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 THE ENCHANTED.
 
 THE 
 
 ENCHANTED 
 
 AM AUTHENTIC ACCOUNT OE 
 THE STRANGE R I C, I N OE 
 THE NEW PSYCHICAL CLUB. 
 
 BY 
 
 JOHN 1JKLL HOUTON 
 
 " My mind had become so completely possessed by the imaginary scenes and 
 
 characters .... that I seemed t hi: actually living among them I < oulil 
 
 not lint reflect on the singular gilt of the poet ; to he able to spread the magic of 
 his mind over the very lace of Nature ; to give to things and places a charm and 
 character not their own and to turn this ' working-day world' into a perfect fairy 
 land. He is indeed THE TRUE ENCHANTER." Washington Irving. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 CASSELL PUBLISHING COMPANY 
 104 & 106 FOURTH AVENUE
 
 COPYRIGHT, iS^t, KY 
 CASSELL PUBLISHING COM ['ANY. 
 
 THE MERSHON COMPANY PRESS, 
 KAHNVAY, N, J.
 
 TO THE MICMORY 
 
 gvuin0, 
 
 T R U K li X C 1 1 A N T V. R S , 
 THIS BOOK IS KEVERENTLY INSCKIliED. 
 
 2061813
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 r.u,E 
 PROLOGUE, .......... I 
 
 l II.U'TKK 
 
 I. MKLDRUM AND \V.\ni. <>w, OK NKW VOKK, MARK A 
 
 DlSCOVK.KY AND ARK 1 )ISi 'K KOI TKD, ... 17 
 
 II. TlIKY YlK.I.I) TO IRVING, THE ENCHANTER, AND Klv 
 PRODI'CK A FKTK CllAMI'KTKK OK THE SEVEN- 
 TEENTH CENTURY, ...... 
 
 III. TIIICIU MOMICNIOCS EXPERIMENT AT WEKHAXVKEN, 
 
 IV. \Vl'II[ SHARK.SI'KAIvK IN HIS M ACIJF/I U COUN'J'RY, 56 
 V. WlTII DlCKKNS AT T1IK lU'LI, INN KXTKAORDI- 
 
 NARY RlKKTIN(; OT' T1IK NlCW PlCKWICK CH'IJ, 6t_) 
 
 VI. TIIK NKW I'ICRWICK Ci.ui; ELKCTS Two HONOR- 
 ARY MEMKKRS, . . . . 78 
 VII. \Viin SCOTT AT KKNILWORMI, . . 92 
 
 VIII. TllK ri.KASANT IJREAKINC; OK A PLEASANT Sl'ELL, 1O5 
 
 IX. WITH TENNYSON AT COVENTRY, .... 117 
 X. MRS. GREATKIELD'S VIEWS ABOUT LAUY GODIVA 
 
 AND OTHER MATTERS, 127 
 
 XI. WITH GRAY AT STOKE POGIS, .... 138 
 
 XII. NIGHT SCENES AND THOUGHTS IN A CHURCH-YARD, 149 
 XIII. A MODERN ELEGIAC POET SEEKING INSPIRATION 
 
 AT THE FOUNT, ...... 160 
 
 v
 
 ( HArTKK I'AI.K 
 
 XIV. WITH PA-RON ON Tin: JuNGi'kAr, . , . 17.4 
 
 XV. MRS. (iuKATMKLD AGAIN KKKKS I IKK MIND, . iS6 
 
 XVI. \Vrni I IAW nioKNK IN SIATK STKKK.T, UOSTON, . 203 
 
 XVII. KKAITKAKAWK o\- TIIK SCAKI.KT IA\\ i I'.K, . . 219 
 
 XN'III. TllK l'''iR I CNA I1-; I I AITF.NINCS i >} A JoURNKY \VEST, 2jS 
 
 XIX. \VllTI I.()Ni.I'T.I.I.i>\v AT MlNNKHAIIA K.M.I..-,, . 
 
 XX. A.N 10.NU AND A 15l.GIN.MNG, ....
 
 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 PROLOGUE. 
 
 UNCLE flUS'S GHOST AT THE IIAILFELLOWS*. 
 
 MR. GUSTAVLIS Anou'iius SWANN" Uncle 
 Gus," lie was always called had been a member of 
 the Ilailfellows' Club, of New York, for twenty 
 years, when he died. The cause of his death was 
 marasmus, the doctors said, or an even wearing out 
 all round. No one knew how old he was, but there 
 were veterans of "the street " who remembered him 
 as a banker and broker in Jauncey Court fifty years 
 back. He had retired from business, before the 
 speculative times of the war, with a fortune ample 
 for his bachelor wants. Club-life was his passion. 
 He had assisted in launching three or four clubs on 
 the sea whose shores are strewn with wrecks, and all 
 but one had foundered and gone to pieces amid the 
 thunder and lightning of enraged creditors. The 
 Ilailfellows, of which he was an original incorpora- 
 tor, was the sole survivor of his ventures in that 
 line. This club, like the rest, would have been en- 
 gulfed, if Uncle Gus had not assumed its load of
 
 debt to upholsterers, grocers, and coal dealers, and 
 taken a chattel mortgage on the furniture and 
 pictures, which was well understood to be an empty 
 formality. This generous act and Uncle Gus's per- 
 petual smile, old-fashioned courtliness, high-colored 
 handsome face, tall, straight figure and jaunty dress, 
 which beautifully blended the old and the new 
 styles, straps and flowing neckcloths with rolling 
 coat-collars and hip pockets, made him a universal 
 favorite. As he sat regularly every afternoon in a 
 great arm-chair, expressly reserved for him by com- 
 mon consent, at the bay window and looked out on 
 the endless Fifth Avenue procession, with the 
 keenest interest in the passing faces, many of which 
 he knew, he was the best possible advertisement of 
 the quiet, the comfort, the neatness, the respecta- 
 bility of the Hailfcllows. At the Saturday night 
 dinners, he invariably occupied' a particular scat at 
 the central table; faultless as to evening dress, with 
 a rosebud and geranium leaf in button-hole and 
 gold double eye-glasses dangling down his shirt 
 front. As he ate sparingly and took only a few sips 
 of a special brand of claret labeled " Uncle Gus" 
 in his honor he found time to talk freely to the 
 neighboring convives, and it was a point of honor 
 with the youngest llailfellows not to yawn over his 
 reminiscences of Grisi, Mario, Fanny Ellslcr, and 
 old Wallack, and always to laugh at his jokes which
 
 UNCLE GUS'S GHOST. 3 
 
 he never failed to repeat in the same familiar 
 words, except that sometimes he wandered near the 
 end and missed the point. Dinner over, Uncle Gus 
 would smoke a small mild cigar and then drop his 
 venerable snow-clad head on his breast and sleep 
 for half an hour undisturbed by the speeches that 
 raged round him. 
 
 Uncle Gus took all his other meals at a corner 
 table, at which no one else presumed to seat himself 
 except on the invitation of its honored monopolist. 
 Over this table hung a half-length portrait of the 
 clear old man, purchased by subscription. It repre- 
 sented him not a whit pinker than the living 
 original, with perhaps a flattery of hair over the 
 temples, the mouth curving at the ends in a truth- 
 ful smile, the eyes bright and friendly, the head 
 canted a trifle on one side, the forefinger of the 
 right hand inserted between the third and fourth 
 buttons of the vest. Having sat expressly for this 
 speaking likeness, it was but natural that Uncle 
 Gus should always uphold its fidelity by his pose 
 and manner. It was noticed that he never stood 
 erect in the club without inclining his head 
 markedly on one side, and exploring the interior of 
 his vest with his right hand, while his winning 
 smile became even more expansive as years rolled 
 on. 
 
 At precisely nine o'clock every night Uncle Gus
 
 4 THE EXCIIAXTEl). 
 
 would go down-stairs to the billiard-room and sit in 
 a high chair, where he could watch the boys play- 
 ing. In his day he had been a fine shot ; but his 
 hands had become shaky and he could no longer 
 grip the cue. ]5ut from his throne he overlooked 
 match games with the deepest interest, acting as 
 umpire when asked. At the expiration of an hour 
 he would ascend slowly to the second floor where 
 he would play just one rubber of whist, in which 
 game he was really formidable when he had five 
 trumps (including two honors) and one strong suit. 
 At twelve o'clock Uncle Gus always bade the com- 
 pany a collective and dignified good-night and 
 sought his own elegant bachelor quarters, about 
 three blocks distant from the club house, usually 
 with some young Ilailfellow hooked to his arm as 
 escort. 
 
 Uncle Gus's perennial courtesy came out strongly 
 on Ladies' Day. Then he reinforced the reception 
 committee of young men and surpassed them all in 
 his gallant deferential attitude to the fair guests. 
 It was delightful to sec him totter around, some- 
 
 o 
 
 times offering his arm with mediaeval statelincss to 
 an old lady and escorting her to a scat, then picking 
 up the fan she dropped (perhaps intentionally), then 
 slowly straightening himself as if fearing a crick in 
 the back, and then bustling about to get an ice 
 and some cake and lemonade for her. lie took
 
 UNCLE GUS'S GHOST. 5 
 
 pleasure as he used to say, in "sailing in and cutting 
 out " the younger ladies from the escort of the 
 rakish juvenile committeemcn. 
 
 It was on a Ladies' Day that he caught, in a 
 draughty stairway, the cold that deprived the Hail- 
 fellows of their most useful and ornamental 
 member. 
 
 By Uncle Gus's will the club received as be- 
 quests the (canceled) mortgage on its furniture and 
 paintings, a monster punch bowl of Wedgwood 
 (authentic beyond doubt), twelve standard treatises 
 on whist uniformly bound in tree-calf and richly 
 annotated by his own hand, and a small fund for 
 keeping the billiard table in repair. 
 
 The club attended his funeral in a body, draped 
 his portrait in crape, and passed three resolutions 
 of regret with a preamble, which were published in 
 the leading papers at regular advertising rates. All 
 of which would seem to indicate that Uncle Gus's 
 connection with the Hailfcllows had been per- 
 manently dissolved, and that his genial presence 
 would gladden them never more. But not so. 
 
 One night, about thirty days after the burial of 
 Uncle Gus, there was a spirited match game of bil- 
 liards at the club. Quayle and Offling, the two 
 crack players, were the contestants. The struggle 
 ceased just before midnight, with Offling as victor, 
 and the spectators filed off one by one into the
 
 6 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 darkness. The champion and the vanquished lin- 
 gered behind to discuss somewhat heatedly the 
 merits of a particular stroke which had been deci- 
 sive in the last round. They were left alone, uhcn 
 Quaylc, in a spirit of bravado, challenged Offling to 
 one more trial of their skill. The banter was ac- 
 cepted, and both men threw off their coats and 
 began. At ten minutes past twelve Ouayle was 
 about to attempt an exceedingly difficult shot, 
 when the cue fell from his hands and he started 
 back with eye-balls protruding and every sign of 
 fright and amazement in his visage. 
 
 " Wh what's that?" he cried, pointing with 
 trembling forefinger to the high chair, which ho had 
 been facing. 
 
 "What's what?" exclaimed Offling, looking in 
 the same direction. 
 
 Quaylc continued to gaze fixedly at the chair a 
 full minute, then passed his hand over his brow, 
 and replied in a still agitated voice : 
 
 " N nothing now but I would swear Undo 
 Gus was sitting there a moment ago." 
 
 "You've been playing too long and your nerves 
 are unstrung. You'd better go home and to bed. 
 
 Quayle energetically protested that he had 
 plainly seen Uncle Gus, in his customary seat, 
 leaning forward and looking earnestly at the shot 
 about to be made. Offling laughed heartily at
 
 UNCLE GUS'S GHOST. ^ 
 
 every word of the statement and then renewed his 
 advice with the additional suggestion of a dose of 
 bromide just before retiring. 
 
 The interrupted game was not renewed, and the 
 rival players sauntered off, arm-in-arm, discussing 
 the alleged occurrence with gravity on one side and 
 jocosity on the other. If the kind-hearted Offling 
 had not really been alarmed at the upset condition 
 of Quaylc, he would have hunted through the club 
 for stray members to whom he could tell the story 
 with the comic exaggeration in which he excelled. 
 But he was anxious to see his perturbed friend 
 safely home and he postponed his amusement till 
 the morrow. Next night all the frequenters of the 
 club were regaled by Offling with the full particu- 
 lars of Uncle Gus's apparition, including a capital 
 imitation of Quaylc's fright and astonishment. 
 And when the latter dropped in, later than was his 
 wont, and noticeably pale as if from lack of sleep, 
 he was obliged to run a gauntlet of questions and 
 jokes. To all these he replied, with forced com- 
 posure, that he had certainly seen Uncle Gus in his 
 favorite high chair. They might say his liver or 
 his head was out of order the night before. He 
 did not ask anybody to believe him. He knew the 
 absurdity of claiming to see a ghost nowadays. 
 But he would not deny what was a solemn fact. 
 He stood by his story against any amount of ridi-
 
 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 culc, and much more of the same sort. Of course', 
 none of his hearers believed in the genuineness of 
 the rcvcnant. The only point at issue was whether 
 Ouaylc was the victim of a momentary aberration 
 or whether he had deliberately invented the spec- 
 ter. Whatever the truth might have been, the 
 incident was a nine days' wonder among the Hail- 
 fellows and then was forgotten, till revived by a 
 strange event a few weeks aftcnvard, as follows : 
 
 It was between midnight and one o'clock whrii 
 four of the best whist players of the club were en- 
 grossed in a game in the snug little card room up- 
 stairs. They were surrounded by lookers-on who 
 had finished their play at the other tables. A fresh 
 deal had thrown into the hands of one of the four 
 a combination which would have rejoiced the 
 heart of Uncle Gus. There were six trumps (three 
 of them honors) and a suit of five from ace to 
 ten spot. When Uncle Gus got the lead with 
 something like this to back him, he was in the 
 seventh heaven of happiness. If, with the assistance 
 of his partner, he could, as sometimes happened, 
 capture every trick, he would never brng of his con- 
 summate skill. He would only smile sweetly and 
 receive with becoming modest)- the congratulations 
 upon his masterly play, which it would have been 
 sheer brutality to withhold. 
 
 Puffer was the fortunate custodian of that hand
 
 UNCLE GUS'S GHOST. 9 
 
 that night. The lead had come to him and he was 
 on the point of swinging out with the king of 
 trumps when Boost, at his left, cried, " Good 
 Heavens ! " and let his fan of cards fall to the floor. 
 At the same moment Tree ford, who stood among 
 the spectators, uttered a guttural sound as of horror 
 and clung to the person nearest him. Both men 
 were gazing in a stricken, helpless manner at the 
 space behind Puffer's chair, the identical arm-chair, 
 roomy and softly-cushioned, which for many years 
 had been taken nightly by Uncle Gus. 
 
 "What's the row now?" "What's up?" 
 " Another ghost ? " " Give us a rest ! " were some 
 of the ejaculations of the little group. Whereupon 
 Boost and Treeford gravely averred that they had 
 seen Uncle Gus in the rear of Puffer, leaning over 
 him and placidly smiling at his cards. 
 
 Questioned by some earnestly and by others 
 facetiously, they agreed in the most trivial items as 
 to the appearance of the phantom, and these again 
 harmonized with Quayle's story. Even down to 
 the rose-bud and geranium leaf which decorated the 
 lapel of the dress coat he wore on both occasions 
 and in which he had been buried. 
 
 The game thus interrupted was not renewed, all 
 interest being absorbed by the startling incident of 
 the night, with the sole exception that Puffer 
 wanted to play out his extraordinary hand. The
 
 10 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 fact that two new men claimed to have seen Uncle 
 Gus, and by their emphatic words and still more 
 their looks sustained that statement, lessened some- 
 what the volume of jeers with which Ouayle's tale 
 had been received. Several persons present in- 
 clined to regard the matter seriously. They said, 
 " Well, after all, who knows?" and " Why not?" 
 and two at the same instant repeated what Hamlet 
 remarked to his incredulous friends about his 
 father's ghost. This reminded some one to empha- 
 size the coincidence that the specter, or whatever 
 it was, had been seen so far only by Uncle Gus's 
 special intimates, as was proper and to be expected. 
 Somebody else pointed to the circumstance that the 
 hour (past midnight) was favorable to ghostly mani- 
 festations. For these reasons the ghost theory, as 
 against the supposition of a practical joke, or dis- 
 ordered livers or heads, gained several adherents in 
 the card room that night. 
 
 On a certain Saturday night, a few weeks after 
 this occurrence, the regular club dinner had been 
 protracted to a late hour by speeches, stories, and 
 songs. The bright, warm room was so cheerful by 
 contrast with the cold rain pattering against the 
 windows, that the feasters were loth to quit the 
 table and go home. Nearly every one had been 
 toasted and had contributed his mite to the enter- 
 tainment. Then began a series of impromptu
 
 UNCLE GUS'S GHOST. u 
 
 healths to absentees, which were responded to by 
 their friends present in a humorous strain of com- 
 pliment to the missing ones. While the merriment 
 was at its height, a young man of a sentimental 
 aspect rose and gave a preparatory " ahem ! " All 
 turned to him, and when they observed the gravity 
 of his face they knew that Fullkirk was about to 
 say something in earnest, as was his custom. It 
 was because of his earnestness, which afforded relief 
 from the habitual frolicsome mood of the Hail- 
 fellows, that he was always heard with strict atten- 
 tionespecially as his remarks were never long. 
 He raised a glass and said in a voice tremulous with 
 emotion, " Gentlemen, let us drink in silence to the 
 memory of Uncle Gus." There was a dead hush as 
 all rose and lifted glasses to lips. Only a few smiled 
 at the thought which all had in mind that Uncle 
 Gus might improve the opportunity to reappear to 
 those privileged beings who had eyes to see him. 
 As glasses were drained, there was a general expec- 
 tation that something startling would occur and it 
 did. Five glasses simultaneously shivered on the 
 table or floor as they dropped from uplifted hands, 
 and from different parts of the room were heard 
 cries of " There he is!" " No mistake this time!" 
 " It's Uncle Gus, sure ! " and the like, and five men 
 pointed at the chair which had always been reserved 
 for the departed Swann at the oval in the center.
 
 12 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 Before the general coinpany could do more than 
 glance at the chair, which was then tenanted by a 
 stout, red-faced man, looking as little like a ghost as 
 possible, the faces of the five became chap-fallen 
 and blank. Nobody needed to be told that what- 
 ever they had seen had disappeared. Then fol- 
 lowed a cross-fire of raillery and questioning which 
 they met as best they could. In their stories there 
 was perfect harmony. They had all seen Uncle 
 Gus, erect behind that chair, wearing the historic 
 dress suit, boutonniere, and smile. His head was 
 slightly bent forward as if in acknowledgment of 
 the compliment paid him. One hand was raised as 
 if to make a gesture of modest deprecation. From 
 this statement the five who included the grave 
 Fullkirk- could not be shaken. If it was a " put up 
 job," as the skeptical ones continued to insist, the 
 scheme was a masterpiece of concerted action. 
 
 The ghost theory made new converts, especially 
 when it was remarked that the clock had struck 
 twelve just previous to the alleged appearance of 
 Uncle Gus, and also that the five who claimed to 
 have seen him were his oldest and dearest friends, 
 and therefore, according to ghost lore, most likely 
 to be favored with the spectacle. It is true that 
 these comprised the three who had previously be- 
 held him in the spirit thus making the number of 
 witnesses small relative to the whole club member-
 
 UNCLE GUS'S 677(9 .V 7". 13 
 
 ship. As the case stood, the five were, by a consid- 
 erable majority, believed to have played a good 
 joke in a manner reflecting great credit on their 
 ability as liars and amateur actors. 
 
 Those members who still clung to the supernatural 
 theory commented on what they called a " singular 
 coincidence," serving to explain why Uncle Gus never 
 again visited the Hailfellows. At a date soon after 
 that memorable dinner the club proceeded to carry 
 out a plan of altering the house, which he had 
 always opposed. This consisted of moving the card 
 room from the second to the third floor, where more- 
 space could be provided for the players, by abolish- 
 ing a partition and throwing two rooms together. 
 The estimated cost was small and Uncle Gus's sole 
 objection to it was that he did not want to climb 
 two flights of stairs. If one may grant the survival 
 of earthly passions and prejudices beyond the grave, 
 it might follow that in another, even though a better, 
 world, this lamented uncle would continue to be so 
 sensitive on the subject as to cut the club which 
 had taken advantage of his death to disregard his 
 wishes. Though (and this was a strong point on 
 the other side) it really would not seem to matter 
 much to a ghost, whether the card room was pro- 
 moted one flight or not, since Uncle Gus no longer 
 required legs to take him up-stairs and could not 
 sit down and play when he got there.
 
 14 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 In these discussions there were t\vo members, in 
 good and regular standing", who took no part. They 
 were Messrs. Meldrum and Wadlow. The altitude 
 they held was that of agnostics ; they neither af- 
 firmed nor denied. They waited for more light, 
 which never came. It never does come. But 
 though they reached no satisfactory conclusion 
 about this particular ghost, they struck a trail which 
 led, by devious windings, to the remarkable results 
 set forth in the pages following. 
 
 Investigating the old theory of projected mental 
 images as explanatory of specters, they found that, 
 with their eyes tight shut and an intense concentra- 
 tion of memory and will, the}' could see an)' quan- 
 tity of ghosts. They could call up shades of 
 Uncle Gns and other dead people, and living ones 
 too these being pictured on the inside of the lids, 
 as it seemed to the startled experimenters. But 
 the forms were all faint and transitory, like celes- 
 tial nebulae, whose outlines can be traced for a mo- 
 ment only and then become confused and vanish. 
 
 When Meldrum tried what he could do with his 
 favorite heroes and heroines of fiction, his success was 
 amazing, and Wadlow's no less so. Jeanie Deans, 
 Edgar of Ravenswood, Colonel Newcome, Becky 
 Sharp, Pickwick, Little Nell, Romola, Dorothea, 
 Jane Eyre, Donatello, Uncas, Rip Van Winkle, and 
 others, whose mimic lives had passed into their own
 
 U\ r CLE GUS'S GHOST. 15 
 
 through the wonderful medium of the printed page, 
 could be plainly seen in figure, face, and dress against 
 the fleshly curtain, and did not disappear till the eye- 
 balls became heated and pained with the strain of 
 holding them to the work. 
 
 o 
 
 Seeking to explain why these fictitious ideals were 
 so much more distinct to the inward vision than the 
 real men and women they had known, the t\vo 
 friends concluded that the former had been stamped 
 on tlicir minds in deeper lines and stronger colors by f/te 
 genius tliat had created tlicm. Uncle Toby was more 
 of a reality than Uncle Gus. No lady of their ac- 
 quaintance was half as sharply defined as Olivia 
 Primrose. How much they owed to pictures, 
 statues, plays as accessories they could not deter- 
 mine. JUit the cardinal fact of the superior distinct- 
 ness of all these purely fanciful characters they at- 
 tributed to the wonder-working genius that lay 
 behind them, and to which painter, sculptor, actor, 
 were only supernumerary. 
 
 Having gone so far in a new line of psychical 
 research, it needed but another step to take Mel- 
 drum and Wadlow into an enchanted realm where 
 they were the first to set foot. 
 
 This book records some of their surprising adven- 
 tures prior to the organization of the New Psychical 
 Club, which will prosecute the same interesting class 
 of experiments in a wider field, with such a variety
 
 iG 
 
 of earnest minds at work as will, it may be hoped, 
 develop all the possibilities of the new science. 
 Those fully qualified for enrollment among THE 
 ENCHANTED may prove to be few. Still fewer may 
 be the TRUE ENCHANTERS themselves. It is not 
 within the sovereign power of many authors of all 
 the past to link their inspirations to places so that 
 these will be inseparably connected for ages to 
 come, as Sleepy Hollow will be identified with Icha- 
 bod Crane and Alloway Kirk" with Tain (/Shunter. 
 What the passing generation of bards and novel 
 ists can do toward supplying THE ENCHANTED with 
 their ethereal food it remains for future generations 
 of their readers to find out. The adjustment of 
 their claims to rank now among TRUE ENCHANTER^ 
 does not come within the present writer's province. 
 Time tries all.
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 MELDRUM AND WADLOW, OF NEW YORK, MAKE A 
 DISCOVERY AND ARE DISCREDITED. 
 
 IN the autumn of 1888, Mr. Felix Mcldrum and 
 his friendliest of friends, Mr. Madison YVadlow, made 
 a little sentimental journey in picturesque West- 
 chester County, New York. A holiday had released 
 them from the monotonous grind of business in the 
 city. They profited by the respite to gratify a long 
 cherished wish to visit Foe's cottage at Fordham. 
 Its occupant courteously permitted them to in- 
 spect every nook and corner of the humble dwell- 
 ing. They sat in the poet's favorite arm-chair. 
 They rested their elbows in contemplative posture on 
 the small, square deal table at which he had written 
 some of his most admired poems and stories. 
 They looked out of window at the back of the 
 house upon a brown landscape from which that 
 powerful and unique genius might have drawn 
 liis gloomiest inspirations. This conventional hom- 
 age having been duly paid by the two friends to 
 the memory of Poc, they left the cottage with 
 a sense of satisfaction tempered only by the
 
 1 8 THE EXC1IAXTED. 
 
 regret that they had identified nothing in its 
 interior with the well remembered effusions of 
 his wonderful pen. 
 
 Then they resumed their standard gait of four 
 miles an hour along a hilly and dusty road. An 
 impulse which may be indulged with safety in any 
 rural environ of New York to quit the highway 
 and take to the fields and woods, suddenly sei/.ed 
 the pedestrians. They jumped over a broken 
 stone wall and struck a cow path. This led through 
 a large meadow, full of golden-rod and late asters, 
 to a thick clump of trees which masked the 
 further view. As they followed the narrow, well- 
 worn track, the}' heedlessly beheaded the flowers 
 with quick' strokes of their walking sticks and recited 
 such snatches of Poe's verses as occurred to them. 
 
 "He | meaning the author of the Raven j must 
 often have rambled over these grounds so near his 
 house," said Meldrum. "What if we should light 
 on some scene he has described." 
 
 " That would be a godsend," responded his 
 equally sentimental friend. " 13ut 3*011 know Poe's 
 realm was the supernatural. lie looked for his 
 cues and hints within, not without." 
 
 "True; but no poet is so continuously intro- 
 spective as to be wholty free from the influence 
 of Nature. In her somber or her joyous aspects, 
 she insensibly ministers to him."
 
 A DISCREDITED DI SCOTER Y. 19 
 
 " Here, if anywhere, we may test your dictum," 
 said Wadlow, laughing, " for, if I mistake not, yon- 
 der is a scene that would have fed Poe's mel- 
 ancholy at the source." He pointed to a little 
 vale into which they could peep between the 
 thick columnar trunks of the trees ahead. It 
 was sunless, though the sky above was bright. 
 An odor, as of stagnant water and rotting vege- 
 tation, saluted the friends as they quickened their 
 steps. In a few moments they stood on the edge 
 of a cup-like formation of land and gazed downward 
 in silence. 
 
 It was a depressing spectacle of Nature and Art 
 in abandonment. In the near foreground was a 
 large blackish pool, full of decaying autumn leaves. 
 Beyond, vanishing in a long perspective of parallel 
 lines, were tall old trees, from which the foliage 
 had been mostly stripped by the high winds. On 
 the ground lay giant trunks of their dead breth- 
 ren. In a cleared space, so contracted that the af- 
 ternoon sun could not reach it over the tops of the 
 adjoining somber pines, stood a large house, di- 
 lapidated and seemingly tenantless. Its great age 
 was apparent in the sunken condition of the 
 roof, which looked as if ready to collapse with its 
 own weight. The windows were broken, the chim- 
 neys toppling. The wood-work had lost its orig- 
 inal paint, if it ever had any, and was of a dingy hue,
 
 20 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 freely streaked with patches of vegetable mold. 
 The only sign of life on the premises was a gaunt 
 black cat which came out of a little jungle of 
 weeds near the house, and when it sa\vthc intruders 
 darted into the woods like a wild thing. A kitchen 
 garden, filled with towering stalks of the sun- 
 flower and tall dead grass were appropriate com- 
 ponents of the unpleasing prospect. The friends 
 looked upon the dismal scene without a word, till 
 the same thought flashed upon both of them 
 simultaneous]}-. 
 
 "What is that but the dank' tarn of Auber? '' ex- 
 claimed Meldrum, pointing to the stagnant poo! 
 beneath them. 
 
 " And to match it, there is the ghoul-haunted 
 woodland of Weir," shouted Wadlow with ecstasy. 
 
 " Ulalume may have been written on this very 
 spot. The feeling and tone of the place and the 
 poem are the same," rejoined Meldrum. 
 
 " Hear in mind that this is October 
 
 the very month rhyming with Auber, you remem- 
 ber," said Wadlow, with awe in his voice. 
 
 " An extraordinary coincidence, indeed," replied 
 Meldrum, who fully shared the emotion of his com- 
 panion.
 
 A DISCREDITED DISCOVERY. 21 
 
 Spcechlessness seemed the proper tribute due to 
 a spot hallowed by such unmistakable associations 
 with one of the saddest and sweetest of poems. 
 But it was broken a moment later by another as- 
 tounding discovery. 
 
 " That is the original of the house of- 
 Usher," whispered Meldrum, pale with the excite- 
 ment of the startling idea. 
 
 " Plainly so," rejoined Wadlow. " Its tottering 
 condition would suggest its impending fall to any- 
 body." 
 
 The two friends had been so long accustomed to 
 one another's ways of thinking, that they harmo- 
 nized spontaneously upon a question that then 
 arose. 
 
 " I do not care to go any nearer," said Meldrum ; 
 " it might spoil the picture." 
 
 " Yes, the general view is much the best for stor- 
 age in the memory. I always want to think that I 
 have seen, with my own eyes, the dank tarn of 
 Auber and the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir, 
 and the house of Usher before its fall. The 
 thought will enrich my whole life." 
 
 " Let us drink in the scene for perhaps the last 
 time," added Meldrum solemnly. 
 
 Their eyes fondly lingered on every detail of the 
 dreary landscape, and then they turned their backs 
 upon it, happy in an achievement of the highest
 
 22 THE EX CHARTED. 
 
 import to a pair of Poe-worshipers like them- 
 selves, but of no particular interest to the world in 
 general. 
 
 In fact, Meldrum and Wadlow were either list- 
 ened to with amused incredulity, or else were 
 merciless!}' chaffed by the Ilailfellows and in society 
 whenever they vainly sought even from the ardent 
 admirers of Ulalumc any sympathy in their own 
 pardonable enthusiasm over this discovery. They 
 found out that, as a rule, one is not paid, but must 
 himself pay handsomely, for the origination and 
 acceptance of any idea which may, perchance, 
 reflect some credit on himself. To do even so little 
 a thing as to localize one or two of Toe's wild 
 imaginings, instead of being taken as a service, 
 humble but real, to literature, was construed as an 
 impertinence, if not an offense. 
 
 There was a run on libraries for Toe's life and 
 works in order to ascertain facts and dates that 
 might go to invalidate the modest claims of Mel- 
 drum and Wadlow. 
 
 Great was the glee of one of these envious 
 mousers when he showed, from a biography of Poc, 
 that his "Fall of the House of Usher" was pub- 
 lished previous to 1841, and that he did not take up 
 his residence in Fordham till 1846. 
 
 Another skeptic was so anxious to deprive the 
 two gentlemen of any honor they might possi-
 
 A DISCREDITED DISCOVERY. 23 
 
 bly reap from their researches in Westchester, that 
 he investigated the matter on the spot for himself, 
 and he reported with face and voice exhibiting the 
 deepest and truest happiness, that the " dank tarn 
 of Auber" was dug out as a private fish pond 
 some years after Poe wrote his poem of Ulalume. 
 Furthermore, that the old house near Fordham (the 
 existence of which, in a tumble-down state, was 
 admitted by the inquirer) was, in the year 1841 and 
 for many years antecedent, the well-carcd-for, 
 beautiful and happy home of a large family, and 
 that even if Poe had seen it long previous to his 
 occupancy of the Fordham cottage, it could then 
 have given him no clew to his conception of the 
 deserted, haunted, and doom-laden Mouse of Usher. 
 
 The bare assertion of these glaring anachronisms 
 was received with almost universal approbation. 
 The suppression of Meldrum and Wadlow was 
 something so very much desired by their most 
 intimate acquaintance that the statements we have 
 cited, some of them unsupported by reference to 
 chapter and verse or by any other testimony what- 
 ever, were regarded as final and overwhelming. 
 
 The gentlemen who were thus discredited were 
 foolish enough, at first, to make a stand in behalf of 
 their contention. Admitting, for argument's sake, 
 that the facts were as represented by their oppo- 
 nents, there yet remained to be explained away
 
 24 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 that extremely gloomy and repelling grove of trees 
 which might justly have been the original of the 
 " ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir." But they 
 were promptly convinced that only an uncondi- 
 tional surrender of the theory, entire, would satisfy 
 the demands of the literal ists. And they gave it 
 up. 
 
 It would be untrue to say that the doubts raised 
 by these discussions had not influenced the minds 
 of Meldrum and Wadlow ; but if they confessed 
 that they had been harboring any illusion, they did 
 not wish it dispelled. They preferred, if need be, 
 to shut their eyes tight and remain under the 
 dominion of the enchanter whose genius had lent, 
 for them if for nobody else, an irresistible charm to 
 a spot elsewise but commonplace in its desolation, 
 whenever it was recalled to memory as a blessed 
 relief from the painful stress of the working-day 
 world.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THEY YIELD TO IRVING THE ENCHANTER, AND RE- 
 PRODUCE A " FETE CHAMPETRE" OE THE 
 
 SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. 
 
 THE stir and clamor of an elevated railway station 
 in New York are emphatically unfavorable to men- 
 tal abstraction. But in spite of these manifest 
 drawbacks it was in just such a focus of noise and 
 excitement that Meldrum and Wadlow, a few weeks 
 after the adventure already narrated, made an ex- 
 periment, the success of which depended on com- 
 plete intellectual isolation from all disturbances. 
 The making of this experiment the fortunate re- 
 sult of which was destined thenceforth to contrib- 
 ute so freely to the innocent pleasure of the two 
 friends was not the formal submission of a slowly 
 ripening theory to a test, but the merest of acci- 
 dents. They had scaled the heights of the station 
 at Battery Place, only to see the wicket slammed in 
 their faces and the train which they had hurried to 
 catch rolling northward. To kill a few minutes' 
 time they leaned over the platform balustrade and 
 looked idly down on the open space which was once 
 
 25
 
 26 THE EXCHAXTED. 
 
 the only pleasure ground of New York", now cut up 
 and spoiled by that quintessence of ugliness, an 
 elevated railway of iron, whose rude and reckless 
 architecture torments the eye, while the snorts and 
 the sulphurous stenches of its locomotives affront 
 the ear and nose intolerably. What was once the 
 favorite resort of Fashion and Beauty is now given 
 over to immigrants, whose right to enjoy the after- 
 noon sea-breeze and what little remains of the old 
 trees and verdure no one disputes. But one may 
 be willing to leave them unmolested in their posses- 
 sion of the Battery, and still regret the absence of 
 so much that used to give brightness and gayety to 
 the lovely promenade ground of Irving's day. 
 
 It was their keen recollection of the Battery of 
 the seventeenth century as Irving describes it con- 
 trasting that charming pen-picture with the scrap 
 of barren landscape before their eyes that put 
 Meldrum and Wadlow on the definite track of a 
 new idea. 
 
 To recall Irving and dwell fondly upon him, 
 almost of necessity brings back to the mind of 
 those who thoroughly know the writings of that 
 first and best of American humorists, his freshest 
 and most amusing book "Knickerbocker's History 
 of New York." The two friends knew it by heart, 
 and could not have appreciated its geniality and 
 unctuousness more thoroughly had they been scions
 
 IRVING THE ENCHANTER* 27 
 
 of the oldest and purest Manhattan stock instead of 
 lineal descendants of those Yankees whom Irving 
 satirized as the smileless and grasping neighbors 
 and rivals of his jolly and confiding Dutchmen. 
 
 Fixing their eyes meditatively on a little patch 
 of withered grass which still lingered to tell of what 
 the Battery was in its ancient prime of greenness, 
 the same scene out of the glowing pages of Geoffrey 
 Crayon came unbidden to their brains. It was that 
 of the Saturday afternoon revels held on the Bat- 
 tery in the good old days of Peter Stuyvesant, Gov- 
 ernor of New Amsterdam. 
 
 Meldrum and Wadlow had often spoken to one 
 another of the graphic and racy descriptions of 
 those gatherings as, on the whole, the most ludi- 
 crous and vivid ever penned by the enchanter of 
 Sunnyside. 
 
 "Can't we conjure it out of the void?" asked 
 Meldrum. 
 
 " We can try," was Wacllow's response. He 
 knew without a word of explanation of what his 
 friend was thinking, so conversant was he with his 
 literary tastes and his habits of mental association. 
 
 " Call that the green lawn where the burghers 
 and vrows, the young men and maidens, assembled 
 by the golden light of the afternoon sun for their 
 weekly dance and frolic." Meldrum was looking 
 hard at a burnt grassy space, barely large enough
 
 28 
 
 to accommodate two quadrilles of our day, still less 
 the extended mazes of the dance in which all the 
 able-bodied subjects of Peter Stuyvesant took- a leg 
 together. 
 
 " Take down those miserable posts and chains ; 
 turf over those black, crumbling concrete walks ; 
 restore some of the mighty spreading trees that 
 have been felled by modern vandals. First, briny 
 back the scene and then perhaps we can summon 
 up the actors," said \Yadlo\v. 
 
 The other nodded and both bent their minds to 
 the pleasing task. 
 
 "That will hold them all, I should say," and 
 Mel drum outlined roughly with his cane, the area 
 which he would rescue from its baser uses, and 
 devote to the forthcoming festivities. 
 
 "That's about what I myself had set apart," said 
 his friend. " Let us each take our time and call 
 out when he sees anything worth mentioning." 
 
 Two or three minutes elapsed before the inefface- 
 able pictures which each carried in the recesses of 
 his head could be successfully projected upon the 
 ground beneath them, like the images of a magic 
 lantern upon a canvas. Both breathed hard and 
 both turned pale under a mental strain as they 
 labored at the concentration of thought indispen- 
 sable for the purpose. 
 
 Meldrum was the first to break the truce of
 
 IRVIXG THE EXCHAXTER. 29 
 
 silence, which he did with marked tremor in his 
 voice. 
 
 " I've got the crowd all right. About a thousand 
 people I should say. The women 
 
 Wadlow snatched the words from his lips " The 
 women with hair pomatumed back from their fore- 
 heads, and covered with smart little calico caps." 
 
 " Exactly," interrupted Mcldrum. " Their petti- 
 coats catch my eye. They are so gay and 
 short." 
 
 " Luckily so, or we should not be treated to a 
 sight of those long blue worsted stockings with 
 magnificent red clocks, and trim ankles and shapely 
 feet set off with silver-buckled shoes. Delightful 
 to get back to those good old fashions, isn't it ?" 
 
 " Yes, indeed. But we can't say as much for the 
 men's costumes. Think of putting on six pairs of 
 breeches every morning. Some of the dashing 
 young fellows down there have ten, Knickerbocker 
 tells us." 
 
 "The fun is about to begin. There's the dear 
 old Governor himself. I should know him any- 
 where by his wooden leg, inlaid with silver, and his 
 brimstone-colored trunks." 
 
 " In his right hand he carries a gold-headed cane 
 and his left rests upon the hilt of his trusty sword. 
 Do you observe who is speaking to him as he takes 
 the chair of state under that great elm ? "
 
 3 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 "Who else but our old friend Antony Van 
 Corlear, master of ceremonies, with his trumpet, 
 his long red nose, his huge whiskers, and his 
 invincible ways with women. Even now, as he 
 whispers to the Governor, he is winking at a pretty 
 girl over his excellency's right shoulder." 
 
 " It is a long distance to see a wink, but I think I 
 caught it, too." 
 
 " See, the lusty bachelor raises his trumpet to his 
 lips and gives a blast, which I am not sorry we 
 can't hear. It is the signal for dancing. Those 
 two darkies on the Governor's left supply the 
 music." 
 
 " How quickly the young people respond. In a 
 moment they have filled all the space left them by 
 the worthy burghers, who sit around them in a 
 great circle, placidly smoking their big Dutch 
 pipes, while their vrows knit and sew and gossip 
 and look on." 
 
 The friends watched the rapid progress of the 
 dance with much interest, occasionally exchanging 
 comments on the conspicuous gallantries of that 
 desperate rogue, Antony the Trumpeter, whose 
 only compensation as director of entertainments 
 was the right of kissing all the good-looking 
 women, married or single. Those who danced the 
 longest, tiring out all their competitors, were 
 specially rewarded, if not ill-favored, with a hearty
 
 IRVING THE ENCHANTER. 31 
 
 smack administered by the great Petrus himself in 
 his executive, semi-paternal capacity. 
 
 " It was something to be a governor in those 
 days," remarked Meldrum, as the first dance was 
 concluded and a number of buxom, rosy-cheeked 
 damsels stepped forward to receive the official re- 
 ward. 
 
 " But better to be a trumpeter," rejoined his 
 comrade. " Observe the muck that rascal An- 
 tony is now running among the petticoats, the 
 fair owners of which always make a dumb show of 
 struggling with him, but finally surrender to their 
 fate and retire, laughing, to repair their damaged 
 headgear and neckkerchiefs." 
 
 There was a pause, during which the two old ne- 
 groes who stood near the Governor's chair screwed 
 up their fiddles, holding them fondly to their ears, 
 snapped the strings with their fingers, drew the bow 
 across them, and would have produced the same 
 twanging and discordant notes which are invariably 
 extracted from catgut during the process of tuning 
 up had those rasping sounds fortunately not been 
 inaudible to Meldrum and Wadlow. 
 
 A little breathing time was required, too, by the 
 belles and beaux. They had danced conscien- 
 tiously with a fervor unknown to modern fetes 
 cJiampctrcs. Layers of breeches and petticoats, in 
 number like the skins of an onion, were conducive
 
 3 2 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 to heat under an unclouded sun ; but fashion, which 
 ruled as tyrannically then as now, would not permit 
 one of those integuments to be peeled off, though 
 their wearers were roasting alive in them. There 
 was no relief but in cooling down slowly, the pro- 
 cess being aided by copious draughts of cider anil 
 home-brewed beer, which were fetched from neigh- 
 boring booths by attentive swains for their ladies, 
 and quaffed by them with undisguised satisfaction. 
 The swains themselves preferred, for the same sani- 
 tary purpose, the genuine Hollands and cherry 
 brandy which the ever-thoughtful Governor always 
 provided free for these entertainments. When, fur- 
 thermore, capacious pipes of tobacco had been 
 smoked deliberately down to the last whiff, the 
 gallants proclaimed themselves refreshed and all 
 ready for another turn upon the sward. 
 
 Antony Van Corlear raised his trumpet to his 
 thick lips as a signal for the next dance; the 
 fiddlers tucked their instruments under their chins 
 and scraped the opening bars of a jig ; the laughing 
 couples were preparing to take their places, when 
 Meldrum and Wadlow saw a handsome, smartly- 
 dressed young girl dash into the center of the still 
 unoccupied space, hand in hand with her partner. 
 As the two came to the front, all the other dancers 
 fell back a little by common consent, and watched 
 one of the figures with an earnest curiosity that was
 
 IRVING THE ENCHANTER. 33 
 
 fully shared by the nineteenth century spectators 
 up there on the elevated railway platform. 
 
 " It is the young belle just from Holland," said 
 Meld rum. 
 
 " Easily recognized by the unusual shortness of 
 her petticoats. We must take the grave historian's 
 statement of their number as only six for granted. 
 From our point of view which is not quite as good 
 as I should like we cannot count them." 
 
 " She is about to execute the famous new jig 
 taught to her by the dancing master of Rotter- 
 clam ! " 
 
 " I am all eyes." 
 
 Dicclrich Knickerbocker has chosen to leave pos- 
 terity to judge of this novel Rotterdam jig by its 
 effects alone. These were remarkable as recorded 
 by that veracious chronicler and observed by the 
 spellbound Meldrum and Wadlow. 
 
 " It takes with the young fellows. She'll be in 
 great demand as a partner." 
 
 " Though, as a spectator, one sees it to better 
 advantage." 
 
 "The older ladies those with marriageable 
 daughters at their side scowl at it. But that is 
 only human nature." 
 
 " And the daughters themselves pout their dis- 
 approval. But they will all want to learn the dance 
 when they see how the young fellows like it."
 
 34 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 " The doughty old Governor himself is beginning 
 to be agitated. While he does not take his eyes 
 for an instant from the center of attraction, his 
 frown shows ho\v much he disapproves of the new- 
 fangled jig. What would he say of the modern 
 ballet, I wonder? " 
 
 " Do look at that scapegrace Anton}- ! Nothing 
 could be more to his taste. With eyes riveted on 
 the whirling nymph, he is mastering the intricacies 
 of the new dance. If he could have his own way, 
 he would insist on its universal adoption at least 
 by the younger and handsomer of the fair Man- 
 hattancse." 
 
 At this juncture that startling incident occurred 
 of which the excellent Diedrich gives the scantiest 
 of particulars. Ilis readers arc only informed that 
 it produced great consternation among all the ladies 
 present ; that the gravest of the male spectators, 
 who had hitherto maintained their equanimity, 
 were not a little moved; and that the good old 
 Peter Stuyvesant himself was grievously scandal- 
 ized. In a less primitive state of society all these 
 profound emotions whatever their cause would 
 have been gracefully masked and there would have 
 been no perceptible disturbance. 
 
 Meldrum and Wadlow, taking, as they necessarily 
 did, a bird's-eye view of things, were in no position 
 to explain what must, therefore, ever remain a pro-
 
 IRVING THE ENCHANTER. 35 
 
 found mystery. They, in common with the rest of 
 mankind, only knew that the Governor improved 
 the critical occasion by recommending, on the 
 spot, that every petticoat should henceforth be 
 eked out by a flounce. Also, that he forbade, 
 under the pain and penalty of his high displeasure, 
 any young lady to attempt what was then termed 
 exhibiting the graces, but would now be called the 
 poetry of motion. And this is the right place to 
 remind the student of fashions and of sumptuary 
 legislation that the most paternal of governors 
 made a bad failure of his decree about the ladies' 
 dresses of his day. For the gentle sex, upon 
 whose hearty approval and co-operation he had 
 innocently relied, declared a revolt against his edict 
 and threatened, if the matter were pushed to an 
 issue, to discard altogether the garments with which 
 he was presumptuously meddling. 
 
 Such, at least, was the alarming report made to 
 his excellency by his trusted confidant, the burly 
 trumpeter, who knew the women of New Amster- 
 dam better than any other man; and who had not 
 been, in the slightest degree, disturbed by the un- 
 toward incident that had thrown everybody else 
 into such a flutter. 
 
 The charming center and object of all this dire 
 commotion was still spinning round in the arms of 
 her nimble partner, unconscious, like himself, of
 
 3 & THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 what had happened, and Meldrum and Wadlow 
 were still doing the best they could to sec the mi- 
 nuter details of the spectacle without opera-glasses, 
 when their day-dream was suddenly shattered by a 
 voice behind : 
 
 " I say, w'ot ycr lookin' at yonder? Give a feller 
 a peep, can't ycr?" 
 
 " Your best chance is clown there, in the front 
 row," said Wadlow, turning round, and still under 
 a powerful impression of the reality of what he had 
 imagined. 
 
 The questioner, a rough fellow, stared vacantly at 
 the open space beneath and then at the two friends, 
 as if doubting their sanity. They, in turn, when 
 they again cast their eyes at the spot, a moment 
 before so crowded with life and human interest, saw 
 nothing to remind them of the delightful dead and 
 gone Dutchmen of Stuyvcsant's reign save a knot 
 of newly-landed German immigrants, stolidly smok- 
 ing their pipes or nibbling at pretzels as they 
 lounged along the walks. 
 
 Meldrum snapped his watch open and discovered 
 to his amazement that they had spent about half an 
 hour and missed several up-town trains while try- 
 ing the reproductive powers of their imagination on 
 that consummate drollery of Irving. 
 
 " It is time well put in," said Wadlow. 
 
 " I don't grudge a minute of it," was the answer.
 
 IRVING THE ENCHANTER. 37 
 
 As the twain were jerked and jolted homeward, 
 the many annoyances of a ride on the elevated rail- 
 way could not prevent them from musing content- 
 edly on the infinite prospect of pleasure held out to 
 them by the surrender of their willing minds to the 
 fiat of literary enchanters.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THEIR MOMENTOUS EXI'ERIMENT AT WKEHAWKEX. 
 
 WHAT were the limitations of this new gift of 
 whose delightful potency they had become aware? 
 Would it extend to purely historical scenes and 
 characters? If so, a fruitful field for its exercise 
 would be opened up to them. Strange to say, 
 Irving is the only true enchanter who has cast the 
 spell of creative genius over any locality in the great- 
 city of New York. Meld rum and Wadlow had 
 been tied down to Irving by the very conditions of 
 the experiments they had made. And they soon 
 exhausted the local material of his bewitching pages 
 in trials mostly unsuccessful because the ancient 
 landmarks were so completely erased. With the 
 exception of the Battery and Bowling Green, which 
 they utilized to the utmost, there was little to which 
 their faith could be pinned as really identified with 
 any of the abounding comic action of the Knicker- 
 bocker History. 
 
 In veritable historical events of the profonndcst 
 gravity and the liveliest dramatic interest, the an- 
 nals of the city and vicinity arc rich. If one docs not 
 
 38
 
 39 
 
 want to go back more than a hundred years he may 
 still find in and about New York houses not yet razed 
 and places not yet built over or otherwise changed 
 out of all recognition, whose connection with the 
 great men and the great deeds of the last century 
 is established beyond dispute. There is no fun in 
 it all, like that supersaturating the Irving fictions of 
 Woutcr Van Twillcr and William the Testy. But 
 to the patriotic, worshipful mind, it is improving if 
 solemn. At all events, more congenial material 
 seeming to fail, it was the last resort of Meldrum 
 and Wad low. 
 
 Casting about for some subject matter for a de- 
 cisive test, in the application of which they could 
 muster up the needed enthusiasm, they finally 
 pitched on the Burr-Hamilton duel at Wechawken. 
 As students of their country's history they had both 
 been deeply impressed by that saddest and most 
 needless of our early political tragedies. It had 
 fixed itself in their minds both by its importance 
 in rudely terminating the brilliant career of one of 
 the most gifted and versatile public men that ever 
 lived and perhaps even more by its intensely 
 spectacular character. They had read all that 
 cautious, impartial historians from time to time had 
 said about it, each one contributing his fresh little 
 grain of fact. They were conversant with the par- 
 tisan lives written respectively by friends and ad-
 
 4 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 mirers and apologists of Burr and Hamilton. These, 
 differing in much else, substantially agreed in their 
 versions of the deadly encounter. After all this 
 reading and reflection on the causes and conse- 
 quences of the most famous of American duels, and 
 on the striking personality of the principals, it would 
 seem to be even easier to cause that combat to be 
 refought on the known scene of its occurrence than 
 to conjure up the new Rotterdam jig that had only 
 been imagined by that roguish young Irving. 
 
 The two friends, in their frequent discussions of 
 this topic, did not then realize the vast difference 
 between fiction told as fact by some great master of 
 the narrative art (whose genius stamps his most fan- 
 tastic creations with the seal of reality) and fact put 
 forth in affidavit style by some scrupulous plodder 
 after the naked truth. They were soon to learn 
 which was the more suitable for the experiments 
 they were making. 
 
 One cool November morning, close upon sunrise, 
 Meldrum and Wad low appeared at the foot of West 
 Seventieth Street, where they knew that some boat 
 could surely be procured to carry them across the 
 Hudson to Wcehawkcn. They might have made 
 the trip comfortably by steam ferry from Forty- 
 second Street, but that would have involved a walk 
 of some distance to the dueling ground. They 
 preferred the more direct journey by small boat,
 
 A MOMENTOUS EXPERIMENT. 41 
 
 because it was in such a craft that each of the dis- 
 tinguished principals, with his second, traversed the 
 river on that fateful July II, 1804, starting, as it 
 might be, from that very spot. Making allowance 
 for the difference of seasons, the hour for embarking 
 was about the same soon after sunrise. Burr and 
 Hamilton could not have eaten much breakfast in 
 the haste of their departure, at dawn, for the rendez- 
 vous. Meldrum and Wadlow had eaten none what- 
 ever. They had indulged the notion, which re- 
 mained to be exploded, that their psychical power 
 (as they provisionally termed it) would probably 
 work better on an empty stomach than a full one. 
 They naturally wished everything to be highly 
 favorable for the forthcoming test, the most delicate 
 and dubious hitherto contrived. A good breakfast 
 on their return to town by nine o'clock, would re- 
 ward or console them, as the case might be. 
 
 Only one boat hovered in waiting at the foot of 
 Seventieth Street when they arrived there blown 
 and wheezing from their fast walk. It was a paint- 
 less, shabby thing, with a good deal of water in it, 
 which the owner, a lank, slouch-hatted fellow, was 
 bailing out with a rusty tin dipper. 
 
 " We want your boat and you with it," was the 
 breathless request of Meldrum. 
 
 For answer the strange being shoved off out of 
 the reach of the new-comers with a quick push of oar
 
 42 77/7: ENCHANTED. 
 
 and then said, "Wot fur?" His eyes and voice be- 
 trayed acute suspicion of something. 
 
 " To cross the river," exclaimed the astonished 
 Meldrum. 
 
 " Yes, 1 know. But wot fur ? " repeated the boat- 
 man, paddling a little further out. 
 
 Though vexed at losing time by the colloquy, 
 Meldrum could not help laughing at the man's 
 inquisitiveness, as he answered, " For the .Burr- 
 Hamilton dueling ground, and we want you to 
 land us as near to it as you can." 
 
 ' Brer llamerton drillin' groun' I never liecrd of 
 it," was the sullen retort, as the speaker put another 
 watery rod between the strangers and himself, and 
 he added as a clincher, " I've bin boatin' roun' here 
 more'n twenty year." 
 
 Meldrum and Wadlow joined in a whistle of 
 amazement. They had rashly taken for granted 
 that every river boatman whose station was any- 
 where opposite the Weehawken shore must at times 
 have ferried to it pilgrims like themselves. They 
 had counted on his services, if required, to pilot 
 them to the scene of the duel after landing. 
 Though they had no doubt about finding it for 
 themselves, failing a guide, so well had they mas- 
 tered the topography of the subject by late and as- 
 siduous inspections of the best authorities. The 
 first thing was to get over the river; and, for some
 
 A MOMENTOUS EXPERIMENT. 43 
 
 reason far from obvious, the boatman was disinclined 
 to transport them. In fact, he was gently paddling 
 himself off all the time. 
 
 "What's the matter? Afraid of us?" shouted 
 Wad low. 
 
 " Well I have ter look out for myself. Some- 
 times I gets taken in ! " 
 
 " Take us in and you wont be, this time," jocosely 
 responded Meldrum, producing a wad of bank-bills 
 in proof of good faith. 
 
 The man's frown relaxed ; but he was not yet 
 satisfied. " Have ycr any plunder 1 mean kits 
 with yer?" he asked, coming a little nearer. 
 
 "Plunder? Kits ?" echoed Wadlow. " Oh, you 
 mean baggage ! None whatever." 
 
 The boatman cast another sharp look at his cus- 
 tomers to be sure they were not deceiving him ; 
 then, as if still a little reluctant, he said : " It's 
 three dollars fur the job over and back inside two 
 hour." 
 
 " Agreed," and the paymaster of the twain 
 counted out the desired sum, which he shook at 
 the man, who now, with quick strokes, brought his 
 leaky boat to shore. Money paid and friends 
 aboard. 
 
 When they had got fairly outside the pier heads, 
 Meldrum broke silence. " Come now, my friend, 
 what did you take us for ? Be honest." His kindly
 
 44 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 manner would have disarmed the stubborncst sus- 
 picion. 
 
 The boatman looked up sheepishly. " No of- 
 fense, yer know I'm sure it's all right now but I 
 jest thought yer might be yer wont get mad 
 
 " No ! no out with it !" 
 
 " I thought mcbbe yer were ycr'll 'xcuse me, I 
 hopes thieves burglars and sich like. Yer see 
 they aliens wants ter cross about sun-up and is allers 
 in a tcr'ble hurry. That's yer case, ycr'll allow." 
 
 Bursts of laughter which threatened to shake the 
 old boat to pieces were the response. Finally Wad- 
 low commanded his features sufficiently to say, 
 "So you took us for thieves, burglars, and sich like," 
 and then went off again. 
 
 " Some of 'em dress better nor yer do," was the 
 rower's candid remark, as he impelled his rickety 
 craft with powerful strokes toward the western 
 shore. 
 
 " 'Taint my line ter be axin questions or mcd- 
 dlin' with other folks' bizncss," he continued, " but I 
 don't want ter get inter no more sich scrapes as I 
 did last Monday mornin'." 
 
 " Tell us about it." 
 
 The boatman then told his story glibly, like 
 one who had oft repeated it to greedy hearers. 
 Stripped of his embellishments it amounted to this: 
 On the morning mentioned two men, as gentleman-
 
 A MOMENTOUS EXPERIMENT. 45 
 
 like as Mold rum and Wadlow, came running down 
 to the dock out of breath. They carried carpet- 
 bags in their hands. They wanted to get to Wee- 
 hawkcn in no time, and would pay the boatman 
 double fare to put in his best licks. He (the narra- 
 tor) thought they acted mighty queer and their 
 gripsacks were uncommon heavy. But, as he said, 
 he never axed no questions. So he took 'em in, 
 and a pair o' jollier gents he never sec. They was 
 larfin' an' singin' all the way and the furder they got 
 from New York the happier they seemed. They'd 
 praise his rowin' and say as how they'd back him 
 agin Hanlon. Then he'd pull on them ash oars 
 jest to the brcakin' pint. Well, that trip beat the 
 record by one minute an' a half, an' when the boat 
 touched shore they both said the double fare was 
 well earned and how thankful they was to strike 
 Jersey safe an' soun'. Next thing he knew they 
 grabbed their kits and jumped off and was over 
 the rocks and inter the bushes like a flash. He 
 yelled arter 'em, " Gimme my money," an' one of 
 'em yelled back, " Charge it to Slungshot Jack," 
 which w r as the name of the biggest cracksman in 
 the whole United States. And what did the gents 
 s'pose they had in them gripsacks ? One hundred 
 thousan' dollars in gole, silver, and bills ! They'd 
 robbed the Nash'nal Dead Sure Bank the night 
 afore. Think of the low down meanness of men
 
 46 THE EX CHANTED. 
 
 who got a hundred thousan' dollar* for nothin', and 
 then bilked a poor boatman out of his fare ! But 
 that warn't all, he added bitterly ; when he rowed 
 back ter the Ner York side, he found two p'licemen 
 waitin' fur him, and they 'rested him as a 'complice 
 fur helpin' the thieves escape, and they wouldn't 
 believe his story of how they cheated him out of 
 his fare. They took him ter the station-house 
 where he was held awhile, and then let go, cos 
 they couldn't prove nothin' agin him. But it was 
 hard lines, gents, and who could blame him fur bein' 
 a little keerful no\v. 
 
 His hearers courteously expressed the interest 
 the}' had taken in this protracted tale, the murmur 
 of whose flow had been broken in upon only by 
 the monotonous clink of the tin dipper against the 
 bottom of the boat as Wadlow ladled out water all 
 the way across. They assured him that he was 
 quite right in being particular about customers. 
 
 Near the point where they now landed a man in 
 pea-jacket, overalls, and mangy fur cap was fishing 
 from a rock. By his side was a basket from which 
 he was mechanically helping himself to cold meat 
 and bread, while he watched an unmoving bit of 
 cork with the patient hopefulness of his kind. 
 
 "What's our short cut to the Burr-Hamilton 
 dueling ground ? " asked Meldrum of this pattern 
 angler.
 
 A MOMENTOUS EXPERIMENT. 47 
 
 The man seemed to grudge withdrawing his eyes 
 a second from that stationary cork. Without glanc- 
 ing at the intruders, he answered, " Durmo nothin' 
 about it." 
 
 " A stranger like ourselves, I sec. I thought you 
 might be living around here. Pardon 1 " 
 
 " I've lived in these parts mornc'n ten year' an' 
 it's the fust time I ever heercl of wot dye call it?" 
 
 " The spot where Burr and Hamilton fought their 
 duel. We want to visit it." 
 
 At the word " fought " the man looked up, with 
 a gleam of intelligence. 
 
 " Oh, it's the old fightin' groun' yer after! Fol- 
 ler that path about ten rod and there ycr are." 
 
 " Thanks," cried Meldrum and Wadlow, and 
 they proceeded to climb with some difficulty the 
 slippery rocks which the ebb tide had just laid 
 bare. As they struck the path indicated, and were 
 about to vanish into the low scraggy bushes, the 
 fisherman hailed them with, " Say, Mister." 
 
 Meldrum, who knew he was the person addressed, 
 turned to receive the communication. 
 
 " If ycr goin' ter have a quiet mill, strickly pri- 
 vate like, me and the boatman '11 go along and 
 see fair play. Hey, mate ? " 
 
 " Suttonly," was the boatman's instant reply, and 
 his face beamed with pleasure. 
 
 The friends woke echoes in the rocky heights
 
 4 8 'J'HE ENCHANTED. 
 
 with peals of laughter. First they \verc taken fur 
 burglars and now for pugilists. What next ? 
 
 "You are very kind," said Meldrum at length, 
 when their mirth had subsided. " .But we are as 
 peaceable as you are. We'll see you later." And 
 no time was lost in covering the specified ten rods 
 twenty by chain measurement. The path, faint at 
 first, soon became barely traceable. The last half of 
 it showed no sign of recent treading. The way was 
 stony, briary, and damp, and the explorers were fain 
 to curse themselves for their quixotism in undertak- 
 ing their tramp before break-fast, when the}' caught 
 sight through the sumac bushes of a comparatively 
 open space. There was the steel-blue river tossing 
 up its wavelets to the sun. There were the big- 
 rocks, fallen ages ago from the beetling heights, 
 picturesque in their mantlings of moss and ivy. 
 There stood the venerable tree it should be cedar 
 for three generations, the book's said, the chief 
 landmark of the dueling ground. Parting the bushy 
 fringe and letting themselves through, the friends 
 found the place less like a bowling alley in shape 
 and dimensions than they had expected. But it 
 was quite conceivable that the notorious resort for 
 disciples of the "code" in 1804, might have been 
 enlarged since that day by the felling of trees for 
 firewood and by the blasting and removal of rock 
 for building purposes. The once restricted area
 
 A MOMENTOUS EXPERIMENT. 49 
 
 might thus have been expanded to accommodate 
 not merely principals, seconds, and surgeon, but a 
 twenty-four foot ring and a select company of spec- 
 tators. It suggested the modern prize-fight rather 
 than the antique duello. 
 
 Meld rum and Wadlow knqw from their reading 
 that the last chip of marble had been knocked off 
 and carried away by relic-hunters, sixty years ago, 
 from the tasteful monument erected by Hamilton's 
 friends, on the spot where he fell, soon after the 
 event. No tree, rock, or board bore any inscription 
 relating to the tragedy. Wadlow caught sight of a 
 faint rude lettering in black paint on the face of an 
 enormous bowlder. Deciphering its weather-worn 
 lines with eager curiosity, he made out this legend : 
 "Here Pat Kilgorc whipped Tom the Smasher in 
 fifty-six rounds, June 24, 18 ." A tribute doubt- 
 less paid by some ardent admirer of the "sport" 
 and the victor. Out of the rubbishy store of his 
 recollections Meldrum at length fished up those two 
 names as having, years before, headed many a news- 
 paper column, many a day, filled with microscopic 
 particulars of the men's training, the state of the 
 betting on them, and everything else antecedent to 
 the "battle of the Giants," which came off at Wec- 
 hawken in due time, and a faithful record of whose 
 sanguinary rounds took up a page and a half of the 
 Trumpeter. Wadlow, on his part, recalled with
 
 5 THE I-:.\CII.1.\TED. 
 
 equal accuracy the gratifying fact that the sheriff 
 and his posse., armed to the teeth, had swept down 
 on the fighters just after the sponge had been 
 thrown up, bagged them and the seconds, and that 
 they had expiated their violation of Jersey's dra- 
 conian statute by a year in Hudson County jail. 
 From that day pugilists have avoided a State so in- 
 hospitable to their order, and the " old fighting 
 ground " of the fisherman had been abandoned to its 
 native weeds and briars. And it was evident that 
 he knew it, not from its distant and now quite for- 
 gotten connection with the Burr-Hamilton duel but 
 from its modern and vulgar association with the last 
 renowned exponents of fisticuffs who faced each 
 other on Jersey soil. 
 
 " We are satisfied that this is the spot, eh? " said 
 Wadlow, with the betraying accent of doubt. 
 
 " Ye yes, especially as I am tired and con- 
 founded hungry." 
 
 In preparing for the task before them the}' had 
 hung long and critically over different portraits of 
 Hamilton and Burr, and had selected those which 
 seemed best to express the character of the men as 
 described by their contemporaries. These had 
 been stored in their minds as images to be projected 
 into space by an effort of the will. It was their 
 design to reduce to a minimum the difficulties of 
 
 o 
 
 this, their first venture, into the domain of plain
 
 A MOMENTOUS EXPERIMENT. 5 1 
 
 history. They had, therefore, resolved to eliminate 
 from the problem the seconds Van Ness and Pendle- 
 ton and Doctor Hosack, and expend their whole 
 psychical force on one tableau, comprising two 
 figures only. This would represent the supreme 
 moment when the Vice-President of the United 
 States took aim and instantly fired and General 
 Hamilton, receiving the fatal bullet, discharged his 
 own pistol in the air and then fell to the ground, 
 face forward. 
 
 They measured off the ten paces in order to fix 
 the exact relative positions of the combatants, 
 Meldrum personating Hamilton at one end of the 
 line, facing the sun, while Wadlow stood for Burr 
 at the other. By way of rehearsal Wadlow raised 
 his right arm, sighted along it, and said "Bang!" 
 Meldrum acted his part with equal fidelity all but 
 the falling headlong. Then, .having stuck two long 
 twigs into the ground to mark the sites, they 
 climbed a rock which commanded a full view of 
 the scene. 
 
 " A beefsteak would have put me in better form 
 for this job, Madison. I don't feel quite up to 
 it, I'm afraid." 
 
 " A hot cup of coffee is what I want, Felix. 
 Hankering after it seems to knock the whole 
 business out of my head. But now we're here, let's 
 try hard."
 
 5 2 TJI1-. f.XCHAXTKD. 
 
 " Here goes," cried Mcldrutn, as a signal to begin. 
 
 " I'm off," was the cheery reply. 
 
 In unison the friends folded their arms, opened 
 their eyes wide, knitted their brows, set their teeth 
 rigidly, strictly conforming to all the physical re- 
 quirements of the game. In two minutes the men- 
 tal strain, coupled with the tension of muscles, 
 brought beads of sweat to their foreheads in the 
 chill November air. Their faces were pale, their 
 lips quivering, in spite of all efforts to shut them 
 tight. 
 
 " Sec anything, Madison ? " This in a hoarse 
 whisper. 
 
 " Nothing, Felix," in a faint, guttural voice. 
 
 " Not a pigtail ? " 
 
 " No, nor a ruffled shirt." 
 
 The allusions here were to t\vo marked features 
 of the attire of each of the duelists, which had 
 been impressed with peculiar distinctness on the 
 minds of the daring experimenters. If these 
 prominences, so to speak', could not be made to 
 appear, by any effort of volition, as precursors of 
 the figures full clad, th.cn it was clearly useless to 
 push the effort any further. 
 
 " Give it up, Felix ? " 
 
 " I hate to, after all the trouble. If we had a bit 
 to cat now, possibly 
 
 " Back in ten minutes, as the cards on office
 
 A MOMENTOUS EXPERIMENT. 53 
 
 doors always say only in this case it wont be half 
 an hour," exclaimed Wadlow gayly, as he jumped 
 through the sumacs and disappeared. 
 
 Meldrum knew that his eccentric comrade was 
 foraging for breakfast, and his absence on that 
 humane mission gave him no anxiety. lie had 
 calmed down and cooled off by the time that Wad- 
 low reported himself, much heated. In one hand 
 was a goodly sausage, in the other a hunch of 
 bread. 
 
 "The fisherman part of his breakfast you 
 know " gasped the obliging fellow. " Better than 
 nothing." 
 
 The half-famished couple divided the supplies, 
 and though, of course, these did not fill the aching 
 void, they assuaged the ache temporarily. Hunger, 
 for the present, would not divert their minds tyran- 
 nically from the feat they had proposed. 
 
 " Now for it ! " 
 
 " I'm with you ! " 
 
 Three more minutes of enforced abstraction, 
 intense thought, and strenuous putting forth of will 
 power, with attendant facial phenomena quite pain- 
 ful to behold. 
 
 " What luck?'' at length murmured Meldrum, not 
 yet removing his eyes from the twig he was trying 
 to turn into Hamilton. 
 
 " Fisherman's luck nothing," sighed Wadlow,
 
 54 THE RXCHA 
 
 who was seeking to erect Burr in place of the other 
 
 stick. 
 
 Recognizing the complete miscarriage of their 
 enterprise, they slid to the ground, and without 
 more ado started for the boat. They were now 
 anxious only to get back to town and a breakfast 
 worthy of the name, the appetizing components of 
 which rose to their minds with a vividness wholly 
 denied to Hamilton and Burr. 
 
 As they retraced the path, they hastily canvassed 
 
 the reasons why this novel experiment, from which 
 
 so much had been hoped, had proved abortive. 
 
 The lack of a substantial meal as a preparative for 
 
 the mysterious operation that should count for 
 
 something, they thought. The lingering doubts as 
 
 to absolute identity of place those had their weight, 
 
 they should say. But they were driven to conclude 
 
 that the most serious, if not the only real trouble, 
 
 lay in the imperfect and confusing mental picture 
 
 of the duel which they had been essaying to set 
 
 forth in palpable form. Neither of them, as they 
 
 now confessed, had derived a luminous, sharply 
 
 defined conception of the scene from the pages of 
 
 any of the unimaginative historians and biographers 
 
 they had consulted about it. The result might 
 
 have been far different had that scene received, in 
 
 advance, the mystic consecration which the true 
 
 enchanter bestows on all he touches.
 
 A MOMENTOUS EXPERIMENT. 55 
 
 Mcldrum and Wadlow were thereafter to ascertain, 
 beyond any manner of doubt, the true and only 
 explanation of the vexatious failure beneath the 
 heights of Weehawken. They were to make other 
 tests in the same line of investigation, and were at 
 last to reach the solid ground of this conclusion, to 
 wit : that no personage and no scene, purely historical, 
 can be conjured up unless previously steeped in the 
 glowing imagination of t lie true enchanter; also, that, 
 when creative genius breathes the breath of life into 
 the dead men and ivomen of history, they become no 
 more vitalised and available, psychically, than the base- 
 less imaginings of the same wonder-working brain.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 WITH SHAKESPEARE IN HIS MACBETH COUNTRY. 
 
 WHEN, in the fullness of time, Mr. Felix Meklrum 
 was enabled to arrange his affairs for his first trip to 
 Europe, it was a cause of much regret that the 
 sympathetic Wadlow could not accompany him. 
 Meklrum had been fortunate in his struggle for a 
 competence ; Wadlow the reverse. The one could 
 take a protracted vacation with a full purse and a 
 mind at case. The other was tied down by condi- 
 tions that made economy and continuous strict 
 personal attention to business indispensable to 
 meeting his living expenses. It was a familial- 
 illustration of that irony of fate which separates 
 deeply attached friends by the barriers of circum- 
 stance. 
 
 When Meldrum parted with Wadlow on the 
 steamer's deck, he knew that he should greatly 
 miss, in Europe, the society of the comrade of his 
 little rambles at home. But he did not realize- 
 one never does till it is lacking the extreme scar- 
 city of full companionship. In his inexperience, he 
 expected to pick up new acquaintances, from time 
 
 56
 
 WITH SHAKESPEARE. 57 
 
 to time, who would share his own enthusiasm in 
 visiting those places abroad to which his heart most 
 fondly turned because they were hallowed by 
 genius. For the small taste of such exquisite as- 
 sociations which he had enjoyed in his own coun- 
 try, had whetted his appetite for them to a keen 
 edge. 
 
 His trip to Europe was wholly prompted by a 
 desire to feast his full on this subtlest of pleasures. 
 Greatly to his disappointment, he found no one 
 among the steamer's passengers who filled Wad- 
 low's place in any respect. Such a paragon there 
 might have been on board, but, if so, he remained 
 undiscovered by Meldrum, because he was an 
 integer in some social group already made up, to 
 which admission was not to be had by an outsider 
 on any terms. He played whist in .the smoking 
 room and shovel-board on deck ; he was good- 
 humored and affable to everybody within reach of 
 his voice at the meals which he never missed ; he 
 improved every occasion to rivet a friendship with 
 some man of about his own age (he confessed to 
 thirty) ; but all his approaches, even toward the 
 amiable sharer of his stateroom, were unsuccessful 
 beyond a certain point. There was not one among 
 them all who echoed, like Wadlow, his inmost 
 thoughts and aspirations. And, if some substitute 
 for that incomparable man had been found, destiny
 
 $8 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 would, doubtless, have foreordained for him a route 
 through Europe entirely different from that which 
 Mcldrum had marked out for himself. 
 
 When he stepped on the Liverpool dock at the 
 end of the voyage, his loneliness became oppres- 
 sively painful. lie had exchanged hearty goocl- 
 bys with some nice people; but none among them 
 had asked him to join them in their land journey- 
 ings, and there were none with whom he would 
 have cared for that close intimacy if he had been 
 invited. He felt that he was craving something 
 which was, in the nature of things, unattainable. 
 Driven back on himself, his pride revolted at the 
 thought of being so helplessly dependent on the 
 sympathy of others. He tried to shake off the 
 depression. Pie laughed at his own silly weakness. 
 He said to himself, " Surely a man of my age 
 should have resources within himself, lie should 
 not mope and whine like a child because he is left 
 alone. It is too absurd." 
 
 Mcldrum's sinking spirits rose again with these 
 encouraging reflections. He addressed himself 
 quite cheerfully to the prosaic formalities of passing 
 the Custom House. These discharged, he took the 
 next train for the north, his destination being the 
 land over which two of the greatest enchanters that 
 ever lived Scott and Burns have cast their spell. 
 The season was early for Scotland, and not a single
 
 WITH SHAKESPEARE. 59 
 
 one of his passing acquaintances on ship-board 
 entered the train with him. They were all bound 
 for London. 
 
 Meldrum heartily congratulated himself on the 
 fact that he should at least be free from the swarm 
 of ordinary tourists whose headlong haste and im- 
 pertinent chatter would only have annoyed him as 
 he paid his devotions at the shrines of genius. 
 Here he was mistaken. The time was fast coming 
 when he would have been glad to exchange impres- 
 sions with the flightiest and least enlightened of 
 fellow-travelers who were " doing " Europe only to 
 say they had done it ; not, like himself, in pursuit 
 of a refined and exalted pleasure. 
 
 At Dumfries, at Ayr, at Abbotsford, Melrose 
 and Dryburgh Abbeys, on Lakes Katrine and 
 Lomoncl, in the Trossachs, wherever, in bonny Scot- 
 land, Burns and Scott were summoned to his mem- 
 ory by some indelible local associations with their 
 immortal works, he would have given something 
 for an inclining ear into which he might have 
 poured himself without stint. It was a question no 
 longer of perfect sympathy, but of a tolerant list- 
 ener. Such a one was not met with for the good 
 reason that Meldrum was an unseasonable pioneer 
 of the great annual pilgrimage which would overrun 
 Scotland a month or two later. The only persons 
 he encountered were commercial travelers or na-
 
 Go 
 
 tivcs with whom he (perhaps foolishly) disliked to 
 air his heated fancies. It was only with the profes- 
 sional and feed custodians and guides that he could 
 talk out of the abundance of his heart ; and it 
 always happened that they wanted to monopoli/c 
 the talking and looked upon his rhapsodies as un- 
 pleasant interruptions. 
 
 More and more he missed the kindly, genial, 
 thoughtful Wadlow, not merely as the man of all 
 men who understood him, but as the sole sharer of 
 that strange, new power of reproducing scenes and 
 repcopling them out of the treasure house of mem. 
 ory. Castles, abbeys, lochs, rivers, bridges, hills 
 and valleys, famed in story and song, were all under 
 the spell of enchanters ; but he found that to break 
 the seals and to enter upon the full enjoyment of 
 these objects and places required the aid of a 
 wholly sympathetic heart and mind, such as Wad- 
 low, alone, of all on his list of friends, possessed. 
 To him, late at night, Meldrum would unbosom 
 himself in long letters descriptive of his travels and 
 impressions, and would receive prompt answers 
 running over with appreciation and sympathy. 
 This correspondence mitigated the pain of separa- 
 tion ; but nothing is exchangeable for the presence 
 of dear old-time friends, face to face. 
 
 In his delightful rambles among the guide-books, 
 preparatory to going abroad, Meldrum had noticed
 
 WITH SHAKESPEARE. 6 1 
 
 several appetizing allusions to the Macbeth country 
 visitable by the Highland Railway. It was boldly 
 claimed that the blasted heath where the witches 
 performed their impious rites, and the identical Bir- 
 nam Wood, could be seen from the passing trains. 
 It mattered little to him whether these claims were 
 true or not. Had he considered the subject in cold 
 blood, he would doubtless have decided that 
 Shakespeare drew upon his exhaustless imagination 
 for the scenery of " Macbeth," as well as for that of 
 " Romeo and Juliet " and the " Merchant of Ven- 
 ice." He would have cynically made up his mind 
 that the Witches' Heath and the wood of Birnam 
 were after-thoughts and cheap advertisements of the 
 Highland Railway Company and the innkeepers. 
 But the mood of enthusiasts is never skeptical. He 
 longed to catch glimpses, if only flying ones, of the 
 scenes associated with a master work of Shake- 
 speare. With this purpose, he found himself one 
 fine morning in June on a train bound from Inver- 
 ness to Perth. 
 
 The fat green guidebook which he carried local- 
 ized the Macbeth country with sufficient precision. 
 But he did not want to be continually on the alert 
 with eyes and ears for fear of missing the objects of 
 his pilgrimage. So, when the guard closed the 
 door of his carriage at Inverness, Meldrum tipped 
 him a half-crown with the request that he should
 
 62 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 be told when they were approaching Birnam Wood 
 and the Witches' Heath. The guard grinned as he 
 nodded and pocketed the silver. The grin an- 
 noyed Meldrum, for it conveyed, as plainly as 
 words, the man's disbelief in the identity of the 
 places in question. But he was less disturbed by it 
 than by a palpable smile on the face of a well- 
 dressed man who sat opposite to him. This person 
 had been reading the London Standard, which he 
 lowered to his knees when he heard Meldrum's re- 
 mark to the guard. The smile which he delivered 
 broadside would have been followed up with some 
 observation equally impertinent, no doubt if 
 Meldrum had not frowned and pulled his traveling 
 cap over his eyes, and buried himself columns deep 
 in his own morning paper. This he pretended to 
 read very hard. Occasionally he would steal a 
 glance at the person before him, who was also 
 seemingly immersed in his journal, but upon whose 
 lips and eyes that smile still lingered. Meldrum 
 knew that he was facing one of those terrible 
 doubters for whom all history is a lavish embroid- 
 ery of fact with fiction, and every legend a pure lie. 
 Silence reigned on both sides, while the two oc- 
 cupants of the carriage kept up the elaborate pre- 
 tense of reading, occasionally varied by glances at 
 the landscape through which the train was leisurely 
 jogging.
 
 WITH SHAKESPEARE. 63 
 
 Presently the guard appeared and tapped upon 
 the glass, which was promptly lowered in response. 
 The smile upon his face this time was broader than 
 before, as he cried out, "Witches' 'Eath, please, 
 sir, in three minutes. The train slows up for it." 
 A blush, compounded of vexation and shame, for 
 he did not like to be looked upon as the dupe even 
 of a cozening guide-book, mantled Meldrum's 
 cheeks. This deepened as he chanced to catch, 
 just then, the intensely amused expression on the 
 countenance of his I'is-h-i'is. 
 
 " 'Ere we are," exclaimed the guide, again grin- 
 ning diabolically, at the window. 
 
 Meldrum's quick ear caught the sound as of a 
 laugh from his provoking neighbor. It jarred pain- 
 fully on the serious associations of the time and 
 place, and went far to deprive the poor man of any 
 pleasure he might have taken in a cursory view of 
 the Witches' Heath. Heroically trying to forget 
 the annoyance, he thrust his head out of the win- 
 dow, in wanton violation of the rules, and gazed 
 upon the scene intently. The heath was a blasted 
 one indeed, so far fully answering to Shakespeare's 
 description. It was full of scraggy bushes, withered 
 and leafless. Some of these reached a height of six 
 or eight feet, with black branches, crooked and 
 forked, recalling to Meldrum the long wands used 
 by the three hags of the play in the incantation
 
 64 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 scene. The heath was framed by dark \voods, which 
 seemed a fit hiding-place for all uncanny creatures 
 that hated the light. As Aleldrum peered into the 
 gloomy depths of this forest he saw a tall, skinny 
 woman hovering upon its border. It was really 
 only a native who was boldly trespassing on the ac- 
 cursed domain to pick up a little fire-wood. But 
 if Meldrum had not been conscious of a mocking 
 
 o 
 
 eye fastened upon him at that interesting moment, 
 he would have given reins to his imagination, lie 
 would have accepted that spectral figure, with a 
 broken branch in her hand, as one of Shakespeare's 
 witches, capriciously showing herself in broad day. 
 If his railway carriage were only emptied of 
 that miserable literalist and skeptic! If anybody, 
 no matter how ignorant, were at hand to whom 
 he might impart his emotions without fear of 
 ridicule ! Best of all, if Wadlow the sympa- 
 thetic were by his side! lie could not suppress a 
 deep sigh, as he drew his head into the carriage at a 
 turn of the road which shut out the dismal scene. 
 Circumstances had robbed him of nine tenths of 
 the pleasure he might have derived from the 
 blasted heath. 
 
 " Well, how do you like it?" was the question put 
 to him by the disagreeable man on the opposite seat, 
 with sarcasm in every syllable. 
 
 " I like it very much if you will let me," re-
 
 WITH SHAKESPEARE. 65 
 
 plied Meldrum, determined to defend the spot from 
 all assaults, whatever his private misgivings about it 
 might be. 
 
 " I wouldn't mar your happiness for worlds," said 
 the person addressed, still smiling in a superior way, 
 " I quite envy you the readiness with which you take 
 the blasted heath as a fact instead of a coinage of 
 Shakespeare's brain." 
 
 There was no better way out of the difficulty 
 than to stand up for the world's bard against all 
 comers. 
 
 " I fully believe in it," said Meldrum, with an im- 
 passive face. 
 
 " What, that Shakespeare had that place in his 
 mind's eye, as the scene of the witches' talk with 
 Macbeth? " 
 
 " Undoubtedly ; he came up from London and 
 picked it out before he wrote the play." 
 
 " Whew ! Perhaps you will next say that you be- 
 lieve the play itself to be all true?" 
 
 " Every word of it," replied Meldrum, slapping his 
 hand on his knee, as was his wont when excited. 
 
 " Including the witches themselves and the ghost 
 of Banquo? " 
 
 ''Them 'most of all. I swallow my Shakespeare 
 whole." 
 
 Every feature in his fellow-traveler's expressive 
 English face betrayed astonishment. This was sue-
 
 66 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 ceedcd by a puzzled look, as if, on reflection, he 
 thought he might be the subject of a little practical 
 joke on the part of the American. He had often 
 heard that Americans were addicted to practical 
 joking, lint at that moment no appropriate remark 
 occurred to him. And had it occurred, it would 
 probably not have been uttered, for the reason that 
 Melclrum had raised the barrier of two thicknesses 
 of newspaper to further intercourse. One cannot 
 well pursue a conversation which another deliber- 
 ately fends off in that way. 
 
 After a protracted silence, during which Meldrum 
 feigned to take a nap in the corner of the carriage, 
 with the paper before his eyes, the guard re-ex- 
 hibited himself at the window. 
 
 " Beg parcling, sir," said he, in a loud voice, to 
 wake the American from his supposed slumber, 
 "but we're a-coming to Birnam Wood leastways 
 wo't there is of it." 
 
 Meldrum opened his eyes and could not fail to re- 
 mark again the damnable grin which followed these 
 words. And unless he was much mistaken, there 
 was something very like a wink of the guard's eye 
 in the direction of the skeptical gentleman, who 
 hoisted his paper again, presumably to hide an out- 
 burst of mirth. His tremulous hands, a moment 
 afterward, indicated that he was vainly struggling 
 to suppress a convulsion behind it.
 
 WITH SHAKESPEARE. 67 
 
 But, true to his professed faith in the preten- 
 sions of the Macbeth country, Meldrum rose and 
 protruded his head into the open air so as to lose 
 not one inch of the coming view. The slowing of 
 the engine announced the moment when passen- 
 gers should be on the lookout for Birnam Wood. 
 But, though all alive, he would not have known 
 when he came to it, save for the timely prompting 
 of the guard, who presented himself once more 
 and, with an ill-suppressed chuckle, pointed to two 
 mighty spreading oak trees, adding, "The rest of 
 'em went to Dunsinane, you know." It was the 
 guard's regular little jest ; and it had oft been rec- 
 ognized and approved with a smile, but it caused 
 no relaxation in Meldrum's set visage, though a 
 sound as of a smothered snort responded to it from 
 the depths of the carriage. 
 
 If the twin survivors of Birnam Wood had been 
 a grove of the first magnitude, Meldrum could not 
 have displayed a livelier interest in the majestic 
 souvenirs of the immortal tragedy. He looked and 
 looked till long after the noble old trees were lost 
 to sight. Then he pulled in his head and closed 
 his eyes again as his most significant hint that he 
 was to be strictly let alone, and the unpleasant per- 
 son facing him respected it. But it was a real re- 
 lief when, soon afterward, that individual reached 
 his journey's end and got out, leaving the senti-
 
 68 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 mental pilgrim to thank God and meditate undis- 
 turbed upon a proposition which he had been for 
 some time turning over indecisively. " Yes," said 
 he, at last, addressing vacancy in his most energetic 
 manner, " I'll send for clear old Wadlow this very 
 night. If he doubles my expenses, he will treble 
 my happiness. A man to talk to one of my own 
 sort besides is cheap at any price." 
 
 That night were mailed from Perth to New York 
 two letters : one was superscribed, " Madison Wad- 
 low, Esq., Attorney-at-Law, Van der Trump Build- 
 ing," entreating him by the sacred bonds of their 
 most ancient friendship to leave his lambs of 
 clients to the tender mercies of other wolves, and 
 report without delay at the Golden Cross Motel, 
 Strand, London. The other letter bore the address 
 " Spinnagc & Mcldrum, Bankers, Broad Street," 
 and made ample provision for Wadlow's traveling 
 expenses.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 WITH DICKENS AT THE BULL INN EXTRAORDI- 
 NARY MEETING OF THE NEW PICKWICK CLUB. 
 
 THE Pickwick Club, convened in extraordinary 
 session at the Bull Inn, Rochester, could not have 
 chosen a better night f r their formal reception of 
 Mr. Felix Meldrum and Mr. Madison Wadlow. The 
 high, cold wind, howling through the deserted 
 streets of the old cathedral town, and the heavy rain 
 that beat fiercely against the window panes, made 
 the snug club room with its cheerful open fire and 
 its closely drawn red curtains seem most delightful 
 by force of contrast. 
 
 The meeting place of the club was an oblong 
 apartment of moderate size, with a low-raftered ceil- 
 ing, buff-painted walls, and freshly-sanded floor; two 
 even dozen of large arm-chairs, leather-cushioned 
 and enticing; in the center a round mahogany table, 
 and on one side a smaller table, fronting a chair, the 
 tall, finely-carved back of which proclaimed its dig- 
 nity and discomfort as the presiding seat. It was 
 occupied by Joseph Smiggers, Esq., Perpetual Vice- 
 President of the Pickwick Club. In private life he 
 
 6g
 
 7 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 bore quite another name, and his high reputation as a 
 physician and all the qualities that go to make up a 
 worthy citizen and a glorious good fellow, were co- 
 extensive with the County of Kent. In the Pick- 
 wick Papers he receives but a single mention, and no 
 portrayal of his person or character is attempted. 
 It only appears from the record in the first chapter 
 of that immortal work, that his firm yet conciliatory 
 manner aided powerfully in averting, fora time, the 
 fatal breach between the founder and Mr. "Blotton 
 (of Aldgatc). The new Pickwick Club was happily 
 exempt from rival ambitions and jealousies ; but, 
 had any personal controversy arisen to embitter the 
 sweet monotony of its sittings, the successor and 
 namesake of Joseph Smiggers, Esq., would, by his 
 unfailing tact and good temper, have done much to 
 restore harmony. 
 
 The club was organized some years ago to bring 
 together statedly the choicest spirits of Rochester 
 under a name which they all loved. It consists of 
 only twenty members. On occasions of ceremony 
 they all wear the original, prescribed costume of a 
 bright blue dress coat with gilt buttons, bearing the 
 initials " P. C.," with whatever other modern articles 
 of attire please their individual tastes. It is a 
 cause of regret that the Posthumous Papers of the 
 parent club did not provide names enough to go 
 round among this score of members. But the most
 
 WITH DICKENS A T THE BULL INN. 7 1 
 
 is made of the few that were handed down, and it is 
 deemed a great honor to be chosen by ballot to bear 
 them for the period of one year, while to be re- 
 elected to the distinction is justly regarded as one of 
 the most gratifying of compliments. 
 
 On this eventful night, at the moment we are 
 raising the curtain to disclose the Innocent secrets 
 of the club, Mr. Winkle was standing with his back 
 to the fire, gently toasting himself, Mr. Snodgrass 
 was pushing aside a thick curtain and trying to peer 
 into darkness with no other object than to kill time, 
 and Mr. Tupman was sitting with a leg thrown over 
 the arm of a chair and drumming absent-mindedly 
 upon the center-table. This historic trio were 
 known to the outside world, respectively, as a junior 
 barrister, a curate, and a country gentleman who 
 lived on his estate near Gad's Hill, Higham, by 
 Rochester, Kent, for some years a neighbor and 
 friend of Dickens, and who had not missed a meet- 
 ing of the club since its organization. Near him, 
 with a seriously preoccupied look upon his other- 
 wise genial face, as if he were settling upon the ex- 
 act phraseology of a few remarks to be made later 
 on, sat a portly gentleman, head of one of the oldest 
 county families, rich, benevolent, and universally 
 liked, whose name in these pages shall be entered 
 only as Mr. Blotton (of Aldgate), of whose restora- 
 tion to membership, after a long-enforced absence, a
 
 72 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 word may be necessary. Though the original Mr. 
 Blotton made an ignominious failure of his pre- 
 sumptuous attempt to underrate the importance of 
 Mr. Pickwick's great archaeological discovery, and 
 was justly expelled from the club in 1827, there is 
 no reason to suppose that, in his exile from that 
 charmed circle, he may not have been delighted, 
 like the rest of the world, with the published report 
 of its transactions, apart from his own unfortunate 
 connection with it. Perfect cordiality among the 
 members being properly regarded as an object to be 
 fostered in the formation of the new Pickwick Club, 
 it was deemed advisable to forget the one painful in- 
 cident in the history of the old one, to rehabilitate 
 Mr. Blotton (of Aldgatc) and restore him to a full 
 and recognized standing, and thus add another to 
 the too few names available for club uses on special 
 occasions. 
 
 Twenty-four hours notice that two Americans, 
 warm admirers of Dickens and pilgrims to the inns 
 and other places commemorated in the Pickwick 
 Papers, were to be ceremonially received that night, 
 had sufficed to bring out every member in spite of 
 the storm. 
 
 Nothing broke the silence of the room but the 
 crackling of the fire and Mr. Tupman's tattoo, exe- 
 cuted with increasing vigor. It was the hush that 
 preceded a long-expected tread of boots outside the
 
 WITH DICKENS AT THE BULL INN. 73 
 
 door. As the sound drew nearer, every member 
 stood erect in an attitude of reception. The door 
 opened, and lo ! Mr. Pickwick himself, framed 
 there like a full-length portrait from life, the bright 
 light of the room bringing him out in full relief 
 against the partial darkness of the hall. From 
 gaiters to spectacles the likeness was faultless. 
 The person upon whom fell the exalted responsi- 
 bility of reviving Mr. Pickwick to the eye of flesh 
 possessed admirable natural qualifications for his 
 task. He was short and stout. That periphery 
 which comes of a happy disposition and generous 
 feeding belonged to him, as to the founder of 
 beloved memory. His, too, were the beaming eyes 
 and the winning smile of the great original. While 
 he lives as the central figure and leading spirit of 
 the Pickwick Club of Rochester, it will not fall to 
 pieces ; and as long as he presides at Quarter 
 Sessions, under his real and honored name, none but 
 the most incorrigible rogues will receive justice un- 
 tempered by mercy. 
 
 Behind him appeared Meldrum and Wadlow, in 
 conventional evening dress. As the three entered 
 the room, they were received with a warm salute 
 of hand-clapping, which subsided on a signal from 
 Mr. Pickwick, who then performed the ceremony of 
 a comprehensive introduction in these words : (As 
 he spoke, he thrust one hand behind his coat tail,
 
 74 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 and gracefully waved the other to assist his glowing 
 declamation, after the manner of his great proto- 
 type.) 
 
 " Pickwickians ! The illustrious man whose un- 
 worthy representative I am (" No ! No ! " and cheers) 
 made one of his greatest discoveries by pure 
 accident, you remember. You know by anticipa- 
 tion that I allude to the wayside stone with that 
 mysterious inscription which a distinguished Pick- 
 wickian of his day (I will not say rival and detrac- 
 tor in the presence of our friend Blotton of 
 Aldgate) pronounced to be nothing more than ' Bill 
 Stumps His Mark.' But no one will for a 
 moment gainsay the undoubted value of an acci- 
 dental discovery recently made by me, for it is no 
 less than that of these two American gentlemen, 
 whom I now have the extreme pleasure of intro- 
 ducing to you. (Immense cheering, during which 
 the recipients of the honor modestly bowed, with 
 their hands on their hearts.) 
 
 "Let me tell you how and where I found them. 
 The other morning I strolled out to Fort Pitt 
 for exercise. As I drew near the spot where 
 Mr. Winkle and Dr. Slammer of the Ninety- 
 seventh met to settle their little misunderstanding, 
 I observed two gentlemen pacing off ground with 
 the greatest care. Having finally measured it to 
 their perfect satisfaction, they took their position
 
 WITH DICKENS AT THE BULL INN. 75 
 
 at the ends of an imaginary line and raised their 
 right arms toward one another. Were they about 
 to fight a duel? Unfortunately I had left my 
 spectacles at home and could not see distinctly 
 whether their hands held pistols or not. Their 
 attitudes were certainly hostile. My magisterial 
 duty was plain. I must interfere to prevent the 
 effusion of blood and punish those who dared to 
 violate the law even by intention. ' Hold ! ' I 
 cried, at the top of my voice, running toward them 
 as fast as my weight would permit ; ' I am a magis- 
 trate.' The two gentlemen burst out laughing, 
 and when I reached them in a breathless condition, 
 it was some minutes before they could recover 
 themselves. Meanwhile, I noticed no signs of 
 deadly weapons ; and the hilarious manner of the 
 supposed duelists convinced me that they were the 
 best of friends. 'Excuse me, gentlemen,' I said; 
 ' there is evidently some mistake here.' 
 
 " ' None on our part I hope,' said the taller of 
 the two (Meldrum nodded his corroboration of the 
 words.) ' We should be very sorry to have spent 
 an hour trying to identify the scene of the Slam- 
 mer-Winkle duel that didn't come off, and be 
 mistaken after all. We thought we had found it 
 and were for the moment imagining ourselves 
 Winkle and Slammer respectively. It was a 
 tableau representing the principals taking aim just
 
 76 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 before the surgeon of the Ninety-seventh, having 
 put on his glasses, discovered that Winkle was not 
 the man with whom he had the difficulty the night 
 before. You must think it very foolish,' continued 
 the gentleman, ' but we arc Americans, on the track 
 of the Pickwick Club. Perhaps you can tell us if 
 this is the place we arc in search of.' 
 
 " ' It is,' said I, repressing my pleasure at recog- 
 nizing a spirit kindred to our own. (Deafening 
 applause.) 
 
 " ' Are you sure ?' asked the other gentleman, with 
 anxiety, which showed the deep interest he took in 
 the answer. 
 
 " ' I ought to be,' I cried, no longer able to con- 
 tain myself, ' for I am Mr. Pickwick.' They looked 
 at me with astonishment, evidently supposing I was 
 mad. 
 
 "'Well, you look like him, anyhow' they then 
 said. (A ringing volley of laughter from the club 
 entire testified the truth of this remark.) 
 
 " ' When I say I am Mr. Pickwick,' I continued, ' I 
 mean that that is my official title as President of 
 the new Pickwick Club. You must follow the trail 
 of the club to its lair at the Bull Inn, where I 
 pledge you a rousing reception.' 
 
 " ' A thousand thanks,' they said ; ' but you do 
 not know who we are '; and they proceeded to hunt 
 for their cards.
 
 WITH DICKENS A T THE BULL INN. 77 
 
 " ' Your names matter not,' I replied. ' It will 
 suffice for the club that you are Americans, sharing 
 our admiration for the matchless humor of Charles 
 Dickens as shown in the Pickwick Papers, and pay- 
 ing the highest tribute to his genius by visiting this 
 spot.' " (Frantic cheering, which cut short any 
 further explanation from Mr. Pickwick, if any had 
 been needed, as it was not.)
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE NEW PICKWICK CLUB ELECTS TWO HON- 
 ORARY MEMBERS. 
 
 MELDRUM did not possess the gift of fluent pub- 
 lic speaking attributed to all Americans by foreign- 
 ers, but he recognized the necessity of upholding 
 that current belief to the best of his humble ability. 
 He sidled up to the little table of the Vice-Chair- 
 man, put one hand on it to steady himself, and 
 thrust the other into the recesses of his vest to 
 get that unruly member out of the way. The 
 Pickwickians had seated themselves (at a gesture 
 from their revered chief) and were looking at him 
 through the kindest of eyes. Mr. Pickwick himself 
 stood by his side, his head slightly bent forward to 
 lose not a word. Meld rum felt that he was indeed 
 among his friends. Thus emboldened, he began by 
 modestly returning thanks for the extraordinary com- 
 pliment paid to two men whose only possible title to 
 it was their profound admiration of Dickens's master- 
 piece. (Resounding cries of " That is enough ! " 
 " But you are Americans, too ! " Mr. Pickwick him- 
 self audibly added, " We love 'em.") These warm 
 
 73
 
 THE NEW PICKWICK CLUB. 79 
 
 expressions greatly reduced the intensity of Mel- 
 drum's nervousness. He came to look upon his 
 hearers not as an audience but as a family circle, to 
 which he was not making a speech but only talking 
 conversationally. After a few halts and mumbles 
 he said what he had to say in a manner which his 
 subsequent recollection of it did not wholly condemn. 
 He gave the Pickwickians a little outline of what 
 his friend and himself had done in England during 
 the previous month. When in London they had 
 lodged at the Golden Cross, Strand, from which an- 
 cient inn the coach had set out that bore Mr. Pick- 
 wick and his friends to Rochester and world-wide 
 fame. They had never looked out of their parlor 
 window without recalling in imagination, and he 
 might say witnessing, (sensation) the assault upon the 
 little group of Pickwickians by the infuriated cab- 
 man. They had fondly recreated every feature of 
 the scene and struggle. In this labor of love they 
 would have been much assisted if they had known 
 the precise locality of that pump under which the 
 hot-pie man suggested that the supposed informers 
 should be put. Could some gentleman present tell 
 them where it was situated ? (" In the court-yard 
 of the old inn, now closed up and built over," re- 
 sponded Mr. Pickwick instantly, for he was a per- 
 fect encyclopaedia of information on the subject.) 
 Meldrum had feared that his curiosity on this point
 
 8o THE EX CHAN TED. 
 
 might be thought trivial. (Cries of " It docs you 
 honor," " Nothing is trifling to the true Pickwick- 
 ian," "We love you for it," etc., etc.) They had 
 spent a delightful day tracing out what was 
 left alas too little ! of the White Hart and the 
 George and Vulture. They confessed that the 
 Wellers, father and son, interested them quite as 
 much as any of the other heroes of the enchanting 
 story save the one and only Samuel Pickwick, Es- 
 quire. (The Pickwick of the hour smilingly bowed 
 his thanks.) In saying this they would be under- 
 stood to derogate nothing from the great claims 
 that Mr. Winkle, Mr. Tupman, and Air. Snodgrass, 
 must ever have on their respectful homage as the 
 immediate comrades of the renowned leader. (Here 
 the junior barrister, the curate, and the gentleman 
 from Gad's Hill rose and made mute acknowledg- 
 ments.) Of course, as Pickwickian pilgrims they 
 had not omitted Guildhall and Gray's Inn and other 
 localities introduced in the matchless episode of the 
 case of Bardell vs. Pickwick. And it need hardly 
 be said that they had not forgotten Furnival's Inn, 
 in an upper chamber of which that book was written 
 which is richer in genuine humor and contains a 
 larger number and variety of original and interest- 
 ing characters than any other one book of any 
 country or any age. (Stentorian applause.) If there 
 was any scapegrace in the whole range of fiction
 
 THE NEW PICKWICK CLUB. 81 
 
 more fascinating than Bob Sawyer, they had not 
 yet found him. It was Bob Sawyer's party that 
 had inspired them to undertake a thorough explo- 
 ration of Lant Street, in the Borough, for the ro- 
 mantic purpose of fixing upon Mrs. Raddles's lodg- 
 ing-house. As the Pickwick Papers afforded no 
 clew to that domicile, they had preconceived a 
 building very old and rickety, some least desira- 
 ble survivor of the unfittest among the improve- 
 ments of the last fifty years, as one that might, per- 
 haps, have been in Dickens's eye. Great was their 
 disappointment to discover that most of the houses 
 in Lant Street answered that general description. 
 It was a question which one of a hundred shabby 
 fronts should be mentally associated in the future 
 with Bob Sawyer's party. They had reluctantly 
 given it up after inspecting Lant Street from end 
 to end. (Murmurs of sympathy, as every member of 
 the club recalled his equally unsuccessful efforts to 
 do the same thing.) Not less fruitless was their 
 persevering labor to identify Mr. Pickwick's resi- 
 dence in Goswell Street. They would never dare 
 to tell anybody but a confirmed Pickwickian, that 
 they had walked up that street on one side and 
 down on the other, and actually canvassed the proba- 
 bilities that this or that or the other very old house 
 was the one where Mrs. Bardell was the landlady 
 and Mr. Pickwick the contented lodger, till she made
 
 8 2 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 him defendant in the funniest breach-of-promise 
 suit ever reported. They had taken many walks 
 and rides about London on similar expeditions, 
 which some would doubtless call sentimental. (Cries 
 of " So they are ! " " That is the highest praise ! ") 
 Possibly foolish. ("No never!") Some were suc- 
 cessful, others not. But they (Messrs. Meldrum 
 and Wadlow) were free to say that their search in 
 that great city for places explicitly mentioned or 
 vaguely referred to in the Pickwick Papers, had been 
 for them the chief pleasure of their first visit to 
 London. They could specify no better proof than 
 their own delightful experience of the immense 
 power wielded upon receptive minds by one of 
 the truest enchanters that ever lived Charles 
 Dickens. (Prolonged and tumultuous applause, 
 every member rising and waving his handkerchief.) 
 When quiet was restored, Meldrum summarized 
 briefly the rest of their Pickwickian journeyings up 
 to date. They had not conformed to the exact 
 itinerary of Mr. Pickwick and his friends. For con- 
 venience they had reserved Rochester as the last, 
 and, it might be added, the best. (" Hear! Hear!" 
 from all parts of the room.) After an excursion 
 from London to the Marquis of Gran by at Dork- 
 ing, out of respect to the memory of Mrs. Weller 
 and the saintly Stiggins, they had struck due west 
 for Bath. The White Hart Hotel, the Grand Pump
 
 THE NEW PICKWICK CLUti. 83 
 
 Room, the Royal Crescent where the four Pick- 
 wickians lodged during the greater part of their 
 stay at Bath, and High Street, upon which had 
 stood, in former years, the small green grocer's 
 shop where Mr. Weller shared a friendly " swarry " 
 with a select company of the Bath footmen all 
 these had a peculiar charm solely derivable from 
 their incidental mention in the Posthumous Papers 
 of the Pickwick Club. They had tasted the cha- 
 lybeate waters only to certify the accuracy of Mr. 
 Wcller's statement that " they'd a wery strong 
 flavor o' warm flat-irons." Thence to the Bush 
 Inn, Bristol, scene of the Winkle-Dowler difficulty. 
 Besides the happiness of recalling that ludicrous oc- 
 currence with the aid of all the original scenic 
 properties, it had been their good fortune to settle, 
 quite beyond cavil, the precise location of Mr. Bob 
 Sawyer's surgery. At all events, the premises to 
 which the speaker referred tallied, inside and out, in 
 the minutest particulars, with those where Mr. Saw- 
 yer kept up his delusive show of professional em- 
 ployment. The red lamp and the inscription, "sur- 
 gery," in golden characters on a wainscot ground, 
 still existed (Meldrum was pleased to say) to assure 
 the world that the same "snug little business" was 
 yet carried on at the same old stand to this day. 
 (At this announcement a thrill of delight like a 
 wave passed over the little audience.)
 
 84 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 The Angel at Bury St. Edmunds, the White 
 Horse at Ipswich, the Leather Bottle at Cobham, 
 and the Bull at Rochester (as to which they fully 
 corroborated Mr. Jingle's encomium of "good house 
 nice beds"), comprised the other Pickwick Inns, 
 as they might be called, at which they had lodged 
 and fed. He trusted it did not smack of irreverence 
 or vulgarity when he added that these old hostcl- 
 ries were always far more interesting to himself 
 and friend than any cathedral, or abbey, or castle, 
 or princely seat in the same locality, and that they 
 were endeared to them by associations as real and 
 precious as those that history links with any struc- 
 ture whatever reared by human hands. (Great ap- 
 plause.) Meldrum would not longer detain his 
 kind friends with details however pleasurable to 
 themsclevcs of their wanderings, but would con- 
 clude by again thanking the club for the most hos- 
 pitable reception which had been accorded them. 
 (The speaker and Wadlow here seated themselves 
 in yawning arm-chairs, which were thrust under 
 them amid a whirlwind of cheers.) 
 
 The portly gentleman who has been already 
 mentioned in these pages as wearing a preoccupied 
 look, rose to his feet. When he was recognized by 
 the chairman as Mr. Blotton (of Aldgatc), Mel- 
 drum and Wadlow smiled and nodded their ap- 
 proval of the happy thought that had put him for-
 
 THE NEW PICKWICK CLUB. 85 
 
 ward as a spokesman of the Pickwick Club ; for 
 that a motion of some importance was about to be 
 made by him was apparent from the extreme grav- 
 ity of his face and a preliminary licking of the lips, 
 as if to lubricate the machinery of speech. Mr. 
 Pickwick led the applause which welcomed the 
 rising of the restored Blotton, and by no means 
 tended to relieve him of his constitutional diffi- 
 dence. The exact speech which Mr. Blotton (of 
 Aldgate) had memorized for the occasion did not 
 come back to his mind until after the exercises of 
 the evening were all over and he was bound home- 
 ward in his private carriage. But the speech which 
 he actually delivered was none the less effective be- 
 cause it was short and interrupted by a good many 
 hems and haws, for its sincerity and underlying 
 warmth of feeling were obvious. Mr. Blotton (of 
 Aldgate) managed to say that, in the opinion of all 
 the members whom he had hastily consulted, the 
 club should testify in some suitable way to the ex- 
 treme gratification they had derived from the un- 
 affected and eloquent remarks of the distinguished 
 American gentleman. ("Hear! Hear!") Merely 
 as Americans, that gentleman and his esteemed 
 associate deserved the best wishes of all English- 
 men because of the kindly sentiments which they 
 evidently felt toward the old home and the old 
 kinsfolk. (Cheers.) But to this strong claim upon
 
 86 THE EXCHAXTED. 
 
 the hospitality of all present they had added, per- 
 haps, the stronger one of being Pickwickians. 
 (Great applause.) They had made of course, he 
 said it with the caution and reserve of a confirmed 
 archaeologist a discovery at Bristol which im- 
 mensely enriched the fast vanishing stock of Pick- 
 wickian relics and mementoes. (Much enthusiasm.) 
 As a small token of the club's appreciation of 
 these valuable services, and as a mark of good will 
 to their American cousins, he begged to move 
 that Mr. Felix Mcldrum and Mr. Madison Wadlow, 
 of New York, be and are hereby elected Honorary 
 Members of the New Pickwick Club, of Rochester, 
 England. (Tremendous demonstrations of approval 
 of every known variety.) 
 
 Mr. Winkle seconded the motion in a short, felici- 
 tous speech, and, being put by the Acting Chair- 
 man, it was carried with a chorus of " yeas " that 
 rattled the window-panes. All semblance of order 
 was then thrown aside, and the members thronged 
 about the Americans, shook their hands, patted them 
 on the back, and generally violated, in the most 
 flagrant manner, all the traditions of British reserve. 
 
 Meanwhile, Mr. Pickwick had given a precon- 
 certed signal, upon which the door was opened by 
 unseen hands and a delicious odor penetrated the 
 apartment. It proved to emanate from an enor- 
 mous bowl, borne aloft with scrupulous care by a
 
 THE NEW PICKWICK CLUB. 87 
 
 waiter clad in the club livery. From its invisible 
 interior a steam arose like incense, of a pungency 
 and fragrance which carried Meldrum and Wadlow 
 back for the moment to their college days, with 
 whose memories it was indissolubly associated. 
 The servant advanced with a stately tread as if con- 
 scious of his great responsibility, and placed the 
 steaming bowl on the center-table, the use of which 
 now became apparent. As it was lowered to the 
 level of the eye, one discovered beneath the softly 
 curling vapors a rich amber liquid in which golden 
 bits of lemon bobbed up and down. A second uni- 
 formed waiter entered with a jingling tray of glasses, 
 and a third with two dozen long-stemmed clay pipes 
 tipped with red sealing-wax, and a huge jar of light- 
 colored fine-cut tobacco. The deep hush which 
 had fallen upon the club, while these mysterious 
 preparations were taking place, was broken by Mr. 
 Pickwick, who moved that the club do now adjourn 
 for refreshments. This motion prevailed without 
 even the formality of a vote, Joseph Smiggers, 
 Esq., vacating the chair precipitately, as if he had 
 become a little tired of the protracted dry talking. 
 They all gathered around the center-table, or as 
 near to it as they could get, and proceeded to test 
 the contents of the great bowl, which were ladled 
 out by the waiter's practised hand. When to the 
 odor of the liquid was joined the tasting of it, Mel-
 
 88 THE ENC1IAXTE1). 
 
 drum and Wad low had no hesitation in classifying 
 it as punch, and very good punch. Mr. Pickwick, 
 who sat next to them, had watched them with 
 some interest as they raised the glasses to their 
 lips. A gleam of pleasure shot through his specta- 
 cles as he marked the gratified expression of their 
 faces, while they drained the goblets to the last 
 drop. " We call it Pickwick Punch," he at length 
 explained, in his most genial manner. " It is 
 brewed from a recipe which has been for a century 
 in the possession of the Bull Inn. \Yc may readily 
 imagine its like to have been enjoyed by the orig- 
 inal Pickwickians during their stay here." 
 
 " It is worthy of them," said Meldrum, smacking 
 his lips and holding out his glass for another ladlc- 
 ful. 
 
 Mr. Pickwick furthermore informed his new 
 friends that the constitution of the club expressly 
 enjoined the observance of simplicity in their enter- 
 tainments. Punch and pipes were their only festive 
 indulgences on occasions even of ceremony. The 
 sole exception to the stringent rule was made on 
 Christmas eve, when a costume ball was given in 
 the same great hall of the hotel where the famous 
 mixed assembly was held on the T3th of May, 1827. 
 Then only were the extravagances of a supper per- 
 mitted. Meldrum and Wadlow were pleased with 
 this intelligence, for they had feared the possibility
 
 THE NEW PICKWICK CLUB. 89 
 
 of a formal banquet in reserve, with interminable 
 set speeches and other tedious concomitants. 
 " Songs, stories, tales of adventure, local traditions, 
 reports of investigations throwing light upon the 
 obscure manners and customs of the dear old Pick- 
 wick era, and more accurately identifying places 
 mentioned under fictitious names in the Papers, 
 these (said Mr. Pickwick) form the innocent exer- 
 cises at our regular meetings. We firmly believe 
 that the Founder himself would relish our society if 
 that most real of imagined characters could be with 
 us bodily." In this opinion the Americans fully 
 agreed, when the gentle stimulus of the punch had 
 unlocked the tongues of all present. Every one con- 
 tributed of liis best freely and spontaneously to the 
 harmless mirth and glorious good fellowship of the 
 evening. It was a point of honor with all to listen 
 attentively to and applaud the efforts of each as he 
 sought to add to the common stock of pleasure. 
 While this award was denied to no one, special 
 favor and grace were vouchsafed to a story of 
 Western life, well told by Meldrum, and to a new 
 sentimental song, set to a new tune and rendered in 
 a good tenor voice by Wadlow. The latter re- 
 ceived an enthusiastic encore, which was responded 
 to by a couple of fresh stanzas, and when the singer 
 was pressed for the names of the author and com- 
 poser, he replied, " A friend of Meldrum,"
 
 9 THE EXCHAXTED. 
 
 " In other words, Wadlow himself," said Mel- 
 drum, punching his comrade in the ribs in the full- 
 ness of his heart. Whereupon a copy of the words 
 and music was asked for by Mr. Winkle, as perpetual 
 secretary, for preservation in the archives of the 
 club. 
 
 It was not till a second bowl of the excellent 
 punch had been finished and the tobacco supply re- 
 duced to a mere pinch of snuff in the bottom of the 
 jar that the party broke up with Auld Lang Syne 
 and all hands round. 
 
 It had been the privilege of Meldrum and Wad- 
 low to occupy, during their short sojourn at the 
 Bull Inn, a spacious double-bedded room known as 
 "the Pickwick." It was firmly and truly believed 
 by all the chambermaids of the house to have been 
 tenanted by the great man himself. Having often 
 heard his honored name mentioned with the deepest 
 respect by so many visitors, he was to them as 
 actual a personage of the past as Lord Nelson or 
 the Duke of Wellington. They bestowed an affec- 
 tionate solicitude upon their care of the room, shar- 
 ing, without knowing the reason why, the profound 
 interest which strangers from all parts of the world 
 exhibited in it. 
 
 When the two Americans, after detaching them- 
 selves with much difficulty from the tenacious grasp 
 of the jovial company down-stairs, proceeded to re-
 
 THE NEW PICKWICK CLUB. 91 
 
 tire for the night, they found it harder than ever to 
 shake off the impression that the Pickwick Papers 
 were no fiction, but formal biography, though cynics 
 may say that there is little difference, if any, be- 
 tween the two kinds of books. They both fell 
 asleep while musing on the potency of that enchan- 
 ter, who, after a lapse of fifty years, had called them 
 from the other side of the Atlantic to see the places 
 haunted by the shade of an imaginary hero and to 
 take part in the proceedings of a club that bore his 
 name and perpetuated his memory, on the very spot 
 where his unreality was best known.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 \YITII SCOTT AT KEX1 L\V( )RT1I. 
 
 " WAITER, can't we have our chops served on 
 those old tin plates ? " 
 
 Meldrum was the speaker. lie pointed to cer- 
 tain battered disks of shining metal, carefully ranged 
 on the top shelf of a sideboard near the table where 
 lie and Wadlow awaited luncheon. 
 
 The waiter shifted his napkin from one arm to 
 the other, drew himself up with some dignity, and 
 replied, " Them is Kenil'orth plates, sir ; the real 
 harticle, and, bcggin' your parding, not tin, but 
 solid pewter." lie could not have laid more 
 emphasis on the name of the material had it been 
 sterling silver. Then, observing a look of in- 
 credulity on the questioner's face, he added, " They 
 'as the genooin horiginal mark on the back, you 
 see." He took one from its perch and exhibited 
 " K. C." deeply engraved in old English text. The 
 two friends inspected it with much curiosity. 
 
 " Whether authenticated or not, they'll give an 
 archaic flavor to the chops," said Wadlow. 
 
 The waiter did not catch the precise import of 
 92
 
 WITH SCOTT AT KENILWORTH. 93 
 
 this remark, owing to the limited extent of his 
 vocabulary ; but he scented skepticism in it. It 
 was in an indignant tone that he further explained, 
 in response to the first query, " They is hextry, sir, 
 six pence apiece." 
 
 " All right, we'll take them," said Meldrum, as 
 delighted as his companion to carve the slow- 
 coming chop on a pewter plate which might, for 
 aught he knew, have shone in the buttery of Kenil- 
 worth, three hundred years ago. " And those big 
 pewter mugs?" he continued, interrogatively, 
 nodding at some badly dinted, but highly polished, 
 objects of that description suspended from nails, by 
 their handles, just above the plates. 
 
 " Kenil'orth mugs," answered the waiter, dis- 
 tantly ; but this time he did not show the identify- 
 ing initials which adorned their sides, expecting his 
 hearers to take him at his word. " It's thry pence 
 hextry to use 'em." 
 
 " Very good. Fill them with the oldest of old 
 ale," exclaimed Meldrum, and he smacked his lips 
 in anticipation of the deep, cool draught of that 
 nourishing fluid which he had good reason to 
 expect from the tap-room of the best inn in Kenil- 
 worth. Then, still pursuing his researches for the 
 antique, his eye fell on what seemed a piece of 
 wood-carving, brown with age, which decorated the 
 sideboard. " What's that?" he asked.
 
 94 THE E \CHAX TED. 
 
 "Wcnison pasty, sir. Its 'arf a crown to cut 
 it." 
 
 " From Kenilworth castle ? " 
 
 This ironical inquiry was received by the waiter 
 with deserved silence, as he carefully unhooked the 
 desired pewter utensils and proceeded to leave the 
 room with them. 
 
 Mcldrum sought to placate his hurt feelings with 
 an order to follow the chops with the venison pic. 
 
 " Pasty, sir," said the waiter, correcting him, as 
 he vanished. 
 
 The Americans accepted the correction in a 
 thankful spirit. Drawn to Kenilworth by the mag- 
 netism of Scott's great novel, they desired, before 
 visiting the castle, to put themselves into the most 
 proper condition of mind to recreate, if possible, 
 the noble pile which Scott describes, and to 
 repeople it with the historic characters who live and 
 move in his immortal pages. They were inclined to 
 accept the pewter plates and the mugs as relics of 
 Leicester's Kenilworth with blind faith. They 
 cheerfully admitted that the dish of venison would 
 taste better as pasty than as pie because the 
 former was undoubtedly the name under which it 
 would have been eaten at the grand banquet given 
 to Queen Elizabeth by her courtier-lover at his 
 splendid castle in 1575. 
 
 In due time the chops were brought in, flanked
 
 WITH SCOTT AT KENILWORTU. 95 
 
 by large mealy potatoes in their jackets, and the 
 marrowfat peas and cauliflower for which England 
 is deservedly famous. The pewter plates had been 
 heated nearly to the melting point, and the meat 
 hissed as it touched the fervid metal. The old ale 
 proved to be worthy of the old mugs, which in turn 
 seemed to impart a relishing electric twang to the 
 contents. Mcldrum had looked forward with much 
 pleasure to the production of the venison pasty as 
 the second course. He had mischievously planned 
 the summary destruction of the imposing work by 
 plunging a carving knife deep into its reeking 
 bowels and then giving it two quick cuts, hari-kari 
 fashion. lie and Wad low had speculated on the 
 consternation of the waiter when he should see the 
 elaborate structure brutally sacrificed in this way. 
 Great was their chagrin when that person placed the 
 pasty on the table, and without a preliminary word, 
 proceeded to dissect out two thin wedge-like seg- 
 ments an operation which required a wrist of iron. 
 The crust was a full inch thick, with almost the re- 
 sisting power of wood itself. A hammer and chisel 
 and fine saw seemed to be the implements most 
 suitable for exposing the interior. Then he scooped 
 up with a tablespoon the accompanying diminutive 
 portions of meat, dry, if not moldy with age. 
 
 When this second course was placed ceremoni- 
 ously before the guests, they looked at it, sniffed at
 
 96 THE EXC1IAXTED. 
 
 it, probed it with forks, and then expressed their 
 regret that the hearty repast afforded them by the 
 first course should have compelled them to forego 
 the pleasure of testing the unquestioned merits of 
 the venison pasty. Whereat the waiter looked so 
 much grieved that Meldrum tipped him a shilling 
 on the spot with gratifying effect. lie then con- 
 sulted his watch and moved back from the table 
 with the remark, " Now for the castle. I wish we 
 had a good guide who would speak only when he is 
 spoken to." 
 
 " I can get you one in a minute, sir," said the 
 waiter, politely. I le stepped briskly to the door and 
 called " Flib ! Flib!" as if to a dog outside. A 
 moment later a shock-headed boy, if he was not 
 an undersized man, dressed in homespun clothing, 
 and awkward in every expression and movement, 
 appeared upon the threshold as if he had responded 
 to a summons not unexpected. " This is Flib," ex- 
 plained the waiter; "the best guide to Kcnihvorth. 
 He thought you might like him for the job and was 
 hangin' round." 
 
 "Excuse me," said Meldrum, " but you have a 
 very singular name Flib, as I understand it." 
 
 " It's short for Flibbertigibbet," was the only re- 
 sponse. 
 
 "Oh, I sec ! the impish dwarf in the story." 
 
 " Exackly."
 
 WITH SCOTT AT KENILWORTH. 97 
 
 As the stunted person proffered no further expla- 
 nation, the waiter spoke up for him. 
 
 " You'll recollcck, sir, that the reel name of Flib- 
 bertigibbet was Richard Sludge. This ere boy,"- 
 he corrected himself " man, is a genooin Richard 
 Sludge, who come straight down from the one that 
 lived here three hundred years ago. The Sludges is 
 one of the oldest families in these parts." 
 
 The dwarf nodded as if with ancestral pride, his 
 stolid countenance betraying no sign of duplicity. 
 
 The Americans had often read of the generative 
 persistence with which humble names have been 
 handed down for centuries by families that are 
 rooted like the sturdiest oaks in the tenant farms of 
 England. They were not prepared to say that 
 Dickie Sludge's genealogical descent could not be 
 as clearly traced back in the county records as that 
 of the Earl of Warwick. If, as was probable, the 
 name was picked up by Scott during his sojourn at 
 Kenilworth, while gathering local traditions for his 
 novel and utilized in the tale because of its quaint- 
 ness, then that was another evidence of the charrn 
 wrought by the potent wizard of the North. Even 
 the yokels and hinds of Kenilworth testified to the 
 reality of the universal spell in asserting their lineal 
 claims of associations with the glorious memories of 
 the castle. 
 
 Meldrum and Wadlow preferred to accept the
 
 9 8 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 guide's pretensions without challenge, enhancing, 
 as these did, the illusion which they were anxious to 
 encourage to the utmost, however much self-decep- 
 tion it might involve. 
 
 The little party rapidly covered the dusty mile 
 between the village and the ruins, which, at a sud- 
 den turn of the road, came into full view. The 
 guide did not even say "there it is,"- a reticence 
 fully appreciated by his patrons, who knew, from a 
 prolonged study of guide books and photographs, 
 precisely how the crumbled towers and battlements 
 would look. They had no need of a cicerone 
 except to save them a little trouble in locating 
 readily some of the less recognizable features of the 
 ruins without their Baedeker or Murray in hand. 
 
 Turning from the shady road into a large sunny 
 space which fronts the pile, they startled their at- 
 tendant out of his impassiveness by throwing them- 
 selves on the green sward. But he only looked 
 amazed and said nothing. Their object in thus 
 arresting their steps, instead of hurrying to the 
 accomplishment of the tourist's customary task, 
 was to reproduce the general effect of Kenilworth 
 Castle by the reflected light of Sir Walter Scott. 
 Concentrating their gaze upon the shattered 
 masonry, and excluding all disturbing thoughts, 
 they had no difficulty in seeing, through the inner 
 eye, the vast and lofty structure of Leicester's clay.
 
 WITH SCOTT AT KENILWORTII. 99 
 
 Sworn comrades of many vagrancies, they inter- 
 changed thoughts by glances, nods and curt ges- 
 tures even more than by words, of which, in each 
 other's company, they were never profuse. Their 
 walking sticks were a sign language. After some 
 minutes of a tacit survey, Meldrum leveled his cane 
 at the obvious relics of a tower on the right, raised 
 it at a moderate angle, and outlined in the air the 
 probable original continuation of that part of the 
 castle. Wadlow assented with two words: "Caesar's 
 Tower." 
 
 " Observe the Queen's flag ? " 
 
 " Yes ; I wish there was a wind to blow it out 
 straight." 
 
 Flib had followed the mysterious pantomime 
 with eyes which seemed ready to burst from their 
 sockets. When the Royal Ensign was mentioned 
 he started backward, as if doubting the sanity of 
 the two gentlemen, and meditating a hasty retreat. 
 What he further saw and heard did not tend to 
 reassure him. There was another long pause, rilled 
 in by much hard looking and unintelligible bran- 
 dishing of canes, succeeded by nods and grunts. 
 Then Wadlow, whose attention had been fastened 
 upon the well-preserved remains of Leicester's gate- 
 way, put this question : " How many men can you 
 count on those battlements ? " (Pointing at the 
 place where the crenelated work should have been,
 
 ioo THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 had any been left by the Puritan destroyers and 
 the tooth of time.) 
 
 Mcldrum hesitated as if telling off heads. " Well, 
 fifty. Can you distinguish, at this distance, the real 
 soldiers from the pasteboard and buckram figures?" 
 
 "Yes, easily. The warder on the ground there is 
 eight feet high, I should say. A fellow of his si/.e 
 and strength could pick up a Flibcrtigibbct in each 
 hand." 
 
 At this stage of a dialogue, hitherto enigmatic, 
 the little guide burst into laughter, as one who 
 makes a pleasing discovery and is much relieved 
 thereby. 
 
 " Ha, ha! You makes believe yon sees the 
 giant what took up the first Dickie Sludge this 
 way." And with pantomimic action, he represented 
 a Goliath personating the Colossus himself for the 
 moment stooping down and raising an invisible 
 dwarf by the nape of the neck and holding that 
 feather-weight at arms-length high in air. 
 
 The absurdity of the thing threw the Americans 
 into paroxysms of mirth, which were not diminished 
 when Flib cried out, "You shall sec the big 'un lift 
 me over again. Please make believe as hard as you 
 can, now." So saying, the little man darted to the 
 foot of Leicester's gate. 
 
 Meld rum and \Vadlow slowly mustered up the 
 seriousness necessary to make the attempt success-
 
 WITH SCOTT AT KENILIVORTIT. 101 
 
 ful. After Flib had stationed himself in the proper 
 place the friends focused their minds upon him. 
 First, they transformed the awkward little lout into 
 an elegant undersized devil, with black jerkin and 
 red horns and cloven feet, wanting only a forked 
 tail to realize in miniature the arch fiend of old or- 
 thodoxy. The giant warder they had already con- 
 jured up, as described. It now remained only to 
 imagine that son of Anak, snatching up the demon 
 dwarf, playfully making sport of his terror, then 
 lowering him to the earth and dismissing him with 
 an affectionate caress. So naturally and vividly 
 had Sir Walter portrayed this amusing incident so 
 deeply was it stamped on the memory of his two 
 enthusiastic admirers, that a brief but determined 
 exercise of volition on their part enabled them to 
 see it re-enacted, as if before their physical eyes. 
 Even the dull-witted Flib shared in the illusion by 
 lending himself to it. 
 
 " Oi likes it," he said. " The joyant didn't 
 hurt me a bit." 
 
 Immensely gratified by the success of their ex- 
 periment so far, the friends, with Flib docilely 
 following, instead of attempting to pilot them, 
 (so great a respect had he already formed for 
 their self-guiding capacity), rose to their feet and 
 began a systematic exploration of the wide- 
 spread ruins, triumphantly applying at this
 
 102 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 point and that their peculiar method of recon- 
 struction. It needed a rigid out-barring of all 
 alien images to call up in that melancholy waste 
 the cavalcade headed by the virgin queen on a 
 milk-white steed, between close hedges of pikes 
 and partisans, with the gold-clad Leicester on 
 her right, their pathway lighted by hundreds of 
 flambeaux and the air filled with exploding 
 rockets. Night would have been more favorable 
 for conceiving the illuminations and the fire- 
 works. But the pyrotechnical display could be 
 superadded to the other features of the grand 
 pageant, simply by closing the eyes, when it 
 instantly appeared on the dark curtain of the lid. 
 No less easy was the materialization of the torch- 
 lit fleet of rafts and boats, and all fantastic floating 
 things, with the Lady of the Lake as the divinity in 
 supreme command, who welcomed the august 
 guest to all the sport which the castle and its 
 environs could afford. But in order to turn 
 noisome swamps into clear, blue water; broken 
 buttresses into lofty, symmetrical towers ; damp, 
 roofless gaps into banqueting halls; and second- 
 story dungeons into royal suites, one prerequi- 
 site was indispensable: there must be a reason- 
 able confidence in the identity of localities. 
 Given assurance on that point, all else followed 
 quite as a matter of course.
 
 WITH SCOTT AT KENILWORTH. 103 
 
 When Melclrum and Wadlovv had made the cir- 
 cuit of the ruins to the Swan Tower, they looked 
 near it for some sign of the grotto where the help- 
 less Amy Robsart concealed herself from her 
 persecutor, and was discovered by the jealous 
 queen. To imagine a grotto as picturesque as the 
 original was easy enough, if they only knew its site. 
 Here, for the first time, they turned to Flib for help. 
 
 " The grotto where was it ? " asked Meldrum. 
 
 The boy-man's face glowed with pleasure as 
 he saw himself in actual request. They followed 
 his beckoning a few rods. 
 
 " It was 'ere, sir," pointing to the bare ground 
 in an angle between two half-demolished walls. 
 His brevity and positiveness carried conviction to 
 minds that wished to be convinced. In two 
 minutes they had the grotto up and the rustic 
 scats in place and the fountain playing and the 
 alabaster column in position, ready to lend sup- 
 port to the sinking frame of the lovely fugitive. 
 
 " Her hair was brown," said Meldrum, mus- 
 ingly. 
 
 " And her eyes, also," added Wad low. 
 
 " Her complexion creamy," returned the other. 
 " Her neck swan-like, not in length, of course, but 
 in grace of motion thus," and Meldrum twisted 
 his head in poor elucidation of his idea of 
 swan-likeness.
 
 104 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 " Her age eighteen," pursued his comrade. 
 
 "Her dress what was her dress?" asked Mel- 
 drum. 
 
 Wadlow shook his head. " Ah ! the book will 
 tell." He produced the second volume of 
 Kenihvorth from a side pocket, and, hastily 
 thumbing its pages, found the required informa- 
 tion. " Pale, sea-green silk." 
 
 " There there she is at last!" cried Mcldrum. 
 " Do you sec her ? " 
 
 " Perfectly ! " 
 
 They gazed in rapt admiration at the charm- 
 ing vision.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE PLEASANT BREAKING OF A PLEASANT SPELL. 
 
 " I SEES 'cr too but not there," exclaimed Flib, 
 with unwonted energy. 
 
 The friends, startled, turned toward the guide, 
 and saw him staring with open eyes and mouth at 
 the window of a tower, some distance off. 
 
 " 'Tis the lady 'erself, alive in 'er own room." 
 
 The allusion was instantly understood. The 
 tower before them was Mervyn's, the least injured 
 of all its kind in Kenilworth. The apartment 
 where Sir Walter lodges his ill-starred heroine was 
 on the second floor of Mervyn's tower, and gave on 
 the Pleasance, at the end of which stood the grotto 
 whither she had fled from a fate worse than death. 
 Framed in the window which faced the beholders, 
 her looks bent on the ground beneath, they saw a 
 beautiful girl, with the brown hair, the white arch- 
 ing neck, the healthy pale complexion and the 
 green dress of the original Amy Robsart. A 
 modern hat jauntily cocked upon a head exquisitely 
 shaped, was the only item not comprised in Scott's 
 inventory of the Countess's attractions, native or 
 
 105
 
 io6 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 artificial. This flesh and blood copy was far 
 superior to the phantom which they had but just 
 evoked from nothingness, and they longed to see it 
 at shorter range. In its presence the grotto and its 
 furniture and its one inmate had vanished like 
 a dream at waking. 
 
 Fearing that the lovely being at the window 
 would disappear before they could reach her, the 
 friends strode hastily toward Mcrvyn's tower, with 
 Flib again superfluous at their heels. They knew 
 from the closely-studied ground plans of Kenil- 
 worth, what door to enter, what turnings to take, 
 and precisely how man}' steps to ascend, in order to 
 attain the " small octangular chamber " of the story. 
 As they ncarcd the goal, they began to hear two 
 female voices, and the words and tones were those 
 of bosom friends engaged in a good-natured dis- 
 pute. 
 
 " If we had a dear, delightful old ruin like this out 
 in Minneapolis," said one voice, " wouldn't it be per- 
 fectly lovely? " 
 
 " You'll have ruins enough when the bust comes," 
 was the response. 
 
 " When the bust comes in St. Paul, you mean ? 
 Very true. Your Ryan's Hotel and your Grand 
 Opera House would, as ruins, be picturesque, which 
 they aren't now. Perhaps we Minncapolitans will 
 buy up the old stones and make an imitation Kenil-
 
 AKEAK'LYG OF A PLEASANT SPELL. 107 
 
 worth out of them for our beautiful new park. 
 Ha, ha ! " 
 
 " Wait five years and your big flour mills will give 
 you all the spare stones you want for a Kenihvorth 
 and a Coliseum to boot there now ! " and a silvery 
 peal of laughter terminated the sentence. 
 
 The other voice was about to retort, when Mel- 
 drum and \Vadlo\v interrupted the lively conversa- 
 tion by appearing upon the scene. The duplicate 
 of Amy Robsart had turned from the window and 
 faced the newcomers. At the close inspection 
 now afforded them, her charms fully matched those 
 of the Countess whom Sir Walter drew. By her 
 side stood another lady who recalled no particular 
 heroine of any novel, but impressed one at first 
 sight as meriting a place in some lively work" of fic- 
 tion. She seemed to be several years older than 
 the fair creature at the window. That indefinable 
 quality which everybody knows and admires as 
 archness crinkled in her light, curly hair, pouted in 
 her full red lips, asserted itself somewhat auda- 
 ciously in her piquant nose, .and welled out from 
 two deep dimples in her rosy checks. Her neck 
 was not swan-like, but yet a manly arm would have 
 found room enough for itself there. Worshipers at 
 the shrine of willowyness might have criticised the 
 generosity of some of this lady's outlines. But 
 when informed that she was a widow, they would,
 
 108 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 it may be trusted, have been swift to confess that a 
 reasonable amplitude of person is not unbecoming 
 to one who has no longer a marital prop to lean 
 upon and twine about. This substantial creature 
 was owner of the voice which had been summarily 
 hushed by the incoming of two strangers; but it 
 made itself heard, without a moment's hesitation, 
 when the speaker marked, at a single glance, their 
 nationality. 
 
 " I'll leave it to you, now. Isn't Minneapolis 
 more of a city, every way, than St. Paul? " 
 
 She plumped this question so naturally and off- 
 handedly at Melclrum that he was no more taken 
 aback by it than if she had asked him the time of 
 day. Her face was full of archness and roguery, as 
 she waited for his answer. 
 
 Melclrum knew all that the strange question im- 
 plied. He was well aware that the aversion between 
 young rival American cities increases in geometrical 
 ratio to their nearness, and reaches its utmost inten- 
 sity in the case of St. Paul and Minneapolis, which 
 are contiguous. They are called the Twins, and 
 have quite naturally fought from the cradle upward. 
 Meldrum had never visited cither city, and could 
 honestly plead absolute ignorance as a bar to any 
 response. To oblige the possessor of all that arch- 
 ness, he would gladly have said " Yes," but for the 
 presence of St. Paul's bewitching representative,
 
 BREAKING OF A PLEASANT SPELL. 109 
 
 who fastened her soft brown eyes on him, in mute 
 appeal. Out of his perplexity he soon found an es- 
 cape by luckily recalling some sentences he had 
 once read in the "jewing advertisement of a trunk 
 
 o o 
 
 railway line, with termini both in St. Paul and Min- 
 neapolis. 
 
 " They are both Queens in their own right," said 
 Meldrtim, falling back on his memory ; " the pride 
 and the glory of the new Northwest the " here 
 he broke down, and then happily recovered himself 
 with the hackneyed line slightly amended for the 
 occasion "The tourist could be happy with either, 
 were t'other dear charmer away," a quotation not 
 wholly misplaced, if stretched to apply also to his 
 two lovely compatriots of the moment in Mervyn's 
 tower. 
 
 "Judiciously neutral? I see," said the merry 
 lady, her eyebrows arching in visible token of the 
 spirit that possessed her. "And you, sir, what do 
 you say?" she continued, turning to Wadlow, who, 
 lawyer-like, had anticipated the attack and prepared 
 himself for it. 
 
 " I think that Mr. St. Paul and Miss Minneapolis 
 are in the way of making a happy match. They 
 have that little aversion which Mrs. Malaprop recom- 
 mends as the best thing to begin with. As a friend 
 of both parties, I " 
 
 "Non-committal, too," interrupted the vivacious
 
 no THE EXCHAXTED. 
 
 lady. " Well, Mancly, we shall have to fight out 
 our little differences alone. Ha, ha?" 
 
 Meldrum and Wadlow bowed in token of their 
 cheerful acquiescence. 
 
 "Shall we call a half hour truce now, Carrie?" 
 
 "As you please, dear," was the reply. "lint I 
 shan't soon forget that shot at my flour mills." 
 
 " It was fired in defense of my Opera House tit 
 for tat you know." 
 
 Arch ladies are expected to be volatile ; and the 
 subject of conversation was instantly changed by 
 the one called " Carrie." 
 
 " I've no patience with that horrid Leicester," she- 
 cried, with mirth in every tone, leaving her male 
 hearers in doubt whether she was serious or joking. 
 "I was looking through the novel again this morning. 
 I do so much want to see the exact spot where the 
 Queen exposed and humiliated that heartless vil- 
 lain," and fun irradiated her face as she spoke. 
 "Isn't it somewhere out here?" She pointed to- 
 ward the Pleasance. 
 
 Flib saw a practical opening for his services. As 
 he stepped forward, the younger lady stood aside, 
 and the dwarf indicated with outstretched hand the 
 place assigned by Sir Walter to that memorable 
 transaction. 
 
 "I must have just one good long look at it," and 
 the arch lady stared protractedly at the spot. Her
 
 BREAKING OF A PLEASANT SPELL. ill 
 
 friend shared in her eager curiosity, but was more 
 serious and pensive of demeanor. 
 
 "The Queen ought to have cut off his head when 
 he was kneeling there the double traitor Ha, 
 ha ! " 
 
 " Why,- Carrie ! " in a tone of mild remonstrance. 
 
 " If I had been in her place I would have bor- 
 rowed a sword from Raleigh, of course the Queen 
 didn't wear one, and done it in a flash, like that!" 
 She saucily snapped a thumb and finger to illustrate 
 the swiftness of the supposed decapitation. 
 
 " But the Queen hadn't the heart to do it. She 
 loved Leicester as much as Amy Robsart did." 
 
 " All the more reason why she should have chop- 
 ped his head off. It would have punished Leicester 
 for his perfidy to herself. It would have avenged 
 Amy Robsart for his brutality. lie would not have 
 lived to cause her death by an accomplice." 
 
 " But Amy herself would still have died of a 
 broken heart, for you know how she idolized him. 
 And the Queen, too, would have pined away with 
 grief and remorse if she had taken his life with her 
 own hand." 
 
 " I suppose so," was the reply, with intermittent 
 laughter ; " and I should have had no pity for their 
 fate. The idea of two women making such fools of 
 themselves for any one man." The absurdity of 
 the conception convulsed the well-shaped figure.
 
 H2 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 " What do you say now?" and she turned quickly 
 to Meldrum. 
 
 " It is not for me to pass judgment upon those 
 ladies. But, as to Leicester, he deserved no mercy 
 from any one least of all from the Queen who had 
 loaded him with favors. History would have ap- 
 plauded her if she had killed him in that blazing 
 moment of righteous indignation." 
 
 "It is a comfort to think that the rascal was poi- 
 soned by his second wife," added Wadlow. 
 
 " I'm so glad to hear you say so," said the laugh- 
 ing lady. "You men are so apt to stand up for one 
 another through thick and thin, against the women 
 you wrong." 
 
 They smiled and shrugged their shoulders in dep- 
 recation of the charge, and each was about to say 
 something, for the purpose of keeping up the ball of 
 conversation, when " Carrie " (for so she may be pro- 
 visionally called) glanced at a little jeweled watch 
 which was conspicuously stuck in her waist belt. 
 " Dear me it's three o'clock, and we must be off." 
 
 "Without delay," added ' Mandy.' 
 
 Both stepped lightly toward the dark spiral stair- 
 case. The gentlemen removed their hats as the 
 ladies disappeared from view, inclining their heads 
 in recognition of the courtesy. It seemed an 
 abrupt and stiff termination of a chat singularly free 
 and unconventional. But Meldrum and Wadlow
 
 BREAKING OF A PLEASANT SPELL. 1 13 
 
 :ncw their countrywomen too well to be surprised. 
 They were perfectly aware that American ladies are 
 idepts in the difficult art of discouraging presump- 
 :ion founded upon their kind-heartedness and affa- 
 bility. Nothing in what had happened warranted 
 them in thinking that the same ladies would conde- 
 scend to recognize them at any subsequent meeting 
 which the Fates might provide. Their departure 
 from the gloomy chamber, or cell it might be more 
 fitly termed was like the retirement of sunshine, 
 so truly had they irradiated it with youth and 
 beauty. But the missing brightness, in Wadlow's 
 opinion, belonged to the "Mandy " whose surname 
 he would have given something to know ; while Mel- 
 drum thought only of the archness that exhaled 
 incessantly from the "Carrie"- Carrie what? 
 
 Both gentlemen thrust their heads out of the 
 deep embrasure, as if for the purpose of scrutiniz- 
 ing objects beneath, but really to see the ladies 
 as they left the grounds. Their wish was grat- 
 ified. A minute later an open landau, which had 
 been standing at the main entrance, received the 
 fair strangers. A person looking like a maid- 
 in-waiting, and bearing shawls, seated herself on 
 the back seat, and another person whose mana- 
 gerial deportment proclaimed him courier, depos- 
 ited himself alongside of the coachman, and the 
 vehicle rolled away.
 
 H4 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 Having seen all of Kenihvorth that they de- 
 sired, Meldrum, in his capacity of paymaster, be- 
 stowed a largess on Flib, and then they sauntered 
 back to the inn where they had lunched. As 
 they approached it they saw the open landau 
 drawn up before the door. Servants were stowing 
 away hand luggage in the roomy interior and 
 under the coachman's seat. This was done with 
 great rapidity and, when completed, the carriage 
 dashed off again. 
 
 Here, then, it was possible to find out the names 
 and even the destination of the fair unknowns. 
 And within five minutes Meldrum had plied his 
 shillings with such effect that he discovered the 
 arch lady's name to be Mrs. Josiah J. (ireatficld, 
 and that her companion was a Miss Robison, 
 and that they were destined to Coventry. It re- 
 quired the co-operation of several postboys and 
 waiters to piece out the scanty facts. Among 
 them they had observed the cards and tags at- 
 tached to the bags and parcels the absence of 
 a register in the English inns not giving the in- 
 formation so easily obtainable at American hotels. 
 
 "Mrs. Josiah J. Grcatfield ! Where, oh where 
 have I heard that name ? " and Meldrum knit 
 his brows with much earnestness, and then tapped 
 them as if to dislodge a reminiscence which 
 was accidentally obstructed there. " Ah ! I have
 
 BREAKING OF A PLEASANT SPELL. 115 
 
 *; now. She is the rich widow of the great 
 Minneapolis mill owner 
 
 " Yes, I remember," said Wadlow " proprietor 
 >f the Balloon brand of family flour. He left her 
 our stone mills, with a daily capacity of five 
 ;housand barrels and clear profits of a million a 
 /ear. I was reading the figures in an American 
 paper the other day." 
 
 " Now I recall everything," broke in Meldrum. 
 " As a rich American widow, she has been 
 hounded by beggarly counts and barons in all the 
 Continental capitals. Her name has been men- 
 tioned in connection with a bankrupt English 
 duke." 
 
 " At all events, she is quite able to take care of 
 herself," suggested Wadlow. 
 
 " Undoubtedly ; but 'tis a pity she should be 
 bothered so by mere adventurers and fortune 
 hunters." 
 
 " Would you like to save her from them by 
 marrying her yourself ? " asked his friend, playfully. 
 
 " Heaven forbid ! " was the laughing response of 
 the inveterate bachelor. " I speak only as a Pro- 
 tectionist, favoring a Home Market for American 
 widows and their fortunes." 
 
 "Good gracious!" exclaimed Wadlow. "I've 
 made a remark-able discovery, too. The other lady 
 is a Miss Robison, you know. Prefix Amanda
 
 Ii6 THE F.XCIfAXTED. 
 
 (which is long for Mancly) to that, and \vhat do we 
 have ? " 
 
 " Why, Amanda Robison, to be sure. What 
 else could it be ? " 
 
 " A great deal more," continued Wadlo\v, with 
 enthusiasm. "We then have a name strangely sug- 
 gestive of Amy Robsart. What with the brown 
 hair and brown eyes, the creamy complexion, the 
 slender curving neck and the green dress is not the 
 coincidence marvelous ? Felix, my boy, we have 
 seen to-day the heroine of Kenilworth." 
 
 " And, perhaps, of a new story of real life', with 
 Mr. Madison Wadlow as the hero, ending more 
 happily, let us hope, than the old one." 
 
 Wadlow laughed at the humor of the notion his 
 prepossessions for bachelorhood being almost as in- 
 vincible as those of his friend. 
 
 Tennyson's dainty version of the Godiva legend 
 had caused Coventry to be booked for a visit by the 
 gentlemen, and the chance of meeting there Mrs. 
 Josiah J. Grcatficld and Miss Amanda Robison by 
 no means tended to lessen the satisfaction with 
 which they looked forward to their departure for 
 that place by an early train next morning.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 WITH TENNYSON AT COVENTRY. 
 
 " Is infamous too strong an adjective to apply to 
 it? Or shall I merely say disgraceful?" 
 
 The speaker was a middle-aged, wiry, nervous 
 little man, whose face quivered with excitement. 
 
 lie addressed his questions to Meldrum and 
 Wadlow, who had been admiringly studying from 
 various points of view the beautiful equestrian 
 statue of Godiva in the Guildhall of Coventry. 
 They had been so deeply absorbed in the contem- 
 plation of that pleasing work of art, that they had 
 not observed the figure creeping up stealthily 
 behind them, and now seizing upon the occasion to 
 speak. 
 
 Thus accosted, they turned sharply and faced, as 
 they supposed, a man who was urging his passionate 
 protest against the nude in Art. 
 
 " To me," replied Meldrum, smiling at the fierce- 
 ness of the questioner, " it seems the embodiment 
 of delicacy and purity." 
 
 " Tennyson's very words, ' clothed on with 
 chastity,' were in my mind as you spoke," added 
 
 117
 
 Ii8 THE EXCHAXTED. 
 
 Wadlow, who shared in the amusement of his 
 friend. 
 
 " Good heavens ! What do you take me for ? " 
 
 The word " crank " occurred to both of them ; but, 
 if they had uttered it, the epithet would have been 
 lost in the sound of the stranger's own voice, for 
 without pausing for an answer, he declared in 
 scornful accents : 
 
 " I am no miserable canting purist. For aught I 
 care they might fill this hall with the statues of all 
 the heathen goddesses ever dug up ! " 
 
 "Then what is the matter?" asked Meldrum. 
 
 "What is the matter? Don't you understand?" 
 with a pitying smile at their obtuseness. 
 
 The friends good-naturedly shook their heads. 
 
 " That statue perpetuates a lie!" and he darted 
 a look at it which the speaker evidently wished 
 were a thunderbolt, that the odious marble might 
 be shivered to atoms. 
 
 " Is that all? " asked Mr. Wadlow, innocently. 
 
 '"Is that all?' Did I hear aright?" And be- 
 fore giving Wadlow time to remark that his cars 
 had not deceived him, the heated stranger con- 
 tinued his passionate interrogations without a mo- 
 ment's pause for any reply. 
 
 "Are men forever to be the dupes of myth- 
 makers? Are the noblest names to be handed 
 down to eternal infamy? Is Lcofric, Earl of Mur-
 
 WITH TENNYSON AT COVENTRY. 119 
 
 cia, to remain the object of execration and ridicule 
 to the end of time because some lying fellow, two 
 centuries after his death, accused him of an act of 
 heartless and incredible cruelty to his wife?" 
 
 "A descendant of the Earl, I presume," said Mel- 
 drum, pulling as serious a face as was possible. 
 
 If the stranger had not been a deadly earnest 
 person, constitutionally incapable of making or 
 taking a joke, he would have questioned the sin- 
 cerity of this remark. But he accepted it in good 
 faith. 
 
 " No. I am only a champion of historical truth. 
 I am here in a spirit of pure disinterestedness to 
 vindicate the blackened character of one of the best 
 Englishmen of the eleventh century." 
 
 " Rehabilitating you call it, I think," said Wad- 
 low. " We call it whitewashing in America. At 
 different times the operation has been applied, I re- 
 member, to Judas Iscariot, Richard the Third, and 
 Lucrecia Borgia. But what proof have you that 
 the grim earl of Tennyson's poem did not require 
 his wife to ride naked through the town as a condi- 
 tion of repealing a tax under which his people were 
 starving to death? I am a lawyer, you see." 
 
 The stranger cooled down a little. "Well," he 
 said, with some hesitation, " no proof as yet to go 
 before a stupid jury with. But I hope to find it 
 here on the ground among the worm-eaten and
 
 I2O 
 
 illegible parchments that may still be preserved in 
 the archives of this Guildhall. I am an expert in 
 the art of piecing together and deciphering such 
 fragmentary records. But if I cannot secure legal 
 evidence to refute the preposterous legend, the 
 moral evidence yet remains overwhelming to every 
 unprejudiced mind." 
 
 "What is it?" asked Meldrum, not yet bored to 
 the last point of endurance. 
 
 "For one thing, Leofric, Earl of Murcia, founded 
 a great monastery. That is a fact resting on au- 
 thority older than the ridiculous myth we are dis- 
 cussing. Now I maintain that a man who is Chris- 
 tian enough to establish a monastery would not tax 
 his people till they starved to death ; still less 
 would he make his wife ride through the streets in 
 the condition you see there," pointing to the lovely 
 simulacrum. 
 
 " But bad men have founded monasteries," inter- 
 rupted \Vadlow. " They have done it on their 
 deathbeds to expiate the crimes of a life-time." 
 
 "Waive that point then for the present," said the 
 stranger. " Look at the intrinsic incredibility of 
 the fable." 
 
 " You refer, of course, to the blindness that was 
 visited upon Peeping Tom," remarked Meldrum. 
 
 " Yes ; that implies the intervention of a super- 
 natural power, with no adequate occasion for it,
 
 WITH TENNYSON AT COVENTRY. 121 
 
 which I naturally deny. But I was not thinking 
 of that," pursued the fierce little man, with the 
 faintest semblance of a smile, and he cocked 
 his eye knowingly. 
 
 "Of what, then?" 
 
 "Well, you know human nature (in a tone as 
 near levity as his chronic grimncss would per- 
 mit). Take my word for it. There were fifty 
 Peeping Toms if there was one of 'em. Why 
 was only one of the fifty struck blind, eh? 'If 
 you would have your tale seem true, keep 
 probability in view,' says the poet." 
 
 Meldrum and Wadlow laughed at the novelty of 
 the argument, the force of which they were not 
 prepared to deny. 
 
 "You can't crack that nut anyhow. Fahns in 
 uno, falsus in omnibus, you know. And so the 
 myth goes to pieces." 
 
 The friends vouchsafing no response, because 
 they were desirous of closing the conversation, 
 the champion of the late Leofric of pious memory 
 took his departure precipitately with a victorious 
 and elated air. 
 
 Left to themselves, Meldrum and Wadlow re- 
 sumed their inspection of the statuary with un- 
 abated interest. The casual observer (but there 
 was none now that the nervous little man had 
 fled the scene) would have supposed them to
 
 122 777/s ENCHANTED. 
 
 be either sculptors or art critics or merchandize 
 appraisers, so determined did they seem to get at 
 the precise value of the Godiva, either in art 
 or money. Whereas, they were only striving to 
 fix the peerless image so tenaciously in their minds 
 that they would be able to call it up at will at high 
 noon in the crowded streets of modern Coventry. 
 
 They had visited the city of the " three tall 
 spires " in order to subject themselves anew to the 
 spell of the enchanter Tennyson, who had shaped 
 a rough legend into a poem of the most delicate 
 and refined beauty, every line of which is a 
 separate picture. As at Kenilworth, now at Coven- 
 try, they sought to recreate the spectacle, the fame 
 of which had been identified with the place by a 
 magician in words. 
 
 Emerging upon the thronged thoroughfares, they 
 found the environments unfavorable for the prose- 
 cution of the work. The number of people scurry- 
 ing to and fro were a minor cause of disturbance. 
 What chiefly hindered the free play of their fancy 
 was the extremely modern architecture of the 
 buildings. They desired a projecting story, or a 
 gable, or a lozenge-shaped window, or a gargoyle 
 upon and about which the ivy of their imagin- 
 ation might throw a tendril. Practiced as they 
 were in the art of making believe, the feat some- 
 times required a little extraneous assistance.
 
 IV I Til TENNYSON AT COVENTRY. 123 
 
 " Here's the street we want," said Meldrum, 
 preceding his friend into a narrow way where there 
 were houses many centuries old, with white plas- 
 tered bodies and black ribs, looking as if they had 
 been built all right and then turned inside out, 
 top-heavy, leaning toward one another from oppo- 
 site side-walks, as if about to fall into the middle 
 of the road in a mutual paralytic embrace. The 
 little old windows of these little old houses 
 were like eyes bleary and dim with age, but 
 still trying to pry into the secrets of the other 
 side of the street. As a spiritualist would say, 
 the conditions were now more favorable. One 
 could believe, in fault of any testimony to the 
 contrary, that some of those " fantastic gables" 
 might have " stared " at the sweet victim of 
 Leofric's cruel jest, as she rode by, and that 
 there were the same " wide-mouthed heads upon 
 the spout " which " had cunning eyes to see " 
 on that day memorable in the long annals of 
 woman's exhaustless pity and goodness. The 
 story ought to be true, if it is not, so ade- 
 quately does it tell of her divine capacity for 
 suffering when her sympathy is touched. 
 
 If heads had not been protruded from windows, if 
 coatless apprentices had not been idling in door- 
 ways, if people had not been moving thickly to and 
 fro on business or pleasure, the task which the
 
 124 T1IJ-. ENCHANTED. 
 
 friends had proposed to themselves might, as has 
 been intimated, have been more easily performed. 
 But so trained had they become in the art of making 
 inward conceptions palpable to the outward vision, 
 so immersed were they in the realization of the 
 ideal, that they soon succeeded in clearing the 
 narrow street of all impediments to their day-dreams. 
 They trod it alone, the palfrey with its precious 
 load of charms all unveiled stepping by their side 
 with noiseless footfalls. The horse, being necessa- 
 rily patterned after the marble in Guildhall, was 
 snow-white; and so, for the same reason, was the 
 rider. To have warmed her into flesh and blood by 
 the glow of a lambent imagination would have been 
 more satisfactory. But the conditions under which 
 the spectacle was conjured up would not allow of 
 this improvement on the model. Its spotless purity 
 seemed more consonant with the lofty conception 
 of the poet than if it had been suffused with nature's 
 own life-tints borrowed from the palette of a Ra- 
 phael. And then, if the friends had been privileged 
 to break away from their restrictions and to see 
 Godiva as that "one low churl compact of thankless 
 earth" saw her, in her own beauty unadorned, thereby 
 condemning himself to be not only stone blind, but 
 "the fatal by-word of all years to come," they would 
 have felt like Peeping Toms themselves, and blushed 
 at their own treachery and baseness. So intent
 
 IV I Til TENNYSON AT CO I' EN TRY. 125 
 
 wore they in the accomplishment of their work, at 
 once scientific and pleasurable, that they did not 
 remark how curiously they were scrutinized by the 
 passers-by, and were unroused from their reveries 
 even by the jostle of passing elbows. If the good 
 people of Coventry who saw those singular 
 strangers, gazing without apparent motive into 
 the middle of the street at right angles to them- 
 selves, could have seen what they saw, they would 
 have deemed the sight much superior to the elabo- 
 rate pageant of their yearly celebration of the city's 
 ancient legend with a circus rider from London to 
 personate the modest and devoted Godiva. 
 
 That rousing shock which the worthy burghers of 
 Coventry could not give the two dreamers from 
 America, was supplied sharply enough by the 
 modern houses lining both sides of a wide street 
 into which they presently came. In the presence 
 of fronts, all undeniably nineteenth century, the 
 lovely phantom of the eleventh could not long sur- 
 vive. Presto! it vanished, and Meldrum and Wad- 
 low saw in its stead the vulgar drays and butcher 
 carts of the period. 
 
 Wrapped in their self-communings they had not 
 exchanged a word till now, when they mutually ex- 
 pressed their contentment with the success of a 
 trial about which, owing to its peculiar difficulties, 
 they had entertained some misgivings.
 
 126 THE EXL'IIANTED. 
 
 The dear Godiva gone, it was not surprising that 
 the charms of women in general should remain for 
 a time uppermost in their thoughts, or that their 
 meditations should be associated with tender re- 
 membrances of Mrs. Josiah J. Greatfield and Miss 
 Amanda Robison. 
 
 "Now for the bridge, Madison," said Meldrum, 
 " Tennyson's own point of view, you know." 
 
 " And the likeliest place for meeting the sprightly 
 widow and Amy I mean Miss Robison," replied 
 Wadlow, supplementing the thought which he well 
 knew was seething under his comrade's Derby hat. 
 
 Meldrum laughed gently. " True. No tourist 
 who comes to Coventry misses the bridge. By hang- 
 ing round it with the 'grooms and porters' as Ten- 
 nyson did, your wish may be gratified." 
 
 " And yours, Felix, you can't deny it," said 
 Wadlow, playfully.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 MRS. GREATFIELI/S VIEWS ABOUT LADY GODIVA AND 
 OTHER MATTERS. 
 
 FOR use in landscape painting and poetry, a 
 bridge should be, if possible, a single graceful arch. 
 Make this arch high and crowning ; twine its but- 
 tresses with ivy; glass it in a slow running stream, 
 whose banks are fringed with grasses and wild flow- 
 ers and overhung with trailing willows, and nor pen 
 nor brush can find in this wide world a fairer object 
 for its exercise. Until one has stood on the bridge 
 near the railway station at Coventry, he cannot im- 
 agine how far it is possible for such an object to 
 lack every element of picturesqueness which should 
 adhere by right to a structure of the class. It is the 
 barest apology for a viaduct spanning, not a river, 
 nor a ravine, but only a shinin'g gridiron of tracks 
 along which trains arc incessantly darting and belch- 
 ing smoke and soot into the faces of those who lean 
 over its stony parapets. If wrought of iron with a 
 slight rise to the center, it might, despite modern- 
 ness, be not wholly devoid of that beauty for which 
 one looks in a bridge that has the honor of being 
 
 127
 
 128 Till-: ENCHANTED. 
 
 embalmed in a poem by Tennyson. But it is as flat, 
 formless, ugly, and strictly useful a work as pinching 
 economy could provide, for the sole ends of clearing 
 the stacks of the locomotives and permitting vet 
 hides to cross it in safety. Tennyson may count it 
 among the triumphs of his versatile genius that his 
 "Godiva" draws pilgrims every day to the height 
 of that hideous utility, not to kill time with the 
 lounging grooms and porters, but to murmur to the 
 circumambient air the old haunting lines. 
 
 Meldrum and Wadlow were thinking less of dead 
 and gone Godivas than of draped living loveliness 
 as they hung on the bridge alone, that sunny after- 
 noon. So intently were they engaged in reviving 
 the latent mental images of the countrywomen they 
 had met at Kenilworth that they at first suspected 
 the genuineness of those ladies, when they actually 
 appeared descending from a carriage at the station 
 and slowly walking up the slope to the bridge. 
 They rubbed their eyes to assure themselves that 
 those two symmetrical forms and handsome faces 
 were not as unsubstantial as the lovely countess 
 herself from whom they had so lately parted. No ! 
 on a second glance, the vitality of the persons ap- 
 proaching was not to be mistaken. That solidity, 
 that exuberance of the widow, that fragility and 
 springiness of the maiden, were no mere figments of 
 the brain. And there was no possible room for
 
 MXS. GREATFIELD'S VIEWS. 129 
 
 doubt, when a gleam of recognition brightened the 
 eyes and flushed the cheeks of both ladies, as their 
 upward glance met that of the gallant fellows, who 
 removed their hats and bowed respectfully, advanc- 
 ing at the same time to greet the newcomers. 
 
 *_> o 
 
 The widow bore the full sunlight of a rare English 
 day very well. The half-gloom of Mervyn's tower 
 is favorable to dubious complexions, and those ex- 
 perts in the texture of ladies' cheeks who had seen 
 her the day before in that partial revelation were 
 prepared to note a shade of sallowness detracting 
 from the healthy purity of the flesh tones they had 
 admired so much. Uncreased, a delicate confusion 
 of red and white, the face that beamed upon them 
 proclaimed the underside of thirty. In her large 
 blue eyes there was a baby simplicity, well calcu- 
 lated to beguile the unwary. The light short ten- 
 drils clustering over her round forehead lent her the 
 appearance of a bright, handsome boy, masquerading 
 in female attire, than which nothing is more roguish 
 and effective and the widow knew it. 
 
 That day she was the incarnation of archness and 
 raillery, and the two friends saw some fun before 
 them. Miss Amanda Robison, while perfectly 
 charming, did not entirely fill the part of Amy 
 Robsart at this second meeting. It was not so 
 much that her green dress had been exchanged for 
 a brown, which matched her hair and eyes, as that
 
 13 THE EXCIIAXTED. 
 
 her age seemed to have been raised over night from 
 
 o o 
 
 eighteen to twenty-one two three four or five, 
 Meldrum and Wadlow being incompetent to 
 guess which. But they were rather pleased than 
 otherwise to supcradd a few years as a ripencr of 
 immaturity. Eighteen seems too young for a hero- 
 ine in real life, and one may honestly doubt if the 
 Countess of Leicester could have shown the cour- 
 age and self-possession with which she is credited 
 at that age. 
 
 The widow was brimming with mischief. 
 "Aren't we all silly to climb up to this dirty old 
 bridge, just because Tennyson lugged it into that 
 poetry about Godiva. Ha, ha ! " 
 
 "It is sentiment," said Meld rum ; as if that were 
 an all-sufficient reason for the foil}'. Wadlow cor- 
 roborated the opinion with a nod and smile, and so 
 did Miss Robison. 
 
 "You all did it to please yourselves, but I did it 
 to please her," and the widow assumed a comic air 
 of great self-sacrifice. "You'll think it bad taste, I 
 dare say, but oh, how I do hate that Godiva ! " and 
 she confirmed the assertion of the mortal antipathy 
 by a prolonged giggle. 
 
 "Why, pray?" asked Meldrum. 
 
 " Why, because she was such a poor, weak little 
 fool, just like so many other women (and the 
 widow knit her white brow very prettily to imply
 
 AfJSS. GREATFIELD'S VIEWS. 13 1 
 
 that she herself was a creature of much sterner 
 stuff). The idea of riding horseback through the 
 streets in broad daylight as as she did, and in 
 this raw air (the widow shivered sympathetically as 
 she spoke), just to satisfy the whim of that brute of 
 a husband. It's horrible ! " 
 
 " But if she had refused," said Wad low, gently, 
 "he would have kept on the tax and let his people 
 starve." 
 
 " Not if she had had a true woman's spunk," re- 
 torted the widow. " Of course, being a bully, he 
 was a coward. If I'd been in her place that circus 
 never would have come off. I'd have forced him 
 to repeal the tax and apologize to me for his impu- 
 dence." (She enunciated this with a positiveness 
 that seemed to be born of some experience in defy- 
 ing and taming just such brutes.) 
 
 "How?" asked Meldrum, curious to know her 
 method of subjugating tyrants. 
 
 " By going home to my mother. That never 
 fails. Ha, ha!" This with an apparent air of 
 conviction as if based upon some actual test in her 
 private history. 
 
 "True, true. I think he would have come after 
 you early next day, I mean Godiva, and begged 
 your that is her pardon and repealed the tax. 
 But, fond as he was of his dogs and hunting 
 and other coarse pleasures, he might have let
 
 I3 2 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 her go and doubled the tax out of spite. "What 
 then?" 
 
 '' What then?" exclaimed the widow. "If I had 
 been fond enough of the people here to do what that 
 Godiva did ugh! it makes me creepy to think" of it 
 (and she mechanically hugged herself in her light 
 traveling shawl as if for warmth), I'd have come back 
 from my mother's on the si}-. Then I'd have taken 
 refuge with some faithful old retainer, --the old re- 
 tainers were always faithful in those times, you know, 
 I'd have disguised myself as a page and got the 
 free run of the castle. Watching my chance, I'd 
 have put a good stiff dose of poison into the goblet 
 which he quaffed, ha, ha ! Then, when the misera- 
 ble wretch was dead, I'd have thrown off my dis- 
 guise and reigned in his stead," and the widow 
 nearly choked herself with laughing'. 
 
 " Carrie, how can you talk in that dreadful way. 
 It would be murder," said Miss Robison. 
 
 " With every respect for your opinion," blandly 
 interposed Wadlow, who with professional instinct 
 had rapidly sketched out a good legal defense for 
 Godiva in the supposititious case, " had she been my 
 client, we could have made it out emotional in- 
 sanity." 
 
 " Just so," said the widow. " ' Served him 
 right ' would have been the verdict of any sensible 
 jury."
 
 MAS. GRE A T FIELD'S VIEWS. 133 
 
 " Would you have had no remorse, Carrie ? " 
 asked her companion, reproachfully. 
 
 " Not a bit of it. Why, the temperature here 
 must be below sixty-five, in the warmest weather, 
 too. The idea of making a poor woman ride horse- 
 back without even a chest protector, a day like 
 this, for example. Poisoning was too good for him. 
 I would have chopped him up fine with a hatchet 
 afterward and gloried in the deed. Ha, ha!" 
 Here the widow was again convulsed with merri- 
 ment. 
 
 Recovering herself, she changed the subject with 
 her usual suddenness. 
 
 " What they most want in Coventry, now, is a 
 first-class fireproof hotel, with an elevator and all 
 the modern improvements like the " 
 
 "Like 'The Ryan,' of St. Paul," interjected Miss 
 Robison, mischievously. " But then it is twice too 
 large for a place like this." 
 
 " Big as it is, you could put it inside of ' The 
 West,' of Minneapolis, and you know it, Mandy." 
 
 " I remember that your Minneapolis Meteor made 
 that absurd statement," retorted Miss Robison, a 
 little more seriously, for they were broaching a 
 topic which divides and maddens the inhabitants of 
 the twin cities. " But the St. Paul Comet showed 
 up the figures next day. Everybody knows that 
 'The Ryan'"
 
 134 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 Wadlow, mindful of the exciting discussion as to 
 the comparative claims of the rival cities, which 
 they had overheard and been asked to participate 
 in the previous day, deemed it politic to call off the 
 fair disputants from so dangerous a theme. There- 
 fore, at the risk of being thought rude, he interfered 
 with the remark: "The three tall spires arc seen 
 to great advantage from this point, aren't they''" 
 (The observation was particularly addressed to Miss 
 Robison.) 
 
 " Quite so," replied that lady. "That one (point- 
 ing to the lofty steeple of St. Michaels) must be- 
 almost as high as St. Ethelfrida's at home." 
 
 " I will say," remarked the widow, as if making a 
 concession to smooth away any unpleasantness, " that 
 Ethelfrida is a great credit to St. 1'aul. I suppose 
 its spire is not twenty feet short of our Holy 
 Evangel's." 
 
 "How kind of you Carrie, really," replied Miss 
 Robison, with veiled sarcasm in her tone. " Per- 
 haps you will next allow that Ethelfrida is almost 
 as fashionable as the Evangel." 
 
 'Yes, I would for peace, dear." 
 
 " How good you arc." Then, abandoning the 
 
 o J *3 
 
 ironical vein, Miss Robison made a direct thrust. 
 " You don't have half as many carriages in livery 
 before your church doors, Sundays, as we do." 
 "Very true, if you count those your people hire
 
 MRS. GREATFIELD'S VIEWS. 135 
 
 for the occasion, ha, ha! By the way, dear, how 
 much salary do you pay Dr. Butterwick?" 
 
 " Ten thousand a year," returned Miss Robison, 
 incautiously stating the precise sum as she remem- 
 bered it. 
 
 " We give our rector twelve and a house to live 
 in. That settles it, I should say;" and the archest 
 of widows curved her expressive eyebrows at 
 her male auditors, who could make no further re- 
 sponse than to show their teeth in a fatuous and 
 helpless way. 
 
 In sheer desperation, Meldrum made another es- 
 say to divert the stream of talk into some safer 
 channel. Grasping at the first idea that occurred 
 to him, he impulsively remarked: "Coventry has 
 very much to interest the tourist, but it lacks one 
 thing besides a first-class hotel." He was about to 
 add "a castle," but Mrs. Greatfield headed him off. 
 
 "What it needs is a flour mill built of stone ten 
 stories high. Thousands of people come to Minne- 
 apolis to see ours. But then, poor things, they 
 have no St. Anthony's Falls here for the water- 
 power." 
 
 The bachelors were now listening greedily, in 
 hope that the garrulous little widow would add to 
 their scanty stock of information already afforded 
 by the press as to her colossal fortune; for there is 
 something about an enormously rich widow to
 
 13 6 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 which no man, not already mated, can be wholly 
 indifferent. It is impossible for such a man to 
 avoid the reflection that she may lose all her prop- 
 erty through inexperience and blind confidence, 
 when it might be saved for her by a second hus- 
 band in the capacity of a hard-headed adviser and 
 trusted friend. 
 
 But any disclosures she might have been about 
 to make of her pecuniary affairs were excluded by 
 a remark from Miss Robison. 
 
 "At all events, Carrie, Coventry is spared an ugly 
 piece of architecture." 
 
 "Not as ugly as your Opera House," retorted the 
 widow gaily, and again the bachelors were all atten- 
 tion. For, much as a widow with highly produc- 
 tive flour mills might appeal to their manly compas- 
 sion, a helpless maiden with an opera house on her 
 hands became an object of even greater solicitude. 
 But it was decreed that no further light should be 
 cast on this matter then and there, for the stroke of 
 the clock reminded Mrs. Greatficld that the North- 
 ern express was due in five minutes. 
 
 " Not a minute to lose ! " she exclaimed, and with 
 a parting inclination of the head, provokingly dis- 
 tant and cold when contrasted with her recent affa- 
 bility, the widow 7 faced right about and walked 
 rapidly toward the station, followed with equal 
 alacrity by Miss Robison, who merely maintained,
 
 MA'S. GREATFIELD'S VIEWS. 137 
 
 :it parting with her fellow countrymen, the same re- 
 serve she had hitherto shown them. As the bach- 
 elors looked down from their eminence at the rail- 
 way platform, they could see the well-remembered 
 courier and maid standing guard over a heap of 
 traveling bags and wraps, so that there was no valid 
 excuse for running after the ladies to proffer their 
 services. Till the gloomy station swallowed them 
 up, they kept their backs obdurately turned toward 
 the spectators on the bridge, who both foolishly 
 thought that by dint of hard wishing such magnetic 
 power might be exerted upon the shapely figures 
 thus presented in reverse, as to compel them to turn 
 and grant one last look. 
 
 The Northern express drew up to the platform ; 
 the ladies reappeared ; they entered a first-class car- 
 riage ; the engine wheezed and the train rumbled ; 
 and the ardent watchers were experiencing a sharp 
 pang of disappointment, when, at a curve of the 
 road, they saw two faces at the open windows and 
 received two indisputable smiles, which were repaid 
 in kind from the bridge with every gesture of re- 
 spect of which hands and hats are capable. 
 
 Would they ever see the ladies again ? 
 
 That is a question that occurred with much force 
 to Meldrum and Wadlow.
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 WITH GRAY AT STOKE I'OCIS. 
 
 BOTH Meldrum and Wadlow had looked forward 
 with the keenest anticipations of pleasure to visit- 
 ing the scene of Gray's pathetic Elegy. A kindred 
 taste for the sweet and sad, when deftly commingled 
 in perfectly finished verse, made them equally 
 familiar with that poem. Musical, delicious lines 
 from it rose unbidden to their memory less often in 
 passing graveyards, or at the sight of funeral pro- 
 cessions, than amid the throng of Broadway, the 
 whirl of Wall Street, the frivolous social pleasures 
 of which they partook. The idea furthest possible 
 from their thoughts, as they repeated bits of the 
 Elegy aloud or to themselves, was that of death or 
 the vanity of human wishes. They drew from it no 
 personal lesson whatever. Happily exempt from 
 any recent, keen bereavement or the bitter con- 
 sciousness of failure in life, they did not resort to it 
 for consolation. It was their good fortune to enjoy 
 it for its intrinsic sweetness and beauty, its fidelity 
 to the night side of nature, its all-embracing hu- 
 manity. The melancholy which is its broad under- 
 
 138
 
 117 77 f GRAY AT STOKE FOG IS. 139 
 
 i tone was to them but the tender gray of one of Corot's 
 pictures, or the plaintive minors of a nocturne by 
 Chopin something to be gratefully accepted with- 
 out searching analysis. Driven to book, the friends 
 could not have give one reason for doting on the 
 Elegy that would have satisfied preacher or moralist. 
 And vet they had planned to testify their profound 
 love of Gray's Elegy by an act from which the 
 severest of homilists might well have recoiled. 
 They proposed to spend a few hours in Stoke Pogis 
 church-yard, after dark. 
 
 Their immediate point of departure for the old 
 burial ground was Slough. They had run down 
 from London and put up at " The Green Man " for 
 supper. They had fortified themselves for the walk 
 to Stoke Pogis about four miles by a solid meal. 
 On its completion they asked the obliging landlord 
 some questions about the road, explaining to him 
 the object of their projected excursion. He was 
 astonished to learn that two men who did not ap- 
 pear to be escaped lunatics should propose to spend 
 part of a dark cold night (for such was the out- 
 look to the weatherwise) in a graveyard, of all 
 places. 
 
 " In coorse it ain't none o' my business, but, if I 
 might wenter to advvise a body, I'd say stop 'ere an' 
 be quite comfortable-like to-night an* go over to 
 Stoke Pogis in the mornin'."
 
 Meld rum, as spokesman, curtly said " No." The 
 landlord knew he meant it. 
 
 "Wery well. No offense meant. You knows 
 best. I takes it you'll want a carriage, or leastways 
 a guide." 
 
 Mcldrum wasted not even a monosyllable but 
 shook his head determinedly. 
 
 ' Mcbbc you'd like a little 'amper o' cold chicken 
 an' 'am; an' I begs parding for mentionin 1 brandy 
 to keep off the roometiz, which is partickly 
 catchin' in graveyards after dark." 
 
 "Quite true," was the gratifying response. " Put 
 up a pint of it." 
 
 The landlord hurried off to execute a commission 
 which enabled him to make something extra out of 
 his eccentric guests, and presently returned with a 
 bottle labeled "Fine Old Brandy, 1850." 
 
 Mcldrum pocketed the flask, paid the score and, 
 with a glance at the setting sun, remarked, "It's get- 
 ting late, and we must be off. Don't sit up for us. 
 Ta, ta ! " 
 
 " I wish you good luck, gents, both. But it's a 
 mighty queer place to make a night of it a grave- 
 yard is." 
 
 The three laughed together at the oddity of the 
 conceit, the truth of which was not to be denied, 
 and the Americans turned to leave, when a sudden 
 thought struck Mcldrum.
 
 WITH GRAY AT STOKE FOG IS. H 1 
 
 " I've one favor to ask of ' The Green Man.' " 
 " Wich I shall be most 'appy to grant it," an- 
 swered the representative of that hostelry. " Wot 
 s the same ? " 
 
 "Only this that the 'Green Man ' shall hang out 
 i picture of himself a signboard, you know. I 
 rant to see what a green man looks like." 
 
 '' It's sing'ler I've never seen none," said the land- 
 ord, reflectively. " There's plenty o' signs with pic- 
 ers of Blue Boars, and White Lions, and Golden 
 ^vans, an' sich like as never existed. Why not a 
 jreen Man, too? But 'old a minute. Should the 
 nan hisself be green, or would you only put him in 
 ;reen cloze ? " 
 
 " Both, undoubtedly. He should be dressed in a 
 nit, say, of Lincoln green, with shoes of bottle 
 reeii, hat of pea green and feather of the same, 
 ace and hands of olive green, hair, beard, and eyes 
 pple green. Nobody could possibly mistake that 
 3rt of a man for anything but a Green Man," said 
 V'acllow, taking up the notion and letting it run 
 way with him. 
 
 " Suttonly not," replied the landlord, with a look 
 f elation. " See 'ere. I'll get Goslin, the painter 
 \ glazier, to do the job on aboard. He can make 
 old-like, by rubbin' in ashes an' dirt enough, 
 hen he shall put on thirteen hundred an' fifty in 
 >-gers, for the year when this 'ouse was built. It
 
 looks almost that age (glancing fondly at the bat- 
 tered structure, \vhieh had a spinal depression in the 
 ridgepole peculiar to many old buildings). Would 
 that draw you Americans, d'ye think?" 
 
 " No doubt of it whatever," said Meldrnm. " Hut 
 Heaven forbid, that we should advise such a fraud. 
 And Mr. Landlord," he continued, with mock grav- 
 ity, " I am very much surprised to hear you propose 
 it. One would think you'd had some experience in 
 making old things out of new for instance, 1850 
 brandy " (caressing the bulging bottle that dangled 
 in his coat tail). 
 
 The landlord had evidently looked for a compli- 
 ment to his cleverness in catering to American 
 tastes, and was not prepared for this bantering allu- 
 sion to his fine old home-made liquors. While he 
 was scratching his head in some confusion for an 
 answer equal to the emergency, the friends set forth 
 with long strides for the vanquishment of the four 
 miles to Stoke Pogis. 
 
 The outlines of all objects were softened in the 
 long English twilight, as they left the green confines 
 of a high-hedged lane, and passed through a turn- 
 stile into the narrow path which gives pedestrians 
 their shortcut into Stoke Pogis church-yard. Climb- 
 ing up a little embankment, they gained their first 
 view of the church whose ivy-mantled tower still 
 keeps watch and ward over the sleepers in its
 
 WITH GRAY AT STOKE FOG IS. 143 
 
 shadow. To look at it in its reality after a long fa- 
 niliarity with its outlines in engravings illustrative 
 )f the Elegy, was like seeing again, after many years' 
 ibsence, the country church of one's youth. 
 
 " It looks natural," they simultaneously cx- 
 rlaimcd, as if they were revisiting it after a pro- 
 longed residence in America. " The church-yard is 
 :ertainly unchanged," said Wadlow, unconsciously 
 referring to the pictures of it he carried securely in 
 iiis mind. 
 
 " I should have said a big yew tree used to stand 
 ibout here," said Meldrurn, with the same pictures 
 as mental guides. " Died of old age, I suppose." 
 
 With many such remarks, showing how carefully 
 ;hey had prepared themselves for the occasion, they 
 strolled down the central graveled walk between the 
 leaving turf and moldering heaps which alone mark 
 ..he resting-place of the nameless rude forefathers of 
 :he hamlet. Reserving these for later inspection 
 jy such a diminished light as Gray requires, they 
 lastcned to accost a person, who was in the act of 
 ocking up the old church for the night. He was a 
 :hin little man, almost doubled up with years, and 
 /ct having so much seeming toughness in his very 
 infirmities that many a healthy middle-aged man 
 might have been glad to exchange chances of long- 
 evity with him. 
 
 Meldrum, after bidding this living companion of
 
 T44 /'///: ENCHANTED. 
 
 the Stoke Pogis dead, " Good-evening," came to the 
 point with a sixpence and a request to see the in- 
 side of the church in which Gray himself is said to 
 have worshiped occasionally. 
 
 "Which was his (meaning the poet's) pew ? " he 
 asked of the guide, who obsequiously preceded 
 him. 
 
 The little old man hobbled up the aisle in the 
 deepening gloom, and paused in front of a large in- 
 closed space, over the high wooden walls of which 
 one could hardly look save on tip-toe. Opening a 
 door, he pointed into what was virtually a room, 
 nicely carpeted and cushioned, and further blessed 
 with a stove, alongside of which was piled wood for 
 fuel. The occupants of this pew would be so com- 
 pletely screened from impertinent observation that 
 they could sleep undetected -barring snores 
 through tedious sermons, a great privilege. 
 
 " So this was his pew," said Wadlow, treasuring 
 up its aspect in a comprehensive glance. 
 
 "Yes, sir. lie sat there," pointing to an enormous 
 arm-chair, luxuriously padded in the back, as if to 
 facilitate naps. " It has been draped in mournin'. 
 We took it off only last week." 
 
 " So the mourning was kept on for over a hundred 
 years," remarked Meldrum. " I did not suppose 
 that Gray was held in such respect even here." 
 
 The puzzled look of the aged servitor gave way
 
 WITH GRAY AT STOKE POGIS. 145 
 
 o mirth. " O, I see, you mean the man wot 
 /rote them lines about the grave-yard out there, 
 iein' a poet, I s'pose lie never come to church. I 
 mows a poet now that's allers mousin' round here 
 except when there's service goin' on. He's what 
 he parson calls a nobstick." 
 
 "Ah, an agnostic," said Meldrum, laughing. 
 
 " This 'ere pew, "resumed the guide, assuming his 
 nost important air, " has belonged for two hundred 
 /cars to Sir Thomas Crickcnback." 
 
 " Who has but lately died in his two hundredth 
 /ear ? " 
 
 " Bless you, no ! There has been nine Sir Thom- 
 ises in all that time. The eighth one we buried in 
 his ere vault two months ago," and the old man 
 pointed with a lean, trembling forefinger to an iron 
 ing in the stone floor, and stamped with his feeble 
 .'eet, producing a sepulchral echo. " Their ladies 
 mcl children is stowed away down there with 'em. 
 If they dont stop bein' born or dyin' we shall some 
 Jay have to build either a new vault or a new 
 :hurch or both for 'em." 
 
 There is no telling when the garrulous old fellow 
 >vould have relinquished his favorite topic, had not 
 Meldrum called him off by the exhibition of an- 
 other bit of silver, coupled with the petition that 
 le might have the loan of the church door key till 
 norning; giving as the reason, that they had a
 
 146 THE EX CHARTED. 
 
 whimsical fancy to hear the hooting of the owl in 
 the old tower, and it would be pleasanter for them 
 to stay in the church till the bird began his per- 
 formances than to wait outside in the cold, and 
 Meldrum significantly nodded into the cosy depths 
 of the Crickenback pew. 
 
 " Anybody can see you arc real gents," said the 
 guide, looking stealthily at the white coin in his 
 hand. " You may have the key and stay in here as 
 long as you like. Only, when you do go away you 
 must slip it under the first flat gravestone to the 
 right of the door. But there ain't no owl in the 
 tower now as I've heerd of." 
 
 This news was a shock to men who had taken the 
 continuous residence of a lineally descended owl in 
 the tower for granted, as well as the rugged elms, 
 the yew tree's shade and the other unchanging 
 properties of the hallowed place. 
 
 They had staked much of their happiness at 
 Stoke Pogis on the complaint of the owl to the 
 moon when she should observe them wandering 
 near her secret bower and molesting her ancient 
 solitary reign. 
 
 "Ter- \vhit ter-who ter-who ter-whit," sounded 
 immediately in their rear. 
 
 The friends gave a nervous start at this most un- 
 expected and welcome of interruptions. But the 
 old man laughed very composedly and said, " it's
 
 WITH GRAY AT STOKE POG1S. 147 
 
 y rogue of a grandson, Jo. He's been overhearin' 
 
 As he spoke, a roughly clad, dirty-faced urchin 
 >peared from behind a pillar where he had been 
 
 ding. Unabashed, he advanced to the Ameri- 
 ins, and placing his arms akimbo, said " I'm your 
 3\vl for a shillin' an hour." 
 
 " He takes off all kind o' birds wonderful," ex- 
 gained the grandfather, with unconcealed delight, 
 ; he saw how artfully the child was bidding for the 
 ranger's coins. It was a proud moment for the 
 >nd old man. 
 
 The absurdity of the proposal made the darken- 
 ig church ring with laughter, to which was joined 
 
 brilliant peal of ter-whits ter-whos, from the 
 raceless Jo, as free samples of what they might 
 xpect at a shilling an hour. 
 
 " It's a bargain," said Meldrum, when he had 
 nally sobered down to business and the require- 
 lents of the sacred edifice. " Here's for the first 
 our in advance. You go up into the tower and 
 oot every five minutes, beginning at eight o'clock, 
 "hat's curfew, I believe?" 
 
 " Curfoo ! " echoed the old man. " I dunno it." 
 
 " It tolls the knell of parting day and all that 
 ort of thing first line of the Elegy, you know." 
 
 The word "tolls" carried with it an association 
 >f ideas which the obsolete word " curfew " had not
 
 I 4 8 
 
 raised. " You can hear the Eton clock strike from 
 here, when the wind sets this \vriy, if that's wot you 
 want." 
 
 "All right. Its sound, with that of the bogus 
 owl, will keep us company in our lonely watch." 
 
 " If you are meanin' to stay out there in the 
 grave-yard, you may have more company than you 
 likes," said the guide, sinking his voice to a hoarse 
 whisper. " I've hcerd how that sometimes the 
 ghost of the poet Gray comes and sits on his own 
 tomb. It's the plain one nearest the church. 
 You'll know it by the name carved on top." 
 
 " A ghost ! " cried Aleldrum. "'How delightful, 
 if he should show up; but then he \\ill keep us 
 waiting till midnight." 
 
 " The time would be well spent watching for 
 him," said Wadlow. 
 
 Grandfather looked aghast at men capable of such 
 levity and audacity, and then relapsing into a 
 friendly interest as he jingled the silver tips in his 
 pocket, he again assured them that they were 
 heartily welcome to quarter in the church all night 
 if they wished.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 IGHT SCENES AND THOUGHTS IN A CIIURCII-YARD. 
 
 BUT little light now struggled through the deeply 
 taincd windows, as the party issued from the build- 
 ig. The feeble old fellow bade the Americans 
 ood-night and wished them good luck, as he 
 mped out of the church-yard and along the well- 
 roddcn foot path that led to his humble cottage in 
 he distance. Jo climbed by the corkscrew stair- 
 asc to the tower, where he abided the Eton stroke 
 f eight to fulfill his lucrative engagement as owl. 
 Teldrum and Waldon strolled off among the 
 raves, noticing with pleasure how nature was con- 
 piring to further the object of their presence at 
 .toke Pogis. The evening was windless and not 
 oo cold for comfort. The landscape was begin- 
 ing to fade on the sight and the air held a solemn 
 tillness. They found the brick and stone tomb 
 'Inch contains the ashes of the beloved poet, 
 nd thanked him mentally for the pure delight he 
 .ad given to their whole lives by his Elegy, and in 
 .dvance for the refined enjoyment insured them by 
 he approaching darkness. Before the night shut 
 
 149
 
 150 777 r. ENCHANTED, 
 
 in, they hastened to decipher some of the names 
 spelt by the unlettered muse upon moss-grown, 
 toppling stones, and the accompanying hoi}- text 
 made almost illegible by lichens, which yielded 
 only to the vicious digs of a jackknife. The un- 
 wonted stooping gave them cramps in the small of 
 the back', and they threw themselves for a moment's 
 respite on the soft lush grass between two little 
 billows of earth unmarked by any stone. Su^t, lin- 
 ing heads on crooked elbows, they reached out 
 and icily plucked daisies that grew profusely about 
 and chewed the stems, a process highlv conducive 
 to meditation for reasons that Herbert Spencer 
 could doubtless give, if he would condescend to 
 philosophize about so small a matter. 
 
 To them, ruminating', happy, and silent, came at 
 length the slow sweet stroke of eight, borne over 
 miles of dewy-scented fields from Kton College. It 
 was the curfew without the name. Promptly, as 
 by contract, sounded the counterfeit "ter-\\hit tcr- 
 who, ter-who tcr-wit," from the ivy-mantled tower. 
 The fidelity of the tones to those of the feathered 
 original, which the friends had often heard in the 
 country clays of their childhood, was perfect. Only 
 a slight tag of laughter betrayed to those who were 
 in the secret the human source of the notes. 
 
 "Capital ! " said Meldrum. " Now, if there were 
 only a moon to which the moping owl might be
 
 NIGHT SCEXES AX I) THOUGHTS. 151 
 
 aipposed to complain. But \vc can't have every- 
 .hing." 
 
 " True," added his comrade, in a complacent vein. 
 ' For example, there are no lowing herds audible 
 is the}" wind slowly o'er the lea ; and, if an}' 
 ilrowsy tinklings lull the distant fold, they are too 
 .listant to be heard by us. The plowing season 
 is over, and, therefore, no plowman can be ex- 
 pected to be plodding his weary way homeward at 
 this or any other hour. 1 don't mind the loss of 
 these things, but, as there must be beetles about at 
 this time of the. year, I would give something to 
 :hear just one wheel his droning" flight." As \Vad- 
 low uttered this fervent desire, his hat was smartly 
 hit by some flying insect, which caromed into 
 , space. 
 
 "Thank Heaven for so much assistance to the 
 
 illusion!" And he laughingly removed his Derby, 
 
 in the crown of which could be seen by the still 
 
 I lingering twilight a small dint made: by the hard 
 
 I shell of a beetle. 
 
 The boom of coleoptcra could now be distinctly 
 i heard, and occasionally the friends received other 
 proofs of their activity in taps on the cheeks, and 
 Meldrum gently disentangled one from his hair 
 where it had alighted. " It is realistic, if not exactly 
 pleasant," he declared. 
 
 " Of one thing I am fully persuaded," he con-
 
 15-' THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 tinned, in a low voice. " Nature never meant 
 that a healthy man should think much about death. 
 All around me are reminders of the inevitable hour 
 and of the grave to which the paths of glory lead, 
 and yet the fate to which \ve must all succumb 
 has not been in my thoughts for a single instant 
 here." 
 
 " I can honestly say the same," observed \Yadlo\v. 
 "To be frank-, 1 have tried to coax myself into some 
 profitable reflections on death -such as seem appro- 
 priate to this place but I can't do it. I am so far 
 from seriousness and morali/ing that I confess I was 
 about to laugh as you spoke. A comical idea had 
 struck me." 
 
 " Let me share it," said Meldrum. " I find that I 
 cannot possibly help being in the facetious vein, too. 
 It is Nature's healthy protest :igainst useless dumps, 
 I suppose." 
 
 The hooting of the hired owl cut into the conver- 
 sation, and this time free from the concluding blem- 
 ish which they had noticed at first. 
 
 " If he keeps it up like that," said Mcldrum, " I'll 
 throw in an extra shilling." 
 
 " I was thinking," resumed \Vadlow, " how lucky 
 for the world it is that the Milton, who here may 
 rest, was mute and inglorious. Imagine two or 
 more Miltons with a corresponding number of Para 
 discs Lost or their equivalents in ponderous epics
 
 bout heaven and hell. Consider that a pair of Mil- 
 ons would have doubled the false pretenses of culti- 
 r ated people. The}' would all have been obliged to 
 iffect a familiarity with one more undying poem 
 vhieh the}' had never read save in the windowings 
 >f anthologies and as parsing lessons .it school." 
 
 " Yes. indeed ! " echoed Meldrnm ; " we will 
 :heerfully admit Milton to be the greatest (A Kng- 
 ish epic poets, and entitled to the immortality of 
 uncut pages in the finest of bindings, and still rejoice- 
 that Nature did not duplicate that particular man 
 with his precise qualifications for writing 1'aradises 
 Lost. \Yhy, much as I admire the genius of Byron, 
 even two Byrons \vould have been a bore ! " 
 
 \Yadlow pursued the tempting theme. " What if 
 somebody were buried here who might have scat- 
 tered plenty o'er a smiling land, if his lonely lot had 
 not forbade it ; per contra, the world may have es- 
 caped, in the enforced obscurity or early death of 
 somebody else, a tyrant who would have waded 
 through slaughter to a throne and shut the gates of 
 mercy on mankind. Two Miltons or two Byrons 
 would be heartily welcomed by the universe when 
 contrasted with two possible Napoleons scourging 
 the human family into untimely graves to gratify 
 their insatiate and remorseless pride and ambi- 
 tion." 
 
 " After all, Madison, is it true that any rage (in
 
 154 Till-. ENCHANTED. 
 
 the quaint phrasing of the poet) that is really noble, 
 was ever repressed, or is the genial current of the 
 soul actually frozen by chill penury? In America 
 we should certainly scout that view of life as pusil- 
 lanimous ; and English literature, science, art, and 
 politics abound in signal proofs of the triumph of 
 undoubted genius over \vhat Claude Melnotte calls 
 ' low birth and iron fortune.' I\icc the shade of Gray, 
 it seems to me the one jarring note in his otherwise 
 harmonious Flegy." 
 
 "Ouite right, Felix. If in this neglected spot is 
 laid a heart once pregnant with celestial fire, or a 
 hand that the rod of empire might have swayed, 
 depend upon it that the owner thereof persisted in 
 willfully stifling or indolently neglecting his native 
 gifts and keeping the noiseless tenor of his way 
 along the cool, sequestered vale of life, instead of 
 entering the race like a man for the prizes. He 
 simply did not seize the opportunity that all men 
 have, and the fact that he let it go by proves that 
 he did not deserve the earthly rewards he missed. 
 But he was just as happy without them." 
 
 Wad low dropped into this closing truism with 
 the same entire lack of belief in it that invariably 
 underlies its utterance by youth and health. 
 
 " But this is no place nor time to criticise or dis- 
 parage any bit of the tendercst and sweetest of 
 poems," said Mcldrum. "Rather let us thank
 
 . 1 
 
 Thomas Gray for the exalted pleasure lie has given 
 to four generations of men by the Klegy." 
 
 " There's an enchanter for you ! " added \Vadlo\v. 
 "In all England, perhaps, no church-yard less pic- 
 turesque than this can be found. Tear up those 
 fe\v rugged elms by the roots, banish that yew 
 tree's shade, and its scant}" natural attractions are 
 gone. There is not one grave here that a tourist 
 would step aside to see, except that of Gray, and 
 his is an interesting object only because lie wrote 
 the Klcgy. Out of such unpromising materials 
 genius has made the Mecca of cemeteries to \vhich 
 pilgrims will resort as long as the English language 
 lasts. The clock strikes nine and here we sit- -shiv- 
 ering in the cold and catching the rheumatism, be- 
 cause Gray chose to celebrate this particular church- 
 yard in poetry." 
 
 " Ter-whit ter-who, ter-who tcr-whit," hooted the 
 owl, high and dry in his belfry, as if mocking the 
 folly of the two sentimentalists down there in the 
 damp grass. 
 
 " l>y a natural association of ideas," said Mel- 
 drum, " I do now remember the fine old brandy of 
 1850, which I had quite forgotten. Let us button 
 up our overcoats and take a nip." Suiting the ac- 
 tion to the word, he fastened his surtout about his 
 chest to a mummy-like tightness (VVadlow following 
 the example), and then produced from its deep re-
 
 lj(> /'//A I:\CII \.\ //./'. 
 
 cess the neglected bottle. " The corkscrew, Madi- 
 son." 
 
 \Vadlow fumbled in several pockets for that 
 treasure of a knife, which comprised, with six 
 blades of different sixes, a corkscrew, a gimlet, an 
 aul, and file, but, as usual in such emergencies, it 
 had been left behind in the other trousers. 
 
 With experience born of many youthful picnics, 
 Mcldiuni was about to clip off the neck of the flask 
 with a dexterous bl<>w of his walking stick", when his 
 friend huskily whispered, "There's some one else 
 in the church-yard. Look! I I is right arm was 
 extended toward Gray's tomb, the outline of which 
 \vas visible at the distance 1 of four or five rods. A 
 figure, clad in an old-fashioned cloak- re-aching to 
 the heels and wearing a large slouched hat, was tak- 
 ing a slow, measured tread which, the next mo- 
 ment, brought him to the tomb, whereon he seated 
 himself and folded his arms, his head sinking on his 
 breast. The action recalled to both observers 
 Gray's own words, supposed to describe some of his 
 chameleon-like moods: "Now drooping, woeful, 
 wan, like one forlorn or crazed with care or crossed 
 in hopeless love." 
 
 " If it were midnight, I should say that was Gray's 
 ghost, of which we have been forewarned," whis- 
 pered Meldrum, with a slight tremor, doubtless 
 attributable to the chilliness.
 
 '57 
 
 " Wouldn't it be luck}' if it were," responded 
 Wadlow, in a tone that, somehow did not express 
 unmixed pleasure. 
 
 " Ter-who ter-whit," cried the owl, and, at the 
 first mournful note, the figure on the tomb threw 
 up his head with a sharp, undignified jerk, and 
 muttered some words inaudible to the strained ears 
 of the two friends. 
 
 Slow, deliberate motions and absolute taciturnity 
 (save when spoken to) have became so fully incor- 
 porated, by tradition, with the universal concep- 
 tion of a ghost, that the uY-.h and blo,,d quality of 
 the apparition was proclaimed at once, and further- 
 more confirmed by his hasty removal of his hat and 
 persistent scratching of his head, like one trying to 
 grub up latent ideas. Then he pulled a corner of the 
 huge extinguisher over his eyes, refolded his arms 
 and became motionless, though the listeners could 
 still hear low, incoherent mutterings. 
 
 " He's wrapped in his own thoughts and will not 
 notice our approach. Let's surprise him for fun," 
 suggested Wadlow, and the}' thereupon concerted a 
 little scheme to startle the man who was taking 
 such liberties with Gray's tomb. 
 
 So, stealing off in different directions, bending 
 low in the shadow of gravestones, crawling on all 
 fours across open spaces, they succeeded in attaining 
 points in the rear of their victim. Then closing in
 
 53 
 
 with silent swiftness, till they stood almost within 
 touch of him, they were about to utter the pre- 
 concerted " boo," when a remark from the uncon- 
 scious person caused a sudden change in their pro- 
 gramme 
 
 " Fowl, cowl, growl, howlpshaw ! how few good 
 rhymes there are to owl ! 
 
 Wudlow's poetic instinct at once asserted itself. 
 Instead of playing spook" for the mystification of 
 the heedless stranger, he found another rhyme on 
 the instant from force of habit. 
 
 " How would jowl do?" he asked, in his ordinary 
 voice. 
 
 "Or soul, if you pronounce it Irish fashion," 
 added Mcldrum, himself disarmed by the appeal to 
 his old talent of rhyming which had been buried in 
 a napkin these man}' years. 
 
 There is no tcllin<_f what effect two vigorous 
 
 o o 
 
 "boos" might have produced upon that man sitting 
 upon that tomb at that hour of the night ; but he 
 turned round quite calmly, and simply replied 
 " Thank' you," in a melancholy voice, and then 
 stared at the dark- forms near him as if awaiting 
 some explanation. 
 
 " It's clear yon don't believe in ghosts," said 
 Mcldrum, pleasantly. 
 
 " If I did I should not be here," and the friends 
 could sec a large mouth curved in a sad smile,
 
 NIGHT SC1-.XES A XI) THOUGHTS. 159 
 
 " No fear of robbers? " asked Wadlow, playfully. 
 
 " Not much," returned the deep chest voice. 
 " I am a poet and chronically cleaned out. I 
 couldn't stand and deliver anything more valuable 
 than a fe\v sonnets and the world doesn't love 
 them overmuch." Here his tones became tomb- 
 like.
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 A MMPKKN KLMGIAC POET SKKKING I NSl'l KA'IK )\ 
 AT Till', I ' il'XT. 
 
 " I low do you happen to be here at this hour.''" 
 asked Mcldrum, kindly, ami yet with an uncoii- 
 cealable touch of proprietorship in the church-yard, 
 as if his private en^a^emrnt of the owl had some- 
 how given him a monopoly of the plaee for self and 
 friend. 
 
 "I often come here for inspiration/' explained 
 the man. " I seem to extract it from (i ray's tomb 
 merely by sitting on it." 
 
 \Vadlo\v \vas on the point of saying " through the 
 pores, I presume," but he forbore to make that un- 
 worthy remark. 
 
 " It is but natural, as elegiac poetry is my forte. 
 And where should I come for ideas but to the foun- 
 tain of Elegy ? " rapping the stone with his knuck- 
 les, to indicate an inexhaustible well-spring be- 
 neath. " You arc Americans, I know by your 
 accent. It is barely possible that even in your 
 distant country you may have heard of Hippie- 
 down? " 
 
 i Go
 
 i (> I 
 
 Meldrum's h;ibitu;il politeness would not permit 
 him to say " no," or even to shake his head. Casu- 
 ists ma)- condemn him as they will, but it is a fact 
 that he nodded, and his voiceless affirmation was 
 abetted by the too flexible \YadIow. 
 
 It was a cheap way of giving the melancholy 
 stranger a great pleasure, which appeared in the 
 sudden expansion of his lean face into a true smile, 
 from which it promptly subsided into its normal 
 gloom. 
 
 " Thank you ! thank- you ! What you have both 
 
 said (they had said nothing) goes far to solace me 
 
 for the too habitual neglect of my own countrymen. 
 
 It is not for me, perhaps, to assert that my heart is 
 
 pregnant with celestial fire, or that I could wake to 
 
 ecstasy the living lyre if I had the chance. It may 
 
 be that others will say that of me too late, when I 
 
 am laid away here," and he glanced significantly, 
 
 almost yearningly, at a little unoccupied strip of 
 
 ground that would have snugly fitted his attenu- 
 
 : ated frame. Then ensued a pause, which his hcar- 
 
 . ers did not improve by the sympathetic remarks for 
 
 which the poet was probably waiting. 
 
 " Ter-who ter-whit ! " 
 
 " That's what brought me here to-night, gcntle- 
 i men. I've lived, man and boy, in these parts for 
 thirty years and never before have I heard an owl 
 in that tower."
 
 102 THE ENCHANTED, 
 
 " And you thought an occurrence so extraor- 
 dinary should he duly commemorated in a poem," 
 said Mel drum. 
 
 " You have divined my purpose. Hearing the 
 bird of night as I was walking home from Slough, 
 the idea Hashed upon me of celebrating the return 
 of (Jlray's owl I mean, of course, a descendant of 
 the original one to her secret bower. Acting 
 promptly upon the happy thought, 1 sought the 
 poet's tomb for tin- usual aid it affords me in com- 
 poMt i' >n." 
 
 " You were at work on the poem when we inter- 
 rupted you ? " 
 
 " I was, if work it may be called which is a pleas- 
 ure. Hut so far from interrupting, you have helped 
 me in suggest ing t\vo capital rhymes for owl, both 
 of which are novel and available. I am roughly 
 projecting a poem of from twelve to sixteen stan- 
 zas, with a rhyme for owl in each." 
 
 Both Meldrum and \Yadlow expressed a curiosity 
 to see the poem in print, and asked where and 
 when it would probably appear. 
 
 " I don't know," answered Mr. Ilipplcdown, 
 bitterly. " There is a clique of shallow society 
 poets in possession of all the magazines. So I 
 cannot gain admission there. I used to be welcome 
 to a corner of the county newspaper, but the 
 editor now tells me that the public taste is inclining
 
 EI. EC, i. ic roET SEEKL\C, LWIRATIOX. 163 
 
 more and more to light and flippant verses. There 
 seems only one place left for a poet who deals 
 \vith the solemnities of life. I am almost ashamed 
 to name it." 
 
 " \Ye should be pleased to kno\v, if the disclosure 
 docs not wound you too deeply," said \Vadlow, 
 compassionately. 
 
 " Well, the obituary column. The editor assures 
 me that room will always be- found for my poetry 
 on payment of the regular advertising rates." 
 
 " A hard condition, indeed," commented Meld- 
 rum. 
 
 " Hard as it is, the arrangement is the only one 
 which pays me at all. It works like this: I have 
 an elegiac trifle on hand. A man in the neighbor- 
 hood loses his father, mother, wife, son, daughter, 
 or any member of his family. I promptly call 
 upon him and show him some verses which, with a 
 little change to suit his particular bereavement, will 
 '.express his feelings of sorrow. He buys them and 
 prints them in the paper at his own expense and 
 generally over his own signature." 
 
 " You make money, but no reputation out of 
 it." 
 
 " And precious little cash." The poet heaved a 
 sigh in which the two friends philanthropically 
 joined. 
 
 " The lines you propose on the return of the long
 
 16 4 
 
 missing owl to the scene of the Elegy are ob- 
 viously unsuited to use in obituaries," remarked 
 Meldrum. 
 
 " Yes, I shall reserve them, with man)- another 
 elaborate production of my muse, to some happy 
 day, when the public tires of folly in rhyme and 
 bids ils poets discourse of the gravest issues of life 
 and death. Then will come- my turn and with it 
 m}- book." 
 
 Air. Ilippledown's profound che>t voice rose 
 several notes in the scale as he uttered this cheerful 
 prophecy and found his evident consolation in it. 
 
 During this conversation the Americans had famil- 
 iarly seated themselves on the flat top of Gray's 
 tomb, on either side of their new acquaintance. It 
 comfortably accommodated all three. Hut the cold 
 touch of the marble, combined with the increasing 
 frigidity of the atmosphere as the night drew on, 
 struck a chill to the bones of two of the sitters, un- 
 accustomed as they were to such exposure. A I el- 
 drum thought it high time to take the postponed 
 "nip," as an infallible prescription against rheuma- 
 tism. 
 
 " Permit me to consult you on a delicate question 
 of ahem church-yard propriety," said he. 
 
 The poet bowed with a pleased expression, as one 
 who is complimented on his expert knowledge of a 
 recondite specialty.
 
 ,6 5 
 
 " Would it be entirely proper and becoming in us 
 three persons, drawn hither as we are to-night by 
 our profound admiration of the Klegy and its 
 author to to drink together to the memory of 
 Gray" " 
 
 "Undoubtedly," was the energetic response. 
 " What have you got to drink ? " 
 
 " Vou shall see if you have a corkscrew." 
 
 " I never go without one, and here it is." 
 
 Meldrum produced the bottle and opened it in a 
 trice, and then politely handed it to the poet to set 
 an example of decorum in the performance of the 
 solemn impending rite. 
 
 Air. Ilipplcdown raised the bottle slowly with 
 , his right hand to the extreme length of his arm, and 
 removed his huge hat with his left hand. Pointing 
 the neck of the bottle toward the zenith, as if in al- 
 lusion to the present presumptive home of the poet, 
 he brought it as slowly back to his lips, murmuring 
 " Here's to the sacred memory of Gray," and kept it 
 there for a surprising length of time, at an acute 
 angle. 
 
 Wadlow was on the point of saying " turn," play- 
 full}', when Mr. Ilippledown was obliged to pause 
 for breath, recovering which, he remarked, as he 
 passed the bottle, that he hoped he had opened the 
 impressive ceremony with due solemnity. 
 
 "Admirably," said Meldrum, and he gravely
 
 I 66 THE EM'JIAXTEJJ. 
 
 copied the stately method of his exemplar, as far as 
 applying the flask to his lips. When the liquor be- 
 gan to trickle down his throat, its fiery quality 
 nearly strangled him. lie withdrew the bottle pre- 
 cipitately and handed it to Wadlow, who went 
 through the prescribed formula \vith the same un- 
 pleasant result. The poet looked at them both 
 with obvious compassion for their incapacity to 
 gulp down raw spirits without flinching. 
 
 " I have another nice question of etiquette for 
 you. Would it be wholly out of place to to Mnoke 
 to the memory of Thomas Gray ? " 
 
 " Not in the least. Regard the fumes of tobacco 
 in the light of incense, and there you have a 
 ceremony of the deepest significance-. Pipe or 
 cigar? " 
 
 Meldrum replied by a courteous tender of prime 
 Ilavanas, and the three occupiers of (Iray's tomb 
 were soon exhaling clouds which bore skyward their 
 heartfelt gratitude to the author of the Elegy. 
 
 Mr. Ilippledown was clearly in the vein of hero- 
 worship that night ; for a few minutes afterward 
 he grasped the bottle, which had been carelessly set 
 down on the marble slab near him, and, without a 
 word, applied it to the large orifice in his face, and 
 took another long pull at the contents. This time 
 his invocation, if any, was silently made, and a 
 chance spectator would have supposed lie was only
 
 ! RLEGIAC PORT SEEKING INSPIRATION. 167 
 
 taking a stiff drink to quench a thirst which seemed 
 well nigh insatiable. 
 
 When, at length, the physical necessity of breath- 
 ing compelled him to withdraw the bottle, and it 
 came again into Meldrum's hand, he noticed with 
 some alarm its greatly reduced weight. He sus- 
 pected that Mr. Ilippledown had that temperamen- 
 tal weakness for liquor to which so many of the 
 poetically gifted have fallen victims. lie feared 
 that this sad man, in trying to drown his sorrows, 
 might get drunk, and that from his intoxication 
 might arise some deed or word not entirely respect- 
 ful to the shades of the man they all so greatly re- 
 vered. Yielding to a not unreasonable impulse of 
 precaution, he said, " 1 now beg to suggest still 
 a third mode of expressing the same beautiful 
 thought conveyed in the previous two ceremonies. 
 It is a rite of the remotest antiquity." 
 
 Mr. Ilippledown opened his eyes and mouth, won- 
 dering what was to come after brandy and cigars. 
 
 " I allude to the immemorial custom of libation," 
 continued Meldrum, suddenly turning the bottle 
 neck down and letting the pungent liquor gurgle to 
 
 ithe ground at the base of the tomb. 
 
 " Oh ! That's un-Cliristian it's positively heathen- 
 
 [ish !" cried Mr. Ilippledown, stretching out a hand 
 in indignant protest. But Meldrum, with hat re- 
 
 : moved, and saying in a voice quivering as if with
 
 1 6 8 rill: EX CHAN TED, 
 
 emotion, " To the dear memory of Thomas Gray," 
 permitted the mysterious concoction from the 
 Green Man's cellar to drench the grass. 
 
 The act, for some reason, deeply offended Mr. 
 Hippledown. lie looked with disapproval at the 
 spot whence the wasted spirit s exhaled a penetrating 
 odor. lie sniffed several times as if regretfully 
 parting with it. Then, after a little silence, which 
 the Americans were indisposed to break (perhaps 
 because their new-found friend was becoming slightly 
 tedious) he rose, wrapped his long cloak about him, 
 and with cold politeness, bade them good-night. 
 
 "Good-night!" said the}- together, and the un- 
 feathered owl chimed in with his " ter-u hit ter- 
 who ! " 
 
 The Americans extended their hands for a formal 
 farewell, and each had a pretty little speech on 
 the end of his tongue ; but the pod turned his back 
 on them and stalked along the pebbly path which 
 led to the narrow road or lane adjoining the church- 
 yard, the glow of his nervously puffed cigar making 
 a little halo of light about his head. The}- called 
 again " Good-night " and threw "Good luck " after 
 it ; but no response. In the kindness of his heart 
 Meldrum regretted that he had done anything, even 
 with the best intentions, to drive away the poor fel- 
 low. I lad he known Mr. Ilippledown better, he 
 would have had no misgivings as to his capacity for
 
 imbibing liquor without showing it in speech <>r 
 deed. If the poet felt pride in any thing outside 
 his poetry it was in his exceptional gift of hold- 
 ing out against that intoxication to which weaker 
 men were forced to yield in nocturnal bouts with 
 the bottle at the village inn. Mr. Ilippledown had 
 instinctively surmised the true reason which 
 prompted the libation, and deemed it an unjust re- 
 flection on himself. His sensibilities were as keenly 
 wounded by it as if his poetical genius had been 
 denied and derided. Hut it is not correct to infer 
 that Mr. Ilippledown was rendered unhappy in con- 
 sequence. He was a man who dearly loved his 
 grievance, and from choice was never without it, in- 
 venting one if there were none in reality. While 
 the strangers were reproaching themselves for a 
 : fancied lack of sympathy with that humble disciple 
 lof Gray, he was felicitating himself on the acquisition 
 of a good fresh grudge against Society. To him 
 the bitterness of the thought was inexpressibly 
 sweet. 
 
 Left to their own devices, they agreed that it was 
 a measure of common prudence to get under cover. 
 Cold and sleepy, they pictured to themselves the 
 cosiness of Sir Thomas Crickenback's high-backed 
 pew, with the chill taken off by a fire in the stove. 
 As they walked toward the door of the church, Jo 
 saw them from the tower, and sounding a last " ter-
 
 17 7V/ A ENCHANTED. 
 
 who/' descended to meet them. Meldrum expressed 
 satisfaction with his able performance of the diffi- 
 cult part of owl, and gave him the stipulated sum 
 with a gratifying bonus. 
 
 " Mayn't I do it for ye to-morrer night ? " asked 
 the delighted boy. 
 
 " Once in a life time is enough," said his employer, 
 laughingly. " lUit .^ee here, Jo, can you imitate a 
 cock" crowing .' " 
 
 For answer he was saluted with a tremendous 
 cock-a-doodle-doo, which provoked echoes from all 
 the neighboring barn-yards. 
 
 "Admirable! And a hunting horn?" 
 
 A clear piercing toot was the response, which 
 woke up some fox-hounds in a distant kennel, and 
 they bayed in recognition of the call. 
 
 "Good! ]>e under the altar window at sunrise 
 and make both those sounds till you wake us and 
 we cry out ' stop.' ' 
 
 Meldrum desired to see how the church-yard 
 would look at the breezy call of incense-breathing 
 morn, to hear the incidental accompaniments of the 
 cock's shrill clarion or the echoing horn, and possi- 
 bly the swallow twittering from the straw-built 
 shed, though he did not remember having seen any 
 shed of that description in the vicinity. The fifth 
 stanza of the Elegy, palpitating with exquisite im- 
 agery, had persistently haunted the friends for
 
 ELEGIAC rOl: T S1:1:KL\G IXSl'lK. I 77U.V. I 7 I 
 
 many years, and they longed to realize it on the 
 spot. Jo's rare talent of mimicry would enable 
 them to do this. 
 
 " For another shillin' I'll throw in ahull, a sheep, 
 a dog, and a cat. Or mebbe you'd like a bagpipe," 
 and Jo gave a taste of its quality, which was bad 
 save to the ears of a perfcrvid Scot. 
 
 " That will do no\v," said Meldrum, with his teeth 
 on edge. 
 
 The bargain being struck for the simple matinee 
 performance, as aforesaid, the party proceeded to 
 the Crickenback pew, where Jo lighted the kindling 
 wood in the convenient little stove and speedily re- 
 duced the chill to the point of endurance. Meldrum 
 made himself at home in the great arm-chair whose 
 soporific properties had been tested by so man}' 
 generations of Sir Thomases. \Yadlow stretched 
 himself at full length on a bench with a hassock for 
 a pillow. In ten minutes both were so fast asleep, 
 after the fatigues of the night, that Boanerges thun- 
 dering his " Lastly" from the pepper box of a pul- 
 pit hard by would have failed to wake them, though 
 the sleepiest of Sir Thomases invaribly opened his 
 eyes from force of habit at that welcome stage of 
 the perfunctory discourse. 
 
 The rude forefathers of the hamlet, in their nar- 
 ) row cells forever laid, were not a surer prey to dumb 
 ;forgetfulness until sunrise the next day than the
 
 172 
 
 tired inmates of Stoke I'ogis church. Ikit when Jo, 
 as the cock crew thrice and followed with the blast 
 of what seemed a fog horn for loudness, they had a 
 decided advantage over the faster sleepers out 
 there : for they were roused to consciousness and to 
 all the pleasures of a new day. 
 
 A peremptory " Stop ! " was necessary lo end the 
 odious noise raised by Jo in the conscientious per- 
 formance of his contract. 
 
 As they emerged from the old church, the early 
 morn was breathing an incense in which one mmht 
 
 i > O 
 
 detect hawthorn, honey-suckle and roses, struggling 
 for sweet supremacy. If there were no swallows 
 twittering for the want of straw-built sheds, there 
 were other swallows silently skimming the air for 
 their breakfasts. The butterflies and bees had be- 
 gun their foraging excursions among the wild flow- 
 ers that nodded above the grass, more precious to 
 the lover of nature than all the transplanted blos- 
 soms that money can buy. Neglected the spot may 
 be by artificial gardening, but the impartial sun did 
 not forget it in the allotment of his glorious beams, 
 and the diamonds of dew tipping every tiny grass- 
 blade were all of the first water. A deep and holy 
 peace rested over all a peace so grateful in 
 contrast with the toil and din outside this charmed 
 precinct, that one for the moment could hardly im- 
 agine a worse fate for the silent inhabitants of Stoke
 
 '73 
 
 I'OLMS church-yard than to be roused once more 
 from their lowly beds to partake of the universal 
 feverish unrest. 
 
 In a sense different from that convoyed by the 
 poet, the Americans cast more than one lony;, HIIL;"- 
 ei'in^ look" behind, as the}' quitted the hallowed 
 Around and trudged toward Slough and the railway 
 station and the inevitable burdens of daily life.
 
 CIIAITKK XIV. 
 
 "SrrrosK we call this the identical spot, Madi- 
 son," saiil Meldrum, sinking exhausted on a table- 
 rock that overhung a ravine. 
 
 "Agreed, Felix, "and \Yadlow panted with the 
 unwonted exertions which had raised him to a point 
 just short of the snow line of the fungfniu. 
 
 "There is nothing really to show that Manfred 
 climbed any higher than this," continued Meldrmn, 
 as if in apology to an invisible somebody who had 
 accused him of shirking his duty. 
 
 " The place where we are seems to fill the prin- 
 cipal requirements of Act I, Scene II," added the 
 other, in the same spirit of self-justification. 
 
 " F'ully. Yonder are the blasted pines, on the 
 slope by which we ascended, some hundreds of feet 
 below us. Manfred must have had them in his eye 
 when he was soliloquizing from the cliff." 
 
 " And this is the cliff itself." 
 
 The friends crawled cautiously to the brink and 
 looked over. Their eyes having been adjusted for 
 a depth of half a mile, they were sadly disillusioned
 
 j WITH BYRON ON Till-: J( \\CI-KAU. 175 
 
 for the moment on seeing before them a depression 
 of about sixty feet, down the bank of which they 
 might have slid in perfect safety. 
 
 Meldrum was the first to rally, with a plausible 
 explanation. " It has all been filled in by land- 
 slides since Manfred's day. Time works wonderful 
 changes in these mountains." 
 
 " Of course," seconded \Vadlow. " No reasonable 
 person would ask Nature to suspend her operations 
 merely to oblige him. It would have given us great 
 pleasure to find the fathomless gulf into which Man- 
 fred talked of jumping, precisely as he left it. But 
 if avalanches will fall ami fill up gorges with rocks 
 and earth almost to the brim, we must only make 
 the best of the altered situation." 
 
 " Speaking of avalanches, Madison, we ought to 
 see some from here ; Manfred did." 
 
 44 That was before Baedeker was issued. If Byron 
 had had a Baedeker in hand when he wrote Man- 
 fred, he would have learned from it that avalanches 
 do not begin to fall till about noon, when the hot 
 rays of the sun loosen the hold of the Jungfrau on 
 the snow, and down it comes. Armed with that 
 scientific truth, the poet would have set his Manfred 
 on this shall we call it dizzy? height about 
 ; luncheon-time, not before breakfast. Then it would 
 have been all right for the misanthropic hero of the 
 poem to invite the avalanches to crush him, which
 
 i 7 6 
 
 they could not possibly have done before twelve, 
 noon." 
 
 Meldrum here consulted his watch, with manifest 
 anxiety, and remarked, " It's just ten. I must get 
 back to the hotel to write some letters by noon. 
 Let's take our luncheon now." 
 
 His hungry comrade gladly nodded assent and 
 proceeded to divest himself of the little covered 
 basket which was slim;.; across his shoulder like a 
 field-glass. A bottle of Yvorne, a half chicken, four 
 hard boiled eggs, a loaf of black bread, and a thick 
 slice of cheese, proved to be the contents, provided 
 by the landlord of the Hotel des Alpes, which was 
 their point of departure for the excursion. As they 
 ate and sipped, they could not refrain from casting 
 occasional glances at those glittering heights far 
 above them, on which the awful avalanche was pre- 
 paring for a plunge at twelve o'clock, sharp. Mean- 
 while, true to the spirit of the occasion, their ears 
 and eyes were ready to note every incident that 
 could serve further to identify the scene with that 
 so graphically portrayed in the poem. 
 
 " Behold the winged and cloud-cleaving minister," 
 cried Meldrum, pointing with a fork, tipped with a 
 scrap of chicken, to a bird that was probably a crow 
 instead of the eagle Manfred, saw. 
 
 " And hark to the natural music of the mountain 
 reed," exclaimed Wad low, to whose sensitive tym-
 
 ll'lTII 11YROX O.V Till-: JL'\'GI-RAL T . 177 
 
 panum was borne the strain of the distant Alpine 
 liorn blown by a bogus shepherd the same to 
 whom the two innocents had paid tribute on their 
 way up. 
 
 " And the sweet bells of the sauntering herd," 
 added Meld rum, who had no difficulty whatever in 
 hearing their melodious jingle, as the cows them- 
 selves were only a little distance down the moun- 
 tain, grazing as contentedly and placidly as if in the 
 safest depths of the (jrintk.-lwald. 
 
 " Sagacious animals, cows," \Yadlow hastened to 
 remark. " I have heard that their wonderful in- 
 stinct, in these high pastures of the Alps, always 
 keeps them out of the track of avalanches." 
 
 " Perhaps we had better join them then," said 
 Meldrum, who could not wholly quiet his apprehen- 
 sions of a premature loosening of the great sinning 
 masses of snow up there, without reference to 
 Baedeker's time-tables. 
 
 " Not till we have rehearsed those passages that 
 wrought us here, Felix. You are Manfred. I am 
 ;hc chamois-hunter. Here is the brink of the preci- 
 pice. Yonder is the ' roused ocean of deep hell,' 
 l.vhich I must say is rather a strong expression for a 
 ittle fog crawling up the mountain side. Proceed." 
 (n his ardor, Wad low hurled a neatly picked leg of 
 i chicken at the head of his bosom friend, who 
 ocosely retaliated with a stony crust of bread,
 
 17& TllK ENCHANTED. 
 
 which missed its mark and \vcnt over the cliff to the 
 fate Manfred had coveted for himself. 
 
 Meldrum rose to his feet. Unaccustomed as 
 he was to mountaineering, the climb of about a 
 thousand feet from the hotel on the \Ycngcrn Alp 
 had caused a stiffness of the legs. From this he 
 obtained transient relief by executing a rudimentary 
 pirouette to take the kinks out of them as he 
 explained. Then grasping his smooth, new alpen- 
 stock', he thrust its sharp, burnished point into a 
 crevice of the rock and, holding on tightly, looked 
 into the ravine with an intrepidity well becoming 
 his part. 
 
 " I wish it yawned a little more," he said, in allu- 
 sion to the comparative shallowness of Manfred's 
 fitting tomb, " though, to be sure, I am safer as it 
 is." 
 
 " I'll do the yawning, while you are reciting the 
 lines, Felix." 
 
 Meldrum did not smile at this ill-timed jest, be- 
 cause lie had already assumed the gloomy demeanor 
 appropriate to the character of the confirmed man- 
 hater. It was no easy thing to quench the mirth in 
 his eye and curve his lips into the bow of despair, but 
 his spirit was in the part and he did it. As he stood 
 there with one hand on the alpenstock for support, 
 and the other holding a 161110 edition of Manfred, his 
 round, ruddy face needed to be lengthened only an
 
 ; II' J Til ItYKOX O.V THE JUXGI-KA t'. I 79 
 
 iich or two and bleached with midnight vigils, to 
 eprescnt the woe-begone visage of Byron's hero. 
 Ueldrum was familiar with that theory of the 
 .istrionic art, which requires the actor never to for- 
 et that he is Jones when he is in the very crisis 
 nd passion of Hamlet. lie had great respect for 
 ::, because it had been ratified in print by so many 
 tars of the theater. It was because he was a mere 
 yro not rising even to the dignity of a drawing- 
 )om amateur that he at once lost himself hopc- 
 :ssly in his part. Luckily for him, there was no 
 pectacled critic sitting on a reserved rock immedi- 
 tely before him to cut him up in the next morn- 
 ig's paper because he had merged Meld rum into 
 lanfred. Beginning with the melancholy line, 
 The spirits I have raised abandon me," it would 
 ave been apparent to the only human observer, 
 V'adlow (had not the speaker's voice reached that 
 cntleman through his back), that the genial Mel- 
 rum was thoroughly loathing himself and imparti- 
 lly extending that aversion to all mankind. The 
 rofound guttural tones in which he opened the 
 :>liloquy conveyed the same idea in a measure; 
 ut, as this soon made Mcldrum hoarse, he was 
 bligcd to abandon it and go on in his natural 
 
 iccents at a higher pitch. But what the voice 
 
 . 
 icked in expressiveness, the face revealed. Even 
 
 Vadlow, had he been in front instead of reserving
 
 himself in the rear, as the coming chamois-hunter, 
 would have been startled by the God-forsaken, 
 fiend-tormented look of the most contented and 
 amiable of chums. 
 
 As Meldrum pursued his passionate declamation, 
 sinking himself most inartistically deeper and 
 deeper into the diabolical individuality of Manfred, 
 the scene before him gradually accommodated itself 
 to the demands of the lines, lie could sec the tor- 
 rent where there \vas not even a trout brook, and tall 
 pines dwindled as to shrubs by dix/iness of distance 
 in a smooth pasturage not three hundred feet below 
 him. Another crow opportunely stood- or rather 
 flew for the eagle at the right instant. The near- 
 by cows shook- their bells \\hen he reached the mu- 
 sical lines relating to them. The Alpine horn, in- 
 dustriously worked at a stone's throw beneath him, 
 continued to be heard as a running accompaniment 
 through the whole of the speech. It was the 
 shepherd's pipe in excess, and was the only over- 
 done thine; in the whole performance. The con- 
 cluding words, " which made me," were the cue 
 for Wadlow, as the chamois-hunter, suddenly en- 
 tering upon the scene. Taking his innings, that 
 gentleman recited his few introductory lines with 
 much propriety, and was sorry when they ended 
 just as he was warming up to the work'. 
 
 Manfred was not supposed to sec him or hear
 
 1177 '// /.' ) 'A'O.V O.V TJ/E J U. \GI-RA U. I S I 
 
 vhat ho said, but Meldrum obligingly paused till 
 u's friend had finished. Then he resumed his 
 Kitroni/ing observations to nature, his execration 
 if the human family, and his impartial damning 
 if himself withal, till the chamois-hunter again 
 ook his turn. The lines given to this character by 
 Jyron are insignificant until the dramatic climax is 
 cached, where Manfred winds up by gathering 
 n'mself for the fatal jump. Wadlow was saving up 
 or his only chance - the rare opportunity offered 
 >y the intending suicide, when the chamois-hunter 
 grasps Manfred in the very act of springing from 
 he cliff and exclaims- -"Hold, madman! though 
 veary of this life, stain not our pure vales with thy 
 ;uilty blood !" etc., etc., etc. 
 
 The long-expected cue came at last. " Earth 
 
 lake these atoms," cried Meld rum, with a strikingly 
 
 ealistic movement, as if to dive headlong into 
 
 i he abyss. If he had been in good earnest 
 
 .nd it looked very like it, so absorbed was he 
 
 n the personation he would have been balked, 
 
 o strong was the grip suddenly laid upon his 
 
 :oat-collar but not by his dearest of friends. 
 
 v ,Vadlow cried " Hold madman ! " all right with 
 
 mmense effect. But another man, who had sucl- 
 
 lenly appeared upon the scene, supplied the ac- 
 
 ion, and that second man, knowing nothing vvhat- 
 
 :ver of the part he was arrogantly meddling with,
 
 i 2 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 said tranquilly, "You musn't kill yourself, you 
 know." At the same time he glanced over the 
 edge of tlie clifl, and added, with a laugh, "not 
 much of a jump, anyhow." 
 
 The sudden jerk" on his collar shook Meldrum 
 back" to his real self. Far from being aggrieved by 
 this ruck: interference of a perfect stranger, he at 
 once reali/ed that the liberty \\hich had been 
 taken with his person was a spontaneous and sin- 
 cere tribute to his enactment of a difficult part 
 which he may be said to have created, since 
 it has never been put upon the stage. Sinking 
 Manfred, he laughed as Meldrum, and was about to 
 make some playful remark about one chamois-hunter 
 too man\", when \Yadlow spoke' up. Nobody had 
 shaken him out of any illusion. He was still the 
 chamois-hunter with his best speech to come, out 
 of which he had been cut by this startling appari- 
 tion, lie wanted the performance to proceed. 
 
 " If you know the lines, go ahead," said 
 Wadlow to the stranger, with forced calmness. 
 " If not, give me a show." 
 
 "The lines what do you mean?" 
 
 " My dear sir," explained Meldrum, interposing, 
 "we have been acting a little piece by Byron, with 
 natural scenery. That's all. My friend only wants 
 to know whether you or he will go on with the 
 part of the chamois-hunter. It's all the same to
 
 //'//'// M'A'aV O.Y THE JUXGFRAU. 1^3 
 
 me, now that my life is saved. But we can't have 
 two chamois-hunters at once, you know. Settle it 
 between yourselves." 
 
 " I always liked Byron's pieces," said the, 
 -itranger. " What's the name of this one?" 
 " Manfred." 
 
 "I never heard of it. It does not seem to be 
 /cry funny, like his other pieces." 
 
 "Like his other pieces!" echoed Meldrum and 
 Wadlow in a chorus of ama/ement, as the}- recalled 
 he unrelieved gloom of Cain, Werner, and Manfred. 
 "His farces and extravagan/as, you know. I 
 hought I should have- died laughing at his ' Cml- 
 leu Gridiron' at I)rury Lane, l.ist Boxing night." 
 
 By this time it had dawned upon the friends that 
 he stranger's Byron and their own were two dis- 
 inct persons; the latter poet of that distinguished 
 ame being the popular playwright who happened 
 o be the only Byron known as a dramatist to 
 hamois-hnnter No. 2. 
 
 There is no leveler of English class distinctions 
 lore complete than a Knickerbocker suit. As the 
 tranger stood before them for his full length por- 
 irait, clad from head to foot in the costume which 
 .11 mountaineering Englishmen affect, it was impos- 
 ible to tell whether he was a bank clerk, a com- 
 lercial traveler, an Oxford professor, or a peer of 
 iie realm. Having no gun strapped to his back or
 
 184 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 cartridges buckled about his waist, he was evidently 
 not in pursuit of chamois, and that discovery de- 
 prived him of his only interest in the eyes of the 
 Americans. It was as if he had thrust himself into 
 their company under false pretenses. 
 
 ])iit, when he told them, the next minute, that 
 he was on the way "up there " (meaning a crag 
 half covered with snow, two thousand feet or more 
 above them) in the hope of picking some edelweiss 
 with his own hands to send to friends in London, 
 the}' felt that here was a man with a latent capac- 
 ity for chamois-hunting only waiting to be devel- 
 oped by circumstances. I-'or they had been repeat- 
 ed!)' assured, down in the valley, by men having 
 bunches of edelweiss to sell at a franc each, that 
 the flower can be gathered /// si/, 1 only by the most 
 reckless exposure of life and limb. In books of 
 travels as the)' well remembered the narrators 
 invariably pluck their edelweiss on the sheer slope 
 of precipices, being lowered with ropes tied round 
 their waists by trusted companions above. Like 
 Shakespeare's samphire gathering, the search for 
 the velvety plant would seem to be indeed a dread- 
 ful trade, and if it is true that it has been for 
 these many years privately cultivated to perfection 
 in the back yards of every Swiss chalet, humanity 
 is a gainer by that domestication of the most prized 
 of the Alpine flora.
 
 ////'// ATA'C.V (>.V TIIK Jl'XGl-'RAU. 185 
 
 " 'l\i, ta!" said the Englishman, cheerily, "I'm 
 off," and the unknown made his exit as sudden as 
 his entrance. It was characteristic of his race that 
 he had expressed no surprise at the selection of 
 that particular pi, ice for the rehearsal of a play. 
 Had he come upon Meldrum and \Vadlow in the 
 act of standing on their he. ids, he would have been 
 equally passive and uninquisitivc. 
 
 " If there were no Alps to climb, what would 
 these plucky Englishmen do?" 
 " They would take to treadmills." 
 The idea of John Hull puffing up an endless stair- 
 case solely for tlu.- pleasure of surmounting obsta- 
 cles, struck the inventor of it as very droll, and he 
 laughed noisily. It was a healthy, happy laugh; 
 ibut manifestly out of place on an occasion solemnly 
 set apart for reviving the peculiar set of emotions 
 which should be inspired by a recital of Manfred 
 I in the shadow of the Jungfrau. 
 
 Respectable, law-abiding persons themselves, 
 'Meldrum and \Vadlow had, as far back as their col- 
 llcge days, conceived a strong liking for the charac- 
 . ter of Manfred. They had preserved this partiality 
 during their after life in New York, while still 
 maintaining unblemished reputations amid the cru- 
 cial tests of a great city. They would never con- 
 fess it, save to one another ; but, at times, they en- 
 vied Manfred his haunting memory of some fright-
 
 iS6 yy/ // ENCHANTED. 
 
 ful, inexpiable crime. Sleeping their regular seven 
 hours, they would in their innocence have gladly 
 exchanged that unbroken .slumber for an occasional 
 night of harrowing retrospection and remorse, just 
 to see how it felt. Holding evil spirits in proper 
 abhorrence, they would, at times, have dearly loved 
 to raise the devil and order him about, even at the 
 fearful price which must always be paid for that 
 privilege. Thinking, as they did, pretty well of 
 human nature on the whole, there were moments 
 when they both heartily wished to taste the forbid- 
 den pleasures of thorough misanthropy. They 
 were prepared to understand how much downright 
 enjoyment might be derived from implacably hat- 
 ing not merely individuals, but the race of man en- 
 tire. It had always seemed to them that the half- 
 breed of cynics and pessimists they had known in 
 clubland had missed the full measure of their grati- 
 fication by not including everything and everybody 
 in their sweeping distrust and contempt, instead of 
 now and then speaking tolerantly of persons and 
 events here and there. Now to Manfred's misan- 
 thropy there were no weak exceptions. 
 
 Estimating themselves quite cheaply, frankly ad- 
 mitting that they were in truth nobodies in the im- 
 mediate vicinity of snow mountains and glaciers 
 and avalanches, they all the more admired Man- 
 fred's lofty disdainful patronage of those sublime
 
 n'A'u.v u.\ /'//A /r.\<;/-A'./r. 187 
 
 and terrific phenomena. It is all very well to 
 preach about Alan's supremacy over Nature, and 
 the incalculable greatness of the human soul, even 
 when contrasted with the most stupendous machin- 
 ery of the universe ; but it requires the boundless 
 egotism and audacity of a Manfred to assert one's 
 self on a spur of the Jungfrau. 
 
 For all these reasons it was Manfred, even more 
 than the peerless mountain itself, which had drawn 
 them to Interlaken, and up the \Vengern Alp, and 
 to the particular spot where they were now reclin- 
 ing. There the}' were unconsciously bearing new 
 testimony to the power of that enchantment which 
 had yielded them a greater pleasure than any other 
 afforded by their Swiss tour. Byron, the en- 
 chanter, was giving them their finest pleasure 
 among the Alps.
 
 CIIAITKK XV. 
 
 MRS. (ikKATI-IlM l> AGAIN I KKI.S HICK MINI). 
 
 Till-; sun had been steadily mounting the sky and 
 his heat increasing, while the}' were regaling them- 
 selves upon Byronic impressions of the Jungfrau. 
 
 " I think," said Meldrum, " that the avalanches, 
 now about due, can be seen much better from the 
 hotel." Wadlow was of the same opinion. 
 
 They therefore began their descent, which was 
 not difficult, as the}' had only to follow the easy- 
 sloping, zig/.ag cowpaths which generations of 
 intelligent herds had trodden. 
 
 " One of the advantages of not going very far up 
 a mountain," remarked Meldrum, philosophically, 
 " is the corresponding shortness of the distance 
 clown." 
 
 They were in a state of complete self-satisfaction 
 when they reached the hotel. If they had experi- 
 enced some fatigue from the morning's little adven- 
 ture, they were content to have paid that price for 
 it. Secure beyond question from the destructive 
 sweep of the most formidable avalanche, they were 
 now prepared to behold that phenomenon with 
 
 iSS
 
 entire composure', ami were as anxious fur it to 
 begin as the}- had been to have it postponed an 
 hour before. Their suspense was not for long. 
 The vertical rays of the sun performed their 
 appointed work with unfailing punctuality and 
 certainty. If the Jungfrau had been under written 
 contract with the hotel men on the Wcngcrn Alp 
 ami the Murrcn, the two observatories provided by 
 nature for the safe witnessing of the spectacle, the 
 agreement to furnish avalanches with neatness and 
 dispatch could not have been more faithfully kept. 
 
 The snow and ice had be^an to move in their old 
 well-worn grooves from point.-, far up the mountain 
 i side, and Meldruin and \VadIow were watching the 
 shining cascades with breathless interest, \\hen their 
 attention was suddenly called off from the magnifi- 
 cent exhibition by the appearance of two human 
 beings directly in front of them. As the morning 
 : had been exceptionally fine, great numbers of peo- 
 ple had improved the occasion to ascend the 
 \Yengern Alp on foot or on horseback', or borne in 
 chairs slung between poles ; and none of these, 
 though making quite a crowd and incessantly chat- 
 t tering in English, French, and German, had dis- 
 ; turbed the two friends in their sweet fit of abstrac- 
 ; tion. They could shut their eyes to every sight 
 but the flash of the avalanches, and their ears to 
 every sound but the low rumble of their fall. But
 
 lyO 7 '//A /-;.\r//./.V //;/>. 
 
 here no\v was a sight and here was a sound that 
 broke in, and not unpleasantly, on their close com- 
 munion with Nature. 
 
 The sound was that of well-remembered female 
 voices. The speakers were the ladies the}' had met 
 at Kenilworth and Coventry. They had just 
 alighted from chairs, and were standing within ten 
 feet of them and giving orders to the sturdy porters, 
 t\vo of whom (the bearers of the stouter lad} 1 ) 
 were blovvsy and red from their great exertions. 
 
 Meldrum and \Yadlow rose to their feet and, if 
 the}' were for one moment undecided about advanc- 
 ing and offering their assistance to their country- 
 women, the}- were put entirely at ease by Mrs. 
 Greatfield. As her bright eyes fell upon them, she 
 smiled so cordially that they stepped forward and 
 offered their hands without an}- fear of a rebuff. 
 Miss Robison, with hardly less readiness, met them 
 half-way. Surely, if punctilio may be waived and 
 formal introductions dispensed with anywhere, it is 
 amid the hurly burly of a Swiss inn, where people 
 of the same nationality (unless they are New 
 Yorkers or Boston ians) seen impelled to form groups 
 in self-defense against the rest. If two of these 
 people happen to be male and two female and all 
 unmarried that tendency is very marked, indeed. 
 
 No courier or maid being visible, Meldrum 
 officiously charged himself with carrying the
 
 J/A'.V. C.REATl'IEl.D i-REES HER M/.\'J). 191 
 
 widow's little load of shawls and wraps, hand-bag 
 and umbrella ; and Wadlow took the same liberty 
 with the personal effects of the other lady. 
 
 " The idea of sensible Americans coming all the 
 way over here to see Jungfraus, when they have 
 bigger mountains at home," said the widow, laugh- 
 ing. " I want it distinctly understood that I am 
 here to oblige Jicr. Shasta and Tacoma are good 
 enough for me." 
 
 " But they have no history no poetical associa- 
 tions, Carrie. That makes the difference," said 
 Miss Robison, evidently employ ing arguments which 
 she had used before with her vivacious friend. 
 
 " Nonsense ! They have all the history there is. 
 
 Aren't they as old as the Jungfrau ? And as for 
 
 >oetry, there have been plenty of pieces in the Cali- 
 
 ornia papers about them. I was born out there 
 
 ind ought to know." 
 
 " Have you ever seen Shasta ? " asked the widow, 
 iiddressing the two gentlemen. 
 
 They shook their heads regretfully. 
 
 " Nor Tacoma ? " 
 
 They were obliged to say " No ; " but earnestly 
 expressed their desire of seeing both mountains 
 i;ome time. 
 
 "Ah ! You'll like them, because they are so easy 
 o do. They are just made for Americans. You 
 lon't have to be carried up any Wengcrn Alps in
 
 \(J2 THE /-.\ (// 
 
 an did chair by two men to see the whole of 
 Shasta. You sit in your Pullman car and have it 
 in view all da}'." 
 
 ''And Tacoma? " queried Meldrum, who appre- 
 ciated mountains maile eas}'. 
 
 " The}- have a first-class hotel expressly built for 
 Tac"ina, with tw<> hundred rocking-chairs on the 
 pia/./.a. You secure one of these fur the day and 
 there you sit and watch the mountain. It's about 
 three miles up in the air----all frm the sea level, too. 
 You don't have to knock off half a mile to bei>in 
 
 O 
 
 with, as vi Hi di > heiv. 1 1 a, ha ! ' 
 
 Meldrum and \Vadl<iw signified their gratification 
 at these statements by nods and smiles, Mrs. 
 Greatfield's eloquence in defense of her native 
 mountains not alfording a gap for an}' words but 
 her o\vn. At this stage of the conversation or 
 monologue the part}' had reached the bureau of 
 the little inn, and the ladies were shown to the 
 room which had been engaged for them by tele- 
 graph from Interlaken. 
 
 The gentlemen resumed their seats in the open 
 air and their attention to the Jungfrau. The 
 avalanches were now in full play of noon-tide, 
 and were declared by an observer no less veteran 
 than the portly landlord, to be grand beyond prece- 
 dent. But they found in Meldrum and Wadlow 
 only listless spectators of their grandeur.
 
 J//i'.V. GKF.ATFIELD FREES HER MIXD, 193 
 
 Desirous as the}- were to surrender themselves 
 wholly to the contemplation of the Oueen of Moun- 
 tains and the pageantry of her court, their truant 
 minds would wander off to the ladies into whose 
 company a bountiful 1'rovidencc had thrown them 
 for the third time. A good idea occurred to Mel- 
 drum, and lie acted on it with the quickness that it 
 deserved. Calling a waiter, lie ordered a light 
 luncheon for himself and friend, and giving the man 
 an impressive tip, told him to reserve the adjoining 
 table for two ladies, who would soon appear, and to 
 show them to it as the only one at their disposal, 
 lie was confident that Mrs. Greatfield, being free 
 from that "nonsense" from which widows, as a 
 class, are supposed to be exempt, would make no 
 disguise of the sharp appetite which the mountain 
 air must have engendered, and would demand a 
 substantial meal at the earliest moment. His ex- 
 pectations were well founded. In about ten min- 
 utes the ladies reappeared, and Mrs. Greatfield, with 
 hunger stamped on every feature, cast her eyes up 
 and down the rows of cleanly-napkined tables, made 
 I further enticing by bright services of glass, porcelain 
 and cutlery. The bribed waiter advanced to their 
 aid and led them quite peremptorily to the table 
 reserved for them by the designing Meldrum. If 
 the widow and her friend suspected the intention of 
 this seemingly accidental arrangement, they be-
 
 1Q4 THE ENCHANTED, 
 
 trnyed their suspicion by no sign. They apparently 
 accepted it as fortuitous and the gentlemen were 
 put entirely at their case by being accosted first. 
 
 " Did you ever read .Byron/" asked the widow, 
 archly. 
 
 Mcldrum and \Yadlo\v hastened to assure her that 
 the}' had read the works of the noble bard in their 
 younger days. 
 
 " S/tt y bought it at Intcrlaken, and lierc it is" 
 producing from a little bag a miniature volume, 
 which \VadIo\v received from her hand. Glancing 
 over it hastily the friends perceived that it was an 
 unabridged edit ion. 
 
 "1 bought it on account of Manfred," explained 
 Miss Robisou, with a show of color. " The guide 
 book's quote from it in connection with their de- 
 scription of the Staubbach Fall and the Jungfrau. 
 Reading the poem has heightened my enjoyment of 
 the splendid scenery of the Alps." 
 
 The gentlemen were greatly pleased to find in 
 this young lady a taste for the sublime in nature 
 and poetry akin to their own, and what was more, a 
 frankness to confess that she had read Manfred, 
 without conventionally adding that Byron must 
 have been a monster to have written it. They vol- 
 ubly assured her that their own liking for Manfred 
 was so great that they had paid a morning visit to 
 the Jungfrau expressly to verify the magnificent
 
 JM'.V. GREATFIELD FKEKS HER J//.VA 1 95 
 
 mageiy of the poem and to enter as far as possible 
 nto the feelings of Manfred himself. 
 
 While these explanations \vere progressing, Mrs. 
 iivat field had carefully ordered a generous lunch- 
 on, and now turned to take her part in the conver- 
 ;ation. 
 
 " I've read Manfred, too," said the widow, 
 miling, ''to oblige IUT. Shall I tell you what I 
 hink about it ? " 
 
 The gentlemen declared that nothing would give 
 hem greater pleasure. 
 
 " It was written to spite 1>\ Ton's wife. Anybody 
 :an see that after read in;.;" the life of Byron in this 
 mok. Though the}- had separated, he knew she 
 vould read ever}' line of poetry he printed to see if 
 le said anything about her. How he must have 
 eased her with that Astartc ! It's too absurd, 
 la, ha!" 
 
 " Teased her ?" asked Wadlow, not quite catch- 
 -n s the idea. 
 
 "Yes. Don't 3-011 know in the poem, whenever 
 he lad)' Astarte is introduced there is alwa3 r s a 
 >reak just when the sto^ becomes interesting, 
 foil think 3-011 are going to find out what had hap- 
 pened to her, and 3-011 run against one of those 
 [lashes which are so dreadfully provoking in novels. 
 f we arc all curious to know what Manfred had 
 lone to Astarte, how much more curious Lady
 
 I9 6 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 l>vron must have been? I can imagine her eoin<r 
 
 o t> 
 
 crazy over the puzzle." 
 
 "Who, in your opinion, was Astarte?" asked 
 Mcldrtim, whose mind liatl been reopening the 
 controversy which raged over that (question sonic 
 years ago. 
 
 'I he widow distended her blue eyes as if amazed 
 at the simplicity of the question. 
 
 lt \\hy Astarte was ---nobody. A man \vho could 
 iiuent demons and witches could make Astartes in 
 an\" quantity. There is a large assortment of them 
 in these pages. I have been looking through the 
 \\ hole bo< ik, you see." 
 
 "And were all Byron's heroines invented t>> 
 .'in no}" his wife.' After they had separated, I 
 mean." 
 
 " Kvery one of them," said the widow, triumph- 
 antly. Then, with a touch of compassion in her 
 voice, " It's a real pit}- that a man with such a 
 heart should have been thrown away by Lady 
 Byron. A husband like that is a scarce article in 
 this cold world." 
 
 Miss Robison bowed her head gently in approval 
 of the proposition. It was evident that the poet 
 had these two ladies on his side. Wadlow took up 
 the examination of the witness, whom the shade of 
 Byron had summoned as an expert in his defense 
 that day.
 
 .l/A'.V. GKEATI'IRLD FKJ-.I-'.S HER M1XD. 197 
 
 " Do you think that Byron still loved his wife, 
 when he wrote Manfred?" 
 
 " His heart was just breaking for her. If it had 
 lot been, do you suppose he would have tried to 
 nake her jealous and unhappy by bragging about his 
 iff airs with the Astartcs and all the rest of them?" 
 Miss Robison's mild brown eyes seconded this 
 question. 
 
 " Then you are of the opinion that the blame of 
 heir continued separation rested with Lady Byron 
 ilonc?" 
 
 " I am sure of it. She had only to whistle to 
 lim and he would have come back to her. If she 
 iad cared a bit for the man, she could have brought 
 .im to her feet. Oh! so easily, after Manfred was 
 printed." 
 
 "How?" asked \Vadlo\v, with much earnestness, 
 >r he had always assumed that that poem had 
 iffectually closed the door of reconciliation against 
 5yron. 
 
 " She should have worked a nice muffler, and a 
 air of good warm mittens with her own hands, and 
 :nt them to him with a little note asking him to 
 ear them for her sake the next time he went up 
 n the Jungfrau. Nothing goes further with a hus- 
 tand, as every married man knows, than a present 
 f her own worsted work from his wife. She is so 
 snerally doing it for somebody else, you sec."
 
 EXCllAXTED. 
 
 Wadlow and Mcldruin accepted this dictum as a 
 valuable addition to their stock of useful knowl- 
 edge. 
 
 " There was another way," continued the willing 
 witness. " Lad}- Byron could have made every- 
 thing pleasant between them by expressing some 
 sympathy for his liver complaint." 
 
 " I did not know that anything was the matter 
 with Byron's liver," said Wadlow, wondering where 
 the widow had discovered a fact unknown to the 
 poet's numerous biographers. 
 
 " Nor I either," was the laughing rejoinder- 
 " Hut I am sure Byron would have been delighted 
 if she had thought so. If a man is nervous, irri- 
 table, quarrelsome; if he says he has lost all his 
 friends and wishes he was dead - and that is the 
 kind of man Byron seems to have been at times 
 yon just tell him that his liver is out of order and 
 see how his face will light up with pleasure." 
 
 Wadlow promised her he would make the experi- 
 ment at the first opportunity. 
 
 " I know what I am talking about," said the widow, 
 with increasing animation. " I hail a friend in Min- 
 neapolis, whose husband was a good-hearted man 
 with a dreadful temper. \Vhen anything went 
 wrong with his business lie was a perfect bear round 
 the house, lie would nag and scold her at the 
 least thing. When he was very much excited, if
 
 MKS. GKEATFIELD FREES HER MIX I). 199 
 
 she opposed him in anything, ever so little, he would 
 smash the furniture ; and once he pulled off the 
 tablecloth with all the breakfast things." 
 
 " An uncomfortable husband," remarked Mel- 
 drum. 
 
 " And yet that same man could be quieted down 
 by his wife in a minute, and made to apologize, and 
 the row always ended by his presenting her with a 
 new dress or a set of diamonds or furs, and once 
 she got a beautiful landau and a pair of bobtailed 
 horses out of him, with a real English coachman 
 thrown in." 
 
 " Wonderful ! " cried Wadlow. " It beats the lady 
 lion tamer out of sight." 
 
 " Nothing was easier," said the widow, who could 
 
 not have told the story with greater pride in the 
 
 achievement had she been herself the subduer of the 
 
 i ferocious husband. '' When he was tearing round 
 
 and breaking things she would keep perfectly cool, 
 
 and say as sweetly as I do now : ' I am so sorry 
 
 about your liver, dear. You must take a pill to- 
 
 j light.' lie would quiet down in a jiffy. You see 
 
 t flattered him to think that she did not blame him, 
 
 nut his liver ; that he was all right and his liver was 
 
 ill wrong. It was like throwing the responsibility 
 
 or his acts on somebody else. Every Christmas she 
 
 ised to present him with a new liver pad." 
 
 " Did it cure him ? " asked Mcldrum.
 
 200 TV/A' ENCHANTED. 
 
 " Oh, no," was the response. " Pads, plasters, 
 pills she tried everything that was advertised, on 
 him --never cured him of his liver complaint, be- 
 cause, between you and me (this in a sunken voice, 
 as if in strict confidence) there was nothing really 
 the matter with his liver. It \vas the man's horrible 
 temper all the time, but she did not mind that when 
 she found out ho\v to manage him. lie was so good 
 after these fits that she used to like to sec them 
 coming on. 1 la, ha ! 
 
 ''And you really think that Lady Byron could 
 have managed her husband in the same way?" 
 
 '' I have no doubt of it." 
 
 It was not for the male listeners to controvert the 
 opinion of a lad}' apparently so well qualified to 
 judge of the complicated relations of the sexes in 
 I'inculo watrimonii. They were reduced to silence 
 in the presence of so much practical wisdom, and, 
 for a little space, all four confined themselves to the 
 demolition of the neglected luncheons. 
 
 Then Wadlow bethought himself of the irrepress- 
 ible contention between the cities of Minneapolis 
 and St. 1'aul, of which the two ladies were respect- 
 ively the able champions, and he roguishly ventured 
 the observation, " I suppose now there is no such 
 bear of a husband in St. Paul." 
 
 The widow and Miss Robison recognized the play- 
 ful allusion to their chronic cause of disputation and
 
 laughed heartily. The younger only said, " I am 
 sure I don't know," as indeed, how should she, with 
 her inexperience of those marital tempests which 
 rarely blow when a third person is around. Mrs. 
 Greatfield thus spoke : "If you expect me, just be- 
 cause I live in Minneapolis, to declare that St. Paul 
 is full of quarrelsome husbands, you are much 
 mistaken, I can tell you. ITc liai'c buried the 
 katclift." 
 
 iMeldrum ami \VadIow both murmured their 
 pleasure at the return of peace, and hoped it would 
 be lasting. 
 
 "This is how it happened," continued the widow. 
 " The peace dates from the receipt of a letter by me 
 from Minneapolis yesterday. It seems that there 
 was a la rye debt owing the estate, and covered by a 
 mortgage on unimproved land within the city limits 
 of St. Paul. This land has been sold under fore- 
 closure, and bought in by the estate. Don't you 
 see, that makes me interested in St. Paul as well as 
 Minneapolis, and I am blowing for both cities now. 
 Ha, ha!" 
 
 Meldrum and Wadlow could do no less than con- 
 gratulate St. Paul on the acquisition of so powerful 
 an ally. They also appreciated the delicacy with 
 which the widow alluded to "the estate," meaning 
 herself, and the charming naivctd of her assumption 
 that they necessarily knew who she was, so fully
 
 202 Till: ENCHANTED. 
 
 were her movements paragraphed in the society 
 journals of European capitals and watering-places. 
 
 A faithful report of whatever conversation ensued 
 is not within the scope of this brief chronicle. But 
 it is certain that when the little improvised party 
 broke up late in the afternoon, and the ladies con- 
 tinued their journey by chair toward Grindclwald 
 and the gentlemen remounted their mules and 
 headed for Interlaken, there was a unanimous wish 
 in the breasts of the four persons that they might 
 all meet again somewhere. And yet, such is Ihe re- 
 serve of the human heart in the treatment of its 
 warmest promptings, that the couples went their 
 different ways without a single word about a pos- 
 sible reunion. 
 
 Will they meet again ? As the elder novelists 
 used to say, " Time will show."
 
 C II APT MR XVI. 
 
 WITH HAWTHORNE IN STATIC STRKICT, I;OST<>N. 
 
 ()N their voyage homeward, Mcldrum aiul \Vad- 
 lo\v made the acquaintance of a fresh-lipped, blue- 
 eyed, agreeable young Bostonian, named Finch. 
 lie was much interested in the accounts of their 
 visits to places over which the spell of enchantment 
 had been thrown by the great poets and novelists. 
 He expressed a strong desire to test, in their com- 
 pany, his own capacity for reproducing to the eye 
 scenes and occurrences selected from the writings of 
 fimous American authors. Meklruin and Wad low 
 seriously questioned the fitness of this amiable per- 
 son for sharing the pleasure which they had fortu- 
 nately brought within their own reach. 
 
 To yield to an enchanter implies, first of all 
 things, not only the passive readiness, but also the 
 anxiety to be enchanted. The caviling, or fault- 
 finding mood, is fatally hostile to that mental atti- 
 tude which is indispensable to success in the line of 
 experiments they had made. Now, Finch, having 
 passed directly from college to an important posi- 
 tion in a long-established private classical school of 
 Boston, had become by virtue of his university 
 
 203
 
 204 THE ENCHANTED, 
 
 course and his professional career a confirmed, fastidi- 
 ous, well-meaning, but highly intolerant critic. The 
 hypercritical spirit which he had acquired at college 
 might have been knocked out of him by a few years 
 of roughing with his equals or superiors, who had 
 themselves outlived its depressing influences. But 
 his immediate transition from the prejudices and 
 narrowness of the academic life to the chair of Yice- 
 1'rincipal in a young gentleman's seminar}", left him 
 no time or opportunity to be cured of the besetting 
 weakness which lie honestly supposed to be his 
 strength. 
 
 To the older, wiser, liberal-minded and tolerant 
 Meldrum and \Vadlow, it was a cause of regret that 
 a fellow, as pleasant in man}' ways as Finch, should 
 be possessed of this devil of depreciation this mor- 
 bid propensity for fastening on the deficiencies, the 
 shortcomings, the limitations of ever}- work of 
 genius that could be named, without any recog- 
 nition whatever of its merits, however supreme and 
 undeniable. Thus, if Thackeray were under discus- 
 sion, Finch would say, " He is too cynical." If one 
 praised Dickens's humor, Finch would add, " But he 
 could not draw a gentleman." He considered Scott 
 "diffuse and prolix," Bulwer and Disraeli "stilted 
 and affected," Macaulay " rhetorical," Carlyle " mali- 
 cious," Motley " sweetly monotonous," Ruskin 
 " fanciful," and that was all he had to say about
 
 //V/7/ UAWTUOKXL l.\ liOSTOX. -05 
 
 them. In his opinion Shelley was a " rhapsodist," 
 l>rowning " obscure," Tennyson " addicted to 
 "mannerism," Gray "conventional," I5yron a " mon- 
 ster of egotism," Swinburne and Whitman " beastly," 
 Emerson " deficient in logic and connectedness," 
 Longfellow "slipshod and superficial." It was not 
 possible to mention to Finch a single eminent 
 writer of prose or poetry that ever lived, without 
 provoking from him an in-.l.mt softly-spoken refer- 
 ence to the presence of some defect in the mind or 
 heart of that author, usually with an apt citation to 
 prove it. I '"or Finch was a rapid and omnivorous 
 reader, and his eye was quick to catch, and his 
 memory was tenacious to retain, errors of statement, 
 lame reasonings, wrong conclusions, and verbal in- 
 accuracies and inelegancies of every description. 
 Doubtless, he could have recalled, with the same 
 ease and precision, the " beauties " of these same 
 authors, but he never did so. Yet he thought it 
 
 , within his power to share with Meldrum and Wad- 
 low their keen enjoyment of something which de- 
 pended absolutely on the absence of the overbalanc- 
 ing critical faculty in the participant. They told 
 him that he was asking for impossibilities; since it 
 
 i was evident that he would not surrender himself un- 
 
 reservedly to any human enchanter. 
 
 Finch laughed, and admitted that he feared it 
 
 j was so, though his manner was that of pride in the
 
 2o6 
 
 possession of ;i mind steeled against the wiles to 
 which weaker persons succumbed. 
 
 " Name the man, the place, and the time," said 
 Meldnun to him one morning, as the}- were pacing 
 the deck before breakfast. lie was referring to the 
 oft-discussed suggestion of an experiment in which 
 Finch might take part as a novice ami test, once for 
 all, his qualifications for the performance of the 
 special teat in which his two new fiiv nds excelled. 
 
 Finch's response was instantaneous. " 1 name 
 1 lawlhorne as the author. The place shall be the 
 open paved space before the old State House, 
 Hoston. The time shall be within a month of our 
 landing- -say, November the first.'' 
 
 " I understand," replied Meld rum, who knew his 
 Hawthorne thoroughly. "You would conjure up 
 the most impressive and thrilling scene in the 
 'Scarlet Letter,' where Rev. ]\Ir. Dimmesdale takes 
 Hester Prynne by one hand and little Pearl by the 
 other and leads them up the steps of the pillory in 
 front of the old First Church, and there confesses 
 his sin to the whole people." 
 
 "You have said it. If I can see anything, I 
 ought to be able to see that; for nothing more 
 dramatic and impressive was ever penned by mortal 
 hand. It acts itself for you on the printed page." 
 
 "Quite true. In my humble opinion, the " Scar- 
 let Letter " is the most original and powerful work
 
 //V/'// II A \VTUOR.\E L\ HOXTOX. 207 
 
 of fiction yet produced in America, and the twenty- 
 third chapter is its masterly culmination. But 
 have you no fault to pick with Hawthorne?" con- 
 tinued Meldrum, quizzically, remembering that that 
 
 illustrious name had not been drained into any of 
 their numerous discussions of books and authors. 
 
 " Oh, none whatever! He is one of my greatest 
 favorites. Kxcept, perhaps," he could not refrain 
 from adding, " th.it he lacks humor." 
 
 Meldrum laughed. " 1 )o you think that the 
 'Scarlet Letter' would have be^n improved by a 
 comic character? Would you have planted a 
 funny man down there in the crowd before the pil- 
 lory to crack his jokes while that terrible scene of 
 remorse and self-expiation was in progress ?" Mel- 
 drum was fond of putting his suppositions strong!}'. 
 
 Wadlow here jumped into the debate to reinforce 
 his chum, before Finch could formulate a reply. 
 " It is true that the ' Scarlet Letter ' is devoid of 
 ; what we call humor, not because, in my opinion, 
 Hawthorne was deficient in humor, but because he 
 thought it incongruous with the prevailing deeply 
 
 somber tone of the story. But the introduction, 
 i entitled ' the Custom House,' which naturally leads 
 i up to the tale, if it is not essential to it, has a pure 
 1 vein of fun worthy of Irving or Dickens." 
 
 Meldrum here struck in with the remark that if 
 the "Scarlet Letter" contained no rollicking
 
 humorous character, there was something better in 
 
 it. That was the elfish, tricksy, willful, charmiiv 
 
 <f ft 
 
 little Pearl, who danced through its darkness like a 
 sunbeam. As an artistic foil, she was a Shake- 
 spearian creation. "The joviality which provokes a 
 downright laugh, if that is what you mean," said 
 Meldrum in conclusion, " I should consider as much 
 out of place in the bod)- of the ' Scarlet Letter' as 
 a clown at a funeral." 
 
 It was a redeeming trail in [''inch's character that 
 he never lost his temper, no mailer how hard 
 pressed. Meldrum had asserled himself somewhat 
 positive!)', even aggressively, in thus laying down 
 the law for the admission or exclusion of humor in 
 a given case. But Finch laughed ripplingly as he 
 said, " Possibly I am all wrong. Hut I still think 
 that a broadly humorous touch here and there 
 would have made the tragic element in the 'Scarlet 
 Letter ' even more prominent and effective, and 
 therefore would have been the truest art." He ut- 
 tered this as genially and sweetly as if he had been 
 passing the highest encomium on the author. 
 There was no such thing as quarreling with a critic 
 so bland in the deliverance of his asperities. Mel- 
 drum only retorted : 
 
 " All right ; but I predict you will pay the pen- 
 alty of your disbelief in the artistic perfection 
 of Hawthorne by being denied the spectacle that
 
 ////// iiAirrnoRXi-: i\ HOSTO.V. 209 
 
 you crave. However, we will make the trial for 
 you." 
 
 Exeunt owncs, at the sound of the breakfast gong. 
 
 On the first of November, Meldrum and \Vadlo\v 
 arrived in Boston by the morning train from New 
 York and \vent direct!)' to Young's, where a meet- 
 ing with Finch had been arranged to take place at 
 noon precise!)-. Kach brought with him a copy of 
 the " Scarlet Letter" and a map of Boston, armed 
 with which they visited the site of the impending 
 experiment, in order to study and understand the 
 exact locations and relations of the original market- 
 place, the earliest church, and the pillory which stood 
 nearly beneath its caves. By correspondence with 
 Finch they had already become possessed of all 
 that history and tradition have handed down about 
 a locality the most famous, by association, in Boston 
 town. They knew from the best available testi- 
 mony that the open space now occupied by, and 
 eastward of, the old State House was the ancient 
 market-place, the boundaries of which have re- 
 mained, but little changed, to this day. They had 
 
 : sufficient reasons for believing that the present site 
 of Bra/.er's Building, bounded by State and Dcvon- 
 
 I shire streets and Congress Place, was that of the 
 square, one-storied, thatched church, whereof the 
 godly Master Dimmesdale was the eloquent and
 
 210 Till-. ENCHANTED. 
 
 adored pastor. And they readily identified the 
 spot where the pillory must have stood at the west- 
 ern extremity of the market-place, as required by 
 Hawthorne. Having settled upon these scenic de- 
 tails and resolved upon a certain plan of operations, 
 more for the benefit of the skeptical, unimaginative, 
 and impervious Finch than fur their own behoof, 
 they returned to Young's and braced themselves for 
 the forthcoming trial by a final reading of the clos- 
 ing scene of the story (which alone the}' designed 
 to put to proof), pending the appearance of their 
 Boston friend. 
 
 The clock was striking twelve as Finch reported 
 at the rendezvous, there!)}" greatly pleasing the two 
 New Yorkers, who reckoned punctuality one of the 
 principal virtues. He was alert, blithe, radiant 
 with good nature and high spirits, as became a 
 healthy, prosperous young man on a cool, sunny 
 November day. There was a hearty interchange of 
 greetings, and then Meldrum fell to business with 
 his customary alacrity and directness. 
 
 "Anybody can see that you arc physically in 
 good form for our little experiment. And that is 
 an essential thing, I can tell you. But have you 
 refreshed your recollection of the twenty-third 
 chapter this morning ? Is every incident of it per- 
 fectly clear to you in the order it is set down ? "
 
 ;///// //.////// uA'.v A' /.\" />'t>.vyuv. -n 
 
 Finch avoided a categorical answer, and only re- 
 plied, \vith smiling confidence, "I have it all by 
 heart, trust me," at the same time touching his 
 white and rounded forehead. 
 
 "There is where you terrible critics carry your 
 hearts," observed \Yadlow, with a laugh. 
 
 Finch laughed, too, and blushed as one who had 
 been complimented on a rare excellence. "Thank 
 you," said he, modestly. " If you imply that my 
 personal sympathies and preferences such as the 
 heart might prompt are held in strict suspense 
 when I pass judgment on a work" of literature or 
 art, I must honestly plead guilt}- to the indict- 
 ment." 
 
 Wadlow knew that there was some unexpressed 
 specific thing behind this general proposition, so 
 airily avowed. 1 le determined to draw out his man. 
 
 " Now, I dare say," he said, banteringly, " you 
 : could improve on Hawthorne's treatment of the 
 : scene at the pillory." 
 
 " To be frank, I think it might be touched up to 
 advantage. For instance, there is no good and 
 sufficient reason why the Rev. Mr. Dimmesdalc 
 j should have been allowed by the author to ascend 
 the platform and publicly avow his sin in the exag- 
 gerated terms he employs, and make that shocking 
 exhibition of a scarlet letter which he had burned 
 into his own breast in a moment of harrowing 1 re-
 
 212 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 morse. The reader of the book well knows how 
 fully the poor fellow had already been punished in 
 his own conscience for his one and only offense, and 
 the sufferer might have uecn spared this last and 
 needless humiliation. It did not relieve the adul- 
 terous wife, the partner of his crime, from any of 
 the odium which still attached to her. It was of no 
 service to the pretty little Pearl, the offspring of 
 their joint guilt. And the self-inflicted agony of 
 the minister's confession caused his death on the 
 spot, as well it might have done. What good did 
 it all do ? " 
 
 " Putt my dear fellow," urged Wadlow, " all these 
 incidents, the painfulncss of which in the reading I 
 fully admit, are indispensable to the story. Its key- 
 note, or motive, is the irresistible goading po\ver of 
 the old Puritan conscience which could not rest till 
 Dimmesdale had taken the full measure of his pen- 
 alty on this earth for sins done in the bod)-, instead 
 of waiting for the balance to be struck in another 
 world. I low could this governing idea of the 
 Scarlet Letter be carried to its logical conclusion 
 short of his own public proclamation of his guilt on 
 the very spot where the Puritan law would have 
 condemned him to stand seven years before, by the 
 side of Hester Prynnc, and wearing another big red 
 'A?' The speaker rested, as one who has pro- 
 pounded "a poser."
 
 ////// //.//;///( >A'.\7-: /.v KOSTO.V. 213 
 
 Finch responded, with his invincible blandncss, 
 "What you say of the keynote, or moti\ p e, <>f the 
 tale is all true. Dimmesdale's intentions were, in 
 the circumstances, natural, proper, and, if you 
 please, laudable. Hut when the reader has once 
 been informed that the err in;.;" pastor intended to 
 make this really absurd and needless self-expiation 
 of his offense, that should have sufficed, without 
 permitting the man's design to be literally carried 
 
 out." 
 
 " 1 low could it have been prevented? " asked Mel- 
 drum, with some curiosity. 
 
 " Simply by letting the minister die of excessive 
 emotion, at the foot of the platform, or while he 
 is slowly ascending the steps with Hester's arm 
 around him, or on tin- platform itself at the foot of 
 the pillory, and to die before he could say a single 
 word in his own condemnation. The reader would 
 have given Mr. Dimmesdale the full credit of his 
 morbidly conscientious purpose and the moral of 
 the 'story would have been equally well enforced, 
 and one of the most shocking denouements in fiction 
 would have been artistically avoided." 
 
 " Ah ! " said Meldrum, with a sigh that was half a 
 laugh, " I now realize full}' how far apart we are. 
 You belong to the class]that wants its novels always 
 mild, unemotional, uneventful, with all the tragedies 
 and sorrows of life hinted at or told by indirection
 
 214 
 
 and obliquely. Y<>u call llial the highest reach of 
 Art, but heaven knows why ! The model novelist of 
 this school would probably have expended himself 
 freely on a description of the planks and oilier com- 
 ponent parts of the platform and pillory, and would 
 have reported the running comments of the specta- 
 tors below (u'hieh Hawthorne oniits>. But when it 
 came to the death of Dimmcsdale if an author of 
 your new school had let him die at all the reader 
 would n<>t have been sure that anything more had 
 happened to him than a fainting spell, from whkh 
 he mi;;'ht recover in the next chapter, and his death 
 would have remained, to the end of the book, a 
 matter of pure inference. Much of \\hat is termed 
 art in current fiction is not art concealing art, but 
 art concealing nature, and one of its aims is to 
 shirk" difficulties of description." 
 
 Finch's smile never deserted him. " I sec that 
 we differ, beyond hope of agreement, on the main 
 issue, our points of view being so widely separated," 
 he remarked. "But as to one matter, T think', we 
 will agree. It was too bad, was it not, now, that 
 the minister's ardent, devoted, life-long friends, 
 those to whom lie had been good and true and 
 helpful all through, should have been obliged to 
 listen to that startling acknowledgment of his guilt 
 and shame from his own lips. It is well that some 
 idols should be shattered. But it is a terrible thing
 
 to lose one's faith in all piety and purity ; and that 
 must have been sadly shaken, if not destroyed, by 
 Dimmesdale's astounding, overwrought revelation 
 of his inner self." 
 
 " \ow, now, I have you," cried \Vadlow, gayly. 
 " After the occasional manner of your kind, you 
 have not truly and fully read the book you criti- 
 cise." (Finch colored a little, for he remembered 
 how he had bolted it raw in one greenly reading and 
 never returned to it, trusting its entire contents, 
 somewhat presumptuously, to his fine memory.) " I 
 beg to remind you that Hawthorne meets your 
 objection in advance. Nowhere does he show a pro- 
 founder and more intimate- knowledge of human 
 nature than where he. tells us how the minister's ad- 
 mirers and personal friends refused to believe that 
 he had done anything wrong, in spite of his explicit 
 confession. Their ears heard nothing from his lips 
 but a short sermon, having no personal application 
 to himself. To them the manner of his death was 
 a parable, designed to convey the lesson that, in 
 ' the view of infinite purity, we are all sinners alike. 
 Their eyes did not sec the flaming " A" which ap- 
 i peared to all others when he tore the ministerial 
 j band asunder. In the exact language of Haw- 
 thorne, as I recall it, " We must be allowed to con- 
 sider this version of the story as only an instance of 
 that stubborn fidelity with which a man's friends
 
 and especially a clergyman s will sometimes uphold his 
 
 eJiaraeter ; \i</ttii proofs as clear as tJie mid-day sun- 
 f.'iine on t/ie scarlet letter establish him as a false and 
 sin-stained creature of t/ie dust." (The italics rep- 
 resent the significant emphasis which Wadlow laid 
 on this passage, i 
 
 " Peeea"i'i ! peeeai'i .' as you well say, you have me 
 there, and 1 cry you mercy," rejoined Kinch, who 
 had by this time recovered from his momentary 
 discomposure, and joined in the' laugh against him 
 which Aleldmm and Wadlow were not quite mag- 
 nanimous enough to fore;,/). " I give up that point 
 a minor one, after all and stand by the rest." 
 
 Aleldrum now took" his turn in disciplining the 
 critic. " 1 am surprised, my dear fellow, that a 
 doughty champion of the mild realistic school, like 
 yourself, should not have fastened instinctively on 
 that part of Hawthorne's story where he violates 
 probabilities, and even human nature itself, to an 
 extent that even Wadlow and myself cannot de- 
 fend." 
 
 Finch opened his eyes widely. He had no idea of 
 what was coming, and secretly hoped it was not 
 some second exposure of his hast)' reading and im- 
 pulsive conclusion. 
 
 " I am referring not to what the Rev. Mr. Dim- 
 mesdale did to himself but to what he did to the 
 procession. It was on its way, you recollect, from the
 
 217 
 
 church to the town hall, where the banquet was to be 
 served. Everybody knows how hungry one is made 
 by long sermons, and Dimmcsdale's election dis- 
 course that morning could not have been shorter 
 than the good old regulation length of one hour 
 and a half. 1 Tawthornc speaks of the ' vast immeas- 
 urable tract of written space which composed it.' 
 Now, here were all the dignitaries of Boston, valiant 
 trenchermen every one, in an age when dyspepsia 
 was unknown, headed by the ancients and honor- 
 ables, whose prowess, then as now, shone most 
 conspicuously at the dinner-table. All these 
 empty, ravenous men, proceeding from a feast of 
 reason to a more material and satisfying repast at a 
 quick step, were compelled to stand in front of the 
 pillory for an indefinite time and stay their stomachs 
 with still another sermon. And, for all the novelist 
 tells us, the procession missed the dinner altogether. 
 Nothing more is heard of it. Now, if I were to 
 
 o 
 
 pick holes in Hawthorne, I would say that he 
 should have allowed the body of the procession, cer- 
 tainly the ancients and honorables and the governor 
 and the councilors, whose appetites were not to be 
 trifled with, to go on to their dinner; and he 
 should have made up Dimmesdale's audience out of 
 the hangers-on and the sidewalk spectators, who 
 had no dinners to eat and could therefore not share 
 the pangs of the bigwigs who had been saving them-
 
 21 S 77/A ENCHAXTKD. 
 
 selves up for the occasion. How is that for an 
 acute criticism, my friend t " 
 
 The speaker had pushed his irony almost to the 
 point of offense ; for, polite as lie was by nature and 
 training, he was apt to be vexed by the kind of 
 criticism to which Finch was prone, when exer- 
 cised upon any one of his select company of be- 
 loved authors. Hut the Bostonian had taken it all 
 in good faith. 
 
 " You are a born critic yourself and must not decry 
 your own craft again," said Finch, with energy. 
 " The objection you make is original, neat, and un- 
 answerable. The realists, of whom you are really 
 one whatever you may say about them, would 
 never have fallen into that mistake." 
 
 "The nairctc of this remark was irresistible in its 
 charm. Meldrum's face, which had been for the 
 moment clouded, was again overspread by a smile. 
 Then, dropping the subject with New York sudden- 
 ness, and starting toward the door, he said, " Re- 
 member the sun was but little past the meridian 
 when Dimmesdale made his confession and took his 
 punishment. The more closely we keep to the text, 
 the more complete will be our success." 
 
 So off they marched to the site of the tragedy, less 
 than a minute's walk from Young's. At the east 
 end of the old State House they paused, and Mel- 
 drum began to look about him earnestly.
 
 CIIAI'TKR XVII. 
 
 KKAI'I'KAUANVK OF Till: SCARLHT LKTTKR. 
 
 " I I\VK you any doubt as to the precise location 
 of the church ami the pillory? I thought that was 
 all settled," remarked l-'iuch. 
 
 " Xot the slightest doubt. That is a matter of 
 fact, determined beyond question. I am only look- 
 ing for a likely boy to play the bird game." 
 
 " What is the bird game ? " 
 
 " It is a little trick that enables us to stand in the 
 street of a crowded city for some minutes and look 
 fixcdly at an}' object, without attracting attention 
 to ourselves. It is my own invention," continued 
 Aleldrum with pride, " and necessity was truly its 
 mother. Wadlow and I worked it beautifully 
 several times last summer in London, and since our 
 return home we have adopted it with equally good 
 results once or twice in Xew York'." 
 
 " Describe it, please." 
 
 " Well, after we have reached the scene of our in- 
 tended experiment, I pick up some loafer a good- 
 sized and mischievous boy preferred and engage 
 him to assist us, as follows : he is to stand in the 
 street at a point convenient for our purpose and 
 
 219
 
 EXCHANTKD. 
 
 dr;i\v a crowd there by keeping still and looking up 
 at the top of sonic building or at a particular 
 window, if the building is too hi^h. In less than 
 ten seconds he is sure to be joined by some other 
 idler who invariably asks him what he is looking at. 
 To this first question he always responds, 'There is 
 a bird up there." 'What kind of a bird?' asks the 
 other fellow. ' I don't know,' answers the decoy. 
 He is instructed, under penalty of forfeiting his 
 pay, never to vary these replies by a single word. 
 l)iit there is no need of his saying much. The 
 other loafers who collect around him as a nucleus 
 soon do all the talking for him. They, in their 
 turn, explain to the newcomers that ' There is a bird 
 up there.' When asked ' What kind of a bird ?' it 
 is amusing to hear their replies. Some are natural 
 liars, and deceive others for the love of deception. 
 Others are merely imaginative and assume that the 
 bird which persists in keeping out of sight must be 
 rare and valuable to excite so much interest. Thus, 
 in two minutes, it is successively a mocking-bird, or 
 a pet canary, or a parrot, which is presumably a 
 great loss to its owner, and for the return of which a 
 liberal reward will surely be paid. Or else it is a. 
 crow, a hawk, an owl, or an eagle, that has lost its 
 way in the night time and is bewildered among the 
 chimney tops. In five minutes, at the utmost, from 
 fifty to a hundred people will be gathered."
 
 "And where do you come into the bird game?" 
 " \Ve hang on the skirts of the crowd and take 
 our fill of the scene we reproduce, undisturbed, for 
 a quarter of an hour, perhaps. When the scene re- 
 quires, as it sometimes does, a populace, as specta- 
 tors, the crowd itself contributes to the illusion. 
 \Ve only have to imagine them clothed in the 
 costume of the period, whatever it may be. (iray, 
 steeple-crowned hats will be the feature to-day." 
 
 " l>ut don't the police ever order your crowds to 
 movc % on ? " 
 
 "Never till we have accomplished our object. 
 You see, the crowd is not badly behaved. It is a 
 new dodge and the policeman himself does not un- 
 derstand it. His curiosity is aroused. He looks 
 for the bird, too. Usually there is a person present 
 who has good reasons for hating the police, and he 
 improves on our game without charge. He pre- 
 ; tends to see smoke coming out of the roof, or a 
 i man hiding behind a chimney possibly an escaped 
 lunatic or a fugitive from justice. Off goes the 
 | policeman to see what is the trouble up there, and 
 the crowd has another respite, during which we 
 : steal away." 
 
 Just then, a tall, rawboned, much-patched boy 
 caught Meldrum's eye. That practiced judge of 
 i character beckoned the urchin into a hallway, and 
 the bargain for the bird game was struck with-
 
 222 
 
 (nit delay. Never was juvenile accomplice better 
 pleased with an engagement, lie grinned with 
 delight as he thought of fooling the people and still 
 more, his natural enemy, the policeman. 
 
 As he crossed the open, paved space to the as- 
 signed point of operations, about fifteen feet from 
 the north front of Bra/.er's building, he kept repeat- 
 ing to himself. " There's a bird up there," and " I 
 don't know," in order to be perfect in his part. 
 
 What Meldrum predicted came true and always 
 \vill come true. Before he could count ten, a .--tract 
 idler was standing by the side of the decoy and 
 looking upward longingly. A third and a fourth 
 followed, and the}' quadrupled the attractive 1 power 
 of the nucleus. Loafers rallied to it like iron fil- 
 ings to a magnet. A full minute had not passed 
 and the desired crowd had been collected. At a 
 signal from Meldrum, the three friends joined it at 
 the outer edge. From this moment each one had 
 to act for himself and act with rapidity. Finch had 
 been carefully coached in the mode of procedure 
 and could not have been further aided by .Meldrum 
 and Wadlow. To look after him would be only a 
 distraction fatal to their own efforts. For the next 
 ten minutes the}' forgot his existence, and he wisely 
 forbore to remind them of it by so much as a 
 nudge or a whisper. 
 
 While the crowd was staring up at the curved
 
 : stone parapet of Brazer's building, Meldrum and 
 \Vadlo\v had willed the building itself off the 
 premises and erected in its stead a square, one- 
 storied, thatched meeting-house. They did nut 
 stop to throw in windows and doors or other archi- 
 tectural details, which could be of no help to them. 
 All they wanted of the meeting-house was to serve- 
 as a kind of accessor}- to the external platform 
 which stood nearly beneath its eaves. This plat- 
 form, ascended by steps from the street, was the 
 one thing that must be most sharply defined at the 
 outset. Meldrum and \Vadlow were both in fine 
 
 ; condition that day, and the platform stood before 
 them in a twinkling, read}' to bear the actors in the 
 forthcoming tableaux. So clearly was it impressed 
 on the minds of the two trained observers that they 
 
 ; saw in the background the pillory itself, which 
 
 j Hawthorne mentions as standing there, but not in 
 use. Had it pleased that enchanter to subject some 
 violator of the Sabbath to disgrace and torture in 
 that public place, as a side show to his tragedy, 
 Meldrum and Wadlow would have distinctly seen 
 the sad face of the offender protruding from the 
 hole into which his neck was closely fitted, and 
 silently imploring the spectators not to throw 
 cabbage stumps at him. 
 
 In lieu of the Derby and other modern hats, 
 battered and seedy most of them, which actually
 
 met the level of their eyes, they su\v, by metamor- 
 phosis, a cluster ot peaked broad brims, like mon- 
 strous fungoid growths. .Among the wearers of 
 these they could easily have identified the historic 
 Bellingham, had time permitted them to tieket the 
 minor personages of the drama. They could have 
 seen, conspicuous by its difference frmn the other 
 headgear, the black skull cap crowning the white 
 locks of the Rev. Mr. Wilson, whose benevolent 
 face- belied the ruthless austerity of his creed. JUit 
 any interest they might have felt in the recreated 
 knot of Puritans who jostled them, was wholly 
 merged in the three figures which were nou slowly 
 climbing the steps to the stage of exposure and 
 shame. 
 
 There was the erring minister, haggard, red-eyed, 
 bent, tottering, who would have fallen but for the 
 strong arm of Heater I'ryune, which encircled him, 
 and the support given him by her shoulder. She 
 was beautiful, calm, erect, full of strength for the 
 awful ordeal, a true type of woman forever bearing 
 more than her share of contumely for the joint 
 offense, and braving public scorn like a lioness if she 
 ma}- shield and comfort her lover. The nerveless 
 fingers of the minister limply retained the hand of 
 little Pearl, who knew the top of the platform too 
 well to be frightened by what she might sec there, 
 and who had been stared at and shunned so long as
 
 A' /:.//'/'/:./ A-. /.\ ('/: or THE SCAKLET LETTER, 225 
 
 the unfathered child of Mistress I'rynne, that she 
 had no fear of facing any congregation of scowls 
 and sneers. She seemed to be leading the way and 
 helping her mother to keep her sin-stricken partner 
 from falling. 
 
 Following them, with a stealth)" footstep, came 
 the aged and crabbed husband of the fair adulteress, 
 he that is known in the pages of tin; Scarlet Letter 
 as Roger Chillingworth. Such husbands do not 
 receive: from the world much sympathy, when their 
 wives go astray, and, if In; had been entitled to any, 
 IK; had forfeited it by his merciless prolongation of 
 the refined torture to which he had put Dimmes- 
 dale when he had fa! honied the secret of that man's 
 miser)" and remorse. Meldrum and \Vadlo\v would 
 gladly have stricken him from the scene, but he 
 was an inseparable part of it. His ryes gleamed in 
 their deep sockets with the fires of hate and baffled 
 : revenge, as he foresaw that his victim was about to 
 escape him to peace by the way of confession which 
 so many sinners have trod. 
 
 The effect of the spectacle could not have been 
 
 i heightened by hearing what Dimmesdale said to the 
 
 , astonished Puritans below him as he straightened 
 
 himself with a great effort and unpacked his soul. 
 
 Meldrum and Wadlow knew every word of it, and 
 
 could follow him textually as his bloodless lips 
 
 parted and closed and his bosom heaved, and the
 
 226 
 
 whole man, save his arms and hands, which were 
 otherwise occupied, vibrated with the passionate 
 joy of unreserved confession. At the point of his 
 speech where he cries " L<> ! the scarlet letter 
 which Hester wears," just before he bares his own 
 breast to show the companion to it which he had 
 branded there, in the vain attempt to sear and 
 satisfy his o\vn conscience by that act of self- 
 punishment, Meldrum and \Vadlow saw, for the 
 first time, the capital " A " of red cloth fantastically 
 embroidered with gold thread on Hester's dress. 
 Their thoughts had been so centered on the princi- 
 pal figure of the little group, that even the noonday 
 sun, shining straight down on the scarlet letter, had 
 not till then made it apparent to them. 
 
 The next moment the speaker had violently 
 detached himself from the woman and child and 
 stepped a pace in front of them, as if to protect 
 them forevermore by taking upon himself all the 
 shame which had hitherto been wholly heaped 
 upon them. His ghastly face flushed as if with 
 triumph ; he stood erect ; his lips opened widely as 
 those of one speaking in trumpet tones ; and then 
 came the dreadful climax the rending of the min- 
 isterial band and the exhibition of the scar of the 
 scarlet letter deeply branded into his own tender 
 flesh, which the devil would never more fret with 
 the touch of his burning finger. Upon the death
 
 .cone which followed, Meldrum and \\';idlow could 
 lardly bear to look, so mournful and touching was 
 hat tableau of broken lives and bleeding hearts. 
 
 P>ul, had the}' been disposed to glut their eyes on 
 uch miseries, the}' would have been balked in that 
 lesion; for, at the instant when little Pearl knelt 
 down and kissed the lips of the dying father she 
 lad but ju-t found, there u as a clang of alarm bells 
 n State Street, and a ^team fire engine, a hose cart, 
 uul a hook and ladder trucl; turned tin: corner on a 
 gallop, and they barely escaped being" run over by 
 ipringing from the street to the sidewalk. Pios- 
 H.TO, snapping his statf across his knee, could not 
 lave broken a spell more suddenly and completely, 
 lone were the- thatched roof of the First Church 
 uul the adjacent pillory, and in their places stood 
 5ra/er's building and an express wagon, which had 
 'jeen sharply drawn up against the curb stone to 
 nake way for the fire engine and its satellites. 
 Slot only had the steeple-hatted Puritans taken 
 dight, but the little crowd so successful!)' collected 
 >y the bird game had melted away. 
 
 Meldrum and \Vadlo\v rubbed their eyes bc- 
 'vilderedly, so precipitate had been their fall from 
 ;.he height of two centuries. Recovering thcm- 
 iclves, they recognized, close at hand, the lank and 
 larlcquin boy and Finch. The lad held out his 
 land to receive the residue of the stipend he had
 
 so well earned. Closing his grimy finders upon it, 
 he ran a\vay to spend it on cigarettes and the latest 
 issue of the F>oy Detective Series. 
 
 " What did you see? "asked Finch, eagerly. 
 
 " Fverylhing." was the joint response. "And 
 you?" 
 
 " Nothing." 
 
 " I am sorry fur you," said Aleldruni. "I tokl 
 you so," was on hi-, lip-, ; lint he was too much of a 
 gentleman to uf ter it. 
 
 "You must ii"t be discouraged by the first fail- 
 ure," added Wadlo\v, kindly. " Practice may en- 
 able you. " 
 
 "To he candid, I fear not," Finch replied, with 
 his habitual sweetness. " My place is in the crowd, 
 diverting its eyes from you. I (latter myself that 
 the boy had an able pal in me for the 1 bird game." 
 
 The subject was renewed and discussed in the 
 same; spirit of frankness and good humor at the sub- 
 sequent generous luncheon at Young's, provided by 
 Finch as host of the occasion. Meldrum and \Yad- 
 low told him exactly what they had seen. Then it 
 was agreed to give him the fullest range for ques- 
 tions. 
 
 " First," said Meldrum, " we invite the most rigid 
 investigation of our claims. Fxamineus separately, 
 if you please."
 
 REAPPEARANCE OF Till'. SCARLET LETTER. 229 
 
 Finch lifted his hand in protest against any sup- 
 position that lie could impugn the veracity of his 
 friends. " I confess that, for my own enlightenment, 
 I would like to put a few questions. You have ex- 
 plained to me that the scenes reproduced in these 
 curious experiments are those which have been in- 
 effaceably stamped on your minds by an enchanter 
 in ideas and words. Visiting the places where these 
 scenes are laid, you are enabled, by an exercise of 
 will power, coupled with an entire surrender to what 
 we may call the genius loci (Tor want of a better 
 term), to transfer them from the chambers of the 
 brain to the external world. Do I make myself 
 clear? " 
 
 " There may be twenty ways of stating the propo- 
 sition," said Wadlow, " but yours will answer." 
 
 " To begin with, then, what was the color of Hes- 
 ter 1'rynne's dress ? " 
 
 Me Id rum replied, without hesitation, " I did not 
 notice. The only color I observed upon her was 
 ithat of the Scarlet Letter." 
 
 " Ditto for me," added Wadlow, " though I now 
 (recall that Hawthorne expressly clad her in coarse 
 gray cloth that day." 
 
 "And little Pearl's dress what was its color?" 
 
 " Give it up," was Meldrum's answer. 
 
 "And I, too," said Wadlow, "which is strange, 
 considering that the author always lays great stress
 
 230 
 
 on the niry gayety of the child's apparel. He took 
 the pnins to tell us that on the morning of the t rag- 
 ed}*, it \vas comparable only to the many-lined bril- 
 liancy of a butterfly's wing or the painted glory from 
 the leaf of a bright flower. Hut it did not catch 
 my eye, or Meldrum's, either, as it seems." 
 
 " No statement could better establish your credi- 
 bility as witnesses," rejoined the examiner, with a 
 laugh. " Kverybody knows that men take no no- 
 tice of women's and children's dresses their color 
 or fashion, or anything but their expense when 
 they are husbands and fathers. Now, let me ask 
 you, what kind of a hat did Mr. Dimmesdale 
 wear ? " 
 
 "None," came from the lips of the two as one 
 word. "And why?" continued Wadlow. "Simply 
 because Hawthorne did not provide him with a hat 
 for that or any other da}*. If the poor man had 
 been fitted with a steeple crown, or a shovel shape, 
 or a skull cap, I, for one, should have remarked it 
 unconsciously." 
 
 "And I," echoed Meld rum. "If novelists don't 
 supply their heroes with hats, we can't do it for 
 them, you see." 
 
 " Good, so far," pursued Finch. " Now, tell me, 
 which arm did Hester throw around her lover to 
 support him as he ascended the steps?" 
 
 "The left," said Meldrum, emphatically.
 
 REAPPEARANCE OF THE SCARLFT LETTER. 231 
 
 "The right," said Wadlow, with equal positive, 
 ness. 
 
 " Let me say that that discrepancy between tin- 
 witnesses is another proof that this is not a put up 
 job," commented the interlocutor. 
 
 " In the absence of any instructions from the 
 author, I had always imagined Hester to be on the 
 minister's right. Thut would bring the child on his 
 left, where she ought to be under good stage 
 management." This from Meldrum. 
 
 It turned out that this arrangement had been re- 
 versed in Wad low's mental picture of the same 
 scene, because it had always occurred to him that 
 Hester would naturally use her stronger arm, the 
 right, to keep her lover from falling. I lis right 
 hand would, therefore, be left free to clasp that of 
 the sin-born child whose paternity he was about to 
 acknowledge. This would put Pearl on her father's 
 right when the three confronted the crowd. In the 
 circumstances, Mr. Wadlow had always thought it 
 a not-unsuitable placing of them. 
 
 As to Roger Chillingworth, these facts were 
 elicited. That Wadlow had seen the old man a 
 little to the left of his young wife at the moment 
 when the other three persons had aligned them- 
 selves on the platform. But that Meldrum had 
 located him for that tableau a step in the rear of 
 Mr. Dimmesdale and Hester, his head alone being
 
 ?3 2 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 visible between their shoulders. Hawthorne not 
 having assigned him a specific place, each witness 
 was obliged to adjust the man according to 
 some preconception, the origin of which was un- 
 known. 
 
 " I rest the case," said Finch, "and as both attor- 
 ney and judge hereby express my entire confidence 
 in the good faith of the witnesses. Hut it is quite 
 another thing to reaii/.e for myself the truth of 
 what the}- say. Be perfectly candid with me no\v. 
 \Vliy didn't I see any of the wonderful sights that 
 yon saw in front of Bra/.er's building .' Is my terri- 
 ble, critical faculty, as you call it, my only draw- 
 back ? " 
 
 Meldrum bethought himself of the proverb, 
 " Faithful are the wounds of a friend." Two or 
 three times in his life it had been quoted at him as 
 a prelude for some piece of fault-finding or rebuke, 
 carrying in its tail a sting that struck- deep and left 
 a fester, such as jealousy or malice might have been 
 well satisfied to inflict. Having himself suffered 
 from the unsparing fidelity of friends, he did not 
 abuse the license granted by Mr. Finch. lie might 
 have told that gentleman that he lacked imagination 
 or was too conceited, and so disqualified from com- 
 ing under the power of the enchanter. Hut, in lieu 
 of these and other faithful wounds, he merely said, 
 "You have the critical disposition in excess, my
 
 dear fellow. That is all. Perhaps you will out- 
 grow it in time." 
 
 " Felix and I were troubled the same way when 
 we left college ; but that was eight years ago, and 
 you have been out only two years. Besides, you are 
 heavily handicapped in one way, you know," said 
 \Vadlow. 
 
 " You mean as vice-principal of an old classical 
 
 k 
 seh< >ol .' " 
 
 " Fxactly. You find that the young people 
 muler you rate your literary abilities the more 
 highly in proportion to the severity of your criti- 
 cisms upon all authors. As long as you admire 
 nothing, the}' think" you know everything. I have 
 known club men get the reputation of connoisseurs 
 in wines by always swearing that there was not a 
 drop in the house fit to drinlc. One man of that 
 kind was called the best judge of cigars in New 
 ; York, because none that the house committee could 
 ever find suited him." 
 
 Finch smiled again. If he did not admit the im- 
 putation, he did not deny it. 
 
 " Have you any novel or essay or poem in 
 hand ? " asked Meldrum. 
 
 " Oh, no ! I have never appeared in print, and 
 i have no thought of doing so. But why do you ask ? " 
 
 " Because the question has a direct and most im- 
 portant bearing on the subject. While you are not
 
 234 
 
 one of the critics so caustically, and, I must say 
 as a class, unjustly described by Disraeli as men 
 who have failed in literature and art, you neverthe- 
 less belong to a class, still more numerous and 
 formidable, composed of those who have never at- 
 tempted anything in literature and art. They have 
 not the faintest idea of the immense difficulties en- 
 countered by nne who aspires to produce a literary 
 work at once original and impossibly perfect. Let 
 them once try it themselves, and the reMilt would 
 perhaps make them more tolerant of the blemishes 
 which disfigure the writings of the greatest authors." 
 
 " I kiss the rod, and thank you for letting me off 
 so easily," cried the blithest and sunniest, if the 
 most perversely critical, of hosts. 
 
 The cheerful manner in which Finch took his 
 punishment, for such it was, though no one could 
 have administered it more tenderly than Meldrum, 
 impelled that judicious censor to say something 
 deprecatory of himself and friend. When you have 
 possibly wounded the amour proprc of another per- 
 son, there is no salve for the hurt like a little low- 
 ering of yourself in his eyes. 
 
 " The truth is," continued Meldrum, as if confi- 
 dentially, " Wadlow and I arc only the most com- 
 monplace and the humblest of hero-worshipers. 
 We admit that an immeasurable distance lies be- 
 tween us and the authors of genuine creative power,
 
 the originators of schools of poetry and novels, of 
 whom alone I am no\v speaking'. \Ve are content 
 to pay them a kind of blind adoration, if you please. 
 \Vc are grateful from the bottom of our hearts that 
 \ve are living in an age th.it produced some of them, 
 and that they are not all dead." 
 
 " \Ve are so thankful for the pleasure they have 
 given us," said \\adlo\v, cutting into the discourse, 
 " that it seems the height of ingratitude to spy (Hit 
 their faults. For us, those faults do not exist. And 
 when OIK: of these great geniuses dies, in the full- 
 ness ot his powers, we feel that we have sustained 
 an irreparable personal loss. For then has come an 
 end to the kind of work which, perhaps, he alone, 
 out of all the hundreds of millions of men, could 
 have done. If one would reflect a moment on the 
 extreme rarity of truly original literary works of 
 high order, he would hail them with delight when 
 
 : they appear at long intervals, instead of giving them, 
 as too man}- persons do, a grudging welcome, or 
 
 i even brutally repelling them as if the authors, being 
 newcomers, were intruders and not royal benefactors 
 of the human race. Being born hero-worshipers, 
 Mcldrum and I know no better objects of our idol- 
 
 ; atry than the great novelists and poets." 
 
 " Who have, in our opinion," said Meldrum, tak- 
 ing his turn, " given more happiness to the world 
 and done it more real good than the great states-
 
 23 6 
 
 men, tlic great theologians and preachers, the great 
 moralists, and even the great inventors. We are 
 content to sit blindly enchanted at the feet of these 
 scarcest of great men. In return for our unalloyed 
 faith and admiration, they give us about a half, or 
 shall I say three fourths, of the pleasure of our 
 lives, in reading their book's over and over again, 
 some of them." 
 
 "Besides private views of deaths on platforms in 
 public streets. Pardon the interruption ! said 
 Finch. 
 
 Mcldrum had a dread of becoming tedious, and 
 he, perhaps needlessly, took this remark- as a hint 
 to close what was tending to become a rhapsody. 
 
 " Excuse my enthusiasm," he said, " it was run- 
 ning away with me." 
 
 " In order to be admitted to the select company 
 of the enchanted, one must be an enthusiast?" 
 asked Finch. 
 
 " An enthusiast above all," was the simultaneous 
 answer. 
 
 "Then there is no use of my applying," retorted 
 Finch, with an expression of pride on his frank, 
 handsome face, as if he had proclaimed the one 
 excellence upon which he most plumed himself. 
 
 The two New Yorkers regretted that this fine 
 fellow, to whom they had taken so strong a liking, 
 should be debarred by his temperament and educa-
 
 tion from sharing in the innocent, exalted pleasures 
 to which they would gladly have admitted him as a 
 companion in any future rambles they might take 
 through Xe\v England on the track" of Emerson, 
 Longfellow, Lowell, Whitticr, and Holmes. Hut 
 such comradeship \vas plainly out of the question, 
 now that Finch's unfitness to be a practicable third 
 had been proved by trial and confessed with a full- 
 ness that left no room to hope for its removal. 
 
 lint Mcldrum and \Vadlow clasped the hand of 
 their kind friend and hospitable entertainer no less 
 warmly, and expressed the hope to meet him in 
 New York, at an earl}' day, no less sincerely, when 
 he parted from them at the station, where they took 
 the three o'clock- train for home. They valued 
 Finch for what he was: a genial, companionable 
 man, a good fellow and a stanch friend, whose 
 misfortune more than his fault it was that the place 
 
 . which enthusiasm should have held in his nature 
 was usurped by a critical demon who could not be 
 
 , exorcised.
 
 CILMTFK XVI 1 1. 
 THI-; I-'OUTUNATK HAITKXINGS ()!' A [OUKNEY WKST. 
 
 A.\ evening paprr, bought in the train that day, 
 gave to \\'.i(lli)\\- one D| the greatest pleasures of 
 his life. Fin-time might have many good tilings in 
 stole for hi.s professional future, but never could she 
 duplicate tin: rapture lie felt on u inning his first 
 important ease at the bar, single-handed, against dis- 
 tinguished veterans. The New York ( 'ourt of Ap- 
 peals had reversed the decision of the lower court 
 on a difficult law point and vindicated his wisdom 
 and persistence in urging his client to fight it out at 
 any cost. His client was one of the great life insur- 
 ance companies, whose young and able president 
 was a warm personal friend of \Yadlow, and had put 
 this case in his charge as a special auxiliary coun- 
 sel. The old regular attorneys of the corporation 
 had advised a compromise, and the president had 
 sin ill hopes of gaining the suit, which involved a 
 large sum of money, besides a principle never be- 
 fore adjudicated upon. But \Vadlow, after care- 
 fully examining all the papers, took a less discour- 
 aging view, and now the highest court of the State 
 had justified his faith, sagacity, and courage, all of 
 
 238
 
 Till-. //. //V'A.V/.Vf/.V ()/ .1 JOL'tiXEY ll'I'.S'/'. 239 
 
 \\hich L(ooi.l qualities were largely dra\vn upon in 
 persuading his friend not to yield at each succes- 
 sive reverse in the protracted litigation. 
 
 The next morning, on reaching his dingy little 
 office in the Van der Tromp building, \Yadhnv re- 
 ceived a note from the delighted [)resident of the 
 great insurance company, congratulating him on his 
 brilliant victory and offering him the highly-salaried 
 position of chief counsel of the corporation, which 
 had become vacant by death during XVadlow's ab- 
 sence abroad. Thus, at a bound, he sprang from a 
 hand-to-mouth practice into the enjoyment of one 
 of the most valuable pri/es which can fall to the 
 share of a young New York lawyer. 
 
 lie was hardly warm in his new seat a deep, 
 high-backed, softly-padded, luxurious arm-chair 
 before the company received notice of a case con- 
 nected with its branch office at Duluth, Minn., 
 which, by reason of its novelty and the large inter- 
 ests at stake, seemed to require the presence of the 
 cool head and iron nerve of the new chief counsel. 
 
 Upon being notified of the trip and the duty, 
 Wadlow remembered with pleasure that Duluth is 
 situated not far from St. Paul, and he foresaw the 
 opportunity of visiting that city and, perchance, of 
 being favored by another sight of his preference 
 among all heroines Amy Robsart ; for by that 
 name Amanda Robison always rose to his mind.
 
 240 
 
 Not inflammable, not highly impressible, but, on the 
 contrary, judicious and circumspect as became one 
 destined to attain high rank in his profession, \Vad- 
 low \vas yet conscious of sweetly disturbing pulsa- 
 tions whenever he recalled the brown hair and eyes, 
 the pure complexion, the oval, regular-featured face, 
 and the supple figure of that lady. lie had not 
 seen her since they parted on the \Vengcrn Alp. 
 lUit accident had befriended him to the extent of 
 opening up communication with her, and receiving 
 in reply a prettily worded little note, which he kept 
 in a pigeon-hole quite apart from any of his grave 
 law papers. It happened in this wise: 
 
 \Yhcn Mcldrum and \Yadlow. after some days' 
 delay at Interlaken, pursued their journey to Lu- 
 cerne, they stopped at the Schwci/.erhof. Looking 
 idly through the bundle of telegrams which were 
 awaiting delivery to guests of the house', Wadlow 
 found one stamped, " International Cable Service," 
 and addressed to Miss Amanda Robison. A tele- 
 gram from America to Europe may be safely 
 assumed to be of some importance to the destined 
 recipient ; and he at once made it his business to 
 ask why it had not been forwarded to the lady, 
 whose next address had doubtless been left at the 
 bureau of the hotel. In reply, he was told that she 
 had failed to leave the needed information on her 
 departure, or, more probably, her courier had neg-
 
 THE HAPPENINGS <>/' ./ JOCRXEY WEST. 241 
 
 lected to do it for her. T\vo or three letters, with 
 American postmarks, bearing her name, were also 
 discovered. It was fortunate for her that \Yadl<>w 
 had made this find, for, with the single exception of 
 Meldrum, there was no one at the hotel who had 
 chanced to observe, in reading the Galignani of that 
 morning, among the " Personals," that the arch 
 willow and her friend were then sojourning at the 
 Hotel Metropole, Geneva. \\'adlow at once in- 
 closed tlu: letters and the telegram in a large en- 
 velope, with his own card (penciling" below his 
 name and his address, " Schwei/crhof, Lucerne," 
 and, furthermore, the two words " Wengern Alp," 
 as a hint at his identity, which he trusted that so 
 bright a young lady would not fail to catch), super- 
 scribed it with the proper address, and stamped and 
 mailed it with his own hand. But in the haste to 
 do this friendly act, he had not omitted to make a 
 slight verbal correction on the face of the telegram 
 and likewise on one of the letters. 
 
 There are many people who think that the spell- 
 ing of other names than their own is of no sort of 
 consequence. Carelessness, and not design, may be 
 supposed to be the explanation of those slips by 
 which middle names or initials are dropped out, and 
 even a sacred surname is docked, lengthened, or 
 otherwise changed, to the annoyance of its lawful 
 owner. Now, Miss Amanda Robison, like her father
 
 242 Till: KXC1IAXTED. 
 
 before her (but not her grandfather, to be frank), 
 ahvays took great pains to \vrite her name so plainly, 
 that all \vliD read it could not help seeing that it 
 was not Robinson. Type could not have made it 
 more legible than she did. In spite of these and 
 other precautions, intended for the permanent ex- 
 clusion of that impertinent letter of the alphabet, 
 there were actually persons, calling themselves 
 friends, who would interpolate the " //." As for the 
 rest of man and womankind, no recognition of the 
 tremendous difference between the two names was 
 ever expected, and Miss Amanda Kobison had be- 
 come compulsorily reconciled to it. 
 
 It was one of Wadlow's peculiarities to be observ- 
 ant of names and punctilious in spelling them. 
 From the time when he ascertained from the waiters 
 and post-boys of the Kenilworth Inn exactly how 
 the lady's name was spelled (they had read it in large 
 painted letters on her trunk's), it ran no more risk of 
 being transformed by him to Robi;/son than to 
 Jackson or Peterson or Williamson. Deeming such 
 trifling with patronymics a marked breach of good 
 manners, he did as he would be done by. lie 
 obliterated the superfluous and offensive " n " on 
 the telegram and on the letter by a boldly pen- 
 ciled X. And he was very careful in address- 
 ing the package himself to dot the " i " plainly 
 and make the following " s " conspicuous, so that
 
 ihere could be no possible room for mistake 
 ibout it. 
 
 A few days afterward came a sweet little note 
 nun thf lady, thanking him warmly for his thought- 
 fulness. She explained that the telegram gave her 
 immense relief from anxiety. For it assured her of 
 [he convalescence of her dear old grandmother, 
 whose illness had been so alarming that Miss kobi- 
 son had made all her preparations to return home 
 ;ilonc. Now she had been telegraphed to remain 
 abroad as long as she pleased, as the.- re was no doubt 
 of her grandmother's speedy recovery. This was 
 signed, out of the fullness of her heart, "Yours 
 [gratefully, Amanda Robison." Indeed, it was a 
 proper occasion for gratitude, and nothing more 
 than that was conveyed between the lines, though 
 \Vadlo\v searched for something else in those blank 
 spaces many and man)- a time. And yet, all the 
 while, it was there in the form of a very decided re- 
 gard for a man as good-looking, sensible, modest, and 
 well-bred as \Yadlow, and so nice also in another 
 :respect. For Miss Robison had noted with pleasure 
 the accurate spelling of the address in his own hand 
 land the bold erasure of the obnoxious " n " in the 
 two instances referred to, by the same pencil evi- 
 dently \vhich had been employed on that gentle- 
 man's inclosed card. 
 
 Though Wadlow could not surmise to what
 
 244 
 
 extent Miss Robison would be pleased to see him 
 again, lie was fairly entitled to think that she would 
 at least be polite to him when the}- next met. Had 
 he been less well-balanced, he might have persuaded 
 his friend to deflect from his line of travel through 
 Germany and run down to Geneva, with the hope of 
 meeting the lady or of following her up till they 
 should meet. Meldmm, though not susceptible to 
 the charms of even the archest and richest of 
 widows, would have consulted to this alteration of 
 plans without much pressing. lUit \Vadlow con- 
 cluded, on reflection, that the proposed pursuit of 
 the two charming Americans would lower himself 
 and friend too near to the level of the titled ad- 
 mirers and fortune hunters who were still in hot 
 pursuit of the widow (all the continental papers 
 containing frequent reference to the fact). And so 
 he resolutely smothered his rising inclination to sec 
 Miss Robison once more in Kurope all the more 
 easily, because he felt a strong presentiment that 
 that privilege would be his, some day, in America. 
 And now there was a possibility that lie might 
 soon taste the deferred pleasure, for the New York 
 journals had, within a day or two, trumpeted 
 the return of Mrs. Josiah J. Greatfield "The 
 Flour Queen ; the Minneapolis millionairess," from 
 her brilliant European tour; " still heart-whole and 
 unprecfnptcd we arc glad to say ;" "her belt filled
 
 THE //.//Y'/:.\7.V(7.Y 01< A JOURXEY IVKST. 245 
 
 with the scalps of her conquests," etc., etc. One 
 paper declared: " We have it on the best authority 
 that she has refused one Bourbon prince, two 
 French dukes, four Italian marquises, six German 
 counts, and two Knglish lords;" and patriotically 
 added, "American husbands are good enough for 
 Mrs. Josiah J. Greatfield." Such were a few of the 
 phrases in which the reporters strove to do justice 
 to the wealth and social position of that lad}'. A 
 line, in the same connection, sufficed to mention the 
 return, safe and sound, in her company, of Miss 
 Amanda Robinson (always Robinson in the papers), 
 of St. Paul, "the fail' proprietress of the magnifi- 
 cent Opera 1 louse of that city." Wadlow, while 
 ! thinking no less of Mrs. Greatfield because the 
 press had taken such liberties with her, was, on the 
 whole, pleased (though it was really no business of 
 his) that the other lady had been made the subject 
 of no such "journalistic enterprise." 
 
 When Wadlow told his best of friends of his 
 
 intended visit to the principal cities of Minnesota, 
 
 , Meldrum expressed a wish to accompany him, 
 
 thereby anticipating the request the other was 
 
 -about to make. "When we arc at St. Paul, yon 
 
 know," said Meldrum, " we can try our luck on 
 
 so>ne scene from Hiawatha say at Minnehaha 
 
 Falls where a part of the action of the poem takes 
 
 place."
 
 246 
 
 \Vucllo\v had not thought of that, so engrossed 
 had he been with the sole desire of meeting Miss 
 Robison again. 
 
 " Ye yes," he replied,"! was on the point of 
 mentioning the same tiling,." 
 
 It is painful to reflect that such duplicity in 
 the form of secretive reserve should be practiced by 
 any person to the most confiding of Iriends. Hut it 
 is true that \Yadlo\v was unwilling to tell even Mel- 
 drum the real object of his side trip to the capital 
 of Minnesota. As for the latter, he was perfectly 
 sincere when he added, as an afterthought, "And 
 may be we shall see the widow and Amy Robsart 
 again, t here or thereabi >ut. That would be pleasant, 
 wouldn't it ? " 
 
 \Vadlow readily admitted that it would, lie 
 knew, from his friend's manner, that the \\ido\v was 
 not occupying any part "f his thoughts, save as a 
 sprightly variety of womankind which Alcldrum 
 liked to stud)" with the mingled interest and com- 
 posure of the popular but predetermined and fore- 
 armed bachelor. 
 
 The business at Duluth having been put in satis- 
 factory train, the two friends proceeded to Minne- 
 apolis. On their way thither the)' observed freight 
 cars, piled high with the Halloon brand of Family 
 Flour, outward bound. As they neared the city,
 
 7 '///: //.;/7'/..v/.v<;.s' or .1 JOCK.VKY irr.sr. 247 
 
 thi' hoard fences adjoining the railroad \vcrc radiant 
 with threat colored placards announcing the engage- 
 ment of the Italian Grand ( )pera Company at the 
 kobison Grand ( )pera House, St. Paul, for three 
 nights only. These little incidents were the most 
 enlivening of the trip. The\' confirmed, as only 
 such realistic evidence can, those newspaper para- 
 graphs, the very repetition of which, somehow, 
 seems to increase their improbability. Meldrum 
 looked tranquilly at the passing heaps of flour, 
 merely regretting the absence of the widow's name 
 from the head of the barrels. lUit \Yadlow felt a 
 pang as he measured with his eye the length of the 
 letters composing the word " kobison " on the flam- 
 ing posters. It was a familiarity bordering on pro- 
 fanation. 
 
 Arrived at Minneapolis, they stopped at "The 
 West," on the strength of the widow's emphatic 
 eulogitim of that_hotel. 
 
 It is a good and safe plan in every city of the 
 world, which a tourist may visit, to take The Drive. 
 No matter how large the city may be, there is only 
 one The Drive in it. I>y adopting it without ques- 
 tion, and leaving one's self unreservedly in the hands 
 of the coachman, one is sure to see the best park 
 that the place can show, with rides along lakes, 
 ! ponds, or rivers, if any, including views of the finest 
 residences in the fashionable quarter, with a ccr-
 
 taint)' (if it is the season and the right hour of the 
 day is chosen) of seeing Everybody since Every- 
 body invariably lakes The Drive at the same time. 
 If Mrs. Great field was at Minneapolis, there was the 
 same assurance of meeting that prominent society 
 personage in the course of The Drive on a brilliant 
 November afternoon, as if an appointment had been 
 made for it. I>oth Meldrum and \Vadlow expressed 
 the hope that a sight of her fresh, laughing face 
 would be among the pleasures in reserve for them; 
 the former adding that, <>f course, there could ''be 
 no such luck' as finding Amy Kob-,ar! \\-ith her," to 
 which \Vadlo\v responded, suppressing a sigh, "I 
 suppose not." 
 
 Nevertheless, it did happen that, as they were 
 skirting tin- Mississippi at a point where they got a 
 fine view of St. Anthony's Falls, they saw approach- 
 ing a span of high steppers, and perched above 
 them a portly coachman, close-shaven, rubicund, 
 English ; and just over his seat appeared the bril- 
 liantly bonneted heads of Mrs. Josiali J. Greatfield 
 and Miss Amanda Robison. They were leaning 
 back in an open landau, with that set and solemn 
 expression of face which Everybody wears on The 
 Drive, and which is only momentarily relaxed into a 
 mechanical smile in recognition of one's friends by 
 the way. l$ut there was no pulling of muscles like 
 strings to produce the smile which illumined the
 
 y/.//7'A.\v.\ (/.v <>/ ./ /OI:K.V/-:Y ir/-.s/'. -'49 
 
 faces of both ladies (and a bit of a blush thrown 
 in for the maiden) \vhen the two carriages came 
 closer. The raising of two hats was responded to 
 b)' the dipping of two parasols. At a signal from 
 the widow, the carriage stopped in the middle of 
 the wide road and the other team drove alongside 
 of it. 
 
 " Let us make no mystery of it," said the widow, 
 who was the first to speak. "Though we have- 
 never been formally introduced, you know perfectly 
 well who we are and we know who you are. \Vc 
 have read about you in the papers, ha, ha ! " 
 
 The widow's allusion, here, was to a paragraph 
 which had appeared in the Uuluth Hustler, ami been 
 copied b} r the journals of the Twin Cities, highly 
 complimentary to the personal and professional 
 character of \Vadlow. The facts of it had been 
 obligingly supplied to the reporter of the Hustler 
 by Meldrum, who had been sought out, in the 
 absence of his friend, for an interview upon the sub- 
 ject. Much interest attached to Wadlow's visit 
 to Duluth on account of his known relations as 
 chief counsel to the Universe Life Insurance Com- 
 pany. The legal question at issue there affected 
 many policy-holders in the company, not only at 
 Duluth but all through Minnesota. The reporter 
 not being able to extract from Meldrum any per- 
 sonal data concerning himself, had ventured on his
 
 own responsibility to speak of him as a " gentle- 
 man " and a "scholar," "well known ami highly 
 respected in \e\v York" a generalization quite 
 safely drawn from his face, manner, and attire. 
 
 The widow's child-like laugh showed how keenly, 
 at times, she enjoyed set tin;.;" conventionalities aside. 
 J>ut trust her not to do so for men who would for a 
 moment presume on her kindly relaxation of social 
 
 which one was a full dost for an adult. 
 
 Meldrum and YVadlow gratefully acknowledged 
 the ladies' goodness in recalling them t<> mind. It 
 is so easy and almost natural for people to drop at 
 home the casual acquaintances they make abroad. 
 Then followed a rattling" fire of reminiscences about 
 their Furopcan trip and other pleasant nothings. 
 The object all around was not to stop talking, under 
 cover of which Wad low made an inspection of the 
 visible charms of Miss Robison. She had a height- 
 ened color, partly tan and the rest a pleasurable 
 flush. The Atlantic voyages, forth and back, had 
 produced the not uncommon result of plumping the 
 figure at points where the typical American girl 
 falls a little short of the sculptor's ideal and does 
 not quite meet the reasonable views of her young 
 fellow countrymen. Altogether, a change from very 
 good to better. No such improvement had been 
 needed in the widow. She remained, as she had
 
 Tin-, i! .//'/'/-..v/.Vf/.s- (/ / /c>r/v'.v/-;r // A.V/'. 251 
 
 first been seen by Mcldrum, who was mentally com- 
 paring notes with himself, the same pleasing com- 
 bination of curves which sank -it one point only to 
 swell at another. 
 
 " Now, gentlemen," saul the widow, abrupt ly* " I 
 am g"ii)g to press you into service for opinions. 
 lMea-;e follow mv carriage." This, in a way that 
 relieved the request of all singularity. It was one 
 of her gift; that the strangest thin- she did excited 
 no surprise. 
 
 Meldnim and \Vadlow declared themselves en- 
 tireh' at her command, and their carriage fell into 
 
 O 
 
 line behind hers. 
 
 After a pleasant little drive alon;^ the river bank", 
 passing new and handsome houses, which marked 
 the prosperous extension of the city, Mrs. (Treat- 
 field signaled a stop in front of a large, unoccupied 
 lot of ground, picturesquely situated. The gentle- 
 men followed the ladies in descending from their 
 carriage and passing into this fine piece of land 
 through a gateway. Arriving at the center of the 
 tract the widow paused, and asked, " How is this for 
 a building site ? " 
 
 Meldrum said, 'Magnificent;" and Wadlow, 
 " Superb ; just the place for a private residence." 
 
 " And that is why I think it none too good for a 
 woman's business college," returned Mrs. Great- 
 field, with a glow of pride, " though the trustees
 
 don't agree \vitli inc. They never do, \vhcn 1 pro- 
 pose any little scheme of benevolence for my 
 fellow creatures. l!ut I shall have my own \vay 
 here." She patteil the ground with lier foot and 
 pursed her lips in the most determined manner. 
 "The plan covers two objects," she continued, with 
 a pretty seriousness. " In the first place, the 
 country is filling up with widows and spinsters (a 
 sly glance at Miss Rohisoii) who have money, which 
 a great man}' other people want to get away from 
 them. (There was nothing of cynicism in the 
 widow's manner. She spoke as if only mentioning 
 an undeniable fact.) Everybody presumes upon 
 their weakness and ignorance, and. shall I say, their 
 sweetly confiding natures? ha, ha! to advise 
 them about investments. Whether this advice is 
 interested or disinterested, the result is equally bad 
 if the money is lost in buying cats and dogs, as 
 Mr. Grcatficld used to call 'em." She paused to 
 catch her breath and went on. " Now, I don't see 
 why these unprotected females, who depend at 
 present on trustees, lawyers, bankers, possibly 
 clergymen, and, undoubtedly, brothers, for advice 
 about money matters, should not be taught to 
 manage their affairs for themselves, just as well as 
 you hard-headed men do." 
 
 " Which is not saying much for some of us," said 
 Meldrum.
 
 " 111 business matters men arc apt to be more 
 foolish than women, according to my experience," 
 added Wadlow. 
 
 " I dare say," said the widow, laughingly. " I 
 know that I\Ir. Greatfield had a pretty poor opinion 
 of men's business capacity, but then he was un- 
 commonly sharp himself. But I think yon \vill 
 agree with me that there is a growing class of 
 women in America who do nerd, for their safety, to 
 be instructed in sound and approved business 
 methods. Men who lose their money through 
 ignorance or overconfidence ought to know better ; 
 for they have the chance of seeing ami knowing 
 how business is done. Hut American women, at 
 least, have few such opportunities. It is these I 
 would furnish at the Woman's Business College. 
 There, now, what do you say to it? Is it all 
 'nonsense,' 'moonshine,' 'chimerical,' 'visionary,' 
 as the trustees tell me ?" 
 
 " Admirable," answered Meldrum, " and feasible 
 that is, if the widows and maiden ladies will take 
 your strictly sensible view of it and become students 
 at the college." 
 
 " And if they don't, that will be their loss. The 
 Woman's Business College is going to be built all 
 the same, as I will presently explain under my 
 ' secondly.' ' 
 
 " It will take clients from me, I have no doubt,"
 
 said \YadIo\\, " bul I am \\ith you heart and suul in 
 an\' project to teach what we will call the income- 
 class of American ladies, to understand and ap- 
 jly business principles to their private affairs. 
 The}- are n<>w altogether too much at the mercy of 
 men, whom the\- amiably tru.^l ; but who, when 
 honest, are often less competent even than them- 
 selves to talc cure of money." 
 
 " Thanks, buth," exclaimed the widow, with great 
 glee. " Still, keeping to the lir-t branch of my sub- 
 ject, since you encourage me, I propose to endow a 
 full faculty of professors all white-haired and ven- 
 erable, of course ha, ha ! who .-diall give lectures 
 and teach by example. '1 here will be professors of 
 book-keeping by double and single entry. There 
 will be a law professor to lecture on wills, contracts, 
 powers of attorney, promissory notes, indorsements, 
 and all that sort of thing." 
 
 " Just the chair for my legal friend here," inter- 
 rupted Aleldrum," if he were not disqualified by your 
 requirements about white hair and venerablencss." 
 
 " Perhaps we will make an exception in his case," 
 said the widow, joining in the general laugh. 
 
 Wad low expressed his delight and bound himself 
 to deliver a course of twelve lectures on contracts, 
 free, if invited. 
 
 " Breach of promise included ? " asked the widow 
 archly.
 
 THE //.//'/'/.. \7.\'<;.s 01- .1 JOCK.YEY ll'ES/'. .155 
 
 " 'I'll, it above all ; for there the ladies always have 
 ni} - fullest sympathies," was the gallant reply. 
 
 My most important professorship," resumed the 
 widow, "will be that of investments. The man I 
 have in view for that place is head book-keeper in 
 an old stock commission house, lie knows fmni 
 experience the humbug and the danger of invest- 
 ments in general. lie bclie\is in nothing but fir^t 
 ni< >rtga;.;vs on city piopeity, government, state, 
 municipal, gas and \\ater bonds what he calls gilt- 
 edge securities \\herc, il \ on don't make so much, 
 you can always get your mney back." 
 
 " Your college will never be. popular with mining 
 companies and stockbrokers," remarked \Yadlow. 
 
 " It is against them, particularly, that I am going 
 to start it. 1 have been there myself ! ha, ha !" 
 
 It ma}' here be said, that before Meldrum and 
 Wad low left .Minneapolis the}- learned from well- 
 informed residents that the widow herself needed 
 no course of lectures at her proposed college. Soon 
 after the death of the lamented " King Miller," as 
 he was called, she had been the prey of numberless 
 schemers and sponges, and at last, in self-defense, 
 had studied and mastered, with her quick mind, the 
 'elementary principles of business. It was firmly bc- 
 ilieved in the community that she could manage her 
 iflour mills better than the trustees, if they would 
 ;let her.
 
 256 
 
 " Ma}' I make a suggestion," inquired Meldrum, 
 with mirth in his eye. 
 
 " I invite it." 
 
 " K.-tabli.sh a professorship of No- N O No; 
 always NO!" 
 
 "Hut the women who will come to my college 
 know how to say "no " already pretty well, I think. 
 I la, ha! " 
 
 "Doubtless," was the response, as Meldrum 
 plated hi.s hand upon his heart, " and man}' are the 
 sufferers in consequence. J>ut while the}' can say 
 ' Xo ' in lift}' wax's to keep off an undesirable sui- 
 tor, they say ' Yes,' too often in business matters, 
 when 'No 'should be the one and only \\ord, stuck 
 to first, last, and ever}' time. A professor might 
 brace them up a bit just there." 
 
 "I xvill make a note of it," said Mrs. Greatfield, 
 who welcomed original ideas for her pet institution. 
 
 Whatever might be said of the feasibility of the 
 first part of the scheme as hereinbefore outlined, 
 there could be no question that the second part, 
 which the xvidow then proceeded to explain, was 
 entirely practical. This was to give free tuition for 
 two hundred young women, xvho should be in- 
 structed in book-keeping, the duties of cashiers, and 
 all the higher grades of accounting and money 
 handling required in any business establishment 
 whatever. The course of instruction, without
 
 ////: //.;/'/'/.. v/.vo.s- or A ywA'.v/-;r U'F.ST. ^57 
 
 charge, would be as full as could be had, for pay, at 
 the best men's business college in the United States. 
 She believed, and she was right, her observations 
 in Kurope confirming her in it, --that women have 
 the natural capacity of becoming readier, more accu- 
 rate, and neater book-keepers than men ; and that 
 their innate honest}', fidelity, and freedom from 
 vices make them more trustworthy than men in 
 places where the temptations for embezzlement are 
 strong-. She ardently hoped that her college would 
 fit a large number of women ever}- year to take 
 such responsible positions at good salaries, and thus 
 to enlarge the self-supporting area of her sex. She 
 should depend on the tuition money and lecture- 
 fees of the richer class of students, specified under 
 the first head, to pay in part the running expenses 
 of the college. But the remainder she was ready to 
 provide out of her own pocket. 
 
 So sensible and discreet had Meldrum and Wad- 
 low proved themselves in their treatment of this 
 scheme as unfolded, that before carriages were 
 I resumed, in different directions, the widow had 
 invited the gentlemen to call at her house that 
 evening and see the architect's plans of the college. 
 Mrs. Greatficld was well qualified by her knowledge 
 of human nature (the male variety in especial) to 
 fill a chair of that difficult science ; and she might 
 have clone much worse than to found one, with her-
 
 self as the incumbent, for the instruction of 
 moneyed widows and spinsters. Xo flattering in- 
 troductions from any third parties could have pro- 
 cured for Meldrum and \Vadlow a greater degree of 
 confidence than she justly reposed in them on her 
 own judgment. She knew by instinct and experi- 
 ence that they were not fortune-hunters, and that 
 the elder of them was not cherishing any, even the 
 remotest, designs upon herself; though >he had no 
 doubt from certain poorly-concealed tokens that the 
 younger was " interested " (which is the mild term 
 used at that earl\' stage of the complaint) in Miss 
 Robison, and, futhermore, she happened to know 
 that that lad}' was more kindly disposed toward 
 \Yadlo\v than toward an}' other man she had ever 
 met. 
 
 A pleasant evening was passed at the widow's 
 house (one of the finest in Minneapolis) in that 
 interchange of impressions of travel which, perhaps, 
 affoi'ds the shortest of all known cuts to close 
 acquaintanceship. This was helped along by those 
 accidental contacts of hands, which result from the 
 shuffling and inspection of mounted photographs. 
 The ground plans and elevations of the proposed 
 college required a good deal of careful stud} 7 , with 
 much indication of points by fingers more or less 
 tapering. So that, when Mcldrum and Wadlow 
 rose to go, at an hour for the lateness of which they
 
 Till-. //.//VY-.. \7.\V.V 01> A JOL'RXEY ll'EST. ?$<) 
 
 i[):)l(\^i/.cel, nothing seemed more natural to the 
 'our than an arrangement for visiting Minuehaha 
 J'alls the next day ami assembling a^ain at ni^ht in 
 \li>s Robison's [)rivate box at her Opera House, 
 .vhere the season was to open with " Lucia."
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 WITH I.MNCI i;i.].M\v AT MINNEIIAIIA FALLS. 
 
 IN the language of the guide books, Minnehalin 
 Falls .have been "immortalized" l>y Longfellow. 
 Tlu: idea of conferring immortality upon a waterfall 
 will perhaps not l>ear cold analysis. lint the uncriti- 
 cal reader accepts the statement of the compilers 
 of those works as a concise tribute to the: power of 
 an enchanter. When the admirer (if " Hiawatha" 
 first sees the rails of Latudiing Water, he sees 
 them (unless he will full\' hardens his heart against 
 first impressions) through the prism of that beauti- 
 ful poem. 
 
 " Charming " " lovely," " ver}' fine," were some of 
 the trite words that came unsummoned to the lips 
 of the two friends as they stood by the side of the 
 silent ladies at a point favorable for observation. 
 A pair of brown eyes sparkled with pleasure at 
 these encomiums. Miss Robison always felt sonic 
 apprehension in showing off the Falls to her friends 
 "from the East," lest the}- should say something 
 disparaging of them, or come too far short of her 
 own admiration of them as a native and land owner 
 of St. Paul. In her capacity of Minncapolitan, Mrs.
 
 //7/7/ /. 0. Y( ;//:/. I f> II' AT .W.V.VA7/./ If. 1 FALLS. 2<n 
 
 Grcatfiehl was no loss anxious for the good opinion 
 of her quests on this ticklish point ; for the Falls of 
 Minnehaha arc situated about half way between the 
 Twin Cities and are the one thins.; concerning whose 
 grandeur the)' do not dispute. 
 
 " You said last night, that you would try to 
 reaii/.e some scene from 'Hiawatha,' to show us 
 how you do it. Miss Robison and I are just dying 
 to sec it done. Of course, poor creatures like our- 
 selves haven't imagination enough to do it, too." 
 
 Meldrum and \Vadlow had already decided that 
 
 the widow's peculiar temperament unfitted her for 
 
 the fanciful task. But they held another opinion 
 
 about Miss Robison. One of them was anxious 
 
 to subject her to a test. And they had privately 
 
 concocted a little scheme to that end. 
 
 " Please do," urged that young lady. 
 
 Both gentlemen expressed their eagerness to 
 
 make an experiment of the kind, and their hope, if 
 
 not exactly belief, that it would prove successful. 
 
 i Wad low pulled a copy of " Hiawatha " from his 
 
 ipockct and thumbed its pages with a hypocritical 
 
 ipretensc of searching for something, just as if the 
 
 jv'ery passages to be illustrated had not been chosen 
 
 yy them last night before retiring. 
 
 " Ah, I have it ! " said he, at length. " There is 
 :hc tableau of the Ancient Arrow-maker and his 
 laughter Minnehaha, at the door of his wigwam,
 
 262 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 which was pitched, the poet tells us, within sight of 
 these very falls. IIo\v shall we cast the charac- 
 ters ?" 
 
 "I'll be the Ancient Arrow-maker," cried Mel- 
 druni, as if the thought were impromptu. 
 
 "And who should be Minnchaha but myself?" 
 exclaimed the widow, with a succession of ha, ha's! 
 which sounded like the echo of the Indian maiden's 
 name. " Let me be Laughing Water; ha, ha ! " 
 
 " You fit the part exactly," said Wadlow. 
 
 "And what will you and Miss Robison be do- 
 ing'?" asked the widow. 
 
 " The poet leaves us nothing to do but look on and 
 try to realize the scene between you and my friend," 
 explained Wadlow. " We will consider the per- 
 formance for the benefit of Miss Robison. I will 
 coach her, if she will let me, in the art and mystery 
 of conjuring up and giving reality to the vivid 
 descriptions of the poet. When one learns how to 
 do it, no such assistance as you and Mr. Meldrum 
 will lend is needed, as we explained to you last 
 night. Given the locality where the scene is laid, 
 it is reproduced easily enough with practice." 
 
 " I am calmer to learn," said Miss Robison, who 
 
 o 
 
 had been deeply interested in what she had heard 
 of the brilliant work of this kind performed by the 
 two gentlemen and believed herself a "subject" 
 only needing development.
 
 ll'ITlf LONGFELLOW AT MIXXE1IA1IA PALLS. 263 
 
 " Beginners should have every help possible to 
 assist in creating the illusion," said Meldrum. "If 
 there \vas only something to represent a wigwam." 
 
 " There used to be a little summer-house just 
 nver that knoll," remarked Mrs. Grcatfield, point- 
 ing to a rise of ground. " Let us sec." 
 
 The four walked along a path, chatting as the}' 
 went, and were delighted to find a rustic kiosk, 
 commanding a good side view of the falls, and, 
 what was more to the purpose, deserted just then. 
 It was a round structure, with a conical roof, and, 
 so far, not wholly unlike the Indian wigwam of 
 pictures. 
 
 "A piece of luck," cried Meldrum. ''And there 
 is nobody insight. Now for the experiment, before 
 we are overrun with spectators." 
 
 In his part of the Ancient Arrow-maker (whose 
 Indian name Longfellow withholds) Meldrum had 
 only to sit at the door of the supposed wigwam and 
 chip arrow-heads. In personating Minnehaha, Mrs. 
 Greatfield was merely required to look handsome 
 and to be plaiting mats of flags and rushes. She 
 must be seated by her father's side. Opposite 
 the entrance to the hut was a narrow flat rock", 
 r which served for both, without crowding. Mel- 
 i drum picked up two small fragments of stone at his 
 feet and began to strike one against the other, after 
 the manner of the primeval savage shaping his
 
 arrow-heads. Mrs. Grcatficld, with C(]ual adapt- 
 ivencss, broke off the dry stalks of some tall, slen- 
 der weeds near her and made the motions of 
 plaiting them. It only remained for the two obser- 
 vers, stationed a hundred feet away, t<> build up 
 the Ancient Arrow-maker and his lovely daughter 
 out of these scanty materials. 
 
 " I low about the Indian man's clothes ?" asked 
 Miss Robison, with some misgivings. " Longfel- 
 low does not describe them." 
 
 "For November," said \Vadlow, "I should put 
 him into a medium suit of light-tanned deer skin. 
 Ihit anything will do. Cany out your own idea of 
 an Indian as nearly as possible." 
 
 Miss Robison's own idea of an Indian, formed by 
 seeing specimens at stations on the Pacific Railroad, 
 was of an ugly man in a dirt}" blanket with a bat- 
 tered stove-pipe hat, carrying a bottle of whisk}'. 
 She was afraid that she could not do much with 
 the costume of the Ancient Arrow-maker; but she 
 said, " Thank's, I will try." 
 
 "Of course, Minnehaha is the important figure. 
 Perhaps, in turn, you can help me there," remarked 
 Wadlow. 
 
 "About her dress, my ideas are clearly made up,' 
 was the quick reply. " I cop}- it from the one 
 worn by Pocahontas in the play of that name. 
 J)icl you ever sec it ? "
 
 " Oh, yes. That will do admirably." And 
 \Vadlow recalled a rainbow-medley of bright-dyed 
 cloths, beads, ribbons, and feathers. As a costume 
 for Minnehaha it was an obvious, if delightful, 
 anachronism, because those adornments could not 
 possibly have been known to Indian belles in the 
 traditional days of Hiawatha. But \Vadlow was 
 bound to aid his fair companion in every way, and 
 it would never do to unsettle any harmless precon- 
 ception of details, however erroneous, which she 
 might have formed. 1'or his own part, as a simpler 
 task', he did not propose to dress the heroine at 
 all. lie trusted that Mrs. Greatficld's costume 
 itself of flowing lines and neutral tints would turn 
 into a simple, quiet, appropriate garment for Min- 
 nehaha, as the widow herself gradually changed 
 under his eye to the Indian maiden in obedience to 
 his powerful wishing. 
 
 " One word of caution," said Wadlow, gently. 
 " You must keep your eyes fixed on the figures and 
 shut out all disturbing sights and thoughts. Are 
 you ready ? " 
 
 " Yes," was the whispered reply. 
 
 As they stood there, in graceful attitudes, slightly 
 bent forward, about a yard apart, they were a fine- 
 looking couple. So the widow thought as she stole 
 a glance at them, while still busily weaving her 
 imaginary mat. Meldrum, more strictly attentive
 
 266 Till-: ENCHANTED. 
 
 to business, did not look up, but struck sparks 
 from the stones as he dashed them together with 
 industrious fur}'. 
 
 His practice of this kind of feat enabled Wad- 
 low to perform it with great rapidity. The low 
 uttered " yes " (how sweetly she breathed it) was still 
 ringing in his ears, when he had the desired tableau 
 completed before his eyes. At any other time he 
 would have dwelt upon it till the strain of the ex- 
 ertion beg, in to fatigue him. ISut on this occasion 
 he abruptly terminated the vision, in order to see, 
 with a side eye, how Miss Robison was getting 
 on. This he did without any motion of his body 
 or his head, so that she was unaware of his scru- 
 tiny. 
 
 There she stood, a beautiful living statue. Her 
 face was sweetly grave, her full lips parted as of one 
 in rapt contemplation, her eyes wide open. She 
 was like an innocent child gazing at an enthralling 
 scene of some play, but her form was that of a 
 woman in its first perfection. Altogether, a charm- 
 ing neophyte of the new school of the enchanted. 
 \Yadlow, in the thrall, would have looked at her as 
 long as she looked at the tableau. But, unfortun- 
 ately for both of them, the jolly widow could stand 
 suppression no longer. " Ha, ha, ha ! It's too 
 ridiculous ! Ha, ha ! " And she flung down her 
 handful of braided weeds and plunged into the sum-
 
 -*'7 
 
 nicr-housc, \vhcrc she amid be heard trying to stifle 
 laughter with a handkerchief. 
 
 "That is too bail, Carrie," cried Miss Kobison, as 
 she seemed to come out of a semi-trance, "just as I 
 was getting you all right 
 
 "You saw Minnehaha plainly.'" asked her de- 
 lighted inst ructor. 
 
 " In ,i minute more I \\-nuld have had h< r dress 
 complete. 1 here were a '.;<>< id many leathers and 
 ribbons and things to look after. you kn<uv; and the 
 wampum bracelets were rather confusing, as I was 
 not sure how man}' I'ocahontas had on." 
 
 Wadlow, in the capacity of professor, assured his 
 lovely pupil that she had made a splendid beginning. 
 Tract iee would soon render her perfect in a difficult 
 art. lUit he warned her laughingly that less time 
 must be spent on minnti.e of costume. General 
 effects were all that should be aimed at. 
 
 " It is all very well for yon men to say that. But 
 we women can't help paying strict attention to snch 
 trifles, as yon call them." 
 
 As Wadlow glanced at her perfectly fitting tailor- 
 made dress and remarked the exquisite matching of 
 her gloves, hat, and parasol, he admitted the truth 
 of her assertion, and mentally recanted some 
 opinions he had crudely formed, as a bachelor, as to 
 the comparative unimportance of artistic scrupu- 
 losity in female attire.
 
 263 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 " I will win her," he said to himself, illogically, 
 and, before he could resume the dialogue, the 
 widow, who had finally choked off her explosions, 
 emerged from the kiosk, and cried out, "Turn 
 about is fair play. You two make up the next 
 tableau, and Mr. Meldrum will give me a lesson." 
 
 " Agreed," said everybody. 
 
 The next tableau, if one keeps to the book", is 
 composed of three figures : the Ancient Arro\v- 
 maker and Minnehaha as before, reinforced by 
 Hiawatha, who comes a-wooing. But Meldrum, 
 being necessarily detached as spectator and coach 
 for the widow, was out of the cast. But \Yadlo\v 
 did not mind that, and Miss Robison made no 
 objection to it. She only hoped that " Carrie " 
 would be as successful as herself, and promised her 
 that she would not spoil everything with a horrid 
 laugh. 
 
 Meldrum, as manager, gave some general stage 
 directions. Then he and Mrs. Grcatfield took their 
 assigned positions and the performance proceeded. 
 
 Miss Robison picked up the partly woven stalks 
 which the widow had thrown aside, seated herself 
 on the flat stone, and fell to work on her mat. To 
 her comes Wadlow, as Hiawatha. lie is supposed 
 to be carrying across his broad shoulders a red deer 
 which he throws to the ground before her, as a 
 propitiatory offering, apparently. lie does not say
 
 i a word. But Minnchaha looks up at him from her 
 weaving and says, in gentle accents, " Vcni are wel- 
 come, Hiawatha." In tableaux, as everybody 
 
 , kno\vs, nothing is said. In lieu of words, attitude 
 and looks must tell the story. That story was of 
 love on both sides. I low could it be better told 
 than by the language of the eyes? XYhen \Yadlow 
 made a graceful gesture as of casting down the deer, 
 he stood erect as became a noble savage and fast- 
 ened his deep black eyes on the brown ones of 
 Minnchaha. 
 
 " Please keep perfectly still a moment, for the 
 effect on tJuin" lie whispered, in ;: stage-aside. As 
 she was returning his ardent ga/.c just then, in the 
 conscientious execution of her role, it was a little 
 awkward not to be allowed to move a muscle or 
 even wink. But she was very anxious to help on 
 Mrs. Greatfield and she dutifully obeyed her pre- 
 ceptor. This arrangement left a pair of large black 
 eyes looking intently into a pair of large brown 
 ones and "dec versa. Both of these young people- 
 had read somewhere that the " eyes arc the mirror of 
 the soul" ; but they never knew it as a vital truth 
 till then, when they saw straight through those 
 half-suffused, half-glowing orbs into that inner self 
 
 o o 
 
 , where secrets stand confessed, stripped of their last 
 , veil. It was love on both sides, fresh and sweet as 
 [ the morning and tingling in the veins like the wine
 
 270 y//A EXCIIANTED. 
 
 of heaven. Forgotten were their mimic parts ; for- 
 gotten their own identity. The}' were the primal 
 man and woman searching each other's hearts by 
 looks a hundred times more eloquent than words. 
 
 " I la, ha, ha!" laughed the widow, unable to 
 contain herself an}' longer. " Looking on is even 
 funnier than performing. Thegre.it big eyes you 
 have been making at each other! 
 
 Thi> ill-timed mirth dissolved the tableau, much 
 to the vexation of the two performers, which they 
 tried to hide with the poor semblance of a laugh in 
 echo of the widow's. 
 
 On comparing notes afterward, it turned out that 
 Mrs. Greatfield had seen nothing as it should have 
 been seen. " P>ut one thing 1 will claim," said she, 
 "I am the original and only genuine Minuehaha." 
 And she authenticated her pretension to the title by 
 peals of laughter which drowned the music of the 
 cataract. 
 
 Meldrum had been fortunate as usual, though his 
 function as coach to the widow had barely left him 
 time to snatch one good view for himself. 
 
 The two persons most gratified with the experi- 
 ments, in their double capacity of spectators and 
 performers, were Miss Robison and \Yadlow. On 
 their return ride to Minneapolis, they were both 
 quite contented and happy, as ihey dwelt on the 
 pleasure that Longfellow, the enchanter, had given
 
 /.<>.V<;/'Y'.7./.G>/r ./ /' .1//.V.VA7/.///./ /-'ALLS, ^?l 
 
 them that day. Mrs. Grcatfield was always good 
 enough to supply small talk when other people 
 chose to be silent. And Mcldrum, equally oblig- 
 ing, secoiuled the widow's efforts at conversation. 
 Between them they fully made good the shortcom- 
 ings of the other two. It would have been decidedly 
 awkward if all four had been introspective and 
 mute together; but there was nothing in the hearts 
 of the widow and of the sworn bachelor opposite 
 her to check their garrulity.
 
 CIIAPTKR XX. 
 
 AX I-M) AN!) A IJKGIXXING. 
 
 I.\ order to avail themselves most easily of Miss 
 Robison's invitation to seats in her private box that 
 night, Mcldrum and \Vadlo\v had moved over from 
 "The West," Minneapolis, to " The l\yan," St. 
 I'aul. Though it is quite practicable to remain as 
 guest at one or the other of these t\vo great hotels 
 and attend to business and pleasure in both eities, 
 there is an intense local feeling upon the subject, 
 which every tourist who wishes to retain the good 
 opinion of friends in St. Paul and Minneapolis re- 
 spectively, recognizes and gracefully conforms to. 
 No amount of real estate owned by Mrs. Greatfield in 
 St. Paul would have shaken her allegiance to "The 
 West." Miss Robison's exalted opinion of "The 
 Ryan " was no less firmly held, and dangerous to be 
 trifled with. 
 
 Entering the fine large opera house, they took a 
 preliminary look about them. They were not at 
 all surprised to find an interior which, for size and 
 decorations, would be creditable to a much older 
 and more populous city than St. Paul. The re- 
 moter the western communities, the more they 
 
 272
 
 ./.V /;.\7> ,1.\'/> A r.KG/tVNf.YG. -73 
 
 pride themselves on grand opera houses. With 
 them the Grand Opera I louse stands for Luxury 
 and Refinement, as the Church stands for Religion 
 and the Rank for Money. I Tastily surveying the 
 crowded audience, the two friends remarked tin- 
 same preponderance of evening dress, the same 
 : style of faces, the same fashionable, worldly-wise 
 look, with which they had long been familiar in 
 New York. The lack of anything new or peculiar 
 iu the appearance of the people before them, made 
 the inspection devoid of interest. Mcldrum and 
 Wadlow, as they followed the usher to Miss Robi- 
 son's box, could only reflect on the melancholy 
 sameness of their prosperous fellow-citizens in all 
 external things, no matter by how many thousands 
 of miles they may be separated. And with that 
 commonplace thought the audience was dismissed 
 from their minds for the rest of tin.' evening. 
 
 If they had differed from the majority of men 
 as they did not in possessing something more than 
 a vague knowledge of women's clothes, they would 
 have appreciated the combined richness and good 
 taste of the new Paris costumes worn by Mrs. Great- 
 field and Miss Robison expressly for the occasion. 
 These had becnthe targets of lorgnettes, leveled at 
 them point blank from all parts of the house, since 
 they were placed on exhibition in the front scats of 
 the box. If they excited feminine admiration, not
 
 274 THE ENCHANTED. 
 
 unmixed with envy, the chief object sought for by 
 the wearers was gained. The widow knew how 
 ignorant and indifferent are men of the higher and 
 better class in matters of gowns and ornaments. 
 Neither she nor Miss Robison expected or desired 
 that Mcldrum and \Yadlo\v would prove exceptions 
 to the rule, and the}- did not. As the door of the 
 box was opened to them there were disclosed 
 radiant visions of partially undraped female loveli- 
 ness, which threw all the trivialities and accidents of 
 dress into the shade. 
 
 The freedom and kindness of their reception by 
 the ladies showed on how g. iod a footing they had 
 placed themselves. It also gave rise to some start- 
 ling and amusing surmises among the audience, who 
 commanded a good view of the " royal box " (as it 
 had been termed by a newspaper reporter, in com- 
 pliment to the fair owner of the house). Several 
 reports of Airs, (ireat field's engagement, while 
 abroad, had got into circulation. She had <contra- 
 
 o 
 
 dieted these as fast as possible, but she could not 
 catch up with them all. The presence of two 
 strangers with the widow, in the box of her friend, 
 started a rumor that one of them might be her im- 
 ported fiance. It was whispered that Meld rum was 
 the lucky man, and that he was variously a Duke, a 
 Marquis, or Count, of any nationality that invention 
 might ascribe to him. As to Miss Robison, no one
 
 A.V EXD AXD A tiEGL\~XL\'G. 275 
 
 was so imaginative as to surest any tender associa- 
 
 O O O J 
 
 lion between her and \Yadlo\v, which only proves 
 ho\v stupid is the great public, even when equipped 
 with <>prra glasses, to see what is going on between 
 two persons who are wise enough not to show it. 
 
 When the conductor rapped with his baton for 
 the overture, there fell upon the house a hush so 
 well bred that Mclclrum and Wadlow reali/.ed more 
 full}', than by an}' other sign, that they were not in 
 \ew York. To be sure, the opera troupe engaged 
 for the opening of the season was very celebrated 
 and expensive the prima donna commanding 
 $1000 a night and the first tenor almost as much 
 and there would be but three performances. Hut 
 in spite of these cogent reasons why audiences 
 should extract the uttermost from ever}- note played 
 or sung, boors and selfish persons, had they been 
 present, would have managed to spoil the entertain- 
 ment for their music-loving neighbors by their in- 
 cessant chatter and giggle. St. Parul reserved its 
 small talk for the cntractcs. 
 
 There were four specially attentive listeners in 
 Miss Robison's box. While the siwgcrs were on the 
 stage, they were not vexed a-nd distracted by an}' 
 signs of inattention in that quarter. The widow 
 was at times sorely tempted to laugh at some ab- 
 surdity of the chorus or blunders of supernume- 
 raries. Hut that would have been bad form and a
 
 had example, and, brusque and volatile as she was, 
 she would have bitten her lip through sooner than 
 have annoyed other people in that way. The jelly- 
 like quivering of her upper frame only showed the 
 difficulty she had in holding in. Meldrum, directly 
 behind her, was the sole person who observed it. 
 Miss Robison and Wad low were ostensibly wrapped 
 up in the performance, but really in thoughts of 
 each other. To both of them Lucia was a musical 
 feast, familiarity with which had not lessened its 
 deliciousncss. In truth, circumstances had imparted 
 to it new beauties, the subtle interpretation of 
 which came from the depths of their own hearts. 
 There is no truer expression of love and despair on 
 the lyric sta;.>;e than Doni/etti's masterpiece. \Vhcn 
 two young people, who are at the beginning of a 
 love still unavowed, drink it in with their ears and 
 eyes, the draught is a very sweet one even its 
 tragic sadness dropping no bitterness in the cup. 
 For them the story is one of constancy even unto 
 death and what lovers worth)- of the name are 
 frightened at that ! 
 
 Between the acts there was an incessant stream 
 of male callers at the " royal box." The hearty 
 greetings to the ladies, on this their first public ap- 
 pearance since their return from Kurope, testified to 
 the popularity they enjoyed at home. Meldrum 
 and Wadlow were introduced and received in the
 
 277 
 
 cordial Western fashion, the more cordial, perhaps, 
 when it was discovered that they spoke the Ameri- 
 can variety of the English language. Had they 
 proved to be Knglishmen or, still worse, French- 
 men, Germans, or Italians, the young manhood of 
 St. Paul would have felt like resenting their intru- 
 sion as undoubted aspirants for the hand of one or 
 the other or both of the ladies. Meldrum had no 
 personal interest in the matter save as a well-wisher 
 of the wido\v. Noticing closely the fine young 
 fellows who dropped into the box successively for a 
 minute's talk, he detected no one with that mark of 
 confidence and presumption in his manner which 
 stamps the favored man. \Vadlo\v, keenly observ- 
 ant on his part, was agreeably sati>fied of the non- 
 appearance of a rival, lie seemed to be having the 
 field all to himself. He did have it. 
 
 And yet for some time he could not convince him- 
 self of the undoubted fact. So accustomed are 
 men to the frowns of fortune, so distrustful, as a 
 rule, of their own future, that \Vadlo\v, with all his 
 good sense, could not readily bring himself to hope 
 that no tremendous, almost insurmountable obstacle 
 would thwart the progress of his love. lie tor- 
 mented himself by imagining some pre-cngage- 
 ment or old entanglement of Miss Robison which 
 had not left her heart whole, or opposition from 
 relatives, or the cooling effects of geographical
 
 separation (she at St. 1'aul, he in Xe\v York), or 
 (though this was tin: least troublesome of all his 
 anxieties) the placement of the lady bevoiul his 
 reach by virtue of her wealth, which was undoubt- 
 edly lar^'e. This last-mentioned cause' of distrust 
 vanished when squarely looked at. It is onlv in 
 Knglish and other foreign novels that suitors are 
 ever appalled by an}' disparity of fortune between 
 themselves and the objects of their idolatry. The 
 resolute, competent \oting American carries a po- 
 tentiality of riches in his head as surely as Napo- 
 leon's soldiers carried marshal's batons in their 
 knapsacks. \Vadlo\v, whatever were his momentary 
 misgiving's, had confidence in his future profes- 
 sional success. lie expected, as a matter of course, 
 to be rich some day. lie considered no lady be- 
 yond his reach, even if it were a question solely of 
 money-bags and not of hearts. 
 
 All the other lions in his path were as Iamb-like 
 as this, had he but known it. There was no prior 
 affair which required the effacement of some image 
 from the lady's heart to make room for his. There 
 was not a single relation who would presume to ad- 
 vise Miss Robison in the delicate and serious mat- 
 ters of an engagement, except the dear old grand- 
 mother, and she was destined to become the friend 
 and abettor of this young man the moment she set 
 eyes on him. There was not even a guardian or
 
 279 
 
 trustee to interpose with officious zeal ; for Miss 
 Robison was of age aiul her own mistress, and she 
 had for adviser a lawyer of mature years, who 
 took an instant liking to the clean-cut face of the 
 stripling who had won, again.-. t the Xestors of th<' 
 Ni-w \ ork bar, the famous case of The Universe 
 Life Insurance Company r'.v. Uumptrt, </ <>/. All 
 was to go smoothly to the end, thanks to the fir-t 
 true love' of the f.iir girl, \\hose resemblance in 
 heart and mind to Amy kobsart was even greater 
 than that of face and form. 
 
 ll \Vadlow had not , in his modesty, underrated his 
 own power of pleasing, he would have foreseen no 
 difficulty whatever. P>ut ho\v shouKl he know at 
 the outset he learned it later from a dear pair of 
 lips that he was himself, in a small way if you 
 please, an enchanter -that the very facility with 
 which he surrendered to the dominion of the 
 Masters in the Art had imparted to him a charm 
 which one young lady, at least, found resistless. It 
 was because she recognized the poetical, spiritual 
 quality of the man, by which he sought to lift him- 
 self out of every-day life and its cares, into close 
 communion with the great minds of the race, that 
 she set him far above any man she had ever known, 
 and made him her hero. 
 
 lUit that night they sat out the melodious woes 
 of Lucia all unknowing of the fullness with which
 
 2 SO 
 
 each occupied the heart of tin- other. The opera's 
 despairing close was fraught with a warning for 
 all earthly love. It rang in their ears as they 
 rose to leave the house, jarring almost painfully 
 upon the feelings they had betrayed only in looks 
 so far. 
 
 Hut it is the happiness of the present writer to 
 say, all wise old saws to the contrary notwithstand- 
 ing, that, as soon as love was mutually avowed 
 between this man and this woman, and \Vadlo\v 
 mustered up the courage to risk- all on a declaration 
 within the next twenty-four hours, its course ran 
 as smooth as oil and was hedged in on both >ides by 
 thornless roses. 
 
 The day after his acceptance, news came from 
 Duluth that he need not return there- for a week, to 
 wind up the business, unexpected delays having 
 occurred in its progress to a conclusion. This 
 week he dedicated to the unalloyed happiness of a 
 first love. 
 
 The sudden and romantic engagement was too 
 choice a secret to be kept by anybody more than 
 two days. Miss Robison had felt a shyness about 
 allowing the fact to be proclaimed from the house- 
 tops till she herself had become a little wonted to 
 it. But Mrs. Greatfield was loud in her reprobation 
 of such " nonsense." And it: was to the treachery 
 of that most devoted of friends that the young lady
 
 owed the production of the only thrilling social scn- 
 s.iti<")ii in which she ever took part. There were men 
 about town who thought that the pri/.e should have 
 fallen into the lap of some resident of St. Paul, 
 instead of a stranger who would bear it away to 
 his home in New York, leaving behind him only the 
 Grand Opera House and Kobison's Block, to recall 
 a name much respected in the short annals of the 
 place, and most of all in the fair person of its only 
 surviving bearer, who was to the poor of that city 
 what Mrs. Greatfield was to the needy of Minne- 
 apolis, a liberal, thoughtful, and constant giver. 
 Chiefly, after all, she would be missed by the 
 charities of her native town. But, however much 
 her future absence might be deplored, no one who 
 met the man of her choice, who was to carry her off 
 in triumph, spoke aught but praise for him, so 
 favorably did he impress everybody by his frank- 
 ness, his good look's, and the heart that shone 
 through his face. Mcldrum, though second of the 
 two in public opinion, made his friends also \vhere- 
 ever he was introduced. And there were many 
 people who hazarded the guess that, if Mrs. Great- 
 field " took anybody, it would be that other genial 
 fellow from New York." But it was not to be. 
 Meldrum had as little intention of marrying as the 
 widow had. Fate, seconding their own preferences, 
 had already irrevocably decreed that they should
 
 both continue through life miniated to anybody; 
 and that whatever happiness they missed for them- 
 selves, by abstinence from marriage, should not be 
 lost to those with whom they came in contact as 
 Ion;.;- as they lived. Much as may be said in be-half 
 of wedlock" as a divine institution, there is room in 
 the world for more widows like Mr.-,. Jo.-,iah J. 
 (ireat field and more bachelors like Mr. Felix 
 Mcldi um. 
 
 It was in the following January, that St. Paul saw 
 a wedding who,e brilliancy was only justly meas- 
 ured by the space accorded to it in the Comet the 
 list of invited gue-.-its alone filling two columns. 
 There were 1 several smudgy pictures of the Kobison 
 mansion and grounds, and there were portraits of 
 the bride and groom, the benevolent intent of which 
 did not mitigate their unparalleled atrocity as work's 
 of art. 
 
 The St. Paul public heard nothing more of the 
 missing one, so retired was she in her new-found 
 happiness, until about three months later the fol- 
 lowing item from the New York Rostrum was borne 
 by the telegraph to that city and to all the world of 
 America. Most of the night editors who received it 
 threw it into the waste basket. Others cut it down to 
 two or three lines. The St. Paul Comet printed it en- 
 tire, and here it is :
 
 SOMKTHINC \K\V. 
 
 The latest novelty in the line of associated effort 
 has just been formally announced. It is a club 
 bearing the strange title of "Till; K\< 1 1.\ NTKI >." 
 Its avowed object is the selection and visiting of 
 places, at home ami abroad, made famous by the 
 genius of truly L;Tcat poets and novelists, and the 
 fe[)roductioii (by a strenuous exercise of the will) of 
 the imaginary scenes and incidents with which 
 those localities are identified, (iood progress has 
 already been made in the new fu-Id by the few 
 resolute persons who have cultivated it privately. 
 "Tin: KxrilAX !T.I> " now number about thirty. 
 The membership is said to be necessarily limited 
 by the difficulty of finding persons fitted by nature 
 and inclination for the extraordinary task proposed. 
 The first President is Mr. 1'Ylix Mcldrum, the uvll 
 known partner in the banking firm of Spinna^e S,' 
 Meldrum, and the Secretary is Mrs. Madison Wad- 
 low, wife of the distinguished youn^ lawyer, whose 
 own investigations have done much, it is said, to 
 build up what may be called an important branch 
 of Psychical Science, if half its claims are true. 
 
 THE END.
 
 PUD iroiiuirT()N\s 
 
 TFE AND LETTKKS. 
 
 Till; 1,1! K, LKTTKKS, AND 1 K 1 1 ,\ ]).-! 1 1 1' S UF 
 
 RH'HARM MONCRTUN MII.NI.S, KIRST I.<>KI> 
 
 1IOUCHTON. 1^' T. WKMYSS KI.II). INTRO- 
 DUCTION J'.Y RICHARD ]!i;\KY SToDDARIt. 
 
 In two vols., with portraits. Price, $5.00. 
 
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