spirits, with nearly five months' work behind, and full ten weeks' pleasure in front ! The whole way to the station we sang : every yokel we met was chaffed, and probably pelted with fruit or pastry : the sour-looking keeper who blamed us for every pheasant's nest which went wrong, was derisively cheered, and reckless invitations to "come and stay with me, old fellow," were extended to companions we had hardly tolerated during the term. At the station there were always a good many people to sec us o[(. The Fernhall boys were popula.- with the regiment stationed at Slowton, who shot sometimes on our range, and were beaten by us twice a year with great regularity at cricket, and who taught us in I/O ¥ ■.Ir A WALK ACROSS ENGLAND return a good many things worth knowing in the way of manly bearing and self-restraint. The swaggering boy who talked too much of his own exploits on the cricket field, or at Rugby Union, got his first hint from these men, that the great world thinks most of those who do great deeds and say nothing of them. Boys are very quick to take a hint, and most of us had noticed that the man who had won the Cross in the Crimea, seemed to know more of roses than he knew of battlefields, while young Molyncux, who won the Grand Military, neither chewed a straw nor carried a riding cane. But these very men, though they were so reticent about themselves, were ready enough to recognise merit in others, and I had hardly put my foot on the platform before I heard eager whispers all round me. Which is he .'' Which is St. Clair? What that bit of a boy with the captain of the second eleven } and then one of them, a sad dog, whom everybody in the regiment loved, came up to me and held out his hand — " Well, Maxwell, going home ? Remember mc to the Colonel, my boy, and tell him to 171 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP horsewhip yo" for bowling a captain in Her Majesty's th, twice running for a duck." Of course I laughed, and said that I wouldn't do it again, and he added laughing too, " No ; I don't think you will, for I shan't be here ; but isn't your friend I\Ir. St. Clair ? I wish you would introduce me." Of course I introduced hiin, and then the colonel came up, a tall, grey man, stiff and (we thought) cold as a rule, and shook hands with both of us, but when he spoke to Dick there was a tone in his voice which must have made it rare music for the boy he spoke to, the tone of respect wliich one brave man fecln for another. As he bade us good-by'\ he hdd his hand on Dick's shoulder. " You must be one of us, lad, tho Ou-cen cannot spare such men as you " ; auvl then whilst Dick's cxxs grew dim and his check flushed with honest pride, he vidded to me, "You come to us of course, Maxwell ; you are soldier brcxk" " Dick's people were soldiers too, sir," 1 cried, anxious to spare «iy chum a pr.ng, for I knew that he hate«i the idea that his fatlicr had never served. A WALK ACROSS ENGLAND " So I should have thought," rcpHcd Colonel Farquharson, and as he strode away I heard him mutter, " Yes, yes, we know the name, and you can't mistake the breed." Other professions are no doubt as honourable (perhaps more so) as the soldier's, but Colonel Farquharson at least did nut think so. Just then the train steamed into the station, and as it did so there was a sound of wheels outside, and another 'bus dashed up, and a fresh crowd of noisy, excited lads rushed on to the platform. "Hold hard there," cried one, "don't leave us behind, conductor"; "No; I haven't got a ticket ; pay you on the train," cried another ; " Wlio has got my bonnet-bo.K ? " yelled a third, xnd so shouting and pushing, utterly regardless of everything and everybody, each carrying lus own odds and ends, they tumbled into the third class carriages, all except a (cw who liad too much money or too little brains, 'ihese travelled first, in great and lonely splendour. Amongst these of course was Crowther, pur- chasing the homage of a porter, who carried his walking sticks, with one of his father's hardly- 173 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP earned half-crowns. On his way to his carriage Crowther caught sight of us, and after hesitating for a moment he turned back, and held out his hand to Dick. " I am not coming back any more, St. Clair, but if there is anything my people can do for It you . He stopped there lamely enough, I did not wonder at it. Dick's haughty stare would have stopped most people. " Well, at any rate, let us shake hands," he said, but Dick took no notice of the out- stretched hand. " What ! Won't you do that ? " Crowther persisted. "You saved my life yesterday, and I owe you some thanks for that." "You owe me nothing," Dick said at last. " I saved your life because I was obliged to. Any one would have done that, but I have a right to choose my friends." And with that he turned on his h" " That is right," Dick admitted, quietly. I don't kncnv what it was about Dick which always annoyed his uncle, but there certainly wab some quality in him which put up that honest gentleman's back— thus even at these simple words, his eyes opened suddenly, and he came to a standstill in front of the speaker, staring angrily into his face as if looking for some covert insult in it. But Dick's face was as innocent of im- 184 I UICK HAS A SECRET FROM ME I pertinence as his words were, and after a moment's scrutiny Mr. liraithwaite renewed his march with an offended snort. After taking two or three turns across the yard he stopped, and handed a long white document to each of us. " Read them," he said. The white documents were of course our "characters," libellous productions issued twice a year, and sent from Fernhall post paid to the boys' parents. Of course no character is all good, but mine, as far as I could see at a glance, was a very fair one, and looking over Dicks sliouKler I could read Proscr's verdict — "Mas brilliant ability, and applies himself diligently to certain subjects." "Well, sir," I said boldly, "I don't .see very much the matter with these." "No.^ Do you see what your masters sa)- about the ability which God has given you }" "Yes; that is not bad, is it.?" "To whom much is given, from him shall much be expected. How have you used those talents, Ion ?" 1 85 THE QUEENSUERRV CUP " All right, sir, I think," I answered. "All right, you think," he answered bitterly. " This letter from your form master tells a different story. I had hoped that the extra- ordinary leniency shown to you for your dis- graceful conduct during your first term would have been remembered by you. It seems that like the dogs you have returned to your vomit." Like most lowlanders, Mr. Braithwaite was very fond of quoting scripture, especially when he was in an unscriptural frame of mind, and I augured ill from the quotation. I was right unfortunately. Mr. Proser, it seems, had heard of our missing the train at Slowton, and as he could not possibly know why we had missed it, he began to suspect. Being no athlete himself he could not of course imagine the pleasures of a week's walk across England, so he refused to believe that we had walked merely for the fun of walking. Why then had wc walked when we might have gone by train .'' A few questions asked in Slowton furnished him with what he considered a satis- factory answer to the conundrum. W^e had been seen in company with the poacher Dixon. 1 86 ^ •I DICK HAS A SECRET FROM ME ^ •\ That was enough for I'roscr, and fortified by a few facts, he had given rein to his imagination, and written Mr. Braithwaitc a truly awful letter. This was the cause of the trouble. " You don't deny I suppose that you met th.. fellow Dixon at Slowton," Mr. Braithwaite asked. "No, sir," I answered. " \Vc met him of course, but ." "And you left the town with him for the moors )' " Yes, sir, but ." " Thank you. I congratulate you on at least being truthful so far. 1 won't trouble you to invent any reasons for your behaviour. I can imagine them, and have no wish to hear any more." " But you must hear our explanation," urged "Silence, sir:" thundered Braithwaite. "Be sure if 1 will not hear Ion, I will not hear you." That was enough for Dick, whose mouth shut at once as if it would never open again. "As for you. Ion,' Mr. Braithwaite went on, "your unfortunate father, when he returns, must 187 THE QUEENSHERRY CUP r decide about you. Richard St. Clair, you have shown yourself utterly unfit by your ta.stcs and conduct for the service you asjjire to. You liad better give up all ideas of the army, and make up your mind to accept the place in Rithct and Turner's, which I have secured for you. By steady application there you may yet do well." With these words he left us, and stalked back into his counting-house, while we stood and stared gloomily at the heaps of old iron all round us. "So," Dick said at last, shaking hiinself a little and taking my arm, " So Uncle Braithwaite is going to make a clerk of me, is he, a clerk to Rithet and Turner, in East India Avenue.' He may make anchors out of old ploughshares, but he '11 not make a clerk out of a St. Clair." "He means to try to, Dick, and what can you do } " " Hold my tongue and work. A man can be what he pleases. It depends upon himself." And this was the last he said upon the subject, though from stray fragments of our uncle's conversation we gathered that arrange- ments had been made for Dick's admission into i88 • F DICK HAS A SECRET FROM ME the East India Avenue firm in August. I don't think the mother liked the idea of an office stool for her boy any more than he did, but slic believed it necessary. "Things are not as they used to be, Dick, in your grandfather's time," she would say, "and I don't think that you would care for the flull routine of a soldier's life in times of peace. There is no likelihood of fighting nowadays." " No, mother ; it 's a good thing too, isn't it, dear > " "Yes, I think so, Dick ; but if there is to be no more fighting, what becomes of your service ? Vou don't want to be a soldier for the sake of wearing a red coat.'" " Not quite." "Nor of loafing your life away in country quarters .' " "Nor that either, mother, though i)erhaps country quarters are no worse than East India Avenue." "But, Dick, it won't always be East India Avenue. With your brains you must succeed, and then you can take a moor or travel, or if 189 THE OUF.F.NSBERRY CUP you arc still ambitious you can enter the House; that is where titles arc won nowadays " "With Samson's weapon," Dick laughed. "Who told you that I wanted to win a title, little mother?" " Isn't that the end of all ambition ? " she asked. " I think not, dear. Title without honour is but a barren pfrant, I would fain win honour, but I know of no title that I would prefer to that my father gave me. Am I not a St. Clair, mother ? " " Yes, dear, and that you will always be, whether you are a soldier or a merchant." " Of course ; and whatever I am I shall try to make the little mother proud of her boy." And here the conversation would drop, and Dick would steal away upstairs and be lost to us all for the day. From morning until night he used to sit in his little room near the top of the house, never coming down to the slip for a plunge in the green wateis, or a turn with the boys about the yard. It was a deadly slow holiday for me, without 190 • ,• r DICK HAS A SFXRET FROM ME any companion except Fcrncy, who wps always too well dressed to jump a hcd^e o,- cross a Ri-ass field, and the wcrst of it was tiiat Dick- did not take me into his confidcpx-. I knew that he had been wnlin- an article for a magazine, because he broujjht it to rnc one mornin- ^-ith a brief printed circular from the publisher, rc^rrcitin- that he could not make use of it. "Beaten there, Ion, I must get money in some other way." "But what do you want money for, Dick.'" " Time will show, bo)-," he answered. "What do you suppose this is worth } " and he drew from his waistcoat pocket a gold repeater which had belonged to his father. " I don't know. Twenty or thirt)- pounds at least, I suppose ; but you would never sell that ! It was your father's, Dick." " Vcs, I know. It was my dear old father's, and I have not much else to remember him by, but I would sell it to pay for some things-' things that he would approve of." And so .saying he put the watch back into his pocket and ran upstairs, coming uown again 191 '■^,"? -t.piJ.'MiijjJ^F ■■ttvif' :4«y^;''^!wiy^np* Mmvuivtiniipi. uptii i. y,ii|j>ii .ijpi f! VH}' 4<1! 'aflii THE QUEENSBERRY CUP dressed with a care and smartness somewhat unusual for him in the country. " Why, where are you going, Dick ? " I asked. It 's nearly dinner time." " Yes, I know it is ; but you must make excuses for me, Ion. My head aches with work, and I am going for a long walk. It will do me more good than food, I think." And this was the first word h " It was Mrs. St. Clair who spoke. She had just come in from gathering a basket of roses in the dusk, and looked white and frightened as she appealed to me. " How should I know, mother.? I don't know all the scamps in the district. Ask Uncle Braithwaite ; he is here more than I am," I said, laughing at her. "Don't be foolish. Ion. I have asked ]\Tr. Braithwaitc, and he doesn't know the man. Do you, John.'" she asked, turning to him as he came up and joined us. " No, I have never seen the fellow before, nor does he belong to this neighbourhood. There are a great many more of such strangers about ^ 193 i U.J. ItLUIUUpHII *mw ' ' TPxE QUEENSBERRY CUP here now than I like," he added, half to himself. "Well, I will go and look rt him anyhow, mother," I said, and turned to go ; but before I could carry out my intention Mary, the house- maid, bounced into the room with her cap on one side, and a " do or die " expression on her face. "Well, Mary, what is it.'" asked Mrs. St. Clair, as the girl stood ga^pmg on the threshold uke a newly- landed fish. "A pusson, ma'am, at the back-door. A pusson askin' for Mr. Ion or Mr. Richard." "Well?" " I slammed the door in 'is face, ma'am, and put up the chain, I did ! " "What! for asking for Mr. Ion >" " No, ma'am— the spoons." " But did he ask for the spoons too > " I put in, laughing. " No, Mr. Ion ; but he looked 'em." Even the mother laughed at this, but Mary went on quite innocently. "Yes, ma'am ; if hanyonc hever looked like a burglar 'e does. E 's got 'is 'air cut that short, 194 ' ' ■"■ "Mf? ' r ^■Pi DICK DISAPPEARS and a red muffler round 'is throat, and 'is jaw broken, and 'anging down that awful as I expect 'e's in after the spoons now. Chains ain't no good against 'is sort, ma'am. And please, ma'am, 'c .said 'is name was Bill Dixon I " " Bill Dixon ! What ! that rascally poacher ! This is monstrous ! " cried my uncle, and at this unexpected confirmation of her suspicions Mary the maid turned to the colour of Mr. Burne- Jones' maidens, and flopped incontinently upon the floor. " My dear ! " cried Braithwaite, when we had put Mary into a chair, "you will surely not consent to his seeing the boys. He is the fellow with whom they left Slowton." But the mother had no need to reply; for Bill, disgusted by the maid's suspicions, and tired of waiting behind a closed door, had retired from our inhospitable house, and as I looked out of the window I saw him slouching away down the road, his close-cropped hair, broken nose, and broken jaw making him look what our western cousins call a " tough citizen." That night I had to stand a very severe cross-examination; but as I knew nothing of »95 T THE QUEENSBERRY CUP Bill's reasons for calling on us, nothing could be extracted from mc. The result was that my uncle considered me a deeper and more dangerous young scapegrace than ever, whilst the mother heard for the first time, I believe, the true story of our connection and adventures with Bill. Perhaps this accounted for the calm fashion in which she heard of Dick's disappear- ance. At least I tried at the time to account for her unnatural indifference in this way, but even then I knew that I was wrong. But if the mother said very little when Dick failed to take his accustomed place at evening prayers, Mr. Braithwaite aid enough for both. According to him the unhappy boy had finally gone to the devil (or Bill Dixon, synonymous terms with our uncle), and would be next heard of through the police. I hardly took Mr. Braithwaite's view of the matter, of course ; but even I had my doubts. That Dick had gone off with Bill I did not believe. 1 knew, for instance, that Dick had left before Bill arrived ; but Bill might have had some message from him for me, and having got that idea into my head, you may be sure that 196 T^ DICK DISAPPEARS I was up and out in the village "bright and early" next morning. Dick of course had not come back, nor could I hear anything of Bill in Scarslcy, so, having snatched a hurried breakfast, I ran over in my flannels to the little town of Clifden, towards which Dick had been walking when I last saw him. The morning was sweet and fresh, and the run did me a lot of good. It was the first decent piece of exercise I had had since those n-iiserable summer holidays began, during which, thanks to Dick's retirement, I had been forced to loaf as I never loafed before. But now there was something to do, and I began to feel alive again. My first business was to find Bill ; but though I hung round every tap-room and stable- yard, and visited every game dealer's in Clifden, I could see nothing of my man. However, as I wandered from place to place, my search was in part rcwardc!JRfll»WJU* THE SCARSLEY STRIKE strikers was impudently set all day at the public-house at the head of the lane, to stop our men if they could when they went down to the slip, and turn them away from their work. We did our best in our town of course, and in spite of the men the liammers still rung all day on the ribs of the big whaler (the Wj-estlcr), which my uncle had upon the slip, and the work went on fairly well in the foundry ; but we had to keep an eye on the slip all day and set a watch to guard it all night, for the Wrestler, in spit(. of her battered appearance, was worth a great deal of money, and I could see uiat my uncle's anxiety to get the repairs upon hci' finished, and send her off again to sea, grew with every day. 2tl CHAPTER XVII HOW DICK SAVED THE "WRESTLER.* " \ T TE shall have the Wrestler off the slip * ^ to-morrow, uncle," Fcrney said at dinner on Friday night, "and I think that that will teach Cassidy and his roughs that we can do without them, and are not afraid of them." " I hope you are right, Ferney, ' replied my uncle. " Perhaps you are, though I don't feel at all comfortable. At any rate, most of the foreigners seem to have gone. There was no one about the slip to-night." "No, they have got sick of the game, and given it up. Take my word for it, we have broken the back of the trouble." So said Ferney, but I did not agree with him. It was true that th" village was quiet, and that the noisiest of the strikers had disappeared ; but the calm and the stillness was too like the 313 HOW DICK SAVED THE "WRESTLER" : I calm before a thunderstorm to please me, and if I was any judge of human faces the men I had seen on my way home looked as little like yielding as it was possible for men to look. Hot and restless I strolled down into the garden, and stood at the very edge of it in the dusk looking out to sea. Down by the water's edge, a mile off perhaps as the crow flics, I could see the slip and the great whaler of over 2000 tons burden standing up gaunt and still against the evening sky, her poop a good sixty feet above the level of the green water. Standing up there silhouetted against the sky she reminded me of the ship at rest in the first quarter of my cousin's shield. Ah, that cousin of mine ! Where was he now that we wanted him so badly.' Just then I saw a figure leap the fence opposite to me, and some- thing in the clean stag-like leap made mc start and cry " Dick," and I was right. In another minute he had seen me and crossed the road to my side, hot and dusty, and with those falcon eyes of his reddening with the light I knew so well. " Is the mother about, Ion } " 213 THE OUEENS13ERRY CUP " No." " Nor any one else." " No ; no one." "That's right. Jump the fence and come along. We've no time to waste." Of course I obeyed him. Dick always led, and I was too good a s(;!dier even then to stop to ask questions. For five minutes we jogged along tlie road together, going at a long swinging trot, and keeping carefully in the shadow of the hedge. Then Dick stopped, and sat down on a stone heap. " They have had prayers, haven't they .' " "Yes, half an hour ago." " Then you won't, be missed. That ib all right. We arc going to sleep on the W'nstUf lu-iiigiit. Do you mind.''" " No, old chap, of course I dun't ; but why .' ' "To save old Braithwaitc more money than he could make in three years. lie doesn't deserve it, but he s the mother's brother, God bless her. Come on." And without deigning any further explana- tion he set Oif again at a run, until he gained the head of the lane which leads to the slip. 214 5 I HOW DICK SAVED THE "WRESTLER" I Here he spoke to the watchman, a very old friend of ours, and gained his permission to pass. It was not the first time that Dick and I had spent a night on board one of Uncle Braithwaite's cripples. The rat hunting in them used to be excellent, and a night passed on board them between heaven and earth was full of weird suggestions to a boy's imagination. Once in the alley, Dick stopped again, and putting his hand on my shoulder said, " Forgive me. Ion, I believe I 've gone too far. She isn't your mother after all." " What do you mean, Dick .'' " I asked, astonished. " I mean that I 've no right to ask you to risk what we are going to risk to-night for my mother's sake. It will be life or death. Ion," and his eyes shone at me in the darkness. It zvas the light of battle in them then! I thought so. " We can talk about this by-and-by," I said ; " let 's climb on board," and I turned to go down to the platform on which the ship stood. " Good old Ion," he said, and gripped me by the muscle of the arm for a moment, and then 215 iui» ^M-ji, IV' (•ii-. ' " J ,■ wi« wiigi^gmmi^i^^i'^^r'. L1.I. ,li^J»|J THE QUEENSBERRY CUP vvc crept down to the I V res //ct together, took a turn round the platform to see if anyone was about, and then climbed up one of the big supports of the scaffolding, dropped on board, and made our way to the deck house on the poop. Here we found Bill Dixon, comfortably smoking a clay pipe and waiting for us. Bill's presence was a surprise to mc, but the whole affair was a mystery ; so I said nothing and waited. "Have you got the blue lights, Bill.'" Dick asked. " Yes, here they arc, lots of 'em," and he pointed to a bundle of things like rockets on the floor. " You know how to light 'em .'' " " Yes, I know ; and the other stuff, is that here.?" "There it is — fifty [)ounds or more," Bill answered, pointing to a scpiarc wooden box full of sawdust, in whii-h lay a number of round sticks about ten inches long by two inches thick. "It's lucky they wanted that to blast the IF;rj-//tV' off the rocks," muttered Dick. "Where did you find it ?" 216 ■*«-■ \,V' !UM ■ ij^ji. .i^aif pivi-4 « I ft 'ST' ' 'I > ^f I HOW DICK SAVED THE "WRESTLE."^" "They'd stowed it away on board; 0113 of the chaps told me where it was." " Very well," said Uick ; " now you be off to Clifdcn, and run as if the keepers were after you, Bill. You may manage to get the soldiers here before anything happens. If not wc '11 keep the ship." But Bill Dixon didn't move. " I 'd like to stay, Mister St. Clair," he said. " I can't do any good running, and you may want mc. They '11 be here before I 've gone a couple of miles " " Do as you arc ordered," said Dick sternly. "This is not your business. We have something at stake ; you haven't," and Dick compelled the old prizefighter, in spite of himself, to climb over the ship's side and swarm down into the darkness. Wc heard him stepping cautiously over the planks of the platform, and then all was still again. Wc were alone in the deck- house, and for nearly an hour wc sat there and waited, watching the stars com^- out and listening to the lapping of the waves against the piers. Once the watchman came round, and we saw his light as he passed round the 217 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP ship. As far us he could sec all was well About half an hour after this Dick rose and looked out to sea. " Now, Ion," he said, " here they come. Don't show yourself, and don't say anything whatever happens, but when I tell you, light one of those blue lights and stand by me. If the worst happens, old chap, we shall have died doing our duty." By this time I had some idea of what was wanted of me, but I said nothing, only I strained my eyes to watch the six dark shapes, which came gliding towards us from the cape where the main part of Scarsley village lay. " Six of them," Dick muttered. " They can hardly do .1 with six crews, though they have got the bilgo blocks all split ready. I 'm glad they neve thought of using fire." "There are two more boats— three, Dick," I said, "coming from the west" ; and I pointed to where three more dark shapes were creeping up to the slip. Presently we could hear the dip of their oars, and then the figures of the rowers became plain to us. The boats were big row boats, and each 218 ] HOW DICK SAVED THE "WRESTLER" was as full of men as it would hold. When they reached th: slip and swarmed out upon it, there must have been between fifty and a hundred men, dark, silent figures, moving about in the gloom under the bilge of the ship, fastening ropes to the " shores " which (wedged between the platform and the ship's bilge) held the great mass erect. I suppose some of you who read my story have never seen a great ship on one of these marine railways, so that in order to understand what follows you must let me explain a little. The rails run from the power house where the engines work, and the great iron cables begin, along the bottom of the sea to a point one or two hundred yards from shore. Along these a weighted platform held by the cables, slips out under water until it catches the keel of the ship, which is to be repaired, in the chocks (blocks of wood built to fit the keelj, and then, the engine being set in motion, the great cables tighten and draw the platform and its burden out of the sea, higher and higher until it is high and d y, with the keel itself two feet from the platform, and the deck perhaps sixty feet above 219 ] THE QUEENSBERRY CUP sea level. To keep the ship from falling over, and thereby shattering itself and everything round it, V-shaped cradles or bilge blocks are built up of square pieces of timber, clamped together with iron dogs, and in these the ship's keel is held as in a vice. But even these are not enough to secure such a weight as a ship of 2000 tons burden, and therefore forty or fifty great beams arc wedged in, one end resting against the rounded under side or bilge of the ship, the other against the platform. In this way the ship is held firmly, and men can walk in safety under the counter, can scrape the mussels and sea-weed off the ship's sides, or even put a new bottom into her if necessary, though should these supports fail the whole mass would come crushing down upon the men, reducing the ship, her masts, and her machinery to almost as useless atoms as the human beings beneath her. The overturning of such a ship as I am describing would have meant to my uncle not only a loss of many thousand pounds, but a loss of reputation for workmanlike skill which would have ruined him. And the object of the nine 220 HOW DICK SAVED THE "WRESTLER" boats' crews of strikers was nothing less than the overthrow of the Wrestler. If they could not gain the victory over capital by ordinary means, these men meant to try what extra- ordinary means would do. The strikers' boats had all been moored to the starboard side of the platform. The men them- selves were on the port-side, and all the ropes (long cables each with three or four men to pull upon it) were being fastened to the " shores " on the port-side. One man in a light-coloured wide- awake seemed to take command, and all worked in absolute silence, quick and quiet as rats, of which they reminded me irresistibly as they crept and glided amongst the timbers under the ship. In ten minutes' time all the ropes had been fixed, and the loose ends of them carried to a bank on the port-side, slightly higher than and some distance from the platform. Several men were stationed at each rope, and then a dozen or so with hammers or axes in their hands came down on lo the platform again, and began to beat savagely at the bilge blocks, which had been already split by them. 221 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP In the stillness of the night their blows made a terrible clang, which seemed to ring through every timber of the ship, and make it qake like a living thing in agony. "Now is our time. If they get those ; iock,-, out she will go over without muc'.. pulling. Light your candle ! " and as I struck a match and lit my blue-light Dick picked up the wooden box full of sawdust and those strange short rods, and sprang out upon the poop. "Hold hard, men, if you value your lives 1" he cried, and at the sound of his clear command the ring of axes and hammers ceased, and mj- weird blue-light streamed out into the darkness, nickering over a score of white faces, which glared up silently at the boy's figure above them, and tlien in the silence, the light passed on, made a wide track across the still sea, and lit up half the heavens, whilst the masts and rigging, the ropes and ratlines of the doomed whaler stood out against the sky with ghastly distinctness. For a moment the strikers were staggered. They were like men who, robbing a corpse, hcai the dead speak. They had thought ' -' the old 6- 222 |PB^,l- I 1*1* --.-^-Twppsrr- HOW DICK SAVED THE "WRESTLER" ship was a helpless, h'felcss victim, and lo! she had found a voice ni the night, and that voice ordered them nt peril of their lives to forbear. It was a strange thing; and it and the stranger bhie-hght, showing each the blanched /ace of his neighbour, cowed them for a moment, but it was only for a moment. Tlie rascals were some of them English after all, and the race, as a race, fears neither man nor devil. " Who the deuce are you .' And who -Jo you think you're givin' orders to.'" cried the first who found his tongue, in a voice which he tried to make steady. "Richard St, Clair of Scarslcy," answered Dick, "and I bid you leave this slip at once. If you stay, you stay at your own peri!." "Well crowed, Master Richard," answered the man. " I5oys, it's the old skinnint's nephew. It ain't enough that we should be bullied by men ; it sicms we 're to be brow- beaten by b/ats. Say ih^- word, and we'll kill the cub in the nest ! " Rut the men .still hesitated. " Great Scott ! You ain't afraid of a boy and a blue-light, mates, are you? Here! lend me 223 ,'-i~ ;?K»j-^iJT/;'mj(owFT^ .-ifi^ wir*, -n'" » <• n " he cried, and I saw a hot flush come into his cheek as he read some- thing on the second page of it. 231 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP " Thank God ! " he muttered, with a deep sigh of relief. " There, little mother, read it for your- self. I told you a man might be whatever he would," and he handed the Standard to her, marking the place for her with his finger and thumb. For quite a minute he held it there whilst she fumbled for her spectacles, and then, with her thin white hands resting on that stron brown fist of his, she tried hard to spell out the paragraph. But she could not do it. Either her spectacles were dim that morning, or her hands shook so much that Dick could not hold the paper steady; in any case he saw her trouble, and bending down until his yellow hair touched that dear white head, I heard him whisper in her ear — " First, mother." For a moment she looked down the table, seeing no one, unless perhaps it were one dear familiar face which only her eyes could sec, and then, with a little catch in her voice which even her pride could not conceal, she laid her hand on Dick's arm, and rising said, " You will excuse us, Captain Croome, I should like to show this to Dick's uncle myself." 232 f?'-^f^":^i..,in^i«iiw^." "FIRST! MOTHER I" As I opened the door for her I turned my head away, but for all that I know that if Dick had not been tlierc to steer her, she could not have found her way from the breakfast-room to her brother's study. When they had gone of course we pressed Croomc for the news, but he would i ,t tell us. " Wait until he comes back, and ask him," he said, and as they had taken the Standard with them we had to do as he bade us. At last Dick came back to us, old Ikaithwaite leaning on his shoulder, and for the first time I felt certain that beneath the business man's crust of formalism a good warm heart was beating. "Well, Dick, hurry up!" I cried impatiently. " What is it that you have done now } Why have you been keeping it from us V "There is nothing to keep, old boy," he answered, laughing. "I have only passed into Woolwich. I knew I should." " Passed into Woolwich } When .? Plow V " Last week ; at the head of the list." Croome answered for him. " Didn't you know that he was up for it > Didn't he tell you ?" 233 THE OUEENSBERRY CUP "Not a word. Dick, you villain, how did you do it ?" And then he told us all about it, how he had made up his mind to pass, on the day his uncle had consigned him to East India Avenue; how, knowing that the Engineers is almost the only branch of the service in which a man can live without private means, he had worked hard all the holidays, denying himself the out-door pleasures which he loved, and grinding away in his garret until, as he said, he could not sec the walls for maps, and felt as if cube-roots were growing all over him. When at last the examination day ap- proached he would tell no one. He might fail, and he dared not risk his uncle's jeers and his mother's disappointment, so that he had to pawn his dead father's watch to obtain funds for his journey. At the last moment he had half confided in his mother. He would not tell her why or where he was going, but ho cuuld not bear to let her worry about him, so he just whispered in her ear, " I shan't see you for a day or two, mother. Don't ask why, don't ask where I am going, but it 's all right. You 234 •5 "FIRST! MOIHER!" can trust Dick, can't-you, mother?" And she looking into his eyes, knew that she could trust him; and whilst Mr. Braithwaitc was fuming and suspecting all manner of evil, and even I (more shame to me) was beginning to doubt, she had much ado to appear decently troubled about her boy's disappearance. There was only one more week left of our holidays after this, and that went all too fast The day after the events just described we all went down to the slip and saw the ropes still fastened to the ship's supports, saw how the bilge blocks had been .split, and in some instances forced out, and realized perhaps fur the first time how near ;i catastrophe we had been. Another block driven out, or a single haul upon those ropes, would have brought the great whaler crashing over on her side ; but it was not to be, and one day in the middle of the week we all lunched on board he,, and then saw the platform glide away benf ah the green water, saw tiie salt sea rise and kiss her sides, and a little later saw her spread her white wings and sail away towards tiiat mysterious north, from which so much of England's 23s •ppp THE QUEENSBERRY CUP strength came, and towards which the national instinct still turns, in spite of its storms and fields of ice. After this I went back to Fernhall, and Dick began his career as a soldier at Woolwich. Of course I heard from him constantly, but I missed him sadly. The old school was not the same place without him, though there was his work to finish. But even that failed me. Dick had dealt a death blow to bullying before he left Fernhall, and I had no trouble in com- pleting that which he had begun. His name was enrolled amongst our school heroes, and for awhile to be like Dick St. Clair was every boy's ambition. No bully could hope to be that, and so bullying ceased to be. As for me, I did my small part, working in the schools, and making scores for the school eleven, but I hardly cared even for cricket as I used to. There was no Dick, you see, to cheer me when I bowled a wicket, or chaff me when I was hit to leg for six. But perhaps 1 worked all the harder. I had Dick's example before me, and I began to realize that my future success or failure in life 236 "FIRST! MOTHER!" dependc-i upon what I did or left undone at school ; and so towards the end of a term I went up to Oxford, and just managed to lesist the dreamy influences of that dear old place, just managed, and only just, to refuse enough invitations to college breakfasts at Oriel and Brazenose, to go into my " exam." with a clear head, and come out with a decent scholarship. Not that I wanted a scholarship. If I had understood that the winning of it would have tied me even to beautiful Oxford for three years, I would have passed more time boating on the upper river, and enjo^, . .; myself gener- ally ; but I had a vague idea that the winning of a scholarship would propitiate my people, and in some way make my road into the army an easier one, in spite of my awful ignorance of mathematics, which even my most strenuous efforts could not diminish. It was just after the winning of this scholarship that a note came to mc from Dick, congratulating me on my success, and proposing a scheme with which I gladly fell in. 237 THE OUEENSBERRY CUP " Can't you get up to town," he wrote, " for a couple of days to see the Queensberry Cup competed for? We have talked of it all our lives, and one or two men from 'the shop' arc going to compete. I fancy that if you asked the Colonel to let you come up and find the funds for you, he would not say ' No/ now. And besides I want to have a talk to you about the future. Do you see that things are beginning to look very black in Mashonaland ? If the mathematics are still a stumbling-block, there might be a chance for you there. Clive, don't you know, primus in Tndis, did not begin life as a regular soldier." You may be sure that ten minutes after this I was writing to my father, as eloquent a letter as I knew how to pen, and in three days' time the dear old man sent me his permission, a letter to the Head asking for four days' leave of absence (which would not have been granted had I not won the scholarship), and a ten pound note to defray my expenses. There was an incidental allusion in the letter too, to the possibility of business bringing him to town at about the same tin". 238 "FIRST! MOTHER! I have always had a suspicion that my father was as much of a boy at sixty as he was at sixteen, and I have met a good many like him since. They were not the biggest duffers in life's great game either. 239 '.'jWB«»»syr ■•jiifc^ JA-s CHAPTER XIX. LONDON. LONDON was a new world to me, and for the first few minutes the din of it deafened me, the lights of it dazzled me, and all the sordid life of the streets repelled me. But even before we had reached Dick's rooms my first feeling of aversion had worn off. The electricity of the great city thrilled through me : my brain worked quicker : my pulse beat higher : I had already caught the fever of England's mighty centre, where men work harder, play harder, and live faster than anywhere else on earth. I of course am country -bred, and would drive men back if I could upon the land, to rear a great limbed race of country folk such as those from whom England's "thin red line" used to be drawn, but for all that I cannot help being proud of London. 240 ^IV.. ^^.(,W|^ .,H T^tft^^^lJ^^l!^! 4IMU.I^ 1J, JIl.ll LONDON If you want to know what she really is, go away from her to the earth's furthest corners and watch and listen. In the uttermost parts of the sea, in the bowels of the earth, in the babel of the world's markets, it is always " London ! London ! " When the miner on the diamond fields finds his stone of great price, the first question he asks is, " What is this worth, mate, in London ?" The hunter of Arctic foxes,' as he smoothes down the rich fur, repeats the question, " What '"s it worth in London ? " The kings and mighty men, when they weigh the chances of war, ask first, " What will they think of this in London?" The man who wants something almost beyond human skill thinks, "They incy be able to make it for me in London ! " The surgeon, considering some last desperate measure for saving life, muiters, " I 'vc heard of its being done in London!" And every great one, scientist or singer, actor, artist, or athlete, the man who has killed his tens of thousands, and the man who has made his tens of millions, comes alike at last to London. They know in their hearts, each one of them, that the sum of their success in this world is ^ THE QUEENSBERRY CUP recorded in the answer to one question, "What do they think of him in London ? " I l It would make you look 'drawn,' wouldn't it } " I thought so, but even this severe course of discipline did not seem to have taken the spring ^45 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP and elasticity out of my friend. On the con- trary ; he strode down the narrow pavements and slipped in and out amongst the cabs at the crossings, at a pace which soon brought us to a quiet square at the back of Regent Street, Here we stopped in front of a certain door- way, over which was a lamp bearing the mystic words " School of Arms," opened the door with- out knocking, and then passing from the narrow passage through a side door to the right, entered a long, bare chamber, with a gallery running round it where the men dressed and kept their flannels. I followed him, and we stood together in the best boxing rooms in London. At one end of the floor where we entered, a powerful grey- bearded man was playing single-sticks with a tall, slight fellow— as well known in London drawing-rooms as he was in every arena where English sportsmen competed for the first place —whilst at the other end of the floor, in a kind of pen, a short black-haired man, with a broken nose and great stomach, was skipping about like a kitten and requesting his pupil, whose 246 LONDON arms seemed stiff and unvvieldly, to "lead out, lead at my 'ed, and 'it 'arder." This corpulent person with the round, smooth arms was Ned Romilly ; and though his figure looked better suited to an armchair than a prize ring, and his arms more like a woman's than a pugilist's, he was the quickest man on his feet, and probably one of the hardest hitters of his day in England. If you notice, you will see that fat people are generally light on their feet, and the best boxers rarely have a largely developed biceps. Their hitting muscle is behind the shoulder. "Ough!" grunted the fat man, sending out his fist as he sent the air out of his lungs, and knocking his stupid pupil half through the panelling, "that's the way to 'it, Sir George. 'It from the shoulder, don't chop. Good evening, Mr. St. Clair, are you feeling fit.'" and leaving the battered baronet to recover himself, he came to the side of the ring, and leaning over the ropes, shook hands cordially with Dick. Even at this distance of time I can remember quite plainly the size of the hand which the " Professor" afterwards offered to me. His glove (boxing- 247 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP giove of course I mean) would have made a commodious mattress for a moderate-sized man. At the first sound of Dick's name there was a distinct stir in the school of arms. The old swordsman and his pupil stopped playing and took off their masks, half-a-dozen heads were crancl over the gallery balustrade, and a small boy of nine or ten half opened the door, looked in at Ned for a mor.ient, and then with a mysterious wink closed it again and vanished. Evidently St. Clair was a name to conjure with in the boxing-room in Lucre Square. " Well, Ned, has my man turned up ? " Dick asked, looking round as if expecting lo see someone waiting for h'm. "No, 'e 'asn't," replied the pugilist. "The silly fool gut fightin' in Smil'.;f;eld last night, and broke 'is nose. That's the worst of Jew prize fighters, they're all too nosey. You can't look rt 'cm without 'urtin' their smellers." " But wl. ' am I to do .? Will you give mc a turn ? ' asked Dick, with some irritation. " No, I won't," replied Ned, " I ain't goin' to spar loose with anybody to-night, least of all with you. I ''.1 goin to a dance by and by, and 248 ik LONDON I don't want no black eyes, and besides, I 've eaten a beefsteak puddin' as my missus made, and don't feel like fightin', but 'ere 's a man 'ere as does, Mr. Campbell, this is Mr. St. Clair, the gentlemen that 's goin' to win me the heavy- weight cup. Mr. St. Clair, Mr. Campbell," and Ned -vaved his hands and bowed with a florid grace of manner peculiar to him, a manner acquired in many city and suburban dancing- zooms, where, in his spare moments, Ned delighted to officiate as M.C. Many and many a time has Ned invited me to see him "dance the polka," and many a time have I gazed in awe at the skill with which he used to revolve round his own waistcoat in the fashionable " trawtom," and listened to his oft-repeated dictum, "A good boxer ought to be a good dancer, because it 's all in a man's feet. Quick 'ands ain't no good if your feet nre slow," Ned's feet were as light as his huge paws were heav}-. Hut away with reminiscences of Ned's hands. Even at this distance of time the mere mention of them makes my head ache. 249 • T^F-"-^ .'C CHAPTER XX. A DARK HORSE. IT is all very well for you to s.iy that you won't box with .ue, Romilly," said Dick angrily, " but I must have a spar." "So you shall, diiln'i; I say so.' This gentle- man will oblige you." " Yes, I shall be very glad to have three rounds with you, sir," said the man introduced ;i,s Campbell, a man at Hrst sight below the medium height, and ol' no great chest develop- ment, dressed quietly and well, and with that inimitable smartness, which together with the "drilled" look of his figure, suggested at once that he had been or still was " in the service." Uick looked at him and I think liked him, for though he was very distant as a rule with strangers, he unbent at once with him, and said very civilly, "It's very good of you, but you 250 T A DARK HORSE don't know Ned. lie has no conscience, and wants to let you in for a rough and tumble which you might not care about." " Oh, as to that," replied Campbell, " the rougher the better ! I don't mind how rough a spar is." Dick looked at the carefully-waxed moustache of the speaker, at his neat button-hole, his pointed, patent leather boots, his irreproachable hat and gloves, and seeing Ned's great face beyond, wrinkled with a mischievous grin which he fancied he understood, he gave the stranger one more chance. " I was to have had a fellow here from Smith- ikid to-night, a second-rate professional, to give me a really hot set-to to try my condition. This is to be my last bout before I compete for the Queensberry heavy-weights." " The heavy-weights ! Are you over eleven stone four.''" asked Campbell. "I should not have thought it." " I am though, just over, and so, I suppose, are you," he added, after a pause, looking more critically at Campbell's square-built frame, " I am, rather ! Well, as your man has not 25 1 THE (2UEENSI3ERRY CUP come, shall wc have a turn ? It '11 do you good. I'll make it as hot for you as I can," and the fellow twirled his moustache and grinned confidently. I think Dick was a little nettled, cither by his coolness or by a doubt which had crept into his mind that Ned was not playing straight with him. As for me, I thought the soldier-man a most conceited person, and expected to see him come utterly to grief in the long run, even if he had the strength to stand up to Dick for a whole round, which I doubted. But Dick was a better judge than I was, for on our way upstairs to the gallery to undress he whispered — " I wonder who the beggar is ? He looks a tough customer, and he is hall-marked ! " " Hall-marked, Dick," said I. " What do you mean ? " " He has had the bridge of his nose broken. Don't you know the hall-mark of the ' fancy ' " > replied Dick. "He may have had that done in a dozen ways, Dick. He is no boxer ! " I answered scornfully. "He looks soft!" "He knew the weights though, didn't he? 352 T A DARK HORSE i » laughed Dick, who was bending down to lace up his tennis shoes and tuck the bottoms of his flannels into his socks. "Well," he said, straightening himself and taking my arm, and " come sec," and together we went down into the boxing room, where Campbell was waiting for us. We had not been in the gallery five minutes, and yet though the long room was almost empty when we went upstairs, it was quite crowded when we came down again ; crowded too with men whose drcs,3 and bearing marked them at once as no more casuals who had dropped in by chance. " There is Sir Frederick, poet and lawyer, and better even with the point of a rapier than a point of law," whispered Dick, " and there 's II., the chess player, alongside of our only tragedian. This is what that brute Romilly calls giving me a pyi7'atc tiial. I would rather break his head, I think, than win the cup — and I say, look at that ! " "That" was Campbell, who like Dick had got into a pair of flannels and a thin, white vest, and was at the moment of our arrival 253 THE OUEENSBERRY CUP carefully depositing a row of three false front teeth upon the mantelshelf over the fireplace. " I can't afford to swallow my pearls," he said laughing, as he saw our eyes upon him, " and you warned me that we should have a hot set-to, you know. Are you quite ready }" " Quite ! " replied Dick, and as I pulled his gloves on him he uttered, " Looks like business, Ion, doesn't he ? " I was obliged to admit that Campbell cer- tainly did look very much like business. I don't know that his change of costume had made him look any taller than before, but the tight-fitting jersey showed off the enormous chest of the man to great advantage, whilst his long, bare arms, as hairy as a chimpanzee's, hung down until the fingers almost reached to his knee-caps. Just then Ned, who had been out with a client for a moment to keep up his .spirits by pouring spirits down, roared across the room, " Now then, Mr. St. Clair, you ain't afraid of such a little 'un, arc you } " Under all those eyes Dick flushed hotly and bit his lip angrily. Ned's familiarity annoyed 354 A DARK HORSE him, and any suggestion of drinking filled him with angry scorn. He used always to say that the chief charm of all athletic exercises was the necessity they laid upon a man of keeping himself clean from all kinds of intemperance, amongst which he numbered drinking and smoking, in however moderate a degree. But though annoyed he went into the little rinc quietly enough. He always was quiet and undemonstrative in a contest, whether it was a tennis match or a death struggle. You could never tell from Dick's face whether he was winning or losing, or whether he cared a brass farthing whether he won or lost. " Too small a ring for the boy," I heard one of the clubmen whisper, as the two faced each other. " Ned ought to have given him a twenty-four foot ring. Fighting in that ring is like fighting in a railway carriage." "Yes," another answered, "his only chance with Campbell would be to stick to out-fighting. The fellow is a pocket Hercules ; he beat the " ]kit the lest was drowned in bravos, as Dick instead of giving way before Campbell's rush, 255 THE QUEENSBERRY CUT countered him twice heav-iy, and then led again with a beautiful long-shot which was too quick for the older man. ^ " By Jove ! he has got a good left hand • Confound the fellow '• " The first half of the sentence was a tribute to my friend's quickness ; the second an anathema in which many joined (and I amongst them), hurled at Campbell. Dick who was evidently not yet quite certain whether he ought to spare his man, or do his best to protect himself against one who was at least his equal, had been sparring cautiously for an opening, when, without a second's warning, a strange thing (in those days) happened. Campbell, of course, was standing as a boxer should. ..ith his left hand and left foot to the front, his right hand guarding his body ; but as Dick came within range he spun round on his right heel, turning his back to his enemy, and swung his long right arm round like a flail, catching Dick a terrific back-hander on the bottom of his jaw, which knocked him down liUe a pole-axed steer. It was the dreaded pivot blow, recently introduced in America, 256 C'.wiri;!' i.r. ;W Ar. siamiim. as a IIuM-.u •-icniii. /■,(V,- AV'. II^IF^^^~~'-"T" A DARK HORSE which, though it is contrary to all our pre- conceived ideas of good form in boxin- is terribly effective against a novice. For a good many seconds Dick lay where he had fallen, in a heap upon his face, and I think- no one expected to see him come up again to the scratch ; but he rose at last and staggered towards his man. Just then Ned Romilly called " time," and the two men went to their corners for a minute to rest. For the next two rounds Campbell had the spar to himself. It was all Dick could do to keep his head up, and came again twice before it was all over he heavily to the ground, though it was so. Til Campbell's fault that he did turs and Ned both did their best to hardly c specta- leavc the ring, but h get him to c would not, though lu could do little more than 1> cep his face to tlu foe, and smile good-naturedly at cver\- fresh blow he received. He was too stunned and dizzy to fight, but too stubborn to When it was over and I give m. was leadino- poor old Dick away, I heard one man say to another e is not much good after all. Campbell H did as he liked with h UTl, '-S7 "JlJlfllJJl 'ou have bet twenty-five pounds on my winning the cup,' Thank you. There will be some consolation for me, then if I lose it. It will teach you not to treat P"()i!s as if the)- were mere race-horses." \-our '['.■en \-ou won't object.'" i d see you hanged fir.st!" replied Dick, 'lu! turning on his heel he left I 271 lim to meditate IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) V /. 1.0 U 1.25 ..„ Mas m^s It lifi 12.0 1.8 U il.c V] <^ /^ ^;. 7 Photographic Sciences Corporation S: Then ? Why do you know that seeing those boys at work makes me want to go into the ring and have a turn with them even now. Do they ever box in Africa, Courtney } " "Yes, they box a bit at Cape Town," replied his friend, a wiry, weather-worn man of forty, with a frank, kindly look in his honest blue eyes. " I wonder where they don't box where they speak English. There was a follow named Campbell there, who was quite a star in the profession." 274 HOW THE CUP WAS WON "I've met Campbell!" broke in Dick. "[ mistook him for a novice." "And what happened ?" asked Courtney. " Locomotive engines," laughed Dick. " That is to say, that all 1 remember of the three rounds was a puffing and snorting which followed me all round the ring, and a hideous 'beat,' 'beat,' which makes my head ache yet." The two men laughed, and the General said : " You did not beat him as easily as you beat Bourne, then ? " " No, sir. Campbell did all the beating." " Who do yen meet in the next bout .'" "There is only one more, the final. I meet Crowther." " Can you beat him ? " "I don't know; I shall try." "VVell, he is a very big fellow for you to tackle. I think, if I may advise, that I should let him do most of the leading at first. He may tire. Big men generally do." "I am afraid Crowther wont. He is always in good condition, though he never deserves to be. Nothing ever puts him out of condition." 275 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP " You know him then ? " asked Courtney. "He is a friend of yours?" " I was at school with him, but wc are not friends," replied Dick shortly, and the con- versation drifted into another channel, and remained there until the finals of the Queens- berry heavy-weights were called, and Dick once more stripped and went into the ring. " Remember the family motto, Dick," said my father as he left us, and thouf;h Dick made no answer, his face showed that he had heard him. " What is the family motto } " asked the General. " Fight," replied my father. " By George ! It couldn't be shorter or better ; and the boy looks as if he could wear it." " He can if anyone can. Watch him now ! " and both men ceased speaking and turned their whole attention to the ring. When Dick and Crowther entered the ring there was a roar of appla.ise and clapping of hands. Now as they stood facing each other a dead silence, the silence of expectation, fell upon the great crowd of spectators. 276 HOW THi: CUP WAS WON Two more perfect .specimens of young manhood probably never stood face to face. Crowther tall, broad, and muscular, his great frame still lissom from extreme youth, but his bull neck and huge limbs already giving promise of the monster he would soon become, and Dick nearly as tall but lighter built, broad in the shoulders, long in the arm, light in the quarters, sinewy and quick and graceful as an Apollo, carrying his head high like the thorough-bred he was. "Never saw a fellow stand better in my life. Didn't know a man could stand so well," muttered the General ; " but why don't they shake hands." Dick had orfcred his, but Crowther fur a moment seemed unwilling to take it. He had not forgotten the scene on the Slowton rail way platform. However, a peremptory " Shake hand.s, gentlemen," from one of the judges brought him to his senses, and he went through the ceremony with as little cordiality as possible. And then they went to \^ork, every eye in that great crowd fixed upon them, their eyes 277 THE OUEEN.SIJKRRY CUI' seeing nothing but each other, their mouths shut tight, and their hands in gentle, cease- less motion, like the tails of tigers before they make their spring, every movement light and free and catlike, their feet kissing the turf, not trampling it. Round and round they went, always circling to the right, now one trying a feint, now the otlier, but for a while neither of them seeing an opening. Then Crowther led, as Ned Romilly taught men to lead, with a quick, savage lunge, his left arm straightening itself as his whole body shot forward from his right foot, his head bent a little to the right, but his eyes still on his opponent's. At the same instant Dick lunged, but both men had been too well taught by the same master. Each left hand but brushed the right cheek of the head it was aimed at, and again both men were on guard. The next moment they were countering heavily, and their blows came too quickly almost for the spectators' eyes to follow them, only the heavy sound of them seemed incessant. Then they sprang apart again panting, but apparently unhurt, until Dick, feinting with his left, and coming in on 278 w «■■ HOW THE CUF WAS WON the ribs with his right, was met by a tei-rific left-hander full in the face, which sent him reeling across the ring, and before he could gather himself together Crovvther was upon him, hitting with such force that the lighter man could not stand before him, but even- tually staggered helplessly back on to the ropes, where for a second he seemed to hang inert. Now was the big man's chance, and seizing it relentlessly he dashed in to follow up his advan- tage ; but Dick, though distressed, was not spent yet. With a quick side step he seemed to slide from under the great bulk of his enemy, and putting in a stinging left-hander on the red head as he passed, he stood once more facing his man in the middle of the ring, a quiet, easy smile on his dear old face. That smile irritated Crowther, who, emboldened by his first success, abandoned caution, and did his utmost to force his man again to the ropes. I thought that the particular left-hander which followed would almost have knocked Dick's head off. I never saw a blow sent in with more force and " vice "' ; but Dick saw it 279 ^1^" THE QUEENSBERRY CUP coming, and this time, instead of countering, came in to meet it, bending his head ever so little to one side as he came in. Certainly he judged that blow to a hair's breadth. Crowthcr's knuckles brushed his cheek and bruised his ear, but the force of it was spent on air; while Dick, using every muscle to the utmost, from the ball of his foot to his shoulder, cut upwards with his left, and catching Crowthcr fairly between the eyes, as his head came forward in the lunge, lifted him clean off his feet, and brought him down with a great crash, half-stunned, upon his back. I don't believe that my father ever missed his right hand as much as he did at that moment, and I did not notice until afterwards that in his enthusiasm he Iiad been battering in the toe of my boot with his cane in his frantic endeavours to applaud. All this had taken but a minute and a half, and there was another minute and a half left in which to fight, but when Crowther staggered to his feet, it was obvious that he at any rate could not make much use of the time. His head was swinging, his legs were unsteady, he could hardly raise 280 W__II.|P l^.i. now TflK CUl' WAS WON his hands, in the wo.ds of the ring he was ahnost "knocked out." One more blow, and that an easy one to i,M'vc, would stretch Iiiin senseless, whil.st men counted si.xty, and Dick St. Clair would be hailed as winner of the heavy-wci " In the middle of a ring of laughing girls and 291 THE QUEENSBERRY CUP women — fair-haired, modest-looking English girls and women mind you, some of the latter with their husbands by their sides, and little children clinging to their skirts, was an under- sized London gutter-snipe, the mean face of the man pinched by poverty and blurred by drink. The miserable fellow had twisted his dirty clothes into some sort of mimicry of a parson's dress. On his head was the orthodox top-hat, round his throat a soiled handkerchief did duty for the white cravat " of the cloth," while in his hand was the IJook on which the Church of England rests, and from it he was coining foully blasphemous obscenities for the amuse- ment of an English audience on Sunday afternoon, his partner meanwhile taking round a hat for coppers. Surely Judas hardly earned his cursed money worse. " Come away, Richard ! For God's sake come away ! " cried Braithwaite. " Take no notice of the scoundrel ! " " Take no notice, uncle } " gasped Dick. " Am I English and a Christian that you dare tell me to take no notice of that ? " 292 T FOR GOD " It can do no good, boy ; and think what the world will say if you make a scandal." " Curse the world ! " hissed Dick. " Let me go ! " and he shook himself free. "Think of the papers, Dick, and your mother." But at that moment a little girl of six, with yellow curly hair and such blue eyes as God makes to remind us of heaven, toddled into the ring. " Suffer little children to come unto Me," quoted the gutter-snipe, as the child's mother, feeling shame too late, tried in vain to drag her back. "Now, my little hinnercence," he went on, laying a foul paw on *"^'e yellow head, and blinking down into the pure child's eyes, " can't you tell me what Hadom did then } But p'raps you ain't old enough for the gay gentlemen to 'ave told you yet." And then he answered his riddle for himself, amidst shouts of laughter and applause, at the expense of our first mother, sweet Eve; and though I have heard many a coarse joke since in Western mining camps and American saloons, 293 ^ THE nUEENSBERRY CUP I have never yet heard coarser, fouler jokes than those which set a crowd of English men and women laughing at the Bible in Hyde Park that Sunday afternoon. 13ut the laughter was short-lived. The spirit of pure dear old Mother I':ngland was there even in that mean crowd. With a cry like the cry of a hurt lion Dick sprang into their midst, and before the gutter-snipe had more than licked his foul chops after delivering Ins last obscenity, a pair of clean young English hands- such hands, boys, as built your England— twisted themselves into the blackguard's neckcloth, and hurled him, as if he had been a man of straw, head over heels into the frightened crowd. But the crowd rallied, and the partner with the hat came to the front. He knew he had his audience with him, against a man who looked like a gentleman. "Oo are you a-'ittin', you bloomin' lord.'" he cried, having emptied the coppers first into his trousers pocket. " Let 's see you 'it one of your own size!" and he threw him.self into what he appeared to consider a i)erfect fighting attitude, and beat the ground behind him (as 294 FOR GOD the costers do) with his right foot like an angry rabbit. Tile man was a big man, but bloated with drink and incapable, and Dick looked at him coldly without moving. He had no mind to fight such a thing unless he was obliged to, but there was something he wanted to say to that jeering crowd and if the fellow stood between him and his wi.'l, he would have to take the consequences. But he stood still until the fellow thought him afraid, and, cheered by cries of "Chuck 'im out !" " Knock 'is face in ! " rushed in to do his patrons' will. Quick as light Dick caught his clumsy blow as it came, clung to his wrist, and then using a well-known "catch," drew the big man to him, and bending suddenly sent him rocketing over his shoulder into the crowd. It was quickly done, so quickly that there seemed to be hardly any struggle, and yet when Dick turned passionately on the crowd one of his eyes had received an injury from which it never recovered. But this he did not know until afterwards. 29s THE OUEENSBERRY CUF His whole heart then was too full of indicrnation to leave any room for thought of self, " You blackguards ! " he cried, as he faced the crowd. " Is this a place to bring your women to ? Is it from such scoundrels as that "—and he pointed to the grovelling figure of his foe — " that you expect them to learn their duty as mothers of Englishmen ? " A sullen growl came from the crowd, and some one bolder than the rest cried, " Go for a bobby ! Pitch the beggar out ! We don't want any of his prayer-meeting sort ! " " Pitch me out ! " cried Dick. " No, no ! that would be men's work. You are not men. The men who fight arc the men who pray, not the things who encourage filth, and bring their women and children to listen to it. Good heavens, you women ! don't you know that Christ died for you } that your only hope of your men's respect and your children's love is to live as lie taught you to.' Don't you fellows know that the men who made it a proud boast to say, ' I am English,' lived by the Bible, died for the Bible, and based every hope for this life and the next upon the Bible's teaching. And 296 I FOR GOD this Book"— and he raised the battered volume reverently from the ground — "the corner-stone of England, is made the jest of a gutter-snipe by your permission. For shame ! You are no Englishmen ! " " I can't have any one a makin' a disturbance in the Park, sir, and these men have laid a charge of assault against you," said a voice at Dick's shoulder. ^' You 'd better come along quietly, and see the Superintendent," and as he spoke the policeman let a faint jingle of steel remind Dick that he carried "the bracelets" somewhere handy for any one who would not peaceably submit to his orders. Dick glanced round him, and decided in a moment that the policeman was right. It was no good staying to say more. The crowd, ashamed of itself, and afraid of the policeman, was slinking away, and though there were knots of loungers all over the grass, ii: was already hard to say which of them had really been parts of the original gutter-snipe's audience. There was no one left even upon whom Dick felt that he could call for evidence in his behalf. Iwen Mr. Braithwaite bad fled before the fear 297 i THE QUEENSBERRV CUP of a public newspaper scandal — that terror before which English courage is most apt to evaporate. "All right, Sergeant," Dick said. "I will come quietly of course. There is my card, but I should be much obliged if you would let me walk on a little ahead of you." "Certainly, sir," said the Sergeant, and the four set out towards the Police Station at Iliah Street, where after a very short investigation, Dick was told that he had better have a talk with the "two gentlemen," and arrange the matter without letting it go into court. Dick's moral crusade in Hyde Park cost him exactly two sovereigns, a new top hat (25,s. at Heath's), a//d his commission ; for the day after the trouble in Hyde Park, his right eye became inflamed, in two days he was nearly blind, and at the end of several months the best optician in London had done so much for him that he could sec to read and write, and even to shoot a little, but not well enough to pass the physical tests ncccs.sary for an officer passing tlirough Woolwich. The gutter-snipe's nails had done more harm 298 FOR (iOD , than the might of Crovvther could have ac- complishec'.. In serving God it seemed as if Dick had forfeited his right to scr\e the Oiicen. Ikit God, thougli we can'; see Mini some- times through the fogs of London, sees us, and rewards Mis soldiers even in this worli. Let me tell you of Dick's reward. 299 CHAPTER XXIV. FOR QUEEN AND COUNTRY. T PLvVE but one more chapter to write, and -■- then I shall have done with. Dick upon earth, though I pray that I may so live as to meet him again where God has fresh battles for brave men to fight, new work for strong men to do. Not only do I still sit beneath the old shield at Scarsley, but I know now what I used not to be able to understand, I know why the ship in the last quarter of it is still sailing on. Dick's work is not done yet, his ship is still sailing on, there is no rest for such as he. If there were, heaven itself would be a hell to them. Do you remember that I mentioned Courtney, a man we both met with the General at the Quecnsberry competition ? On that occasion he prophesied that trouble was brewing in 300 FOR C2UEEN AND COUNTRY Mashonaland, and I noticed that the General and my father listened to him as to one whose prophecies could be relied on. They knew their man, as England knows him now, for one who understands Africa as few men have understood it, and who has done more to make our race respected in that dark continent than any man of his time. All through the summer, whilst the doctors were tinkering with Dick's eyesight, the trouble in Africa grew, until at last the Chartered Company found that it must cither fight or fly. Being English, and a worthy peer of these two great companies (John Company and the Hudson Bay), -.vhich have won empire cast and west for England, the Chartered Company made up its mind to fight, and Dick reading the rumours of war, and looking round despairingly with his dim e}'es for some place in the world in which he might fulfil his destiny, saw his chance in Africa, remembered Courtney, and wrote to him at once. lie told him his whole story since the Oueensberry competition in plain, straight- forward fashion, and asked for such help and advice as he could give. Courtney's answer THE OUEENSBERRY CUP was characteristic, written in the big, bold hand of a man more used to holding a rifle than a pen. " I was to have started next week," he wrote, " for a shoot in America, but I cannot leave the boys now they arc in trouble. The little thirty three which should have killed wapiti will come in liandy for Kaffirs. I am going down home to-morrow. Meet me on the platform. You '11 know me by my hat if you have forgotten my face. Rhodes I expect wants all the good men he can get, though he has no room for duffers." It is needless to say that the next day, Dick marked down that wide brimmed African sombrero on the platform, and went with its owner to his beautiful old home by the Thames, and there in a room piled high with trophies of the chase, lions' masks and skins, the white tusks of bull elephants, and the curled horns of a hundred antelopes, talked matters over and decided to go out with his friend. Early in November he was at Boluvvayo ; London and its teeming streets, and his own peaceful home at Scarsley almost forgotten, or 302 FOR QUEEN AND COUNTRY at most appearing to him only as memories of another state of existence. The whole world for him had changed in a few weeks, but the spirit within him remained unchanged, and the fearless picked men amongst whom he found himself suited him exactly, as he suited them. At Boluwayo in '93 there was no room for incapables, and there were no incapables found there. About the middle of the month of November, the great king hunt which closed the Matabele war commenced. Lobengula was in retreat, and Major Forbes was collecting a little army only 300 strong, to follow the tracks of the king's waggon, and if possible capture the king himself. Partly owing to his own merits, his grand physique and fearless bravery, and partly perhaps to Courtney's influence, Dick found his v/ay into the little army, and left Inyati with it on the 14th of November. That was no picnic upon which the 300 started. Their whole impedimenta consisted of a hundred cartridges and a police cape per man, though the country through which they had to pass was densely 303 »»>li;i«IT«'.," '" ".^.T'll-' * ■'»',l .■!-»- "S'A '-.l»uj»i4»;tsji.tiepiui»-',il*H*Wi ,tP .t-^l IJMW3|r]»(BW"iwIl"*" ■t w»»» .-II- Kw/ yjppw ^ THE OUEENSBERRY CUT wooded in parts, cut up by rivers, and the tropical rains were already coming on. All about the tracks of the flying king were death and the signs of death. In the long grass lay the bodies of men and slaughtered cattle. Smallpox had been busy with the Matabele, busier even than the rifles of the white men, and the forest air was putrid with the exhalations of corruption. Now and again the three hundred caught a glimpse of natives by the road, but they vanished as the white men approached. There were some skirmishes, but not many. As a rule the pursuers only felt that a cloud of stealthy, swift-footed foes hovered incessantly near them, a vast but invisible mass which fled silently through the forest as they approached, growing more numerous and bolder day by day. At any moment a bullet from an unseen foe might quench the bravest life ; the incessant marching through thick places wearied the men ; the want of food weakened them, and at night they had to stand in the pelting rain at their tired horses' heads, or lie in pools of water trying to sleep. For the African rains had 304 ''"I'JJJdWJIHL P:. FOR QUEEN AND COUNTRY commenced, and were soaking through them until their very bones began to soften, and the strength of the hardiest was washed out of them. Even when they built themselves a fire to dry their clothes by, they liad to build cairns of stone round the fire that they might keep their feet out of the water whilst they dried tlieir bodies. And yet they never lost heart. To Dick, and probably to most of the men his comrades, there was some compensation in the savage beauty of the surroundings ; in the occasional dash after cattle ; in those rare skirmishes when tiie Matabcle ventured for a few minutes to give battle ; in the thousand and one new forms of life which surrounded their path ; and in the majestic chorus of the lions at night, which made the very forest leaves tremble with its full-throated, awful music. More than once they came upon kraals still warm with the life wnich had just streamed from them into the bush, or upon mission stations wrecked and ruined by the very men for whose benefit they had been built. Jkit ^ 305 THE nUEENSBERRY CUP thourjh the chase was a long one there were sifTiis that it was ncarinp the end. At first the king was reported as being now sixty, now forty miles ahead ; later on the distances grew less ; the king's cainp was only twenty, some- times only twelve miles in advance of his pursuers, and towards the end of the month his camp fires were seen more than once ; but though when this occurred the lean, worn men who were upon his track pushed forward through the bush as quickly as British skirmishers could, they were always too late. When they reached the camp fires, those who had made them had vanished, and not a breaking twig or the rustle of trodden grass betrayed the way they had On the third of December the main body of white men camped by the Tchangani river, a rapid stream 150 yards wide, and so confident were they that now at last the king was almost within their reach, that though the dark was coming down, a small patrol party, the very flower of that little army, was sent across the river to see which way the enemy had gone. Thanks to his youth, his temperate life, and his 306 !■ «P<«P FOR QUEEN AND COUNTRY years of training, Dick had stood tlic work of the last fortnight better than most of his fellows, so that he had the luck to be included in this chosen band. The river was full of crocodiles, but no man recked of these. Death and danger had become familiar to these men, and they waded or swam thcTchangani as if it contained no living thing more dangerous than a croaking frog. On the other side the river, darkness fell, and yet in spite of the silence and the darkness the whole forest seemed to be alive. Indefinite shapes moved through it, soft - footed things stole across the trail ; they felt, though they could not see, that their footsteps were dogged, their every Uiovement watched. So dark did the night become that the men had to grope on their knees and feel for the waggon-tracks. They guided theinselves by touch, they could no longer guide themselves by sight. And at last in the blackness before them the swift-footed prisoner, who led them, pointed to the king's kraal. At first they could see nothing. The darkness seemed absolutely solid, but the thirteui who represented England could hear the rustle of 307 Till". nUEENSHKRKV CL'T many foct in the enclosure In front of them, and knew that tlieir guide spoke the truth. The African King was there in front of them. They had followed the lion to his lair in the very heart of an African night. What his strength was, how many his followers were, they never stopped to think. With the superb insolence which comes of centuries of victory, one man went forward and called to a people to give up their king. It was but a small thing to hear, that voice in the vast silent forest, but even the Matabelc knew its power. It was the voice of the Queen of nations, the voice of England. For answer, the thirteen who listened, heard the rustle inside the kraal grow louder, as if a hive of wasps was rousing itself for action ; they heard the clicking of a hundred locks as the Matabelc cocked their rifles, and, worse than all, they heard the rush of swift-footed, unseen foes who poured past them in the darkness into the kraal. The men whom they had passed on their way were gathering in hundreds round their king. The children of the night and the forest were making them ready for battle. 308 FOR nUEEN AND COUNTRY And then the thirteen withdrew. They would not give up their quest ; they were ready to fight at any odds. The greater the odds the greater the glory of victory ; but their chief had men's lives in his hands to guard, and at least he would let them have daylight to fight by. So for the rest of that night they stood in utter silence waiting for the dawn, no man seeing his fellow's face in the darkness, r.o man hearing anything more cheering than the forest whispers and the ceaseless swish of the rain. Two men were sent back for reinforcements to the main body beyond the Tchangani river, and just before dawn these reinforcements came. When the first red tla.sh burst from the darkness of that African jungle there were thirty-three heroes waiting to die for I'-ngland. Hut amongst them there were three who were not her's. Hravt' men those as aii\- iherc, .md bred from the same i;;illant stock; hut ihes' were America's and not luigl.md's, and Wilsnn sent them back to take word of his plight to Forbes, where he lay hemmed in by foes beyond the river. 309 THE QUEENSBERRV CUP Probably few but frontier men such as they were could have made their way back, even then, through those "humming" hordes of Matabelc, but they won their way to the river at last, and the message they gave their chief was worth taking. When he asked them why Wilson and his men, such as had horses still alive, had not also fled and saved their lives, do you remember their answer ?— "They could not all have escaped, and Wilson's men were not the sort to leave their chums." No, lads, and be sure of it, when the great war comes, if it ever comes, when the children of England are arrayed against the rest of the world, be sure that men of the same race as those scouts will be found, at bottom Engli.sh too, "not the sort of men to leave their chums." There will be little chance for the rest of the world when the great West, rememberitig old ties and pride of race, stands ..houlder to shoulder with the old folk at home. It would be worth the greatest war the world ever saw to bring back all her children again to their grey old mother. 310 FOR UUKKN AN] J C( UNTRV After the scout;; had gone, the end caine quickly. The dayliglit as it grew, showed the Matabelc the mere handful against which they had to fight, though it showed our men too where to put their bullets. Behind Wilson's party was a long, open valley, girt in with dense bush, and in the middle of it a huge ant heap. To this ant heap the patrol party retired, losing some more horses as they went, whilst waves of Matabelc swept after them and round them through the bush. As long as a cartridge was i;jft our men kept that valley clear of foes. To put foot in it was to die, but one by one they too sank behind their horses until in front of them was a rampart of their own dead. At the last moment the forest in their rear belched out another regiment of blacks, men who had come up from the ri\er, and okl Dick who, though he was slowly bleeding to death from a score of wounds, was still able to kneel and load for a comrade, saw the black wave; closing in, and heard the hoarse yells of th; leaders. 3" . THE OUEENSBERRY CUP " At them with the assegai ! " " Stab at close quarters ! " In spite of the odds against him, Alan Wilson stopped the Matabelc rush just once more. Calmly, r.s T .,^n parade, every man put his last cai'- ■ o the breech, came to the shoulder, and al Wilson's word " l^'ire I " the whole of that little square broke and blossomed into flame. The men listening by the Tchangani heard one volley and then silence. They were too far off to hear what followed, but a Matabelc has told us. When the last shot had been hred there was nothing left but to die as Kn(;Tlishmcn know how to die, VV'ilson knew how to fig' ; ;.. >• knew too how to die. I h. 'l •;(-; of any man who knew (}uitc so ux When tlic black" waves of de.J'i and his men, wan, weak, bleeding to death, staggered to their feet, their revohcrs gripprd in their honest right hands, their caps held reve- rently in 'heir left, and with calm, brave eyes fixed steadily on the rusi f 7 thousand foes, 312 better ; he vet heard •-!('d in, li(.> i FOR OUEEN AND COUNTRY hands still ready to fi^ht, noble English hearts turned to their homes, they met death singing, "GOD SAVE THE QUEEN." * * * * Good-bye, Dick. \Vc who loved you would fain have had you with us until our lives end, but being such as you were, we know that death could never have come to you in more welcome fashion than he came then, when your hot, young blood was full of the fire of battle, and your loyal English heart of that pride of race which rings through every line of our glorious National Anthem. The old Norse religion of your Viking fore- fathers, which Carlyle calls "the consecration of valour," has been replaced by a nobler religion to-day, but the glory of the old faith lives on still in the new ; and you, and gallant Alan Wilson and his comrades, have taught us that the English of to-day are true linglish still. It is a lesson worth dying to teach. Nn'l'lC — The autlicir ;ipi)l(igizcs I'm luivini; iiur'» uhich his hny-lieio cmild liave (lie CLASSICAL TRANSLATIONS, . 32 SEPTEMBER 1895 SErj'EMBER 1895. Messrs. Methuen's ANNOUNCEMENTS Poetry and Belles Lettres RUDTARD EIPLINQ BALLADS. By Rudyard Kipling. Cro^vn Zvo. Buckratn, 6j. Also 200 copies on hand-made paper. 2ix. Also 35 copies on Japanese vellum. 42J. The exceptional success of ' Barrack-Room Ballads,' with which this volume will be uniform, justifies the hope that the new book too will obtain a wide popularity. W. E. HENLEY ENGLISH LYRICS. Selected and Edited by W. E. Henley, Crown Svo. Buckram. 6s. Also 30 copies on hand-made paper Demy Svo. 2is. Few announcements will be more welcome to lovers of English verse than the one that Mr. Henley is bringing together into one book the finest lyrics in our language. The book will be produced with the same care that made ' Lyra Heroic* ' delightful to the hand and eye. ANDREW LANQ THE POEMS OF ROBERT BURNS. Edited, with Intro- duction, etc., by Andrew Lang. With Portraits. Crown Svo 6s. Also 75 copies on hand-made paper. Demy Svo. 21s. This edition will contain a carefully collated Text and Notes on the Text, a critical and Biographical Introduction, Introductory Notes to the Poems, !ind a Glossary. Mfliii Messrs, Mkthuen's Annoucements 3 EGBERT LOUIS STEVENSON VAILIMA LETTERS. By RonERT Louis Stevenson. With an Etched Portrait by William Strang, and other Illustra- tions. Crown 8vo. Bucki am. "js. 6J. Also 125 copies on hand-made paper. Demy 8vo. 2^s. A series of long journal letters written from Samoa to Mr. Sidney Colvin during I lie last five years. They form an autobiography of Mr. Stevenson during this period, giving a full account of his daily life and literary work and ambitions. Mr. Colvin has written a Prologue and Epilogue, and has added numerous notes. ENGLISH CLASSICS Edited by W. E. Henley. The books, which are designed and printed by Messrs. Constable, are issued in two editions— (i) A small edition, on the finest J.ipanese vellum, limited in most cases to 25 copies, demy 8vo, lis. a volume nett ; (2) The popular edition on laid paper, crown 8vo, buckram, 3s. 6d. a v.jlume. NEW VOLUMES. THE LIVES OF DONNE, WOTTON, HOOKER, HERBERT, AND SANDER.SON. By I7..\ak Walton. With an Introduction by Vernon Blackhurn, and a Portrait. THE LIVES OF THE ENGLISH POETS. By Samuel Johnson, LL.D. With an Introduction by John Hei'hurn Millar, and a Portrait. 3 vch. W. M. DIXON A PRIMER OF TENNYSON. By W. M. 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I'idili-d by a scliolar who has made this peiiod his special study, and issued in .1 convenient form ar.d at a moderate pi ice, this edition should till an obviou: void. The volumes wdl be issued at inttiNals ot a (ew months. 8 Messrs. Methuen's Announcements E L. S. HORSBURGH THE CAMPAIGN OF WATERLOO. By E. L. S. HOKS- BURGH, B.A. With Plans. Cio-.'tt 8vo. ^s. This is a full account of the final struggle of N.ipoleon, and contains a careful stii'ly from a strategli.al point ol view of tlie inoicmeiits of the I''rench and allied armies. FLINDERS PETRIE EGYPTIAN DECORATIVE ART. By W. M. Flinders Petrir, D.C.L. With 120 J/hislrafions. Ovu'it Sva. y. 6ii. A hook which deals with a subject which has never yet been seriously treated. EGYPTIAN TALES. Translated from the Papyri, and edited with notes by W. ^L Flindkus I'ktrie, LL.D., D.C.L. Illus- trated by Tristram Eli.is. Part 11. Crown %vo, ^s. Gd. W. H. HUTTON THE LIFE OF SIR THOMAS MORE. By W. H. 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'The verses display a rare and versatile gift of parody, great commarJ of metre, and a very pretty turn of humour.'— /V»««. H. 0. Beeching. LYRA SACRA : An Anthology of Sacred Veise. Edited by IL C. Beechin'g, M.A. Crown ivo. Buckram, gilt- top. 6s. |AnanthuloBy of high exceWitnCf.'—A //leH^um. 'A cliariniiig selection, wliich m.um.iins a lofty standard of excellence.'— 7";w«. Yeats, AN ANTHOLOGY OF IRISH VERSE. Edited by W. B. 'S'eats. Crow?! Svo. 3s. 6d. ' An at tract i v.- and catholic selection.'— yV/»w. ' It is e.iitcd Ijy the must original and most accomplished of modern Irish poels, and against his editing Init a single objection can be brought, namely, that it excbides from the collection his own delicate lyrics.'—Saturday Kcview. Mackay. A SONG OF THE SEA : My Lady of Dreams, )»N-D OTHER POEMS. By Eric Mackay, Author of 'The Love I t;'ers of a Violinist.' Second Edition. Fcap. 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BALLADS OF THE BRAVE : Poems of Chivalry, Enterprise, Courage, and Constancy, iVom the Earliest Times to the I'resent Day. Edited, with Notes, by Rev. F. Langbridge. Ciown %-oo. Buckram y. 6iL School Edition, 2s. 6d. 'A very happy conception happily carried out. These " liallads of the Brave" are iriteniled to suit the real taster of boys, and will suit the taste of the great majority. —Sficctator. ' The book is full of splendid things.' — World- English Classics Edited by W. E. Henley. Messrs. Methuen are publishing, under this title, a series of the masterpieces of the English tongue, which, while well within the reach of the average buyer, shall be at once an ornament to the shelf of hiin that owns, and a delight to the eye of him that reads. The series, of which Mr. William Ernest Henley is the general editor, will confine itself to no single period or department of literature. Poetry, fiction, drama, biographv, autobiography, letters, essays — in all these fields is the material of many goodly volumes. The books, which are designed and printed by Messrs. Constable, are issued in two editions — (i) A small edition, on the finest Japanese vellum, demy 8vo, 2ij. a volume net ; (2) the popular edition on laid paper, crown 8vo, buckram, y. 6kin's Toems. Willi numerous Portraits, and 13 Drawings by Mr. Ruskin. 2 vols, ivo. 32J'. Sicond Edition. ' No more magnificent volumes have been published for a long time. . . .' — Times. ' It is long since we have had a biography with such delights of sub.-.tance and of form. Such a book is a pleasure for the day, and a joy for tya.'— Daily Chronicle. 'A noble monument of a noble subject. One of the most beautiful books about one of the noblest lives of our cenluty.'— C/oj^otw Herald. Waldstein. JOHN RUSKIN : a Study. By Charles Wald- STEIN, M.A., Fellow of King's College, Cambridge. With a Thoto- gravure Portrait after Professor IIkrkomer. Pat 8vo. S^. Also 25 copies on Japanese paper. Dewy Svo. 21s. net. 'A thoughtful, impartial, well-written criticism of Kuskin's teaching, intended to separate what tlie author regards as valuable and permanent from what is transient and erroneous in the great master's writing.'— i'rt//)' Chronicle. Kaufmann. CHARLES KINGSLEY. By M. Kaufmann, M.A. Crown 8fO. Buckram, ^s. A biography of Kingsley, especially dealing with his achitvementj in social reform. ' The author has certainly gone about his work with conscientiousness and industry.' — Sheffield Daily Telegraph. EARLY LIFE OF By A. F. RoBiiiNS. WILLIAM EWART With Portraits. Crown Robbins. THE GLADSTONE, ' Considerable labour and much skill of presentation have not been unworthily expended on this interesting viqxV.'— Times. ' Nut only one of the most meritorious, but one of the most interesting, biographical works that have appeared on the subject of the_ ex-Prcniier. . . . It furnishes a picture from many points original .ind striking ; it makes additions of value to the u^il:ellce on wh ch we are eiuitlcd to cstiiiiale a great public character ; and it gives the reader s judgment exactly that degree of guidance which is the function of a calm, restrained, and judici- ts historian.'— 5;r«n'«^/(a«( Viiily Post. Clark RusseU. THE LIFE OF ADMIRAL LORD COL- LINGWOO'l). ByW. Clark Russell, Author of 'The Wreek of the Giosvenor.' With Illustrations by F. Brangwyn. Second Edition. Crown ^x'o. 6s. 'A really good hooW—Saiurday Rttjitm. ' A most excellent and wholesome book, which wc should like '.1 r.cc in the hands of eveiy boy In the country.'— .S7. /u/'.vj'j Cazelie. i6 Messrs. Metiiuen's List Southey. ENGLISH SEAMEN (Howard, ClifTord, Hawkins, Drake, Cavcnilish). liy Roiikrt Souiiif.y. Ediied, with an Introduction, by David IIannay. Crown ^vo. 6s, This is a reprint of some excellent biocrapliies of Kli2.ibelhan seamen, written by Soulliey anil never repuliliihed. 'I hey are practically uukiiown, and ihey de- serve, and will probably obtain, a wide popularity. General Literature Gladstone. THE SPEECHES AND PUBLIC ADDRESSES OF THE RT. HON. \.. E. GLADSTONE, M.P. With Notes and Introductions. Edited by A. \V. IIutto.m, M.A. (Librarian of the Gladstone Library), and II. J. CoaiiN, M.A. With Portrails. Svo. Vols. IX. and X. \2s. 6d. each. Henley and Whibley. A BOOK OF ENGLISH PROSE. Collected by W. E. Henley and Charles WiuiiLEY. Cr. Svo. 6s. Also 40 copies on Dutch paper. 21s. net. . Also 15 copies on Japanese paper. \zs. net. 'A unique volume of extracts — an art R.illery of early prose.' — Bir>i:hi:^ham Foit. ' An admirable companion to Mr. Henley's " Lyra Ueroica."' — ^nlurUny Review. ' Quite delightful. The choice made has been excellent, and the volinne has been most admirably printed by Meabrs. Constable. A t;reatir treat for those not well acquainted with pre-Restoration prose could not be \m:\f,m^i.'— A Ihenceuni. Wells. OXFORD AND OXFORD LIFE. By Members of the University. Edited by J. Wells, M.A., Fellow and Tutor of Wadham College. Crown "ivo. y. 6d. This work contains an account of life at Oxford — inlellectual, social, and religious — a careful estimate of necessary expenses, a review of recent changes, a statement of the present position of llie University, and chapters on Women's Kducation, aids to study, and University lixtension. 'We congratulate Mr. Wells on the production of a readable and intelligent accouiit of Oxford as it is at the present time, written by persons who are possessed of a close acquaintance with the system and life of the University," — Aihcnwuin. Ouida. VIEWS AND OPINIONS. By Ouida. CrownZvo. 6s. ' Her views are always well marked and forcibly expressed, so that even when y.\^e crown &vo, Ts, 6vo, ■^s. 6J. ' We must draw attention to the anticjne style, rpiaimness, and typographical excel- lence of the work, its red-letter " iintiaU" and black letter type, . iid .)ld-la^llloned p.'traj^raphic arrangement of pages, 'the antique paper, uncut eti.,'.s, and illii.stra- tiuns are in accord v.itli the other features of this uniijue little work.'— AViWrt^'^w/. 'Amongst all the innumerable English editions of the '■ Imitation," there can have been few which were prettier than this one, printed in strong and handsome type by Mes-rs. Constable, with ail the glory of icd iiuiials, and the comfort of buckr.un binding.'— 6V<«j^i«« }lcrald. THE CHRISTIAN YEAR. By John Kehi.e. Withanlntio- duction and Notes by W. Lock, M.A., Sub-Warden of Kcblc CoUci^e, Author of 'The Life of John Keble.' Illustrated by \\. Annino Bell, l-cap. Svo. 5;. [Octoier. ' i Messrs. Methuen's List '9 Leaders of Religion 3/6 Edited by H. C. liEKCIIING, M.A. iriih Portraits, crown Zvo. A series of short bingraphies of the most prominent leaders of reli<;i()us life ami thou;.;ht of all ages and countries. The following are rcndy — CARDINAL NEWMAN. By R. H. HUTTON. JOHN WESLEY. By J. H. Overton, M.A. BLSHOP WILBERFORCE. By G. W. DANIEL, M,A, CARDINAL MANNING. By A. W. IIurroN, M.A. CHA RLES SIMEON. By H. C. G. MouLE, M.A. JOHN KEBLE. By Walter Lock, M.A. THOMAS CHALMERS. By Mrs. Oliphant. LANCELOT ANDREWES. By R. L. Ottley, M.A. AUGUSTINE OF CANTERBURY. By E. L. Cutts, D.D, WILLIAM LAUD. By W. H. Hutton, M.A. Other volumes will be announced in due course. Works by S. Baring Gould OLD COUNTRY LIFE. With Sixty-seven Illustrations by W. Parkinson, F. D. BedI'Ord, and F. Masev. Large Crown 8w, cloth super extra, top edg; gilt, los, dd. Fifth and Cheaper Edition. 6s. '"Old Country Life," as healthy wholesome reading, full of breezy life and move- ment, lull of quaint stories vigorously told, will not be excelled by any book to be published throughout the year. Sound, hearty, and Engli-li to the core.' — li'orlJ. HISTORIC ODDITIES AND STRANGE EVENTS. Thini Edition. Crown ^vo. 6s. ' A collection of exciting i^nJ entertaining chapteis. The whole volume is delightful readuig.' — Times, FREAKS OF FANATICISM. Third Edition. Cro^un?,vo. 6s. ' iMr. Hariiii; Gould has a keen eve f jf colour and elTect, and the subjects he has chosen t^lve ample scope to his descriptive and analytic faculties. A perfectly faiscinaling book.' — Scottish Leader. A GARLAND OF COUNTRY SONG : English Folk Songs with their tr-tdition-Tl melodies. Collected and arraiigt.'d by S. Baring Goi'TD anil H. Fi.f.ktwood Sheppard. Demy .\to. 6), 20 Messrs. Methuen's List SONGS OF THE WEST : Traditional Ballads and Songs of the West of England, with their Traditional Melodies. Coiiircted by S. Baring Goui.n, M.A., and II. Fleeiwood Shei'I'aud, M.A. Arrnnged Un Voice and Piano. In 4 Parts (containing 25 Songs each), Faris /., //., ///., 3^. eacA. Fart JV., 5^. Jn one Vol., French morocco, \^s. 'A rich collection of humour, paihos, grace, and poetic fancy.' — Saturday Review. A BOOK OF FAIRY TALES retold by S. Baring Gould. With numerous illustrations and initi:\l letters by Arthuk J. Gaskin. Crow*' %vo. Buckram, ds. 'Mr. Baring Gould lias done a good de^J, and is deserving of gratitude, in re-writing in hone", simple style the old stories that delighted the childiiood of "our fatticrs and gr.indfathers." We do not think be has omitted any of our favourit'i .stories, the stories that arccDmmonly reg.irded as merely " old fashioned." As to the form of the book, and the printing, which is by Messrs. Constable, it were ditTicult to commend overmuch.' — Saturday Review, YORKSHIRE ODDITIES AND STRANGE EVENTS Fourth Fidition, Crov)ti Svo. 6s, STRANGE SURVIVALS AND SUPERSTITIOMS. With Illustrations. By S. Baring Gould. Crozvn 8vo, Secon.: Edition. 6,f. ' We have read Mr. Baring Gould's book from beginning to end. It is full of qunint and various information, and there i'^ not a dull page in 'H.'—Setes and Queries, THE TRAGEDY OF THE CAESARS: The Emperors of the Julian and Claudian Lines. With nuiuerous lllus- l:-'»ions from Pnists, Geina, Cameos, etc. By S. Bar:ng Gould, Auihor of ' Mehalah,' etc. Third Edition, KoydlZvo, 15^. 'A most splendid ad fascinalinc; book on a subjert of undying inte.tst. The greit feature of tli' 000k is the use Jie author has made of the existing iortraits of the Caesars, and the admiiahle critical subtlety he ha.' exhibited in dealii.i? with this line of researrli. It is brilli.mtly written, and the illu'tr.itions are supplied on u scale of profuse nagnificence ' — Daily Chronicle. 'The volumes will in no .sense flisappoii:t the general reader. Indeed, in their wiy, theie Is niiiiiing in any sense so good in English. . . . Mr I'.aring Gould has presented his iiairciiv" in such a .vayas not to make one duil page.' — Athentrum. THE DESERTS OF SOUTHERN FRANCE. By S. r-.\RiNG Goi!LD. Wilh nuivicroiis lihistrations by F. D. Bi'-I.IORd, S. IIUTTON, etc. 2, vols. Demy'ivo. 32.?. This book is the first st'iivus attempt to dt-sciilie the great barren tableland that extends to the south of l.inunisin in the Orprircncnt of Avcyroii, l.ut, etc., a country of dolomite cliffs,, and cd'ions, and sulHerinuean rivers. The region is full of prehistoric and historic iit itst, relics of ca\e-dwcllcrs. of mcdia:val rolibers, and of the Kiiglisii domination and ilie Hundred Years' War. 'His two richly illustrated volumes are fuil ol matter of interest to the geologist, the arch.-rnlogist, and ihe student of history and \\\.mntx%.' -■ Scotsman. ' It deals wilh its suhjr'Ct in a manner which rarely fails to arrest attention.' — Titntf. Mi Ai Ai ■ Messps. Methuen's List 21 Fiction SIX SHILLING NOVELS Marie Corelli. I3ARABDAS : A DREAM OF THE WORLD'S TKACJE1)Y. By Marie Coreli.i, Author o>' ' A Romance of Two Worlds,' ' Vendetta,' etc. Seventeenth Edition. Crown %vo. 6j. 'The lender reverence of the treatment and the ima,'inative beauty of the writing have rcconc'led us to the darit);; of the conception, and tiie conviction is fori cd on lis that even so cxaited a sulij'-ct caniioi be made loo familiar lo us, provided it be presented in the true spirit of Cliristiaii faith, 'i he ajnpiifir.alions of the Scripture narrative are often concei-.ed wiih hi>;h poetic ip,-it;hi, and this "Dream ol the World's Tragedy " is, despite some tritiing inconjjruilies, a lofty and not inade- quate paraplirase of the supreme climax of the inspired narrative.' — Dublin Rn>tnvi_r, tlu: trained delineator of human nature, its weal and itsvoe.' — Freeman s Jour miL 'These talcs ar'. skilful, attractive, and eminently suited to give rchrf to tiie mind of a read'-r in quc-st of distraction.* — Athcn'ir iiraise. '1 he ' (Juarrli:in ' spoke ol ' PoJo' as ' i««- usually clever and intent stm^ ; ti.e 'Spectaior' called u 'a delif^ht/ully witty iketch of society \* {hi 'Spe.tker' saiii ti^e tiialo^^nc was 'a perfetual feast of epiiiram and p.iradox' ; the 'Athen.-vum' spoke of the author as ' i» writer of quite exieptional ability' , the ' Academy' praised his ' amuziui; cleverness ;' the 'W.rld' saiil the book was 'brilliantly wtilten'; and half-a-dozen p:ipers dci.lared there was ' not adull pa^e in the book.' E. r. Benson. THE RUBICON. By E. F. Benson, Author of ' iJodi).' Fourth Edition. Crown '&7)o. Os. Of Mr. ilenson's second novel the ' iiirnunghnm Post' says it is ' tvell written, stiniulatini;, uncontrntional. and, in a nut, I, characteristic' : the 'National f)|jsctver congratulates .M.-. lienson upon an txieptiunal achirvttntnl,' and calks the 'book ' a notaldt advance en hit pi tvieus ivu/,.. Messrs. Methuen's List 23 M. M. Dov/ie. GALLIA. By M^nik Muriel Dowie, Author of 'A Gill in the Carpathians,' Second Edition. CrownZvo. ds. 'The style it genernlly .-icJmirable, the diilngue not seldom hrilliant, the situations surprising in their freshiie<^^s and originality, wliile the ■iuli^idinry as well as the princii'al characters live and move, and the story itself is readable from title-page to coloplioii.' — Saturday Review. ' A very nonhle book; a very sympathetically, at times delightfully written look.' —Dai'.y Graphic. MR. BARING GOULD'S NOVELS •To say that a book is by the author of " Mehalah" is to imply that it contains a story cast on strong lines, containinij dramatic possibilities, vivid and sympatlietic descri|il.ons of Nature, and a wealth of ingenious imagery.'— .S/ca/(t'r. 'That whatever Mr. Haring (louid writes is well worth reading, is a conclusion th.-it m.ay he very generally accepted. His views of life are fresh and vigotous, his lanuiuage pointed and ch-iracteiisiic, the incidents of which he makes use are striking and original, his characters are life-like, and though somewhat excep- tional people, are drawn and coloured with artistic force. Add to this that his descriptions of scenes and scenery are painted witli the loving eyes and skilled hands of a master of his art, that he is always fresh and never dull, and under such conditi.ins it is no wonder that readers have pained confidence both in his power of amir-ing and satisfying them, and that year by year his popularity widens.' — Court Circular. Baring Gould. URITH : A Story of Dartmoor. By S. Baring (joui.n. Third r.dilioii. Crtnvit Svo. 6s. 'The aMh t is at his best.'— 7V"-i-.f. ' He has nearly reached the high water-mark of " Mehalah." '—National Obserfer. Baring Gould, IN THE ROAR OF THE SEA: A Talc of the Cornish Coast. By S. Baring Gould. Fifth Edition. (,s. Baring Gould. MRS. CURGENVEN OF CURGENVEN. By S. Baring Goit.d. Fourth Edition. 6s. A story of Devon life. The 'Graphic' spe.iks of it as ' anovel c/viiiorous l:uniour ait.i stislninfd /-over' ; the 'Sus ex Daily News 'says that ' the iv>i)i,; ie most strikini;.' - -- , ■, intercstini;, and clever.' ' l'iim;h ' says that 'j.'» i ^nnot fut it do:rn until ,i,'« havejiniihed it.' ' The Sussex Daily News' says tl it ' can he lieitrtiiy recom- mended to alt who careJorJeaniy, energetic, and inteiestingfi. tion.' 24 Messrs. Metiiuen's List Baring Gould. KITTY ALONE. By S. Baring Gould, Author of ' Mehalah,' 'Cheap Jack Zita,' etc. Fourth Edition. Crown 87'y in his delineation of every-day experiences, but rarely has he been brighter or breezier than in " Matthew Austin." The pictures arc in Mr. Norris's ple.isantest vein, while running through the entire story is a felicity of vtyle and « ho!esomeness of tone which one is accustomed to find in the no\e!s of this favourite author.' — Scotsman. W. E. Norris. HIS GRACE. By W. E. Norris, Author of * Madi'inoiselle (le Mersac' Third Edition. Crozvn^vo. 6s. 'Mr. Norris has dr.Twn a really fine character in the IMike of Hurstbourne, at once unconventional and very true to the conventionalities of life, weak and strong in a breath, cap.ible of inane follies and heroic decisions, yet not so definitely por- trayed as to relieve a reader of the necessity of study on his own behalf.' — A thcno'um. W. E. Norris. THE DESPOTIC LADY AND OTHERS. By W. E. Norris, Author of 'Mademoiselle de Mersac' Crown %vo. 6s. 'A delightfully humorous tale of a converted and rehabilitated rope-dancer. — Glasgit^v Herald. 'The ingenuity of the idea, the skill with which it is worked out, and the sustained humour of Ms situations, make it after its own manner a veritable little master- piece. ' — /( 'estmmster Gazette. ' A budget (^i good fiction of which no one will tire.' — ^cotsvtan. 'An extremely entertaining volume — the sprightliest of holiday companions.' — Daily Telegraph. Gilbert Parker. MRS. FALCHION. By Gii-^sert Parker, Aiuhnr of ' Pierre and His People.' .Second Edition. Crown ?ivo. 6s. Mr. I'atker's second book has received a warm welcome. 'I'he ' Athena:uin ' called it ' a sf'lenilid stuilv of character' \ the ' fall Mall Cazette ' spoke of the writing as ' but little I'ehiml anything that has bein done by any vritrrnf cur time ' ; the ' .St. lain-^s's ' called it ' a very striK'itii^ and admirable novel \ and the ' West- minster Gazette ' applied to it the epithet of ' distinguished.' Gilbert Parker. PIERRE AND HIS PEOPLE. By Gilbert I'AKKF.R. Second Edition. Crown ^vo. 6s. 'Stories happily conceived and finely executed. There is strength and genius in Mr. I'arker's style.' — Daily Telegraph. Messrs. Metiiuen's List 25 Gilbert Pcir!:or. THE TRANSLATION OF A SAVAGE. By Gii.iiKKT Parker, Autlior of 'Pierre and His People,' '^'r3. Falchion.' etc. CroTvnSvo. 6s, 'The plot is original and one (iiificult to work out; but Mr. P.irlccr has done it vviit\ great skill aii'l riolic.icy. 'J lie render who is not intcre-ted in this original, frcsli, and \\cil-tidti tale must lie a dull person indeed.' — Daily Chn ntcle. 'A strong .Tiid ?'.;cee«5ful piece of workmanslnp. The portrait of I.:di, strong, dijni- fie(J, and pure, is exceptionally well dra\Mi.' — Manclustt-r (iitnniian. 'A very pretty and interestini; .'tory, and Mr. I'arker tells it with .-nuch skill. The story is one to be rciA.'—St. James's Gazette. Gilbert Parker. THE TRAIL OF THE SWORD. By Gilbert Pauki.u, Author of 'Pierre and liis People,' etc. Third Edition. Crown "ivo. 6s. 'Everybody with a soul for rrm.ince will thorougldy enjoy "The Trail of the Sword." ' — St. Jnv7c:i's Gazette. •A lousing and dr.-im.-nic tale. A book like this, in which swords lla^h, great sur- piiscs are undertaken, and daring deeds done, in which men and women hve and loN'e in the old straiglitforward p;is^ion:ile way, is a joy inexpressilile to the re- viewer, brain-weary of the domestic tragedies and psychological puzzios of every- day liction ; and we c.innot but I elieve that to the reader it will bring refreshment as welcome and as keen.' — Daily Chronicle, Gilbert Parker. WHEN VALMOND CAME TO PONTIAC : The Story of a Lost N.npoleon. By Gilbert Parker. Sucud Edition, Crown Svo. 6s. ' Here we find romance— real, breathing, living romance, but it runs flush with our own times, level wiiii our own feelings. Not liere can we compLun of lack of inevitalileness or liomogeneity. T he character of Vahnond is drawn unerringly; his career, biicf as it is, is placed before us as convincingly c.s history it-elf. T he book must be rc.id, we may say re-read, for any one thoroughly to appreciate Mr. Parker's delicate touch and innate sympathy with humanity.'— /'a// I\!all Gazette. Arthur Morrison. TALES OF MEAN STREETS. By Arthur Morrison. Third Edition. CrozvnSvo, 6s. •Told with consummate art and extraordinary detail. He tells a plain, unvarni-h'-d tale, and the very truth of it makes for beauty. In tlie true humanity of the bo'ik lies its justification, the permanence of its interest, and its indubitable triumph.' — Atli'Virtitn. 'A great bouk. The author's method is amazingly effective, and produces a thrilling sense of reality. The writer lays upon us a master h.md. The book is simply appalling and irrcsi-tible in its interest. It is humoniu- also; without humour it would not make the ni.irk it is certain to waVc' —World, Julian Corbott. A BUSINESS IN GREAT WATERS. By Julian CoRnErr, Author of 'For God .ind Gold,' ' Ivophetua XIIIth.,'ctc. Cnm'n2,io, 6s. •There is plenty of incident and movement in this romance. It is interesting as a novel framed in an hi-,torical setting, and it is all the more worthy of attention from the lover of romance as being absolutely free from the morbid, the frivolous, and the ultra-sexual.' — Athcnerum. , . ,„ ' A stirring tale of naval adventure duri-g the Great French War. The book is full of picturesque and attractive characters.'— (T/rtj-jfOJi/ llerahf. 26 Messrs. Methuen's List Robert Barr. IN THE MIDST OF ALARMS. By Robrkt Hark, Author of ' From Whose Bourne,' etc. Second Edition. Crown Sz-'tf. 6s. 'A book wliich has aluiml.-intly satisfied us by its capital humour.' — Daily Chronicle. ' iMi. liarr has achieved a triumph whereof he has every reason to be proud.' — Pall Mall Gazette. 'There is a (|uaint thought or a good joke on nearly every page. The studies of ch.iracter are carefully finished, and linger in the memory.' — black and White. 'Distinguished for kindly feeling, genuine humour, and really graphic portraiture.' — Sussex Daily News. 'A dtliulitful romance, with experiences strange and exciting. The dialogue is always bright and witty; the scenes are depicted briefly and effectively; and there is no incident from first to last that one would wish to have omitted.' — Scotsman. Mrs. Pinsent. CHILDREN OF THIS WORLD. By Ellen '". PiNSKNT, Author of 'Jenny's Case.' Crown 2>vo. 6s. ' ihere is nuich clever writing in this book. The story is told in a workmanlike manner, and the characters conduct themselves like average human beings.' — Daily News. ' Full of interest, and, with a hirge measure of present excellence, gives ample pro- mise of splendid work.' — Birmingham Gazette. ' Mrs. Pinsent's new novel has plenty of vij;our, variety, and good writing. There are certainty of purpose; strength of touch, and clearness of vision. ' — A thenitum. Clark Russell, MY DANISH SWEETHEART. By W. Clark Russell, Author of 'The Wreck of the Grosvenor,' etc. Illustrated. Third Edition. Crown ^vo. 6s. Pryce. TIME AND THE WOMAN. By Richard Pryce, Author of ' Miss Ma.wvell's Affections,' ' The Quiet Mrs. Fleming,' etc. Second Edition, Crown 8vo. 6s. ' Mr. Pryce's work recalls the style of Octave Feuillet, by its clearness, conciseness, its literary reserve.' — Atheiiwum. Mrs. Watson. THIS MAN'S DOMINION. By the Author of ' A High Little World.' Second Edition. CrcuinSvo. 6s. ' It is not a book to be read and forgotten on a railway journey, but it is rather a study of the perplexing proljlcms of life, to which the rtllecting mind will frequently return, even thuiivih the reader does nut accept the soiutions which the author sngtiests. In these da>s, when the output ol merely amusing novels is so overpowering, this is no slight pr.iise. There is an underlying deplh in the story whicli reminds one, in a lesser degree, of the profundity of (iciir>;e Kliot, and "This Man's Dominion " is liy no means a novel to be thrust aside as exhausted at one perusal.' — Dundee Advertiser. Marriott Watson. DIOGENES OF LONDON and other Sketches. By II. B. Marriott Watson, Author of 'The Web of the Spitler.' Crown Svo, Buckram. 6s. ' By all those who delight in the uses of words, who rate the exercise of prose above the exeicise of verse, who rejoice in all proofs of its delicacy and its .strength, who believe that Knglish prose is chief among the moulds of thought, by these Mr. Marriott Watson's Ijook will be welcomed.'— A'a//i>«a/ Uiserver. Messrs. Methuen's List 27 Gilchrist. THE STONE DRAGON. By Murray Gilchrist. Croiun ^vo. Buckram. 6s, 'The author's faults are atoned for by certiin positive and admirable merits. The romances have not their cuuntcrpart in modern literature, and to read them is a unique experience.' — Aiitional Obitrver, THREE-AND-8IXPENNY NOVELS NOVELIST, By Forty-first Thousand. Edna Lyall. DERRICK VAUGHAN, Edna Lyall, Author of ' Donovan,' etc. Crown Hvo. 3^. 6d. Baring Gould. ARMINELL: A Social Romance. By S. Baring Gould. Netv Eiiitioti. Crown 8vo. ^s. 6J. Baring Gould. MARGERY OF QUETHER, and other Stones. Ly S. Baking Gould. Crczvn ivo. 3^. dd. Baring Gould. JACQUETTA, and other Stories. By S. Baring Gould. Crown ^vo. ^s. 6d. Miss Benson. SUBJECT TO VANITY. By Margaret liENbON. IVitli numerous Illustrations. Second Edition. Crown Svo. 3J. 6./. ' A charming little book about household pets by a daughter of the Archbishop of (Jamerbury. '— .S"/^rt/rr, 'A delightful collection uf studies of animal nature. It is very seldom that we get anyiLing so perfect in its Uind. . . . 1 he illustrations are clever, and the whole book a sin^^uiarly deli^lufnl one.' — Cuayiiinti. 'Humorous and seiumicutal by turns, .Miss Henson always manages to interest vis in her pets, and all who love animals will appreciate her book, not only for their sake, but quite as much for its own.' — J'iiiit's. 'All lovLTS of animals should re.id Miss llensuu's book. For sympathetic under- standing, humorous criticism, and appreciative observation she certainly has not her equal.' — Ma/tchester Guardian. Gray. ELSA. A Novel. By E. M 'Queen Gray. CrownZvo. y. 6d. 'A charniinjj novel. The characters are not only powerful sketches, but minutely and carefully finished portraits.'— G'wori/.'Virt. J. H. Pearce. JACO TRELOAR. By J. H. Pearce, Author ot ' Esther I'entreath.' A^ew Edition. Crown Svo. y. 6d. The 'Spectator' speaks of Mr. I'earce as ' aivrittr of excrptiona! /',nver'\ the 'Daily Telegraph' calls the book ' piivrr/ut anil picturesi/ue ' \ the ' liiriningliam Post' asserts that it is 'a novel 0/ hish quality.' X. L. AUT DIABOLUS AUT NIHIL, and Other Stories. By X. L. Crown Hz'o. 3^. 6d. ' Disfnctly original and in the higiiest degree ini.aginative. The conception is almost as lofty .IS Milton's.' — S/ixtali'r. 'Or ;;inal to a dcKrce of oiiKinality that may be called primitive — a kind of passion- ate directness that absolutely absorbs Ui.'—Siuurjay AcTiew. ' Of powerful interest. There is sometliiii); starrhn^iy orii;iiial in the treatment of the themes. The terrible realism leaves no doubt ol the author's power.' — A thtnteum. 28 Messrs. Metiiuen's List O'Grady. THE COMING OF CUCULAIN. A Romance of the ileroic Ac^e of Ireland. By Stanuish O'Grady, Author of ' Finn and his Companions,' etc. Illustrated by Mltrray S.mith. Crown Svo. y. dti. 'The su.;;;estions of mystery, the rapid and exciting action, are superb poetic effects.' — S/'fiiker. ' For liL;lit .uid colour it resemljles nothing so much as a Swiss davrn.'—Jtfaiic/iester Ctinytiian. ' A romance extremely fascinating and admirably well knit.' — Satiirdny AVzvVtw. Constance Smith. A CUMBERER OF THE GROUND. By Constance Smith, Author of 'The Repentance of Paul Went- worth,' etc. Neiv Edition. Cfotvn 8t'^. 3^'. Cd. Author of 'Vera.' THE DANCE OF THE HOURS. By tliL' Author of 'Vera.' Crown ?>vo. 3^. 6a'. Esm6 Stuart. A WOMAN OF FORTY. By Esme Stuart, Author of 'Muriel's Marriat^e,' 'Virginie's Husband,' etc. New Edition. Crown Svo. 3^. 61/. 'The story is well written, and some of the scenes show great dramatic power.'— Daily Chronicle. Fenn. THE STAR GAZERS. By G. Manville Fenn, Author of 'Eli's Children,' etc. Neiv Eaition, Cr. Svo. 3^.61/. 'A stirring romance.' — Western Mi'rnins^ Mews. 'Told with all the dramatic power for which Mr. Fenn is conspicuous.'— 57-ai4^;rf Observer. Dickinson. A VICAR'S WIFE. By Evelyn Dickinson. Crown Svo. 3^. 6d. Prowse. THE POISON OF ASPS. By R. Orton Prowse. Crown Sro. 3^. 6d. Grey. TUE Crown Hfo, STORY OF CHRIS. By Rowland Grey. Lynn Linton. THE TRUE HISTORY OF JOSHUA DAVID- SON, Christian and Communist. By E. Lynn Linton. Eleventh Edition. J'ost ':ivo. is. HALF-CROWN NOVELS A Series of Novels by popular Authors, 2/6 THE PLAN OF CAMPAIGN. By F. Mabel ROBIN.SON. DISENCHANTMENT. By F. Mai'.kl Rohinson. MR. BUTLER'S WARD. P,v F. Maiifi. Roi;in.son. HOVEN DEN, V.C. By F. Mahel Roiunson. ELI'S CHILDREN. By G. Manville Fenn. A DOUBLE KNOT. By G. Manville Fenn. DISARMED. By M. Betham Edwards. Messrs. Methuen's List 29 8. A LOST ILLUSION. By Leslie Keith. 9. A MARRIAGE AT SEA. By W. Clark Russell. 10. IN TENT AND BUNGALOW. By the Author of Indian Idylls.' 11. MY STEWARDSHIP. By E. M'QuEEN Gray. 12. A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. By J. M. Cobban. 13. A DEPLORABLE AFFAIR. By W. E, NORRIS. 14. JACK'S FATHER. By W, E. Norris. 15. A CAVALIER'S LADYE. By Mrs. Dicker. 16. JIM B. Books for Boys and Girls A Series of Books by well-known Authors^ well illustrated. Crown %vo. 3|6 1. THE ICELANDER'S SWORD. By S. Baring Gould. 2. TWO LITTLE CHILDREN AND CHING. By Edith E. CUTHELL. 3. TODDLEBEN'S hero. By M, M. Blake. 4. ONLY A GUARD-ROOM DOG. By Edith E. Cuthell. 5. THE DOCTOR OF THE JULIET. By Harry Colling- woon. 6. MASTER ROCKAFELLAR'S VOYAGE. By W. Clark Russell. 7. SYD B ELTON : Or, The Boy who would not go to Sea. By G. Manville Fenn. 3/6 The Peacock Library A Series of Books for Girls by well-known Authors, handsomely bound in blue and silver, and well illustrated. Croiun &V0. 1. A PINCH OF EXPERIENCE. By L. B. Walford. 2. THE RED GRANGE. By Mrs. MOLESWORTH. 3. THE SECRET OF MADAME DE MONLUC. By the Aulhoiof 'MdloMori.' 4. DUMPS. Bv Mis. Parr, Author of 'Adam and Eve.' 5. OUT OF THE FASHION. By L. T. Mkade. C. A CAWL OF THE PEOPLE. Bv L. T. Meade. 7. HEPSY GIPSY. By L. T. Meade. 2,r. 6d. 8. THE HONOURAIU.E MISS. Bv L. T. Meade. 9. MY LAND OF BEni.AH. By Mrs. Leith .'\"am3. 30 Messrs. Methuen's List University Extension Series A scries of hooks on historical, literary, and scientific subjects, suitable for extension students and home reading circles. Each volume is com- plete in itself, and the subjects are treated by competent writers in a broad and philosophic spirit. Edited by J. E. SYMES, M.A., Principal of University College, Nottingham. Crown %vo. Price (with some exceptions) zs. 6d. The following volumes are ready : — THE INDUSTRIAL HISTORY OF ENGLAND. By H. DE B. GiHBiNS, M.A., late Scholar of Wadham College, Oxon., Cobden Prizeman. Fourth Edition. With Maps and Plans. Is. 'A compact and clc.ir story of our industrial development. A study of this concise but luminous Look cannot fail to give the reader a clear insight into the principal phenomena of our indiNtrial history. The editor and publishers are to he congrat- ulated on this first volume of their venture, and we shall look with expectant interest for the succeeding volumes of the series. — University Extension Journal. A HISTORY OF ENGLISH POLITICAL ECONOMY. By L. L. I'UICE, M.A., Fellow of Oriel College, Oxon. PROBLEMS OF POVERTY: An Inquiry into the Industrial Conditions of the Poor. By J. A. lIonsoN, M. A. Second Edition. VICTORIAN POETS. By A. Sharp. THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. By J. E. Symes, M.A. PSYCHOLOGY. By F. S. Grangkr, M.A., Lecturer in Philo- sophy at University Coll< ge, Nottingham. THE EVOLUTION OF PLANT LIFE: Lower Forms. By G. Masske, Kew Gardens. IVith Illustrations, AIR AND WATER. Professor V. B. Lewes, M.A. Illustrated. THE CHEMISTRY OF LIFE AND HEALTH. By C. W. KiMMiNS, M.A. Camb. Illustrated. THE MECHANICS OF DAILY LIFE. By V. P. Sells, M.A. Illustrated. ENGLISH SOCIAL REFORMERS. H. DE B. Gibhins, M.A. ENGLISH TRADE AND FINANCE IN THE SEVEN- TEKNTII CENTURY. By W. A. S. Hewins, B.A, THE CHEMISTRY OF FIRE. The Elementary Principles of Chemistry. By M. M. Pattison Muir, M.A. Illustrated. A TEXT-BOOK OF AGRICULTURAL BOTANY. ByM.C. Potii:k, M.A., F.L.S. Illustrated, y. 6d. Messrs. Methuen's List 31 THE VAULT OF HEAVEN. A Popular Introduction to Astronomy, liy R. A. Grkgory. IVi/A numerous Illustrations. METEOROLOGY. The Elements of Weather and Climate. By H. N. Dickson, F.R.S.E., E.R. Met. Soc. Illustrated. A MANUAL OF ELECTRICAL SCIENCE. By George J. I5uRcn, M.A. With mimerous Illustrations, y. THE EARTH. An Introduction to Physiography. By Evan Small, M.A. Illustrated. INSECT LIFE. By F. W. THEOBALD, M.A. Illustrated. ENGLISH POETRY FROM BLAKE TO BROWNING. By W. M. Dixon, M.A. ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT. By E JENKS, M.A., Professor of Law at University College, Liverpool. Social Questions of To-day Edited by H. de B. GIBBINS, M.A. Crown 8vo. 2s. 6d. /^ f/C A series of volumes upon those topics of soci.il, economic, .^ I \J and industrial interest that are at the present moment fore- ' most in the public mind. Each volume of the series is written by an author who is an acknowledged authority upon the subject with which he deals. Thefolloiviui^ Volumes of the Series are ready ; — TRADE UNIONISM-NEW AND OLD. By G. Howell, Author of ' The Conllicts of Caiiital and Labour.' Second Edition. THE CO-OPERATIVE MOVEMENT TO-DAY. By G. J. IIOLYOAKE, Author of ' The History of Co-operation.' MUTUAL THRIFT. By Rev. J. Frome Wilkinson, M.A., Author of ' The Friendly Society Movement.' PROBLEMS OF POVERTY : An Inquiry into the Industrial Conditions of the I'oor. By J. A. IIor.soN, M.A. Second Edition. THE COMMERCE OF NATIONS. By C. F. Bastable, M. A., Professor of Economics at Trinity College, Dublin. THE ALIEN INVASION. By W. H. Wilkins, B.A., Secretary to the Society for Preventing the Immigration of Destitute Aliens. THE RURAL EXODUS. By P. Anderson Graham. LAND NATIONALIZATION. By Harold Cox, B.A. A SHORTER WORKING DAY. P.y H. OE B. GiPPiNS and R. A. Hadfiei.d, of the Hecla Works, Sheffield. 32 Messrs. Metiiuen's List An Inquiry into the Cure for Rural MnoRE. BACK TO THE LAND; l)0|inpul;\tion. Ijy II. E. TRUSTS, FOOLS AND CORNERS: As aifccting Commerce and Industry, liy J. Stki'IIKN Jkans, M.R.L, E.S.S. THE FACTORY SYSTEM. By R. CooKE Taylor. THE STATE AND ITS CHILDREN, By Gf.rtrude Tucicwici.i.. WO.MEN'S WORK. By Lady Dilke, Miss Bui.i.ky, and Miss Wiiitlry. MUNICIPALITIES AT WORK. The Municipal Policy of .Six Great Towns, and its lu^luence on their Social Welfare. By FuEDERiCK Dolman. Willi an Introduction by Sir John IIu 1 ION, late Cliairman of the London County Council. C>o:in 8vo. Cloth. 25. 6.'/. Classical Translations Edited by H. F, FOX, M.A., Fellow and Tutor of Brasenose College, Oxford. Messrs. Methuen propose to issue a New Series of Translations from the Greek and Latin Classics. They have enlisted the services of some of the best (Oxford and Cambridge Scholars, and it is their intention that the .Series sh.all be distin;^uished by literary excellence as well as by scholarly accuracy. Crozvn 2)V0. Finely printed and bound in blue buckram. CICEP.O— De Oratore I. Translated by E. N. P. MoOR, M.A., Assistant Master at Clifton. 3^, ()d. /ESCHYLU.S — A'j^nmemnon, Chocphoroe, Eumenides. Trans- lated by Lewis Campbell, LL.D., late Professor of Greek at St. Andrews. 5,f. LUCIAN— Six Di;ilo:^ues (Nigrinus, Icaro-Menippiis, The Cock, Tha Sliip, The I'auisite, The Lover of Falsehood). Translated by S. T. Ikwin, M.A., Assistant Master at Clifton; late Scholar of Exeter College, Oxford. 3^. 6d. SOPHOCLES— Electra and Ajax. Translated by E. D. A. MoRSiii;Ai\ M.A., late Scholar of New CoUeije, Oxford ; Assistant Master at Winchtster, 2s. 6d. TACITUS — Agiicola and Gcnn.ani.a. Translated by U. 15. TowNSllE.Mt, late Scholar of Trinity College, Cambridge. 2s. dd. CICERO— Select Orations (Pro Milonc, Pro Murena, Philippic 11., In CrUllinam). Translated by II. E. D. Blakiston, M.A., FeHow and Tutor of Trinity Colle^'c, Oxford, ^s. i M for Rural Commerce 3f,rtrude l.I.KY, and Policy of al Welfare. ^ Sir John Croun ^vo. isenose lations from ces of soiiic itcntion that well as by 7m, OOR, M.A., 5. Trans- jtreek at St. The Cock, ran-