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 SIERRAS 
 
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AN EDELWEISS OF THE 
 SIERRAS,GOLDEN-ROD 
 AND OTHER TALES. BY 
 MRS. BURTON HARRISON 
 
 HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS 
 <s* NEW YORK - MDCCCXCII <4a 
 
Copyright, 1892, by HARPER & BROTHERS. 
 
 jlU rights reserved. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 3 
 
 GOLDEN -ROD : AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT. 27 
 
 UNDER THE CONVENT WALL 135 
 
 CHERRYCOTE 147 
 
 THE SHATTERED VIOLIN 163 
 
 A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 173 
 
 ON A HILL -TOP 197 
 
 942209 
 
AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 
 
AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 
 
 i 
 
 LUCY BOYNTON lived a solitary life in a gray old 
 minster town in England. She was an orphan, in 
 charge of a venerable maiden aunt who, like the 
 celebrated " Mrs. F." of Hood s ballad, was 
 
 " so very deaf 
 
 She might have worn a percussion-cap, 
 And be hit on the head without hearing it snap." 
 
 From spring to autumn, from autumn to spring, 
 Lucy sat and sewed, dusted the tea-cups on the 
 mantel-shelf, read a few dull books, and accom 
 panied her aunt to service whence the morning 
 and evening chants floated in at the window of 
 their sitting-room close to the cathedral walls. 
 Not so much as the Vicar of Wakefield s excite 
 ment "to migrate from the blue bed to the brown" 
 was allotted her ; for ever since she could remem 
 ber, Lucy had occupied the same still, white-cur 
 tained nest, opening from Miss Boynton s bedroom, 
 
4 AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 
 
 where at night she could peep out to supervise the 
 removal of a certain glossy, ink-black frontispiece 
 of hair, and the assumption of a frilled coif, con 
 verting the old lady s strong aquiline profile into 
 a grim silhouette of some warrior of ancient Greece 
 or Rome. 
 
 Into this colorless existence, when Lucy was 
 about eighteen, there came an influence potent and 
 mysterious, as if a waft of jasmine scent were blown 
 across some meadow nook where homely butter 
 cups are springing in the grass. 
 
 Miss Boynton s nephew, Tom Boynton, of whom 
 his few scattered kinspeople had heard nothing for 
 several years, arrived from the other side of the 
 Atlantic to look up those of his blood remaining 
 to him in England. He was a handsome, active 
 young fellow, with a jaunty grace of carriage and 
 a timbre in his hearty voice, irresistibly compelling 
 a return of cordiality, be the recipient never so 
 guarded in his dignity. 
 
 Innocent Lucy, herself perhaps not quite up to 
 the standard of dignity at St. Margaret s in gen 
 eral, fell in love with him frankly at the outset, 
 while Tom, who began by finding no end of pleasure 
 in telling his traveller s tales to this dear little wide- 
 eyed creature, growing white and red alternately 
 with his perils and escapes, ended by picking her 
 up in his arms one day, and vowing he must have 
 her for his wife her or no woman, present or to 
 come. That rough wooings speed cheerily some 
 times, witness King Harry the Fifth, or the son of 
 
AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 5 
 
 " those fierce Vikings out of the dark Northeast," 
 Hereward the Wake. 
 
 The staid atmosphere of St. Margaret s not hav 
 ing proved favorable to the growth of feminine 
 coquetries, Lucy, trembling a little and blushing a 
 great deal, but strong in trust, plighted him her 
 troth. 
 
 Unlike the members of his adopted brotherhood 
 in the New World, Tom Boynton never "cal 
 culated." He was quite unprepared for the effect 
 of this news upon poor old Miss Boynton, who re 
 ceived his triumphant announcement with a sort of 
 tearless grief peculiar to age, and most appealing 
 to the stalwart mountaineer. He realized that to 
 take Lucy away from her would be like tearing the 
 ivy from a mouldering wall. To remain in England, 
 as his aunt pleadingly suggested, partly dependent 
 upon her slender means, until an opening in busi 
 ness could be found for him, was a thought impos 
 sible to entertain. Tom s heart went out with a 
 mighty yearning towards the wonderful hill country 
 left behind, and the prospect of speedy wealth it 
 held out to a strong, capable fellow like himself. 
 
 For a time he was in a pitiful state of irresolu 
 tion. One clay in spring, when golden laburnums 
 and sweet lilies-of-the-valley were coming out in 
 the sunshine of the prim little garden behind the 
 house, Tom strode up and down the walk, con 
 sumed with restlessness. Catching sight of Lucy s 
 brown head at the window of the room where she 
 sat sewing in a frame of ivy leaves, he asked her 
 
6 AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 
 
 to put down her seam and come for a walk with 
 him. 
 
 They reached a point beyond the town, where 
 Lucy seated herself upon a bank of rich grass 
 "with daisies pied," such as only England can pro 
 duce. Looking down the vista of a bowery lane, 
 they saw the minster tower rise ivy-wreathed against 
 a tranquil sky, gray chimneys and moss-grown roofs 
 clustering about it, half hidden from sight by ven 
 erable trees. A shining river ran through mead 
 ows of greenest turf. Everywhere the eye plunged 
 into a mass of unequalled verdure. All was calm, 
 hushed, locked in a deep repose. Here was old 
 England garnering in her centuries of well-earned 
 peace. Here, nearer still, was Lucy, her candid 
 eyes fixed trustfully on his. 
 
 Just then the sun at setting painted the heavens 
 with a glory unspeakable. It was as if his own 
 Golden Gate had opened suddenly before him, and 
 Tom sprang to his feet, the fire of " Westward Ho!" 
 thrilling in his veins. 
 
 " Lucy," he cried, crushing her hands in his vig 
 orous grasp " dear, darling Lucy, it is an awful 
 wrench, but I must go. It is only for a while, never 
 fear ; for while grass grows and water runs I ll be 
 true to you, my lass. I am going to work for for 
 tune now as I never did before. God bless your 
 dear little soul, if there s gold to be had, I ll have 
 it. Will you wait for me, Lucy?" 
 
 " I ll wait, Tom," she answered, simply. 
 
 " There is one thing you have never looked at, 
 
AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 7 
 
 my dear," said Tom, after a long talk over their 
 plans. " It is just possible that you may be left 
 alone in the world at a time when I can t get away 
 to come for you. I am haunted by the fear. It 
 drives me to proposing what I might not have dared 
 to ask for otherwise. As my sweetheart, Lucy, you 
 could not sail around the globe to come to me ; 
 but if you love me well enough to marry me now, 
 before I go, and let me leave you the protection of 
 my name, you can take ship at any time for New 
 York, and from there take another to San Fran 
 cisco, where I will meet my wife, and carry her off 
 to my den in the mountains, like a great ogre as I 
 am. Think twice, Lucy, before you say yes. It 
 will be a long voyage for you, poor little waif, and 
 a wild life after you get there : only God forget 
 me, Lucy, if I ever cease to love and cherish you as 
 the apple of my eye !" 
 
 " I will do what you ask, Tom," Lucy said, like 
 the creature of a dream. 
 
 Two years passed, and all that Lucy had to re 
 mind her of the strange vows she had taken were 
 the little gold wedding ring he had squeezed upon 
 her finger in the shadow of the old minster altar, 
 another circlet hammered out of virgin Californian 
 gold, and imprisoning a great sparkling diamond, 
 sent after Tom s arrival in San Francisco, and the 
 letters glowing with love and pride that came to 
 her by every mail. Tom was now engineer in 
 charge of a famous new mine up under the snow- 
 
8 AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 
 
 peaks of the sierras, working hard and cheerily. 
 Miss Boynton s little house overflowed with In 
 dian, Mexican, and Chinese curiosities, quaint 
 souvenirs of the far Pacific coast, and Lucy might 
 have walked in silk attire had she chosen to as 
 sume the " marrowy shawls of China crape, like 
 wrinkled skins on scalded milk," and their com 
 panion rolls of stuff, that Tom showered upon the 
 two ladies from time to time. 
 
 Thus Lucy s even life ebbed on under the ivy- 
 covered walls that bounded it. 
 
 When the day came that poor old Miss Boynton 
 entered into everlasting rest, Lucy was bewildered 
 by her sudden freedom, and the stirring change it 
 entailed. She was an Englishwoman, however, 
 which means one capable of arising to any emer 
 gency; and when the answer to the letter announc 
 ing her aunt s death to Tom arrived, it found her 
 quite ready to obey its loving behest, and to set 
 forth alone upon the two long voyages. Tom, who 
 was chained to his post just then, awaited her with 
 open arms. 
 
 Westward she journeyed bravely through Atlantic 
 storms ; then southward to the languid torpor of the 
 tropic seas, and across the Isthmus to the calm Pa 
 cific. When at length the steamer passed through 
 the Golden Gate into the broad land-locked harbor 
 of San Francisco, Lucy s heart beat high with ex 
 pectation. Enough of her story had become known 
 to her fellow-voyagers to create in them a feeling of 
 
AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 9 
 
 active sympathy in the expected reunion with her 
 husband. Something very like a groan at his ex 
 pense arose from Lucy s adherents when among all 
 the motley groups of Calif ornians, native and im 
 ported, assembled to greet the arrival of the ship, 
 no trace appeared of the recreant Tom. Under 
 the inspiration of Calif ornian air, it is barely pos 
 sible that Mrs. Boynton s zealous friends might at 
 that point have been led to visit with prompt ven 
 geance a laggard appearance of the missing man. 
 If the quiver of Lucy s lip and her blanching 
 cheek thus affected them, what would have been 
 the result of witnessing the bitter, inconsolable 
 burst of tears with which she shut herself in her 
 state-room till the first disappointment was spent ! 
 By the captain s advice, and under charge of 
 respectable people, Lucy betook herself to a hotel, 
 pending the arrival of tidings from her husband. 
 It was evident that the letter announcing her com 
 ing, a date rendered previously uncertain by the 
 settlement of her small business affairs in England, 
 had miscarried. Her good friend the captain found 
 for her a special opportunity to send a letter on to 
 Tom without delay; and, Lucy s courage rising with 
 renewed hope, she determined, after a day of rest, 
 to take stage for the station nearest the mining 
 camp, and there await his coining. The captain, who 
 saw to all her arrangements and put her in the stage, 
 watched her departure with glistening eyes. Lucy 
 leaned out to wave her hand to him, "with a smile 
 like an angel s," the old man afterwards declared. 
 
10 AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 
 
 During the first part of that long journey by 
 stage Lucy knew not fatigue, so astonished and ex 
 cited was she by the New -World glories. The 
 early spring had broken up the gentle undulations 
 of field and plain with countless flowering plants, 
 whose fragrant breath perfumed the air. Far as 
 the eye could reach in this wonderfully clarified 
 atmosphere were vineyard-clad slopes, prosperous 
 ranches, meadows dotted with patriarchal flocks 
 and herds, and watered by crystal rivers. Above 
 hung cliffs crowned with a dark continuous zone of 
 pines, cutting off the flower-enamelled paradise be 
 low from the snow-shrouded crests of the sierras 
 " Tom s mountains," the foolish child called those 
 grand untrodden summits. Lucy s insular reserve, 
 her fears, her scruples, melted into the gladness of 
 a child butterfly-hunting under a summer sun ; her 
 "heart clothed itself with love." 
 
 Something of her early exhilaration, but none of 
 her patient courage, had worn away, when the un 
 wonted fatigue of two days and a night of stage- 
 riding took possession of Lucy s exhausted frame. 
 A rough woman, her comrade during the greater 
 part of the journey, had, to Lucy s unqualified de 
 spair, been left at the station before the terminus. 
 She was alone now with half a dozen men, who 
 surveyed her with curious but not irreverent eyes. 
 
 Jerry, the soft-voiced stage-driver, reined in his 
 six magnificent horses with the same professional 
 calm exhibited frequently during the journey in driv 
 ing them at full gallop along the edge of a precipice. 
 
AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS II 
 
 The stage halted before the rude veranda of a 
 desolate two-story building, with a little colony of 
 out-houses to correspond, over which was proudly 
 inscribed the word " Hotel." Lucy, almost unable 
 to walk, was half carried across the threshold. 
 The other passengers, travel -soiled as they were, 
 rushed by her like so many cannon-balls into the 
 open door- way of a supper- room, before which a 
 stolid Chinaman promenaded back and forth ring 
 ing a resonant bell. 
 
 Making his obeisance to Lucy in the smoky, oil- 
 reeking atmosphere of this sitting-room, bar, and 
 office combined, stood the proprietor, a hopelessly 
 seedy Don Quixote, with a smack of former gentil 
 ity in his drawling tones. 
 
 " I am the wife of Mr. Boynton, of the Hum- 
 boldt Mine," Lucy managed to say, with quiet dig 
 nity. " I have every reason to hope that my hus 
 band will meet me here very shortly, and I must 
 beg you to give me a room at once where I may 
 rest until he comes." 
 
 Although profuse in civilities upon t]ie discovery 
 that his guest was the " colonel s lady," as he chose, 
 to Lucy s amusement, to style her, Don Quixote 
 looked a trifle blank at the mention of a room. 
 Going off for a moment into the supper-room, he 
 quickly reappeared with the beaming announcement, 
 made in the style of a provincial theatre manager, 
 that " in order to accommodate Mrs. Colonel Boyn 
 ton, Jedge Tompkins had kindly consented to dou 
 ble up with General Snyder for the night." 
 
12 AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS. 
 
 Lucy s strength only sufficed her to ascend to 
 the rude room proffered by that distinguished citi 
 zen, Jedge Tompkins, and there to request a cup 
 of tea. This awful beverage was served to her 
 presently by the stolid Chinaman, who took the 
 opportunity to remove a box of paper collars and a 
 package of toothpicks belonging to the Judge, sub 
 stituting for them Mrs. Boynton s rugs and dress 
 ing-case. Lucy waited to see him depart, bolted 
 her door, spread one rug over the straw bed, and 
 drew another upon herself as she dropped into the 
 deep sleep of utter physical fatigue. 
 
 Towards morning she was aroused by a con 
 fused sound from the room below. She sprang up 
 in bed, trying to realize her position. Through the 
 thin boards dividing them she distinctly heard the 
 rattle of dice-boxes, voices in dispute, oaths, a scuf 
 fle, a pistol shot, then another a riot making hid 
 eous the night. Overcome with terror she tottered 
 to her feet. The candle she had left burning flick 
 ered in its socket and went out, leaving her in dark 
 ness. Lucy groped her way to the window, with 
 an absurd impulse to cry aloud for help. At the 
 very moment when, fancying that she could detect 
 the noise of a horse s hoofs, a wild prayer for Tom 
 to come for her rose to her lips, more shots were 
 heard below, and something whizzed up past her 
 ear, leaving a trail like fire upon her cheek. 
 
 Tom Boynton, riding hard through the night over 
 rough mountain-roads to seek his wife, reached the 
 tavern just in time to find its inmates launched 
 
AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 13 
 
 into a fierce but not unusual affray at cards. The 
 landlord, apt at this stage of the game to be over 
 come by strong libations, and on the present occa 
 sion somewhat unnerved by what he called " the 
 boys bein rayther onexpectedly lively," directed 
 him to Lucy s room. Tom s knock and call receiv 
 ing no response, he burst open the door to find his 
 wife lying senseless on the floor. 
 
 Out of her trance of terror Lucy slowly came. 
 She felt the warm clasp of loving arms, a strong 
 heart beating close to hers. A man s tears were 
 rained upon her face, and the slight wound upon 
 her cheek was stanched with tenderest kisses. 
 
 II 
 
 WE may look in upon Lucy s new home, after 
 the lapse of a peaceful year or two. It was a veri 
 table mountain eyrie, somewhat apart from the min 
 ing settlement, a roughly built but comfortable 
 cottage, clinging for dear life to the edge of a bat 
 tlement of cliffs, nestled under the locked arms of 
 giant pine-trees, where they lay down to rest at 
 night lulled by the music of falling waters, in early 
 spring swelling to the roar of a mighty cataract as 
 the swollen torrent plunged downward through the 
 canon at their feet. As for the interior, every stick 
 of furniture had been brought up on pack-mules 
 
14 AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 
 
 from the station below, and it was not elaborate ; 
 but a few months of Lucy s stay sufficed to make 
 of it a very bower of bliss, Tom thought. There 
 were warm red curtains to hang before the case 
 ments, old Aunt Boynton s blue tea-cups and brass 
 candlesticks for the dresser shelves, fair English 
 linen and bright English silver adjusted by deftest 
 English fingers upon their modest board. For 
 drapery to the little lounge they had the brilliant 
 coloring and fine web of blankets made by the Na- 
 vajo Indians. How Lucy had cried for joy when 
 she found blossoming bravely upon her window- 
 sill a pot of old-fashioned red and white balsam, 
 which Tom had raised for her from the seed, in 
 memory of the garden at St. Margaret s ! 
 
 As months went on, Lucy, well trained to the 
 solitude of her New-World life, found a thousand 
 charms surrounding it. In early summer, leaving 
 their mossy fern-hung cliffs, Tom and she would 
 make long expeditions on horseback down into the 
 enchanting region, where, kneeling upon hillocks 
 of emerald turf, waist-deep in scented grass, she 
 might fill her lap with a mass of gaudy wild tulips, 
 of lilies, and syringa lusciously sweet in smell, of 
 tiny unknown flowers in every shade of blue and 
 white and rose. 
 
 The glorious oaks of the foot-hill summits, 
 spreading afar their layers of lustrous shade, ap 
 pealed most strongly to her English heart ; but she 
 learned to look with enthusiasm upon the pines 
 clothing with their girdle of everlasting green the 
 
AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 15 
 
 granite ribs of the mountain monarchs couched in 
 eternal sleep. 
 
 At last there came a late October day when 
 Tom s baby-girl came into blossom like Alpine 
 Edelweiss beneath a fall of snow. Lucy did well, 
 and during two or three weeks purest love and joy 
 reigned under the roof of the little dwelling. Tom 
 walked about on tip-toes, and conversed in awe- 
 stricken whispers even at the distance of a mile 
 from his new treasure. An old Dutchwoman, who 
 had been induced to come from a distant settle 
 ment to attend upon Lucy, abandoned them when 
 the baby was about three weeks old, Lucy declar 
 ing herself quite strong enough to resume her 
 usual duties about the cottage, aided by her quaint 
 factotum, the Chinaman with a blue cotton blouse 
 and a pigtail, who was their cook, launderer, and 
 butler combined. A few days after, Tom bounded 
 up the little path leading to his home, and burst in 
 like an autumn blast of wind, to find Lucy sitting 
 by the fire, looking pale and weary, holding her 
 hand upon her side. 
 
 "I think I have taken a little cold, Tom," she 
 said, trying to smile up at him in her usual fashion. 
 " Perhaps I had better go back to bed." 
 
 And oh, the pity of it ! all too soon, poor little 
 English Lucy lay still and cold upon her couch, the 
 baby wailing at her side. Just before she died, 
 Lucy asked Tom to listen they were singing the 
 "Jubilate" at St. Margaret s: so listening she 
 passed away. They made her a grave at the foot 
 
l6 AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 
 
 of her favorite tree a grand heaven-reaching pine, 
 clothed with a mist of perfumed plumy green. 
 
 Ill 
 
 TOM BOYNTON recrossed his desolate threshold 
 to cast himself down upon Lucy s vacant couch, 
 and pray God to take him too. He heard a feeble 
 cry, and felt beneath the clothes a stirring like the 
 flutter of a bird. Lucy s baby lay there, forgotten 
 in the might of his despair. He picked up the 
 tiny thing, awkwardly adjusting its garments and 
 soothing it against his cheek. The child cried on, 
 and would not suffer him to lay it down ; by-and-by 
 it fell asleep in his bosom ; and to his heart, that 
 had been like a stone, there crept again a sem 
 blance of human warmth. 
 
 Next day storm-clouds hung low upon the peaks 
 of the Sierras, and the wind went moaning through 
 the pines. A miner, who was Tom s especial friend 
 among his employes, came up early from the camp 
 to find him making preparations for departure from 
 the cottage. 
 
 Without proper food or attendance for the child, 
 and with no prospect of securing for it a woman s 
 care, short of the kind old nurse whose services at 
 home were claimed by her own newly arrived 
 grandchild, he had made up his mind, in view of 
 
AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 17 
 
 the menacing snow blockade, to set out on horse 
 back with the baby in his arms, and striking down 
 the mountain-side by a precipitous trail not often 
 used, make all speed to gain the far-away ranch- 
 house where the old nurse might be found. Tom s 
 mare, the noble creature that had borne him so 
 fleetly and so faithfully to meet his bride, was 
 equipped with such provision for the ride as she 
 could carry, and the infant, warmly wrapped, was 
 laid in her father s breast. Boynton rode forth 
 from his home into the forest gloom, like a spirit 
 driven from paradise, daring not to look behind. 
 
 With steady riding, under ordinary conditions of 
 the weather, he might hope by evening to secure a 
 shelter for the child. A sullen canopy of sky and 
 a peculiar threatening of snow in the atmosphere 
 caused him many an anxious pang of doubt and 
 self-reproach as from time to time he gazed in 
 upon the sleeping baby nestled under the folds of 
 the great plaid with which she was bound to his 
 body, then, loosening rein, let the mare out into 
 a long even stride, carrying them swiftly through 
 the pine-carpeted forest reaches, and across the 
 granite ledges, where her hoofs rang cheerily. 
 
 A snow-flake, then another, fell like lead upon 
 his heart. They came thick and fast as the short 
 day closed in, bringing the expedition to a sudden 
 halt. The dreaded snow was upon them in good 
 earnest, and he dared not risk the loss of trail. 
 Turning aside under the impervious roofing of a 
 group of firs, Boynton prepared to bivouac. 
 
18 AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 
 
 No hardship this for an old campaigner, and in 
 a short time a brisk flame from a pile of storm- 
 riven logs and branches shot up into the blue 
 shadows overhead. Tom would have taken oath 
 that his brave little comrade smiled back at him 
 when, after feeding, he stowed her warmly away, 
 under the peak of an India rubber blanket, upon a 
 royally fragrant couch of moss and fir boughs. She 
 lay there, uttering a few inarticulate murmurs of 
 sweet content, while he brewed himself a pot of 
 tea, and looked after the comfort of his mare, teth 
 ered sociably at his elbow. 
 
 Through the long watches of the night, while 
 Tom kept vigil by his baby s side, taking anxious 
 heed of the progress of the storm, his faithful ani 
 mal turned on him eyes so full of human sympathy 
 he almost felt that she must speak. 
 
 With the return of daylight Boynton determined 
 at all cost to take up the abandoned trail. Cheer 
 ing him as could no other sound, arose the baby s 
 lusty demand for breakfast. Making nervous haste 
 to prepare for her a meal consisting of biscuit- 
 crumbs and sugar, with snow-water warmed over 
 the embers, he broke camp, and set forth anew 
 upon his eyrie pilgrimage. 
 
 Amid the spectral tree-forms shivering beneath 
 their weight of snow (his knowledge of the confor 
 mation of the hills, the grouping of the rocks, aid 
 ing him in this extremity) he labored on, progress 
 at every moment becoming more difficult, in the 
 teeth of a growing storm. The mare s feet gath- 
 
AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 19 
 
 ered snow until, sliding forward with a dangerous 
 rush down the incline, then pulling herself up, with 
 panting sides, she would turn her head away from 
 the furious onslaught of wind and snow bearing 
 upon them through the forest aisles like a wall of 
 breakers on the shore. 
 
 Tom Boynton drew rein beneath an overhanging 
 shelf of rock, not knowing whether he had there 
 found his grave and his child s. Hour after hour, 
 while the sleet drove and the wind raged, he stood 
 with his back against the granite wall, hugging the 
 baby close, wetting her lips with wine, and breath 
 ing his warm breath on her face. With all his 
 might he resisted an overmastering sense of drow 
 siness. The recklessness of life before possessing 
 him was merged into an intense desire to struggle 
 for existence for the sake of Lucy s little one, 
 Once, when the baby cried long and piteously, Tom 
 sang her to rest with the fragment of a nursery 
 song, the big tears running down his cheeks. 
 
 The storm lulled, and the sleet-fall changed into 
 rain as the afternoon wore on. Bad as the outlook 
 was, the situation left him no alternative but to 
 press forward with all the strength remaining to 
 man and beast. Down in the valley below this 
 ridge was a familiar ford, beyond which he knew 
 the locality to have been a recent camping ground 
 for Indians. Again they set out under clouds clos 
 ing down in a dense gray curtain, to break ere long 
 into a violent pelting shower of rain. In a moment 
 Boynton was soaking wet, as if he had fallen in a 
 
20 AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 
 
 stream. The baby, roused to a new sense of dis 
 comfort, uttered a faint moan. Looking in upon 
 her, he saw a strange pallor on the little face, a 
 blue shade settling on her lips. 
 
 Now, indeed, Tom Boynton s stout heart quailed 
 within him. They had reached the summit of the 
 mountain spur. Below, chafing within its rocky 
 bed, ran the turbulent river. Over upon the far 
 ther bank, curling merrily up among a thicket of 
 firs, arose the unmistakable column of a camp-fire 
 smoke. 
 
 With a shout to his mare, Tom dashed madly 
 down the hill. For Lucy s dear sake he would 
 gain that camp with her child alive ! 
 
 With her fine instinct of never-flagging sympa 
 thy, the mare plunged unhesitatingly into the icy 
 stream. Then ensued a rare struggle, every nerve 
 of horse and rider strained to keep afloat under the 
 fierce resistance of the swollen torrent. About 
 mid-stream the mare was caught in the waves and 
 whirled about like a cork. Boynton threw himself 
 into the boiling foam, and, supporting his precious 
 freight upon the saddle with one hand, managed to 
 keep up with the other, until, by a splendid effort, 
 the mare recovered her balance and struck out for 
 the shore, planting her hoofs in triumph upon firm 
 ground at last. 
 
 Tom rode into the Indian encampment, where a 
 half-dozen of them were busy around a generous 
 fire of logs. A young woman, tall, impassive, state 
 ly, like a Diana cast in bronze, looked up from 
 
AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 21 
 
 her pappoose at the apparition of this spent and 
 dripping traveller, who could only muster strength 
 to drop from his saddle, walk into the red glare of 
 the heavenly ring of warmth, and without words 
 hold out to her the burden from his breast. 
 
 
 IV 
 
 A FEW years ago some Americans newly arrived 
 in Paris were lounging in the court -yard of the 
 Grand Hotel, listening to the idle talk of their com 
 patriots, who dispensed with liberal hand the gos 
 sip of their colony. 
 
 While they were thus chatting a carriage drove 
 under the porte-cochere, from which an elaborate 
 footman proceeded to extract severally a middle- 
 aged gentleman of distinguished appearance, a 
 lady bountifully handsome, cordial in manner, 
 frankly magnificent in attire, and a young girl 
 dressed in gray velvet with bands of silvery gray 
 fur, the type of whose aristocratic beauty would 
 have stamped her as worthy of adorning any court 
 in Europe. 
 
 As this party passed in all of the young men 
 doffed their hats. One of them stood as if moon 
 struck by the vision. 
 
 " Hamersly, you are palpably slain on the spot ; 
 or is it the reopening of some old wound ? You 
 
22 AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 
 
 have met our American Edelweiss, the rare pale 
 Margaret, before?" 
 
 "I did not know I am a fanatic," said Hamers- 
 ly, coming out of his maze ; " I honestly declare to 
 you that I never in all my life till now saw a girl 
 before whom I felt madly inclined to throw myself 
 down and be trampled on." 
 
 " You may be saved the sacrifice, my dear fel 
 low," his friend said, with the pleased air of one 
 who has a sensation to communicate. " Can it be 
 that the joy is reserved for me of finding one man 
 in Paris who doesn t know that the young lady you 
 have just seen is in a few days to become by her 
 
 marriage with the Due de B a member of one 
 
 of the most illustrious families in France ? that he 
 is as romantically in love with her as if he were the 
 poorest and proudest of jeunes premiers, which, in 
 deed, he might be from his looks? that the hand 
 some old fellow yonder, with the sort of cavalier 
 dash about him, and those ferocious long mus 
 taches and melancholy eyes, is her father, who wor 
 ships the ground she treads upon a father-in-law 
 many a man besides the Due has coveted, let me 
 tell you Tom Boynton, the Californian millionaire, 
 the well-beloved hero of the Pacific coast?" 
 
 "And the florid lady is her mother, I suppose?" 
 
 " Nothing of the sort. You are arguing yourself 
 unknown not to recognize the famous Queen of 
 Diamonds of our colony, who has a very substantial 
 husband of her own hereabouts. Miss Boynton 
 has had the benefit of her chaperonage off and on 
 
AN EDELWEISS OF THE SIERRAS 23 
 
 since leaving \iox pensionnat a year ago. Old Tom 
 Boynton married, indeed. Half the women of your 
 acquaintance would tell you how unlikely that 
 is ever to come to pass again." 
 
GOLDEN -ROD 
 
GOLDEN -ROD: 
 Bn 1F&BI ot flfcount Beeert 
 
 IT was at one of the " Patriarchs " balls at Del- 
 monico s, two seasons ago, that Erskine first saw 
 the woman destined to reign upon the empty throne 
 of his affections. 
 
 He had been poor, proud, and studious during 
 many years of his college life and subsequent 
 career at the New York bar, had abjured society as 
 far too expensive a luxury, and, with the exception 
 of dining occasionally with two or three warm 
 friends, who would not take " no " for an answer, 
 went nowhere. 
 
 The windfall of an unexpected inheritance, lead 
 ing to a summer run over the European Continent, 
 where he fell into the hands of Mrs. Pratt (Polly 
 Pratt, she is commonly called by her followers), 
 extracted him from his seclusion as cleanly as a 
 nut kernel from its shell. Mrs. Pratt has a way 
 with her that no one can resist, and the two or 
 three fashionable New York girls in her train fell 
 upon this "new" man with the rapture that in- 
 
28 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 spired Columbus when he first saw the coast-line 
 of the New World detached from the waste of 
 waters. Erskine was whizzed through Switzerland 
 and Germany with lightning speed, and taken to 
 see the midnight sun in company with all these 
 gay, gossiping people, who flattered him so deli 
 cately that, only in the most imperceptible way, 
 he awoke one morning to find himself a desir 
 able, fresh from the mint, and ready to be put into 
 immediate circulation in the society of the great 
 Western metropolis. 
 
 When they all met again, in December, in New 
 York, Erskine was more and more filled with sur 
 prise that he had not long ago found out how 
 very nice it is to dine, day after day, with charming 
 well-bred people, in houses that are a dream of 
 decorative art ; to drop in at one or two clubs, and 
 chat with fellows who are ever ready to " put you 
 up to anything ;" to ride up the Avenue and through 
 the Park, past long lines of elegant equipages, 
 whence gay nods and wooing smiles are bestowed 
 in quick succession. 
 
 To weary women and responsive girls this man 
 was a heaven-send, with his erect figure, his warm 
 coloring, his clear eye, his look of active manhood, 
 and strong intelligence. Then, too, while conscious 
 of his success, he had the rare grace to be modest 
 in his hour of triumph. As yet the insufferable airs 
 of some young Knickerbockers had not invaded 
 him. Perhaps it was a relic of his barbarism 
 that made him laugh naturally, walk with a spring 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 29 
 
 in his step, treat women with an old - fashioned 
 chivalrous courtesy, and deal with a young girl in 
 thought and speech as with a sister. 
 
 Not one of all the women of the world whom he 
 had met had as yet had power to quicken his 
 pulses, until one evening, at the February ball I 
 speak of, he saw Rosalie Gray leave her seat upon 
 the dais, where she was talking to an effusive old 
 dowager, and, laying her hand upon some man s 
 coat-sleeve with the coldest touch imaginable, go 
 out to join the dance. She had refused to dance 
 in the cotillon, and it was apparently to supplant 
 one reign of boredom by another that she made 
 this move. 
 
 Erskine stood gazing at her tall form, draped 
 in white, with a glitter like that of the snow in 
 moonlight, her bust rising and falling tranquilly 
 under a circlet of diamonds, her proud head un 
 decked, save by a few jewelled stars. He was 
 quite too recent a recruit to the privileged ranks of 
 the Patriarchs to know that she was the best- 
 dressed woman in the room. It was left to little 
 Watson Webster at his elbow to appraise her gown, 
 to affix the great maker s name, to reckon up the 
 value of her gems, to speculate as to who had sent 
 her the two bouquets she carried one of royal red 
 Jacqueminot roses, the other of 
 
 "naiad-like lilies of the vale, 
 Whom youth makes so fair and passion so pale 
 That the light of their tremulous bells is seen 
 Through their pavilions of tender green." 
 
30 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 Erskine saw her lend herself haughtily to the arm 
 of her danseur, and melt away into the throng, with 
 an insane jealousy of the puppy who dared invade 
 this goddess by a touch. Eagerly did his eyes fol 
 low her perfect grace, and all the while Watson 
 Webster continued to babble in his ear unweariedly. 
 
 Watson is the most industrious of quidnuncs, 
 and a more useful small personage to society it 
 would be difficult to find. He is kind and gracious 
 to all the debutantes, and hand in glove with all 
 the dowagers. He fancies that half of them are 
 secretly in love with him, but, like Mr. Snevellicci, 
 he is catholic in his admirations, and says, " I love 
 em, every one." While Watson stands, with his 
 little cock-sparrow air and his eye-glasses, talking 
 of fifty things, poor moon -struck Erskine, losing 
 sight of his beauty as she passes out under the soft 
 pink-shaded lamps into another room, turns upon 
 him with a gasp. 
 
 " Who is she ?" he asks, as if there was but one 
 " divinest she " in all this throng. 
 
 " Oh, really, now, my dear fellow !" remonstrates 
 Mr. W T ebster, with a puzzled air ; and when Erskine 
 makes him understand, he speaks relentingly. " Oh, 
 that, indeed ! Well, I m not surprised, as you are 
 just beginning among us, and she keeps to herself 
 awfully. That s Mrs. Caspar Gray, a widow, who 
 has been in Europe, mending her broken heart, as 
 we Americans always do, for several years. Peo 
 ple are making no end of fuss over her this season, 
 but somehow or other I don t seem to get on with 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT. 31 
 
 her. That grand sort of creature is all very well, 
 you know, but to my taste a woman should be 
 simpatica ; that s it simpatica, you know." 
 
 Watson was quite delighted with himself for find 
 ing so elegant a phrase, and went on cheerfully : 
 
 "She made an immense success in London last 
 spring, and at Newport this summer, when she came 
 
 back. She has a beautiful house in Street, 
 
 but don t take the trouble to entertain much. Now 
 dinners, for instance a widow ought, in my opin 
 ion, to lay herself out on dinners. It is her mission 
 in life, according to my idea. As far as you are 
 concerned, I don t see how you are to get the en 
 tree there, because, for one thing, you are handi 
 capped by that Pratt set. Mrs. Caspar Gray sits 
 on that kind of thing awfully. I advise you to be 
 very careful, my dear fellow, about that kind of 
 thing. You can t be too particular to know just 
 the right sort of people at the start, and stick to 
 them." 
 
 Little Watson was so plaintive in his admoni 
 tions that Erskine laughed outright. To him the 
 spectacle of these society men, so decorous, so lan 
 guid, so anxious to step neither to the right nor to 
 the left of the chalk line described for the division 
 of their " set " from the next so terribly in earnest 
 about it all was infinitely diverting. 
 
 When he made his way into the supper-room, it 
 was to be hailed by Mrs. Pratt, who, in a gown all 
 pink and blue, with roses, like a Dresden figurine, 
 had taken possession of a table in company with 
 
32 GOLDEN- ROD: 
 
 two or three fast girls and men. This little lady is 
 in her element when reigning over a supper-table 
 at a ball. She has a talent for venturing to the 
 verge and not falling over that is quite unparalleled ; 
 and being well-born, rich, and supplied with a most 
 complaisant husband, is in the front rank of good 
 society. With Erskine she had always been end 
 lessly good-natured, sisterly, and on her guard. 
 To-night he felt as if he hardly knew her for the 
 same woman. She drew aside her gauzy clouds 
 of blue and rose-color, calling him to sit by her ; 
 she had a bottle of champagne in her hand, and 
 filled from it a goblet, which she held to Erskine s 
 lips, and a fire of raillery arose from all the gay 
 party, which, so far from exhilarating him, excited 
 the profoundest gloom. 
 
 At the very moment when he was thus coldly 
 captive, Mrs. Caspar Gray, with a distinguished- 
 looking gray-haired gentleman for her cavalier, than 
 whom there is no one more honored in the com 
 munity, whose word is law in all matters of social 
 observance, passed them by. Her dress brushed 
 Erskine, and a floating fringe caught and was fixed 
 upon the button of his coat. He sprang to his 
 feet and endeavored to aid her in withdrawing it ; 
 Mrs. Pratt, also, transformed into a busy ingenuous 
 fairy, proffering her services. It was curious to 
 note the look upon Rosalie Gray s face as she 
 calmly repelled the advances of Mrs. Pratt s coterie. 
 Had they been disembodied spirits she could not 
 have looked through them more completely. But 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 33 
 
 when the link binding her to Erskine refused to 
 break, and some one was searching for a penknife 
 to cut the Gordian knot, the horror of a scene, and 
 in such company, overcame Mrs. Gray so far as to 
 bring a flush to her features like the rosy sunrise 
 on Mont Blanc. Erskine could hardly tell whether 
 she even noticed him, as she stood there erect, with 
 her proudly-poised head and delicately-curved nos 
 trils, impatient to be gone. For one moment their 
 eyes met, as he bowed low, and she swept away. 
 
 For the rest of the evening Erskine was on 
 thorns. He watched her surrounded by men, and 
 with resentment observed that she danced twice 
 again once with the Vicomte de Marsac, a French 
 man of distinction on his American travels ; once 
 with Mr. Vernon, a statuesque creature contributed 
 .to the evening s entertainment by her Majesty s 
 legation at Washington, which was supposed to 
 claim the right to his valuable services at other 
 times. 
 
 In vain did Mrs. Pratt resume her winning courte 
 sies. Erskine felt unconquerably oppressed by her 
 and by everything. He haunted the corridor, and, 
 when a tall figure draped in a white and gold wrap 
 went down the stairs, again attended by the gentle 
 man who took her to the supper -room, Erskine, 
 with ulster on and hat in hand, found his way to 
 the lower landing. Fate favored him, for just as 
 
 Mr. A , whom he knew, reached the last step, 
 
 he slipped and twisted his foot, making it neces 
 sary to be at least assisted to a seat. Erskine s 
 3 
 
34 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 offer of service to him was courteously declined, 
 but as the door opened and " Mrs. Caspar Gray s 
 carnage " was loudly announced, her footman ap 
 pearing outside, Mr. A said, hurriedly, 
 
 " Put Mrs. Gray in the carriage for me, Erskine, 
 will you ? I shall be all right in ten minutes, I as 
 sure you, Mrs. Gray. A thousand thanks for your 
 solicitude. Oh, I beg your pardon ! May I intro 
 duce to you my friend, Mr. Erskine Mrs. Caspar 
 Gray ?" 
 
 It was done : for a moment her gloved fingers 
 touched his hand. She entered her carriage, the 
 footman closed the door; there was a cool con 
 ventional murmur of "thanks" bestowed upon 
 poor Erskine, with hardly a glance towards him, 
 as the little brougham, crowded in the line, drove 
 off rapidly, leaving him with a vision of a clear- 
 cut face looking out of the white and gold dra 
 peries, and a waft of odor from the roses and 
 lilies in her hand that will haunt him all his 
 life. 
 
 And then, as it often happens we meet people 
 once whom we have never seen before, and go on 
 meeting them pertinaciously, Erskine encountered 
 Rosalie Gray within two days after that. He was 
 behind time at a large dinner-party, and reached 
 the drawing-room only to be assigned to a pretty 
 young girl of the period, so confident of her own 
 powers, and so full of easy talk, that during two 
 hours he abandoned the thought of any possible 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 35 
 
 exertion other than that necessary to the considera 
 tion of Mrs. Lyle s perfect menu. 
 
 " This has been such a gay season, you can t 
 think," Miss Amy North was saying in his ear, 
 while addicting herself with the frank gourmandize 
 of girlhood to a bouchkeci la reine, " this is my tenth 
 large dinner, and I have been to fourteen lunches 
 already. I can t count the dances and little things, 
 and as to afternoon teas, they are a nuisance ; don t 
 you think so? I never saw you at an afternoon 
 tea, by-the-way. I think they are just a sort of an 
 apology for people who don t know how to enter 
 tain, getting Robinson to send cards to everybody 
 they know, giving them bread-and-milk all around, 
 and then patting them on the head, and telling 
 them to run home early and go to bed, like good 
 children." 
 
 "A sort of a curfew bell for society?" Erskine 
 said, laughing at her strictures. " I don t see how 
 you accomplish anything else but winging your way 
 from one flower to another in such a life as this." 
 
 " Oh, I haven t told you half," said Miss Amy, 
 with disdain. " Why, all the girls in my set do a 
 great deal more than that. We have a Shakespeare 
 class and a German class and a literature class. 
 Then we go to draw at the Art League, and to do 
 crewel-work at the Decorative Art Society. Then 
 we must go to that dear Theodore Thomas s con 
 certs, you know, and I have my singing twice a 
 week with Herr Bayreuth. What with the theatre 
 now and then it s so nice to go to Wallack s, and 
 
36 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 there is always something melodramatic for you to 
 cry over (if you can, but I can t} at the Union 
 Square and lots of other things, one s time is 
 pretty well taken up." 
 
 " How much I should value that portion of it 
 you are bestowing now upon me !" 
 
 " Oh, I like to talk to you," was the consoling 
 rejoinder. " The truth is, my brother-in-law, Frank 
 Thornton, and Gracie (that s his wife, my sister, 
 you know) had made such a swan of you before I 
 ever met you that I was rather inclined to think 
 you horrid. You know how one feels about those 
 people in Sunday-school books who love to take 
 their medicine, and want to die early, and all that 
 sort of thing ? I had a kind of an idea that you 
 would be like that ; but it is quite different. Gracie 
 says when you come to see us she always feels as 
 if somebody had opened a door in a very hot room. 
 Fihtl No, thanks, and no champagne. It is my 
 principle always to skip here till we come to the 
 salad at a dinner. That and an ice-pudding are 
 like oases in the desert of Sahara. Do you know 
 I am seriously thinking of retiring from the world 
 after this year? One likes to try everything, of 
 course, but one or two seasons will be enough for 
 me. I can stand the girls, and some of the men ; 
 but I have no patience with the older women the 
 married ones ; they take everything away from us 
 in New York society." 
 
 "There is a remedy that I observe most of you 
 young ladies fly to," Erskine said, with a smile. 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 37 
 
 " Well, but if I loved anybody, as Grace loves 
 Frank, for example," said Amy, with a look like 
 Una s in her face, " I should want to stay with him 
 and read, and go to balls together and come away 
 early, as they do. But these women who are rather 
 old at least I think so who go around to public 
 places with silly little boys keeping Kindergarten, 
 we girls call it. Look at Mrs. Pratt. Almost any 
 man is game for her, and you see her with every 
 body in turn. There is one woman in town whom 
 I admire more than anybody else, and there she is, 
 at the very end of the table, next to Mr. Lyle. You 
 can t see her for those waxlights. Lean this way 
 a moment. Isn t she a love ? Mrs. Caspar Gray." 
 
 Far up the glittering vista of lights and glass and 
 porcelain, over a bed of Marechal Neil roses, Ers- 
 kine saw her beautiful, high - bred face, wearing a 
 little wearied air that charmed and excited him at 
 once. His heart beat high with the anticipation of 
 meeting her again. 
 
 "Why, what is the matter?" said the quick- 
 sighted Miss Amy. " You look wonderfully bright. 
 One would think that you belong to Mrs. Gray s 
 cordon of unrequited lovers." 
 
 " I have never spoken to her in my life," he said, 
 gayly. " May I not worship from afar ? The la 
 dies are going, I see. Au revoir, then, in the draw 
 ing-room." 
 
 The long train of beautiful women passed out. 
 When the men rejoined them, the large room, 
 sparkling with the subdued light of many candles, 
 
38 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 set upon mantel-shelf and brackets everywhere, and 
 in sconces of old English brass high up on walls 
 hung in the half-tints of color that artists love, dis 
 played more than one group of beauties a man 
 might cheerfully delay to look upon. Erskine had 
 eyes but for one. Against a portiere of Oriental stuff 
 of some deep blue, like the plum before a touch has 
 brushed away its silvery bloom, sat Rosalie Gray. 
 Her dress was of a pale yellow brocade, the front of 
 palest blue. Round her throat was a necklet of dia 
 monds, and at her breast a great cluster of early 
 jonquils nestled in the folds of some rare old Ven 
 ice point. Her hand trifled with a pale blue fan, 
 with carved sticks of yellow ivory. She was in con 
 versation with Mrs. Lyle, but arose as the gentle 
 men came in, and, making her adieus, quickly dis 
 appeared. 
 
 "Another engagement," the hostess said, when 
 some one asked the reason why. 
 
 " That is the penalty of wooing a bright particu 
 lar star," was the laughing rejoinder. " Nobody 
 is so much in demand as Mrs. Gray." 
 
 Bitterly disappointed, Erskine sought the street. 
 It was drizzling gently as he walked down the 
 avenue to his club, but he did not know it until, 
 upon going into the smoking-room, some acquaint 
 ance suggested to him that he had better go home 
 to change his clothes. 
 
 Something possessed him next day to go to a 
 famous florist and wreck himself upon an order for 
 roses rare, princely roses, laid layer upon layer in 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 39 
 
 beds of maidenhair fern. These were sent anony 
 mously to her address, and for weeks the offering 
 was repeated, until the florist and his young man 
 began to look upon this reckless youth with the 
 favor bestowed only upon male customers either 
 just before or for a short time after their entrance 
 into the holy estate of matrimony. 
 
 He saw her in her brougham in the Park; on 
 horseback sometimes, followed by her groom ; at 
 the opera, where from a distant door-way he gazed 
 at her profile against the crimson lining of her 
 box, fancied that he saw his flowers in her hand, 
 and noted with exultation that among all the vis 
 itors succeeding each other in the vacant chairs 
 behind her there was not one to whom she gave a 
 shade of preference above the rest. 
 
 At last, one morning when he was coming out of 
 the Brunswick, a lady walking with a firm, light 
 tread crossed his path. She looked up, and for the 
 first time since their casual introduction met his 
 open gaze. Alas for Erskine and all his wasted 
 hopes and roses ! Mrs. Caspar Gray looked at 
 him without a shadow of recognition in her glori 
 ous eyes. He might have been the jaunty porter 
 of the Hotel Brunswick, standing near, for all in 
 terest she vouchsafed. 
 
 " It is over," Erskine said, between his teeth, 
 striding away over Madison Square. 
 
40 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 II 
 
 ONE summer evening, when town had become 
 rather less endurable than usual with heat and 
 dust, Erskine dropped in upon a pair of people of 
 his acquaintance, to whom you were very irregu 
 larly presented by Miss Amy North, in the last 
 chapter, as " Frank and Grade." 
 
 Erskine found them fanning themselves in the 
 half-light of a parlor open on all sides to what 
 stirring of the air it was possible to trap under the 
 semblance of a breeze. An exhausted voice came 
 to him in greeting from a gilt wicker-chair, and he 
 felt his way to a small jewel-laden hand, though 
 not without becoming entangled in a billowy mass 
 of lawn and lace that lay across the India-matting. 
 
 " I am as glad to see you as I can be of any 
 thing in this weather," Mrs. Thornton said. " Pray 
 sit here between the windows, and have a fan. 
 Frank dear, are you quite sure that you have 
 opened everything, and will you please take away 
 these flowers from my side ?" 
 
 " I hate these roses feverish blood, " quoted 
 obedient Frank, as he bore away the vase whose 
 fragrance was filling all the air. " Erskine, we 
 have just arrived at that period of matrimonial de- 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 41 
 
 bate when we welcome an outsider. My wife is 
 becoming a little plaintive, and I a little argument 
 ative. Amy, who has no fancy for this atmosphere 
 of domestic gloom, has retired up-stairs, I believe, 
 to read some book upon arctic explorations, which 
 she finds a solace on a day like this. The point 
 at issue is, What shall we do to get out of town, 
 and where shall we go ? Here am I, with a nurs 
 ery full of whooping-cough and incipient teeth, 
 which very naturally militate against a warm re 
 ception for us anywhere ; a charming sister-in-law, 
 who must have the usual diversion of woman in 
 her hours of ease ; an adorably patient wife, who 
 has submitted to the untold sacrifice of staying in 
 town until nearly the end of June." 
 
 " We are growing positively cross under the 
 protracted indecision," Mrs. Thornton said. "We 
 talk of a dozen plans, and never can agree on one 
 for five minutes at a time. I am afraid" this 
 was ventured soothingly " Frank rather dreads a 
 long journey anywhere just now." 
 
 " Rather," said Frank, grimly. " Juvenile de 
 mands for paternal ministrations, however sweet 
 in the sacred seclusion of one s own nursery, do 
 not, as a rule, excite either pride or joy in the bos 
 om of a man who must promenade forever back 
 and forth through a railway car, with sandwiches 
 and silver cups of water, during all the thousand 
 hours of a slowly waning midsummer day. But 
 here comes Amy to lend her voice. Can you dis 
 cover Mr. Erskine, Amy, in this uncertain light ?" 
 
42 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 Erskine advanced to meet the slight, erect fig 
 ure, to be welcomed in her somewhat high-pitched 
 but clear and pleasant voice. 
 
 " I am not quite sure, Frank dear, that I mean to 
 be altogether civil to Mr. Erskine, after the evening 
 last winter when I talked at him, from the oysters to 
 the coffee, at Mrs. Lyle s dinner, and he basely took 
 himself off without even bidding me good-night." 
 
 Erskine remembered this occasion well enough 
 to feel a sharp pang at having it recalled. He 
 threw himself upon the young lady s mercy, and 
 was sufficiently forgiven to have her take a seat 
 near him by the window, where the light from a 
 street lamp streamed across her cool pink muslin 
 gown, her bare round arms, with elbow sleeves, 
 and her prim little white lace fichu with the pink 
 rose and knots of black velvet. 
 
 " All will be forgiven and forgotten," said Miss 
 Amy, " if you will only help me to coax or coerce 
 this wretched Frank and Gracie into submission 
 to my will. Give ear unto me, O ye people, while 
 I test my eloquence ! Imagine, then, being perched 
 on the deck of a yacht that skims like a sea-gull 
 over lovely little crested waves along the coast of 
 Maine. Every now and then a dash of salt spray 
 flies up on your feet and petticoats " 
 
 " I can t imagine it, Amy," said Frank. 
 
 " (Don t, Frank, for I am going to be really im 
 pressive) but you don t mind it a bit, for there 
 is the most agreeable man conceivable generally 
 from Boston " 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 43 
 
 " Thanks," said both of the gentlemen from 
 New York. 
 
 " at your feet, quoting Tennyson s Voyage, 
 as he gazes up at you. The yacht speeds glori 
 ously on her way before a stiff breeze through a 
 region of sea and mountain, crag and pebbly beach. 
 All the crimps come out of your hair ; anchovy 
 sandwiches and claret-cup are passed about ; every 
 thing is delightful when suddenly the jib-boom, 
 or whatever the nasty thing is, comes sweeping 
 round, and everybody has to get up and change 
 places, and ten to one another girl gets your man." 
 
 "You are becoming too personal, Amy, to ac 
 complish your point," her sister said, while they all 
 laughed at her nonsense. 
 
 " Well, if that don t tempt you, think of canoe 
 ing over to Bar Island on a midsummer day. Of 
 standing on the top of Green Mountain in a breeze. 
 Of sitting under the cliffs at The Ovens, and watch 
 ing the boats go by. Of catching trout in Eagle 
 Lake. Of riding in a buck -board and shouting 
 * Nancy Lee. Tell me, if you dare, individually or 
 collectively, that there is anything better for us to 
 do than to go to Mount Desert ?" 
 
 "You have omitted one of the hotel joys," said 
 her brother (The Counsellor, as he was called by 
 most of his friends) " that of being served with 
 mackerel and doughnuts at the hands of a dis 
 guised princess wearing a celluloid coronet. I re 
 member once asking my particular one of these 
 stately attendants what her name was. My name 
 
44 GOLDEN - ROD I 
 
 is Mrs. Somerset, she remarked, with withering 
 dignity. * But them as knows me well calls me 
 Sairey. " 
 
 The talk, turned into this channel, went on un 
 til town its gaslights, the sidewalks where hot 
 haggard -looking people went wandering by, and 
 wan little tenement -house children crept out to 
 play until far into the night, the roll of vehicles 
 and tinkling street-car bells had melted away like 
 the scene of a theatre, to be replaced by country 
 visions cool and beautiful, where 
 
 " Only to hear and see the far-off sparkling brine 
 Only to hear were sweet, stretched out beneath the pine." 
 
 " You have conquered, Amy," suddenly remarked 
 The Counsellor. " It is evident that we have all 
 talked ourselves into a state of mind for which 
 there is no cure save our beloved Bar Harbor. I 
 have been turning over in my brain a plan I have 
 had proposed to me to abridge the distance, or to 
 modify the weariness of the jaunt to those slumber 
 ing cherubs up-stairs. I think I have hit it exactly. 
 And to put it out of the power of any one to misin 
 terpret me, or to tell me afterwards that I never 
 can make myself clearly understood " 
 
 " That I never did," said his wife, with fervor. 
 
 " I hereby pledge myself to conduct you all, 
 after a method of my own, as far as Boston. Only 
 I stipulate that no questions be asked; that we 
 start this day week ; that we don t go a step unless 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 45 
 
 Erskine be of the party ; that I am for once cap 
 tain of my crew, with undisputed powers. You 
 consent, Grace, Amy, and Erskine ? Then let us 
 ring for Apollinaris water, and hurrah for the 
 Thornton family en voyage!" 
 
 Ill 
 
 THE day before the eve of our great national 
 holiday, when all New York lay simmering with 
 heat and patriotic zeal, ready to boil over on the 
 glorious Fourth, saw the Thornton family upon the 
 steps of their home in one of the avenues, deliver 
 ing the keys of the house into custody of the mel 
 ancholy female in a crushed bonnet, whose sad lot 
 it was to remain during the next three months en 
 tombed in an atmosphere of brown holland, tete-a- 
 tete with household gods swathed in white or 
 shrouded with mosquito gauze. 
 
 The children, from the front seat of the carriage, 
 behind a breastwork of rugs, bags, and umbrellas, 
 vociferously condoled with that dejected personage, 
 who stood courtesying within the vestibule. Their 
 elders Mr. Thornton in a cab, intending to pick 
 up Erskine at his club, who got in with a parting 
 look at the mountain of luggage completely ob 
 scuring from view both horses and driver of an 
 express wagon were themselves pervaded with a 
 
46 GOLDEN - ROD I 
 
 sense of benevolent pity for all stay-at-homes of 
 whatever estate in life. 
 
 As they drove down Broadway after a halt for 
 fruit and cigars, the great business world was pal 
 pitating through its daily task at the mercy of a 
 withering sun. From Grace Church to Rector 
 Street, where the carriage turned from the whirl of 
 Broadway into a region tinctured with the old-time 
 dignity lingering upon the flanks of Trinity Church, 
 they met a continuous line of vehicles so apparent 
 ly tangled in wild confusion that the chief dangers 
 of the route seemed to attend our travellers at the 
 outset. 
 
 Beside the pier where they finally drew up a 
 large coasting steamer, just about to sail, awaited 
 them. 
 
 " Here we are," said The Counsellor, radiantly. 
 " All aboard, if you please, ladies and gentlemen. 
 Until we reach Boston, at least, there will be room 
 enough in the world for my restless young family." 
 
 The gloomy wharf over which their procession 
 passed presented an appearance very unlike those 
 most known to New York voyagers, where several 
 times a week gay birds of passage flutter, to be 
 wafted on their ocean voyages with flowers and 
 waving handkerchiefs ; it was encumbered with 
 huge trucks loading or unloading freight. 
 
 The large dimensions of the steamer afforded no 
 small consolation to the depressed matron of the 
 party, when she presently found herself politely as 
 sisted up what seemed Jacob s own ladder hang- 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 47 
 
 ing in mid-air, and when her Blessed Baby had 
 been safely hoisted after her. Across a broad 
 clean after-deck, through the cabin, where tea was 
 in readiness, they were conducted to spacious and 
 airy state-rooms. Nothing was lacking for comfort. 
 These favored mortals were guests of the line the 
 only passengers and, through the courtesy of the 
 owners, monarchs of all they surveyed for the next 
 twenty-eight or thirty hours. 
 
 As they unpacked and disposed of their traps 
 the ship parted company with her berth, and noise 
 lessly glided out into the river. The absence of all 
 the customary bustle at such a moment was curious 
 enough. Hardly a sound broke the silence from 
 either the steamer or the wharf. It was like em 
 barking in a phantom ship, and " quite deliciously 
 mysterious," as Amy North observed. 
 
 Rounding the Battery, New York, with all her 
 sins and excited thermometers, lay behind them ; 
 her towers and spires piercing through golden mist, 
 her shipping alive with the commerce of the world. 
 Under the wonderful arch of the Brooklyn Bridge 
 they slid like a snake, and thence fresh winds, 
 sighed for in vain during the sultry days just gone, 
 wafted them on their way. Into the troubled wa 
 ters of Hell Gate, now lulled to repose by a spell 
 more enduring than that which controlled the raging 
 Kuhleborn, leaving behind those beautiful islands 
 condemned to the mournful uses of mad -houses, 
 hospitals, reformatories and prison cells ; along the 
 emerald shores of Astoria, and so close to the fringe 
 
48 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 of salt-meadow encircling the old Morrisania man. 
 sion that they seemed to be heading straight into the 
 rose -wreathed pillars of its ancient veranda; past 
 Port Morris, and over the spot where the British 
 troop-ship went down, with her store of gold sent 
 out to pay the redcoats in the Revolutionary War. 
 And thus gliding on, over water so still and shining 
 that sea and sky seemed blended into one, and in 
 haling soft land-breezes, fraught with sweet odors of 
 new-mown hay, that touched the brow with a thrill 
 ing caress, they heard the sunset gun boom from 
 Fort Schuyler, and watched the evening-star trem 
 bling into light. 
 
 The little ones, who had romped over the deck, 
 sniffing the pure sea-breeze, until already a redder 
 tinge had come into their cheeks, retired to rest 
 with cheerful unconcern of their surroundings. A 
 double berth received the younger two, dexterously 
 imbedded at either end, like apples in a dumpling. 
 No apparition of the terrors of Point Judith assailed 
 them, as through the long bright summer night the 
 steamer ploughed peacefully over the smooth waters 
 of the Sound. Not so fared Mrs. Thornton, who, 
 having announced that she should be sick while 
 skirting that "still-vex d Bermoothes," had made 
 up her mind to fulfil the prophecy at any cost, and 
 was naturally indignant when not the least excuse 
 offered for doing so. Amy declared of Grace that 
 she was like the old lady of blessed memory who 
 always slept with an umbrella and galoshes, to be 
 ready for every emergency. So she braced herself 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 49 
 
 for the tribulation that ought to have come, and 
 about four o clock in the morning arose resolutely, 
 made her toilet with unshrinking hand, and went 
 out on deck to battle with the foe. Boisterous 
 Point Judith was asleep and peaceable enough, but 
 the witchery of the scene, reluctantly abandoned 
 late the night before, was gone. The deck was 
 saturated by fog, shutting out all about them, save 
 the long billows softly powdered with yeasty foam 
 from the ship s sides. Everything was woe-begone. 
 An occasional sailor gave the only evidence of life, 
 and he slunk by her, dripping. Moisture exuded 
 from every pore of the ship ; the rigging streamed 
 with it, and comfort was nowhere to be found. In 
 the desolation of the moment a qualm of sea-sick 
 ness would have been almost a relief. But no ; 
 nothing suggested itself but a feeling of general 
 forlornness, induced by the hour and the outlook. 
 It was not until the benevolent steward, observing 
 this solitary waif on deck, had brought a cup of tea 
 and a ship-biscuit that Mrs. Thornton s spirits rose 
 to a level the plummet could fathom. She needed 
 them all to meet the merciless banter that awaited 
 her from her husband. 
 
 When breakfast was ready the rest of the par 
 ty appeared, looking generally bright and hearty. 
 They sat around the captain s table, on high stools, 
 like school-boys en penitence; and then it was that 
 Blessed Baby revelled in unwonted dishes, bolting, 
 Amy asserted, a " plumbiferous doughnut" and a 
 pickled cucumber, as the polite steward, according 
 
50 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 him a dignity hitherto unattained, deferentially 
 handed everything in turn. 
 
 The officers of the ship, clustered around the 
 lower end of the table, formed a characteristic 
 group. Distinctively American in feature, they sat 
 in serious, almost melancholy, silence, eagerly dis 
 cussing a variety of dishes. The captain a gruff, 
 hearty man, bearded like a pard was scarcely seen 
 in the cabin during the voyage, but addicted him 
 self to the pilot-house, with a watchful devotion to 
 duty as a navigator, which explained the fact that, 
 amid the many dangers of fogs and shoals, there 
 had been for eight years not one accident to a ship 
 of this line. " Never see the captain down below 
 when there s a fog like this," remarked one of the 
 officers an announcement as cheering as anything 
 could be in a "fog like this." 
 
 Dreary enough is this phase of coast -voyaging, 
 and against it one may never be altogether secure. 
 
 When Point Judith was left behind, and the ship 
 had sailed into Vineyard Sound, the gray curtain 
 hung heavy around them, and the hoarse, discord 
 ant whistle kept calling, to be answered by whistle 
 or bell from shore or light-ship, or by the whistle of 
 a steamer or the horn of a sailing vessel, near by 
 but invisible. The sun struggled sharply with the 
 fog, and from time to time conquered it, the envious 
 drapery lifting for an instant to reveal picturesque 
 glimpses of the main-land, or of the camp-meeting 
 grounds at Martha s Vineyard, where the white roofs 
 rising amid foliage, and the green waters of a little 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 51 
 
 bay dancing in the sunlight, fairly dazzled the eyes 
 with brightness. At such a moment the fog melted 
 away as if by magic ; the constant vigil of the look 
 out in the bows was relaxed ; the raucous whistle 
 of the steam-pipe ceased ; the decks were dried by 
 sparkling sunshine ; a fresh breeze enlivened every 
 thing ; the order was given to go ahead, and the 
 ship fairly sprung forward in a merry race with the 
 crested billows. Our party, gathered under an awn 
 ing on deck, felt the general exultation. The Coun 
 sellor rebounded from the pressure of feminine re 
 proaches heaped upon him during the fog, because, 
 forsooth, he had decoyed his family into cette galere. 
 He took heart of grace now, and waxed facetious, 
 aiming witticisms at his tormentor, who somewhat 
 reluctantly consented to smile once more. Amy 
 and Erskine walked vigorously up and down the 
 decks. The children, happy beings, had rioted 
 madly all day into the rigging, on top of the awn 
 ing, everywhere had romped with their father, 
 their aunty, and Erskine, and had made frequent 
 visits to the steward and the two black cooks, which 
 generally resulted in pockets stuffed with edibles. 
 Even the Blessed Baby, emulating his predecessors, 
 toddled off on excursions of his own devising, and 
 parleyed with the smiling darkies, who leaned out 
 of the galley windows, affecting an inability to in 
 terpret the assiduous repetition of " Cookey, cakey," 
 pronounced in every accent from entreaty to com 
 mand. Their maid had quite as much exercise in 
 that one day as was good for her, following the va- 
 
52 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 garies and suppressing the dangerous freaks of her 
 youthful charges. 
 
 The only officer to be seen on the after-deck was 
 the chief engineer, who, like a whale coming to the 
 surface for an occasional breath of air, ascended 
 now and then from cavernous depths, where, as the 
 children were told by Erskine, he had charge of a 
 mighty monster which, attended by half a dozen 
 slaves to feed it on live coals, lay chained at the 
 bottom of the ship. A zealous politician was the 
 chief, and great solace he found in fighting over 
 again with The Counsellor the battles of the few 
 months preceding March, 1877. With an entire de 
 votion to his leader, and a serious scorn of the 
 "man in the White House," he asked after the 
 health of "his Excellency the President, who lives 
 in Gramercy Park." Something of a reader withal 
 he was ; and Mrs. Thornton s hopeless application 
 for a book, during the reign of the fog, elicited quite 
 a library from the upper berth of his state-room 
 odd volumes of Shakespeare, Byron, Tyndall, 
 Draper s Conflict of Religion and Science, Dickens, 
 and Lever. 
 
 "We haven t got rid of that pest yet," said the 
 chief, at a moment of general rejoicing over the 
 sun ; " unless the wind changes, it will be down on 
 us again. Look at that fog-bank over there." 
 
 To the eastward the white column was indeed 
 drawing near again, and there a beautiful spectacle 
 presented itself of a ship s tops shining in the sun 
 while all the rest was veiled in low-lying mist. The 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT. 53 
 
 fog settled again, thicker than before, the engine 
 slowed, and the captain announced he should go 
 no farther. " You will spend your Fourth on 
 board," he remarked, with grim pleasantry a pros 
 pect rather refreshing than otherwise to passengers 
 flying from the exuberant patriotism of a great city, 
 though, it must be confessed, the surroundings of 
 that narrow and often crowded channel in Nantuck- 
 et Shoals were not the most desirable for a pro 
 tracted sojourn in a fog. The deafening and in 
 cessant steam-pipe overhead, and warning notes 
 from light-ships, now made the situation more de 
 pressing than before. They seemed to be set 
 apart from the rest of the universe, to be hover 
 ing in a new world of nebulae, through which 
 nothing but sound could come ever to them. But 
 that coquettish curtain arose again presently, and 
 again the ship gave one of her glad bounds for 
 ward. Only for a moment ; down it fell once 
 more ; and a heedless schooner sheering off and 
 shooting aside just then, as she came unheralded 
 out of the fog-bank full upon the bows of their 
 steamer, gave them a thrill, with sense of great 
 danger escaped. 
 
 " We have to do the looking out for these schoon 
 ers," said one of the mates ; " and when they don t 
 blow their horns, and by their own fault run into 
 us, we are called on to pay damages all the 
 same." 
 
 The last of the line of light-ships in Nantucket 
 Shoals marks the end of the narrow channel, through 
 
54 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 which mariners steer cautiously, until deep water 
 and the broad swell of the Atlantic invite them to 
 sail on fearlessly and fast. These light-ships, fully 
 manned, and anchored from point to point, provide 
 various signals of warning by whistle or bell so 
 different that no one can be mistaken for any other. 
 In the great gales of winter they sometimes break 
 from their moorings, and go cruising down the 
 coast, before making head against the storm. 
 
 The last of these light-ships, Polycripp by name, 
 announced herself to our travellers by a sound 
 issuing from the encompassing pillar of cloud 
 so inexpressibly mournful and harrowing to the 
 susceptible spirit, that the children, struck with 
 mortal fear, rushed precipitately to the shelter of 
 parental arms, and hid their heads, crying, " Oh, 
 papa ! suppose it should be the sea-serpent!" "The 
 Sea-Serpent " Polycripp was forthwith dubbed, and 
 no persuasions could induce one of the youngsters 
 to desert his rock of safety until quite out of hear 
 ing of that awful wailing sound. All that could be 
 seen of little Frank, not dangling legs or a very brief 
 kilt petticoat, was a mass of golden curls blown 
 across a rosy cheek and over the neck where his 
 sturdy arms were tightly locked. 
 
 In memory of Polycripp, Erskine made a sketch 
 in water-colors of the sea-serpent, fearfully and 
 wonderfully imagined, riding at ease upon gigantic 
 billows, and breathing on a bar of music the notes 
 of his horrible chant. The small voyager was hence 
 forth fully persuaded that with his own eyes he 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 55 
 
 actually saw the original of the picture, and it had 
 for him ever after a baleful fascination. 
 
 " The wind is veering, we are through the Shoals, 
 and you are out of jail now," was the captain s 
 cheerful announcement, as at last he came below 
 to take a mouthful of dinner long deferred. 
 
 " O blessed west wind, that springs up to banish 
 our foe !" cried Amy. " O stern and rock-bound 
 coast of Massachusetts !" (" which is here all a 
 level beach of fine sand," interpolated her brother- 
 in-law) "how beautiful you look, with the last 
 wreath of mist vanishing under a glorious afternoon 
 sun !" And now picture them, ye sweltering den 
 izens of the workaday world, to whom also this 
 delight is possible. They are sitting, a happy group, 
 on the broad deck, wrapped in plaids the breeze 
 is stiff and cool from the wide Atlantic. The good 
 ship, released from her curb, fairly bounds forward 
 like a thorough-bred steed. The white surface of 
 the sea breaks up in crests of foam. Sails are set, 
 and wind and steam speed them swiftly towards the 
 beacon held out on the crooked finger of Cape Cod. 
 And ever and again, mingled with the pure smell of 
 the salt waves, comes a whiff from the shore scented 
 with the freshly-cut grass ; all New England is mak 
 ing hay to-day. 
 
 And thus it is through all the lovely afternoon, 
 and until evening closes in, when the little ones fall 
 asleep the moment their tired, busy heads touch 
 the pillows no cradle-song required save the con 
 stant lapping of the sea against the flanks of the 
 
56 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 ship. In the waning sunlight they had looked bet 
 ter, brighter, stronger, than for weeks before. They 
 had eaten as voraciously as young birds. Their 
 faces had grown brown as berries, and their spirits 
 were exhausting. 
 
 Those left on deck experienced now an hour 
 was it ? or two, or three ? altogether delightful, 
 and worth all the anxiety aroused by all the fogs 
 that could have gone before. Leaving Cape Cod 
 behind, they swiftly crossed the dancing waters of 
 Massachusetts Bay, allured by the at first distant 
 speck of brightness from Boston Light, that deep 
 ened and broadened into a pathway of glory lead 
 ing them into the harbor. Our travellers paced the 
 deck as tireless as the two mute shapes on the for 
 ward watch who crossed and recrossed continually 
 from starboard to port, from port to starboard the 
 only other moving things visible under the black 
 silhouette of the rigging against the starry sky. 
 Grace seized her husband s arm and bore him away 
 in triumph. Sometimes they dreamily lingered in 
 the stern of the vessel, watching her track in the 
 phosphorescent waves ; then they were seized with 
 a fit of diligent pedestrianism, stirring all the blood 
 within their veins ; then they relapsed again, and, 
 like Mr. Wegg, " dropped into poetry," in a friendly 
 way. They were surprised at their own eloquence, 
 so many similes, poetical situations, and flowers of 
 fancy came to the lips. It was really a tourney of 
 lofty sentiment ; and when the moon showed forth, 
 and the harbor lights began to gather, as they 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 57 
 
 threaded their way past one after another anchored 
 and motionless vessel, and the far-away gleams from 
 the shore increased in number, Grace heaved a sigh 
 born of regret. " We are almost in. This has been 
 too lovely for anything. But there is one great 
 mistake : it ought to have been a honeymoon," she 
 whispered, clinging to her husband s arm. " You 
 are just ten years too late with -your suggestion," 
 she was answered, politely ; " but I ll remember it 
 next time, darling." 
 
 The spell was broken. Not all the charms of sea 
 and sky, not even the elevating reflection that they 
 had now reached the very Hub of the Universe, 
 could keep her on deck after that. She was " aw 
 fully sleepy ;" had " been so for a long, long time ;" 
 wondered " why Amy had taken herself away with 
 Mr. Erskine, when it was so much more jolly all 
 together;" and "must and would go in." 
 
 Perhaps if you had questioned Erskine, he would 
 have avowed a decided preference for being left to 
 himself, to indulge the haunting memories he loved 
 to conjure up. But a man would have been a churl 
 to resist the bright and hearty, almost boyish, com 
 radeship of Amy North, who was a desperate walker, 
 and had not an ounce of superfluous sentiment in 
 her composition. Erskine found himself happily 
 exercised out of his melancholy, and also out of 
 breath, when Miss North reluctantly followed her 
 sister into the cabin. 
 
58 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 IV 
 
 THEY had resolved to remain on board rather 
 than disturb the happy little dreamers in the nur 
 sery state-room. It was midnight when the good 
 ship touched her Boston dock, and a sound night s 
 rest brought Grace to five o clock in the morning 
 of the Fourth of July, when she awoke to listen to 
 a monotonous voice counting out thousands of 
 Long Island cabbages, consigned, as part of the 
 ship s cargo, by New York to aesthetic Boston folk. 
 
 Unable to sleep, she, with the eldest of her lads, 
 reflecting that years might probably elapse before 
 another opportunity to view the habitable globe at 
 that hour should occur, determined to make the 
 most of her impressions. They got ashore from a 
 slippery rope-ladder by the aid of a kindly boat 
 swain, and wandered around the docks and adja 
 cent streets all very unlike New York. There 
 was no commotion or crowd ; there were many 
 queer old buildings, some of them with walls slated 
 downward, and steep wooden roofs. Everything 
 was clean and practicable for a lady s feet, and a 
 general air of antique respectability pervaded the 
 quarter. A strong flavor of salt characterized the 
 whole neighborhood. Everything was of the sea, 
 or for the use of men that go down to it in ships. 
 The docks themselves, the outgoing and incoming 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 59 
 
 ships, had an endless charm for the little lad. He 
 speculated upon the ports whither these vessels 
 would sail, with a fatal precision in geography, lat 
 itude and longitude, exports and imports, that put 
 his mother s rustier memory to the blush. 
 
 " Mamma, I can t exactly remember what coun 
 tries the Lesser Antilles belong to; can you?" he 
 said, musingly, when, to her great relief, his atten 
 tion became suddenly distracted to the stand of a 
 cherry -woman close by, who dealt also in ginger 
 bread and torpedoes. 
 
 Torpedoes ! This brought her back to the fact 
 of the Fourth of July, and aroused in her a desire 
 to get out of the Cradle of Liberty as rapidly as 
 possible. 
 
 " We will go to the Parker House for breakfast, 
 Frank," she said, returning to arouse the occupant 
 of state-room No. . " Then we can take our time 
 about going aboard the other ship." 
 
 "The fact is," said guilty Frank, who had gone 
 to sleep in full consciousness of his blunder, "there s 
 no other ship ; at least, she does not sail till to 
 morrow afternoon. I ought to have found that out 
 before, but I didn t. I m awfully sorry, Grace, 
 indeed." 
 
 " And my poor children are to spend a day 
 no, two days and a night at a hot hotel in 
 town !" Mrs. Thornton said, with awful calm. " I 
 shouldn t be a bit surprised if it were to kill the 
 Baby, Frank. Poor little drooping thing !" 
 
 At this moment arose from the adjoining state- 
 
60 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 room a joyful uproar. A contraband load of torpe 
 does had been introduced to the awakening cherubs 
 by their older brother, and despite the remon 
 strances of nurse, all three of them were engaged 
 in wildly hurling the offensive missiles wherever 
 they would strike. Loudest among the war-cries of 
 these night-gowned conspirators arose the delighted 
 squeal of Baby. 
 
 "We will take train to Portland," the Counsellor 
 said, taking advantage of a reluctant smile. 
 
 " Oh, very well," said his wife, with a resigned 
 look. " Only, if we had known it in time, we might 
 have stopped over with the Rutledges in Brookline 
 a visit I have so long promised to make." 
 
 " Yes, and have given their new baby the whoop 
 ing-cough that dreadful malady now preying upon 
 our enfeebled ranks." 
 
 They had left the good ship ere long, and were 
 off to the Eastern Railway station, where jostling, 
 perspiring throngs of eager holiday folk already 
 pouring into every train made them think tenderly 
 of the quiet scenes of yesterday. Securing seats in 
 a car, they checked their many trunks, their baby 
 carriage, and their tubs, disposed of their numerous 
 parcels in the racks, and instantly all that was 
 picturesque in their journey had departed. The 
 Blessed Baby, from a winsome brown-eyed water 
 sprite became a mere mortal infant, howling even 
 at that early hour of the day, with heat and weari 
 ness. The golden-haired traveller, aged four and a 
 half, who had, at sea, bewitched admiring eyes with 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 6l 
 
 bright looks and countless vagaries, now visited the 
 company with a public outburst of whooping-cough, 
 scattering their fellow - voyagers from the adjacent 
 seats. Thornton and Erskine retired into another 
 car, with a feeble attempt to look as if they had 
 nothing to do with the temporary centre of dis 
 turbance. 
 
 Many a book has been condemned as a conse 
 quence of sleepless nights, shooting corns, or in 
 digestion falling to the lot of the reviewer. More 
 than one traveller has set the seal of general con 
 demnation on the town where he has been ill-lodged, 
 ill-fed, or ill-attended, without regard to its actual 
 merit. A sense of justice, therefore, blots forever 
 from this page the beautiful city of Portland, whose 
 commanding position, stately homes, and wide elm- 
 arched streets deserve more than our travellers, 
 groaning under the recollection of their stop at a 
 great, pretentious, badly-kept hotel, are willing to 
 concede in praise. 
 
 " Impossible to stay here twenty hours more to 
 meet the Lewiston" The Counsellor said, woe-be- 
 gone. 
 
 " Let us go anyhow, anywhere," Grace and 
 Amy said, imploringly ; and they boarded a mid 
 day train for Rockland. 
 
 A good-natured jog-trot old train it proved to 
 be, that began by waiting in the hot station until, 
 like an ogre, it had gorged itself with babies; 
 then, after running a little way, stopped so long 
 (without any visible reason) that The Counsellor 
 
62 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 and Erskine got out and wiled away the time by 
 gathering bunches of daisies, at which the town- 
 bred children clapped their hands with delight, 
 and every straw- hat in the party was speedily 
 enriched with a wreath. In and out passed hard- 
 featured, shuffling, brown -faced men and women, 
 recognizing each other with demure cordiality, and 
 sitting down to talk over the events that dot the 
 shepherd s calendar in nasal monotone rather 
 soothing to the ear. Our ladies found themselves 
 deeply interested in the fate of " Sarah Jane s 
 speckled hen," which " might a sot an sot till she d 
 a tuk root, an never would a hatched ;" while 
 The Counsellor renounced a newspaper, and gave 
 his whole mind to a discussion of doctrines be 
 tween two long-haired deacons on the seat behind 
 him all about infant damnation and orthodoxy in 
 general. The car was furthermore illumined by 
 the presence in the flesh of no less a personage 
 than Mrs. Gamp a native of Maine, off duty, so 
 voluble in her confidences to all in ear- shot that 
 none could remain in ignorance of her affairs, or 
 escape the information that her occupation was 
 plied at the Hub, " because in Boston I can make 
 a sight more money than here, with half the 
 work." Mrs. Gamp wore a bonnet and carried a 
 bandbox of the size and style our grandmothers 
 kept on remote shelves, embalmed with sprigs of 
 lavender ; an umbrella, of course. Not more than 
 half a dozen teeth remained to her, and the local 
 ity of each of those was continually revealed by 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 63 
 
 a smile bestowed impartially on friends and stran 
 gers. She was a constant patron to the boy who 
 peddled lozenges, figs, and prize candy. She im 
 bibed oranges until the odor filled the air. She 
 had a gossip on the seat beside her (" Perhaps, 
 oh ! perhaps it is the veritable Mrs. Harris !" 
 whispered Amy) to receive confidences of joys 
 and sorrows in a ceaseless stream. Her greatest 
 pride in life seemed to be a certain " Marier," 
 of whom it was proudly remarked " she kep two 
 girls." The exact progress of the invalid she had 
 last attended was clearly narrated with scientific 
 precision, and her harangues went on amplifying 
 until everybody s attention was monopolized. At 
 one period her roving eye fell upon the Blessed 
 Baby, whose healthy sleep on a couch of shawls, 
 one dimpled fist near his rosy cheek, was occasion 
 ally interrupted by a cough. " I kinder mistrust 
 that whooping-cough in a teethin child," she re 
 marked, cheerfully. " Ef it don t kill em outright, 
 it generally goes to the brain, they say, and makes 
 em weak like. Did I ever tell you the time Marier 
 had with her young un in the whooping-cough ? It 
 jest wasted and wasted " But at this point the 
 mother of the Baby could bear no more, and moved 
 to the end of the car farthest from Mrs. Gamp, 
 whom she now knew to be a vampire. 
 
 The country they were passing through was full 
 of quiet rural beauties, its green hill-sides covered 
 with hay-cocks, and cows everywhere sought the 
 shade of trees that hung their branches low over 
 
64 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 placid streams. The railway skirts the coast, and 
 comes suddenly upon many a picturesque little vil 
 lage, where the deep waters lie locked in the hills. 
 One looks in astonishment at the tall masts of ves 
 sels arising amid trees, where they have found safe 
 harbor. " The ship-building industries seem to be 
 looking up," said The Counsellor. " During the 
 war these fellows, finding their occupation gone, 
 took the field, away down in far Virginia, and made 
 some of the best soldiers the North brought forth. 
 See, Grace, the vertebrae of these vessels stretched 
 upon the stocks. 
 
 " Ere long will we launch 
 
 A vessel as goodly and strong and stanch 
 As ever weathered a wintry sea. 
 Timber of chestnut and elm and oak, 
 Cedar of Maine and Georgia Pine, 
 Here together shall combine. " 
 
 At Bath their train, reduced by this time to two 
 cars, was taken upon a boat, and ferried across the 
 Kennebec a noble river, fed by Moosehead Lake. 
 
 The spirits of the party began to rise, as they 
 stood upon the rear platform of the car, and filled 
 their lungs with fresh, exhilarating air. 
 
 When Rockland was reached, and their hearts 
 made glad by a hotel with clean beds, clean table 
 cloths, and a palatable bill of fare, the tired chil 
 dren were left to rest, and our travellers strolled 
 down after supper to the wharf, and stood there 
 gazing out upon the broad expanse of the Penob- 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 65 
 
 scot Bay, across which, on the morrow, they were 
 to set sail in quest of the enchanted isle of Mount 
 Desert. 
 
 Erskine withdrew himself from the others, and 
 climbed out upon a projection from the pier. Amy, 
 Grace, and The Counsellor left him sitting there, 
 and went off to explore the village. In a green 
 yard where they were tempted to pause and look, a 
 young woman was raking new-mown hay, occasion 
 ally tossing it over a little child, and the house wall 
 behind her was covered with a vine of sweet old- 
 fashioned white roses. Grace begged for a rose, 
 and the woman, with a smile, broke off a generous 
 cluster, and gave it to the child, who trotted to the 
 palings and laid it in her hand. 
 
 The sun was setting ; a church-bell rang for even 
 ing prayers. Erskine s unsatisfied spirit experi 
 enced a strange peace. The journey hither, in com 
 pany with these kind and cheerful people, these 
 joyous children, had been just what he required. 
 For Amy he had conceived a very sincere regard. 
 She made no exactions of him, or of any man. Fun, 
 enterprise, excitement, were the breath of her nos 
 trils. Her assumption of little mannish ways 
 amused Erskine, where a demand for compliment 
 would have bored him utterly. Altogether he felt 
 better and more hopeful than he had done for 
 months. 
 
66 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 ON board the little steamer Houghton next day 
 our party fell in with a party of Boston pilgrims, 
 bound to the same " haven where they fain would 
 be." Established upon deck, with shawls and 
 books and lunch baskets, they defied the white- 
 caps on Penobscot Bay that frightened quite a 
 number of their fellow - passengers into seeking 
 sofas down below. Amy, with her hands in the 
 pockets of a long ulster (made by her brother-in- 
 law s tailor, and the pride of her life), with a derby 
 hat and a cardinal silk neck-handkerchief, walked 
 gayly up and down. 
 
 We have no coast-line to compare in beauty and 
 variety with that of Maine. Its jagged outline 
 breaks up into a thousand picturesque caprices of 
 cape and bay and headland; while islands, sown 
 like emeralds from a sieve, are scattered in count 
 less numbers in a field of waves. Here masses of 
 stern gray rock arise from the seething surf; a 
 boat s length farther on some sparkling little fiord 
 opens through greenest meadows. Here is a cave, 
 tinted with all the gorgeous coloring that ever daz 
 zled Aladdin in his jewelled hall, where in crystal 
 pools lurk a hundred living wonders of the sea, and 
 at high tide the great waves go booming in with a 
 voice of thunder. Close beside it is some tiny bay, 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 67 
 
 tinted like " strips of the sky, fallen through from 
 on high," and all unruffled by the wind. Under a 
 summer sun, what voyage can be more delightful 
 than a run in and out of the islands from Rockland 
 to Bar Harbor ? The cheery little steamer, recover 
 ing from the rude treatment of the broad Penob- 
 scot, moved soberly upon North Haven, where a 
 row-boat was in waiting with two passengers and a 
 trunk to be hoisted on board. After this operation 
 they lost no time, but steamed away across the 
 bay of Isle au Haut (pronounced " Illyhut " in the 
 vernacular) to Deer Island, where all the population 
 had gathered to receive an attenuated mail -bag, 
 and a few egg boxes returned from Rockland to be 
 refilled. 
 
 "And now," said the kindly captain, "you will 
 see an island for every day in the year ; and if 
 you like to buy and settle hereabouts, we can sell 
 you any one of them you take a fancy to very 
 cheap." The eldest of Thornton s boys, with a 
 small sum of money burning holes in his trousers 
 pockets, pursued the captain with a thousand eager 
 questions and presently came to his father, fired 
 with zeal for the purchase of "that nice round 
 island over yonder ; the captain says I may have 
 it for five dollars, or this lovely little bit of a one 
 for seventy-five cents." 
 
 In and out between granite ledges crowned with 
 spruce and fir, the little steamer winds her busy 
 way; and after passing through York Narrows, 
 with Black Island to the northward, the first view 
 
68 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 of lovely Mount Desert Island opens before them. 
 The beacon on Bass Harbor Head stands as her 
 sentinel ; and when they draw nearer, rounding 
 Long Ledge, the full chain of her mountains is 
 revealed. As the day wanes, the view changes 
 every moment, yet never wearies. Sometimes the 
 boat, crossing a stretch where the Atlantic swell 
 rolls in unchecked, dances like a cork on the heav 
 ing sea ; then, under the shelter of an island, the 
 water is as calm as an inland lake. Sometimes the 
 breeze is soft and mild as an infant s breath ; then 
 suddenly there comes a change ; a glacial chill borne 
 from the bosom of a wandering iceberg descends 
 upon them, laughed at at first, but conquering in 
 the end, and sending them on a race to the cabin 
 for extra wraps. Contradiction seems to be the rul 
 ing passion of Mother Nature in this region. 
 
 The first landing made at Mount Desert is South 
 west Harbor, destined during the following year to 
 be the scene of an apparition unwonted as a fla 
 mingo in a barn-yard the mysterious ship Cimbria 
 lying at anchor here for months, carrying under her 
 German flag a horde of Russians awaiting the war- 
 note between their master and the Queen. 
 
 All things must have an end, and this fairy voy 
 age was drawing near its close. 
 
 Leaving Southwest Harbor one has a momentary 
 glimpse to the northward of Somes s Sound, with a 
 broad haven and splendid precipitous cliffs. Here 
 came Henry Hudson in 1609, on his way south to 
 explore the river now called after him. Here, a 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 69 
 
 little later, a French colony of Jesuit fathers was 
 attacked by the English pirate Argall ; the station 
 was plundered, and the godly priests murdered 
 under the shadow of the cross they had so tri 
 umphantly planted on the rock with chants of 
 thanksgiving a short time before. These worthy 
 disciples of Christ, after many days of tossing upon 
 angry seas, in finding themselves in the glassy 
 waters of this tranquil sound, thought it a very par 
 adise planted in the midst of desert rocks and 
 had bestowed on it the original name of " MONT 
 DESERT." Their little colony, called St. Sauveur, 
 was thus rudely destroyed ; but after the lapse of 
 nearly three centuries the memory of those good 
 men remains, and the new church recently erected 
 at Bar Harbor is called St. Saviour, as a reminder 
 of their devotion. 
 
 Otter Creek was passed, and many spots whose 
 names are dear to the heart of the faithful Mount- 
 Deserter : Thunder Cave, the shining sands of 
 Newport Beach, the beetling precipice of Great 
 Head ; Egg Rock with its picturesque light-house ; 
 the Anemone Cave, Schooner Head, the Spouting 
 Horn, and the Porcupine islands, guarding the har 
 bor over which tower mountains where one may 
 climb through woods rich in the balsam of fir and 
 pine trees and, emerging on the summit, look down 
 nearly two thousand feet of precipice into the chaf 
 ing ocean. 
 
 Bar Harbor was not as they had known it years 
 ago, for the spectacle of tall hotels and " Queen 
 
70 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 Anne " cottages made now a smart modern water 
 ing-place of what was then a quaint yellow, red, 
 and brown tinted fisher-village on the coast. 
 
 In the harbor, side by side with fishing - smacks 
 and Indian canoes, were gay pleasure yachts and 
 boats, and several times a week were emptied on 
 its pier a horde of society -seekers, alas! clad in 
 purple and fine linen, instead of the sturdy band 
 of young men and maidens, artists, students, pro 
 fessors, who would be boys again, who in earlier 
 days wore stout shoes, and swore to dress like 
 tramps, and dwell like gods together through long 
 days of glorious idling in this crystal atmosphere. 
 
 The fatal tide of fashion had set that way, and 
 having given vent to the customary Jeremiad of 
 aboriginal visitors to Mount Desert, our travellers 
 found it proper to admit that there were a great 
 many consolations left under the present state of 
 things. 
 
 " Erskine, you had better go ashore cautiously," 
 said The Counsellor, as the little steamer touched 
 her pier. " Ten to one there will be two rival 
 leaders of picnic parties waiting to capture you, 
 and bear you off in a buckboard to eat hard-boiled 
 eggs and dismember cold chickens upon the rocks." 
 
 For once, however, this common fate was es 
 caped, and the new-comers were only showered 
 with cordial greetings from the picturesque groups 
 assembled to see that great event, the arrival of the 
 boat. Take it all in all, Bar Harbor is such an 
 amazingly affectionate place. One grows rapturous 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 71 
 
 on its wharf over friends whom one has failed to 
 see for months, even years, in town. Snubs are 
 forgiven, feuds are forgotten, desperate friendships 
 are created in a breath, in this atmosphere of uni 
 versal good-fellowship. 
 
 It need not be said that Miss Amy North was in 
 her element at Mount Desert. In a moment her 
 attached family beheld her submerged in the em 
 braces of five particular friends among the girls, 
 four of whom wore brilliant red petticoats and flour 
 ished Turkey red parasols. 
 
 VI 
 
 THE COUNSELLOR and his party, or Erskine and 
 his friends, in whatever way you prefer to regard 
 them, found that their telegrams had preceded them 
 to some effect. Amy declared it was due to the 
 remembrance of their attractions upon a former 
 visit Thornton, to everybody s fear of whooping- 
 cough that mine host had quartered them in the 
 vacant rooms of a cottage sufficiently far from the 
 madding crowd to breathe in freedom, yet near 
 enough to become, in the Maine vernacular, 
 "mealers," /.<?., go back and forth to the Rodick 
 House for their meals. 
 
 Erskine announced that he was lodged like a 
 prince, in a quaint little ship s cabin of a room, 
 with floor painted green, and sunflowers and holly- 
 
72 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 hocks looking in at his window, barring the slight 
 inconvenience of a snoring neighbor in the adjoin 
 ing room, of whom it was certified by his landlady 
 that he would not fail to leave in Monday s boat. 
 
 At breakfast next day at the Rodick their repast 
 was continually interrupted by people who came 
 into the great dining-room, took places, looked over 
 at their table, looked again, as if, like Mr. Twem- 
 low they were not quite sure whether these were 
 indeed their dearest friends or not ; then, abandon 
 ing uncertainty, descended upon the last arrivals 
 with effusive welcome. 
 
 In this dining-room of the Rodick were then as 
 sembled representatives of all parts of the country. 
 The F. F. s of Boston and the F. F. s of Virginia 
 forgot their mutual slight unpleasantness of a few 
 years gone by, and affiliated on the ground of com 
 mon superiority to the mass of Americans not en 
 dowed like themselves with sangre azul. New York 
 compared notes with Cleveland and Chicago, willing 
 to credit them with " a certain kind of progressive- 
 ness, no doubt," but profoundly pitying them for 
 being situated so far from the radius of her enlight 
 ening beam. 
 
 All the younger ladies were attired in short cos 
 tumes, with a manifest determination towards the 
 picturesque. " I don t care about the becomingness 
 of it," said, to her dress-maker, a New York girl 
 bound for Mount Desert ; " but you must make me 
 effective against a rock !" 
 
 Two marked peculiarities were to be noted in 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 73 
 
 the charming creatures who frequented the Eastern 
 Eden. One was a reckless disregard of the ordi 
 nary rules for the preservation of complexion, a 
 rich tawny brown there being as much a standard 
 of beauty as in the Marquesas ; another, the most 
 delightful liberality in the display of stockings, 
 which, with high -heeled slippers and sparkling 
 buckles, were scattered over the Rodick veranda 
 like poppies in a field. 
 
 Upon this long veranda a dress parade was held 
 three times a day. After every meal people rallied 
 there to plan excursions, lay out routes, discuss 
 weather, abjure fogs, exchange novels, eat choco 
 late bonbons, and compare crewel-work. Truth to 
 tell, Kensington embroidery, after a brief devotion 
 to the aesthetic bulrush, languished in the face of 
 yacht parties, buckboard parties, catamaran parties, 
 and, most popular of all, those parties where two are 
 company and three are trumpery in the frail limi 
 tation of a birch-bark canoe. 
 
 Erskine found himself caught up and whirled 
 away in abundant schemes mapped out for his en 
 tertainment by his friends, old and new. 
 
 Thornton s prophecy came speedily to pass. On 
 the afternoon following their arrival they were capt 
 ured, stowed in a buckboard the Mount Desert 
 equipage par excellence and borne to a distant 
 cliff beside the sounding sea, each man in charge 
 of an especial keeper. Erskine thought that he 
 might have found enjoyment more keen than in 
 being wedged three on a seat with people from the 
 
74 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 four quarters of the globe whom he never saw be 
 fore, to be driven through blinding dust, the horses 
 going uphill and down dale at a steady gallop. 
 
 It is the correct amusement at Mount Desert to 
 sing, while at this rate of speed, glees, catches, and 
 choruses a custom honorable in its antiquity, no 
 doubt, but occasionally falling short of full effect 
 from the preponderance of strong bass voices and 
 shrill sopranos, as well as the rigid determination 
 of those who never sang before to open their 
 mouths and make a noise to add to the general 
 hilarity. The unfortunate composer of that popular 
 maritime ballad "Nancy Lee," should have spent 
 a summer at Bar Harbor, in order to make him rue 
 the day and hour when he gave it to the world. 
 
 When they reached Otter Cliffs, a glorious battle 
 ment of sea-worn, storm-riven rock, Erskine s young 
 woman was discovered to be indispensable to the 
 compounding of lobster salad, so he availed him 
 self of brief freedom to clamber down nearer to 
 the water and observe at leisure the picturesque 
 scene. 
 
 To Amy North s portion had fallen the especial 
 glory of the party a young Englishman passing a 
 few days at Mount Desert on his way to Nova 
 Scotia. 
 
 The Honorable Cecil Clive had a fine aquiline 
 profile, wore irreproachable knickerbockers, and 
 divided his other interests in life with incessant 
 contemplation of his own substantial legs, cased in 
 woollen hose and heavy calf-skin shoes. 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 75 
 
 " I suppose you visited New York," Amy was 
 saying, after a protracted pause. 
 
 " Oh yes, of course," said the Honorable Cecil. 
 "Fancy not stoppin in New York, now ! And, I say, 
 there s a capital fellow there for stoppin teeth 
 whats-his-name, you know. I went to him every day 
 I was there ; upon my soul I did. He s an awfully 
 keen fellow on teeth, now, isn t he ?" 
 
 Amy shot a mischievous aillade towards Thornton 
 with an expression from which he inferred that she 
 was enjoying herself with exhilaration, and that no 
 power on earth would detain her other than the 
 natural sense of triumph in having appropriated 
 the Honorable Cecil from the very grasp of " My 
 Lady Disdain," as they called Mrs. Ketchum from 
 New York. 
 
 This lady having, with her two pretty inane 
 daughters, once been presented at Queen Victoria s 
 court, and visited two or three English country 
 houses, had conceived the idea of becoming a sort 
 of self-constituted duchess in New York society. 
 A foreigner of distinction or of title fell into her 
 hands upon his arrival as naturally as an October 
 apple gravitates towards the earth. A brace of 
 English lordlings had even been recently consigned 
 to her care by their respective mammas, with the 
 polite injunction to keep them from the snares of 
 American match-makers a request rigidly, though 
 not intentionally (so ill-natured people said), com 
 plied with. It may be, then, readily imagined that 
 this American fairy godmother of the English aris- 
 
76 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 tocracy had every reason to resent interference with 
 the Honorable Cecil, her rightful property. 
 
 Mrs. Ketchum sat upon the rocks, with discon 
 tent written on every line of her countenance, sup, 
 ported on either side by the pretty daughters, who 
 had hung fire at Mount Desert in consequence of 
 their inability to comprehend "these odd American 
 ways." Mrs. Ketchum refused to be comforted 
 even by the attendance of that great arbiter of 
 fashion Mr. Philip Daly, who was spending a 
 week at Bar Harbor before adjourning to New 
 port, "just to see what people find to like in it, 
 by Jove !" 
 
 It was apparent that Mr. Philip Daly s principle 
 in life resembled that of Dickens s hero, who would 
 rather be knocked down by a gentleman than picked 
 up by a cad. His conversation with Mrs. Ketchum 
 consisted mainly of warmed-over reminiscences of 
 their respective English experiences, in discussion 
 as to whether it was Lord Partington s wife s sister 
 or his half-sister who had just eloped with young 
 Plantagenet Grenville. 
 
 My Lady Disdain only consented to relax into a 
 wan sort of a smile when Mr. Daly disclosed to her 
 an entirely new anecdote, just received, about Mrs. 
 Langtry and the Prince of Wales. 
 
 Higher up on the cliff sat Mrs. Hazelhurst, an 
 aristocratic dame of noble Dutch stock, whose wont 
 it was to " sit upon thrones in a purple sublimity," 
 and repress the " audacity of people in trade, my 
 dear, aspiring to lead in New York society." Mrs. 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 77 
 
 Hazelhurst considered it her duty to draw the line 
 somewhere, and she drew it at Mrs. Ketchum. 
 
 Mrs. Hazelhurst was in close conversation with 
 Grace Thornton about some one of their mutual 
 " fads." Mrs. Thornton was a typical young New 
 York matron, and the possession of a husband and 
 a pretty little house overflowing with bric-a-brac 
 and babies, did not prevent her embarking in 
 every kind of enterprise, social, philanthropic, pious, 
 or patriotic. 
 
 Mrs. Thornton had, at home a little blue and 
 white cretonne morning- room, all over crooks and 
 Cupids, where in one corner was placed a daven 
 port, severely dedicated to public works. Here she 
 sat, amid piles of reports and other documents, writ 
 ing innumerable little notes, and overhauling her 
 visiting list in the intervals of drawing up the 
 minutes of her last meeting with a crimson feather 
 pen. 
 
 Mrs. Hazelhurst was the president of the Anti- 
 Cassowary Sisters of Timbuctoo. Mrs. Thornton 
 was secretary of the Alb Association and Chasuble 
 Club. Both ladies patronized sewing societies, hos 
 pitals, amateur theatricals flannel -petticoat guilds, 
 and Orthopaedic bazars at Delmonico s. 
 
 "Mon Dieu, madame !" said a young Frenchman 
 to Mrs. Thornton one season, " I have come to think 
 that your grarienses American ladies have a veritable 
 mania for good works. If I escape from a salon 
 where there are rose-colored and blue tickets for 
 sale, I call u-pon a charming person who excuses 
 
78 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 herself to attend a committee or to visit an asylum 
 for blind or lunatics." 
 
 In conference with these two ladies was Mr. Pe 
 ters, a very round, blond, and rosy personage, whom 
 nature meant for a good-natured kindly diner-out, 
 but who persisted in adopting a mournful and poetic 
 role. His especial weakness or gift was for the con 
 struction of neatly turned essays upon the charac 
 ter of deceased friends. Irreverent girls like Amy 
 North called poor Mr. Peters "The Ghoul," and 
 men said of him that it added new terrors to death 
 to know that Peters would inevitably write your 
 obituary for publication in the E g P /. 
 
 The Counsellor, rejoicing in the good-fortune of 
 his wife and sister, had taken possession of a lovely 
 little Philadelphia girl, with cheeks like wild roses 
 blooming at the bottom of a scoop straw-hat, ac 
 cording to an agreement with Grace that he might 
 flirt as much as he pleased at Mount Desert. 
 
 A pair of sisters, Louisiana Creoles, with brilliant 
 mobile faces, lips of pomegranate, and complexions 
 that resembled the white of a camellia petal, were 
 resting upon a crimson rug from their unusual 
 labors in ascending the steep cliff, and at their 
 feet were stretched a bevy of Harvard men, whom 
 these soft Southern beauties had completely car 
 ried by storm. 
 
 Two Boston ladies, themselves resembling sketch 
 es by Du Maurier, had brought their water-colors, 
 and were diligently at work, ambitious to catch an 
 especial point of view under the supervision of the 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 79 
 
 famous artist Shorterfeldt, whom all the amateurs 
 were following " a very long way after," as Punch 
 would say. 
 
 The " Baltimore delegation " of pretty, slender 
 girls, with irresistibly cordial ways, had undertaken 
 to build a fire of drift-wood, whose pale blue column 
 of smoke arose under the shoulder of a huge rock. 
 Into their service they had impressed a number of 
 cavaliers, among them no less a star than the youth 
 ful Knickerbocker Mr. Percy De Witt, whose dear 
 little hands were assuredly more at home in wield 
 ing a fan to conduct the Cotillon than in the Cali 
 ban service of fetching heavy logs. 
 
 Everywhere echoes of cheerful laughter from 
 merry maidens smote the ear. One sees the Bar 
 Harbor colony out in force at such a festival as 
 this. 
 
 Erskine was out of tune with gayety, and by no 
 one of these attractive groups did he care to linger 
 long. He strayed down to the verge of the chafing 
 sea, and walked idly up the coast. Sometimes he 
 crossed a wall of ragged rocks upon which the long 
 roll of the Atlantic spent its force. Beyond, a for 
 est of leaves, layer upon layer of every conceivable 
 shade of green, wooed the foot to follow where the 
 eye had plunged. Again, he passed a stretch of 
 beach, green and glittering with the spines of 
 countless sea-urchins, powdered by the action of 
 the waves. Then came an inlet, where the surf 
 swirled up between two black and frowning walls. 
 Next, a tiny path through a bit of fern pasture, all 
 
8o GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 embedded in moss and red berries, and overhung 
 with tangled boughs of birch. And so, with errant 
 footsteps, on and on, until he came suddenly out 
 again upon a stretch of unimpeded coast, and stood 
 upon a jutting point of rocks. 
 
 There, full in his view, across an intervening 
 bay, he saw an archway of stone, gorgeous with 
 prismatic hues, where at certain conditions of the 
 tide a single boat might float in on the wave, and 
 rest its keel upon a bit of pebbly beach. Behind 
 it rose a beetling crag to shut off all retreat, and a 
 little stream of water, crystal clear, came stealing 
 down between tufts of harebells growing where no 
 hand could reach. Here, in this cool recess, might 
 one retire to gaze out upon the wide panorama of 
 islands rising from a sapphire sea ; and here, like 
 a picture set in a frame, he saw a lady stand. 
 
 Erskine s breath grew short, and a dimness pass 
 ed before his eyes. It was none other than Rosalie 
 Gray. It was evident that she had rowed herself 
 into the cavern, and found it a much more difficult 
 matter to return. The waves were dashing in upon 
 her feet, and the little cockle-shell of a boat was 
 beating and grinding on the rocks in utter rebellion 
 against her attempt to bring it into subjection with 
 a line or oar. 
 
 One moment Erskine gave to the luxury of gazing 
 upon her unobserved. She was more beautiful, he 
 thought, in the dark blue boating dress, with the 
 fish-woman s tunic and coarse straw-hat, than in all 
 the bravery of silk attire and gems. The lines 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 8l 
 
 of her figure, the poise of her head, were here re 
 vealed in a new phase, that seemed in some way to 
 bring her more down to his level than before. In 
 her belt she wore with careless grace a large knot 
 of the ox-eyed daisies just then starring every field 
 upon the island, another in her hat. 
 
 " I beg your pardon mayn t I help you ?" Ers- 
 kine hailed her. As she turned and saw him the 
 flush in her cheek deepened perceptibly. In a 
 moment s time he was scrambling over the slippery 
 rocks regardless of appearances, and torn, rough, 
 and breathless, presented himself before her. 
 
 His first task was to capture the boat, and, walk 
 ing in water to his knees, hold it with a firm grasp 
 until the passenger was safely stowed within. 
 
 " Now keep your oars shipped for a moment, 
 please, and here goes ;" and with a mighty push 
 Erskine shot the little craft far out beyond the pas 
 sage-way, but simultaneously lost his footing, and 
 plunged headlong into deep water after it. 
 
 Before Mrs. Gray had time to realize her dismay 
 he was up again, and scaling the rocks as he dash 
 ed the brine away, vowed that he would walk back 
 to the party, and beg for hot coffee and a wrap. 
 
 " It is absolutely nothing, I assure you," he said, 
 as she rowed up to his side. " Who would count 
 a wetting in sea-water like this ? though I must 
 confess it has a sting of cold, as if the splinter from 
 an iceberg had touched me passing by. It is rather 
 a downfall to my pride, however, to appear before 
 you in such a way." 
 
 6 
 
82 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 " You are too good, to make light of it. Thanks 
 again," Rosalie said, every trace of reserve depart 
 ing from her manner. " I am more than ashamed 
 of myself to have been the cause of such an acci 
 dent. It is quite impossible for you to think of 
 returning to your party. They will have left The 
 Cliffs probably, and it is a great way off. I beg I 
 insist that you come into my boat, take this rug, 
 and let me row you home." 
 
 "Everything but that," Erskine said, acquies 
 cing, with a smile. " Pray be compassionate, and 
 don t bring me to shame by making an invalid of 
 me. I bargain for the oars myself." 
 
 What between the active exertion of a long pull 
 and the astonishing excitement of the situation, he 
 had nothing to fear from lack of circulation of the 
 blood. Like a draught of wine was the delicious 
 look of sympathy she turned upon him. He almost 
 wished that he might have struck his head upon a 
 submerged rock, in order to pose a little, and win 
 still more of these anxious womanly glances. There 
 was nothing left of the imperial ball-room belle ; 
 she was dreamy and almost shy. 
 
 Nothing passed between them in reference to 
 their former meetings. In society one recognizes 
 that there are a great many things convenient to 
 forget, and that almost everybody has a time when 
 it is best to rub out bad marks and begin over 
 again. Mrs. Gray may have murmured, " I met 
 you at the Patriarchs last winter, I believe ?" and 
 Erskine may have answered, "Yes ah, certainly. 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 83 
 
 I think I was indebted to my friend A for the 
 
 pleasure ;" but neither one betrayed any profounder 
 emotion. 
 
 When Perseus proceeded to land Andromeda at 
 a floating-dock, and to assist her up the steep stair 
 way, she waited until they were out of hearing of 
 the ring of lounging boatmen, and turning, offered 
 him her slim white hand. 
 
 " Mr. Erskine," she said, for the first time pro 
 nouncing his name, " let me thank you again, the 
 more heartily because I have to ask your pardon 
 for another offence." 
 
 It did not occur to Erskine to demand for what 
 just then. His blood was thrilling in his veins. 
 He looked after her stately figure as she walked 
 away, without even knowing if they should meet 
 again. 
 
 VII 
 
 THEY did meet again, early and oft, after the 
 friendly Mount Desert fashion. " Better a fort 
 night of Mount Desert that a cycle in New York," 
 say enthusiasts in the art of love-making. It is a 
 very dispensary of opportunities. 
 
 Mrs. Gray was stopping with her aunt a de 
 lightful old lady with pretty white crimped hair, 
 who did endless bands of crewel-work and that 
 lady s husband, Mr. Carson, at a cottage at some 
 
84 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 distance from the centre of gayety, the Rodick 
 House. Although Mrs. Caspar Gray habitually 
 declined picnics and large excursion parties, she 
 was more accessible to her friends here than in 
 town. 
 
 The day after his adventure Erskine was saun 
 tering listlessly up and down the board walk in 
 the chief street with his hands stuck in his tweed 
 pockets, utterly unconscious of the siren glances 
 bestowed on him by numbers of pretty girls loung 
 ing on verandas or steps, under scarlet or blue 
 umbrellas, with pretty little feet coquettishly dis 
 played before them. It was this provoking indiffer 
 ence of Mr. Erskine s, the young ladies agreed, that 
 made him so very desirable. Poor, good-natured 
 Tom Elliott, who spent his time in everybody s 
 service, whose life was one struggle "to get up 
 something new " for the diversion of society, wan 
 dered up and down like Noah s weary dove, vainly 
 seeking a resting-place beside some of these in 
 different fair ones. He compromised at last upon 
 a promenade with Miss Amaryllis Glover, who 
 had weathered dear knows how many summers at 
 Mount Desert, and had gone to so many picnics in 
 her day that one trembles at the thought of com 
 puting the number of sandwiches she must have 
 consumed, not to mention Albert biscuits and sar 
 dines. 
 
 Not until Amy North came down the Rodick 
 steps a fact noted promptly by several curious 
 damsels, and put on record by old Mrs. Delancey, 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 85 
 
 the picket -guard of the Rodick House, who was 
 always on duty by the hall door, armed with her 
 knitting -pins did Mr. Erskine arouse from his 
 reverie and join her with a smile. The fact was, 
 he had been guilty of the unconscionable weakness 
 of hanging round the principal thoroughfare solely 
 with a view to catching a possible glimpse of Mrs. 
 Gray, or of gaining some insight into her move 
 ments for the day. 
 
 So far, he had entirely failed, and the spectacle 
 of Amy North in her boating dress was sufficiently 
 consolatory to make him feel that a morning spent 
 with this " dear charmer " might atone for the ab 
 sence of "t other." Amy s light figure and springy 
 grace of motion were best seen in her jaunty sailor s 
 suit of blue and white. Her little tarpaulin hat set 
 upon the golden braids, and the short " banged " 
 hair in front, gave her a childish look, sustained 
 by the fearless wide-open blue eyes looking out of 
 a somewhat sun-kissed dimpled little face. 
 
 " May I go with you, my pretty maid ?" Erskine 
 said to her. 
 
 " If you choose to come out in the canoe with 
 me and my own Indian, and will promise not to 
 touch the paddle. I am quite an expert." 
 
 " If you will take me in exchange for your own 
 Indian," he said. " I am eminently cautious and 
 conservative." 
 
 " I don t know that that is an especial recom 
 mendation to me," Amy said, with her light-hearted 
 laugh. " But wait here a moment, please, while I 
 
86 GOLDEN - ROD I 
 
 run back to the house for my scarlet silk neck- 
 handkerchief. I would do you discredit without 
 my bit of color in the canoe." 
 
 As she left him, a lady passed Erskine and 
 walked into a village shop, which contained every 
 thing imaginable in addition to the daily mail to 
 Bar Harbor. 
 
 It was Rosalie Gray, and he was by her side as 
 her foot touched the threshold. 
 
 "Good- morning," Erskine said, with a strange 
 lack of self-possession. " I have been watching for 
 you all the morning. I did not exactly like to pre 
 sent myself at your quarters, and I wanted to know 
 if if you are quite well to-day." 
 
 " I should rather ask you that question, Mr. Ers 
 kine, for you were the principal sufferer," she said, 
 lightly, and looking him in the eyes, with the inde 
 finable airy confidence of a woman of the world. 
 
 " Oh, if you mean my wet clothes, that is nothing. 
 May I might I walk home with you this morn 
 ing ?" he went on, feeling more and more at a dis 
 advantage. 
 
 At that moment Amy came running out upon 
 the walk, ready for their jaunt, and summoned him 
 as unceremoniously as if she were a boy and he a 
 school-fellow. 
 
 Mrs. Gray s face wore an amused look as she 
 offered him her hand. 
 
 "Another time," she said, in her quiet voice. 
 " Let me wish you, instead, a pleasant paddle and 
 better luck than befell you in my service." 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 87 
 
 " Do you row much ? Do you care for a canoe ? 
 May I take you out to-morrow ?" Erskine said, with 
 a profound rebellion against the trick Fate was 
 playing him. 
 
 " Come to my cottage to-morrow morning about 
 eleven, and we may talk it over. One never can 
 promise anything too surely at Mount Desert. 
 There are fogs, you know, and other interruptions. 
 Pray don t let me keep you a moment longer from 
 that charming young lady now." 
 
 There was nothing left about her of the heavenly 
 softness of the day before. Her manner was cool, 
 though sufficiently cordial, easy, bright, and care 
 less. Erskine, who had been for hours hungering 
 for another one of those looks from her soft dark 
 eyes, went back to Amy, consumed with disap 
 pointment. 
 
 " So that is Mrs. Caspar Gray," Amy said, with 
 a girl s admiring curiosity. " I did not know she 
 was here, or that you knew her. I think she is too 
 splendid for anything ; but that sort of a woman 
 always makes me feel as if my gown doesn t fit, 
 or the buttons are off my boots, or as if I have 
 large red hands, and don t know how to do my 
 hair." 
 
 Erskine thought it would be difficult for this 
 little town-bred creature to look other than she 
 was fine and fair to see. Her unaffected admira 
 tion of his divinity aroused in him for her a new 
 warmth of friendship. He resolved that he would 
 bring these two women together, as men often do, 
 
88 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 not always with success. Hope springing eternal 
 pointed him to the morrow when he was bidden 
 to Rosalie s cottage, and his spirits rose. They 
 walked down to the point of embarkation, chatting 
 merrily, and Amy, hailing her Indian (otherwise 
 the one chartered by Mr. Thornton for especial at 
 tendance upon the whims of his enterprising young 
 sister-in-law), their canoe was run up beside a float 
 and they were stowed within. The Indian was dis 
 missed, but Erskine received orders to take his ease, 
 reclining luxuriously, while Amy paddled their tiny 
 craft across the "glassy, cool, translucent wave." 
 
 " I feel like a Moslem saint reclining in para 
 dise," Erskine said, dreamily, as they floated in 
 from the sun-glare to the haven of a shaded little 
 bay so noiselessly that they scarce disturbed a le 
 gion of bright fishes darting underneath their keel. 
 
 " If Moslem saints have their noses burned to a 
 bright red, then you certainly resemble one," said 
 his skipper. " This is chief of the drawbacks to 
 romance upon the water at Mount Desert. See, 
 Mr. Erskine, how clear the water is over this shal 
 low, and how the bottom shines like silver near the 
 shore." 
 
 They gazed down in fascinated silence through 
 the amber veil upon the under-world. There, over 
 sunken rocks, matted with olive-tinted kelp, sway 
 ing lazily in the current, passed and repassed the 
 busy workers of submarine commerce, jostling, 
 struggling, and devouring each other quite as they 
 do up above. 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 89 
 
 " Let us go ashore here," said Amy. " I am 
 filled with a desire to explore the wooded sides of 
 this Porcupine." 
 
 " Let us rather seek a shady nook, and loaf," 
 Erskine said. "We have had enough of action 
 and of motion we. " 
 
 " We!" said Amy, scornfully. " I should like to 
 be told how large a share of it has fallen to you. 
 But, as Grace says, there is nothing so easy to 
 spoil as men, and you shall be made to work your 
 passage back, I promise you." 
 
 She consented to indulge his idleness, after all, 
 and they found shelter beneath a downward sweep 
 ing branch, where Erskine stretched himself at half 
 length upon a carpet of pine-needles, and looked 
 up into her face. 
 
 Amy took his straw hat and decorated it with a 
 cavalier s plume of ferns growing out of a cleft in 
 the rocks near by. 
 
 " Now you are my knight," she said, conferring 
 it upon him with a fantastic little gesture. 
 
 Erskine thought it not unnatural that he should 
 respond to this by taking her hand in his and kiss 
 ing it with a courtly grace. At the very moment 
 chosen for the exploit another canoe shot across 
 the water at their feet, and Rosalie Gray and the 
 Indian who propelled it had the full benefit of this 
 pretty pastime. 
 
 The Indians at Mount Desert must be rather ac 
 customed to that kind of thing, for the present 
 spectator looked to the full as stolid as his kind, 
 
90 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 and Mrs. Gray gave no more evidence of conscious 
 ness than did her dusky guide. 
 
 " It is just my luck, Grace," said Amy, coming 
 into her sister s room that night in a blue cashmere 
 dressing-robe, with her yellow locks hanging loose 
 around her indignant little face. " I, who never 
 did anything fast in my life in that way, I mean 
 and just because Mr. Erskine kissed my hand, 
 every bit in fun, you know, that Mrs. Gaspar Gray 
 should be the one to come upon us ! If she had 
 only laughed, it would have been some consolation, 
 but she barely nodded, and looked more like the 
 Empress of Everything than usual. How stupid 
 it all is ! Men are great nuisances, I think. One 
 may be happy forever, and as soon as they get 
 mixed up with things, trouble sets in." 
 
 " Very true, dear," said the matronly Grace, 
 heaving a sigh she thought she might venture upon 
 without disloyalty to Frank. " But there they are, 
 and we must make the best of them. Now let this 
 teach you to be careful, Amy, for there never was 
 such a place as this, and whether you flirt or whether 
 you don t, people will be sure to suspect you." 
 
 " Then what is the use of self-denial ?" was Amy s 
 very natural inquiry, her mischievous spirit spring 
 ing up. 
 
 " If you only heard the confidences that are made 
 to me !" Grace went on, unheeding this indiscretion. 
 " I don t know what there is about me, but I am a 
 perfect repository of love secrets. Flirtation is in 
 the very hair of the hatmosphere at Mount Desert. 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 91 
 
 And girls, Amy, whom you would never suspect of 
 it at home. As to the men, why, there is that nice 
 young Grafton, in Frank s office, who met a girl 
 coming up on the Lewiston from Portland, spent 
 three days in devoting himself to her on verandas 
 and at picnics, and proposed to her on the fourth 
 day, before ever having seen her with her hat off. 
 Fortunately she was already engaged to be married, 
 he told me, for when she did appear bareheaded 
 her forehead went so far back he was in an agony 
 lest she should say yes. " 
 
 "But what will Mrs. Gray think of me?" said 
 Amy, ingrevert to her own grievance, as she wield 
 ed her ivory brush. 
 
 " Oh ! I don t know," said Mrs. Thornton, with a 
 strong desire to laugh, which she repressed from 
 motives of decorum. " If she knows Mr. Erskine 
 at all, she will know he did it in a brotherly kind 
 of a way, I suppose." 
 
 Why should the unreasonable blood have mount 
 ed up to Amy s face at this ? Only a woman can 
 tell, I fancy. Perhaps Grace had some sly design 
 of her own in throwing out this fly to catch a fish. 
 She changed the subject by inviting Amy to go 
 into the nursery and look at Baby an act of wor 
 ship performed by both women nightly with un 
 feigned faith and love. 
 
 There he lay, the monarch of their hearts, in his 
 little cot, with golden rings of hair clinging to his 
 moist brow, and a rosy flush upon his cheeks, rest 
 ing the tired feet that all day long had trotted on 
 
92 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 the coast, and the hands relaxed from their labor of 
 fetching and carrying sticks and stones. Beneath 
 his pillow nurse revealed a huge pine cone, without 
 which Baby would by no means have been induced 
 to go to sleep, and an invalid tin soldier was just 
 dropping out of the dimpled fist. 
 
 The other beds contained two sturdy slumberers, 
 who, having been consigned to rest in the ordinary 
 attitude, had gradually worked themselves around 
 at right angles with each other, and at intervals 
 kicked out wildly, scattering the bed-clothes far and 
 near. Above their heads two shelves contained 
 their museum of treasures collected during the day. 
 Pebbles, bits of lobster shells and claws, "sea- 
 dollars," dried starfish, the shells of sea-urchins 
 perforated with a skill no Chinese carver on ivory 
 could surpass, mussels, oysters overgrown with sea 
 weed what was there not ? 
 
 "I m in mortal fear, ma am, that this rubbish 
 will begin to smell, if it don t already," said nurse, 
 carrying her case to the highest tribunal ; " but it s 
 as much as my life is worth to touch one of the 
 nasty things. Coaxing ain t of no use, and I d be 
 much obliged to you, ma am, if you d speak about 
 it yourself to the young gentlemen." 
 
 Grace promised redress, but surveyed the scene 
 with satisfaction unalloyed. 
 
 " After all, my dear," she said, as they turned 
 away, "it does give one a better opinion of men, 
 to think they belong to the same class with Frank 
 and the boys, doesn t it ?" 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 93 
 
 VIII 
 
 IT is to be supposed that to Erskine s lot fell 
 most of the suffering from his thoughtless act of 
 gallantry to Amy. No one s society had power to 
 retain him during that evening, and he spent the 
 hours in wandering about the village in the vicinity 
 of Rosalie s cottage home, and in keeping watch 
 like a devotee over the casement where a light was 
 burning. This light was, in reality, the kerosene 
 lamp by which dear old Mrs. Carson was putting 
 up her crimps ; but what did it matter, after all ? 
 he was just as much comforted by surveying the 
 wrong side of the house. 
 
 At a very few minutes past eleven o clock next 
 day he presented himself in Rosalie s little sitting- 
 room, to be received, as he might have expected to 
 be, like any other morning caller. 
 
 Her surroundings, as she sat sketching a cluster 
 of field flowers stuck in a blue china jar, were full 
 of picturesque grace in decoration and arrange 
 ment. A few Eastern rugs and Japanese hanging 
 screens, sketches in water-color or in charcoal, jugs, 
 draperies, bibelots, a wicker-chair tied with knots 
 of cardinal ribbon, a chintz-covered lounge, a bowl 
 filled with brier roses in masses of shaded pink, 
 books, and an easel, had transformed the homely 
 cottage room into an artist s interior. 
 
94 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 During the ensuing conversation not once could 
 Erskine find a loop-hole to introduce an explana 
 tion of the island scene she had unintentionally 
 become aware of. It was clear that she intended 
 to exclude personalities from the range of their 
 talk. Whatever of impulse she had exhibited to 
 , him on the occasion of his exploit at the cave 
 was exhausted then. Her manner was courteous, 
 though somewhat measured. 
 
 Mrs. Caspar Gray knew too well the opening 
 manoeuvres of a suitor s campaign to expose to 
 them any part of her own plan of defense. He 
 felt the full charm of the well-bred woman of so 
 ciety in her politeness, neither flattering nor coquet 
 tish ; her tact in generalizing conversation ; her sub 
 tle force in putting between them a bridge of glass 
 over which he dared not tread. 
 
 Erskine talked with her long, and with ever-in 
 creasing interest. He soon realized in some inex 
 plicable way, that in proportion to his abandon 
 ment of the manner most expressing his real feeling, 
 her geniality and bienveillance (what English word 
 will say this for me ?) increased. 
 
 She was more than a match for him in this deli 
 cate contest, and when Erskine rose to go, he felt 
 as if he had been brushed in the face by a butter 
 fly s wing, and none the less repelled. 
 
 " You are with the Thornton party, I understand, 
 Mr. Erskine ?" she said, as he was leaving. " I 
 know Mrs. Thornton a little, in town, but my aunt 
 was intimate with her mother long ago, and has 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 95 
 
 charged me to seek out the daughters for her sake. 
 The young lady Miss North is charming, I think. 
 I hope they will like to come to our cottage some 
 times, when they are tired of the bustle at the 
 Rodick. This is a quiet little nook of ours for 
 such a crowded place. It is just what I needed, 
 and what I like. The sea is my best friend, after 
 all, for in my boat or canoe, exploring these lovely 
 shores, I can be most sure of the rest and solitude 
 I seek. I can t always hope to be so fortunate, if 
 trouble overtakes me, as to have such aid as yours. 
 You must go, then ? Thanks, so very much, for 
 being willing to come away from all the gayety to 
 bestow an hour on me. Don t forget to tell your 
 friends about Mrs. Carson, and, when they come to 
 see us, you will come with them, may I hope ?" 
 
 From that day forth Erskine fell quietly into the 
 position assigned to him by Mrs. Gray. They met 
 frequently, but always on the same terms. He did 
 not renew his offer to accompany her boating ex 
 cursions, and in these most of her hours of day 
 light were spent. When he visited the cottage, Mr. 
 and Mrs. Carson and other friends were always 
 there. With the Thorntons and with Amy North 
 his intimacy daily increased. Visits had passed be 
 tween them and Mrs. Gray, who dazzled and de 
 lighted at least two of the family, if the third did 
 not yield unresistingly. 
 
 The summer days slipped down the rosary of 
 Time ; every boat brought a fresh contribution of 
 visitors to the already overcrowded island. Enough 
 
96 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 rain had fallen to lay the dust; the weather was 
 perfect; altogether Bar Harbor was in the full 
 swing of a prosperous season. 
 
 " It is just as if the Venus de Milo had consented 
 to leave her cool corner of the Louvre," The Coun 
 sellor said one day, while straying with his wife and 
 boys down the path leading to the Indian encamp 
 ment, whither he was decoyed to buy " baskets and 
 things" by those arch -conspirators. 
 
 It was a delicious stroll in the sunshine, along a 
 grassy bluff, the harbor at their feet lying like a 
 mirror to reflect the blue of cloudless heavens and 
 the green shores of island and main-land, while the 
 sails hung idle, and fishermen were resting from 
 their early morning s toil. The Counsellor felt as if 
 he could forgive his enemies and forget his clients 
 so long as this glorious weather should endure. 
 
 The necessities of the path compelled them to 
 progress in single file a fact in itself rather annoy 
 ing to the person who walks behind, especially if 
 anything not entirely audible is said. This may 
 have accounted for the somewhat tart accents of 
 Mrs. Thornton s voice when she requested him to 
 repeat his remark, begging to know to whom it 
 might refer. 
 
 "Why, is there more than one Venus de Milo?" 
 he answered, turning back with cheerful alacrity. 
 " I mean, of course, that magnificent Mrs. Gray. I 
 have sometimes suspected Erskine of being touched 
 in her quarter, and I wish him good-luck, with all 
 my soul, though there are some inconveniences at- 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 97 
 
 tending the translation of a goddess from the 
 clouds to sit behind one s soup tureen." 
 
 " You are too silly, Frank," said Grace, coming 
 up in her impatience to thrust her hand within his 
 arm. "Why are you so blind as not to see that 
 Erskine is just the person for Amy ? Mrs. Gray 
 would never think of marrying again. Why should 
 she ? Look at her position. She is perfectly happy. 
 In the first place, she is a widow " 
 
 "Thank you for the hint," said her husband. 
 
 " she has a house and fortune, nobody to con 
 tradict her, liberty to travel when and where she 
 pleases, to indulge all her tastes. How stupid it is 
 for such women to want to marry, when this world 
 is so full of nice girls, and there are so few nice 
 men !" 
 
 "With what dash does this unblushing young 
 general unmask her batteries !" said The Counsellor. 
 
 " But, you know, darling, that Erskine has been 
 more with Amy than with any other girl this season, 
 and though she did not care a straw for him in the 
 beginning, I have sometimes thought lately that 
 she might be brought to fancy him." 
 
 " And why bring her to fancy him if he does not 
 fancy her ?" said Frank, clinching the thing in what 
 Grace always called "that hateful manly way." 
 "Why try to induce a state of affairs on the hypoth 
 esis that it will all turn out as you like ? By Jove ! 
 Grace, I ll tell you what I believe you women 
 take to match-making for the excitement of it, as 
 gamblers take to cards." 
 
98 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 "You are very low in your way of putting it," 
 Mrs. Thornton said, with an air of fine scorn. " I 
 don t suppose it makes the least difference to you 
 that a woman s feelings may be concerned. Only, 
 dear" and with a sudden change of base she drew 
 so near to him that her cheek touched his shoulder 
 " you are so good and kind to our darling Amy, 
 that if anything should come of this, I know you 
 won t spoil everything by talking to Mr. Erskine 
 about goddesses and all that, or putting it into his 
 head that he is in love with Mrs. Gray. Say you 
 won t, Frank." 
 
 " You have revealed your weak spot, Grace. You 
 are afraid of Mrs. Gray." 
 
 But not another word would she vouchsafe upon 
 the subject. She became as sweet as honey drop 
 ping from the comb. They sauntered on, amid the 
 booming of bees and the nodding of clover, the 
 children darting into the sweet vanilla-scented grass 
 in pursuit of butterflies, and running back with 
 "flowers for mamma." Thornton made up his 
 mind, like a sensible fellow, that submission to au_ 
 thority was a cheap price at which to purchase 
 peace like this. 
 
 IX 
 
 AT the Indian encampment they made the usual 
 tour from tent to tent, investing small sums in 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 99 
 
 baskets delicately woven of the sweet-smelling grass 
 growing about the fields; in bows, arrows, birch- 
 bark canoes, lacrosse bats strung with thongs of 
 deer leather, and much in demand by the critical 
 small boy ; in grebe or sea-gulls breasts and wings ; 
 in skins and feather fans until even these insati 
 ate shoppers cried " Enough !" 
 
 At the last tent the children paused in admira 
 tion of a very stolid-looking pappoose overflowing 
 with fat, whose mother, a handsome young squaw, 
 with her hair bound up in a red cotton handker 
 chief, and shades of Pocahontas ! clad in a 
 black alpaca gown, with rusty knife - pleatings, had 
 suspended him in a hammock between two trees, 
 while she sat weaving her basket silently at the 
 opening of her tent, overhanging the water s edge. 
 
 Impressed by the attention he received, she un 
 strapped the pappoose, and set him on his feet to 
 confront the Blessed Baby of the Thornton family, 
 who stood gazing at the small copper- colored ap 
 parition, with awe depicted on his countenance. 
 Then, with a quick sentence or two in her own 
 tongue, the squaw reached up, and taking down the 
 topmost basket from a long string of them, placed 
 it in her baby s hand with the first smile she had 
 bestowed upon the scene, and motioned him to 
 present it to the visitor. The harsh and unwonted 
 sound had the unfortunate effect of reducing Thorn 
 ton minimus to bitter tears, welling irrepressibly, 
 and not to be stanched until he was safe within 
 the strong shelter of his father s arms. 
 
100 GOLDEN - ROD : 
 
 While Mr. Thornton was engaged in consoling 
 his infant, and inducing it to bestow a small coin 
 upon the unwinking and sphinx-like pappoose, the 
 other lads were trying to investigate the interior of 
 a small plank structure, not unlike a hen-house, 
 built behind the tent. Out of this came sounds 
 much exciting their curiosity. 
 
 " It must be pigs, Indian pigs," the oldest boy 
 said, solemnly. "Please, may we look?" he asked 
 the squaw ; who nodded in her imperturbable fash 
 ion ; and there, inside the pen, they saw two small 
 boys, aged about five and eight, poking their brown 
 fingers through the apertures, and gazing out cheer 
 fully with their bright black eyes. Shut up here 
 for safe -keeping and general convenience, their 
 mamma had obviated all the usual difficulties in 
 the matter of seasonable clothing by leaving them 
 in the costume of our first ancestors before the 
 fall. 
 
 " Here comes nurse for Baby," the boys an 
 nounced, as that functionary, in French cap and 
 long apron, and an expression of countenance as 
 if she had ceased being surprised at the latitude 
 allowed her young charges in this remote spot, 
 came briskly down the path. 
 
 " And now, papa please, oh, please ! It is just 
 the day for mackerel-fishing. Let us get a boat, 
 and row over there off Bar Island. We can stop 
 at the fish-house on the island for bait and lines. 
 I know the nicest man there, papa. He s my par 
 ticular friend, only he smells a little of fish. He 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT IOI 
 
 will lend us lines and all. He knows everything, 
 papa a great deal more than you do ; all about 
 boats, and tides, and porpoises, and whales, and 
 where the blueberries grow, and how to get birch 
 bark off oh ! lots of things !" 
 
 " The Lilliputians have overcome Gulliver," said 
 The Counsellor, as he found himself being dragged 
 off to visit this Admirable Crichton of a fisherman. 
 " Come, Grace ; we will put you ashore if the sun 
 proves too much for you." 
 
 And Grace, nothing loath, we may be sure for 
 her heaven on earth was in the joy of these three 
 followed over long strips of birch bark drying in 
 the sun, past where the Indians were constructing 
 their canoes, and to the water s edge. A large 
 flat -bottomed boat was secured, Grace and her 
 umbrella established in the stern, and they steered 
 for the opposite shore, Frank doing the main work 
 with one oar, and his oldest boy manfully tugging, 
 as was his especial pride, at the other. 
 
 The boy s hero was unfortunately absent from 
 his usual scene of duty, on a deep-sea fishing jaunt, 
 but a substitute presented himself, and supplied all 
 necessary apparatus, including a tin can full of 
 chopped bits of raw herring for bait. 
 
 " Now you may land me speedily," said Grace, 
 as this odorous object was deposited at her feet. 
 " Put me ashore just after you round the island, 
 please, and I will wait there cheerfully until you 
 have caught Polycripp himself." 
 
 She made an ineffectual effort to induce her 
 
102 GOLD EN -ROD: 
 
 younger boy to remain ashore with her, and seek 
 an asylum from the sun. He refused stoutly, shak 
 ing his golden locks, and clinging to his father s 
 arm, tenacious of this first permission to assume 
 the coveted privileges of a big boy. 
 
 The boat glided off again out of the cool green 
 shadows into the sunshine. Grace climbed up to 
 the edge of the wooded hill and, half hidden in a 
 nest of tall ferns, sat where she could look out 
 under shelving boughs, and see it courtesying on 
 the little waves, where they had anchored to throw 
 out their lines. 
 
 It was one of those days in Mount Desert waters 
 that make everything else seem tame by compar 
 ison intoxicating in the fulness of midsummer 
 beauty. Grace sat a while, satisfied, with 
 
 "half-shut eyes, ever to seem 
 Falling asleep, in a half-dream. 
 
 There was a sound of footsteps on the slope be 
 hind, and Rosalie Gray, with her hands full of 
 ferns, came along the path from out the sombre 
 boskage of the woods. 
 
 " I have been rambling over the island to fill my 
 jars and vases," she said, with a word of greeting. 
 " My boat is beached behind that bowlder yonder, 
 and I have found treasures of lovely ferns. May I 
 sit by you and rest before embarking for my home 
 ward pull ? You look so thoroughly in the spirit of 
 the place and the day that I envy you. I think 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 103 
 
 you must like, as I do, to be sometimes utterly 
 alone." 
 
 " I try to persuade myself that I do," answered 
 Grace, laughing ; " but the last few years of my life 
 have been so spent in dividing and subdividing 
 my time and attention, and in doling them out to 
 others, that I am afraid I have lost even the faculty 
 to enjoy seclusion. I am perpetually forming plans 
 for arriving at a period when I can cultivate my own 
 thoughts, and the time never comes. All that I 
 ever accomplish in this world is done in desperate 
 rushes, as if I were behindhand for a train about to 
 start. Sometimes I fairly long for a week, or a day, 
 when I can sit still and rally up my scattered fac 
 ulties. You have no idea, Mrs. Gray, what an un 
 dignified contrast my life presents to yours, for ex 
 ample." 
 
 "I have a very clear idea," said Rosalie, in a low 
 tone, while her look expressed the " star-like sorrow 
 of immortal eyes." " Ah, Mrs. Thornton, believe 
 me that there is no epoch of a woman s life so in 
 finitely sad as when she realizes that in all the world 
 there is not one whose happiness depends on her 
 self-sacrifice." 
 
 " Listen ! listen !" said Grace, springing to her 
 feet, as a merry shout came across the water. She 
 saw her husband bareheaded in the boat, waving 
 his hat towards her. The little boys were waving 
 too, and cheering lustily, as they pointed to a fine 
 mackerel, shining like silver, held up on the line of 
 the proud little golden -haired fisherman in the 
 
104 GOLDEN -ROD. 
 
 stern. " He has caught it himself ! How happy he 
 must be, my darling one !" Grace cried, sending her 
 blue veil fluttering towards them in response. She 
 sat down, her face flushed with purest joy, a little 
 ashamed of her irrepressible outburst. To her sur 
 prise, Rosalie s eyes were full of tears. 
 
 " Forgive me," Mrs. Gray said, gently ; " I am 
 weaker than I thought." 
 
 " Dear Mrs. Gray," Grace said, in her impulsive 
 way, "you teach me how to value my blessings. 
 Only to-day I spoke to my husband about your lot, 
 as being the most enviable one a woman ever had." 
 
 o 
 
 " And yet you would not change with me !" 
 Rosalie said, with a sad smile. " We shall be better 
 friends, I think, henceforth. It will do me good to 
 know you and yours, for I am very poor in friends. 
 And that sweet little sister of yours, too. If I could, 
 I should like to be her friend. What a blessing her 
 fresh young companionship must be to you always !" 
 
 " I am afraid I have almost too much for my 
 share," Grace said, stopping to think what she 
 would be without Frank, or her boys, or Amy; 
 which of them she could by any possibility give 
 up ; what wealth or power would make amends to 
 her for losing these. " I am glad you like Amy, for 
 she is a darling. She feels for you that sort of 
 championing admiration a girl sometimes cherishes 
 in secret for a woman older and more brilliant than 
 herself. Dear little Amy! We are orphans, as you 
 know, and her happiness is very near to me." 
 
 "And there is no claim on her still nearer?" said 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 105 
 
 Rosalie, turning aside to strip a birch bough of its 
 leaves. " You probably know what is the common 
 report here of her engagement with our friend Mr. 
 Erskine. Surely you could not do more wisely than 
 commit her happiness to the keeping of a man like 
 that?" 
 
 Grace started and, with her husband s hint still 
 fresh in her memory, looked narrowly at Mrs. Gray; 
 but there was no indication of anything more than 
 delicate womanly solicitude, and she breathed a 
 sigh of positive relief. 
 
 " If I were to tell you how much I had set my heart 
 on the reality of that, you would laugh at me, prob 
 ably, as Frank does. I have no reason to believe 
 in it as yet ; that is the candid truth ; but I know 
 they have been together constantly, and I have 
 sometimes thought on Amy s side I beg your 
 pardon, Mrs. Gray, and Amy s too, for discussing 
 her affairs in this way. I am sure I don t know 
 what tempted me ;" and Grace recovered herself, 
 with a feeling of actual guilt. 
 
 " Shall I tell you what tempted you ?" Rosalie 
 said, taking her hand, and speaking with irresistible 
 simplicity. " Was it not because you felt that the 
 name and maidenly reserve of a young girl are as 
 safe in my hands as if I were her sister or her 
 mother ? Be sure now that you can trust me, and 
 rely on me." 
 
 The fishing-boat touched shore, and shrill young 
 voices filled the air with twittering, like early birds 
 of spring. Grace was borne away in triumph, to be 
 
io6 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 installed amid piles of silver-bellied mackerel, three 
 of them claimed as the especial spoil of her little 
 sunburned rogue. 
 
 Rosalie was left alone. Soon she was seated in 
 her boat, and pulling homeward with that long light 
 stroke at once the envy and admiration of every 
 woman on the island. 
 
 THE season at Mount Desert is comparatively 
 short, and the earliest days of autumn find the 
 hotels sadly thinned of guests. By the middle of 
 September, the most beautiful part of the year in 
 that region, almost every one has vanished. 
 
 Some of our friends lingered on after the close 
 of August. Frank Thornton, having gone back to 
 town for an interval of solitary work, finding it more 
 than he could bear, had returned to Bar Harbor to 
 take possession of his family. They, with Amy 
 North, were to leave in a few days. 
 
 Mrs. Gray and the Carsons, making up their 
 minds that no place would suit them half so well 
 until they should go to the Berkshire hills, had 
 determined to remain. 
 
 Erskine, whose first visit to Bar Harbor had 
 lasted much longer than originally intended, had 
 gone back finally to New York, and now reappeared 
 upon the scene, to be consigned with remarkable 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 107 
 
 unanimity of public voice to the custody of Miss 
 North. That he would accompany the party upon 
 their return was a foregone conclusion. Amy s 
 friends among the girls had begun to exchange con 
 fidences as to which of them would be bridesmaids, 
 and at what church the ceremony would take place. 
 When they had almost come to an open rupture 
 over the rival merits of veils or no veils, white lilacs 
 or Jacqueminot roses for the bridesmaids, one of 
 them ventured to rally Miss North upon the subject 
 of her approaching nuptials, and was met by a sud 
 den sharpness of rebuke she little counted on. Old 
 er gossips said what a very clever thing Mrs. Thorn 
 ton had done to secure that fortune for her sister, 
 as everybody must see Amy had been from the first 
 quite thrown at Mr. Erskine s head. 
 
 To Erskine, whose whole heart and mind were 
 filled with his consuming passion for Rosalie Gray, 
 these reports seemed trifles light as air. His con 
 science acquitted him of anything more than the 
 frankest brotherly affection for Amy ; and he laugh 
 ed when he sometimes told her of the charge. So 
 absorbed was he in his own troublesome state of 
 mind, that he never noticed a certain almost wist 
 ful gentleness that stole over the young girl when 
 she talked with him. 
 
 Poor Erskine ! He was in sore need of some 
 body s love, when the one he sought proved so 
 elusive. He felt like an automaton, going through 
 day after day of meeting and greeting Rosalie, only 
 to go away cursing his folly in dreaming he could 
 
io8 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 ever wake this Galatea to a response. It was mad 
 ness to waste so many months of life and energy 
 in haunting the footsteps of a strange adorable 
 woman, whose winning tact and grace kept him 
 within the bounds of civil commonplace, when an 
 unguarded word or look of sympathy from her 
 would have let loose the flood-gates of his tender 
 ness. And yet and yet at times, since his re 
 turn, he dared to fancy she was kinder to him than 
 before. 
 
 It was within two days of the time fixed for his 
 departure that Erskine, clad in his mountain cos 
 tume, looking, as Amy North told him, with his 
 rich coloring and sweeping dark mustache under 
 the bold curve of his wide-awake hat, like Fra 
 Diavolo about to sing a solo, appeared at the door 
 of Mrs. Gray s cottage. 
 
 " You have always promised to climb the mount 
 ain with me some day. As I go the day after to 
 morrow, perhaps you will be good enough to give 
 me this afternoon. Please do," he added, plead 
 ingly, as she seemed to hesitate. " It will be the 
 very last time. The summer is over now, and it 
 will be all changed if we meet again in town." 
 
 Rosalie let fall her embrodiery, and went off to 
 prepare for the walk. When she came down again, 
 she wore the dark blue dress with the crimson 
 touches here and there, and the kilted petticoat, so 
 well remembered by him since the day of their 
 first meeting in the cave. They walked side by 
 side across the yellowing fields, aglow with feathery 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 109 
 
 plumes of golden-rod, and his eye rested on her 
 with delight. 
 
 "There will never be any dress like that, to 
 me," he said ; " only there is one thing lacking 
 your bunch of daisies at the waist, and another in 
 your hat." 
 
 " The daisies are all gone now, so I must take 
 a substitute," she answered, lightly, stooping to 
 pick some sprays of golden - rod. " How will 
 this do ?" 
 
 " Royally !" he said, with a sudden burst of his 
 old boyish enthusiasm, so long under control. "No 
 flowers that you have worn have ever seemed to 
 suit you half so well ! I can t picture you without 
 flowers, but I think when I wake up in paradise, I 
 shall like to see you standing there, decked as you 
 are now, in these tossing golden plumes " 
 
 " Please leave me out of your pagan arrange 
 ments," she said, laughing, and coloring deeply. 
 " I am more inclined to come to the painful con 
 clusion that Nature is giving me a hint to leave 
 the daisies and betake myself to her autumnal 
 garlands." 
 
 She made haste to divert the dangerous current 
 of their talk into another channel. They passed 
 through thickets where the sumac flamed, tall grasses 
 bent beneath their weight of fruitage, and giant 
 brakes spread out their layers of green. In the 
 hollows, where in early summer hundreds of wild 
 roses opened their pale pink petals to the wind, 
 the forsaken plants now interlaced their briery 
 
no GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 arms, and clothed themselves with scarlet leaves 
 and capsules. 
 
 There was a wild autumnal flavor in the air. 
 The blue of heaven was overcast, the wind with 
 a " saintly Memnonian swell " swept through the 
 forest aisles. Far out, on the wide Atlantic, 
 
 Through scudding drifts the rainy Hyades 
 Vext the dim sea." 
 
 The autumn gale was rushing shoreward fast. 
 
 " Are you afraid to go on ?" Erskine asked, as 
 they struck the mountain trail and set their feet 
 upon its rocky spine. "I don t think the storm 
 will be upon us before night." 
 
 " Afraid ! never !" she answered, the spirit of 
 adventure shining in her eyes. " I could walk for 
 ever in such an atmosphere as this. Besides, I 
 have always longed to view the coming of a gale 
 from one of these mountain-tops." 
 
 After a long and toilsome climb the summit was 
 attained, and they stood there with the wind hurt 
 ling around them, wild and free. A wide panorama 
 of sea and shore, hill and vale, lay at their feet. 
 The outline of distant hills upon the main-land 
 was dim and gray; the water all about the fairy 
 islands was ruffling angrily; the storm-cloud from 
 the ocean came ever swiftly on. 
 
 Rosalie stood upon a crag, with the garments 
 blown back from her beautiful form. 
 
 " How glorious it is !" she cried. " I have never 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT III 
 
 seen it like this before. Fancy old Spouting Horn 
 and Thunder Cave to-morrow, when the great waves 
 go raging madly in, to break and scatter in a thou 
 sand flakes of foam !" 
 
 "The rain is nearer than I thought," answered 
 Erskine, who had been surveying the clouds with 
 some anxiety. "And although I feel a natural 
 hesitation in requesting a storm-inspired goddess 
 to step down from her pinnacle, perhaps you will 
 remember that we have no umbrellas, and that the 
 hour is later than that we calculated on to begin 
 our descent." 
 
 She gave him a bright smile, and no longer, as 
 in the ascent, disdaining the help of his hand, 
 began springing downward from rock to rock. 
 
 " I suppose it is part of the initiation of the true 
 devotee to Mount Desert to be lost or drenched at 
 least once during the summer," she said, gayly. 
 " What if both befall us now ?" 
 
 Which did, indeed, seem impending. Erskine, 
 who thought that he recalled a cottage situated 
 upon one of the mountain spurs, had taken a path 
 leading in that direction rather than risk the long 
 unsheltered road to the village in the face of such 
 a storm. 
 
 The trail they had been following stopped ab 
 ruptly at the summit of a cliff springing from a 
 grassy plateau at least twelve feet beneath them. 
 The face of the rock was unbroken by crevice or 
 projection ; to descend it by ordinary means seemed 
 a thing impossible. Half way up, the green branches 
 
ii2 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 of a fallen tree arrested in its crash by the rocky 
 wall, spread out, concealing the trunk with masses 
 of luxuriant verdure. 
 
 " I know where I am now, if that be any conso 
 lation," Erskine said, after a rapid reconnoissance 
 of the situation. " I spent an hour down in that 
 bed of ferns this summer surveying the cliff from 
 below. The path leading from there is a cow- 
 track to the very cottage I am in search of. But 
 there is no time to waste, so here goes !" And in 
 a moment he had swung down the cliff, supporting 
 himself as best he could, and crashing into the 
 branches of the fallen tree. Directly after, Rosa 
 lie saw his head and shoulders emerge from a mist 
 of green leaves before her. 
 
 " Only care kills cats !" he said, merrily. " I 
 am quite steady now, with my back against the 
 rock, and my feet firmly braced on a stout branch 
 of this friendly old tree. There is nothing for it 
 but to let yourself down, and I will catch you. 
 Don t fear, Mrs. Gray ; it is really not dangerous." 
 
 Rosalie s answer was instant obedience. She 
 let herself drop into the cloud of green, and was 
 met by Erskine s arm, which closed around her 
 in an iron grasp. The branches snapped and 
 quivered under the shock of her fall, but the old 
 tree bore up nobly, until, with considerable diffi 
 culty, they made their way down its sloping trunk 
 to the ground beneath. 
 
 " That was an exploit !" said Rosalie, looking up 
 at the level where she had recently stood. "I 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 113 
 
 could not have believed it of myself ; and as I let 
 go and came crashing down upon you, I thought 
 it was the most abominably selfish thing I ever did 
 in my life." 
 
 " I won t tell you what I thought of it yet !" 
 Erskine answered, with a smile. " You have a 
 great scratch on your forehead, your sleeve is 
 nearly torn off, and the pretty mountain dress is 
 quite defaced. Here come the rain-drops, and we 
 must make haste to find a shelter." 
 
 They ran together down the steep path, parting 
 the overhanging boughs, and reckless of where 
 their feet were set. The rain fell in great pelting 
 drops like hail, as they fled hand in hand. Ers- 
 kine s strong clasp and his firm stride were an 
 immense help to Rosalie when springing over 
 mossy rock and fern thickets, and she found her 
 self involuntarily quoting the fairy s answer to 
 Puck, "Thorough bush, thorough brier," as they 
 stopped for a moment to draw breath. 
 
 " Thorough flood, thorough fire, add for me," 
 he said, " and to the world s end, joyfully, if I had 
 your hand in mine. There is the cottage at last ! 
 One more scamper through this bit of wood, and 
 we shall be safe." 
 
 It is such a common event in that region to give 
 shelter to storm-beaten wanderers that the good 
 people within the little house made their arrival 
 quite a matter of course. 
 
 " You did get a pritty consid able peltin , now, 
 didn t you ?" said the old woman, who escorted Mrs. 
 
 8 
 
ii4 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 Gray into a rear room, resplendent with patchwork 
 quilt and giant feather-bed. A little fire was quick 
 ly made, and an extraordinary flowered bed-gown 
 produced in lieu of Rosalie s saturated garments. 
 The old woman bustled in and out with cups of 
 " yarb " tea and fresh sticks for the fire. Upon 
 Mrs. Gray s inquiry for the gentleman who had ac 
 companied her, what was her surprise to learn from 
 her hostess that he was already some distance on 
 his way back to the village. 
 
 " Here s a bit of a note he writ on a piece of 
 the almynac ; maybe that 11 tell you what he caP- 
 lates to do." 
 
 "I am off to tell your aunt, and to fetch your 
 dry things, and some sort of a trap to take you 
 home. It is impossible for you to face this rain 
 again." 
 
 Rosalie suppressed a strong feeling that she had 
 rather far have gone with him, even through the 
 driving storm. To get away from her thoughts she 
 came out in her comical disguise into the little 
 room, where two old men were sitting, one of them, 
 evidently her host, a shrewd weather-beaten speci 
 men of humanity, who had, like many of the isl 
 anders, a regular sea-flavor pervading him like a 
 bit of old tarred rope. He was full of kindly 
 gossip, and the absence of marked provincialisms 
 in his speech arose from the fact that, until a few 
 years before, he had followed the sea, and knew al 
 most every port on the two continents. 
 
 " And your wife," said Rosalie, after hearing a 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 115 
 
 long yarn , " what did she do here during all your 
 voyages ?" 
 
 " My wife ! Bless you, miss, you mean the old 
 ooman there ? She s my sister. I stayed by a gal 
 once, but she died, and sence then I han t had any 
 speret. I means as well by the gals as any man on 
 the island, but I ain t mannerly somehow." 
 
 " Your sister makes you very comfortable here, 
 at any rate," Rosalie said, looking round upon the 
 hair-cloth sofa, the shells, the kerosene lamp, and 
 the irrepressible tidies that banish from our hum 
 ble homes in America every vestige of the pictu 
 resque. 
 
 " Well, I kinder rub along, with this and that. 
 If I get as much as three hundred dollars a year to 
 keep up on, I m rich. There was a Congregation l 
 preacher here last year from down to Boston, and 
 says he to me, I ve got a selery of five thousand dol 
 lars, and it s as much as I can do on that to make 
 both ends meet. Five thousand dollars a year! 
 says I ; * why, you d oughter have a gardeen ! " 
 
 The remembrance of this scathing scarcasm kept 
 her host chuckling for some time after, and at inter 
 vals he was heard to murmur, " Five thousand dol 
 lars a year, and can t make both ends meet !" in 
 tones of heart-felt wonderment. 
 
 " This is your brother, perhaps ?" Rosalie haz 
 arded, indicating the bent and patient old fellow 
 who sat in a far corner. 
 
 " Dear me, no, ma am ; that s only Jabez Stub- 
 blefield. He s a new-comer on this island. We 
 
ii6 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 don t know nothin bout his folks. When Jabez 
 was a little chap, I ve heerd my father say, the 
 cap n of a schooner brought him along this way. 
 There was an East Eden man tuk a fancy to have 
 the boy do chores around the house, and he ap 
 plied to the cap n to have Jabez stay. Cap n he 
 didn t exactly like to give Jabez up without a 
 kinder little swap, and the upshot of it was the 
 cap n he took along a fine bull-calf, and the man he 
 kep Jabez." 
 
 " But that must have been dear me ! ages 
 ago," said Rosalie. 
 
 " Yes, Jabez he s a pretty old man, I guess, and 
 he married here, and his old ooman died, and all 
 his children. They re buried on the island." 
 
 "And you still call him a new-comer!" said 
 Rosalie. " This conservatism is equal to anything 
 in the Faubourg St. Germain." 
 
 " Well, I guess Jabez 11 stay here till he dies," 
 the woman said, as she came in with some food, 
 which she proceeded, not unkindly, to administer 
 to the poor old patriarch, a " stranger in a land 
 that knew him not." " There ain t nobody left now 
 but my brother and me, and we ve got enough for 
 three. If my boys had lived, miss," she added, 
 presently, coming to sit down by Rosalie, and 
 speaking in a matter-of-fact tone, without a tear in 
 her pale blue eyes, " ther d a been somethin to 
 save for ; but they re all dead. I had four of em, 
 and they were all lost at sea except the one that 
 died of the fever in port, down in South America. 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT Ii; 
 
 I ve got a picture of his grave, miss, and the letter 
 the hospital folks down there writ me, under glass, 
 if you ll please to look at it. My husband was a 
 sailor too, but he fell out o the riggin in a gale, 
 and was lost over here in Penobscot Bay when we 
 weren t six years married." 
 
 The rain beat upon the roof, and Rosalie fell 
 a-musing. Life seemed to her such a little thing, 
 and love how mighty ! Oh, if she dared if she 
 but dared ! 
 
 There was a sound of wheels, a shout, and Ro 
 salie, expecting the arrival of her uncle, ran to the 
 door in her comical attire. It was no sedate elderly 
 gentleman who sprang from the covered vehicle 
 drawn by two stout mountain horses, but Erskine, 
 who, with his arms full of wraps, bounded along 
 the little garden path. 
 
 " Here are some things your aunt gave me. Of 
 course she was for having Mr. Carson come ; but, 
 actuated by purely benevolent motives, I would not 
 hear of risking his rheumatism in this storm. Then 
 your maid was proposed ; but the vision of that 
 fine fly-away French creature appalled me, and I 
 would have none of her. Pray make yourself 
 comfortable now, and come, for the gale is grow 
 ing steadily worse, and the wind is blowing great 
 guns." 
 
 Rosalie assumed her own attire and, taking 
 leave of her kind hosts, went out once more, with 
 a strange thrill of pleasure, to face the buffeting 
 of wind and weather. Safely consigned to the 
 
ii8 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 interior of the vehicle, she was so entombed in oil 
 cloth curtains that she could only feel, not see, the 
 vicinity of her friend, who sat out beside the driver, 
 urging the sure-footed horses to their full speed 
 along the road. 
 
 "Tell me," said her voice out of the darkness, 
 and Erskine leaned back to hear, " about your 
 self. You must be thoroughly wet again. How 
 did you change your clothes so quickly ? Are you 
 sure it will have no bad effect ?" 
 
 " I prevented such a contingency arising by not 
 changing them at all, but took some brandy, and 
 put on my ulster instead. Don t give me a thought, 
 please, that is not of congratulation. I am the most 
 selfish mortal alive, if you did but know it." 
 
 " Home at last !" he added, as they drew rein 
 before her cottage door. There was no time for 
 more, for there were lights, and open doors, and 
 welcoming voices, and a general uproar of rejoicing 
 over the wanderer returned. 
 
 "To-morrow," whispered Erskine, in tremulous 
 accents, as he lifted her to the ground. 
 
 XI 
 
 WHEN Mrs. Gray was at last able to dismiss her 
 useful but too emotional Desiree, whose idea of 
 rising to an emergency was to wring her hands 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 119 
 
 effusively, to repeat " Mon Dieu !" a great many 
 times, and to proffer a tisane of eau de fleur 
 d oranger, she retired to rest, but not to sleep, under 
 the shelving roof of her cottage bedroom. The gale 
 raged with increasing violence ; rain fell in floods, 
 and great bursts of wind bore incessantly upon 
 the house front like breakers on a cliff. The 
 walls of her little summer dwelling shivered with 
 each repeated shock, and the bed vibrated sensibly. 
 Sleep under ordinary circumstances would have 
 been impossible, but to-night Rosalie was in a 
 strangely nervous state. Memory was at her piti 
 less work, conjuring up a thousand phantoms that 
 she would fain have buried forever. A most un 
 happy past rose before her, warning her against 
 vain indulgence in human faith and love. "You 
 loved once," it said; "with what result? You 
 trusted once ; did it bring you peace ? Remember 
 the hours when in anguish you prayed God to re 
 lease you from a bond that was worse than death. 
 And more than all," chimed in her better self, " re 
 member your tacit pledge to a guileless girl, whose 
 fresh young love may confer the happiness yours 
 never could again !" 
 
 Rosalie s pride came to her rescue after a burst 
 of bitter tears. " It is an infatuation," she said to 
 herself, almost angrily. " A woman of my age, to 
 whom vows of love are an oft-told tale, whose life 
 is filled with the incense of perpetual flattery ! Who 
 would imagine he least of all that for months, 
 ever since our first meeting, I have remembered 
 
120 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 him, and retained every trifle that recalled him, 
 with folly worthy of a dreaming school-girl ! His 
 roses, that I traced to him, and still consented to 
 receive. Shall he ever know that when I met him 
 at last face to face, and passed him without speak 
 ing, it was because I had resolved to crush a weak 
 ness that made my cheeks burn when I thought 
 of it ? Since I have known him here, during this 
 lovely summer-time and to-day especially there 
 has been more excuse for me." 
 
 When a wild wet morning dawned after the long 
 tempestuous night, Rosalie fell into the deep sleep 
 of physical exhaustion. 
 
 It was verging towards mid -day when Desiree 
 stood by her bedside with her dressing things and 
 chocolate. 
 
 " Madame Carson desired a thousand tender 
 nesses ; and there is a monsieur Meester Erskine 
 below, inquiring for madame s health." 
 
 With a fevered hand Rosalie wrote and sent to 
 him these few words : 
 
 " I am ill with fatigue and loss of rest. If you 
 go to-morrow, come here this evening, and I will 
 try to see you." 
 
 The lapse of hours gave her resolution. She 
 spent the day in her room alone, while the fury of 
 the storm spent itself upon the island, giving place 
 to a heavy rain blotting out all the life and beauty 
 from the view. 
 
 At the Rodick the people who were left shivered 
 through windy corridors, wrapped in shawls and 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 121 
 
 ulsters, or huddled round a snapping fire of birch 
 logs in the great barn -like parlor, declaring that 
 they had been sea-sick all night from the rocking 
 of their beds in the gale, and would leave in the 
 earliest boat. 
 
 To Erskine the day was interminable. The 
 Thorntons tried to woo him into their little sitting- 
 room ; but he proved a sorry comrade, abandoned 
 even by the boys (whose delight in ordinary times 
 he was), who with the instinctive selfishness of 
 childhood shunned his moody countenance, as rats 
 desert a falling house. 
 
 Grace was perplexed and anxious. The Coun 
 sellor, after reading his rather elderly copy of a 
 New York newspaper till he had exhausted the ad 
 vertisements, wandered over to the dancing -room 
 at the Rodick, where Amy, with several other storm- 
 stayed young persons, was organizing a set of glees 
 around the piano. 
 
 From her post as leader Amy saw through the 
 window her friend Erskine stalking up and down 
 the long veranda in solitude. She made a motion 
 as if to beckon him, but, on second thoughts, re 
 frained. 
 
 When people met at the early dinner hour, Ers 
 kine was absent. He was striding through rain and 
 mire along the road leading to Schooner Head, 
 where he stood upon the cliff looking out at the 
 cold gray wind-swept sea, and listened to the mad 
 dash of the breakers, not yet rested from their 
 wild night s work. When evening came at last, 
 
122 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 " the spirit in his feet " led Erskine with bounding 
 steps to Rosalie s home. 
 
 Mrs. Gray s delight was to have a tiny sweet- 
 smelling wood fire upon the old brass andirons of 
 her hearth. To-night it sparkled cheerily, and the 
 student-lamp burned soft beneath its crimson shade. 
 Beside a table holding her pet bits of porcelain, her 
 vanilla-grass basket with its tangle of bright-colored 
 silks, and a vase of Venice glass with meadow grass 
 and orchids, Rosalie sat, her face somewhat with 
 drawn from the light, that, dancing over her black 
 drapery, brought out here and there the gleam of jet. 
 
 Nearer to the fire,. swathed in the soft folds of a 
 pale blue Chuddar shawl, dear old Mrs. Carson was 
 putting the finishing touches upon a high-art sun 
 flower, worked on a strip of kitchen crash. 
 
 Such a sweet peaceful scene it was, coming in 
 from the darkness and the penetrating sea-damp 
 without ! Erskine s wild fancy, overleaping the 
 minor details of a luxurious taste, saw only the fire 
 side, and Rosalie waiting there waiting for him ! 
 He pictured himself the proprietor of a fishing- 
 lodge somewhere, and this the angel of his hearth. 
 Poor fellow! He was quite out of date with his 
 romances. 
 
 They talked a while, and presently in bustled Mr. 
 Carson, who was a musical maniac, and carried off 
 his wife to listen to the singing of a girl with a 
 lovely contralto voice in the adjoining hotel. 
 
 Something in the irrepressible joy of Erskine s 
 manner when they were left alone sent a pang to 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 123 
 
 his companion s heart. A strange constraint fell 
 upon her, and she became very pale. Suddenly she 
 lifted her eyes to his, and spoke with great resolve. 
 
 " You are going away to-morrow, and I have 
 asked you to come here this evening that I may 
 tell you something. First, about yourself. You 
 have never asked me for an explanation of my 
 manner to you my one unpardonable rudeness in 
 the early days of our acquaintance, if we can even 
 call it such." 
 
 "I never shall," said he, impetuously. "It is 
 forgiven a thousand times over." 
 
 " That is like you," she said. " And it is because 
 I know you as I do now, and want your friendship," 
 she added, after a moment s hesitation, and in a 
 lower tone, " that I must tell you about myself the 
 story of my life." 
 
 Involuntarily a wave of apprehension swept over 
 him. This confidence boded him no good. 
 
 " You are comparatively so young for you can t 
 be more than a year or two older than I am and 
 so full of trustful belief in everything, that I hardly 
 think you will credit me when I tell you that 
 I am a woman without faith restless, unsatisfied, 
 impatient of everything commonplace ; wont to 
 touch the cup to my lips and dash away what I 
 have scarcely tasted ; fitful, arrogant, cased in an 
 armor that is proof against all soft emotion, all 
 lasting tenderness." How stubbornly she wronged 
 herself ! " Years ago I gave away my heart, and 
 wrecked my happiness in a marriage lasting long 
 
124 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 enough to drag me through all the tortures of dis 
 illusionment. I loved with a girl s fervor ; I suffered 
 with a woman s capacity. The world knew nothing 
 of my life, for to outward appearance I had all that 
 a woman s ambition could ask. Beauty, power, 
 wealth, a husband courted and popular; and I 
 was, as I am, very proud. If we all wore our 
 hearts in view under glass, like the people in the 
 Palace of Truth, how many of the prosperous 
 of your acquaintance would be envied long, do 
 you think? It is not fit that I should raise for you 
 the curtain over my uncongenial domestic life. 
 Such things are common enough, Heaven knows ? 
 I have been free now for some years, and I sup 
 pose happy. Only you will see that I am not 
 quite the woman you have thought me." 
 
 How bitterly she spoke ! With what passion her 
 low voice trembled ! Erskine sat motionless. The 
 light had gone out of everything, he thought ; even 
 the wood fire ceased to sparkle on the hearth. By- 
 and-by she resumed, but in a far gentler tone : 
 
 " I have let you see enough of my real self, for it 
 has given you pain. We shall part now, and you 
 must try to forget the woman who has crossed your 
 path. For me everything is finished ; for you it has 
 only begun. Strength, talent, high aims, will carry 
 you onward. Let me hear from you again when 
 you have won the love of some gentle girl, who will 
 come to me and claim me as her friend. For all 
 that you have done for me and been to me I thank 
 you again and again. If I have learned to believe 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 125 
 
 in friendship once more, it is you who have taught 
 me." 
 
 " And you tell me to forget you !" he began, 
 passionately, but was stopped by the pitiful sad 
 ness of her eyes. 
 
 The little French clock upon the mantel-shelf 
 ticked with the beating of his heart. A burst of 
 wind came wandering about the house like an aim 
 less soul in pain. He looked at her for a moment 
 without speaking, then took his leave. 
 
 The steamer Lewiston bore away next day a 
 large gleaning from the crop of lingering visitors, 
 among them the Thornton family, not quite so 
 buoyant as when they^came (who ever does leave 
 a pleasant summer place quite cheerfully?), and 
 Erskine. 
 
 As the boat ploughed her way past all the well- 
 remembered haunts on " cliff and scar," he. was 
 standing alone by the railing, looking back. Amy 
 North left her family and came to join him. 
 
 " May I speak to you ?" she asked, with a girl s 
 vivid blush suffusing neck and cheek and brow. 
 
 " Certainly," he said, rather wondering. 
 
 " It may be very rude of me to dare, but I can t 
 help it. I will never speak of it again. I have 
 never spoken of it to any one before." She seemed 
 for a moment unable to go on for the faltering in 
 her voice. " I don t think anybody has realized 
 what you have been suffering this summer except 
 myself. I know Frank does not, or Grace. But 
 
126 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 I must tell you that I believe oh ! I am quite 
 sure she cares, too." 
 
 And then, red as a June rose, and rather tearful, 
 poor Amy fled away. 
 
 XII 
 
 AMONG the " distinguished departures " for Eu 
 rope duly chronicled by the newspapers early in 
 October was that of " Mrs. Caspar Gray and maid." 
 The gay world over after-dinner coffee, and on the 
 club-house portico at the Jerome Park races, re 
 gretted that her house would be shut up during 
 the coming season. 
 
 " A woman like that is an immense loss to so 
 ciety, by Jove !" Mr. Watson Webster said, con 
 fidentially, to a stranger whom he desired to im 
 press with his own exclusiveness ; " or, I should 
 say, to a few of us whom she especially affected. 
 She did not even show at Newport this year, but 
 went off and buried herself among the aborigines 
 somewhere. You see, the trouble is, my dear fel 
 low, New York can t hold her stars. I m thinking 
 of a run over to make half a dozen country visits 
 in England myself." 
 
 Grace Thornton was plunged anew into her vor 
 tex of philanthropic engagements. It was a great 
 blow to her to find that Erskine and Amy, though 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 127 
 
 still good friends, had no apparent intention of 
 ever assuming any closer bond. Erskine was, dur 
 ing that winter, entirely given over to hard work. 
 Society forgot him, and it was only at rare intervals 
 that he dropped in upon the Thorntons to dine, 
 romp with the boys, listen to Amy s ballads, and dis 
 cuss with The Counsellor some knotty point of law. 
 
 And Amy, what of her ? What of all such 
 Amys in the world ? They dress and dance, and 
 beautify and cheer their homes as usual. When 
 Lent set in, Amy became the zealous leader of a 
 fashionable sewing circle for the poor, and her 
 little class of Five Points ragged boys found her 
 more than ever worthy of their adoring champion 
 ship. When Amy laid hold of anything to do, she 
 did it with her might. 
 
 Again it was summer-time. Sitting one day 
 wearily working in his office there came to Ers 
 kine from Newport, in Amy s well-known dashing 
 hand, a little note, like a waft of cooling wind. 
 
 " Did you know that Mrs. Gray has returned, 
 and is on her way, if she has not already gone, to 
 Bar Harbor ? Grace and I find our life here at 
 this headquarters of swelldom rather tame after 
 Mount Desert. 
 
 "I rebel against eight -button gloves and lace 
 parasols and basket -phaetons and morning calls; 
 but Grace, who is at heart a snob, I tell her, likes 
 it, and persuades herself that she is doing it all in 
 order to be nearer to darling Frank. " 
 
128 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 It is one of the inalienable charms of that " Sum 
 mer isle of Eden," lying off the coast of Maine, 
 that in the height of the thronged season one can 
 always find some forest solitude, 
 
 "Where the gloom divine is all around, 
 And underneath is the mossy ground " 
 
 or a cave in the rocks, to sit gazing down into pools 
 filled with starry anemones and all the multitudi 
 nous life of the sea, and be lulled into repose by 
 harmonies of wind and wave. 
 
 At what, viewed in the wonderfully clear atmos 
 phere, seems a stone s-throw from the main-land, 
 a rock rises from Frenchman s Bay whose waves 
 go courtesying up to powder it with spray. This 
 proves, upon close inspection, to be a superb mass, 
 riven asunder by a chasm, where at high tide the 
 surf speeds in over beds of sea -weed, and, reced 
 ing, leaves its tribute of a hundred starfish there. 
 The tinting of the rocks, of red and blue and gold 
 and purple, is blended with indescribable mellow 
 ness, and where the bare summits rise sea-gulls 
 make their nests. Westward a bar of pebbly beach 
 extends, where at low tide one may gather a boat 
 load of sea-wonders, coral, shells, and weed. 
 
 One afternoon a canoe shot across the water 
 and headed for this point. Its occupant, a gentle 
 man, sprang eagerly ashore, and lifted his frail craft 
 upon the rocks above the line of the advancing tide. 
 A few vigorous strides bore him to the summit of 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 129 
 
 Bald Rock, where a flag -staff of the Coast Survey 
 indicates the finest point of view. His impatient 
 gaze on every side at once was arrested by an ap 
 parition on the ground at his feet, which brought 
 the warm blood rushing to his face. It was a wom 
 an s coarse straw hat, tied down with a loose 
 scarf of crimson gauze ; through the knot to one 
 side was carelessly drawn a bunch of golden-rod. 
 
 Immediately he became aware of a presence 
 other than his own upon this desolate spot. There, 
 under an overhanging rock, looking southward, her 
 head drooped somewhat listlessly, and one fair 
 hand shading her eyes, sat the lady of his dreams. 
 
 She turned as, with the old joyous impulse, he 
 called her name. In spite of her habitual self-con 
 trol her face grew very pale. 
 
 " I have come in search of you," he said. "For 
 an hour I have paddled about the bay, looking 
 vainly, and at last fell upon the device of climb 
 ing up to these rocks to scan the horizon with my 
 glass, hoping to catch a glimpse of a vagrant boat. 
 The man over there at the boat-house told me that 
 you were certainly seen pulling in this direction, 
 and alone. But you must have flown up here on 
 the wing of a sea-gull. What can you have done 
 with your boat ?" 
 
 " I left it on the bar," she said, with some sur 
 prise. 
 
 " Then the tide, which was rising when you 
 landed, has carried it off." 
 
 Rosalie uttered an exclamation of dismay. 
 
130 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 " How stupid of me to have let time go by like 
 this. It was a longer pull than I thought, and I 
 was tired. Oh ! Mr. Erskine, if you will be good 
 enough to look for my poor boat. See, a fog is creep 
 ing up. It is quite time I should be returning." 
 
 " Impossible to leave you !" he said, " The boat 
 has drifted off, and somebody will find it, without 
 doubt. As you say, a fog is coming in ; and we are 
 a considerable distance from the village. You must 
 come into my canoe." 
 
 What inspired him, Rosalie asked herself, that 
 his eyes shone with such delight and triumph. 
 
 " You are forgetting your hat," Erskine said, as 
 they picked their way down the rocks. 
 
 " Oh, of course," Rosalie said, in some confu 
 sion, as in giving it to her he broke off a spray of 
 golden-rod and placed it on his breast, after signifi 
 cantly touching it to his lips. 
 
 " If this be not the one you wore on the mount 
 ain in the storm last year, it is a duplicate." 
 
 " I am afraid I have an eccentric way of liking 
 one pattern of hats for the sea-side, without regard 
 for the laws of fashion." 
 
 " I should have known your hat among a thou 
 sand. I assure you that I felt like Robinson Cru 
 soe discovering Friday s footsteps when I came 
 upon it lying here where the sea-gulls perch, and 
 knew it to be yours." 
 
 Both felt that a great many commonplace re 
 marks were in order at that moment. In ordi 
 nary life a lady dropping quite unexpectedly from 
 
AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT 131 
 
 one part of the globe upon a "lone rock in the 
 sea," with a man from another, is naturally ex 
 pected to comment on the fact. Again and again 
 Rosalie tried to speak, and could not. All of her 
 proud confidence had failed her in her utmost 
 need. 
 
 " At least you should tell me whence you came, 
 and when," she said, when they were seated in the 
 canoe, and gliding swiftly away from the ever-less 
 ening pile of rocks. 
 
 " I came to day ; I am here," said Erskine s 
 happy voice. " Now if you want to know for what 
 I came, that is easily answered too." 
 
 Rosalie was silenced, and the fog overtaking 
 them just then, they were incontinently blotted out 
 from the rest of the created world. 
 
 " Shall I tell you what I wish ?" he said, as the 
 delicious sense of utter isolation with her stole over 
 him. " I wish that the fog would never lift, and 
 that we might float on forever. It is like heaven 
 to have you so near me, after all these months of 
 cruel silence and separation. I have loved you, 
 Rosalie, and followed you like a madman ever since 
 my eyes first rested on you. There has never been 
 a moment s wavering in my devotion. Fate has 
 brought us together again and again, dearest. 
 Why not hail it as a good omen, and stay with 
 me always ? Something tells me that I was a fool 
 to have left you so, last year. Oh, Rosalie, do 
 those blushes mean that I am right ?" 
 
 " Oh no ! no !" she cried, with as much energy as 
 
132 GOLDEN -ROD: 
 
 one dare bestow on anything in a canoe. " Re 
 member what I told you of myself. Don t make 
 me suffer over again what I did then. After all, 
 you are taking everything for granted." 
 
 " Tell me only one thing, Rosalie. Look me 
 fairly in the eyes, and say that during all these 
 months you have not carried in your memory what 
 I said to you about the golden-rod. If you do not 
 wear it now, because I love it and you, my beauty 
 then, and then only, will I give you up." 
 
 What was there left for her but royal self-sur 
 render ? Erskine never so thoroughly realized the 
 abiding inconvenience of a canoe as now. 
 
 The fog lifted, and before them earth and sea 
 lay bathed in happy golden light. High towards 
 heaven rose the blue outline of the everlasting 
 hills. 
 

 UNDER THE CONVENT WALL 
 
UNDER THE CONVENT WALL 
 
 ABOUT twelve o clock one bright February day 
 in Paris, Madame Bourget sat waiting for the ar 
 rival of her belated scholar, Miss Cora Bell, a young 
 American whose habit it was to spend a couple of 
 hours three times a week in so-called "elegant 
 conversation" in the French language with that 
 worthy dame. The little apartment where the 
 teacher lived had formerly been a garret over the 
 dependance of a suburban boarding-house, taken 
 under some stress of circumstances by its present 
 occupant, and, little by little, with taste and per 
 severance, it had been made to " blossom like 
 the rose." No wonder merry Miss Cora liked her 
 tri-weekly French lessons. The walls of the large 
 room, divided into two smaller ones by screens, 
 were hung with fluted chintz, all flowers and leaves 
 of brightest hue. A tiny porcelain stove diffused, 
 when called upon (but that was not too often, for 
 maclame, like all Frenchwomen, believed in econo 
 my in wood), a friendly warmth. In the windows, 
 whose panes of glass were polished like the speck- 
 less boards of the flooring, were kept plants and 
 
136 UNDER THE CONVENT WALL 
 
 birds. A great green box of mignonette in flower 
 sent out a luscious fragrance. Vines were made to 
 start from behind every picture -frame and out of 
 china jars upon the shelves; and somehow or 
 other they grew like Jack s bean-stalk, strong and 
 green and luxuriant. Best of all, a flood of genial 
 sunshine came in on all sides, for the garret boasted 
 of various windows. Where madame slept, one 
 could find out by peeping behind a screen at the 
 tiny white-curtained bed with the crucifix above it, 
 but where madame cooked no one ever guessed; 
 yet she had a fashion of producing from unknown 
 corners a series of luncheons that were nectar and 
 ambrosia to her youthful visitors. Days there had 
 been in madame s past experience when the poor 
 lady had known what it was to subsist upon the 
 slenderest of rations, but now the fame of her 
 exquisite embroideries in chenille and silk was 
 noised abroad, while her occasional scholars, like 
 Cora Bell and a few liberal Americans of the same 
 set, made up an income sufficient for the widow s 
 wants. 
 
 Madame Bourget, sitting at the open window 
 overlooking an ivy -covered wall that just here 
 formed the boundary of the Bois de Boulogne, felt 
 quite wistful with regret over the non-appearance 
 of her favorite scholar. " She will not come now," 
 the widow said to herself, as the inevitable mantel 
 clock struck a cheerful loud-voiced "one." "Truly, 
 she has twined herself into my heart, that chere 
 petite Cora. How she laughs and dances and 
 
UNDER THE CONVENT WALL 137 
 
 sings her life away ! Just like that other one so 
 many years ago." A shiver ran over the little 
 woman s frame, and she closed her eyes as if to 
 banish some painful image. " My pretty Cora will 
 never know so sad a fate as hers, thank le bon 
 Dieu." A light step upon the stairway, and Cora, 
 blooming with health and animation, came into the 
 room. 
 
 "Don t scold, dear madame. There is time 
 enough yet for a chapter of our book before they 
 send for me." 
 
 The lesson began, but Cora s attention wandered ; 
 her thoughts flew off at a tangent; her eyes grew 
 dreamy; a deeper rose-color settled in her cheeks. 
 At last a little white protesting hand was laid 
 across madame s page. 
 
 " Bourget dear, I want to confess to somebody. 
 Won t you be my priest ? You know that papa is 
 in America attending to business always, and that 
 mamma is forever going out. I ve nobody but that 
 stupid Parker of mine, and talk I must I must. 
 Oh, Bourget, if such a thing can be, I am too 
 happy ! All of this dear blessed morning he has 
 been with me, and mamma has given her consent, 
 and we are to be married soon." 
 
 And then, the flood-gates loosed, came a stream 
 of joyous confidence. Cora never thought to look 
 up at her listener until she felt a hot tear, then 
 another, drop upon her hands clasped in the wid 
 ow s lap. 
 
 " What is it, dear madame ? what have I said 
 
138 UNDER THE CONVENT WALL 
 
 to pain you ?" the girl asked, wondering, to be an 
 swered by a fit of bitter sobbing. With kind and 
 gentle words Cora soothed her friend s emotion, 
 and at last Madame Bourget was able to speak 
 once more. 
 
 "Forgive me, dearest young lady," she exclaimed. 
 " In truth I never can forgive myself. I owe it to 
 you to explain my weakness. See here : this pict 
 ure which you have often caught a glimpse of in 
 my desk. Look at it judge for yourself of her 
 youth, her innocence, her beauty. She was my only 
 child, and I have lost her forever. Years ago she 
 knelt, as you do now, and poured out to me the 
 wealth of her love and happiness, under circum 
 stances like yours. The rest is too painful for you 
 to hear." 
 
 " Tell me more," the girl said, tenderly. " I 
 would be selfish indeed if I refused my sympathy 
 at a time when all seems so bright before me." 
 
 Little by little the story was revealed. Ten 
 years before, Leonie Blanchet had been sought in 
 marriage by a wealthy Englishman, to whom her 
 mother had given her with some misgiving, watch 
 ing her go from that modest home into a life of 
 luxury with many anxious fears. The husband 
 Leonie had chosen was handsome, young, and win 
 ning; he had convinced her of his right to a rank 
 and station far above Leonie s expectations. Leonie 
 adored him. What, then, was there to apprehend? 
 The widow could not tell but still ! Leonie s first 
 letters came to her so full of buoyant pride, of 
 
UNDER THE CONVENT WALL 139 
 
 confident happiness, that for a time the mother 
 could not but reflect it. The young couple were 
 absent upon their wedding journey in the South, 
 and had reached Rome, when a thunder -bolt fell 
 upon the pretty, trustful bride. It was a mock mar 
 riage. The man whom Leonie believed to be her 
 husband had left his true wife in England a gay, 
 fashionable beauty, sufficiently " emancipated," ac 
 cording to the notions of her class, to scoff openly 
 and lightly at her husband s latest fancy. 
 
 " But this is not for you to hear, my child," the 
 little French teacher said. Cora, who from motives 
 of delicacy had avoided looking at her friend, 
 glanced hastily up, struck by the suppressed pas 
 sion in her voice. What a transformation was 
 there ! In place of the quiet, repressed, demure 
 personage she had been accustomed to see, Ma 
 dame Bourget s eyes were afire ; her cheeks glowed 
 with a dull crimson ; her teeth were clinched. 
 
 "Do you know what, had I been Le onie, I 
 should have done to him ?" she went on. " I am 
 a Corsican, and the blood runs hot in our veins 
 when it is stirred by wrong va /" 
 
 The brief passion was spent. It was succeeded 
 by a calm even more full of meaning. Cora waited 
 until her friend could trust herself to speak. 
 
 " They parted then and there," Madame Bour- 
 get went on, in a low tone. "He did not defend 
 himself. He simply laughed at her my poor, 
 heart-broken, humiliated child. He said she was 
 too innocent for the times she lived in. And so 
 
140 UNDER THE CONVENT WALL 
 
 she was, bon Dieu too innocent. She put all of 
 this into one last letter to me, and then she fled 
 fled into the night." 
 
 " And now ?" the young girl said, after a long 
 silence. 
 
 "Now she is at peace," the mother answered, 
 quietly. "The Holy Church received her in its 
 bosom. Le onie is one of the sisters of the con 
 vent of the Sepolte Vive. For some time past I 
 have been laying up money in order to take the 
 journey to Rome; but until recently it was all I 
 could do to live here, and to go away from my 
 employment meant starvation. Oh, if I could but 
 have seen her I would have starved yes, gladly 
 but that is impossible. All that is permitted to 
 me is to visit the outside of the convent upon her 
 day. Once a year each sister has a day, when 
 she is allowed to throw over the convent wall a 
 flower in token to her watching friends that she is 
 still alive, but there it ends. I know what flower 
 my Leonie would choose a bunch of fresh white 
 lilac !" 
 
 " Sepolte vive buried alive!" the young girl 
 repeated, sadly. A shadow seemed to fall over her 
 life and her budding happiness. 
 
 A few months later saw the Roman spring unfold 
 in all its glory. A party of tourists were visiting 
 that relic of mediaeval days, the convent of the 
 Sepolte Vive. Most of them turned back disap 
 pointed at the threshold, but a group of three peo- 
 
UNDER THE CONVENT WALL 141 
 
 pie lingered until the rest of the sight-seers, after a 
 colloquy held beside a revolving barrel in the wall 
 of the convent, had reluctantly dispersed. Over 
 this barrel was traced an inscription : " Who would 
 live content within these walls, let her leave at the 
 threshold every earthly care." Upon these lines a 
 woman dressed in black, standing apart from her 
 two companions, kept her eyes fixed, while her lips 
 moved in prayer. 
 
 The order of nuns who have thus condemned 
 themselves to death in life subsists on charity. It 
 is only when their supplies are totally exhausted 
 that they are allowed, after twenty -four hours 
 starvation, to ring a certain bell, which the outside 
 world interprets, " We are famishing." Two Lents 
 are observed by them during the year the one 
 common to all Catholic Christians, and another 
 held between November and Christmas. In the 
 intervals the sisters receive and partake of what 
 ever food may be bestowed on them by visitors. 
 
 Two of the three loiterers were young and hand 
 some, radiant with happiness. That they were new- 
 made husband and wife none could doubt, and it 
 was a pleasant sight to see the wife order to be 
 brought from a carriage in attendance a hamper of 
 abundant dainties, and with the aid of her husband 
 proceed to unpack their store. To attract atten 
 tion from those within the convent the young man 
 knocked briskly upon the barrel, which, slowly turn 
 ing, revealed an opening to a shelf within. 
 
 " What wilt thou, stranger ?" came a voice, faint 
 
142 UNDER THE CONVENT WALL 
 
 and far as the note of an y^Eolian harp. So strong 
 was the sense of remoteness and of desolation pro 
 duced by this sound that involuntarily the young 
 wife clasped her husband s arm in shuddering. 
 
 " Oh ! it is too sad," she whispered in his ear. 
 " I think I shall go back to the carriage and leave 
 Madame Bourget with you may I not ?" 
 
 " Nonsense, darling. Who is it who has contrived 
 and carried out this little expedition, I should like 
 to know ? Come, cheer up, and bestow your boun 
 ties upon the good sisters within. Depend upon it 
 they will relish them." 
 
 Their presents were given, and in exchange our 
 visitors had received a series of cartolini, or tiny 
 slips of printed paper folded like homoeopathic 
 powder papers, and intended to be swallowed whole 
 by the believer, who might thereafter hope for a 
 cure of any mortal ailment possessing him. As 
 their colloquy with the unseen sister came to a 
 close, the young man signed to Madame Bourget 
 to draw near. The mother had kept a veil over 
 her face while standing by in silence, but now she 
 sprang forward, and uttered with feverish anxiety a 
 few sentences of wild pleading unheard by her com 
 panions. 
 
 Fainter and farther were the pitying accents that 
 smote her ear in return. 
 
 " Sepolte vive, daughter. The grave gives 
 back no answer." 
 
 "Let us wait beneath the garden wall, dear 
 friend," Cora said, as between them her husband 
 
UNDER THE CONVENT WALL 143 
 
 and she supported the steps of the trembling moth 
 er from the spot. " It should be at about this 
 time that the flower is thrown, and oh ! how it will 
 comfort you to have it from her hand !" 
 
 Underneath the ancient wall of the convent 
 garden the little group waited in silence. It was 
 a moment of feeling too profound for words. As 
 the hour drew near the mother left her friends and 
 went to kneel alone upon a grassy mound where 
 her cheek might graze the wall, as if caressing it. 
 For a time all was silent. Then a bell sounded the 
 hour with slow and solemn strokes. A bird burst 
 into joyous carolling in the tree above where Cora 
 stood. "It is a good omen," she said, glancing up 
 into her husband s face. As the last stroke of the 
 bell died upon the air something white and fragrant 
 fell at the feet of the kneeling figure. "It is 
 Leonie s white lilac !" Cora cried, starting joyously 
 forward. 
 
 But the mother did not stir. The token had 
 come too late to awaken joy or sorrow. 
 
CHERRYCOTE 
 
CHERRYCOTE 
 
 "AND you expect me to travel over nine miles of 
 muddy roads behind that beast and in that rattle 
 trap ?" a gentleman said, discontentedly surveying 
 the conveyance provided for him by an obliging 
 countryman residing near the station of the Vir 
 ginia railway, where a train had recently deposit 
 ed the stranger. 
 
 "Well, tain t as ef thar was much to choose from, 
 mister," was the answer. " If you ve a mind to wait 
 till evenin , the stage mout happen along. But, 
 bless yore soul, sah, ole Buck 11 carry you thar ef 
 you only give him time enough. An I reckon the 
 buggy won t break down tween this and the black 
 smith s at the cross-roads. Thar s string an rope 
 an a lot o nails under the buffler-robe ; an little 
 Poss here ll manage to mend the damage ef so it 
 be that thar s a rock to pick up long the road 
 side." 
 
 " May I drive, boss ?" was the hesitating prayer 
 of little Poss (short for possum), as the dilapidated 
 vehicle, drawn by a spavined plough horse, got 
 finally under way. Looking down with amusement 
 
148 CHERRYCOTE 
 
 at his excited petitioner, Barksdale saw a droll little 
 darky, costumed in meal bags, hatless, and with 
 plaited twigs of wool, who, when the rope reins were 
 relinquished into his hands, assumed the post of 
 charioteer with dignity ineffable. 
 
 Barksdale forgot Poss as the overmastering pow 
 er of early association soon took possession of him. 
 Ten years before, at the outset of the war between 
 the States, he had left the neighborhood through 
 which they were now passing, and during that time 
 the history of its places and its people had been 
 almost a sealed book to the wanderer in many 
 lands. He had fancied himself weaned from his 
 sentimental love for old Virginia; but here he was 
 craning his neck to look at the ancient landmarks, 
 recalling rides ending at this point and picnics at 
 another, his cheek flushing and a lump coming into 
 his throat like the veriest school-boy home for the 
 holidays. The country was beautifully green, and 
 as old Buck plodded along there was nothing to 
 do but to resign himself to memory and anticipa 
 tion, while the wind, laden with fragrance from the 
 blossoming woods, blew over him refreshingly. 
 
 At last Cherrycote Farm was reached ; but before 
 they could enter it, little Poss jumped down to 
 struggle with an old red gate of such persistent in- 
 hospitality that Barksdale himself could only force 
 it open by half lifting the crumbling gate-post from 
 the soil. 
 
 " Barren acres," he said, with a si^h, glancing 
 over what were once prosperous fields of grain. 
 
CHERRYCOTE 149 
 
 Grass grew on the roadway, and a multitude of 
 little blue star flowers were crushed beneath their 
 wheels. Emerging from a bit of pine woods, he 
 caught sight of the gables of the old house. They 
 at least were unchanged, half veiled from sight by 
 Virginia-creeper and wistaria, jasmine and roses. 
 His old room was that one with the window over 
 which grew the branch of a mulberry-tree, its foliage 
 so thick that neither blind nor curtain was required. 
 As Barksdale gazed he saw, emerging from the 
 shrubbery around a turn in the road, a cavalier be 
 striding a sleek mule. This was a man seemingly 
 between thirty and forty years old, his once clear- 
 cut features overgrown with rlesh, and wearing a 
 brown beard that swept his waist. His frame, al 
 beit a trifle unwieldy, was muscular, his eyes were 
 of an honest blue; his seat in the saddle, even 
 though the mount was of the unenviable class, 
 admirable. His clothing consisted of a pair of 
 corduroy breeches tucked into spurred cavalry 
 boots, and a nondescript shooting jacket faded by 
 sun and rain, with a broad-brimmed hat of straw, 
 showing marks of home manufacture. At the first 
 sight -of Barksdale his brows knit inquiringly; in 
 a moment he charged down upon the antique bug 
 gy with military dash. 
 
 " Lance, old fellow !" he cried. " It isn t pos 
 sible !" 
 
 " Hal !" exclaimed the other, simultaneously, in 
 a tone that meant much. Immediately two hands 
 met in fervent friendship. Since these hands had 
 
150 CHERRYCOTE 
 
 grasped each other last a river of blood had flowed 
 between them. Bitter words had been spoken, hot 
 discussions had raged, party strife had swelled re 
 sentful hearts ; but now, when the half-brothers met 
 again, neither thought of anything but the early ties 
 of blood and affectionate companionship. Barks- 
 dale, thin, active, embalmed in an atmosphere of 
 foreign travel, his clothes scrupulously well cut. his 
 speech refined to nicety, appeared at least five 
 years younger than the bluff, sunburned squire, who 
 was, in reality, considerably his junior. 
 
 They were the sons of a Virginia gentleman, who, 
 a widower with one small boy when he was hard 
 ly out of college, had consigned the little Lan 
 celot to the care of his mother s relatives in the 
 North. Marrying a second time in Virginia, Mr. 
 Barksdale had settled down to a peaceful agricult 
 ural existence on the estate belonging to his bride, 
 " one of the Carters of Cherrycote Farm," as that 
 lady was styled. 
 
 Hither Lancelot had come to spend many happ)i 
 hours of irresponsible holiday in the free and easy 
 life of old-time Virginia. Here he had learned to 
 feel a sincere affection for his kind step-mother and 
 her boy Hal. But at the outset of the war his 
 Northern training and sympathies in political faith 
 set a terrible stumbling-block in the path of family 
 pleasantness. Unwilling to contest the fervid 
 torrent of secession talk, he at first kept silent. 
 This led to suspicion, and finally to open warfare 
 
CHERRYCOTE 151 
 
 on the part of the generous people who had once 
 extended their arms to him. His father had died, 
 and the widow, an ardent Southerner, learned to 
 look on him with constraint. Even Hal, merry, 
 handsome Hal, who had adored the ground Lance 
 trod upon, began to quarrel with him. There was 
 nothing for it but retreat. Lancelot returned to his 
 Northern home, and soon heard the news that Hal 
 had become a volunteer at Manassas. After that 
 there was a long and painful gap in their relations. 
 
 It was while wandering aimlessly around Europe 
 ten years later that Lancelot made up his mind to 
 return to America, and to visit the home of his 
 fathers. The resolution once taken was acted upon 
 with almost feverish zeal. Now that he had again 
 shaken Hal s hand, had satisfied himself that the 
 slim lad of nineteen was still somewhere lurking 
 behind the veil of adipose matter enshrouding the 
 man of twenty-nine, Barksdale breathed a long sigh 
 of relief. As for the squire, he was one of those 
 guileless natures content to take things as they find 
 them. Barksdale s foreign airs excited in him 
 wonder not unmixed with amusement. He fell to 
 speculating over what the women would say to this 
 importation of fastidious elegance into their impov 
 erished household. In old times Cherrycote had 
 never speculated; secure in homely plenty, it had 
 simply flung wide open its doors and bidden the 
 stranger in. 
 
 " Suppose we walk the rest of the way," Barks- 
 
I $2 CHERRYCOTE 
 
 dale said, springing with alacrity from his mouse 
 trap of an equipage. " I have so much to say to 
 you, Hal, I don t know where to begin." 
 
 " I don t walk much nowadays ; but still " said 
 the squire, getting down in rather a ponderous 
 fashion, and leading the mule, followed by Poss 
 and his spavined steed, along a road carpeted with 
 pine tags and bordered with wild honeysuckles. 
 
 " I haven t asked you about your wife," Lancelot 
 said, when it appeared that the question could no 
 longer in common courtesy be deferred. 
 
 " Kitty ? Why, she s splendid," said the squire, 
 heartily. " And if you ll believe me, Lance, I have 
 six young ones, all girls. The old house is as full 
 as ever, but you ll find things down at the heel, I 
 reckon. The same story everywhere hereabout : no 
 money, poor labor, no repairs ; the women struggling 
 with inefficient servants, worn-out furniture, worn- 
 out clothes. But Kitty s temper don t wear out, 
 thank God ! You ve not forgotten what a splendid 
 girl she was, Lance ?" 
 
 " I have not forgotten her in the least," his 
 brother answered, in a tone of slight constraint. 
 
 " You must have been surprised to hear I mar 
 ried her. When you left I was far gone in the direc 
 tion of Polly Rivers, of Rivers Hall, you remember. 
 Polly played the devil with me ; was engaged to 
 another fellow all the while she wore my ring. I 
 saw her last year at the Old Sweet; and, by George, 
 Lance, she s as big round as a barrel, and has three 
 chins. Kitty, now, is slight, and has kept her figure 
 
CHERRYCOTE 153 
 
 wonderfully. I didn t lose much time in courting 
 her after Polly bounced me, did I ? She was always 
 the jolliest little thing, was Kitty." 
 
 Lancelot thought of the time when he had last 
 seen Katherine Morris, one of the many cousins of 
 a youthful cousin of Mrs. Barksdale, on a summer 
 visit to Cherrycote. She was standing in the deep 
 grass of the old orchard, under the cherry blos 
 soms, in the spring of 61, a mere slip of a girl 
 then, with large dark eyes, and a weight of dusky 
 hair upon her small proud head. He remembered 
 the gown she wore, a sort of full-bodied thin white 
 stuff, with a sash of crimson, and the trick she had 
 of interlacing her small brown Southern fingers 
 while she talked. 
 
 " Never, never !" she had cried out, in an im 
 petuous treble, the sound of which still echoed in 
 his ears. "What I promised was not to an enemy 
 of my country. I had rather die than marry you." 
 
 She had faced him bravely, two red spots flaming 
 in her ordinarily clear pale cheeks, but there was a 
 tremble in her voice, as if she would have been glad 
 to cry instead of speaking defiance. 
 
 Thus they had parted ; in the course of time Lan 
 celot had heard of his brother s marriage with "our 
 cousin, Katherine Morris ;" he was to meet her as 
 the mother of Hal s six girls ! For a moment he 
 felt like turning back upon the threshold of his visit, 
 but while little vagabond Poss was in quest of re 
 freshment for man and beast, the two walkers 
 struck into a well-remembered path across the or- 
 
 
154 CHERRYCOTE 
 
 chard leading to the house. The cherry trees were 
 in bearing now, and under a green arcade of fruit- 
 laden boughs was seen a merry group of ladies and 
 children picking violets in the grass. 
 
 Lancelot caught one glimpse of his old sweet 
 heart, recognizing her instantly. From the girl of 
 seventeen she had expanded into a splendid beauty 
 of twenty-seven, lithe and brown as ever, with a rich 
 color in her cheeks, not in the least suggesting a 
 matron oppressed by cares of maternity and house 
 keeping. Swarming about her were a number of 
 affectionate small girls, and at a little distance stood 
 Mrs. Barksdale the elder, looking thin and care 
 worn, engaged in conversation with a lady whom 
 he dimly recalled as another Miss Morris of the by 
 gone days, then a coquettish personage with dim 
 ples, and wonderful plaits of hair worn in a crown 
 around her head. The dimples were still evident, 
 though the cheeks had faded, and the abundant 
 braids were perceptibly thinner. Barksdale took 
 in all these details, while struggling to control the 
 immediate and powerful impression made on him 
 by the first view of his brother s wife. The color 
 had receded from his face, leaving him quite pale. 
 
 " What is the matter with you ?" asked Hal, in 
 nocently. " No doubt our Virginia sun has been 
 too much after such a confoundedly long walk. I 
 say, Lance, if you d care to, come into the dining- 
 room and let me mix you a julep before you meet 
 the ladies !" 
 
 " Capital idea !" Lancelot found himself answer- 
 
CHERRYCOTE 155 
 
 ing, with a strong effort at indifference. He suc 
 ceeded presently, and while Hal bustled around 
 among the decanters, calling for ice and mint and 
 strawberries, stood battling with the ghost of his 
 younger self. The trial had been to the full as 
 painful as he had expected. Often as it had pre 
 sented itself to his imagination, the reality was not 
 surpassed. Her face had shone upon him like a 
 star from Alpine heights, across wintry seas, in de 
 sert reaches, at the opera, in his dreams, on the 
 pages of his books, everywhere, anywhere, during 
 ten long years of absolute non-intercourse. It was 
 not until she had been Hal s wife for several years 
 that he heard at all of this marriage, seeming to 
 him so extraordinarily incongruous and unsuitable. 
 He still could not reconcile it with her appearance, 
 her manner, her pretensions, now that he had seen 
 her once again in the splendor of maturer woman 
 hood. 
 
 The jovial good-fellowship of the kindly squire 
 offended him. He felt as if he could not bear to 
 see husband and wife together, to hear Hal s lanky 
 girls claim her as their mother. But Lancelot 
 Barksdale had a noble nature and a strong will. 
 Resolutely he trampled out the fire that had so 
 suddenly been kindled up within him. Kate was 
 no longer it was long indeed since she had ceased 
 to be the sovereign of his dreams. This brief 
 madness at an end, he would be able to take her 
 by the hand like a loyal and honorable gentleman 
 as he was. His reverie was brought to a prosaic 
 
156 CHERRYCOTE 
 
 ending by the appearance of Hal at his elbow, 
 looking like an amiable young Bacchus, so ruddy 
 were his cheeks, so broad his smile of pride over 
 the beaded goblet he now presented to the trav 
 eller. 
 
 " Drink this, my dear boy," cried the Virginian, 
 " and if in your travels you have come across a 
 beverage to beat it, may I never compound another 
 julep !" 
 
 Absurd as it seemed to a man of Lancelot s tem 
 perate habits to partake of stimulants at the me 
 ridian of an afternoon in spring, he tasted, never 
 theless, of the amber liquid, wherein strawberries 
 coquetted with sprigs of mint in a mass of finely 
 splintered ice. " Your brew does you credit, Hal," 
 he said, gayly. " And now to pay my respects to 
 the ladies. You haven t told me what welcome to 
 expect from my step-mother. I m in her debt for 
 a long list of bounties in my boyhood, and to have 
 been separated from her all these years through the 
 estrangement of that miserable war has been a real 
 
 O 
 
 pain." 
 
 At this moment in came Mrs. Barksdale the elder 
 to answer for herself. She had been told by the 
 servants of the arrival of a guest, and, with the 
 usual cordiality of her kind, hastened in to do the 
 honors. " My dear Lance," she cried, after a mo 
 mentary survey of extreme astonishment, " I m glad 
 to welcome you once more to Cherrycote." 
 
 " If you knew how much those words convey to 
 me !" returned Barksdale, with real feeling, taking 
 
CHERRYCOTE 157 
 
 her thin old hands and kissing them. "I am alone 
 in the world since my aunt died, a year ago, and 
 the ties of early association seem more potent as 
 we get on in life, I think. At any rate, I have 
 fairly longed to make friends with you all again, 
 and such a welcome as you and Hal have extended 
 to me heals many a wound of time." 
 
 "And I am far too old to indulge in rancor," 
 said the old lady, tears coming into her eyes. " Now 
 that our fearful war is over, I can regret the violence 
 of feeling with which we went into it. Oh, Lance ! 
 I am glad your poor dear father was spared seeing 
 his State conquered. I think it would have killed 
 him. But let by-gones be by-gones. We must agree 
 not to talk about the war. It was kind of you to 
 come so far to see us once again, and we will make 
 you comfortable, though things are not as they were 
 at Cherrycote. I am sure you are pleased to find 
 Hal married and settled so happily. His little wife 
 is such a manager I have given up the house-keep 
 ing entirely into her hands. And those sweet chil 
 dren ! Dear me ! here I am forgetting that Kitty 
 wants you to come out to the garden, Hal, to consult 
 about the best place to set out the Lima beans. 
 Don t tell her Lance is here, for she has not the 
 least idea who it is. The children said it was Mr. 
 Lewis come to see their papa about the sheep. 
 Such nice girls Hal has ; and such a good mother 
 that little flirting Kitty Morris has turned out to be ! 
 Lance, you must be taken to your room. But here 
 comes Hal again with his wife. Though you never 
 
158 CHERRYCOTE 
 
 knew her intimately, I believe, Kitty knows you 
 well by reputation." 
 
 At this point, when good Mrs. Barksdale paused 
 for breath in her flow of cordial greeting, Lancelot 
 felt his temples throb, and a sort of mist pass be 
 fore his eyes. Through the opening door Hal 
 hurried, followed by a lady, and in a single brief 
 and blissful moment Lancelot became aware of the 
 fact that Hal s Kitty was not his own " bride of old 
 dreams," whose spell went with him still. In plain 
 words, Mrs. Henry Barksdale the younger was none 
 other than the cousin with the dimples also a 
 Katherine Morris, whose given name had long ago 
 departed from Lancelot s recollection had he ever 
 been possessed of it, indeed ? In the confusion of 
 his ideas during the moments that followed this dis 
 covery he was absorbed with a longing to satisfy 
 himself at once about his Kate the Kate. " The 
 only one worthy of that sweet old-fashioned name," 
 he said, in his joyous heart ; for lovers, as we know, 
 glorify everything even the homely nomenclature 
 of ancestral days. 
 
 She came in soon to answer for herself, the little 
 girls, as before, twining around her waist and cling 
 ing to her skirts. 
 
 " I wonder, Kate dear, if you remember my old 
 est son, Lancelot ?" said good Mrs. Barksdale, with 
 an accent of pride in her presentation of the 
 new-comer. 
 
 The evening sunlight slanted through a western 
 window of the old oak-panelled dining-room. Lan- 
 

 CHERRYCOTE 159 
 
 celot stood with his back to it, his face in shadow, 
 but the searching radiance brought out every ex 
 pression of her changeful face more lovely than he 
 remembered it. 
 
 " You have not done me the honor to supply the 
 lady s last name," he said, a new fear assailing him 
 as he took her hand in his. 
 
 " Still Kate Morris, though a greater belle than 
 ever," cried hearty Hal. " It s just occurred to me, 
 Lance, that you and Cousin Kate used to be famous 
 friends till you quarelled about the war. Don t you 
 think it s time to take back hasty words and begin 
 again, you two ?" 
 
 " I have nothing to take back," said Lancelot, 
 and Kate s cheeks showed that she understood 
 him. 
 
 " Come, come," said the kind old mistress of 
 Cherrycote, " as I said, let by-gones be by-gones, 
 children. I m sure Kate is ready to start in again 
 where the war interrupted her now, aren t you, 
 Kate ?" 
 
 "Are you, Kate ?" Lancelot found himself, later, 
 murmuring where she alone could hear. And Kate 
 did not say him nay ? 
 

 THE SHATTERED VIOLIN 
 
THE SHATTERED VIOLIN 
 
 ONE evening when the cream of a " first-night s " 
 audience flowed into the Salle d Athenee, in Paris, 
 where the great Joachim was advertised to wield 
 his magic bow, among the row of first violins in 
 Pasdeloup s famous orchestra, grouped upon the 
 stage, sat Gustave Thorez, a gentle old enthusiast, 
 with a trim gray mustache, smartly buttoned up in 
 a well-brushed black coat, and the inevitable bit of 
 red ribbon in his button-hole. 
 
 As the concert progressed, and the listeners, 
 crowding the pretty little theatre, broke into wild 
 enthusiasm after the maestro s unapproachable 
 rendering of some theme of Bach, Gustave, in com 
 mon with the rest of the orchestra, took up the re 
 frain with that applause the artist s soul loves best, 
 coming with generous spontaneity from his broth 
 ers in the guild. 
 
 On his final withdrawal, after repeated calls to 
 the front, Joachim, in threading his way between the 
 crowded musicians, their instruments and racks, 
 passed close enough to old Thorez to be arrested 
 by the look of rare and dreamy delight upon his 
 wrinkled face. 
 
164 THE SHATTERED VIOLIN 
 
 "Thank you, man ami," the great artist said, 
 kindly, laying his hand upon Gustave s violin. 
 " May your instrument never do less noble service 
 to art than it has rendered me to night !" 
 
 To Gustave his speech was like an accolade. 
 Thenceforward the violin, always dear, would be 
 sacred to him, owning but one rival in his reveren 
 tial love. His comrades smiled when, the concert 
 over, they saw the vieux moustache, shouldering his 
 treasure, march jauntily away with a glow of color 
 in his pallid face. 
 
 Nearing his lodging, in a quiet street beneath 
 the shadow of the Pantheon, Gustave quickened 
 his pace to an almost martial tread. Mounting the 
 five flights of a stone staircase, he gayly hummed 
 the verse of a popular song. 
 
 " She will have reached home by this, and the 
 supper will be ready. My mouth waters for the 
 thigh of that cold roast fowl I saw her put away. 
 Supposing that I don t tell her at once about my 
 grand event ? That will keep to give zest to the 
 salad and the cheese. It will cheer my pretty 
 Gabrielle, for she has been a trifle triste of late 
 Pretty, wilful little Gabrielle ! I have sometimes 
 feared that taking Mademoiselle Cheri s place in 
 the Cendrillon has turned her little head. Tiens ! 
 but I can feel beforehand the rose-leaf touch of her 
 lips when she shall stand on tiptoe to give her old 
 father deux gros bons baisers upon the cheeks !" 
 
 Gustave had reached the last landing, and was 
 fumbling at his door. 
 

 THE SHATTERED VIOLIN 165 
 
 " Gabrielle !" he called aloud, on opening it. 
 
 No answer, and his face fell. 
 
 " She will have been detained to sup, no doubt, 
 with our good neighbor Madame Bourget," he solil 
 oquized, stumbling about in the dark to find his 
 matches. " What ! no table spread for the hungry 
 vieux papa! Careless petite Gabrielle !" 
 
 No light, no tempting little feast, no kiss of wel 
 come, no answering voice ! Not then, or ever 
 more! 
 
 People who cared to join in the mad struggle for 
 life and limb leading to a rehearsal of the Phil 
 harmonic Society of New York, during that period 
 before the society fell into its long and trance- 
 like torpor, to be aroused by the baton of the 
 wizard Thomas, may have observed among the 
 violins upon the platform at the Academy of Mu 
 sic a blurred and sketchy outline of the old Thorez 
 who had appeared upon the occasion of Joachim s 
 de but at the Athenee. The warlike mustache 
 flopped drearily ; the eye had lost its power to 
 gleam or soften ; the red ribbon on the worn old 
 coat drooped like the banner upon a forsaken 
 citadel. 
 
 Gustave had traced Gabrielle to America, and 
 had thither come in search of her; but in the city 
 of New York that great receiver of unlawful 
 foreign merchandise the clew was lost. Obtain 
 ing a place in the orchestra of a reputable so- 
 
166 THE SHATTERED VIOLIN 
 
 ciety, he had fallen into the groove of a solitary 
 and unfriended life. Among the few who noticed 
 him at all Gustave passed for an honest but toque 
 old artist, whose harmless mania was the worship 
 of his own violin. 
 
 One Friday afternoon of a bleak December day, 
 at the close of the Philharmonic rehearsal, Gus 
 tave passed out of Fourteenth Street into Broad 
 way, where, sauntering aimlessly down the sunny 
 side of the block, he saw a lady descend from a 
 carriage in front of a fashionable shop. He did 
 not recognize the costly wrapping of seal-skin, half 
 shrouding a slender form, or yet the air of languid 
 luxury. But whose was that beautiful veiled face, 
 that tress of escaping golden hair, if not his Ga- 
 brielle s ? Gasping for breath, Gustave held his 
 violin against his breast and waited. When she 
 came out of the shop on her way to the carriage 
 he intercepted her. Without a glance, she waved 
 him impatiently aside. 
 
 " Gabrielle !" cried Thorez, with all his broken 
 heart in that single word. 
 
 The girl started, looked him in the face, and 
 caught her breath. 
 
 " You are mistaken, my good man, or mad. Do 
 you want charity ? or shall I have to ask the aid of 
 a policeman to protect me to my carriage ?" 
 
 " Gabrielle !" the old man said again, falling back 
 as if he had been shot. 
 
 At this juncture an interposing policeman took 
 Gustave in charge, and, without elaborate inquiry, 
 
THE SHATTERED VIOLIN 167 
 
 consigned him, with his violin, to a night s lodging 
 in the station-house. 
 
 From that night of despair dated the downfall o f 
 his self-respect. His habits, before decent, lapsed 
 from bad to worse and worst. Losing his standing 
 with musical societies of the higher rank, Gustave 
 still did not find it hard to earn a livelihood. Upon 
 the first occasion when he was engaged to play for 
 dancing at a second-rate ball, Gustave fiddled like 
 a madman through the night, then went home to 
 shed tears upon his desecrated violin. After work 
 in the orchestras of petty theatres came music 
 halls, then lower drinking dens. When once the old 
 musician came out of one of these haunts to slink 
 homeward in the gray of morning, he fell upon the 
 icy sidewalk, and in trying to save his violin re 
 ceived a severe concussion of the brain. 
 
 Getting up from his cot at Bellevue Hospital, 
 after many days of prostration, something of Gus- 
 tave s better nature came back to him. The nurses 
 in his ward, finding the old fellow expert and bid- 
 able, made quite a pet of him ; and eagerly peck 
 ing at the crumb of a kind word or a look of sym 
 pathy, Gustave, during his convalescence, began 
 hopping about in the sunshine of human warmth 
 like a reviving sparrow. 
 
 One day in March, when the winds were work 
 ing havoc with flues and chimney draughts, the 
 nurse of a woman s pavilion ward called old Gus 
 tave in to try his skill upon a refractory stove 
 pipe in her department. 
 
1 68 THE SHATTERED VIOLIN 
 
 Close by where he was set to work a screen sur 
 rounded one of the beds, and a litter stationed there 
 told too plainly that the "feet of the dead" were 
 about to be carried out. 
 
 " Here, Thorez, lend a hand, will you ?" said his 
 friend the nurse, coming from behind the screen. 
 " We re short of elp this morning, and I m in a 
 urry to get this poor creature out of the ward at 
 once. I m all hupset with the night she s given 
 me, and I can truly say a more pitifuller case 
 never fell hunder my hobservation at ome or ere. 
 Since she took the bad turn yesterday she s done 
 nothink but jabber French and call Papa ! papa ! 
 She ain t got a friend on hearth that hever I see, 
 and she such a reg lar beauty! Heart-disease it 
 was, and shame and misery, that did the work. 
 Hit s all ready now ; you take the feet, will you ?" 
 
 Gustave obeyed,, and mechanically did the work 
 assigned to him. As the men carried their covered 
 burden out of the pavilion through the open yard 
 a gust of wind, blowing suddenly across the river, 
 lifted the sheet from the shrouded form. 
 
 Then Gustave saw again the face of Gabrielle ! 
 
 When dismissed from the hospital, he wandered 
 back to his old lodging, where for charity s sake 
 the people gave him shelter for a night, until nearly 
 morning he leaned in a stupor over the table, rest 
 ing his cheek upon the violin. 
 
 Just before dawn he lifted the instrument and 
 tried to play. It was a faint and tuneless echo of 
 
THE SHATTERED VIOLIN 169 
 
 the theme from Bach which Joachim had rendered 
 at the concert of the Athene e. 
 
 Gustave dropped his bow and, seizing a fire-iron 
 from the hearth, struck with all his force upon the 
 violin, setting free forever the sweet spirit it en 
 shrined. 
 
 When, a few days after, the rushing river yielded 
 up her dead, the body of Gustave Thorez was 
 washed in upon the Fort Hamilton shore. 
 
 Upon a high shelf in the cupboard of his room, 
 beside the wreck of an old French opera hat mak 
 ing a dusty and feeble assertion of remote respect 
 ability, some people of the house found the shat 
 tered remnant of the dead musician s violin in 
 which a mouse was rearing up her brood. 
 
A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 
 
A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 
 
 A WEDDING-PARTY was about to issue from the 
 wide-open portals of a brownstone house in upper 
 Fifth Avenue. As usual, a little crowd of curious 
 street loungers had gathered around the awning to 
 see the hackneyed yet ever-interesting ceremony of 
 rice-throwing, together with the reckless launching 
 into space of high-heeled slippers. 
 
 Simultaneously the inner vestibule doors of the 
 besieged mansion were thrown open. From an or 
 chestra hidden by a screen of palms in the marble 
 hall came the strains of an inspiring march. A 
 swarm of white-robed maidens and attendant men 
 rilled the entrance-way, leaving a narrow passage, 
 down which came a page, youthful and smirking, 
 conscious of many buttons, having in tow a fussy 
 Frenchwoman of uncertain age, who made great 
 show of a large alligator-skin dressing-case elabo 
 rately mounted in silver. A cab drawn up first in 
 the line of carriages before the door received these 
 ornaments to society, but not before they had been 
 plentifully greeted with curbstone wit, affecting to 
 mistake them for the newly-married pair. Next 
 
174 A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 
 
 came the father, a slender, middle-sized, care-worn 
 man, between fifty and sixty in appearance, but, 
 in fact, some ten years younger. After him, walk 
 ing alone with superb independence, smiling, an 
 swering the farewells showered upon her, leisurely, 
 giving her friends ample time to survey all the 
 details of her dress of brown velvet and sable fur, 
 came the bride. She bade good-bye to her family 
 with composure, and laughed at the showers of 
 rice falling around them as she and the young 
 man following her descended the steps, to where 
 her father was already waiting at the carriage door. 
 " There, that s over, thank goodness ! " she said 
 when seated by her husband, who occupied himself 
 in drawing a rug about her knees. " Good -bye, 
 papa ; I hope you charged Marie about the dress 
 ing-case, not to let it go out of her hands for a 
 minute. I put Aunt Hope s diamond star in there 
 at the last moment. Who would have believed that 
 the old lady was good for diamonds ? I had made 
 up my mind to nothing but a book-rack or a paltry 
 little toilet set. I m so thankful she settled on that 
 old case of grandmamma s books as Grace s wed 
 ding present and not mine. I wish, papa, that 
 mamma would see all my things are properly 
 packed at once to-morrow, and put away till we 
 come back. I can t bear to think of their being 
 fingered by curious people. Yes, we will write from 
 Washington or Richmond. There, we are off, I 
 suppose. Good-bye ! Good-bye ! I trust, Dick, we 
 mayn t be starved travelling in that horrid south- 
 
A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 175 
 
 ern country. But think of Grace and her cheap lit 
 tle bridal trip to visit Ned s relations in that old 
 fogy village in Connecticut! I should think she 
 would have more self-respect than to let such a 
 thing get abroad about her. Dick, I do hope you 
 saw Marsden s face during the ceremony. I stole 
 a glance at him, for I wouldn t have missed it. He 
 looked so dreadfully cross and blue ha! ha! ha! 
 Just as he always looked when he was following 
 me around and I danced or talked with other men." 
 
 As the carnage drove rapidly down the long ave 
 nue Ellinor settled back with an air of perfect con 
 tentment. 
 
 " We certainly ought to be satisfied," she said, 
 in a business-like way. " The thing has been done 
 in style ! Papa has been preaching so about econ 
 omy of late that I d no idea he meant to give us 
 such a send-off." 
 
 Richard started. He had, strangely enough for 
 a bridegroom who had just succeeded in carrying 
 off the belle of her " set " and season, lapsed into 
 a meditation of a somewhat rueful character. He 
 was very much in love with Ellinor, but the parting 
 with his newly acquired father-in-law had not been 
 as pecuniarily reassuring as he could have hoped. 
 Nothing had been said of the future arrangements 
 of the young couple beyond a vague " Hope we 
 shall see you both back for a visit at New -Year, 
 my boy." A check for $1000 had been duly pre 
 sented (and as duly, we may be sure, chronicled 
 by the reporters for the fashionable news columns) 
 
176 A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 
 
 to the bride by her father, together with as fine a 
 silver tea set as Tiffany could furnish, and an 
 elaborate trousseau. (The wedding outfit of this 
 republican belle had been modelled in Paris after 
 that of a young foreign princess just then entering 
 the bonds of matrimony with an English prince.) 
 The flowers serving to deck the house for the cer 
 emony would have paid the house rent of the young 
 couple for a year. The collation, the music, the 
 dresses, were as costly as is usual on such occa 
 sions in New York. The new Mrs. Eliot also left 
 behind her in a special casket Aunt Hope s star, 
 as we know, was allotted to Marie s care cres 
 cents, bars, drops, and pendants of diamonds, to 
 gether with a dozen yards of lace fragile as a spi 
 der s web, but much more convertible into cash. In 
 the " spare room " of the paternal mansion were 
 heaps upon heaps of bric-a-brac, from Venetian 
 glass to painted gauze fire-screens, the customary 
 offerings to an expectant house-keeper. In the cab 
 preceding our young couple was an expensive, ill- 
 humored, but correct appendage in the shape of a 
 French maid. What more could Mr. and Mrs. 
 Richard Eliot ask of Fortune at the outset of their 
 career? Richard, it may be parenthetically re 
 marked, was in receipt of a modest but uncertain 
 income from the junior partnership of a firm re 
 cently entering business on their own account. 
 
 Before the crowd around Mr. Talbot s doorway 
 had time to disperse, to their surprise, the large 
 front doors again swung back upon their massive 
 
A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 177 
 
 hinges, and another bridal train appeared within. 
 This time the bride was smaller, slighter, less as 
 sured. She clung to her father s arm, and her hus 
 band, a stalwart open-faced young fellow, shook 
 hands right and left as he passed down the line. 
 Instead of music from the orchestra, the cheery 
 roar of a college song was started and taken up 
 with good -will by the company. And just as the 
 fair young bride turned for a moment to wave her 
 acknowledgment from the threshold a small, elab 
 orately dressed child ran out from the group, and 
 clung, weeping, to her neck. 
 
 " Oh, Grade, Gracie ! what shall we do without 
 you ?" 
 
 The little girl was comforted and caressed, and 
 Grace turned again to her husband ; but her path 
 was beset by servants and old family retainers, who 
 kissed and showered blessings on their " sweet 
 young lady." When, amid a rain of flowers and 
 rice and slippers, the second bride had reached her 
 carriage, she was observed to turn and throw her 
 self impulsively upon her father s breast, whisper 
 ing in his ear, manifestly to the surprise of his deco 
 rum and his shirt collar. What she said this poor, 
 unconventional little Grace was, "Bless me, oh, 
 my father !" and the man of business, swallowing 
 a decided lump in his throat, kissed her again, brush 
 ing the tears from his eyes as he muttered a few un 
 wonted words of benediction above her sunny head. 
 
 No maid or lackey accompanied this couple, 
 and their surroundings were so unobtrusive that 
 
178 A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 
 
 the crowd upon the sidewalk gave vent to audible 
 remonstrance at what in their judgment seemed an 
 unequal distribution of parental favors. 
 
 An hour later all the guests had gone; waiters 
 ran to and fro with piles of used plates, and sol 
 aced themselves at intervals with hidden bottles 
 of champagne. The musicians were packing up 
 their instruments in green -baize bags; the little 
 male and female Talbots were skirmishing on the 
 stairs, unwilling to succumb to bedtime and to nur 
 sery authority. A few remote relations, members 
 of the family unearthed for weddings and funer 
 als, were seen wandering around the house, peer 
 ing into shut rooms, and handling with itching 
 fingers the wedding presents, over which a Gorgon- 
 like maid kept guard. An elderly cousin in black 
 silk, festooned with an antique shawl of llama lace, 
 was discovered no one knows how she got there 
 in the butler s pantry ogling an untouched Stras- 
 burg pie, while a pocket-handkerchief full of grapes, 
 cakes, and mottoes lay suspiciously near at hand. 
 Another spinster made it her business to go around 
 among the wax candles, snuffing them out with 
 commendable economy. In the large drawing- 
 room Mrs. Talbot herself, looking the picture of 
 fatigue and woe in her trailing satin and Venetian 
 lace, had dropped into a crimson satin chair, the 
 two school-girl daughters on either side of her lost 
 in happy dreams of future possibilities of their own. 
 In a carved chair at the fireside corner, erect and 
 placid, Aunt Hope, a shrewd - looking widow, sat 
 
A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 179 
 
 at her knitting. Everywhere were drooping flow 
 ers, furniture pushed into unwonted corners, the 
 general air of discomfort after the feast that en 
 tertainers know so well. Poor Mr. Talbot wan 
 dered about, getting in everybody s way, snubbed 
 by the hired waiters, who failed to identify him as 
 the proprietor, restless and dispirited. 
 
 " As it is now half-past seven, and there seems 
 no reasonable prospect of dinner here, Maria," he 
 said at last, after assisting the butler forcibly to 
 eject an intoxicated hireling who was found sitting 
 with his head in a punch -bowl amid a wreck of 
 broken glass. " I think I ll go down to the club and 
 get a chop and a bottle of claret." 
 
 " No, indeed, John ; you must wait for us. 
 There ll be something presently. Sit down ..here 
 with Aunt Hope and me. The girls have gone to 
 a rose-bud dinner at the Mays , though I can t 
 say I approved of it, before they are even * out ! 
 But they were so set I just gave them leave for the 
 sake of peace. Heigho ! our two oldest gone, 
 there ll be these two to launch next winter, John, 
 and a coming-out ball of course. How lucky that 
 one can give such things at Delmonico s !" 
 
 " I wish you d please to take another time than 
 this, Maria, to talk about your Delmonico balls and 
 fallals. Wait till these bills are paid, and see what 
 they amount to. And what with George at college, 
 and Tom at Dr. Blank s, and those two little chaps 
 in the nursery, it s nothing but pay, pay, from morn 
 ing to night." 
 
l8o A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 
 
 " Well, John, I think you are very ungrateful, for 
 a fine family like ours, to begrudge giving them all 
 the young people they associate with expect," said 
 Mrs. Talbot, tired and ungrammatical. " Just as 
 our two poor girls are married and gone, too." 
 
 " Wait till John has had his dinner and he will 
 sing a different song," said Aunt Hope, cheerily ; 
 and dinner being just then announced, John did 
 brighten up as was predicted. 
 
 But not for long. Aunt Hope, who rarely left 
 her country home to visit her city relatives, was 
 struck with the jaded look her prosperous nephew s 
 face had assumed of late years. His once active 
 step has begun to lag, and an unwonted peevish 
 ness had taken the place of his light spirit of yore. 
 
 " And what will Ellinor do on her return ?" Aunt 
 Hope asked, when they were again talking over 
 affairs. "What a queenly creature she was, to be 
 sure, under her veil !" 
 
 " What does everybody do ?" asked Mrs. Talbot, 
 complacently. " They will probably not want to 
 go to house-keeping at once, since Ellinor will be 
 overrun with engagements, and I have advised Mr. 
 Eliot to take rooms at the Hotel Guelph, where 
 their meals are served, don t you know, and Elli 
 nor will have no cares, no responsibilities. Of 
 course we will furnish the rooms, and I am to go 
 to-morrow to meet Palette. He has such taste, 
 you know; and with all Ellinor s presents their 
 rooms will be a dream ! The only thing to really 
 worry over is that poor Ellinor will keep no car- 
 
A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND l8l 
 
 riage at first. Mr. Eliot was quite positive about 
 that, much to my surprise. Luckily I can call for 
 her for visits, and they can have cabs for going out 
 to dinner. I think it is the most delightful ar 
 rangement this living at the Guelph. Just fancy! 
 Ellinor will have absolutely nothing to do but to 
 amuse herself." 
 
 " I had rather not think of it, Maria," Aunt Hope 
 said, with unusual gravity, which was quite lost 
 upon Mrs. Talbot. 
 
 " Of course, with Ellinor s looks, we had a right 
 to expect everything in her marriage, dear girl ; but 
 she was absolutely infatuated with this young man, 
 and, to be sure, he has always held the best place 
 in society invited everywhere and dances to per 
 fection. His ideas and tastes are just like Elli 
 nor s, and he has been lavish in flowers during the 
 engagement. He is never seen anywhere except 
 
 with men from the and the clubs, which 
 
 with Ellinor is everything. She is so fastidious. I 
 only wish he were a little more independent in his 
 circumstances ; but of course John will arrange all 
 that." 
 
 " Of course John will do nothing of the kind," 
 said Mr. Talbot, with apparent effort. " We might 
 as well understand each other, Maria, about this 
 matter. You know whether I have held back any 
 of the money I have worked so hard for all these 
 years. You and the children have had it, every 
 bit. I have written a letter for Ellinor, which her 
 maid will give to her, telling her that I will con- 
 
182 A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 
 
 tinue the allowance she has had to dress upon here 
 tofore. Anything more is literally impossible in 
 the present state of my affairs, either for Gracie or 
 herself." 
 
 " Gracie," said Mrs. Talbot, trying to conceal the 
 blankness of her countenance. " That girl is a 
 perfect enigma. Not content with saving at least 
 two-thirds of the money her father gave them both 
 for their trousseaux, and buying herself an outfit 
 like a Quaker s, she has actually persuaded Edward 
 that it is better for them to begin house-keeping 
 at once. They have been off together (luckily it is 
 in a quarter where nobody goes), and they have 
 hunted up a two-story house with a box-garret the 
 most dingy, absurd little mouse-trap you ever saw 
 
 on the east side of the town, in Place. I 
 
 believe it was occupied by a dress-maker last. The 
 worst of it is, they have actually taken it, and have 
 set the painters and paper-hangers to work there. 
 Of course I did everything I could to talk Grace 
 into an apartment. Everybody goes into apart 
 ments now, and you may be as poor as you please 
 in one of them, and still keep up appearances. 
 But Grace says that Edward is too big for any 
 apartment she has yet seen, and far too noisy. 
 And Edward says he wants four walls and a front 
 door-step all to himself. He is as obstinate as a 
 mule, it is plain to see, and I pity poor Grace when 
 the honey-moon is over. What will become of her 
 music for she certainly has a lovely voice, and 
 has had every advantage in masters and her Ian- 
 
A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 183 
 
 guages, and all, tucked away in that hole, with that 
 kind of a set, selfish man for a companion ? Just 
 imagine what a house it must be when I tell you 
 that they got it on a lease for eight hundred dollars 
 a year !" 
 
 " I remember, Maria," said John Talbot, gently, 
 " when we first came here from the country, and I 
 was a clerk on a small salary, that we lived in one 
 room of a boarding-house, and had to be content. 
 Aunt Hope, I see you taking all this in in your quiet 
 way, and I know it astonishes you. That a mother 
 should reproach her child for trying to live within 
 her husband s means, I confess, astonishes even 
 me." 
 
 " Now, John, when you try to be satirical I al 
 ways stop," said his wife, comfortably. " Haven t 
 you, I d like to know, always paid every bill with 
 out inquiring into it, and given the children every 
 advantage without counting the cost ?" 
 
 " Aye, God help me, so I have !" said John Tal 
 bot, getting up abruptly to leave the room. " With 
 out counting the cost." 
 
 " John is like that sometimes," said his wife. 
 " Don t mind him, Aunt Hope ; he is really the 
 most indulgent creature living. A true American 
 father, some one called him, who met us at Nice 
 last year. What puzzles me is this holding back 
 about increasing Ellinor s allowance. Of course he 
 must be talked into it. A girl of Ellinor s tastes, 
 indeed ! Ellinor must have money." 
 
 During a mild week in May, about six months 
 
184 A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 
 
 after the double wedding, Aunt Hope was again in 
 town. She had called once or twice at the Hotel 
 Guelph before gaining admission. The man in 
 waiting at the entrance door took her card, glanced 
 superciliously at her poke-bonnet, "guessed" that 
 the madam was not receiving, and after a long de 
 lay came back with the information that Mrs. Eliot, 
 at 2 P.M., had not yet left her room. At last Aunt 
 Hope received permission to ascend to her niece s 
 quarters, and being enclosed in an elevator, was 
 carried to the sixth story of a sumptuous apart 
 ment-house. A boy in buttons answered her touch 
 upon the electric knob, and conducted her through 
 a long dark passage-way into Mrs. Eliot s presence. 
 
 Ellinor was lying on a couch in a small room 
 littered with bric-a-brac, and crowded with furs, 
 heavy draperies, and costly rugs. What light there 
 was came through thin curtains of amber silk hung 
 beneath screens of multicolored glass. A wood- 
 fire was blazing on the hearth, and the air was per 
 fumed to suffocation with the odor of roses and 
 hyacinths, crowded in vases upon every shelf and 
 bracket. A small stand of gilt wicker at Ellinor s 
 side contained boxes of bonbons, fresh heliotrope 
 massed in a yellow jar, the morning papers, and a 
 couple of French novels. Amid this luxury the 
 young wife lay in an attitude of utter listlessness, 
 her robe of white India silk half hidden by a cover 
 ing of gold-embroidered Oriental stuff thrown across 
 her couch. 
 
 " Humph !" said Aunt Hope, sitting bolt-upright 
 
A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 185 
 
 on the edge of the first chair she could find. I 
 supposed I had got by mistake into the room of 
 some tragedy queen. What would your grand 
 mother Talbot have said to this, I wonder ? she 
 who was up by candlelight winter and summer, 
 sweeping, dusting, cooking, mending, to make both 
 ends meet, and to give your father and the others 
 what education she could afford ! Seems to me, 
 child, the size of your rooms isn t in keeping with 
 your finery. Of course, with a limited income, you 
 have to live high up, that should be no reproach to 
 you." 
 
 " I wonder if you know what we pay for this 
 apartment," Ellinor said, sharply, naming a sum 
 that made the old lady s spectacles fly off in her 
 excitement. 
 
 That Aunt Hope had much to learn, she dis 
 covered in the course of this memorable visit. She 
 found in her niece a type of an increasing class, 
 descendants of the thrifty New York merchants of 
 a generation back cradled in luxury, and yield 
 ing to no hereditary nobles the right to surpass 
 them in personal indulgence of lavish tastes. 
 On every side in the circle of Ellinor s contem 
 poraries might be seen the same push and struggle 
 for supremacy in the world of fashion a world 
 of self-constituted aristocracy, whereof the puppets 
 representing men and women danced to the far 
 away pipings of a social leadership they affected 
 to despise, creating, in a word, a London at second 
 hand. In such hands the vigor of the American 
 
l86 A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 
 
 republic is swathed in eider-down and stifled in 
 attar of rose. No wonder that a shrewd old wom 
 an like Aunt Hope, whose eyes had been wide open 
 to the interests of her fellows these sixty years 
 past, should pause aghast at the spectacle ! A 
 brief interview with her niece revealed far more 
 than Ellinor meant to show. Already the husband 
 and wife had begun to drift apart, both finding in 
 the narrow limit of home companionship meagre 
 food for their restless spirits. Night after night 
 Ellinor went into the world, day after day lounged 
 upon her sofa until the hour arrived for some fresh 
 gayety. The discovery that, for the first time in 
 her life, money to lavish on her own amusements 
 was not forthcoming was resented as a personal 
 affront put on her by father and husband both. 
 On his side Eliot, a good-natured and well-mean 
 ing young fellow in the main, waked up with dis 
 may to the reality of his married life. Instead of 
 a helpmeet he had a princess on his hands. Little 
 by little dreams of domestic happiness took wing. 
 His pecuniary responsibilities overwhelmed him. 
 In despair, he went back to the old society life for 
 solace. 
 
 "Whose fault is this?" Aunt Hope asked her 
 self, sternly, pinning her little gray shawl to go 
 down the stairs, heart-sick and despondent of bet 
 ter things. Second thoughts induced her to turn 
 her steps in the direction of the remote locality 
 where Grace Fielding had made her home. 
 
 The small brick house in unfashionable 
 
A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 187 
 
 Place was blushing in a fresh coat of paint, and 
 the brass dragon knocker on the dark green door 
 shone resplendently. A tiny grass-plat was filled 
 with tulips, hyacinths, and wall -flowers. From 
 the open windows of the parlor Grace s voice 
 was heard singing at her piano. A hand-maiden 
 whose smile assumed personal interest in the 
 caller ushered Aunt Hope into the presence of 
 her niece. Grace greeted her aunt joyfully, and 
 forthwith began the eager exhibition of a young 
 wife s first belongings. 
 
 " No, dear auntie, you can t sit down until you 
 have admired our skill in making sixteen feet square 
 do the work of twenty. No crowding either ; we 
 are proud of that," she said, in her rapid, girlish 
 way. " With the bookcases, which, thanks to your 
 blessed wedding present and Ned s college library, 
 we have filled, we defy criticism as to the decora 
 tion of our walls. Those engravings and photo 
 gravures and the little Florentine mirror look well, 
 don t they, against the Pompeiian red, though tis 
 only * water wash ? The tops of the shelves, you 
 see, have served to accommodate the best of our 
 wedding loot/ as Ned calls it; but the china or 
 naments have by his stem decree gone into one 
 especial press in the dining-room. We are rich 
 in lamps and candelabra, of course, and the horrid 
 little chandelier was banished altogether from this 
 room. A committee of two or three of Ned s art 
 ist friends came here and sat upon our affairs 
 while we were furnishing, so we flatter ourselves 
 
188 A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 
 
 that the tone of everything is eminently correct. 
 That portiere was an extravagance, but don t tell 
 we exchanged a hideous rug for it that somebody 
 bestowed on us. Now for the dining-room. Isn t 
 it a pretty spot ?" 
 
 Here, instead of the traditional gloom of the 
 modern eating-room, were light, color, fragrance. 
 Two little windows had been knocked out to be 
 replaced by an ample bow, large enough, when re 
 quired, to contain a tete-a-tete breakfast table. 
 The furniture, of the slender -legged mahogany 
 variety, glittered brilliantly in a bath of morning 
 sunlight. Glass, brass, silver, and procelain caught 
 up and repeated the sparkling effect. Two or three 
 jars of blue Delft held vigorous young palms. A 
 bowl of yellow tulips ornamented the centre of the 
 table, and around the little plot of ground behind 
 the house wistaria, ivy, and honeysuckle made a 
 wall of green to enclose a grass-plat with its central 
 flower bed. 
 
 " The wonder of it is, we are, in our modest way, 
 a social success," Grace went on. " All my friends 
 among the girls followed me here, and once a week 
 I have afternoon tea, and so many pleasant people 
 drop in. Now and again a carriage rolls into the 
 street that brings all our neighbors to the window; 
 but many of mamma s friends have contented them 
 selves with sending cards through the post. The 
 visits of mere form will soon stop, and then Ned 
 and I will settle down to making our own "set," if 
 we are to have such a thing. Think of papa com- 
 
A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 189 
 
 ing, aunty ! papa, who never goes anywhere but 
 to the office and the club. Sometimes he and the 
 children have their Sunday dinner here, and we 
 have great fun. Ned and papa are such friends ! 
 But then everybody is friends with Ned, Aunt 
 Hope. We see less of mamma, because she is 
 really very busy going out with Ellinor, and then 
 she doesn t like to bring the horses to the east side 
 of town." 
 
 They had luncheon, served by the smiling Phyllis 
 upon flowery china, and afterwards Aunt Hope fell 
 to sentimentalizing in Grace s aesthetic three-cor 
 nered chair by the open bow. 
 
 " There is nothing like the spring-tide of married 
 life," the old woman mused. " How beautiful is 
 this fulness of faith in the object beloved this 
 persistent happiness owning no alloy ! Bless me, 
 child, I am doting ! Give me a cup of tea, and 
 then you may as I see you are dying to do 
 talk about Ned s virtues till one or the other of 
 us drops through sheer fatigue, and I know which 
 one of us that will not be." 
 
 Grace needed no further invitation. She sat 
 down on a cushion at her aunt s knee ; but before 
 the confidence had gone far it was interrupted by a 
 loud knock, followed by the appearance upon the 
 scene of John Talbot, looking pale and worn. 
 
 "Papa," cried Grace, "you here at this hour! 
 Has anything happened ?" 
 
 " Don t be alarmed, my dear ; we are all well at 
 home, thank God," her father said, dropping wearily 
 
190 A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 
 
 into a chair. " I am glad to find you here, Aunt 
 Hope, you and Grace brave women and true. I 
 believe I am a little tired, that s all. The way has 
 been long and hard, but my good name s safe. 
 Yes : no man can say John Talbot has robbed him 
 of a dollar. But for your poor mother and the 
 children I d not mind. There is a relief in all be 
 ing known at last . . . Talbot & Co. have to-day 
 failed to meet their obligations, and I d rather not 
 talk of it just now with Maria and Ellinor and the 
 rest." 
 
 By the time summer was fairly under way, the 
 old farm-house where Aunt Hope had spent. so 
 many lonely years was alive with the clamor of 
 young voices. Its long-closed doors had opened 
 wide to receive John Talbot s family, of which the 
 younger members made no scruple in declaring 
 their delight at the exchange of domicile. Mrs. 
 Talbot could not be brought to think of herself 
 otherwise than as a much-injured woman. She 
 wore away the long dull hours of country life in 
 vain repinings for her lost estate, and her one 
 gleam of light was the prospect of a visit with her 
 daughter Ellinor to Newport later in the season. To 
 read in the society journals of Ellinor s appearance 
 in the Park or at the races, or of Ellinor s toilet 
 at ball or dinner, was the solace of her present life. 
 Grace and her husband spent their holidays at 
 Hope Farm, and " the boys " rallied there from 
 school and college. Mr. Talbot came but seldom, 
 
A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 19! 
 
 for a Sunday, when he could. He was back again 
 at the treadmill round of business, and through 
 the generous support of his friends had every pros 
 pect of renewed success. True, Aunt Hope, Grace, 
 Edward, and the family doctor urged upon him rest ; 
 but the reproaches of his wife and the goading 
 sense of responsibility to his children made Talbot 
 shake his head and redouble his exertions. For a 
 year this state of things went on, until one day in 
 the following June, Talbot arrived at the farm with 
 a look of rare excitement on his pallid face. 
 
 " I ve got the reins in my hand again, Maria," 
 he said to his wife, before the family. " Affairs 
 are going on better than I dared to hope, and, 
 please God, before long I can give you all I robbed 
 you of." 
 
 " Father dear, how can you ?" Grace cried, cover 
 ing his trembling hand with kisses and with tears 
 " you, who have been so generous, so self-deny 
 ing, so tender. Speak to him, mamma, and tell 
 him this. He wants it from you, not me." 
 
 " Well, I m sure everybody knows how well I 
 have borne this trial " Mrs. Talbot began, but 
 was stopped by an alarmed gesture from Aunt 
 Hope. Grace s arms were around her father, her 
 cheek pressed to his. She did not see the strange 
 look that came into his eyes as he reeled and fell 
 heavily to the floor. By the time they could lift 
 him to a couch if was found that life had fled. 
 
 As if through a mockery of fate, the following 
 day brought Ellinor Eliot, alone and unattended, 
 
IQ2 A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 
 
 to the shelter of her aunt s despised home. Dis 
 carded by her husband, and overshadowed by the 
 odium of a scandal with which the newspapers in 
 another day would teem, she had come to her family 
 for shelter. 
 
 " I shall always think that this misfortune of poor 
 dear Ellinor s would never have come upon her," 
 said Mrs. Talbot, the day after her husband had 
 been laid to rest, "if John had taken my advice 
 about allowing them enough to keep up the posi 
 tion she had always had. But there is enough left, 
 I believe, for us to have a house in town next sea 
 son; and she, poor girl, will be able to live down 
 the consequences of her father s lack of judgment. 
 One comfort is, she is still the most beautiful creat 
 ure of her set." 
 
 For some years the little house in Place 
 
 continued to be, in the eyes of two people at least, 
 the centre of earthly sunshine. Wooed by the 
 fame of its hospitality, guests came and came 
 again, to go away singing the praises of their hosts. 
 When, at last, to these young people fortune arrived 
 in a measure enabling them to answer the demands 
 of a growing family to widen the borders of their 
 home, the change was made with infinite reluctance. 
 
 " One thing I can say with truth, Aunt Hope," 
 Grace cried, impulsively, when the dear old lady 
 appeared at the christening of a fourth young Field 
 ing "that the only tears Ned has brought to my 
 
A HOUSE BUILT UPON THE SAND 193 
 
 eyes since we were married were shed when he 
 drove me from our first home." 
 
 Aunt Hope smiled, but as she stooped to kiss 
 the baby a tear fell on its face. She was thinking 
 of John Talbot s wrecked happiness, of the mis 
 taken struggle of his life. 
 
ON A HILL-TOP 
 
ON A HILL-TOP 
 
 ONE afternoon, in Central Park, when the late 
 spring was making strenuous efforts to assert 
 herself by means of shivering green fringes hung 
 upon naked boughs, and by a tinge of red, like 
 a blush for tardiness, over the bushes of Pyrns 
 japonica, the main drive offered the usual spec 
 tacle of pleasure-seekers on wheels, rolling at a 
 discreet rate of speed between Fifty-ninth Street 
 and One Hundred and Tenth Street and back 
 again, while keeping carefully in view each other s 
 equipages, horses, grooms, and gowns. Not so 
 brilliant in variety is this dress-parade of American 
 fashion as that familiar to the lounger in Hyde Park 
 or the Bois de Boulogne, but sufficiently gay and 
 changeful to enchain the watcher s eye during the 
 hour or two when its glory is at the height. Pass 
 ing in review the rapid succession of coaches, 
 landaus, victorias, broughams, wagonettes, T-carts, 
 tilburys, and village -carts, sprinkled with less pre 
 tending buggies and hansom cabs, a young man on 
 horseback kept his spirited steed in check, curveting 
 back and forth where one of the equestrian roads 
 
198 ON A HILL -TOP 
 
 crosses the principal drive, until a trig policeman 
 began to cast upon him side glances of a decidedly 
 investigating character. Evidently the loiterer s 
 wait was in vain, for a look of annoyance came 
 upon his open face, and giving his horse an un 
 reasonable cut with the riding-stick, he at last con 
 sented to gallop away from the spot he had so long 
 haunted. At that moment another steed, can 
 tering lightly along the bridle-path, emerged from 
 the trees ahead, bringing face to face with him a 
 pretty girl with golden hair and a bunch of narcis 
 sus in the breast of her well-cut habit. 
 
 You told me you were to drive with your 
 mamma !" abruptly exclaimed the young gentle 
 man ; to which the lovely Amazon replied, blushing 
 slightly and tossing her head, that she could not 
 know she was obliged to render an exact account 
 of her doings to every person with whom she might 
 chance to dance at Mrs. Gardiner s ball. The groom 
 coming up at this juncture diverted conversation 
 from an apparently threatening channel. In the 
 most natural manner our young man s horse was 
 turned, and the couple were soon making their 
 way through the suburb on the west side of the 
 Park, to emerge upon the beautiful Riverside Drive. 
 Here a wide and admirably made road runs parallel 
 with the Hudson, whose tranquil bosom, skimmed 
 by white-winged sail-boats or scarred by bustling 
 steamers along the channel, reflects the wood- 
 crowned summits of the Palisades opposite, and 
 the colors of the sky. 
 
ON A HILL -TOP 199 
 
 " To enjoy the Riverside," the young man said, 
 " one should resemble the true love of the early 
 English poet, who looks not back, his eyes are 
 fixt afore. Let me recommend you to impose a 
 forfeit on yourself for turning your head one mo 
 ment from the left as we follow up the avenue. In 
 this way you may be able to preserve the illusion 
 that you are out of town." 
 
 " It s all of a piece with everything else here," 
 the girl answered, with a discontented glance at 
 the landscape on her right. There, amid a curious 
 combination of squalor and ambitious architecture, 
 she saw on the steep slope in front of a squatter s 
 shanty, in a wilderness of rubbish and tomato cans, 
 two belligerent goats assuming the attitude of the 
 supporters of the British coat of arms. Beyond an 
 expanse of rocky hill-side, streets and boulevards 
 were in various stages of construction. Here a 
 brand-new feudal castle, looking as if it had come 
 out of a bandbox, arose beside a whitewashed cot 
 tage with dilapidated roof and shutters. There a 
 smart Queen Anne villa overtopped a road-side 
 saloon for the sale of beer to wayfarers. Where a 
 glimpse was caught of the elevated railway, the 
 trains looked like caterpillars crawling along an im 
 mensely high and inexplicably long bridge. Gangs 
 of workmen, steam-drills, piles of sand and granite, 
 everywhere obstructed the neighboring streets. To 
 see what still remained to be done might have de 
 pressed the most naturally sanguine spirit, save for 
 the consoling evidence of what had been already 
 
2OO ON A HILL -TOP 
 
 done by the great city spurning her island bound 
 aries in eager growth. To Miss Caroline Heath, 
 aged twenty-one, recently returned from a six years 
 residence in Europe, the incompleteness of Ameri 
 can affairs in general was a matter of continual 
 comment. Edgar Barclay, on the contrary, the son 
 of a Western man, who after making a fortune in 
 Cleveland had moved to New York to spend it, 
 was a warm defender of our peculiar institutions, 
 and, coming from other lips than those of the 
 present critic, would have resented unflattering 
 comments upon them with emphasis. 
 
 "You are a most unreasonable person," he an 
 swered. " A few months ago you were raving about 
 our atmosphere. You declared yourself thankful 
 to be a native metropolitan." 
 
 " Perhaps that was because I saw it was the 
 only thing you could not boast of," she said, sau 
 cily. "I can imagine a Cleveland man feeling quite 
 awe-stricken by New York antiquity. But for me / 
 Have you forgotten that ever since I was twelve 
 years old I ve been roaming about Europe, ab 
 sorbing by-gones, living in delicious old palaces 
 where tragedies had taken place centuries before 
 I came there ? Why, I m saturated with that kind 
 of thing tinged, like the bowl of a pipe. Think of 
 Florence and Venice, will you, and contrast them 
 with this. And then England ! The last house 
 mamma took there was a lovely old grange sur 
 rounded by a dry moat, and by trees and hedges, 
 and turf so green and soft and unbroken that it 
 
ON A HILL -TOP 2OI 
 
 made one adorably sleepy merely to stand at the 
 window and look out." 
 
 " I should prefer to keep awake." 
 
 "Not if the only amusement you had was to 
 walk down pretty green lanes, where the trees met 
 overhead, to call upon the rector and his wife or 
 the squire and his. When that was done, we waited 
 till they came back to call on us. I must confess, 
 it rained almost every day last summer. But it 
 was enchanting, all the same." 
 
 " I don t wonder you find the change to New 
 York exhilarating." 
 
 " That s just what I complain of. I m too much 
 exhilarated. I m tired of a champagne diet. Be 
 sides, everything is brand new. The houses smell 
 of furniture polish. I want to rest my eyes on 
 something belonging to the past." 
 
 They had now turned into a broad boulevard, 
 and followed it to an end, indicated by the pres 
 ence of workmen with their impedimenta making a 
 barrier across the road. 
 
 " Let us go on," Carry urged. " Yonder, on that 
 hill-top, I see a genuine old house one that must 
 have been there since the Revolution at least. I am 
 determined to ride up and have a peep at it." 
 
 Apparently uninhabited, but with a sparse curl of 
 smoke issuing from the kitchen chimney, the old 
 house stood in melancholy isolation upon a bluff 
 overlooking the river. The avenue in process of 
 construction beneath it had ruthlessly shaved off 
 the near side of the hill, leaving exposed a steep 
 
202 ON A HILL -TOP 
 
 and gravelly incline crowned with the straggling 
 grasses of an unkempt lawn. Around the white 
 columns of the portico grew walnut and chestnut 
 trees, and in the garden at the rear were seen a 
 ruined summer-house and broken statues arising 
 amid an unpruned growth of box. Cocking their 
 ears cautiously at the unusualness of the proceed 
 ing, the horses consented to be guided up a precip 
 itous path along the edge of the acclivity. Barclay 
 was conscious of a feeling of relief when his ad 
 venturous young comrade had finally attained her 
 wish, and stood facing the moss-grown portico. 
 
 " Nobody lives here, that s plain," said wilful 
 Caroline. " Mr. Barclay, I don t know what you 
 mean to do, but I am determined to explore." 
 
 So saying, she slipped lightly from the saddle, 
 gathered up her jaunty habit, and ran around 
 through the weedy garden at the side. Barclay, 
 consigning his horse also to the groom, followed 
 to see her engaged in active conversation with a 
 deaf old dame who emerged from a mouldy kitchen 
 at the rear. 
 
 " She says we can get water from the well, and 
 have leave to look at this lovely river view," cried 
 the explorer. "It appears the house is owned 
 by an old maiden lady, whose family has always 
 lived here. If I may trust to my hitherto infalli 
 ble powers of intuition, the mistress, like the house, 
 is a little out of repair in her upper story, and the 
 maid is afraid of her. Come, Mr. Barclay, grind 
 away at this handle. How long is it since I have 
 
ON A HILL -TOP 203 
 
 had the satisfaction of drinking from the * moss- 
 covered bucket that hangs in the well ? There, 
 that s deliciously cold and pure. Do you see, this 
 garden must have been a stately one in its prime ? 
 I wonder if the ancient dragon could be induced 
 to let us have a glimpse of the interior of the house ? 
 I m positively wild to try." 
 
 Nobody withstood Caroline, so Barclay was not 
 particularly surprised to see her return from a 
 second interview with the old woman, beckoning 
 him with a mysterious forefinger. 
 
 " We re to see the ground-floor. It is the hour 
 for Miss Stillman s afternoon nap, when she never 
 comes down-stairs. Hush ! tread like a burglar, 
 and follow me." 
 
 In the wake of the stolid guardian our two young 
 people went from one room to another, filled with 
 handsome furniture of the patterns peculiar to a 
 century ago. Fluted fire-boards, stiff chairs, con 
 vex mirrors, black-framed mezzotints, knobs of brass 
 or crystal, held their own, their sway undisputed by 
 the appendages of modern luxury as seen every 
 where to-day. It was in the best parlor that their 
 guide came to a halt, waving her withered hand 
 with a faint show of pride in its faded splendor. 
 
 "That s all there is to it," she said, in a croak 
 ing voice. " I guess them things is solid." 
 
 " Either I am dreaming or that portrait of the 
 lady in the red frock with balloon sleeves resem 
 bles you" Caroline suddenly exclaimed, turning 
 upon Barclay an astonished gaze. " She is enough 
 
204 ON A HILL -TOP 
 
 like you to be your what ?" She paused, puzzled 
 by the date. 
 
 "My great -grandmother, great aunt what you 
 will," said Barclay, laughing. " I wish I were 
 lucky enough to be able to lay claim to her, but, 
 unfortunately, if we have any ancestral respecta 
 bilities of this kind in the East, I have yet to be 
 informed of it. My mother, who died in my child 
 hood, was born in the West, and my father is a 
 Westerner, root and branch." 
 
 "The likeness is astonishing," pursued Caroline ; 
 and even the purblind eyes of the old woman lighted 
 with something like assent. 
 
 " She ain t no one belongin to her I ever heerd 
 of," went on the old creature, pointing upward with 
 her thumb. " The last on em to die was Miss 
 Tabitha, and she s Miss Lois. They was great 
 folks once, I ve heerd tell, but that was before I 
 came here. She was pinchin poor till the city tuk 
 the place to run a road through, an now they say 
 there s a fortin in the bank for her. She don t 
 spend none of it, sartin sure. The two of us don t 
 eat more n d keep a mouse from starvin , an there 
 ain t nobody else." 
 
 " I breathe freer," Caroline said, when, after pre 
 senting a gratuity to their guide, the two mounted 
 again and rode out of the enclosure. " After all, I 
 like the sunshine best. But I wish I had seen the 
 queer old lady ; and as to that portrait, it was 
 simply your double, deny it as you may." 
 
 " I am more occupied in wondering if I can get 
 
ON A HILL -TOP 205 
 
 my horse by that steam-drill down yonder," Edgar 
 said. " He has a rooted objection to anything of 
 the kind, and this path does not offer much room 
 for antics on his part. Your gray is quiet, Miss 
 Heath ; you had better wait here, and let me lead 
 the way." 
 
 Hardly had he spoken when the engine beneath 
 them sent forth a sudden rush of hissing steam. 
 Caroline repressed an exclamation of alarm. Bar 
 clay s horse, rearing violently, grazed the edge of 
 the steep declivity, then set off at a run. Half-way 
 to the bottom he slipped, his rider falling over his 
 head, the horse rolling completely over, and re 
 covering himself to stand shivering with terror be 
 side Barclay s prostrate form. Before a number of 
 men from the gang at work below could reach him 
 Caroline was at his side, the groom following. 
 Barclay, catching one glimpse of her agonized face, 
 bent over him, tried to speak reassuringly, but 
 fainted in the effort. Without consulting the young 
 lady, the men ran up to the house upon the hill, 
 returning with a shutter, upon which they carried 
 the injured man gently along the path he had just 
 descended, laying him down without interference 
 from its guardian in the dim old parlor immedi 
 ately beneath the portrait of the lady with the bal 
 loon sleeves. The bustle of their entrance stirred 
 from her solitude up-stairs the other dweller in this 
 silent mansion. Gliding down like a wraith came 
 a tall woman, with melancholy eyes and chill lips 
 that seemingly had never known a smile. 
 
2O6 ON A HILL -TOP 
 
 " Open the window and give him air," cried 
 Caroline, unheeding the approach of the mistress 
 of the house. 
 
 " Who gives orders for me ?" she said, in a mo 
 notonous voice. " It is years since those front win 
 dows have been opened." 
 
 " It is a matter of life and death," answered the 
 girl, imperiously; and without further opposition 
 the stiff blinds were thrown back, letting in a flood 
 of afternoon sunlight that flowed in a golden stream 
 across the sufferer s temporary couch. Barclay s 
 face thus revealed to view, was untouched by wound 
 or stain. He seemed quietly asleep. 
 
 " If a doctor would only come !" began Caro 
 line, interlacing her cold hands. There was an 
 interruption to the quiet of the room, a strange 
 sound, half sob, half laughter, coming from the 
 mistress of the house. Caroline looked up to see 
 the old woman kneeling at Barclay s side, her dull 
 eyes kindled into a sudden rapture of recognition. 
 
 "It is Margaret s child. I knew I should see 
 one of them before I die. Oh, my poor wronged 
 sister ! After so many years ! Thank God ! thank 
 God !" 
 
 " You d better coax the old lady to go up-stairs 
 again," said one of the workmen to the servant, 
 touching his forehead significantly. It was evident 
 that all present agreed in his estimate of her men 
 tal equilibrium. But until the arrival of a doctor 
 from the neighborhood the gray old woman held 
 the unconscious sufferer s hand in hers, from time 
 
ON A HILL -TOP 2o; 
 
 to time fondling it against her cheek, and crooning 
 over it words of tenderness. When the surgeon 
 came Caroline, passing an arm around her shoul 
 ders, led Miss Lois from the room. 
 
 An hour later Edgar s father and step -mother 
 answered the summons sent them by telephone in 
 the neighborhood, arriving to swell the anxious lit 
 tle group waiting in the dusky hall outside the 
 sick-room. Edgar had returned to consciousness, 
 but the injury to his leg was exquisitely painful, 
 requiring nicest treatment. Until the arrival of 
 Mr. Barclay s family physician, the doctor in charge 
 refused to take the responsibility of sanctioning 
 the removal of his patient. The distressed father 
 walked to and fro in moody silence, and, when twi 
 light brought Dr. Gray, urged him to say that Ed 
 gar might be carried in an ambulance to his home. 
 
 "On no account," said the doctor. "I can t 
 imagine anything more foolish. Unless these peo 
 ple positively turn you out, he should stay here. 
 His situation is extremely critical. I cannot answer 
 for the consequences of change." 
 
 " Here, in this old rattle-trap, with a mad woman 
 for a keeper?" the impatient father wanted to say, 
 but he substituted for it the milder suggestion that 
 they had no claim upon the owner of the house. 
 
 " The child of Margaret Lothrop has every claim 
 upon his great- aunt," said the same hollow voice 
 that had startled all a little while before. At his 
 elbow stood Miss Loi s Stillman, holding in her 
 
208 ON A HILL -TOP 
 
 hand a faded daguerrotype at which Mr. Barclay 
 glanced, astonished. 
 
 " This !" he exclaimed, looking from it to her 
 again " This picture my poor wife had taken long 
 ago, to send east at her mother s dying request to 
 Mrs. Lothrop s sisters, who had cast her off for 
 marrying to suit herself. But she never heard from 
 them. They never softened. They let their niece 
 die as they had let her mother, without a token of 
 forgiveness. If you, madam, are, as I suppose, one 
 of those Miss Stillmans, you will understand that 
 I have a reason the more for removing my unfortu 
 nate boy from the shelter of your roof." 
 
 " Oh, have pity !" cried the old woman, pleading 
 ly. "Don t force me to bring charges against the 
 dead. It was Tabitha s will. Tabitha always had 
 her way with me. I loved poor Margaret 
 dearly. Don t take her grandson from me now." 
 
 And thus it was that, by a strange guidance of 
 fate s leading-strings, Margaret Lothrop s grandson 
 was brought into intimate relation with his sole 
 surviving relative upon his mother s side one who 
 through half a century of alienation and of silence 
 had brooded over the image of her best -loved 
 sister with ever-increasing intensity. Between the 
 handsome lad who for days lay there beneath his 
 grandmother s portrait, uncertain whether death or 
 life would claim him as a prize, and the pallid 
 shade of once beautiful Lois Stillman, Caroline 
 Heath was the link of warm humanity. 
 
ON A HILL -TOP 209 
 
 Until the young man s extremity had given place 
 to the joyful promise of convalescence, Carry and 
 her mother, who blamed her child s heedless impet 
 uosity for the accident, made frequent pilgrimages 
 to the hill -top. Then Carry s visits ceased alto 
 gether, until one afternoon, when June had clothed 
 the old brown house with roses, she accepted a be 
 seeching invitation from the invalid to have a cup 
 of tea with Aunt Lois and himself. She found 
 them in the well -remembered parlor, sitting hand 
 in hand, but by-and-by Aunt Lois arose and stole 
 away. Soon she came back, bearing an antique 
 string of pearls. 
 
 "These were intended for our Margaret when 
 she went away to be married against our will," the 
 old lady said, solemnly. " Through poverty and 
 sorrow I have kept them, hoping that some day 
 one of Margaret s granddaughters would come back 
 to receive them at my hands. Now that Edgar is 
 to have all the rest, I want Caroline to wear them 
 as a token of my love and gratitude." 
 
 " You are giving them to Margaret s grand 
 daughter, after all, Aunt Lois," the young man 
 said, triumphantly. And then for the first time in 
 many a long year, tears came into Miss Stillman s 
 eyes, but they were tears of happiness. 
 
 THE END. 
 
BY MRS. BURTON HARBISON. 
 
 BAR HARBOR DAYS. A Tale of Mount Desert. II- 
 lustrated by Fenn and Hyde. 16mo, Cloth, $1 25. 
 
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 GOLDEN ROD . AN IDYL OF MOUNT DESERT, 
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BY CONSTANCE F. WOOLSOK 
 
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 lineation of her heroines no less than in the suggestive pictures of 
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 reate Boston Globe. 
 
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 conspicuous dramatic power ; while her skill in the development of a 
 story is very remarkable. London Life. 
 
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SEVEN DREAMERS. 
 
 A Collection of Seven Stories. By ANNIE TRUMBULL 
 SLOSSON. pp. 286. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, 
 
 $1 25. 
 
 A charming collection of character sketches and stories 
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 ur ," and " A Speakin Ghost." 
 
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 best contributions to the light literature of this season. Ob 
 server, N. Y. 
 
 Stories told with much skill, tenderness, and kindliness, so 
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 in them. N. Y. Tribune. 
 
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 N. Y. Mail and Express. 
 
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BY MARY E. WILKINS. 
 
 A NEW ENGLAND NUN, and Other Stories. 16mo, 
 Cloth, Ornamental, $1 25. 
 
 A HUMBLE ROMANCE, and Other Stories. 16mo, 
 Cloth, Extra, $1 25. 
 
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 The reader who buys this book and reads it will find treble his money s 
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 Miss Wilkins is a writer who has a gift for the rare art of creating the 
 short story which shall be a character study and a bit of graphic picturing 
 in one ; and all who enjoy the bright and fascinating short story will wel 
 come this volume. Boston Traveller. 
 
 The author has the unusual gift of writing a short story which is com 
 plete in itself, having a real beginning, a middle, and an end. The volume 
 is an excellent one. Observer, N. Y. 
 
 A gallery of striking studies in the humblest quarters of American 
 country life. No one has dealt with this kind of life better than Miss 
 Wilkins. Nowhere are there to be found such faithful, delicately drawn, 
 sympathetic, tenderly humorous pictures. N. Y. Tribune. 
 
 The charm of Miss Wilkins s stories is in her intimate acquaintance 
 and comprehension of humble life, and the sweet human interest sho 
 feels and makes her readers partake of, in the simple, common, homely 
 people she draws. Springfield Republican. 
 
 There is no attempt at fine writing or structural effect, but the tender 
 treatment of the sympathies, emotions, and passions of no very extraor 
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 their own. N. Y. Commercial Advertiser. 
 
 The author has given us studies from real life which must be the result 
 of a lifetime of patient, sympathetic observation. ... No one has done 
 the same kind of work so lovingly and so well. Christian Register, 
 Boston. 
 
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YB 75634 
 
 942209 
 
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