L 

 
 tt/vi 
 

 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 BY 
 
 MARION HARLAXD. 
 
 " My heart weeps to see him 
 So little of his great self." 
 
 KING HENRY VIII. ACT III., SCENE 2. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY 
 
 1892.
 
 Copyright, 1891, by J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY. 
 
 PRINTED BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY, PHILADELPHIA.
 
 TO MY FRIEXDS, 
 
 MAJOE AND MRS. DREWRY, 
 
 OF WESTOVER, 
 
 IN AFFECTIONATE MEMORY OF HAPPY DAYS SPENT UNDER THAT ANCIENT 
 ROOF, AND IN ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF VALUABLE ASSISTANCE 
 RECEIVED FROM HOST AND HOSTESS IN THE COLLEC 
 TION OF MATERIAL FOR MY CHRONICLE, 
 
 THIS VOLUME IS 
 
 DEDICATED. 
 
 1782160
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 " Tis certainly a convenience, under certain circum 
 stances, to have a husband, and for a plantation to have 
 a master." 
 
 Madam Byrd said it musingly, as one who weighs a 
 matter fairly. She stood in the front door of her home, 
 watching a little fleet of three boats just parting from 
 the pier at the foot of the lawn. Two were broad, 
 clumsy punts, each carrying two horses saddled and 
 bridled, with grooms at their heads. The third, which 
 led the way across the river, was a large wherry, English- 
 built sharp of prow and keel. Her wet sides glistened 
 in the sun ; lines of foam swept to the right and left 
 as she cut a straight trough in the water under the 
 powerful strokes of three pairs of oars. The negro 
 boatmen in all the boats wore white shirts, blue trousers, 
 and wide scarlet belts. In the wherry-bows a stately 
 figure arose to wave his hat to the wife in the door 
 way. 
 
 " Especially such a husband as yours !" 
 
 The laughing reply was made by Mrs. Carter, a pretty 
 and youthful matron, as, from her easy-chair in the 
 hall, she craned her neck for a view of the fleet. 
 
 l* 5
 
 6 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " Somebody called him in my hearing, the other day, 
 a trinity of perfections/ " she continued in the same 
 strain, " a Sidney, a Raleigh, and a Bayard fused into 
 one form, and that a model of domestic virtues and 
 graces. I quoted for reply what Governor Spotswood 
 said to Colonel Byrd, when teased about his fondness 
 for the wife he married late in life, Whoever brings 
 a poor gentlewoman into so solitary a place, from all her 
 friends and acquaintances would be ungrateful not to 
 use her with all possible tenderness. " 
 
 " He spoke of Gerinanna !" retorted the other, briskly. 
 " The colonel says it is a very wilderness. The gov 
 ernor s is the only house worth naming in all the region. 
 How Lady Spotswood and her sister can abide to live 
 amid such desolateness passes me. And, within-doors, 
 such strange doings ! The colonel, on one of his visits, 
 was carried into a room elegantly set off with pier- 
 glasses and much fine furniture ; but would you believe 
 it ? not only three dogs, but two tame deer were let to 
 follow the ladies into this apartment where the table 
 was ready laid for supper. One of the deer, spying 
 himself in a mirror, leaped to get at the image, broke 
 the glass to pieces and fell back upon the table, shat 
 tering much china. Had so unlucky an accident hap 
 pened in my house and in a stranger s presence I should 
 have died of mortification." 
 
 "But we must not forget, mamma, that papa said 
 twas worth all the damage to show the moderation and 
 good-humor with which Lady Spotswood bore the 
 disaster," said a voice from the neighboring drawing- 
 room. 
 
 " Tut, child ! twould be be.st on that head to have
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 7 
 
 in my lady as a witness rather than your father. I ll 
 warrant that deer was ready for the spit in twenty-four 
 hours time. Tis easy prating philosophy and resig 
 nation over other people s mishaps. Should any ill 
 befall the mantel-glass your father and you are so vain 
 of, we should have Job s story over again. When he 
 was touched to the quick, he cursed the day he was 
 born." 
 
 " Tis a noble mirror," remarked Mrs. Carter. " I 
 doubt if there be one to match it in America." 
 
 " One of the colonel s extravagances !" said the wife, 
 in affected petulance. " Heaven knows the building 
 we ve been at these six years has cost us enough without 
 paying five hundred pounds for a mirror to reflect his 
 charms of person and his daughter s !" glancing slyly 
 toward the drawing-room and purposely raising her 
 voice. 
 
 A low, musical laugh acknowledged the hit, but no 
 one appeared. 
 
 Mrs. Carter the wealthy mistress of Shirley, a lordly 
 estate higher up the river that had come to her husband 
 through her as an only child lifted her eyebrows 
 slightly as the price of the glass was named. In mar 
 rying Maria Taylor, a London heiress of suitable age, 
 Colonel William Evelyn Byrd, already the owner of 
 what a contemporary calls "a principality" in the New 
 World, doubled his fortune. The fair chdtelaine of 
 Shirley, born and brought up in America, fancied 
 sometimes that she detected in Madam Byrd s bearing 
 and speech a flavor of purse-pride, a quality which only 
 age and habit can refine away. Still, madam was an 
 esteemed neighbor, arid while her tongue was glib and
 
 8 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 upon occasion, sharp she was sound-hearted and true 
 and at her best when her friends were in trouble. Too 
 well-bred to express surprise at the cost of the mirror, 
 or at the mention of it by the purchaser s wife, Mrs. 
 Carter diverted the conversation : 
 
 " You should be well content with the result of 
 your years of pulling down and building up. If 
 Westover were ever one of the solitary places whereof 
 our uxorious ex-governor speaks, you have made it to 
 rejoice and the wilderness to blossom as the rose." 
 
 Madam tried to look more indifferent than com 
 placent, picking diligently at a knot in her netting- 
 thread before replying, 
 
 " Aye ! tis well enough for Virginia ! Nothing 
 can make it London or England. Though, to do him 
 justice, the colonel has wrought long and well to con 
 tent me in my exile. I have little to fret over, ex 
 cept, of course, servants. And I chose mine own lot. 
 As you say, there are not many men on either side of 
 the sea comparable to the father of my children." 
 
 She had remained standing in the doorway all this 
 while, thread and shuttle in hand, and now fluttered 
 her handkerchief in adieu to the fast-dwindling wherry. 
 The day was sultry, and she pulled a chair into the 
 draught in the middle of the hall. 
 
 " There !" she sighed, establishing herself with due 
 regard to the folds of her silken gown, " I shall see 
 no more of him for a full month, I suppose. If I 
 could put from me the imagination of the perils he 
 may encounter, the nights he will spend on the damp 
 ground, the ill-savored victuals, the agues and swamps 
 and tiresome marches and the chances of death at the
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 9 
 
 hands of hostile Indians, I could be quite easy now 
 that he is gone. For, though, as I said awhile ago, 
 tis convenient to have a husband and pleasant when 
 he is an accomplished gentleman, a smack of liberty 
 refreshes every woman now and then, were she Gri- 
 selda herself." 
 
 " Are you sure that you have not an unruly hanker 
 ing after absolute sovereignty ?" 
 
 It was the voice that had called her " mamma," and, 
 in speaking, a young woman emerged from the draw 
 ing-room, with a sleeping child in her arms. 
 
 "Lady Bess has fallen asleep, Mrs. Carter;" drop 
 ping her tone of affectionate banter for a more cautious, 
 "Shall I lay her here on the settle, or is it your will 
 that I shall take her up to your room?" 
 
 " The naughty minx !" chided the mother, rising in 
 haste. " I should have distrusted that somewhat was 
 amiss when she was quiet for so long. Evelyn, dear 
 girl, lay her here at once. Her weight is enough to 
 bend you double." 
 
 By now she had arranged a shawl and pillows upon 
 the roomy hall-settle, and the child was gently laid 
 upon them. One of Miss Byrd s admirers had once, 
 on seeing her pet fall asleep upon her shoulder, likened 
 the twain to a rose and bud, a compliment that moved 
 her as little as did Mrs. Carter s more homely protest. 
 As she stood erect, after parting with her burden, the 
 richer carmine of her cheeks was the only token of 
 unusual exertion. 
 
 " My bonnie maid !" she murmured, looking fondly 
 at the sleeper. " She is every day more the little 
 fairy papa calls her. She crept into my arms like a
 
 10 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 tired kitten, and was in dream-laud before I suspected 
 her of drowsiness." 
 
 Lady Bess so nick-named by her godfather, Colo 
 nel Byrd was a spoiled darling from the first moon 
 of her existence. She lay curled up among the folds 
 of the rose-colored shawl like a fay asleep in a shell, 
 the fairer for the proximity of a tall press of black oak, 
 elaborately carved and surmounted by the Byrd coat- 
 of-arms. 
 
 " I wish, sometimes," continued Evelyn, softly, " that 
 I might read my beauty s future. If I might cast her 
 horoscope, she would have many sunny days and no 
 more cloudy than the dear Lord sees are for her soul s 
 growth." 
 
 "Her lot will not be like to differ from other 
 people s," said Madam Byrd, practically prompt. 
 "Just what the Almighty appoints and does, without 
 holding counsel with the stars or with us. Her mother 
 and your father are agreed in fetching about a match 
 between her and my Will. More, as 1 have told them 
 over and over, because the plantations of Shirley and 
 Westover march together than because the children were 
 made for one another. Tis a sort of royal-alliance 
 affair that jumps well with the pride of the heiress of 
 Sir Edward Hill and the ambition of William the 
 Second of Westover. As for the happiness of the poor 
 puppets, that God help them ! may go to the wall." 
 
 " Fie, fie !" cried the amiable neighbor. " As if my 
 Bess could fail to make your boy the happiest of men, 
 or William the Third grow up to be one whit the less 
 charming than his father ! We shall have you mad 
 for the marriage in a dozen years or so. It will be my
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. H 
 
 part, then, to hem and haw and doubt if the best man the 
 Lord ever made can be good enough for my daughter." 
 
 While the good-humored badinage went on, Evelyn 
 leaned against the oaken annoire, seeming, by her half- 
 smile, to hearken, but silent, her eyes upon the slum 
 bering child. 
 
 The day was unseasonably warm even for September 
 in tide-water Virginia, and her gown was of white 
 muslin, girt about the waist with a blue lutestring 
 cincture. One arm was thrown a little way above her 
 head, the hand supported by one of the carved pome 
 granates on the panels of the press-doors. The loose 
 sleeve, slipping down to the elbow, showed a forearm 
 of exquisite mould and fairness; her cheek rested 
 against the umber wood that made a background for 
 her profiled face and form. Her eyes were large and 
 brown ; her hair was a shade darker ; her complexion 
 was delicate and sensitive, the bloom flickering through 
 the skin as she spoke or moved, as flame wavers in the 
 wind. The fine oval of her face, the graceful turn of 
 her neck, the slope of her shoulders, the pose of her 
 head and her perfect hands were indices of old blood 
 and gentle breeding. The lips were well cut and 
 mobile, and the red fulness of the lower had in it a 
 suggestion of passionate sweetness contradicted by the 
 placid indifference which, thus far, she exhibited to 
 lovers, gentle and simple. The modulations of her 
 voice, although singularly refined and pure, were more 
 varied than those of her English step-mother, and she 
 spoke her father s tongue with a slight foreign intona 
 tion, it was hardly an accent, very bewitching to 
 ears used to colonial carelessness of speech.
 
 12 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 She had, in fact, been educated in Paris from her 
 sixth to her twelfth year, at which time her father, in 
 the third year of his widowerhood, wedded an English 
 woman, and leaving the two daughters of the first 
 marriage in charge of a governess in London, sailed 
 for America and settled upon his patrimonial estate. 
 
 His beautiful girls were the toast of Virginia cava 
 liers some years later, driving some unsuccessful wooers 
 out of the colony, and, according to their witty parent, 
 forcing so many to take holy orders as a solace for 
 earthly disappointment that he congratulated the ob 
 durate belles upon their success in the propagation of 
 the gospel. Lucy Byrd married, at seventeen, Mr. 
 Chamberlayne of Eastern Virginia, and went to live 
 upon her husband s plantation, more than fifty miles 
 away. Evelyn passed two years of her girlhood with 
 friends in England, was presented at court, and hon 
 ored by the admiration of royalty. Rumors of her 
 belleship and social triumphs were rife in her distant 
 home, when her father departed from America in one 
 of his own fast-sailing vessels, arrived unexpectedly in 
 London, and bore off his daughter with him on a 
 continental tour, embarking at Genoa for his native 
 land. 
 
 This was five years prior to the September morning 
 when, in the chastened loveliness of perfected woman 
 hood, she lent divided attention to the chat of her step 
 mother with her guest, and resting indolently against 
 the oaken armoire, dreamed was it only of Lady 
 Bess s future? 
 
 The noule mirror of which Madam had feigned to 
 speak lightly received through the open door of the
 
 JUS GREAT SELF. 13 
 
 drawing-room the faithful reflection of the musing 
 
 o <~> 
 
 figure defined in strong relief against the sombre panel 
 by the sunlight flooding the hall. 
 
 In the small chamber opposite the state apartment, 
 a man, looking up from his desk as the door swung 
 ajar in a wandering breeze, caught sight of the picture, 
 and sat moveless, pen suspended in air. 
 
 "My private secretary, Mr. Bass," was Colonel 
 Byrd s usual formula of introduction of the demure 
 scribe. His outspoken consort affirmed that " he made 
 no more difference in the house than a tame sheep, and 
 even less, for the sheep might bleat if you stumbled 
 over him, whereas Colin Bass would not whimper 
 though you trampled him to a jelly." 
 
 The secretary-sheep was not ill-looking. His pow 
 dered hair was combed away from a round forehead 
 and tied with a black ribbon behind a round head. 
 His eyes were deep-set and of an opaque gray ; except 
 that the upper lip projected beyond the lower and that 
 both were thin, the mouth was not amiss; his chin was 
 square, with a sunken scar on the left side, in which 
 he had a trick of laying his forefinger when thoughtful. 
 It went up now and rested there, his regards never 
 stirring from the mirror. His brows met with the 
 effect of depressing the round forehead and giving a 
 sinister cast to the eyes; his chin was the squarer for 
 the. gradual clinching of the jaws that narrowed the 
 lips to a thread. His fingers played nervously with 
 the quill of his pen, but he neither glanced at them 
 nor at the page he had been transcribing. It was the 
 look of one who hungered with a mortal hunger 
 with the desperation of a forlorn hope not despair.
 
 14 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 The Westover library described by the historian 
 Stith as " the best and most copious collection of books 
 in that part of America" lined the walls of a spacious 
 apartment adjoining the drawing-room. In the heat of 
 the summer weather and the general free-and-easiness 
 of a house so hospitable that inner and outer doors 
 stood, like " the golden gates of gospel grace," open 
 night and day, that joining the t\vo rooms was seldom 
 shut. It had been wide open while Evelyn permitted 
 Lady Bess to doze off in her arms. By means of it, 
 another pair of eyes, full and expressive, surveyed the 
 goodly picture set between the masses of grape.*, tendrils, 
 and leaves, sculptured in Carrara marble, which formed 
 the border of the glass, a framing that accounted satis 
 factorily to connoisseurs for the sum paid by the affluent 
 planter for his recent acquisition. 
 
 The occupant of the library was a man of thirty, 
 with an olive-pale, clearly-chiselled face, replete with 
 strength and intelligence, tempered by mildness that 
 was indescribably winning, even to strangers. He was 
 dressed in black, the sign at that date that the wearer 
 was a clergyman, or in mourning for a near relative. 
 The nominal residence of the Westover chaplain and 
 rector of the parish church was in bachelor s quarters 
 two miles away, upon a glebe- farm ; but he was more 
 at home in the Westover homestead than there. He 
 had, on this morning, accompanied Colonel Byrd to the 
 landing, seen him embarked, and returned to the house 
 by a side-entrance. In the act of drawing a book from 
 the shelf, he was arrested as by a vision. So nearly 
 perfect was the reflection and so motionless, the figure 
 seeming to float in the far, dusky depths of the mirror,
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 15 
 
 that a sensation of dizzy unreality passed over him. It 
 was as if his thoughts had taken visible shape. A 
 second explained the illusion, but he did not move to 
 take down the book. 
 
 Had Evelyn glanced toward the drawing-room door, 
 she must have seen both gazers in the tell-tale glass, 
 and, perhaps for the brain behind the liquid eyes was 
 quick learned what would have put the woman within 
 her on guard. When she did turn, it was to reply to 
 her step-mother s incisive address : 
 
 "Bless me, child ! while you stand mooning there 
 the day is half-gone, and all those bushels of roses 
 wasting for the lack of picking. There will likely be 
 rain by to-morrow, and then, what waste! There s 
 nothing so uncertain as September weather." 
 
 "I did not forget the roses, mamma; I only waited 
 for the dew to dry off." 
 
 " Dew ! You might have walked across the lawn in 
 white satin slippers at sunrise and found not a drop ! 
 Another token of rain ! Pray GOD the Colonel get not 
 the rheumatism this night !" 
 
 As the girl passed from the field of the mirror, 
 the unseen spectators changed each his position, in 
 voluntarily, to follow the flitting image and their 
 eyes met in the glass. A dull glow suffused the sec 
 retary s face; the better-bred man returned the defiant 
 look that was yet embarrassed, with one so calm and 
 keen that Bass bent his head again over his manu 
 script. 
 
 The table was littered with loose sheets of varying 
 sizes, closely written, but disfigured by erasures, inter 
 lineations, and marginal notes. Bass s task was to
 
 16 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 make a fair copy of them in a large volume bound in 
 vellum. 
 
 These remarkable MSS. still in excellent preserva 
 tion deserve more than the brief notice which the 
 novelist may fitly give of an authentic and valuable 
 relic. Some years previous to the date at which my 
 reader is introduced to the dramatis personce of my 
 story, William Evelyn Byrd, Richard Fitz- William, 
 and William Dand ridge, Esqrs., members of His 
 Majesty s Council in Virginia, were appointed to meet 
 with four commissioners from North Carolina, "to 
 determine the Controversy relating to the Bounds 
 between the Governments of Virginia and North Caro 
 lina." In pursuance of this object, these gentlemen led 
 a party of four surveyors and twenty-one assistants, 
 with servants and Indian guides, through the heart of 
 the Dismal Swamp. Never diverging by the hundredth 
 part of a degree for morass, jungle, or creek, they carried 
 out the work for sixteen weeks to a scientific and legal 
 conclusion, deserving and receiving therefor high com 
 mendation from royal and colonial governments. 
 
 Colonel Byrd is delineated by an eloquent annalist 
 of colonial life as " a man of brilliant wit, of high cul 
 ture and the richest humor, a Virginian of Virginians, 
 and the perfect flower of his time." Another says, 
 " His extensive learning was improved by a keen obser 
 vation, and refined by an acquaintance and correspond 
 ence with the wits and noblemen of his day in England." 
 His epitaph informs us that " he was admitted in youth 
 to the Bar in the Middle Temple, visited the Court of 
 France, and was chosen Fellow of the Royal Society ; 
 that he was Receiver-General of His Majesty s revenues
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 17 
 
 in Virginia, thrice appointed public agent to the Court 
 and Ministry of England, and, being thirty-seven years 
 a member, at last became President of the Council of 
 the Colony." 
 
 With all these and this is neither the season iior 
 place for recounting how much more he was more 
 vain of the project which had recently occurred to 
 him of preserving in permanent form the history of 
 his various expeditions in the New World than of his 
 manifold accomplishments and dignities. He collated 
 his records under the caption of " History of the 
 Dividing Line, and Other Tracts." These " Tracts" 
 were compiled from the diary he never failed to keep 
 when absent from home. His minutes were some 
 times jotted down in cipher upon the pommel of his 
 saddle, sometimes pencilled by the glare, of the watch- 
 fire while his comrades slept upon the bare ground 
 about him, or scribbled in wayside hostelry and in the 
 finest private mansions Virginia could boast. Every 
 scrap was jealously treasured, and finally committed 
 to his secretary, whose skill in deciphering the least 
 legible of the discolored fragments was no mean 
 recommendation to his patron s favor. That his 
 position as scribe was not a sinecure is evident from 
 the author s critical editing of the carefully-written 
 
 O * 
 
 pages. 
 
 In Colonel JByrd s absence, Colin Bass prosecuted 
 the important undertaking with what looked to the 
 bustling mistress like dull diligence. 
 
 " He ticks like a clock," she had complained that 
 morning to her guest, taking no pains to lower her 
 voice while she drew the door to the lock. " I ll e en 
 b 2*
 
 18 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 shut to the case and muffle the sound. It makes my 
 flesh creep and my eyes snap." 
 
 The monotonous scratching was sharply audible after 
 the chit-chat of the matrons ceased and their footsteps 
 died away in different directions. The scribe wrote 
 slowly in the neat chirography modelled upon his em 
 ployer s, forming each letter with equal care, and not 
 intermitting the labor except to turn the loose leaves or 
 to substitute another for the scrap just copied. At the 
 bottom of eacli page he stopped to re-read it, rounding 
 a looped letter here, dropping a comma there, crossing 
 a t or dotting an i, then setting below the last line the 
 word with which the next page was to begin. He was 
 not an imaginative man, nor was there the slightest 
 sign of nervous expectation in eye or action, yet he was 
 moved inwardly by a consciousness of an impending 
 interruption, and a disagreeable one. For awhile his 
 strained ears heard nothing but the pleasant murmur 
 of women s voices far down the gravel walk leading 
 away from the house, where Mrs. Carter was helping 
 Evelyn gather fragrant petals for Madam s famous 
 " rose-jars;" the soft " hushings" of the breeze, rocking 
 the trees to sleep upon the lawn ; the twitter and whir 
 of a bird in the branches nearest his window; and, 
 loudest of all, the rhythmic amble of his pen from left 
 to right of the broad page. 
 
 The man whose rebukeful gaze he had met had not 
 left the library. Had he crossed the floor, or so much 
 as fluttered the pages of a book, the secretary believed 
 that he must have heard it in the late-summer silence 
 of hall and chambers. 
 
 Yielding at length to an uncontrollable impulse, he
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 19 
 
 arose, slipped through the half-open door, without 
 moving it on the hinges, crept, cat-like, across the hall 
 and into the drawing-room to the library entrance. 
 
 A still figure sat at the round table in the middle of 
 the room, his face buried in his hands. 
 
 Colin Bass had never seen the courtly rector suc 
 cumb to selfish emotion. He knew him to be no weak 
 dreamer. It might be that the flash in the dark eyes 
 that had pierced his conscious soul was mere surprise. 
 Yet, when he had stolen back to his lair and labor, he 
 could not get away from the vision of that bowed form 
 and hidden face or forbear to listen for the something 
 he felt was coming. 
 
 " Ah-h-h !" The pen slipped upon the curve of a 
 capital C at a movement in the library, the grating 
 of a chair upon the oaken boards, followed by a pause, 
 during which he knew that the rector was on his feet. 
 Bass rectified the crooked curve before a footfall vi 
 brated upon his tense tympanum. His jaw squared, 
 his lips straightened as the door was pushed back, but 
 his eyes were cold and lustreless. 
 
 "Good-day, Mr. Fontaine," he said, in dryest civil 
 ity. " I had not known you were in the house till 
 I chanced to see you in the mirror over there, awhile 
 ago/ 
 
 His accents were habitually suave to his superiors, 
 " like the run of warm treacle," Madam had declared. 
 His self-control was phenomenal, and the intruder, 
 aware of these things, could not have been unobservant 
 of the latent insolence in his remark. He spoke as if 
 he had not noticed it. 
 
 " Good-morrow, Mr. Bass. Colonel Byrd requested
 
 20 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 me to look in upon you occasionally during his ab 
 sence- " 
 
 "For what purpose, may I inquire?" without wait 
 ing for the end of the sentence. 
 
 Something in the little episode of the mirror seemed 
 to have brought him nearer the level of one he was 
 wont to treat as of higher rank than himself. In his 
 heart uprose malicious exultation such as greeted the 
 fallen Lucifer. The polished scholar, the reverend 
 overlooker of three aristocratic parishes, for all the 
 strained purity of his Huguenot blood and the guards 
 of his holy office, was become like unto him, the 
 abject slave of a woman ! 
 
 Mr. Fontaine regarded him in tranquil dignity. 
 
 " To a certainty, not because he is not fully assured 
 of your ability and industry," gravely courteous. " But 
 since I had the honor of bearing my little part in the 
 toils of the expedition whose history you are recording, 
 he did me the further honor, this morning, of asking 
 me to review such pages as you have copied, and make 
 minutes of any errata that may have crept into them, 
 in spite of his care and yours." 
 
 "I am duly grateful for the condescension that 
 links my poor name and endeavors with those of our 
 patron," said Bass, rising, with an overshow of defer 
 ence. " Nevertheless, had I aught to conceal from 
 him or from you, gratitude would not blind me to the 
 indignity of espial. Let that pass, since my conscience 
 is clear. May it please you to note Colonel Byrd s 
 pencilled private mark at the foot of this page, show 
 ing that he had inspected my manuscript up to this 
 point? I have transcribed to-day four pages no
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 21 
 
 more. If you will likewise examine these," taking 
 up a handful of creased and soiled scraps, apparently 
 torn from a note-book, and covered with hieroglyphics, 
 "you will see that the task was not easy. With 
 these remarks, which I pray you to forgive, I resign 
 my chair and table to yon." 
 
 The ostentatious servility of the pretended apology 
 brought to the listener s eye the spark his rudeness had 
 not kindled. 
 
 " Patron and { espial are words that hardly belong 
 to a land and generation where and when all gentle 
 men of birth and breeding are equals," returned Mr. 
 Fontaine, with no other show of temper. " Colonel 
 Byrd is my friend and parishioner, whom I respect 
 too much not to seek some more auspicious season for 
 complying with his request." 
 
 A sneer went over the secretary s smug visage, be 
 lying the travesty of obsequiousness lie chose to main 
 tain. 
 
 "I beg you to believe, sir, that one season with me 
 is as another. In the words of the Book most familiar 
 to you, I am as one who watches for his lord. I can, 
 however, comprehend the impatience of a member of 
 the favored order for whom sunshine and roses are 
 created, and who recollects that neither lasts forever." 
 
 A meaning glance out of the window pointed the 
 innuendo. The dark cheek of the clergyman burned. 
 He had reached the door, but wheeled abruptly and 
 took a step toward the speaker. Bass faced him as 
 quickly, and the two stood at bay, looking into each 
 other s eyes, and through these, for the instant, un 
 guarded gates, into one another s souls.
 
 22 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Fontaine was the first to speak. Tone and smile 
 were totally unlike anything Bass had ever beheld 
 before in the master of himself and men : 
 
 " I am your debtor in that you have reminded me 
 of my devoir and my privilege," he uttered in ironical 
 distinctness. "The wise man is he who sees Provi 
 dence in Opportunity." 
 
 He bowed, closed the door with intention after him, 
 and went out with agile step and head erect into the 
 sunshine. 
 
 " He also shuts the case !" soliloquized the secretary, 
 a white, wrung smile upon the countenance just now 
 so stolid. " When the clock strikes, they will hear it 
 all over the house, whether they will or no !" 
 
 Each entry of the journal kept during the survey 
 of the Dividing Line was dated. " March 24, 1728," 
 was the last written by the copyist before the entrance 
 of the unwelcome visitor. He finished the section 
 mechanically : 
 
 " The Truth was they now knew the worst of it, 
 and cou d guess pretty near at the Time when thev 
 might hope to return to Land again." 
 
 Automatic as was the action of one-quarter of the 
 scribe s brain, the words awoke him to a sense of their 
 odd parity with the operation of the rapt other three- 
 fourths of him. The pallid glimmer revisited his face. 
 
 " I know the worst," he said, aloud. " But do I 
 care to return to the Land I have left ?" 
 
 It was fully ten minutes before he began to decipher 
 the next loose leaf: 
 
 "The Air was chilled this Morning with a Smart 
 Northwest Wind which favour d the Dismalites in their
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 23 
 
 Dirty March. They returned by the Path they had 
 made in coming out, and, with great Industry, arriv d 
 in the Evening at the Spot where the Line had been 
 discontinued. 
 
 "After so long and laborious a Journey they were 
 glad to repose themselves upon their couches of Cypress- 
 bark where their sleep was as sweet as it wou d have 
 been on a Bed of Finland Down." 
 
 Over against this record the secretary, his eyes 
 fiercely vacant with pain, and his fingers clammily 
 glued to the quill, inscribed " 1729, March 25." It 
 was the date on which he, a gawky country lad, lowly- 
 born and lowly-bred, had taken service with the master 
 of Westover. In reviewing the page, the blunder 
 caused by his moody abstraction was unperceived, and, 
 still wrapped in his own thoughts, he began the next 
 record with the same date, carrying it forward to the 
 close of the " Tract." Strangely enough, the anachro 
 nism escaped the eye of the august author, and stands 
 thus to the present hour. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE first Byrd who emigrated to America yclept 
 William the First in family papers and talk bought 
 in 1674, from Theodorick Bland or his heirs, the finest 
 building-site upon James River. The plantation of 
 Westover is mentioned in colonial annals half a cen 
 tury earlier, but it came into prominence under the
 
 24 HI* GREAT SELF. 
 
 regime of the first Byrd, and into eminence among 
 colonial houses under the administration of the second 
 and greatest of the name, Colonel William Evelyn 
 Byrd. 
 
 After his father s death and the beginning of his 
 own permanent residence in Virginia, he enlarged the 
 house erected by his predecessor, and made mansion 
 and grounds worthy of his taste and wealth. The 
 central building of English brick was joined to the 
 wings by corridors, and underrun by cellars that were 
 models of stolidity and spaciousness. The sloping 
 lawn was defended against the current and periodical 
 freshets by a river-wall of massive masonry. At reg 
 ular intervals buttresses, capped with stone, supported 
 life-sized statues of mythological deities, fauns, and 
 
 o / 
 
 dryads. Gardens, fences, out-houses, and conservato 
 ries, fashioned after European designs, were the marvel 
 of the colony, and won the admiration of travellers 
 from older lands. 
 
 The sward rolling gently from house to river was 
 smooth and luxuriant, dotted with grand trees standing 
 singly or in clumps. At the right and the left of the 
 broad flight of squared stone steps a tulip-poplar flung 
 out, on this early autumn day, danger-signals of ap 
 proaching frost to the double line of trees bordering 
 the sweep of gravelled walk connecting the iron gates 
 on each side of the lawn. The river singularly clear 
 for the tawny James, by reason of infrequent up-coun 
 try rains danced and shimmered in the sunshine; 
 grasshoppers sang in the turf regardless of the beacon- 
 fires burning here and there upon maple and poplar ; 
 butterflies and humming-birds swam and swooped
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 25 
 
 above the roses. The air was bland, languorous, and 
 laden almost to excess with rose-scent, the September 
 blossoming that often exceeds in abundance and beauty 
 that of June. 
 
 As Pierre Fontaine emerged from the hall-door and 
 halted upon the stone platform, the sweet waves brought 
 ecstasy to his senses, enticing fancies to his imagination. 
 He was man as well as priest; he was young, and 
 youth will have its day. Without tracing the feel 
 ing to the origin Madam Byrd had frankly given, he, 
 too, was conscious of a sense of larger liberty in the 
 absence of the masterful lord of the manor. The will 
 and energy that had created and kept up the paradise 
 that lay about the beholder, an Eden the fairer for 
 encompassing wilds, impressed the owner s personality 
 upon all whom he encountered. His rule of household 
 and community might be wise, and, when not opposed, 
 benignant; but it was despotism, clear and simple, the 
 more absolute because of his acknowledged superiority in 
 talent, learning, and accomplishments to his associates. 
 His regard for his chaplain was sincere ; his fondness 
 for his society undisguised, and to a vainer man would 
 have been nattering. Nothing could have been further 
 removed from sycophancy or slavish constraint than 
 the clergyman s bearing towards the seignior of West- 
 over. He said and he felt that companionship with 
 such a mind was a continual education, a boon for 
 which he could not be too grateful ; that conversation 
 with him, whom he had proudly called " friend and 
 parishioner," brought out what was worthiest from his 
 own mental store. 
 
 Still, in strolling between the rose-hedges towards 
 
 B 8
 
 26 II IS GREAT SELF. 
 
 the white-robed figures he descried at the end of the 
 vista, he took in deep draughts of intoxicating incense 
 warmed and spiced by the sun, and felt more light of 
 heart, more eager of desire, than he had for many a 
 long day. He put from him the thought of the inter 
 view which had strangely ruffled his spirit as easily as 
 he brushed away a bumblebee that droned too near his 
 ear. This was not a day in which to heed the buzz of 
 insects. The world was wide and life was beautiful. 
 
 The result of Mrs. Carter s and Evelyn s work 
 verified Madam Byrd s boast of " bushels of rose- 
 leaves." The baskets into which the ladies gathered 
 them had been emptied, as they were filled, into a 
 hamper set in the middle of the walk, and at Mr. 
 Fontaine s approach Evelyn was stooping over this, 
 pressing down the contents to make room for other 
 relays. Her shepherdess-hat had fallen back, and 
 hung from the ribbon caught under her chin ; her 
 cheeks glowed with the reflected blush of the damask 
 petals in which her arms were sunk to the elbow ; her 
 eyes danced with fun. 
 
 " You are just in time to take this to the still-room !" 
 she called, gayly. " Now, Mrs. Carter, pour the rest 
 in, and let him have all !" 
 
 For answer, her friend turned both baskets upside- 
 down over the girl s head, veiling her with the rosy 
 rain. 
 
 " Danae with a difference!" said Fontaine, as she 
 issued from the flood, laughing and shaking her head 
 to free her curls from clinging petals. " Let me do 
 that!" stepping forward when she would have collected 
 with her scooped hands a heap from the gravel.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 27 
 
 Restoring the roses by double-handfuls to the hamper, 
 lie stayed Evelyn as she was tossing in more. " Wait ! 
 I am sure I espied the glitter of gold !" he said, dipping 
 his fingers gingerly into the scented mass and burrow 
 ing watchfully. 
 
 "Danae without much difference after all?" queried 
 Mrs. Carter, roguishly. 
 
 Both women eyed him in lively curiosity as he poured 
 the petals back into a smaller basket, and finally abruptly 
 reversed the hamper upon the short turf. 
 
 " Let us hope that you will always choose to do the 
 right thing," bantered Evelyn, seeing him separate petal 
 from petal. " You will never swerve Oh !" 
 
 With the stifled scream she snatched a chainlet of 
 gold hanging from his finger. Her hand went hurriedly 
 up to her throat, and fumbled among the muslin folds 
 covering her bosom. 
 
 " Look further !" she panted, pale as a ghost. " I 
 have lost something else !" 
 
 She went down upon her knees on one side of the 
 pile, Mrs. Carter, wondering and sympathetic, upon the 
 other, and, assisted by Mr. Fontaine, they sifted the 
 roses with anxious assiduity, until all were back in the 
 hamper. 
 
 " It is not there !" breathed Evelyn in a frightened 
 whisper. "I have dropped it! I do not know when 
 or where ! What shall I do ?" 
 
 " What is it, dear ? Something of value ?" asked her 
 friend. 
 
 A rush of crimson throbbed into the blanched cheeks, 
 the fingers clutched the chain more tightly. 
 
 " I have had it this great while. It is a locket a
 
 28 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 little one with my mother s hair and Hush ! pray 
 
 not a word !" 
 
 She hid the chain in her bosom, as down the walk 
 sailed Madam Byrd, her trim waist begirt with a 
 voluminous white apron, her sleeves pinned back to her 
 shoulders, in short, in housewifely battle-array. As 
 soon as she was within speaking distance, she opened fire. 
 
 "Had I guessed that the church was pressed into 
 service, I might have waited more contentedly for my 
 harvest. I hope your reverence has blessed it with bell 
 and with book, to warrant the leaves against shrinking 
 or running to water? If the ceremony be over, I will 
 begin the work that has hung upon my hands these three 
 hours or more." 
 
 Evelyn laughed nervously. 
 
 " Dear mamma ! it is not yet quite an hour since we 
 talked with you in the hall, and see what we have ! 
 An accident befell the roses, too. The hamper was 
 overset, and we have but just gathered up the spoils 
 with Mr. Fontaine s help. He will bear them in for 
 you." 
 
 " That will he not !" protested the dame. " No or 
 dained minister of the Word shall be beast of burden 
 upon my premises while a score of lazy servants eat my 
 bread and drink my cider." 
 
 She blew into a silver whistle that had dangled from 
 a chain of the same material at her girdle, together with 
 a pair of silver-handled scissors and a silver nutmeg- 
 grater. A mulatto lad in the Byrd livery appeared 
 with alacrity that bespoke strict training, hoisted the 
 light weight to his head and bore it through a side-gate 
 into the house.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 29 
 
 Mrs. Carter gave Evelyn an expressive look behind 
 her mother s shoulder. 
 
 "You will suffer me to see how you make your in 
 comparable pot-pourri, won t you ?" she said, coaxingly. 
 " Either the Shirley roses are not so sweet as yours, or 
 I fall far short of your skill. By the time my rose-jars 
 have been stocked for a month they might as well be 
 filled with dried currants. Colonel Carter will have it 
 that they smell like mince-pie. And, while we are in 
 the still-room, perhaps you will let me copy your 
 receipt " 
 
 The rest was lost in the distance as the matrons 
 walked amicably together to the small gate, through it, 
 and around the corner of the house. 
 
 Evelyn heaved a hysterical sigh. 
 
 " I seem but a foolish creature to you, Mr. Fon 
 taine/ the slight foreign accent giving pathetic pre 
 cision to her speech. " But I am sore bestead. If I 
 should not find my locket ; if some one has picked it 
 up " a gesture of intensest uneasiness said the rest. 
 
 " We will look for it at once, and so diligently that 
 nobody can forestall us," said Fontaine, confident and 
 cheery. " It may have been wrenched from the chain 
 by a rose-tree. If you will take one side of the alley 
 and I the other, there is no fear lest it should not come 
 to light. Will the hamper return? Must all the 
 roses be harvested to-day ?" 
 
 She could not but smile at his whimsical alarm. 
 
 "Only those that are in fullest bloom. Even the 
 pot-pourri maker has compassion upon the buds and 
 
 half-blown. But, by to-morrow " shaking her 
 
 head in mournful significance. 
 
 3*
 
 30 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Her habit of supplementing words by action was 
 among the French tricks" reprobated by her step 
 mother and admired by the men, in whose sight they 
 were another and a maddening grace. 
 
 " Your study-door is bewitched, colonel," his wife 
 had said yesterday. "The blacksmith swears there is 
 nought amiss with the lock. Yet, close it when I may 
 on some days, it clicks open at its will without the aid 
 of hands. Again, and oftentimes, it must be wrought 
 upon and wrenched before it will yield." 
 
 " Then, my dear Lady Maria, you must work 
 a countercharm and shame locksmith and devil by 
 your wiser witchery," the gallant spouse had made 
 reply. 
 
 Afterward, and not in her hearing, he had bidden 
 Colin Bass, "see that the latch is righted, or have a 
 new one made." 
 
 Reminded of the commission by the mysterious click, 
 which for the third time that forenoon undid the door 
 of the " clock-case," the secretary got up, with an ejacu 
 lation of profane disgust, and began the examination of 
 the offending bolt. While working it up and down, he 
 became carelessly conscious that Lady Bess, having had 
 her nap out, was chattering to herself, still lying on the 
 settle. Upon his appearance, she accosted him affably. 
 Although not four years old, the "little fairy" had 
 many and individual opinions, and was fluent in 
 expressing them. 
 
 "Does oo want to loot at mine p itty bofe ?" she 
 said to him, as the only auditor in sight. And, at the 
 churlish silence of a bachelor to whom all minors were 
 cubs, she persisted, in a louder key, "Say, turn an ook
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 31 
 
 at mine p itty bofe, dis tninnit. If oo don t, I ll holler 
 youd I" 
 
 Bass shot a glance at her in time to see the bauble 
 slip from her grasp to the floor and the sparkle of 
 jewels as it fell. He picked it up without other pur 
 pose than to rescue a valuable from the infant bar 
 barian who had probably stolen it from her mother s 
 jewel-chest. 
 
 " Isn t it boo ful?" said Lady Bess, gratified by his 
 practical interest in her prize. 
 
 Bass turned it over in his hand. It was an oval 
 medallion, less than two inches long, of wrought gold, 
 encrusted with diamonds and hinged at the back. His 
 deft fingers quickly detected the hidden spring, and the 
 opening ca.se revealed a miniature, painted upon ivory, 
 of a young man in the uniform of the Royal Guards. 
 In the chased gold band encircling the portrait and 
 below the face was enamelled the legend, " J attends." 
 Opposite the miniature, under glass, were intertwined 
 a lock of golden hair and one of dark brown, almost 
 black. 
 
 Without other suspicion of the ownership of the 
 trinket than that it probably belonged in the Carter 
 family, Bass looked again, and closely, at the pictured 
 face. It was comely, he decided, and patrician. Be 
 cause it was both, he considered it coxcombical ; but as 
 a painting it was exquisitely executed, although so 
 minute. 
 
 "Dive it to me, p ease !" importuned Bess. "It is 
 Yady Bess s p itty sing !" 
 
 " It is none of yours," retorted Bass, roughly. " And 
 I shall keep it !""
 
 32 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Lady Bess was angelic when with angels. If her 
 
 / o o 
 
 wings were rubbed the wrong way, she shed them with 
 diabolical celerity. Bass, who knew little, and cared 
 less for children, was unprepared for her next move 
 ment, which was to spring to her feet upon the settle, 
 and launch herself upon him like a shrieking cata 
 pult. Instinctively casting the hand containing the 
 miniature behind him, he reeled and staggered several 
 paces. At the shock of the cherub s onslaught, the 
 locket flew from his hold. He heard it strike the 
 floor and skim along the polished boards to the front 
 door. 
 
 Bess had fastened upon his lappels and ruffled shirt- 
 front. In shaking her loose, an action performed with 
 the vigor and despatch he would have used in ridding 
 his person of a wild cat, he left long strings of cambric 
 in her claws. The noise brought her maid from the 
 
 O 
 
 upper story. In common with the Westover negroes, 
 and her class generally, Sally despised the hireling 
 whose one advantage above herself lay in the lack of 
 coloring-matter in his skin. Her outcry and rush 
 toward her afflicted nurseling were dramatic and 
 insolent : 
 
 " For de love o heaven, what you bin do to her, 
 now ?" 
 
 He had never, to his knowledge, touched the dreadful 
 infant before, but disdained to repel the insinuation. 
 Bess rolled over on the floor, eluding the nurse s arms, 
 and grabbed his ankle when he would have retired in 
 dignified reserve to his study. 
 
 " Dimme mine bofe / Tafe it f om him, raamruy ! 
 He toot mine boo ful sins: !"
 
 - HIS GREAT SELF. 33 
 
 Bass shook his leg impatiently, and the negress caught 
 up the writhing child. 
 
 " Fo de Lawd, ef you had V dared to kick er, I d 
 V tored you low-lived eyes out, ef I had a swung for 
 hit !" she snapped at him, and carried her screaming 
 charge off, answering her kicks and her wails for her 
 " bots" with adjurations " not to have nuthin ter do wid 
 nobody but reel gen man n ladies! Mammy would 
 give her a sugar-cake, so she ould !" 
 
 Yells and soothings were deadened by the flooring of 
 the upper chambers, and the secretary, smiling evilly, 
 looked about him for the lost bauble. He was not 
 interested in restoring it to Mrs. Carter, but knowledge 
 of the value of the gems moved him to search in 
 corners, on the steps and gravel-walks without, whither 
 & smart ricochet might have carried it. It had vanished 
 as utterly as if Lady Bess had swallowed it at her first 
 howl. The circumstance was odd, but not disquieting. 
 Should inquiry be instituted for the locket, he had the 
 choice of telling the truth, or, what he would prefer, 
 holding his tongue. The gibberish of the baby-pur- 
 loiner could not convict him as a receiver of stolen 
 goods. 
 
 Nobody was in sight from the front-door. The rose- 
 pickers whom he expected to see were not at work or 
 visible ; but a monstrous gobbler, the Anak of his race, 
 reared and domesticated by Evelyn Byrd from a wild 
 chick trapped with the mother in the forest, strutted 
 along the walk, picking tentatively at pebbles. He 
 stiffened his drooping red cockade at Bass s approach, 
 ruffled every feather, put up a vast semicircle of tail, 
 and emitted a hoarse " gobble gobble gobble !"
 
 34 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Bass laughed outright. 
 
 "You may have got it! Then it s safe enough until 
 Christmas. I ll keep my eye on you, my fine fellow." 
 
 The conceit of the possible lodgement of miniature 
 and diamonds in the turkey s craw or gizzard, or in 
 whatever other cranny of his anatomical apparatus he 
 stored gravel-stones and the like, appealed so forcibly to 
 his peculiar sense of humor that he stayed his pen more 
 than once that day to chuckle over it. Whatever had 
 become of the ornament, the affair did not concern him 
 personally, and it was not in his line to disquiet himself 
 in vain over other people s business. 
 
 Evelyn s tedious and futile quest for her lost treasure 
 was interrupted by the second appearance of the mulatto 
 in livery. Her step-mother required her attendance in 
 the still-room. 
 
 Fontaine s heart beat fast and warm at her mute, dis 
 mayed appeal to himself. 
 
 "I shall seek until it is found," he answered her. 
 a Unless the earth has opened her mouth and swallowed 
 it up, you shall have it within the hour. Trust me." 
 
 "I do trust you always!" coloring vividly in the 
 pause severing the emphatic phrase. 
 
 The solid earth quaked under the lover s feet as she 
 flitted away. Rose-scent, bird-song, the wind s wooing 
 whisper to the trees ; mellowed sunshine and flashing 
 river the knowledge of all these made harmonious 
 ripples in a great tide that lifted his soul and swept 
 his senses into a sea of rapture. 
 
 "I do always!" Faithful echoes rang melodious 
 changes upon the words. Had she lingered one instant 
 longer, the hidden stream of love must have burst
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 35 
 
 bounds in passionate speech. He murmured delirious 
 phrases of endearment, of hope, of longing to him 
 self as he walked, ungratefully forgetful of the mission 
 he had undertaken, uutil brought rudely back to earth 
 by the angry scream of a child. 
 
 It proceeded from the open front-door up to which 
 he had strayed. Glancing that way, he espied the 
 blaze of what looked like a live coal upon the sunny 
 steps. With one bound he secured it, and, without 
 look or thought for the animated tableau in the hall, 
 hurried in the direction of the still-room. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 MADAM BYRD S still-room was as famous in the 
 mouths of her sister-housewives as were her lord s 
 gardens, stables, and fields among his fellow-planters. 
 It was a long, low-ceiled apartment in the left wing 
 of the house. Two windows overlooked the river; a 
 wide-mouthed fireplace at one end was fitted up with 
 cranes and pot-hooks, for here pickling, preserving, 
 and potting were done under Madam s supervision. 
 The products of her skill crowded cupboards that 
 reached from floor to ceiling on one side of the room, 
 and were protected by locked glass doors. The front 
 wall was lined with open shelves filled with empty jars 
 and gallipots of delf and china awaiting their contents. 
 At that early epoch of Virginia housewifery the mis 
 tress appreciated the necessity of keeping delicacies,
 
 36 SIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 particularly sweets, under lock and key. Madam s 
 key-basket was never two feet away from her, day or 
 night. When she went abroad or to church, she 
 locked it up in her wardrobe and carried the key of 
 the wardrobe in her pocket. 
 
 A table ten feet long and three in width was in the 
 middle of the floor. The deal top, white from assidu 
 ous scourings, was half-concealed by a fair linen cloth, 
 on which the harvest of rose-leaves was piled. Madam, 
 enveloped in a snowy apron, the ruffled bib touching 
 her rounded chin, was taking these up singly and 
 dropping them into a big jar beside her, the mouth 
 being on a level with the table-top. 
 
 Mrs. Carter, at her ease in a rocking-chair, surveyed 
 the process in amused admiration. 
 
 "/ heave mine in by the peck," she confessed. 
 
 " What is worth doing at all is worthy of well 
 doing," rejoined the hostess, pithily superior. 
 
 " But there are millions of them, dear Madam Byrd. 
 It must require an eternity to take them up one by 
 one." 
 
 " Eternity, as well as time, is most wisely spent in 
 the right performance of duty," rebuked the flippant 
 criticism. " Evelyn, child !" as her step-daughter en 
 tered, " I sent for you half an hour ago. Tis said to 
 be the nature of young blood to be hot and hasty. 
 I m sure tis the nature of young limbs to move slow. 
 But one might suppose you had run a mile from the 
 way you pant and your color comes and goes. The 
 heat should not affect you who were born here so much 
 more than me who have lived in Virginia scarce ten 
 years."
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 37 
 
 " You sent for me, mamma?" 
 
 Evelyn, resting the finger-tips of one hand lightly 
 on the table, and raising the other involuntarily to her 
 throat as if to steady her respiration, waited for com 
 mands. She knew her step-mother, and the necessity 
 laid upon the exemplary matron to " have her talk out" 
 when talk seethed within her. 
 
 " Of a. certainty I sent for you, or you had not come. 
 I marvel you will waste the life of an immortal being 
 in asking needless questions. Here s Mrs. Carter who 
 has asked, at the least, twenty times to have two or 
 three trifles copied for her from the Westover receipt- 
 book, and she still goes a-begging. Sit you down over 
 there at the table, out of the way of the roses. Caliban ! 
 will you stand grinning all the day and never set a 
 chair for your Mistress Evelyn !" 
 
 Evelyn took the seat the lad hastened to bring, drew 
 to her the standish, paper, and pen ready for her use, 
 and opened a book bound in worn sheep-skin. The 
 leaves were dog-eared and spotted in sundry places, and 
 the ragged ones had been mended by pasting a margin 
 of stout paper along the edges. 
 
 " I shall be most happy to oblige Mrs. Carter," said 
 the young lady, politely. " Where am I to begin ?" 
 
 " What a flurry you are in ! One might fancy 
 Hercules s tasks were appointed unto you, and all to 
 be done in a day." 
 
 Madam s mood was not sweetened by her occupation. 
 
 "Mrs. Carter would like to know how the Westover 
 wine is made; and it wouldn t be amiss to add to that 
 Mrs. Ot way s receipts for clary and sherry wine, and 
 Mrs. Shut s receipt for birch wine, though that she 
 
 4
 
 38 #/S GREAT SELF. 
 
 will not need till March, and we may all be in our 
 graves by then. Life in a new country is ever uncer 
 tain. But there s Mrs. Blackiston s receipt for elder 
 wine, and the berries are black as sloes this very hour. 
 Or, stay," as Evelyn dipped her pen in ink, " Bass 
 can copy those in plainer hand than yours. It passes 
 me that you ve never rubbed the French accent off 
 your pen any more than off your tongue. I ll get 
 Colin at those receipts before he s a day older. What 
 he can t do, and what you can, the Lord knows there re 
 not many things, is to write down in English, mind 
 you, the first Mrs. Byrd s receipt for making portable 
 soup/ 
 
 Evelyn turned the battered leaves without change of 
 expression from the pale abstraction that nettled her 
 step-mother into a harangue which made the visitor un 
 comfortable. The girl was as used to the sleety patter 
 of the tongue, under if not in which was the law of 
 kindness, as to the tapping of the pigeons feet upon the 
 slated roof of the still-room. Their cote was hard by, 
 and they courted and quarrelled incessantly upon the 
 sun-warmed area during summer days. 
 
 " Duchesse ofLorreign s Receipt for Making Soupe, " 
 she read aloud, impassively docile. "Is it that you 
 wish me to copy ?" 
 
 " Surely, girl ! Have I not said it six times within 
 the past ten minutes? I wonder what you dream of 
 that you never hear a word I say ! Did not I instruct 
 you in the plainest language to copy that receipt, I 
 having no faith in Bass s knowledge of French? 
 Though there s your father, who will have it that 
 Solomon was but a babe in long clothes compared with
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 39 
 
 his secretary s wisdom. You may have heard, Mrs. 
 Carter, for idle talk travels far, that Colonel Byrd 
 was named The Black Swan by certain lively fellows 
 among the younger nobility in London because of his 
 prodigious learning and polite accomplishments, so far 
 exceeding they were pleased to say those of other 
 native-born Americans who visited the Mother Country. 
 I rally the colonel upon the saying, now and then, tell 
 ing him he should pass on the title to the cygnet he 
 lias discovered among the ducks of the lower James. 
 Tis amazing the trust he puts in one who, to my way 
 of thinking, has little sprightliness and less wit." 
 
 Mrs. Carter was spared the necessity of passing 
 judgment upon the comparative justice of husband s 
 and wife s views as to the secretary s endowments by 
 the housewife s digressive orders to Caliban to go on 
 with his task of crushing with a rolling-pin upon a 
 board the salt for the pot-pourri. The guest was more 
 interested in the taciturn step-daughter than in the 
 matron s dissertations. Evelyn wrote fitfully, now 
 fast, now lingeringly, glancing toward the front win 
 dows at the end of each line. There was a plait of 
 care or anxiety between her brows, a heaviness about 
 the broad-lidded eyes, an air of expectation in form and 
 feature, assumed by the neighbor to be certain indices 
 that the locket containing her mother s hair had not 
 been found. Why the loss was not to be named to the 
 sensible second wife, who spoke openly and without 
 jealous disrespect of the " first Mrs. Byrd," and had 
 set Evelyn to translate a recipe from the original in her 
 own mother s hand, was more of a puzzle. 
 
 Madam s talk subsided presently, perhaps under
 
 40 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 the monotony of her employment, or the lullaby of the 
 muffled crunching of the rock-salt before the roller, and 
 the coo and tiptoeing of the pigeons overhead. A long 
 term of silence was interrupted by the whistling whir 
 of wings as the startled birds forsook their promenade. 
 Hasty steps grated upon the gravel and struck the flat 
 stone at the back-door. 
 
 " Pardon me, Madam Byrd,"said Mr. Fontaine from 
 the door- way, " but Colonel Byrd instructed me to report 
 myself for orders before going home. Is there anything 
 I can do in his absence to serve you?" 
 
 " Going home, when dinner will be on the table in 
 an hour ! Not a foot do you stir, fasting" began the 
 hostess. 
 
 The bright blood had flown into Evelyn s cheeks at 
 the intruder s voice ; her eyes met his eagerly, and the 
 smile exchanged was seen by both matrons. Evelyn 
 arose hastily. 
 
 " That missing volume of Froissart, Mr. Fontaine !" 
 she exclaimed, a sort of happy break in her tone, also 
 noted and misconstrued, " I found it yesterday. I will 
 get it for you before I forget it again." 
 
 She had joined him and they disappeared to 
 gether ere Madam Byrd found her tongue and Mrs. 
 Carter s imagination could fairly receive the new and 
 astounding impression made by the swift scene. 
 
 " Go to the kitchen, Caliban, and tell Isis to hurry 
 dinner, and yourself see there is a place set for Mr. 
 Fontaine," ordered the mistress, discreetly. Then to 
 her friend, 
 
 " Did you see that ?" 
 
 Mrs. Carter nodded in emulative discretion.
 
 HIS ORE AT KKLF. 41 
 
 " You don t suppose it can be possible " 
 
 Her crony smiled dubiously. 
 
 "It looks a good deal like it," she committed herself 
 so far as to admit. 
 
 " Great heavens ! what would the colonel say ?" 
 
 The bared arms and plump hands dropped prone 
 upon the yielding heap of petals, and were buried out 
 of sight. The confidante forbore reply by look or word, 
 awaiting clue and cue. 
 
 " Mr. Fontaine is a gentleman, to be sure," resumed 
 Madam, thoughtfully, but as one seeks for consolation 
 and finds none, "of excellent family and education. 
 The colonel likes and admires him. I have never 
 heard a syllable from him disrespectful of Mr. Fontaine. 
 But sure am I that he has never dreamed of him as 
 Evelyn s suitor. His ambitions for his daughter are 
 past finding out; but, after all the distinguished offers 
 she has had, this would be a bitter pill. I dare not think 
 of what may lie before us!" 
 
 She looked really frightened ; her sanguine com 
 plexion was sallow, her chin trembled like a baby s. 
 The gentler and meeker woman was amazed at these 
 tokens of timidity in one whom she had regarded as too 
 stout of heart and will to fear the frown of man. 
 
 " Both of us may be mistaken," essaying comfort. 
 "There is nothing so deceitful as a girl s blushes, unless 
 it be her smiles. And Mr. Fontaine being her rector, 
 
 O 7 
 
 and so much at home here " 
 
 " No ! no ! no ! There s something between them ! 
 I never saw him look so before nor her. Not that I 
 wonder at him. Most men who know her come to that, 
 soon or late ; but I had set it down as a truth past 
 
 4*
 
 42 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 altering that she would live and die Evelyn Byrd !" 
 cried the step-parent in odd vexation. " And here it is 
 all to be gone over with again, and rue between father 
 and daughter like cloth caught in the shears ! If Colin 
 Bass had begun to sigh and ogle, and she to blush at 
 him, I could hardly have been more upset." 
 
 "Now you are going too far," demurred Mrs. Carter, 
 laughingly. " Mr. Fontaine s birth, breeding, and char 
 acter are above reproach. He is handsome and good, 
 and richer than most clergymen. Colonel Byrd is the 
 most reasonable man I know. When he sees that 
 Evelyn s heart is set upon her lover her father cannot 
 hold out against his favorite child." 
 
 " You don t know William Evelyn Byrd, Esq., of 
 Westover, Virginia," enunciated his spouse in slow 
 portentousness. " His is the iron hand in the velvet 
 glove. And when the velvet is stripped off, the iron is 
 red-hot! Ah-h !" her fine eyes enlarging with mount 
 ing tears, "I was too light-hearted this morning. I 
 shall never tempt Providence again by casting off care 
 so entirely. The smell of rose-leaves will always make 
 me sick ! You must have marked their dalliance over 
 the hamper before they espied me poor, prating, pur 
 blind fool that I was !" 
 
 " Nay !" remonstrated Mrs. Carter, seeing the salt 
 drops trickle upon the petals with which the plump 
 hands were again mechanically engaged, "in that you 
 err. There was no love-making over baskets or hamper. 
 And" awkwardly to redeem the lapse she had so nearly 
 made " there is really not an atom of proof that these 
 two will ever be other than friends." 
 
 Madam reached out an arm to draw toward her the
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 43 
 
 sheet on which Evelyn had been writing. The kindling 
 fire in her eyes scorched up the moisture. 
 
 "Look at that!" in accents trembling with sorrow 
 and wrath, yet dashed with triumph. " Did not you 
 hear me bid her, times without number, to write down 
 that receipt in honest English ? Tis plain to be seen 
 her wits were running upon her French-born suitor. 
 His tongue could wile a bird off a bush. I mind me, 
 now, of coming out upon the front steps, a week ago 
 Sunday night, where she, with my Jane, Mary, and 
 Willy, the dears never mistrusting they were but a 
 cat s-paw, sat still as mice, hearkening to his Rever 
 ence s tale of how his father also a clergyman of the 
 Reformed faith was persecuted out of his native land, 
 obliged to shift for his safety in forests and deserts, was 
 stuck into a noisome dungeon and laden with chains, 
 and a deal more piteous stuff, in hearing which my 
 little lambs cried outright and the fair Evelyn was 
 fain to mop her eyes, while as for me, soft-hearted 
 mole ! I couldn t count the stars for the tears!" 
 
 Silenced and confounded, Mrs. Carter followed the 
 freshly-written lines traced by the dreaming amanu 
 ensis : 
 
 " Bouillon Sec on portatif, tres Commode et Utlle 
 fanner (I L Armee, et en Voyage. 
 
 " Prenez deux vieux Chapons ou Coqs, Concasses en 
 les Os sans endommager la Chair ; huit livres de Bceuf 
 maigre et L Eschine, ou d un autre bon endroit, avec un 
 Os de Mo elle, et un demy pied de veau, metlez-le tout en 
 semble dans un pot de terre bien vernisse ; mettez de L Eau 
 suffissamment, faites-le cuire aupres du feu; ecumez-le 
 bien, ajoutez-y une piece de Ginyembre, vingt grains de
 
 44 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 poivre, Fruit Cloux de Giroffle ; trois grandes pieces de 
 fleur de muscade, deux feuilles de Laurier ; conlinuez d, 
 le cuire & petit feu, sansflamme " 
 
 " Petit feu, sansflamme / " ejaculated the step-mother, 
 with an angry sob. " Grand feu, avec flamme / she 
 had better have written. She has her lover to console 
 her unless, indeed, her father judges fit to risk the 
 chances of carrying her over to the other side to part her 
 from this one. The Lord only knows how twill end ! 
 But one thing is sure. I, who am least to blame, will 
 get the brunt of it all. How many million times have 
 I charged you not to burst into a room in that fashion ?" 
 to Caliban, whose bounce over the threshold merited 
 the reproof. " Go back and scratch upon the panel, as 
 you have been taught. Now," the prescribed form 
 having been observed, "you come to say that dinner 
 is served ?" 
 
 " Naw, mistis," drawled the servitor. " But de 
 Buckley kerridge drivin down de road." 
 
 " The Berkeley carriage ! Where is your Mistress 
 Evelyn?" 
 
 " Waitin at de gate, wid Mr. Fountaine, for de ker 
 ridge. Twas her sont me fur to tell you dere was 
 comp ny a-comin ." 
 
 The mistress of Westover collected her dignity. 
 
 " Be at the gate in time to let down the carriage-steps. 
 Tis not Mr. Fontaine s business. When you have 
 seen how many persons are there, go bid Osiris lay 
 that number of covers the more at table. Get you 
 gone !" 
 
 It was characteristic of Evelyn and her unconfessed 
 lover that she did not ask if he had opened the locket
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 45 
 
 lie had found, and that he did not offer to explain that 
 he had not. 
 
 " It lay on the front steps, twinkling like a star/ he 
 said, in restoring it. " The marvel is that I passed it 
 on my way out without espying it." 
 
 He felt himself color slightly in the recollection of 
 the haste and heat produced by the dialogue in the 
 study, that had made him unobservant. Evelyn, heed 
 less of his confusion, in her joyful relief from anxiety, 
 holding her recovered treasure close until it seemed to 
 give back the warm pulsing of her palm, poured out 
 thanks and blessings as upon a benefactor. 
 
 " I am right glad nobody else discovered it ! that I 
 owe the pleasure of having it back to you, mon ami!" 
 falling into and going on in his native tongue, as she 
 often did when no listeners were by. "I hope the 
 good GOD will put it into my power one day to give 
 you a great pleasure in return. For it is a great ser 
 vice you have done me, M. Fontaine. I have many 
 jewels, but I value none others as I value this. It 
 never leaves my neck, whether I sleep or whether I 
 awake. I recollect now that Lady Bess toyed with 
 the chain while she was in my arms. The clasp must 
 have been loosened thus, and the locket have fallen 
 from my gown upon the steps. I shudder to think if 
 I had lost it forever!" kissing it before putting it into 
 her pocket. " It is my amulet, a charm ; not against 
 pain or sorrow, oh, no ! I think only death can 
 secure us against them ! but against heart-break and 
 despair !" 
 
 "Heart-break and despair!" echoed Fontaine, in 
 credulously. "The words do not become your lips."
 
 46 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 lie was not given to gallant formula, and she an 
 swered in grave simplicity, 
 
 " Because I am the petted daughter of a rich man, 
 and seem to want for nothing? For all that, sorrow 
 and I have been close acquaintances for many a day. 
 We joined hands when I was a child. I was but nine 
 when my mother died. Of small-pox, too!" shudder- 
 ingly. " She, fair as the angels ever are, and delicately 
 nurtured. 
 
 "My sister and I were at school in Paris. Our 
 mother had left us but a fortnight before. I remember 
 how unwilling she was to go. But there was a great 
 court-ball in London, and my father would have her 
 attend it with him. He was very fond and proud of 
 her, but she lent him obedience in all things as every 
 body does. 
 
 "She carne into the nursery early on the morning 
 of their departure and knelt down by our bed to say 
 good-by. As she kissed me, a tear dropped on my 
 face, and I began to cry. I held her fast by the neck 
 and prayed her not to go. I said I was afraid I should 
 never see her again. My father laughed and frowned 
 at me, and bade me behave less like a baby. He 
 would bring her back in a week, he said. Didn t I 
 want the king to see the prettiest woman in his domin 
 ions? She was feverish on the night of the ball, but 
 sooner than disappoint my father she would not com 
 plain. She was never handsomer than she looked that 
 evening my poor, beautiful mother! I have her 
 court-dress, the last she ever wore, and her jewels. 
 The fever heightened her color and brightened her 
 
 o o 
 
 eyes. The king danced with her, and, in returning
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 47 
 
 her to my father when the dance was over, kissed her 
 hand, and asked my father if there were many other 
 birds in America as beautiful as she. That was much 
 for His Majesty to say." 
 
 " The talent for fine speeches does not run in the 
 House of Hanover," observed Fontaine, smiling. 
 Deeply interested as he was in the story, so naively 
 recited, a compassionate impulse warned him to change 
 the theme. " You were, yourself, presented at the 
 court of our present king, were you not ?" 
 
 " Yes ; how long how very long ago it was !" 
 
 They had sauntered away from the house into the 
 garden, passing between two immense box-trees cut 
 into the shape of peacocks, with tails broadly unfurled. 
 A gate in the garden-wall opened upon a level green, 
 over which a gravel walk led to the little parish 
 church. Other clumps of box flanked the gateway, 
 and were clipped into the semblance of gigantic urns, 
 in obedience to a fantasy of harmonious approach to 
 the burial-ground surrounding the chapel. In the 
 shade of one of these lugubrious ornaments, Evelyn 
 leaned on the wall, her eyes fixed upon the ivy-mantled 
 church, close to which slept two generations of her 
 kindred. 
 
 " It is like a dream now," she went on, softly. " I 
 was very young. I seem to have lived a century since." 
 
 The bees hummed in shrill, sweet legato about the 
 hives on the sheltered side of the wall ; the September 
 sunshine was a pale amber tissue upon land and water. 
 Even here they could discern the smell of the roses, 
 like the memory of a love-dream. /-x 
 
 "You loved the Old World very dearly, did you
 
 48 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 not?" said Fontaine, sinking his voice to the pitch of 
 hers. " If you had had your will, you would never 
 have recrossed the ocean ?" 
 
 He had put her on her guard. Whatever scene was 
 conjured up in that brief reverie, stealing seductively 
 between her and the ivied walls, it fled more fleetly 
 than it had come. 
 
 "Nay," the exquisite courtesy learned from her 
 father informing smile and tone, " that would have 
 been ingratitude, you know. Westover is my birth 
 place. I have too many dear friends here and else 
 where in America to think or speak lightly of exile. 
 So far as I can read the page lettered with my name 
 in the book of Destiny, I shall live on quietly here 
 and thus, until I am borne by this gate to my home 
 over there. I have thought, sometimes, that my sleep 
 would be more peaceful if the shadow of the church 
 fell likewise on my mother s grave. But that may 
 not be. Forgive me !" with a deprecatory smile, as she 
 saw the unfeigned pain in the dark eyes turned upon 
 her; "this is sorry, foolish talk for summer weather. 
 You are ever such an indulgent hearer that I prate my 
 thoughts, be they wise or simple, grave or gay, quite 
 
 as if I were talking to myself Surely that is the 
 
 Berkeley chariot at the far gate ! I was hoping, not 
 an hour ago, that Anne Harrison would be over to 
 day." 
 
 If her companion did not sympathize in the pleasure 
 that lent wings to her feet, he was not ill-content in 
 following her down the long alley towards the house. 
 The blessedness bound up in her ingenuous confession 
 that converse with him was almost like self-communion
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 49 
 
 gave strength sufficient for many days of fasting from 
 other assurances as sweet. The hope he had never, until 
 to-day, permitted himself to recognize in its true form 
 and fulness, much less to foster, had feathered itself 
 bravely in the last few hours. 
 
 " She knows me ; she likes me ; she trusts me !" was 
 his rapid summing-up. " Let me be assured that love 
 may follow, and no mortal force can bar my way. 
 Least of all- 
 He set his well-cut lips in unclerical indignation, as 
 over the paling dividing front and back lawns flew what 
 Evelyn playfully called her " cog des Juries," alighting 
 with screech and flutter at his mistress s feet. On the 
 thither side of the fence, peering through the lilac 
 hedge, Fontaine caught sight of the pale, sardonic 
 smile of the secretary. The teasing gobble of the 
 turkey, uneasy from indigestion or other cause, had 
 worn the scribe s patience to threads. 
 
 " What fluttered my Hassan ?" cried Evelyn, stoop 
 ing to offer her hand for the harmless peck that meant 
 a caress from the odd favorite. 
 
 Fontaine answered distinctlv, and with meaning lost 
 
 / o 
 
 upon her, but comprehended upon the other side of the 
 hedge : 
 
 " Some evil thing, doubtless. The instinct of bird 
 and beast oftentimes perceives and is affrighted by what 
 human reason overlooks."
 
 50 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE Manor-House of Berkeley was less than a mile 
 from Westover, and visible from the roof-windows. 
 Harrisons and Byrds had been close intimates for ninety 
 years, but between no two representatives of the respec 
 tive families had ever existed fonder friendship than 
 the wife of the present proprietor of Berkeley and 
 Evelyn Byrd felt the one for the other. 
 
 The gentlewoman who now stepped from her chariot 
 into her friend s embrace had done far more than her 
 nominal mother to fill the place left in the girl s heart 
 by the early death of the beautiful woman who had 
 given her birth. 
 
 " Robert Carter, Esq., of Corotoman, Lancaster 
 County, of His Majesty s Province of Virginia," is 
 better known in colonial history by the sobriquet of 
 " King Carter," bestowed upon him on account of his 
 immense possessions and the regal sway he exercised 
 over them. He was the father of twelve living children. 
 The love-match of his fairest daughter, Anne, with 
 Benjamin Harrison, of Berkeley, brought about the 
 marriage of his son John to the only child of Edward 
 Hill, Esq., of Shirley, knighted baronet for services 
 done the Crown. The princely estate of Shirley was 
 a fortified plantation as far back as the days of Sir 
 Thomas Dale, and that a young man whose twelfth 
 part of even such a realm as King Carter s did not
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 51 
 
 rank him as a householder with other of Miss Hill s 
 suitors, should have secured the heiress, was ascribed by 
 many, besides the chagrined non-suited, to his sister s 
 diplomatic talents. True or unjust, the suspicion did 
 not mar the satisfaction in existing relations of those 
 most nearly concerned. The sisters-in-law remained 
 upon affectionate terms ; John Carter left his estate in 
 the management of an overseer, and passed months at 
 a time with his wile and children at Corotoman, con 
 sulted by and co-operating with his father in the gov 
 ernment and transfer of patrimonial acres, his heiress- 
 spouse expressing herself as well-pleased with the 
 arrangement. One and all, baffled lovers and disap 
 pointed fortune-hunters, in due time forgave Mrs. 
 Harrison, each cheerfully contributing his quota of 
 attractions to win for Berkeley the reputation of being 
 the most popular house on the river. 
 
 Having married early, Mrs. Harrison was, in the 
 teeth of the rebutting evidence of half-a-dozen children, 
 still so youthful in appearance, so pretty and so viva 
 cious as to make her confidential intercourse with the 
 belle of the tide-water region altogether congruous. 
 
 Like most of the James River mansion houses, 
 Westover had two fronts, one commanding the water 
 view, the other towards carriage-road, fields, and back 
 country. The gate within which the friends paused for 
 a whispered word supplementary of their greetings, hung 
 between two square pillars. A stone ball surmounted 
 each ; on these globes were perched two leaden eagles 
 (mistaken by some natives of the soil for turkey-buz 
 zards), wings half-spread and beaks pointed upward. 
 From pillar to pillar was an arch, filled with iron
 
 52 SIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 scroll-work wrought in and about the monogram, 
 "W.E.B." 
 
 For many years afterward Pierre Fontaine never 
 passed beneath this lintel without recalling the inde 
 finable thrill that shot through him as the two graceful 
 heads leaned together for a hasty second, and light 
 sparkled from face to face. He drew aside in intuitive 
 forbearance not to hear the mutual " aside." Had it 
 reached him, it would not have made him uneasy or 
 serious. 
 
 " Contrive to see me apart for ten minutes," said 
 Mrs. Harrison. 
 
 And Evelyn : " I have had such a fright ! I must 
 tell you of it." 
 
 Madam Byrd advanced to the edge of the stone 
 platform outside of the rear door of the hall to receive 
 the visitor. Ceremony she owed Benjamin Harrison s 
 wife. Courtesy was a matter of noblesse oblige. Cor 
 diality, or a show of it, went with the entree of her 
 house. Her bitterest enemy would have had under 
 her roof-tree civility and lordly cheer. She would not 
 affect, beyond these, complaisance she did not feel. 
 And she had reason for not feeling over-complaisant. 
 Once, when nobody except her husband and step-daugh 
 ter was by, she had flung a caustic gibe at her fairest 
 and nearest neighbor. Evelyn repelled it with spirit, 
 and her father supported her by a smiling defence of 
 "a charming woman, who would ever find detractors 
 among her own sex, especially among those who had 
 erst been slim and fair themselves." 
 
 Madam had never exactly loved this particular 
 charmina; woman. From that hour she would have
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 53 
 
 disliked her as heartily as one good Christian can dis 
 like another had she not been " Ben" Harrison s faith 
 ful wife. But nobody heard another overt criticism 
 from her. 
 
 " You are just in time to take pot-luck with us," she 
 said by the time she had shaken hands with her new 
 guest. " Caliban, call Canute to take Mrs. Harrison s 
 horses around to the stable. I wish you had brought 
 Mr. Harrison with you, and your girls to see mine. 
 I hope they are in fair health? Here is Willy come 
 to ask why Ben has not been over to play with him for 
 a month of Sundays," stroking the head of her pretty 
 little son. " No, Evelyn ! do not drag Mrs. Harrison 
 to your room, when she must come right down again. 
 She can lay aside her hat in the hall." 
 
 There is an excess of hospitable attention that ap 
 proximates rudeness, and Madam Byrd s behavior 
 escaped this so narrowly that Evelyn became nervously 
 apprehensive. The excellent matron was, as she would 
 have phrased it, " in a swivel." Whatever degree of 
 general upsetativeness the word may define, her sensa 
 tions were unenviable. Her lord had been gone less 
 than four hours, and she found herself confronted by 
 a complication beyond her management. Already it 
 began to dawn upon her humbled soul that the true 
 word spoken in jest was when she averred a husband 
 to be a convenience. Liberty was one thing, and re 
 sponsibility another. And Evelyn, usually a sensible, 
 dutiful girl, of whom she was very fond, had behaved 
 badly in coquetting with, or encouraging Mr. Fontaine, 
 whichever it might be. Her temporary guardian was 
 impatient to have the house clear of visitors, that she 
 
 5*
 
 54 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 might "have it out" with the young woman and be 
 confirmed in or disabused of her misgivings. 
 
 Dinner was not served for a trying hour, despite 
 Madam s message to the cook and assurances to her 
 guests. When served, it befitted the wealth of the 
 Byrd s and their reputation for high living. After the 
 fish, which was set before Madam Byrd, and the mast- 
 fed ham (salted under the eye of the mistress, then 
 smoked with seasoned hickory-chips), that stood at the 
 far end of the board, were removed, a pair of boiled 
 chickens, stuffed with York River oysters, took the 
 place of the first- mentioned dish, and a mighty haunch 
 of venison superseded the ham. Besides these bul 
 warks of the feast, there were veal collops garnished 
 with olives, larded sweetbreads, a chine of mutton, 
 stewed terrapin, roast guinea fowl, a puree of pease; 
 potatoes, Irish and sweet, green corn, artichokes ; a 
 tongue done in jelly balancing a young turkey simi 
 larly embedded on the other side of the table, and a 
 salad of lettuce.* 
 
 Of sweets there were no less than twenty different 
 kinds, including East India sweetmeats, and persim 
 mons, gathered last Christmas and preserved in lucent 
 syrup, according to an original recipe of that notable 
 housewife, Madam Maria Byrd. 
 
 Two colored footmen, assisted by two sable hand 
 maidens, their heads done up in starched muslin tur 
 bans, waited under the captious superintendence of 
 Osiris, butler-in-chief and second in command upon 
 the plantation in the absence of the master. Even 
 
 * A bona fide bill of fare.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 55 
 
 Madam Byrd deferred to him once in many whiles, 
 and addressed him habitually in accents several semi 
 tones removed from the imperiousness which, accord 
 ing to her creed, was absolutely essential to the preser 
 vation of discipline among what she chose to consider 
 half-barbarous vassals. Caliban s office combined the 
 functions of call-boy, bearer of despatches between 
 kitchen and table, whipper-in, and flying-artillery 
 man, but he stood, when allowed to stand, behind the 
 chair of his young mistress. 
 
 Charley Carter sat with madam s four children at 
 a side-table, the sable damosels aforesaid having this 
 in especial charge. Lady Bess s high chair was be 
 tween her mother and Evelyn Byrd. Of the six 
 bairns, she was the only one who spoke unless when 
 spoken to during the hour given to the meal. The 
 rule that children, although of necessity visible to the 
 naked eye, need not be audible, obtained in force in 
 those primitive times. Even the spoiled elf conversed 
 in whispers with her neighbors to the right and left, 
 and issued orders to Sally who waited on her by twist 
 ing her head half around, or throwing it back until 
 those opposite had only a ludicrously fore-shortened 
 jumble of dimpled chin, cherry mouth, tip-tilted nose, 
 and yellow curls. That she should be at the "grown 
 folks table" at all was a violation of Westover law 
 and precedent. The juvenile Byrds looked on in won 
 der, mixed with indignation, only to be appeased by a 
 message privately conveyed through Caliban that their 
 half-sister had become security for her pet s good be 
 haviour. 
 
 The minx, put upon her honor, disturbed nobody
 
 56 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 except the two nearest her until she preferred a whis 
 pered petition for " more cream-pudding." 
 
 Her mother replied aloud, 
 
 "Say, Mr. Bass! I will take a little more pud 
 ding, if you please. " 
 
 " Yady Bess out not say p ease to dat bad man/ 
 piped the infant, ruffling up like a game pullet. 
 
 " Bess !" from her horrified parent. 
 
 "My darling !" in a whisper from Evelyn. 
 
 "Hoity-toity! these be fine airs!" from Madam 
 Byrd, temporarily forgetful of hostesshood in dread 
 lest the example should be contagious. 
 
 The secretary sat at the foot of the table when Colo 
 nel Byrd was away. His hands were thick, with short, 
 blunt fingers, but they were white and smooth, and 
 exceptionally deft and strong. He had not spoken all 
 dinner-time except to utter the formulas inseparable 
 from his office as carver. Both tables were served with 
 ham, venison, mutton, fowls, and pudding from plat 
 ters set before him. He carved skilfully and rapidly, 
 and contrived to get in an abundant repast for himself 
 consistently with his duty to others. 
 
 " He is one witted (wicked) man," continued Bess 
 in treble crescendo, accentuating the iteration with a 
 chubby index finger. " Yady Bess ont not say 
 t ankye or p ease to dat ole tat !" 
 
 A titter from the side-table and a strangled snicker 
 from Sally applauded the figure, and both mothers 
 arose to the occasion. 
 
 "Right sorry am I to hear child of mine giggle at 
 such language, albeit from a baby," said Madam, sitting 
 an inch higher in her chair.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 57 
 
 "Leave the room, Sally!" ordered Mrs. Carter. 
 " Bess ! look at me. Now, say, Mr. Bass, I beg 
 your pardon ! " 
 
 Instead of submitting, Bess glared upon the secre 
 tary, who was eating his own share of pudding with 
 every symptom of unconcern. 
 
 " He kno#ed me down an too mine p itty bos way 
 f om me. I s all tell Turnel Byrd and mine fader fen 
 dey turn home. I jink" meditatively-murderous 
 dey ill bof of em till him dead. Wif a c/un ! An 
 buckshot hit it !" 
 
 The climax in the baby-patois, joined to the com 
 placent enmity of the cherubic visage as she gloated 
 over the anticipated vengeance, was irresistible. Disci 
 pline went to pieces in the general struggle for a decent 
 measure of gravity, only the secretary remaining un- 
 infected by the prevailing disorder. Charley Carter 
 and Willy Byrd made a simultaneous rush for the 
 door, and were overheard going into convulsions on 
 the lawn. Madam was obliged to cough behind her 
 handkerchief, and Mr. Fontaine forgot clerical deco 
 rum. With it all, nobody thought of analyzing the 
 child s jabber to ascertain whether or not there were 
 an admixture of fact in her sweeping arraignment. 
 The stolid composure of the accused had much to do 
 with the omission. Plebeian phlegm, if stanch, is not 
 a bad substitute for patrician self-command when no 
 better material is at hand. 
 
 Mrs. Harrison saved the day for the nonplussed 
 mother with whom articulation was an impossibility. 
 
 " Did you see the Jaquelines sloop go by this morn 
 ing ?" she inquired of Madam Byrd, her voice treacher-
 
 58 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 o us from inward laughter. "It brought me a barrel 
 of peaches, besides oysters and yams, and two crates of 
 grapes. I must not forget to ask for your receipt for 
 making claret. These are red and purple grapes. I 
 should beg you to accept one crate, but you are so lucky 
 with everything you raise and make as to leave your 
 friends little opportunity to do anything neighborly for 
 you." 
 
 Mr. Fontaine s eyes at this instant met Evelyn s 
 across the table in a mirthful gleam that irritated the 
 step-dame into resentful recollection of the unfinished 
 receipt left on the still-room table. 
 
 "You flatter me," she said, dryly. "As to the 
 receipt, you are welcome to it. That is, if Mr. Bass 
 will copy it from my household book." 
 
 The secretary bowed assent, comprehending as little 
 of the animus of request and tone as Evelyn, who 
 colored sensitively. 
 
 " I will copy it for Anne, mamma. I have still to 
 complete what I was doing for Mrs. Carter " 
 
 " Enough !" Her step-mother stayed her with a 
 majestic wave of the hand. " Mr. Bass will transcribe 
 the receipt for Mrs. Harrison in English. I hope the 
 Jamestown folk are well ?" to Mrs. Harrison, with the 
 air of dismissing an unsafe subject. " Mistress Martha 
 will be shaming the rest of us with her Paris gowns 
 and furbelows. Does she speak of coming up the river 
 to let us have a peep at her finery ?" 
 
 " I had a letter from her." To Mr. Fontaine, if to 
 no one else, occurred the idea that Mrs. Harrison avoided 
 looking at Evelyn while she said it, directing her gaze 
 full at the hostess. " She says naught of her Paris
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 59 
 
 gear, but we are like to have a chance of judging of 
 it for ourselves, since she promises to make me a visit 
 next week." 
 
 Evelyn cried out with delight. 
 
 "And me also, I hope! I love no girl better than 
 Martha Jaqueline, and we have not met, it is now a 
 good twelvemonth !" 
 
 " Is it also recorded in your calendar that ten of the 
 twelve were spent by Mistress Martha on the other side 
 of the ocean?" Madam s temper strained upon the 
 curb. "She was ever more French than English, 
 though, like yourself, Mistress Evelyn, born in America 
 under an English king. Without doubt she will have 
 quite forgotten her mother-tongue, having, as I hear, 
 given much time while abroad to her father s kinspeople 
 in France." 
 
 "It is not a Frenchman whom she has brought home 
 in her train." Mrs. Harrison s sparkling face did not 
 reflect the uneasiness beginning to appear in that of her 
 sister-in-law at the subacid suavity of the lady of the 
 manor. u But an English cavalier. So she writes to 
 me in asking consent to bring him up the river with 
 herself." 
 
 The turn was cleverly conceived, and successful in 
 smoothing Madam s ruffled plumage. 
 
 " An English gentleman ! The sight will be welcome 
 to one pair of aching eyes ! Did she name him ? Does 
 he belong to the gentry ? or, perchance, to the nobility ?" 
 
 "She writes him down simply as a Mr. Francis, 
 and adds little by way of description." 
 
 "Nor that she means to wed him?" with the pro 
 vincial scent for gossip of courtship and matrimony.
 
 60 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " Nay that she did not hint," rejoined the other, 
 laughing. " Only that he was her fellow- voyager from 
 Havre ; that he is a gentleman by birth and breeding, 
 uot deficient in learning and the fine arts, and a traveller 
 in many lands. Furthermore, that he had letters to her 
 mother." 
 
 " That brings all right !" in judicial satisfaction. 
 " The widow of Edward Jaqueline receives as honored 
 guests none who cannot produce good reasons for pre 
 senting themselves at her door. You will not fail to 
 allow Westover a share in the pleasure of making Mr. 
 Francis welcome to our rude provinces ? Being learned 
 and a traveller, he will the more readily excuse our 
 deficiencies than some who are not used to see better 
 things. Mr. Fontaine, if I cannot prevail upon our 
 friends further to honor my humble fare, will you 
 return thanks ?" 
 
 The day was wearing toward evening when Mr. 
 Fontaine s studies in the library were interrupted by a 
 light, hasty step. The four ladies had spent the after 
 noon in the breezy hall, the hum of their voices some 
 times unheeded by the reader, sometimes distracting 
 his senses so completely that for several minutes he 
 did not turn a leaf. He needed not the evidence of 
 sight to tell him that Evelyn had left the party three 
 or four times, once remaining absent for half an hour. 
 At the touch of her foot on the threshold his frame 
 was electrically alert, but he arose with his usual calm 
 courtesy. 
 
 She came up to him swiftly. 
 
 "Mrs. Harrison is going," she said in French, low 
 and breathlessly. " I have had no opportunity for a
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 61 
 
 minute s private speech with her, though both of us 
 have essayed it once and again. Will you propose that 
 we shall all walk with her part of the way home, and 
 will you escort Mrs. Carter and mamma, should she 
 go?" 
 
 " Evelyn ! Where has the girl gone now ?" cried 
 Madam from the hall, and the daughter fled sound 
 lessly by way of the drawing-room door. 
 
 Mr. Fontaine, hat in hand, waited at the eagle gate 
 to hand Mrs. Harrison into her chariot, adieux having 
 been spoken, and according to rural custom the whole 
 family attending the departing guest to the carriage. 
 Her foot was on the step, but she turned to heed a pro 
 posal that was evidently an after-thought. 
 
 "The sunset from the top of. the hill will be fine 
 this evening," said Mr. Fontaine, naturally and per 
 suasively. "Am I bold in suggesting that you send 
 your chariot forward to wait for you at the trysting- 
 tree while these ladies" indicating the group she was 
 quitting " walk with you that far? I know" with 
 his pleasant smile " that I am selfish in offering my 
 self as escort for the party." 
 
 Madam Byrd would have been at a loss with the 
 lights then at her call to state why she had of inten 
 tion hindered Evelyn s coveted t&tc-H-t&te with her 
 friend. She would have been more perplexed if asked 
 to account for the heat that coursed through her veins 
 and heightened the fresh color in her comely cheeks at 
 the prompt acquiescence in Mr. Fontaine s suggestion 
 that put it out of her power to negative it. Mrs. Har 
 rison had stepped back to the ground, declaring that 
 nothing could be more charming. Mrs. Carter and
 
 62 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Evelyn had chimed in with exclamations of like effect. 
 Madam could, and did, decline to join the party, and 
 she called after the quartette a warning, voiced like 
 a threat, of the danger of the river-air at sunset. A 
 Londoner by birth and life, she was an authority upon 
 fogs. Mrs. Harrison answered merrily over her shoul 
 der; Mr. Fontaine looked back to lift his hat in ac 
 knowledgment of her kindly concern in their behalf, 
 then walked on to offer his arm to Mrs. Carter. 
 
 Re-entering her own hall frowningly, Madam faced 
 the secretary. A brass-bound cedar pail of water stood 
 on a shelf just within the door. He was in the act 
 of dipping into it the white gourd that hung, when 
 not in use, upon a nail beside the pail. The action 
 was common, the man s air commonplace, yet she 
 divined that he had witnessed the scene at the gate 
 and liked it even less than she. The consciousness 
 hurried her into indiscretion unusual in such presence. 
 
 " I wish Colonel Byrd would stay at home to look 
 after his daughter, instead of racketing off to the mines, 
 and Lord knows where else !" she ejaculated, pettishly. 
 
 The smile that replied was the pallid, joyless gleam 
 that had provoked Fontaine to sarcasm at noon, but 
 the thin lips were not parted, and as she swept up 
 stairs she heard the click of the study-door that shut 
 him in. The remembrance of her peevish outbreak 
 did not annoy her. Colin was a good scribe, and a 
 convenient man to have about the house, but lao-o-ard 
 
 / oo 
 
 iii wit poor wretch ! 
 
 The trysting-tree marked the boundary line of the 
 Westover estate. Beyond lay the Berkeley Plantation, 
 the " Berkeley Hundred" of earlier days. From
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 63 
 
 time immemorial the pretty custom of Harrisons and 
 Byrds was to take their evening meal together many 
 times each summer, under this wide-branched oak. 
 Servants from each manor-house brought thither ham 
 pers of provisions, napery and table plenishings, and 
 young and old, members of the two families and guests, 
 supped jovially in good fellowship. 
 
 Beneath this tree, and on such an evening as this, 
 Benjamin Harrison first beheld and instantly fell in 
 love with blithe Anne Carter. Rumor said she had 
 the incident in mind when she brought together, under 
 like circumstances, her brother John and the heiress of 
 Sir Edward Hill. Certain it is that she liked the spot 
 passing well, and dwelt fondly and often upon trysts 
 and love-scenes that had made it memorable for much 
 besides such natural beauty as greeted the eyes of the 
 pedestrians on this afternoon. 
 
 The two friends had walked briskly up the slight 
 ascent, but, while Mrs. Harrison was flushed by the 
 exercise, Evelyn was pale and agitated when they 
 halted amid the green shadows. 
 
 " Martha met him many times, you say, and they talked 
 of me ?" she faltered. " That would mean " 
 
 " That he is true and resolute ! Why do you 
 tremble, dear? Martha will tell you all when you 
 meet next week, in six days more. She is a brave 
 and loyal friend ; oh, so brave ! Think over what I 
 have said, for it is but to prepare you for more and 
 surprising things she has to tell, may be to propose. 
 I have kept until now a letter enclosed in mine for 
 you. Here it is. Nay, you must not open it yet; for 
 hear what she directs of it in mine," drawing it from
 
 64 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 her pocket. " Tell Evelyn not to break tlie seal of 
 that which I enclose unless she feels in her heart war 
 rant to trust herself to a love that believes all things, 
 hopes all things, and dares all things. I counsel her 
 to wait until she is safely shut within her chamber, and 
 the door double-locked, and Madam asleep (if she ever 
 closes more than one eye at a time !). Then and there, 
 having said her prayers to the Defender of the right, 
 let her, still kneeling, open and read and ponder the 
 pacquet I herewith send to her. Unless she promise 
 these tilings, I charge you to fling the said pacquet into 
 flood or fire, as may be more convenient. Return reply 
 from yourself and Evelyn by sloop which drops down 
 the river with the tide to-morrow morning. " 
 
 Mrs. Harrison returned the letter to its hiding-place 
 and continued, hurriedly : 
 
 "The others will soon be here, dear child. They 
 would have overtaken us ere now were not Mr. Fontaine 
 an angel in a black coat. Should your answer to Mar 
 tha be Aye, send me this" plucking a knot of blue 
 ribbon from her sleeve "as soon after sunrise as may 
 be possible on the morrow. I do not ask you to write, 
 for that may not be easy when you have read your 
 letter. And keep it until you are in your own room 
 to-night, as Martha says. Good- by, my darling! GOD 
 bless you and make von strong !" 
 
 * / o 
 
 To cover the agitation her companion could not at 
 once master, she moved in front of her to meet the 
 forms just appearing among the bushy growth below, 
 hailing them scoffingly, 
 
 " Go to, now, ye sluggards ! consider our ways, 
 and be wise !"
 
 JUS GREAT SELF. 65 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE demon of perversity, Lady Bess s preferred 
 familiar, instigated her that evening to refuse to be 
 put to sleep elsewhere than in the gentle arms that had 
 cradled her for her morning nap. Having carried this 
 point, she moved, furthermore, that she would sleep all 
 night in Evelyn s room and bed or nowhere. 
 
 Mrs. Carter almost wept over her recalcitrant off 
 spring, and opined, as millions of other mothers have 
 since that "all so long ago," that "children always 
 seize upon the occasions of being abroad or in com 
 pany to behave their worst." Madam Byrd, her lips 
 tightly plaited, watched grimly the contest which took 
 place in the hall soon after supper, and Mr. Fontaine, 
 booted and spurred for his homeward ride, looked on 
 in silence as compassionate as hers was severe. 
 
 For the girl over whom the unequal contest went on 
 was the sad shadow of her whom he had seen in the 
 mirror-depths ten hours ago. Her eyes were dark and 
 large with wistfulness; her cheek was as colorless as a 
 magnolia-petal ; her very figure looked slighter and her 
 hands thinner. Madam Byrd had remarked upon 
 Evelyn s lack of appetite at supper-time, and attributed 
 her lassitude to the depressing effect of riverside walks 
 after sundown. 
 
 "One might think that people who had lived in an 
 unhealthy region all their born days would learn not to 
 expose themselves recklessly." 
 e 6*
 
 66 If IS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Fontaine winced at this, but not for himself. It 
 was plain that Evelyn was weary from some occult 
 cause, and in need of rest, and he did his best towards 
 gaining it for her by an early leave-taking. 
 
 She forestalled his intention by a sudden movement. 
 
 " Let me have her," she said, stooping to lift the 
 sobbing child from her mother s knee. " She will make 
 herself ill. Bess ! do you hear what I say ? Leave off 
 crying and we will go up-stairs, and you shall sleep in 
 my room. Yes, I know that you love me!" a smile 
 like wan sunlight flitting over her countenance at the 
 fervor of the spoiled imp s embraces, and the shower 
 of wet kisses rained upon her brow and cheeks. " But 
 you must kiss poor mamma, too, and promise to be a 
 better girl another night before I can say that /love 
 you." 
 
 At the outcry from mother and nurse at the sight of 
 the slight form swaying under the weight of the baby, 
 Mr. Fontaine interposed : 
 
 "Lady Bess will let me carry her up-stairs, I am 
 sure." 
 
 With a gurgle of innocent pleasure, the beauteous 
 load nodded approval. She even locked her fat arms 
 behind his neck on the way up and cooed, " I yove 
 oo !" In the same breath she spat out virulently, 
 " Bass is a ugly nigger /" 
 
 " Poor Mr. Bass is in her black books to-day for some 
 unknown reason," said Evelyn, waiting in the opeu door 
 of her room for him to transfer his charge to her. " She 
 hates as she loves, with her whole heart. Thank you 
 for bringing her up, and for all else you have done for 
 me this day."
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 07 
 
 He bowed reverently. The maiden-bower, the in 
 terior of which he now saw for the first time, was a 
 shrine. He could not have told the position of a single 
 article of furniture, or what it was ; but he carried away 
 a dream of purity and fragrance, of cool, gray dusks and 
 reaches of silvery moon-rays, and in the foreground a 
 figure and face like an angel s, that looked gratefully 
 up at him. 
 
 His way home lay through the heart of woods where 
 owls, startled by the beat of his horse s hoofs, hooted 
 dismally; rabbits ran across the road in front of him, 
 whippoorwills cried to one another, and frogs bellowed 
 hollowly in the bayou swamps. Letting his rein hang 
 loose upon the horse s neck, he rode onward with dream 
 ful eyes that saw only the vision he bore with him, and 
 ears that heard but the silver ring of a woman s voice, 
 thanking him "for all else he had done for her that 
 day." 
 
 Lady Bess took her own time and plenty of it for 
 getting to sleep. Endued in her night-gown and cap, 
 her curls escaping, like rings of floss-silk, from the lace 
 edge, she lay against Evelyn s shoulder, harmless and 
 fond as a turtle-dove, cooing and lisping that her guar 
 dian was the " boo flest yady in ee worl ," and that she 
 "yoved her a whole heartful, an ten million barnfuls," 
 her artless head the while crushing the muslin folds 
 above Martha Jaqueline s unread letter. 
 
 Colin Bass, strolling down the moonlit, rose-bordered 
 walks curving from the east to the west gates, heard 
 a faint voice singing a lullaby, and looked up at the 
 unlighted windows from which the music floated down 
 to his greedy ears. Half an hour later, while on the
 
 68 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 same beat, he saw the gleam of a lamp, and the singing 
 had ceased. 
 
 " The little she-devil has let her off at last !" he mut 
 tered to the discreet moon. 
 
 Literally obedient to the behest of her imperious 
 friend, Evelyn said her prayers before unsealing the 
 packet she longed, yet almost feared, to read. She 
 prayed silently, her face hidden in the drapery of the 
 bed whereon Lady Bess slept the sleep of the con 
 scienceless unjust. Now and then a shiver ran through 
 the body and limbs of the kneeling figure, and once an 
 audible moan shook the white stillness of the chamber. 
 Not until her petitions were ended did she light the 
 lamp upon the stand at the bed-head, and then she did 
 not rise from her knees. There was a vein of super 
 stition in her nature to which Martha Jaqueline s adju 
 ration appealed with force. While breaking the seal of 
 the letter, she said aloud, "G(>D help me !" and " GOD 
 forgive me if I am doing wrong !" before unfolding the 
 sheet. 
 
 She read fast and excitedly after passing the first 
 lines, eyes dilated and quivering lips apart with eager 
 ness. At the very foot of the last page, below the 
 signature, a line had been added by another hand than 
 that which had written the rest : 
 
 "Eva ! J attends encore ! f attends toujours /" 
 
 She raised the sheet to her lips, kissing these last 
 words over and over, between sobs and inarticulate 
 cries, laughing and weeping together. 
 
 Madam Byrd s prejudice against early and late 
 rambles was apparently not shared by her lord s secre 
 tary. The sunrise of the day succeeding Mrs. Har-
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. (J9 
 
 rison s visit saw him in the broad lane dividing the 
 Westover and Berkeley plantations, and opposite the 
 gate of the latter, on his return from a walk of three 
 miles into the back country. He wore knee-breeches, 
 black stockings and stout shoes, and a jerkin of buff 
 leather buttoned to his chin ; a silk skull-cap, that would 
 not be in the way in his tramp in the low-boughed forest, 
 was upon his head. His complexion was freshened by 
 the damp air, and he forged ahead in the middle of the 
 road, swinging a big stick, with the gait and mien of a 
 well-made, healthy, and unfatigued man. 
 
 Right at the Berkeley gate lay something white and 
 small. Bass crossed over and picked it up. It was a 
 dainty parcel, soft to the touch, done up in silver paper. 
 Opening it, he beheld a knot of ribbon which he had 
 remarked yesterday upon Mrs. Harrison s sleeve. His 
 forefinger went up to the scar upon his chin; with his 
 head tilted a little to one side, he studied the bit of 
 finery with a vague, irrational idea that it portended 
 something. How came it here, and thus enveloped ? 
 The wearer had not gone home by this route. From his 
 lookout in the shadowy hall, he had certainly seen that 
 both sleeves were adorned with blue satin bows, as she 
 took Evelyn Byrd s arm and walked on in advance 
 of Mrs. Carter and Mr. Fontaine. He plumed him 
 self, and with reason, upon the eyesight which was as 
 quick and vigilant of every detail as that of an Indian 
 scout. 
 
 Light came soon, and from an unexpected source. 
 In the avenue, more than half a mile long, leading 
 straight to the Berkeley manor-house, he saw a 
 moving form tacking from side to side of the way,
 
 70 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 and stooping occasionally to examine a clump of grass 
 or weeds. As it approached, Bass saw that it was 
 Caliban. He was a handsome fifteen-year-old half- 
 breed, the son of a negress and of an Indian father, who 
 had bequeathed to him stature, litheness, and cunning. 
 The secretary knew himself to be the object of con 
 temptuous dislike with Colonel Byrd s unsalaried de 
 pendents, and liked none of them, while affecting not 
 to notice sly impertinence and overt disrespect. Be 
 tween himself and Caliban there was war as open as 
 was safe for the slave to wage against a white man 
 protected by his master and mistress. As it was, the 
 manoeuvres by which the scribe had contrived, on 
 divers occasions, to bring certain elfish tricks practised 
 upon himself to the mistress s knowledge without actu 
 ally playing the tell-tale, had drawn down condign 
 retribution upon the perpetrator. 
 
 In a twinkling, the secretary had the key to the pres 
 ent enigma. Mrs. Harrison had lost the ribbon-knot 
 on the path to the trysting-tree ; it was found by the 
 returning party. Evelyn had sent her page over with 
 it to the owner; he had dropped it, and not discovered 
 the loss until he reached Berkeley house. He was now 
 searching for it. 
 
 Without further hesitation, Bass pocketed the trifle 
 and walked right on to meet the delinquent. Caliban s 
 black eyes were rolling perturbedly; his skin was the 
 hue of a dusty copper-kettle; his violent start on per 
 ceiving the secretary was palpable evidence of guilt. 
 In the shock of the meeting, he lowered his guard so 
 far as to pull off his cap to Bass, who would have 
 passed without speaking, and to accost the last man to
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 71 
 
 whom he would in ordinary circumstances have applied 
 for information or help. 
 
 " Morn in , Mr. Bass, suh ! You ain happen fur to 
 see a little teeny bundle lyin roun nowhar on de groun , 
 is you, suh ?" 
 
 Bass looked him over from head to foot in cold dis 
 dain, and moved onward without halting or speaking. 
 It was his hour, and he improved it. Beau Brummell 
 could not have achieved more superb nonchalance if 
 addressed on the Mall by a shabby creditor. 
 
 Caliban stood still in the middle of the road, glower 
 ing after his enemy. He clenched his fists, and his lips 
 curled back from gnashing teeth. The savagery in 
 his veins leaped past the merry, devil-may-care guise 
 under which most people knew him. 
 
 "The low-live limb <> Satan!" he hissed. "I d 
 give my hade ter know ef he done foun it. I d ruther 
 take nine- n-thirty on my bar back n have to tell 
 Mis Evelyn I los dat bundle, else I ouldn a let 
 myself down so fur ez to ax him bout it, de low- 
 down honn !" 
 
 Nobody was astir at Berkeley except the servants ; 
 but Bass took the precaution to ask for Mrs. Harrison s 
 own maid, and to deliver the parcel into her keeping, 
 without condescending to explanations, and doubled 
 upon his track, serene in the consciousness of having 
 done the woman he loved a good turn, and a foe he 
 despised an ill. 
 
 Shrewd and cool-headed as he was, he, like every 
 other creature of mortal mould, had his pet supersti 
 tion. 
 
 " I have picked up two valuables within twenty-four
 
 72 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 hours," he said, smiling sourly in thinking of Lady 
 Bess and the voracious gobbler. " The third will be 
 along soon, and be most precious of all." 
 
 The morning was less bright than at dawn, overcast 
 by clouds, and not fogs. He recollected Madam Byrd s 
 prognostications of falling weather, based upon the 
 dewless sward. The sun had arisen luridly before he 
 reached Berkeley, dyeing the river blood-red. The 
 smoke from the chimneys of the Westover "quarters" 
 fell and spread broadly at the level of the tree-tops; 
 the boding cry of the rain-crow sounded from the 
 church-yard as he ncared it. His scheming brain was 
 usually allowed a rest before breakfast. His matuti 
 nal tramp was conscientious recreation. He was sys 
 tematically as kind to himself as he knew how to be, 
 and he had made self-benevolence a study. He had 
 walked his body into a capital appetite, and his diges 
 tive apparatus into tone that would justify him in in 
 dulging his palate. What he had observed as he went 
 along was considered as superficially as was consistent 
 with his principle of letting nothing escape notice or 
 memory. He caught a glimpse of the rusty-brown 
 bird of ill-omen flitting from one branch to another 
 and uttering his discordant cry, and having scraped 
 together a smattering of natural history, with a little 
 of everything else from his erudite chief, he wondered 
 why even colonial ignoramuses should refer the creature 
 to the genus corvus. 
 
 Down the central alley of the garden, over the inter 
 vening paddock and past the chapel, flitting between 
 the tombstones, and so, straight to where he had paused, 
 wonder-stricken at the apparition, Evelyn Byrd sped
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 73 
 
 up to him. Her hat was in her hand, having evidently 
 been caught up as she ran out of the house ; there was 
 not a tinge of color in her face ; her eyes were wild 
 with fear. 
 
 " Mr. Bass," she began, when within speaking dis 
 tance, " did you find I have lost that is, Caliban 
 
 dropped I thought, perhaps " Here breath and 
 
 voice failed her. 
 
 Bass plucked off his cap and bowed respectfully. 
 
 "I think I found what your messenger lost, Miss 
 Byrd. I carried it over to Berkeley, and sent it up 
 to Mrs. Harrison. I hope I acted wisely ?" 
 
 Every one of his measured words appeared to con 
 vey exquisite relief. She clasped her hands, and looked 
 up at him as to a deliverer. 
 
 " Wisely ! Oh, mon dieu ! How can I thank you ? 
 I was in terror lest " 
 
 She leaned against a tree and burst into tears, weep 
 ing so violently that she scarcely knew who led her 
 gently into the church-porch and seated her on a 
 bench. Calming herself the sooner for the quiet and 
 seclusion of the place, she smiled presently, still with 
 suffused eyes, at seeing Bass fanning her with the hat 
 she had let fall. 
 
 "Pardon me. I was very silly," she was begin 
 ning to say, when he interrupted with, 
 
 " You ran too rapidly, and the morning is close. 
 Such an attack of faint ness and breathlessness is quite 
 natural in the circumstances. Allow me to explain 
 that, finding the parcel, and recognizing to whom the 
 ribbon belonged, I guessed that she had lost it and you 
 found it. I took the further liberty of restoring it to
 
 74 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 the owner. The whole affair is perfectly simple, 
 such a trifle as not to deserve your thanks." 
 
 Evelyn put out her hand impulsively. He took it 
 in his and held it for one supreme, intoxicating second. 
 He had never touched it before. The distance between 
 him and the daughter of the house was an established 
 fact, a fixed gulf. His breath clogged his throat ; 
 the blood beat upon his brain ; he staggered a step, 
 and rested against the post of the open door. 
 
 Unobservant of his agitation, Evelyn ran on, not 
 yet coherently, 
 
 "You have done me a signal kindness and Mrs. 
 Harrison a favor. I was so terrified when Caliban 
 told me of his carelessness and the time was so short 
 that I fear me I behaved strangely enough. Forgive 
 rny folly. I slept ill last night, if, indeed, I slept at 
 all." 
 
 "On account of that wretched child," escaped Bass s 
 lips before he could catch himself up. 
 
 Evelyn blushed painfully while trying to speak 
 gavly. 
 
 " Do not cast the blame upon poor little Bess. She 
 slept soundly enough. I was but trying to show you 
 that there are excuses for my weakness. You will not 
 betray it to others or think of it again, I am sure?" 
 with a look that ravished his wits. 
 
 "Never while I live!" he protested, earnestly and 
 absurdly. 
 
 "Nay! a less vehement oath would suffice!" She 
 looked and spoke like her usual self, and arose with 
 maidenly dignity. " It was a kind thought to bring 
 rne hither. There are strength and comfort in the very
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 75 
 
 air of a church," glancing into the cool shadows of the 
 interior. " The winter we spent in Rome, I used to go 
 with only my maid to St. Peter s, and sit there a long 
 time, thinking out perplexing things. The place and the 
 spirit pervading it helped me. I could not tell why." 
 
 "Yet you are not a Catholic?" 
 
 He had put his hand under her elbow, as any man, 
 even a footman, might, as she descended the two steps 
 of the porch, and still dizzy with the renewed throb 
 and thrill of the contact, spoke at random. 
 
 She turned suddenly upon him, lips ready for speech 
 as impetuous as the movement, then checked the 
 impulse, and walked beside him for a silent minute, her 
 face toward the river and averted from him. 
 
 "Not a Roman Catholic !" came at length, in a tone 
 that was all gentleness. "But I believe in the Holy 
 Catholic Church, and in the communion of saints. We 
 are too prone to forget who said, * Other sheep I have 
 that are not of this fold. " 
 
 "She got that from her ghostly director," meditated 
 Bass. And still inly, " - - him !" 
 
 Instead of following the walk leading to the garden, 
 Evelyn had taken one skirting the river-bank, then 
 bending towards a tall iron gate capped by the Byrd 
 coat-of-arms, that gave upon rose-walk and lawn. She 
 moved languidly, and neither offered further remark 
 until they were at the squared stone steps before the 
 front door of the mansion. 
 
 The day could not breathe under the blue-black pall 
 rolling up all around the horizon; the water was like 
 slow molten lead ; the leaves of the poplars lay back 
 flat against the stems, the whitish under side upward.
 
 7G HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " It will rain of a certainty," Evelyn aroused herself 
 to say, pausing upon the platform. 
 
 " The Jamestown sloop is lucky in that she goes down 
 with the tide," answered Bass. 
 
 He had no small-talk at his command, but feeling 
 for the first time on a level with her, unconsciously 
 imitated the tone and ways of those other men he had 
 hated for enjoying the right to lounge beside her in her 
 walks, sit by her when she sat, and chatter society 
 banalities. In another moment she would be gone. He 
 would detain her while he could. 
 
 " Mon dicu /" broke from her a second time. She 
 leaned forward eagerly to look out upon the river to 
 where a small vessel, with but half her rigging un 
 furled, wallowed sluggishly down the channel. 
 
 As if fascinated, the girl continued to watch her until 
 she was on a line with the dock. Irresolution, doubt, 
 fear, and vivid gleams of a light the observer could not 
 define, appeared and were gone, like shadows upon 
 water. In the delusive atmosphere presaging storm, 
 the craft seemed so near one might have hailed her 
 with hope of a reply. 
 
 " I suppose it would be quite possible to stay her 
 even now, if one wished/ said Evelyn, in forced 
 levity. u My voice is not strong, but if I should make 
 a speaking-trumpet of my hands, thus, and halloo, the 
 sailors would hear me, would they not ? If I were to 
 bethink myself of something to be sent to my friend, 
 Mistress Martha Jaqueline, the captain could heave to, 
 have the helm turned inland, and come into the West- 
 over dock, could he not? I would fain try." 
 
 "Oberon would mistake it for Titania s call !" ven-
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 77 
 
 tured the enchanted secretary in clumsy compliment ; 
 "or a troop of obedient fairies, headed by Puck, would 
 troop up the lawn." 
 
 He thought the turn neat, and was somewhat dashed 
 in spirits that she paid no attention to it. She was so 
 distracting! y lovely in her capricious changes of mood 
 and countenance, that he could have stayed to watch her 
 all day, had she given him never another word or look, 
 only leaned forward in that attitude of eager, almost 
 expectant grace, hardly seeming to breathe while follow 
 ing the vessel with her beautiful eyes. 
 
 He knew so little of women s witcheries and weak 
 ness, that when the sloop had slipped down a bow-shot 
 below the wharf, and, throwing out another sail, tacked 
 boldly for the other shore, and Evelyn, with a low cry, 
 " She has gone /" sank, a breathless heap, at his feet, he 
 was wholly unprepared for a revulsion so entire and 
 alarming. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 A MESSENGER on a bare-backed mule trotted over 
 from Berkeley through the pouring rain that afternoon. 
 Mr. Harrison had been taken seriously ill during the 
 night, and grown so much worse by noon that the 
 neighborhood physician had been sent for. At four 
 o clock he had not arrived. The errand of the drip 
 ping Mercury was to beg of Madam Byrd one of the 
 simples for the preservation and use of which she had 
 a reputation, and that she would look in upon the 
 patient as soon as the weather would permit.
 
 78 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 She ordered her chariot forthwith, and stocked it 
 with the desired remedy in abundance, eight or ten 
 bundles of herbs, and as many gallipots and phials, 
 with a supply of jelly, broth, and gruel that would 
 have nourished the ward of a city hospital. The 
 county held not a better or a more willing nurse, and 
 that she knew her worth in this regard did not make 
 her otherwise than gentle and efficient in the hour of 
 need. 
 
 Instead of returning home that night, she sent back 
 for a change of clothing, and held the fort against sur 
 prise and siege by deatli for four days. Evelyn, still 
 pallid from the indisposition that had overtaken her 
 on the morning succeeding the riverside ramble, spent 
 part of eacli day with her afflicted friend, but was 
 regularly ordered home before sunset by the corn- 
 mander-in-chief, whom even the surgeon durst not 
 gainsay. 
 
 "She will be coming down next," complained 
 Madam on the fifth day, which was Sunday, to Mrs. 
 Carter, who had prolonged her visit to Westover at the 
 earnest petition of the hostess and her step-daughter. 
 "She looks like a puff of air would lift her now. I 
 have ever insisted that September is the sickliest month 
 of the year in the low country, and mayhap, when I 
 and my poor children are food for worms, Colonel 
 Eyrd may come around to my way of thinking. That 
 girl has wasted to a shadow in less than a week. I 
 have put her upon port and bark to-day, and would 
 be obliged if you will see that she takes it thrice a day. 
 Also, bid Osiris prepare a bottle one-quarter full of 
 well-rusted nails and filled up with hard cider, of
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 79 
 
 which she should take a glassful at rising and another 
 at bed-time. Were it not that Mr. Fontaine and she 
 appear to be on such excellent terms, I should suspect 
 a lover s quarrel. The Lord forgive me for naming 
 him or any other man as her lover, and her father 
 away from home ! 
 
 "I m reckoning high upon Martha Jaqueline s 
 coming to cheer Evelyn up, and the English gallant 
 will doubtless divert her from the dumps. And this 
 is what I wanted to see you about. I ve fairly wor 
 ried Anne Harrison into agreeing that they shall be 
 put off at our wharf, instead of at Berkeley. It stands 
 to reason that her husband will be driven fair beside 
 himself to have such junkettings and curvettings in 
 the house as go with Martha Jaqueline everywhere, to 
 say naught of his wife s place being at his side. Stay 
 you, then, at Westover and play duenna to the young 
 folk until I can come back, which, please GOD, will 
 be soon, if Ben grow no worse. I have a soft spot in 
 my heart for him, now he s in so sore a case." 
 
 " She has a soft spot for everybody who is in trouble, 
 I think," said Mrs. Carter, in repeating the talk over 
 the dinner-table to Evelyn and Mr. Fontaine, the taci 
 turn carver at the foot of the board counting for noth 
 ing. "She has a marvellous head, too, as you would 
 know had you heard the messages sent by me to the 
 servants. I prayed leave to write them down. My 
 brain would not carry them. Yet she forgot naught 
 from guest-chamber to cellar. She even named the 
 
 o 
 
 men who are to man the boat to be sent off from the 
 wharf to stay the sloop on her way to Berkeley. She 
 will herself write the note to Martha conveying the
 
 80 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 invitation and giving reason for the change of plan, 
 which is to be sent in the boat. It would best come 
 from her, she says, and not from you, Evelyn." 
 
 Mr. Fontaine lent the narrator courteous but divided 
 attention ; for Evelyn s fork had fallen from her 
 hand and the glass of water she lifted to her lips 
 shook. She caught his eye before lie could look away. 
 Her glance was that of a hunted thing ready to fly, 
 yet entangled beyond the possibility of moving. She 
 drank hastily, set down the tumbler and laughed, 
 strainedly; her voice was almost sharp, 
 
 " Fate is fate !" she cried. " Martha had no right 
 to promise Anne Harrison a visit that should have been 
 mine. I shall tell her so, and show how destiny is on 
 the side of equity. And, then, we will do our bravest 
 to reconcile her to the exchange of residence and 
 mamma s absence." 
 
 The others laughed at the demure addenda. Madam 
 Byrd s wordy encounters with Mistress Martha were 
 historical. Colonel Byrd likened them to the English 
 and French forces, and took huge delight in pitting 
 them against one another. 
 
 " Mistress Martha is proficient with the rapier," he 
 said. "Madam will have no weapon but the broad 
 sword. Both are fair marksmen ; but one has skill in 
 pistol-practice, while the other brings the blunderbuss 
 up to her shoulder and draws a fine bead upon her man, 
 in honest British fashion." 
 
 Mrs. Carter s reply was not, then, so irrelevant as it 
 sounded. 
 
 "Madam Byrd deserves all the more praise, these 
 things being so. Her orders are that all hospitable
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 81 
 
 honors shall be done your friend and Edward Jaque- 
 line s daughter. Her respect for his memory is great." 
 
 "Colony and church had an incurable loss in his 
 death," rejoined Mr. Fontaine, and led the talk to 
 reminiscences of one of the noblest, as he was one of 
 the wealthiest, men of his day and region. 
 
 Evelyn s friendliness towards the rector was marked 
 for the rest of the day. Encouraged by it, he drew a 
 chair to her side as she sat awhile before sunset in the 
 middle of the hall, Lady Bess on her knee, and the big 
 Dutch Bible, clamped at the corners with massive 
 ornaments of wrought brass, upon the table before 
 them. 
 
 Bess was in a Sabbath mood, oddly dissimilar to that 
 in which she had menaced her brother and the Byrd 
 children with clenched fist and flashing eyes from too 
 near approach to what she had pre-empted as her pre 
 serves, Evelyn s lap, and Evelyn s talk of the curi 
 ous engravings embellishing the mighty volume. Her 
 golden poll rested against her guardian s shoulder ; her 
 chubby hands were pressed together like thoughts 
 adjusting themselves for prayer; her eyes were clear 
 and rapt ; even her smile was serenely slow. Her chas 
 tened beauty would have made her fond mother tremble 
 for the continued life of her darling, had she been there 
 
 O 
 
 to see, instead of having gone again to Berkeley for the 
 latest news of the beloved patient. 
 
 The great book lay open at a picture which teacher 
 and pupil were contemplating seriously as Mr. Fontaine 
 joined them. It was a fearfully realistic representation 
 of the scourging in Pilate s hall. The hands of the 
 victim were tied at the wrists to an iron rin made fast
 
 82 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 ill a pillar ; behind the executioner was a Roman soldier, 
 holding a bundle of fresh rods ; a lean, wicked-eyed 
 dog crept up to lick the bloody pedestal. 
 
 Evelyn looked up mutely at the rector s approach, 
 then, again, as silently to the awful object-lesson. Lady 
 Bess said with sugared imperiousness, 
 
 " Oo wead e hard words, Misser Fonten." 
 
 " Papa read the Latin to her one day, and the sound 
 pleased her ear," added Evelyn. " One might almost 
 believe that she comprehended their meaning." 
 
 The reverent voice of the scholar rendered the in 
 scription, " Vulneratus est propter iniquitates nostras ; 
 attritus est propter scelera nostra : disdplina pads nostrse 
 super eum, et livore eius sanatl sumus." 
 
 " Fitty ! p itty !" sighed Bess, satisfiedly. 
 
 Evelyn s eyes brimmed with warm, sweet tears. She 
 raised her hand furtively to brush them away before 
 she spoke, 
 
 " A strange impulse came to me this morning in 
 church," without looking up. "Something tempted 
 me to wait on my knees until the others had departed ; 
 then to ask you to listen to my confession, and to ab 
 solve me. Are you displeased? Have I shocked 
 you ?" 
 
 He was serious, but not stern, to her arch pleading. 
 Beyond the seriousness was the steady glow of a pure 
 fire that illumined the fine face. He laid a finger im 
 pressively upon the bowed Figure in the picture: 
 
 " There is the only Confessor ! DiscipUna pads nos- 
 trce super eum! Unto Him is the cry of the human 
 heart : O Lamb of GOD, who takest away the sins of 
 the world, have mercy upon us ! "
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 83 
 
 " He is afar off, Mr. Fontaine." Her mouth trem 
 bled ; more tears were ready to fall. 
 
 "Dear Miss Byrd, no earthly friend is so near. 
 Surely you know this !" 
 
 She shook her head, setting her teeth upon her lower 
 lip to control the quiver. 
 
 " Once, perhaps ! Of late, my prayers rise no 
 higher than my head." 
 
 Fontaine s theology would not second the plea put in 
 by his heart for the beloved sinner, that the symptoms 
 of physical malaise were often confounded with those 
 of spiritual disorder. He was a priest, and a con 
 scientious one. 
 
 " That would seem to show that something had come 
 between your soul and GOD," he said, fearlessly. 
 
 She winced and blenched as at a needle-prick. Her 
 eyes returned to the stricken Form, the cruel scourges, 
 the creeping cur. 
 
 "Yet you will not confess me? Will not appoint 
 me a penance? Will not absolve me?" 
 
 Each whispered word was a tempter to the man 
 within him. Had his Protestantism been of a more 
 ductile type, he would have crossed himself and said a 
 mental exorcism. 
 
 "GoD forbid!" he said, fervently. "He knows, 
 too, how every thought of you is a prayer that His 
 peace may possess your soul " 
 
 She interrupted him. "That is a pax vobiscum! 
 Thank you ! Whether you meant it or not, it does 
 my sotd good like a medicine." 
 
 " Yady Bess don yike nossy med cin !" commented 
 the cherub, in pensive dissent.
 
 84 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Fontaine answered as if Evelyn had said it : " Old 
 Samuel Rutherford writes to an afflicted friend, Be 
 sure the Lord must love you very much, or He would 
 not give you so much and so bitter medicine. The 
 saying has helped me, oft and again." 
 
 " So much and so bitter medicine! repeated 
 Evelyn, musingly. " Suppose one had lived upon 
 that and little else for years and years; had it 
 mingled with his bread and drink ; found each morn 
 ing at rising the bitter draught set at his bedside; in 
 every scene of pleasure felt the acrid drops upon his 
 lip, would that soul be sickly or healthy, think you, 
 Sir Priest?" 
 
 "The Great Physician makes no mistakes. The cup 
 given to each man to drink is for himself, and no other. 
 Health and sickness depend upon the spirit in which 
 the draught is swallowed." 
 
 " Is nothing sweet wholesome ?" 
 
 She asked it abruptly. His soothing voice atoned 
 for the didacticism of the reply : " With GOD S blessing, 
 the bitter is sweet !" 
 
 Lady Bess twisted herself around to cast her arms 
 about her friend s neck. 
 
 " Mine Eva is sweet !" kissing her fast and hard. 
 "Mine Eva! Her is nobody s Eva but jus on y 
 mine !" 
 
 A crimson rush suffused the girl s face, a blush 
 that burned and hurt by the impetuosity of the tide. 
 Without a sound, she snatched up the child and carried 
 her off up the stairs. 
 
 Fontaine had arisen with her, and stood gazing at 
 the lauding where she had disappeared, a flush like
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 85 
 
 the reflection of her blush upon his olive cheek. A 
 chuckle from the door of the study aroused him from 
 his stupefaction. Bass was coming out of the room, 
 hat in hand, bound upon his evening walk. He might 
 have seen and heard all that had passed in the hall. 
 He might be ignorant of everything except Evelyn s 
 flight and his surprise. 
 
 The secretary sneered openly in glancing at the open 
 tome ; " So endeth the second lesson !" 
 
 It was dignified and characteristic that Fontaine 
 feigned not to catch the purport of the sentence, im 
 perfectly smothered behind the scoffer s teeth, as he 
 walked leisurely past him to the door. The rector 
 resumed his seat and seemed to study the ancient 
 print. 
 
 Twenty years later, on another summer afternoon 
 sitting with his little son upon his knee, he happened 
 to turn the leaves to the same picture, and blinding 
 mists of memory drove between it and his eyes; resur 
 gent waves of emotion beat him faint for an instant; 
 his temples throbbed, and his heart ached again under 
 the weight of anger and love striving together for 
 mastery in a soul that would not stoop to use weapons 
 he began to perceive were directed against him by his 
 inferior and rival.
 
 86 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE wind blew straight from the sea next morning, 
 dissipating the fog that had lain like soft wool upon 
 the lawn all night. It left the glitter of diamond)* 
 upon every blade of grass and freshened the late roses 
 into the richness of early summer. The "Westovi-r 
 household was astir as early as if the mistress were to 
 preside in person over the preparations for the guests. 
 As soon as it was light enough to discern the close seams 
 in the oaken flooring, the rub and squeak of waxed 
 brushes were resonant in halls and lower rooms. The 
 kitchen-hearth, never cold from Christmas to Christ 
 mas, prevented the dawn with its glow; an army of 
 retainers, under the direction of an tipper servant in 
 each department, wrought with diligence, and what was 
 for negroes and half-breeds, despatch, until by the time 
 the Jamestown sloop, flying the English and French 
 colors, appeared at the lower bend of the river, bustle 
 was exchanged for the calm of conscious readiness. 
 
 The great lawn was swept clean of withered leaves; 
 the gravel walks were rolled ; the crisp folds of fresh 
 curtains swayed in the open windows ; tall jars of 
 roses, bergamot, lilies, and southern-wood were upon 
 mantels and stands ; and, as the lookout set upon the 
 house-top ran down with the news that the sails were 
 in sight, a hospitable party left the front door for the 
 pier. 
 
 As was fit in the absence of her parents, Evelyn came
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 87 
 
 first. Mr. Fontaine was at her side, and Lady Bess 
 hung upon her other hand. Mrs. Carter was escorted 
 by Master Willy Byrd, a handsome urchin of eight ; 
 but the secretary walked beside her, and behind them 
 were Charley Carter, Jane and Mary Byrd, demure and 
 best-frocked, under the surveillance of Mammy Teena, 
 the head-nurse. Sally, Bess s custodian, off duty for 
 the time, brought up the rear with Caliban. No matter 
 who came or who went, the smart servitor was to the 
 fore, partly because of native audacity and the favor 
 of master and mistress, partly because he was clever and 
 handy. His ostensible business on the present occasion 
 was to bring up from the wharf such light luggage as 
 the owners might not care to commit to the handling 
 of the liveried boatmen waiting upon the bank for the 
 arrival of the vessel. 
 
 The wind was with her, and she had flung out every 
 stitch of canvas ; the spray broke whitely over her 
 prow. 
 
 " There is positively a Cleopatra-barge-ish look about 
 her !" said Evelyn to her companions. " It would sound 
 like profanation to tell how she came up last week with 
 potatoes and oysters in her hold." 
 
 " One might know that Martha Jaqueline is on 
 board," rejoined Mrs. Carter in like mirthful vein. 
 " Nothing ever goes fast enough for her, be it a horse, 
 a vessel, or a human being. She will not live out half 
 her days." 
 
 Evelyn flung back a laughing retort, and walked 
 more swiftly down the incline. A marvellous trans 
 formation had come over her in twelve hours. At bed 
 time last night, as Mrs. Carter silently reflected, she
 
 88 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 looked although nothing could make her unbeautiful 
 fully thirty years of age. To-day, but for the per 
 fection of her figure and the easy elegance of carriage 
 that bespoke familiarity with the fashionable world, she 
 might have been eighteen. Over her shoulders she had 
 cast a blue crepe shawl, an Indian fabric, as was the 
 white embroidered muslin of her gown. The sea-wind, 
 or the joyful anticipation of meeting her friend, had 
 brought soft, yet brilliant bloom to her cheeks; there 
 was a happy flutter in her laugh, her eyes were wells 
 of changeful light. The kindly neighbor considered, 
 furthermore, that the visit of an intimate friend whom 
 she had not seen for a twelvemonth, was no trivial event 
 in the life of one who had known little of gay life of 
 late, and yet had had so much of it in her girlish prime. 
 After all her reasoning and indulgent allowance for 
 circumstance, she was forced to appreciate the existence 
 of an underlying force the nature of which was a secret. 
 The girl had drunk of the elixir of life between sunset 
 and sunrise. 
 
 Neither of the men, whose observation of the belle 
 of the county was, to say the least, as close as that of 
 her nominal duenna, detected anything equivocal in the 
 restored bloom and animation that gave lustre to her 
 loveliness. Fontaine, standing at her side, Bass, a little 
 behind her, as the sloop headed for the pier, saw the 
 delicate hands seek and clasp each other until the flesh 
 was bloodless, and her whole form shaken by irregular 
 respiration, and both thought the agitation altogether 
 natural and becoming. 
 
 The gangway had scarcely touched shore when a lithe 
 figure, in a costume which Mrs. Carter at once discovered 
 
 O /
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 89 
 
 was Parisian and ravishing, darted down the tilted plank 
 to throw herself into Evelyn s arms, with a shower of 
 French ejaculations, mostly diminutives, the more re 
 markable that the new-comer was half a head shorter 
 than she who was thus saluted. At a prudent distance, 
 picking her steps gingerly, followed a woman with wasp- 
 like waist and stature like a grenadier s. She was attired 
 in a stuff gown of rusty black ; a voluminous calash, like 
 the top of a Conestoga wagon, protected a mob-cab, 
 and within the fluted borders of this were the smallest 
 head and face that could, by any elasticity of imagina 
 tion, be supposed to belong to the grenadier s height. 
 
 This was Miss Lotsie Johnson, companion, house 
 keeper, ci-devant nursery-governess, a little of every 
 thing and a good deal of most good things to the 
 Jaqueline household. She was led by the captain of 
 the sloop, who held the tips of her mittened fingers as 
 if afraid they might break forth into talons. 
 
 Lastly, having waited, courteously, until both ladies 
 were safely landed, a man ran down the steep gang 
 way. In touching the pier, he bared a head covered 
 with close blonde curls, undisfigured by the powder 
 which most men of fashion wore in abundance. 
 
 " Mistress Evelyn Byrd," said Miss Jaqueline s clear 
 soprano, French in pitch and accent, " I have the very 
 great pleasure of presenting to you my friend, Mr. 
 Francis, of London. He was my fellow-voyager over 
 the ocean, and has been for some days the honored 
 guest of my mother at Jamestown." 
 
 "I am glad Madam is not here to note that intro 
 duction," thought Mrs. Carter. " Mistress Martha has 
 assuredly picked up a fine art or two at Court." 
 
 8*
 
 90 II IX C If EAT SELF. 
 
 Miss Byrd curtesied low, her eyes on the ground, her 
 color wavering enchantingly, then going out, so that a 
 very pale face met the gaze of respectful admiration 
 bent upon her, as the stranger recovered himself from 
 a bow as profound as her curtesy. 
 
 Mistress Martha, considering apparently that the 
 claims of etiquette were satisfied by the length and 
 ceremony of her presentation-speech, now absorbed 
 within herself general attention by voluble embraces 
 distributed among Mrs. Carter, the little girls, Willy 
 and Charley, and shaking hands with everybody else, 
 beginning with Mr. Fontaine and ending with Caliban. 
 She was popular with people of all grades, but par 
 ticularly and immensely witii children and the lower 
 classes. Caliban adored her as second of created things, 
 his young mistress rating as first ; the boys, deserting 
 all others, clave to her forthwith. She shed upon Mr. 
 Fontaine the sunniest of her smiles in giving him a 
 reticule of gilded leather to carry, telling him that it 
 contained " beaucoup de tresor" and handed a small 
 casket to the secretary. 
 
 "I know of old whose discretion to trust," coquet- 
 tishly. " Nobody but Mr. Bass shall handle Pandora s 
 box. Mr. Fontaine ! I am going to beg the support of 
 your arm up the terraces. I saw from the sloop that 
 Mr. Bass had the honor of escorting Mrs. Carter. 
 Evelyn, here is Mr. Francis a-dying to ask for the 
 pleasure of your company. Now, boys and girls, I 
 have something in my portmanteau for the one who has 
 grown fastest in the past year, and I can t see who is to 
 have it unless you all walk in a line like soldiers ahead 
 of us. March ! forward ! heads up and toes out !"
 
 HIS ORE AT SELF. 91 
 
 There was one exception to the omnipotence of her 
 fascination. Lady Bess, at Miss Jaqneline s approach, 
 promptly wrapped her head in Evelyn s muslin skirt, 
 and shrugged a mutinous shoulder when her mother 
 implored her to reply to the young lady s blandish 
 ments. When curiosity, and pique at being taken at 
 her word drew her from her covert, she carried her nose 
 high in air and affected utter unconsciousness of the 
 interloper s presence, holding fast all the while to 
 Evelyn s hand. 
 
 Miss Jaqueline laughed, well content and amused. 
 
 " True to her first love ! No blame to you, monkey ! 
 She is ever and ever so much better worth the loving 
 than I. And people who love her once, love her ever, 
 I find. I like you the better for the excellent taste you 
 display." 
 
 The procession, headed by the children in line of 
 march, as directed by their divinity, and ending with 
 Mam Teena and Miss Lotsie, hobnobbing in friendly 
 familiarity, was followed at a gradually-widening 
 distance by Evelyn and Mr. Francis. The sea-breeze 
 tempered the heat of approaching noon, but could not 
 make the day cool, and Lady Bess s short legs flagged 
 in ascending the hill. The path ran parallel with the 
 river-wall for a hundred yards or so, then arose by 
 stone steps laid in the bank, and zigzagging easily up 
 to the brow of the hill. A low wall of masonry over 
 run with vines defended the wall from the wash and 
 drift of heavy rains. None of the party in front looked 
 back until the last terrace was gained. Martha Jaque 
 line talked incessantly, her voice ringing above the 
 children s prattle, Mam Teena s gutturals and Miss
 
 92 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Lutsie s harsh, chopping tones, that, according to 
 Martha, " would not be unmusical if her vocal organs 
 could be taken apart, cleaned and oiled." 
 
 " There is a balm for every bane," said that vivacious 
 young woman, pausing at the lower gate of the lawn to 
 take breath and face her audience. " We, whose lot is cast 
 in a region where the rise of land in every mile is less 
 than an inch, ought to live longer than you who waste 
 lungs and limbs in riotous climbing. Yet Westover is 
 beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole river." 
 
 "I am afraid Bess may be troublesome," Mrs. Carter 
 was saying anxiously, apart to Mr. Fontaine. " My 
 mind misgave me in leaving her so far behind. I 
 should have insisted upon releasing Evelyn from the 
 care of her, especially as she is in company with a 
 stranger." 
 
 " I will go back and fetch her to you," was the 
 response, so promptly given and acted upon that he was 
 beyond the nearest turn in the crooked path before 
 remonstrance could be offered. 
 
 A flush darkened Martha Jaqtieline s mobile face; 
 she compressed her lips ; her black eyes opened and 
 closed fast and repeatedly, a trick of her impatient 
 moods, which were not a few. Colin Bass looked from 
 her to Mrs. Carter s embarrassed countenance, and 
 queried inly why both should be averse to breaking the 
 virtual t&te-h-ttte between Miss Jaqueline s admirer and 
 a more beautiful woman than she. 
 
 Fontaine caught sight of the loiterers from the second 
 terrace. Lady Bess had been lifted to the top of the 
 wall and sat there at her ease, swinging her dumpy legs. 
 Evelyn s back was towards the unseen spectator, but
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 93 
 
 something iu the droop of her head and slight but 
 eloquent inclination of the graceful figure made his 
 heart sink in unreasonable pain. Thus might a flower 
 bend towards the sun, a willow lean to the water that 
 fed its roots. Dismissing the unwelcome similes as 
 absurd, he yet paused in momentary incertitude whether 
 to go on or to retreat unnoticed. The group was pic 
 turesque. A rock-maple, one bough of which, tipped 
 with scarlet and gold, almost touched Evelyn s head, 
 shielded them from the vertical sun; Bess s hat lay on 
 her lap, and "she was sticking wild asters in the ribbon 
 band. Mr. Francis had uncovered his head, and from 
 the step below Miss Byrd looked up steadfastly into 
 her half-averted face. 
 
 " As goodly of countenance as a Saxon god !" thought 
 the observer. 
 
 Goodliness that was not all in finely-chiselled fea 
 tures, in the clear skin and the glow of youth and 
 health, the deep, blue eyes, the fair curls crowning the 
 noble head, and the athletic symmetry of the figure. 
 The light of smile and eye had a glory of its own, the 
 curve of lips that could be haughty was now playful, 
 and it could not be tender ! 
 
 Fontaine s second thought and impulse were of vehe 
 ment indignation. How dared this foreign fop, this 
 courtly coxcomb, the suitor perchance the betrothed 
 of that other girl awaiting the recreant at the top of 
 the hill thus stare and smile at one he had known 
 scarce ten minutes? Well might a modest maiden 
 shrink beneath his bold regards ! 
 
 He strode forward resolutely to protect her from 
 further insolence.
 
 94 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Lady Bess was the first to hear his step upon the 
 stones. 
 
 " Misser Fonten !" she shouted, clapping her hands, 
 " Ook at mine p itty hat !" holding aloft the triumph 
 of sylvan millinery. The instinct of self-indulgence 
 potent in the shrewd angel moved her to add, her 
 mouth drooping plaintively, " Yady Bess mighty 
 tired ! P ease tarry me up ee hill I" 
 
 She relieved the embarrassment of a surprise that 
 was evidently an interruption. 
 
 " I came back for her," said Mr. Fontaine, with 
 grave directness. " Mrs. Carter is uneasy lest she may 
 hinder you in mounting the hill." 
 
 Mr. Francis interposed himself between the speaker 
 and Evelyn, who without turning was hurriedly gath 
 ering up the scattered asters from the wall. The back 
 of her neck and the one small ear that was visible were 
 of a vivid pink. She had, then, resented the stranger s 
 audacity. 
 
 He spoke courteously enough, and his ready laugh 
 had in it nothing of bravado or bashfulness. 
 
 " I offered my poor services as porter to her lady 
 ship, but she would none of me, even insisting that 
 Miss Byrd should lift her upon the wall. Once there, 
 she would go no farther. We were conspiring to dis 
 lodge her by strategy. I had in mind an ambush of 
 Indians in the thicket over there, but Miss Byrd assures 
 me that red savages are no longer a terror to American 
 babies. Nor would her tender heart consent to a scare 
 from bogie or ghost. We are your grateful debtors, 
 Mr. Fontaine." 
 
 He spoke in fluent French, and the frankness of the
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 95 
 
 laughing eyes and the indulgent smile that rested for 
 an instant upon the spoiled child, reversed instantly the 
 current of criticism. The explanation was too plausi 
 ble not to be true. Fontaine s responsive laugh was 
 the heartier for the relief from disagreeable suspicions. 
 The blue and black eyes met in mutual good- will. 
 
 " Come, Lady Bess ! Mamma is wondering if her 
 bird has flown away !" said the rector, gayly. " What ! 
 I must shoulder you ! Be it so, then." 
 
 He sprang lightly up the steps, unhindered by his 
 burden, leaving the others to follow at their pleasure. 
 
 "I have been unjust to an innocent man," he was 
 schooling himself by saying when the precocious infant 
 spoke out one of the many pieces of her mind. 
 
 " Yady Bess finks she doesn t yike dat gem pieman. 
 Not vewy much, I don t fink !" 
 
 " It is not kind to dislike a pleasant gentleman who 
 has done nothing to vex you," replied her porter, in 
 gentle reproof. 
 
 " Yady Bess ould yike him if he didn say Mine 
 Eva! She is mine Eva! Nobody else s all call her 
 so but mine own self." 
 
 " He said nothing like that !" retorted Fontaine, 
 emphatically. " Bess is only a foolish little girl who 
 does not understand all that grown people may say. 
 Mamma would be grieved to hear her sweet daughter 
 tell such a silly thing." 
 
 To his sensible inner self he subjoined : " What a 
 fallacy is contained in the adage, * Children and fools 
 speak the truth ! They are the most unsafe, because 
 the most ignorant of eaves-droppers."
 
 96 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE fortnight succeeding the arrival of Mistress 
 Martha Jaqueline at Westover was monumental for 
 half a century thereafter in the social annals of tide 
 water Virginia. With the speedful certainty of the 
 message of the crosslet stained by fire and blood to 
 Highland height and loch, the news flashed up and down 
 the river that high carnival would be held in the Byrd 
 mansion, where there were room and welcome for all. 
 All day long chariots and horses were halting at the 
 tall gate surmounted by the monogram of the princely 
 proprietor. Lighted windows from ground-floor to 
 steep roof, blinked to passing vessels like fiery eyes 
 until midnight was far sped. Strains, jocund and 
 sweet, from players upon instruments, and wildly- 
 plaintive as the song of the Lorelei, from daughters 
 of music whose fame is not yet forgotten, mingled 
 with the river-breeze and kept the whippoorwill 
 silent. 
 
 Madam Byrd had never been happier in her pros 
 perous life. Mr. Harrison s rapid recovery was a brave 
 feather in her cap, and the publicity given by the influx 
 of guests to the talk of his danger, and the share she 
 had in his cure, was a continual triumph. She was able 
 to return to her own house with a good conscience on 
 the fourth day of the visitors sojourn there, and fell in 
 love out of hand (in matronly, virtuous fashion) with 
 Martha Jaqueline s " friend."
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 97 
 
 That he was all the word implies when it flies quota 
 tion-marks was palpable, or assumed by everybody to 
 be obvious. Had doubt lurked in the worldly-wise 
 mind of the chatelaine, it could not have survived a 
 confidential chat held in the still-room a few days after 
 her home-coming, with Martha s chaperone. 
 
 Miss Lotsie Johnson had brought up Martha Jaque- 
 line " by hand," and estimated her proprietorship in 
 that lively damsel, as compared with the nominal 
 mother s vested rights, as ten to one. The smaller 
 number represented the title Nature grants to her who, 
 willingly or of necessity, brings an unconsenting infant 
 into the world for the Lotsies to take care of. The two 
 housewives, seated side by side at the long table in the 
 still-room, were flavoring loaf-sugar for cake-making 
 by rubbing the hard white lumps with lemons and 
 fresh peach-leaves until they were yellow and green, 
 then pulverizing them in a small marble mortar, after 
 which the powder was sifted through coarse muslin. 
 The process, insufferably tedious in the telling to a 
 modern cook, was necessary in the absence of flavoring 
 extracts for culinary purposes ; so common that nobody 
 thought of complaining of it, yet too delicate to be 
 intrusted to menials. Miss Lotsie had charge of the 
 lemon-flavoring; Madam s capable fingers bruised the 
 peach-leaves against the granulated surfaces without 
 abrading her knuckles or breaking her nails. The 
 sugar came to colonial store-rooms in conical loaves 
 a foot high, enveloped first in white, then in purple 
 paper, as thick and stiff as a board. To prepare it for 
 use, it was broken into lumps with a hammer and stout 
 knife; afterward cut into small cubes with "a clipper," 
 & 9
 
 98 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 a wrought-steel implement with keen nippers and a 
 powerful spring. 
 
 The blended fragrance of lemon-peel and prussic 
 acid scented the air; each worker had a low, ample 
 chair, cushioned on seat and back, and used a footstool 
 to make a lap commodious enough to accommodate the 
 big bowl into which the green and yellow lumps were 
 dropped. At a smaller table at the far end of the 
 room, Caliban, enveloped in a checked apron from 
 chin to instep, was cleaning tankards, pitchers, urns, 
 and other silver vessels, with scraped rotten-stone, oil, 
 and vinegar. Occasionally his mistress raised her voice 
 to admonish him to diligence or caution. The house 
 was unusually quiet. Martha Jaqueline s riding-horse 
 had been sent up from Jamestown for her use the day 
 before, with an imported English mare for Mr. Francis, 
 and a large equestrian party had set out for Shirley 
 two hours ago. Mrs. Carter had gone home with her 
 children as soon as Madam Byrd was fairly settled 
 again upon her nest. 
 
 "I shall be easier when the young folks are safe 
 home," Madame said, in the course of more desultory 
 talk. " Mr. Francis is, I suppose, a skilful horseman. 
 All the English gentry are. But tis a tempting of Provi 
 dence to back a creature with such a temper. I was in 
 nowise surprised when she reared so soon as he touched 
 the saddle. And did you note that his thought was all 
 for the terror he had put me in? What Virginian 
 cavalier would have bowed to the saddle-bow, doffinw 
 
 O 
 
 his hat and begging my pardon for having affrighted 
 me? Twas weak, doubtless, to scream on seeing his 
 peril, but my nerves have scarce recovered the trial of
 
 7/7.9 GREAT SELF. 99 
 
 Ben Harrison s sickness. I could but compliment 
 Martha Jaqueline on her composure, and own that I 
 and Evelyn showed like faint hearts beside her." 
 
 "She knows the mare and Mr. Francis," said Miss 
 Lotsie, gratingly. 
 
 " True enough. And, judging from the signs of the 
 times, she is like to become better acquainted with one 
 of them. Ah, well ! so wags the world, and young 
 people s fancies will run where they will. It must be 
 a comfort to you and the young lady s mother that 
 Mistress Martha s affections would seem to be so well 
 bestowed. Was Madam Jaqueline in health to see 
 Mr. Francis while he was at Jamestown?" 
 
 " Yes. She enjoyed his company." 
 
 "As well she might! I would not say it to Mar 
 tha s self, since to praise her lover would be to flatter 
 her, but a goodlier man and a more charming mine 
 eyes have seldom lighted upon. And I surmise from 
 his deportment and acquaintances in dear old London 
 town that he is of excellent family?" 
 
 " I have heard as much," returned Miss Lotsie, 
 rubbing a lump upon a fresh lemon with the regularity 
 of a machine. 
 
 "Madam Jaqueline would make sure of that, of 
 course. The young couple have my best wishes for 
 their happiness. As you know, Martha and I have 
 had some passages at arms in the pa.st ; but she is her 
 father s daughter, and has a warm, true heart, as her 
 friendship for Evelyn testifies. I only wish that Provi 
 dence had deigned to send the twin-brother of this 
 same young traveller over the seas to fall in love with 
 my step-daughter, who is like to fill a spinster s grave."
 
 100 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " She does not lack for admirers." 
 
 "Admirers, forsooth!" in lofty contempt. "Such 
 as they be ! Caliban, when next you pick peach-leaves 
 for me, look to it that there are no slugs among them ! 
 Faugh ! Bring me hither water and napkin for my 
 fingers!" As the lad vanished, she continued, more at 
 her ease : " When one has tasted old wine of prime 
 quality, she will, belike, make a wry face at that which 
 is new and sour. And what blame to her? I can only 
 hope she may not have heard what my English letters 
 brought me, it is now over six mouths since, that he 
 has come into his grandfather s estate and title. I took 
 Mistress Martha aside the day of her arrival, when she 
 drove over to Berkeley to inquire after Ben Harrison, 
 and catechised her sharply as to what she knew of the 
 matter. She had heard, while in England, of the old 
 lord s death, and even seen him who was Charles Mor- 
 daunt several times at court and elsewhere. She mani 
 fested more discretion than I thought was in her in 
 agreeing with me that it would be best not to name him 
 to Evelyn. He is still unmarried, she says, but there 
 was talk of a match between him and a certain Mistress 
 Mary Cox, a young woman of fortune. The name speaks 
 nothing for her lineage. The right judgment displayed 
 by Mistress Martha in telling me thus much (which I 
 know to be true, inasmuch as my London letters had 
 already advised me of it) wrought well towards alter 
 ing my opinion of her whom I used to upbraid for 
 light speech and romantic fancies. Beside yourselves, 
 there is nobody this side of the Atlantic to whom I 
 dare speak of this matter. Certain it is, that I could 
 confess to no one but you, Lotsie, what I would not
 
 HIS GREAT SKLF. 101 
 
 whisper to the walls were Colonel Byrcl within fifty 
 miles of me, to wit, that my mind misgives me 
 grievously, at times, as to the wisdom of his action in 
 a certain affair." 
 
 "In refusing to let his daughter wed a Papist?" 
 " Papist ! Fudge ! you ve caught the Huguenot 
 Jaqueline cant ! Some of the best blood in England is 
 Roman Catholic, and the young gentleman, whom I 
 never clapped eyes upon, from what I can learn, was 
 well enough, even had he not a title in prospect. And, 
 having fallen in love with the American beauty who 
 was quite the fashion at court that year, he might, 
 under proper management, have been brought to view 
 Protestantism in a reasonable light. Moreover, and 
 above all," sinking her voice mysteriously, "were it 
 not that I know of old how safe is the secret confided 
 to you, Lotsie, I would be racked to death before I 
 would lisp it, there was somewhat behind this show 
 of church ly zeal. Colonel Byrcl was a roistering young 
 blade in his day, and had his fling even while he was a 
 widower. Not that I esteem him the less for it. He 
 was ever a man of honor, and if he had which all 
 popular young men have a woman s secrets to keep, 
 he was as close as wax. This young nobleman s 
 father, Mr. Mordaunt, was shockingly gay, so I ve 
 heard, and the two men were rivals in some affair, and 
 quarrelled. 
 
 "That i.s all I know, except that the Colonel hated 
 his very name. I chanced to let it fall one day in 
 Paris, whither we had gone on our honeymoon, and I 
 had to listen to some biting things, I can assure you, 
 such as tied rny tongue on that subject forever after.
 
 102 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Well, this poor Morclaunt died years ago, before I 
 ever knew there was such a man as William Evelyn 
 Byrd, or such a place as Virginia, for that matter, and 
 the tomb should swallow up enmities of all kinds. 
 But the Byrds have long memories, and you know the 
 rest. It served the Colonel s turn, being stout for his 
 religion and church, to swear that his daughter should 
 never marry with a Catholic ; and he got no small 
 credit with some for his behavior. Here tis never 
 spoken of, and I shall wish, when I ve said my prayers 
 to-night, that my tongue had been blistered before I 
 wagged it over all this story; but you do wheedle 
 things out of one." 
 
 " Perhaps Colonel Byrd would change his mind if he 
 knew Mr. Charles Mordauut had come to the title." 
 
 " If he knew ! I ll wager my best diamond bracelet 
 against that lemon in your hand that he knows all about 
 it. what with the piles of letters every mail brings 
 him, and his correspondence with the nobility, and all 
 that. He must have had tidings of the old Earl s 
 decease soon after it happened, but never a word has he 
 let slip to me of it. As to changing his mind, a title 
 or two more or less would not avail one tittle with him. 
 He lived hand-and-glove with dukes and earls and 
 viscounts too long to be awed by them. Charles Mor 
 dauut, to whom he refused his daughter s hand, would 
 get no other answer were he to present himself to-mor 
 row at Westover as Fourth Earl of Peterborough and 
 
 o 
 
 Second Earl of Monmouth. Those are his titles." 
 
 The mournful intonation was not to be mistaken. Her 
 husband s familiarity with peers might have bred in him 
 republican contempt, or patrician indifference to rank.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 103 
 
 Madam Byrd, formerly Mistress Maria Taylor, the 
 great London heiress, loved a title with British loyalty. 
 
 Engrossed in the subject, she had sat, her wrists 
 crossed and palms uppermost, awaiting Caliban s return 
 with basin and napkin, an event which she foresaw 
 would be tardy. Perceiving him now at her elbow, she 
 dealt him a perfunctory cuff for hindering her task so 
 long, washed and dried her hands, and took up a stain 
 less lump of sugar and a bunch of tender leaves with 
 another section of her discourse. Caliban was, prac 
 tically, no drawback to conversation, yet Colonel 
 Byrd s helpmeet bore in mind, when she did not forget 
 it, that diplomacy takes no needless risks. She men 
 tioned no more names. 
 
 " The Lord above only knows how any young woman 
 of quality is to mate herself properly hereabouts. But 
 His will be done ! My heart sinks with the thinking 
 what a certain distinguished parent would say should 
 he discern how the land lies between a nameless belle 
 and a certain divine. I shall not open his eyes, but I 
 cannot shut mine. Nor, I dare say, can you 
 
 " Caliban, you feckless rascal ! pick up the lemon 
 Mistress Johnson has dropped ! Wash it, dirty fellow ! 
 Do you think her as foul as yourself, that you give it 
 to her right from the floor, and with your bare hand ? 
 One would think there was ne er a tray in the house!" 
 
 " Yet he is a proper gentleman," remarked Miss 
 Lotsie, with her usual economy of words. 
 
 " I don t deny it. And of gentle blood. But when 
 a man who has lived in courts, and has a great fortune, 
 has but one marriageable daughter, and she a celebrated 
 beauty at an age when most women in this country show
 
 10-i HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 signs of fading, he is not like to be content with a 
 country parson for a son-in-law. When the tug comes, 
 you will see the Huguenot fare no better than the 
 Papist." 
 
 " Will not she make choice for herself?" 
 
 "That will not she! Time was when /would have 
 scaped down a rope-ladder from a turret-window to 
 run away with the man I loved. She stands too much 
 in awe of the powers that be. It must be owned she 
 loves him too dearly besides. She will not let me so 
 much as hint that he has a fault which every sensible, 
 right-minded wife must do, now and then men being 
 what they are." 
 
 Miss Lotsie s qualifications for the post of confidante- 
 general would have seemed scant to a passing acquaint 
 ance. She looked grim ; she was ungainly, and shy and 
 taciturn to a proverb. Yet people of all grades and 
 tastes dropped secrets into her ears as naturally as letters 
 into a post-box. She might say little, but she had a 
 genius for listening, and her mind was ever bent upon 
 promoting the interests of others rather than her own. 
 The meanest of mortals was esteemed better worth the 
 serving than herself; so far as in her lay, she effaced 
 her own individuality and magnified the personality of 
 her neighbor. 
 
 Martha Jaqueline brought to her once, when a child, 
 the question put by the Jewish lawyer. 
 
 "You are all the time talking about your duty to 
 your neighbors, Aunt Lotsie. Who are they all?" 
 
 " Anybody I can help, child !" 
 
 It was the key-note of her life. 
 
 Her dormitory at Westover was in the very top of
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 105 
 
 the house, but she never repaired to it at night, how 
 ever late the hour, until she had seen Evelyn and 
 Martha, who roomed together, in bed, and, seated at 
 the foot of their couch, chafing the feet and ankles of 
 her nurseling, had heard the tale of the day s pleasures 
 and perplexities. Martha likened her, in one of their 
 conferences, to a miser s treasure-chest. 
 
 " Her ear is the hole in the lid. Her mouth is 
 hasp and staple, and always padlocked. The coffer 
 must be full to bursting by this time. If the lid 
 should fly off, we would be in a pretty pickle eh, 
 Evelyn ?" 
 
 " I m not afraid !" 
 
 She lay high upon the pillow, one arm cast over her 
 head ; her eyes beamed softly ; her cheeks had the 
 flush of an oleander petal ; countenance and mien were 
 expressive of blissful content. 
 
 Martha raised herself upon her elbow to kiss her. 
 
 " Mon ange !" she said, fondly. "How any one 
 can look at you without guessing what has made you a 
 young girl again, and the loveliest thing out of Para 
 dise, passes me! Where do people keep their eyes and 
 their wits? What is it, Aunt Lotsie?" 
 
 To Evelyn, the duenna had given no sign of in 
 terrupting the other s speech. Martha felt the sinewy, 
 gentle hand pause in the slow passage up and down 
 her foot. It went on as Miss Lotsie said : 
 
 " Mr. Fontaine has both !" 
 
 Martha laughed, carelessly. "N importe! What 
 his eyes see, his wits will construe into flattering evi 
 dences of his influence over her. A man in a black 
 coat is not less nor more than a man !"
 
 10G HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Evelyn looked pained. 
 
 "If you would imply that Mr. Fontaine cares 
 for me except as a friend, you err grievously. You 
 need not smile incredulously ! He thinks of me 
 but as a parishioner a mere child a foolish, weak 
 girl who looks to him for counsel and guidance. 
 Ah ! he is good ! so good that your suspicion dishonors 
 him." 
 
 " As if to love you were not equal to a patent of 
 nobility to any man !" cried Martha, warmly. " As 
 if all men must not adore you, from Monsieur L lti- 
 connu to the sleek, sly, sober, silent secretary !" 
 
 Evelyn s gesture of fine disdain did not check the 
 gay rattle. 
 
 "I caught him watching you this evening through 
 a crack of the study-door, where he sits all day, pre 
 tending to copy the Colonel s manuscript, like a cock 
 chafer nibbling a morsel of cheese. The wind blew 
 the crack wider, and showed me his face. You were 
 at the harpsichord, singing, and somebody else was 
 watching you, leaning on the instrument. Colin had 
 a view of you both, and I saw a fire light up his eyes 
 that made them red and Uijlv, and his crest lowered 
 
 O / 7 
 
 and flattened like a snake s, and up went that diabolic 
 forefinger to consult the scar on his chin, and I thought 
 of a wizard in his cave, and a toad in his hole, and all 
 manner of creeping, eerie, slimy things. Then it was 
 that I sidled up to Bayard, as being his betrothed I 
 had a right to do, and, the song over, fastened upon 
 his sleeve and walked him out into the hall, and so up 
 and down, hanging upon his arm and looking lovingly 
 sidewise up at him, while I berated him soundly for
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 107 
 
 his imprudence, and told him to whom lie had nearly 
 betrayed himself." 
 
 "I saw you!" smiled Evelyn. "Would I could 
 play rny part as well I" 
 
 " You improve !" Martha conceded. " And Mon- 
 seigneur is not bad, except that his eyes are now and 
 then derelict. Eyes are the loop-holes of the heart, 
 and Cupid shows his face at them oftener than is safe if 
 he would not be recognized and aimed at. But to our 
 secretary ! While we loitered in the hall, he feigned 
 to pore over his blotted scraps of dirty paper, although 
 you were still in full sight, talking to Major Muruford. 
 And what does my squire do at our tenth round but 
 clap the study-door to in passing! This door is ever 
 ajar, letting pass all sorts of pestilent draughts ! quoth 
 he, coolly. I ll warrant you, Colin owes him no good 
 will!" 
 
 " The poor man means no harm," interceded Evelyn, 
 still smiling. " Twas cruel to shut him up on a warm 
 night because he dared look across the hall, doubtless 
 because the music disturbed his calculations of pounds, 
 shillings, and pence. He keeps the plantation-books, 
 and I know not what other tiresome volumes, and never 
 thinks of a woman, gentle or simple, unless he stumbles 
 over her in the corridors. 
 
 " But, Mr. Fontaine ! I cannot suffer you, or Miss 
 Lotsie, to nurse ridiculous fancies concerning a noble 
 gentleman whose thoughts are set upon higher things 
 than love and courtship, especially when both would 
 be vain. I would not scruple to confide everything to 
 him to-morrow, were I in a sore strait for a friend and 
 helper. He would judge mercifully, and lend me a
 
 108 HIS GREAT SELF, 
 
 brother s aid. Heaven send I may never be driven to 
 cast myself upon his compassion ! but it would not fail 
 me. I could rest upon his friendship as upon my 
 mother s love." 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE master of Berkeley was restored to sound health, 
 and his lady-wife summoned the country-side to rejoice 
 with her, and do honor to Miss Jaqueline and her 
 English gallant. 
 
 It was now October ; the evenings were long, and 
 cool enough to justify the pleasure-loving dame in 
 calling the rout for which she issued invitations, a ball. 
 For fifty miles up and down the river, and twenty back 
 of the noble stream, little was talked of for a fortnight 
 by the women but dancing and toilettes, while the men 
 looked forward with interest as eager to the run of the 
 Berkeley race-course set for the morrow of the ball. 
 
 The important night was fair, and glorious with 
 moonlight. Williamsburg magnates of College and 
 Court, grave, gallant, and gay, in powdered wigs, in 
 uniform, and more sober-hued coats, laced upon collar 
 and cuffs, jostled burly planters who depended upon 
 wives and daughters to show that " the river" was 
 not ignorant of the elegant mysteries of gala-raiment. 
 From Turkey Island, Brandon, Wyanoke, AVakefield, 
 Shirley, Curies, Presque Isle, Tuckahoe, Bermuda Hun 
 dred, as far up the James as Henrico, and as far down 
 as Jamestown and Hog Island, and from Rosewell and
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 109 
 
 Werowcomoko on the York, the current of revelry 
 ran in the direction of the hospitable homestead set 
 high on the river-bank. 
 
 Madam Byrd, handsome and imposing in purple 
 satin, brocaded with silver thread, a turban of white 
 crepe and silver heightening her stature, entered the 
 ball-room upon the arm of the English stranger. He 
 was conspicuous by his height, comeliness, and the fact 
 that, although richly attired in the prevailing mode, he 
 wore neither wig nor powder. His blonde curls were 
 gathered into a loose knot at the back of his neck and 
 tied with black ribbon. They grew close to the rest 
 of the head in natural waves, instead of being combed 
 away from the forehead and temples, and strained 
 smoothly toward the queue upon the nape of the neck, 
 a fashion which with young men was superseding the 
 full-bottomed wig, formerly en regie for all ceremonious 
 occasions, social or public. 
 
 Madam Byrd had, as we know, given her matronly 
 favor to him at sit>;ht, and each dav strengthened his 
 
 ~ / v O 
 
 hold upon her liking and admiration. To-night, her 
 pleasure at being singled out from the brilliant crowd 
 as the object of his especial devotion was imperfectly 
 concealed. Uppermost in her mind was the intention 
 to have what the American of over a century later 
 would call "a royally good time." Her husband s 
 return from his distant possessions and surveys had 
 been postponed from week to week, until the novelty 
 of freedom had somewhat abated, but not the enjoyment 
 of it. Association with her courtly guest and talk of 
 her old home had revived her taste for polite society. 
 Unconsciously, her manner took on something of gra- 
 
 10
 
 110 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 cious stateliness witli which her Virginia congeners 
 were unfamiliar. Ornate phrases tripped from her 
 tongue, and she surprised herself by the facility with 
 which she rounded repartees which she would have 
 despised a month ago. 
 
 " I am a poor dependent upon your bounty, to-night," 
 Mr. Francis was saying, as she suffered him to with 
 draw her from the surging crowd into the embrasure of 
 a window near the principal entrance. " But for you, 
 I should be remote, unfriended, melancholy, slow/ in 
 this gay throng. You will allow me to linger beside 
 you for a little while will you not? Recollect that I 
 am a stranger in a strange land, and take me into the 
 secure retreat of your sympathy." 
 
 "Fie upon you !" cried the flattered lady, "when all 
 the beauties present will be pulling caps presently for 
 the honor of your hand in the dance ! There ! I came 
 near doing it again ! I actually was on the point of 
 saying, your lordship s hand ! And the like has hap 
 pened sundry times before. It is, maybe, the force of 
 old habit, for my lord and your lordship were used 
 to be as pat upon my tongue as plain mister and sir, 
 and much converse with you provokes me to recollec 
 tions and tricks of the dear olden times. If you can 
 put up with the chatter of an old gentlewoman, when 
 younger belles are languishing for your notice, I shall 
 be only too happy to tell you who are somebodies, and 
 who next-to-nobodies, though Mistress Harrison has 
 few besides notables here to-night. East Virginia can 
 
 o O 
 
 boast no braver array of her best people than you see 
 now." 
 
 " I can easily believe it," said the gallant, his glance
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. Hi 
 
 sweeping the room to return to his companion s face, 
 as having found nothing to excuse distraction from his 
 devoir. "Grant me the honor!" taking her fan and 
 beginning to fan her with the same air of absolute 
 devotion. 
 
 "If you will engage to use it hcedfully ! It is a 
 holy relic, being nothing less precious than the fan I 
 bore when presented to our late gracious sovereign, 
 King George the First of blessed memory. He con 
 descended to salute me, and as he stooped to my lips, 
 my fan brushed his sacred shoulder. -Until to-night I 
 have never borne it since. There are not many men 
 to whose keeping I would commit it for an instant." 
 
 Mr. Francis bowed, hand on heart. His eyes said 
 that his sense of obligation was unspeakable. 
 
 " It is a superb relic," he observed, handling it cir 
 cumspectly. " It could have been purchased nowhere 
 but in Paris." 
 
 " You guess aright. At my special request, my step 
 daughter likewise sports to-night the fan she bore to 
 the drawing-room of our present sovereign. She was 
 foolishly reluctant to bring it forth from the silver 
 paper in which she is used to keep it wrapped, but our 
 dear Mistress Martha added her petitions to mine. Not 
 that the workmanship of Evelyn s fan can compare 
 with mine, but she is disposed to sentimentality, and 
 there were circumstances connected with that occasion 
 that she cannot easily away with." 
 
 Mr. Francis turned the fan to examine the reverse. 
 He was, apparently, less interested in Miss Byrd s 
 presentation than in her step-mother s. Perceiving 
 this, the matron waxed generous :
 
 GREAT SELF. 
 
 " Mistress Martha is looking passing well. That 
 yellow taffeta and amber ornaments become her rarely. 
 My Evelyn looks but a colorless chit beside her." 
 
 Her companion s eyes followed hers to where the 
 girls stood together, surrounded by a bevy of beaux. 
 Evelyn s gown of white taffeta draped her in large, 
 soft folds; it was belted by a rope of pearls; a pearl 
 collar banded her beautiful throat ; the one touch of 
 color in her attire was the painted fan she waved 
 slowly to and fro. Mr. Francis passed his hand over 
 his eyes, a swift, unstudied motion. A sentence from 
 an old book he had read aloud to his mother went 
 through his mind : 
 
 " The Interpreter looked upon her and said unto 
 her, Fair as the moon ! ; 
 
 Then the courtly smile returned to his lip, the light 
 ring to his tone : 
 
 " Laburnum and lily ! Virginia is a gracious soil, 
 bringing forth none but brave men and beauteous 
 women. May I ask the name of the young lady in 
 blue satin talking to that gallant warrior? For war 
 rior he looks to be in lineament and carriage." 
 
 " What eyes and what judgment ! That is Mistress 
 Hannah Harrison of "Wakefield. Her father, Nathan 
 iel Harrison, is the Admiral of James River, and his 
 daughters are prodigiously admired by our provincial 
 beaux. The warrior, as you call him, is Lieutenant 
 Mavnard, of whose prowess you may have heard in 
 far-off England. But what am I saying? You must 
 have been in the nursery when he headed an expedition 
 to Pamlico Bay against the pirate John Teach, other 
 wise known as Blackboard. Lieutenant Mavnard
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 113 
 
 boarded his vessel, killed the monster in a hand-to- 
 hand fight, and sailed back up James River to Wil- 
 liamsburg, with Blackboard s head dangling from the 
 bowsprit. 
 
 " This happened before my marriage, but I have 
 heard the tale so often I seem to have been in the 
 provinces when the awful scenes were enacted. Thir 
 teen of Blackboard s men were hanged at Williams- 
 burg. His skull was mounted in silver as a drinking- 
 vessel and presented to Lieutenant Maynard by admiring 
 friends. I have oft seen and handled it; but so 
 squeamish am I, meseems I could never drink from 
 it, though it were filled with nectar." 
 
 Mr. Francis looked curiously at the hero of the 
 ghastly adventure. Beyond his martial deportment 
 there was nothing to indicate his sanguinary trade, 
 much less the ferocity with which it had been plied. 
 He was hard upon forty years of age, frank of face, 
 jovial in eye and laugh, and assiduous in ballroom 
 gallantries to his pretty companion. 
 
 " It is rumored that they are betrothed, or like to 
 be," resumed Madam Byrd in a confidential key. " I 
 shall be glad if this be so, very glad, and thankful, 
 as his friend and well- wisher." 
 
 The listener was the impersonation of interrogatory 
 attention, as she meant lie should be. She took her 
 fan from his idle hand, held it before her mouth, and 
 talked through lips that hardly moved : 
 
 " The phrase escaped me unawares. But your rela 
 tions to the Jaquelines my tried friends of years 
 justify the confidence. Lieutenant Maynard was once 
 a suitor of Mistress Martha. He is a man of stubborn 
 h 10*
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 disposition, and his persevering pursuit of her begot in 
 me fears I perceive now were groundless. I appeal to 
 you, Mr. Francis, as one versed in the more refined 
 sensibilities of the female heart, if it be natural for a 
 tender, delicate woman to contemplate with complacence 
 the vision of a husband who chopped off a pirate s head 
 with his own cutlass, and who has the bleached skull 
 filled, each Christmas, with eggnog in which to drink 
 the king s health and confusion to the king s enemies !" 
 
 "Do I understand that Miss Jaqueline shares your 
 womanly sensibilities anent the buccaneer-butcher- 
 hero?" asked the auditor with labored gravity. " Or 
 had the gory head fascination and the silver-lipped 
 cranium charms for the girlish imagination?" 
 
 u Martha has ever showed true maidenly reserve 
 touching the affair. She is brave-hearted, and not easily 
 daunted by the details of war; but it was not from her 
 that I learned of the Lieutenant s obstinate suit, you 
 may be sure. She mentions him with profound respect 
 as a brave gentleman and her father s friend. I entreat 
 you to forget tiie unwarrantable indiscretion that has 
 given you a glimpse of what you d better have heard 
 from another tongue than mine." 
 
 " Do not, I pray you, dear lady, apologize for that 
 which honors me and invests you with a new charm in 
 my eyes," returned the young man, impressively. " It 
 is not unlikely that I may erelong beseech you to 
 hearken to confidences of mine own that will tax your 
 patience and good-will. Then I shall venture to remind 
 you that I was emboldened to thrust rny poor matters 
 upon your indulgence by the noble candor you have 
 displayed here and now."
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 115 
 
 " I do protest that your lordship flatters me beyond 
 ray deserts !" cried Madam, fluttered out of her wits by 
 the subtle compliment of word and manner. 
 
 Unaware that the slip of the tongue, so often immi 
 nent, was an accomplished act, she was hurrying on with 
 further disclaimers when she was struck by the ashen 
 terror in one face, the ill-concealed astonishment in 
 another, and felt that the broken sentence had been 
 overheard. 
 
 The crowd was in general motion, the dancers en 
 route for places in the first cotillon. Evelyn Byrd, on 
 her partner s arm, was so near her step-mother in passing, 
 that the white silk and thepurple satin met in whispering 
 folds. Colin Bass, who never danced, had fallen back 
 to the outer wall to make room for those who did. Both 
 were within hearing of Madam s seldom-subdued speech, 
 now shrilled by excitement. 
 
 Evelyn s fan slid from her fingers, and was caught by 
 Francis before it touched the floor. The silver cord- 
 and-tassel attached to it was entangled in her skirt. 
 Francis dropped on one knee to disengage it, and the 
 secretary caught a rapid murmuring of French as he 
 restored the toy to the owner. So quickly did all this 
 pass that Madam Byrd had not time to exclaim upon 
 her step-daughter s pallor before her complexion was 
 normal, even rosier than usual. 
 
 " May I conduct you to a seat?" prayed the English 
 man, with proffered arm. " I am afraid that I must 
 leave you to look for Mrs. Harrison, who deigned to 
 promise me her hand for this set. Dare I hope that 
 you will reserve the next cotillon for me?" 
 
 She entered fully into his implied regret that duty to
 
 116 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 his hostess had prevented him from asking her to take 
 the floor with him now, and dismissed him beamingly. 
 
 " I release you !" waving him away. " Do not linger 
 one instant on my account. Mr. Bass will find me a 
 chair or a place on a bench turning upon the secretary 
 with a total change of voice and expression. 
 
 He drew back to designate the cushioned window-seat 
 behind him, and, without waiting for further demands, 
 brought a footstool and a cushion for her back, settling 
 her luxuriously. The window was raised, admitting 
 delicious sluices of night-air fragrant with sweetbrier 
 and honeysuckle. She had the whole ballroom and 
 the hall beyond in view. Not another woman there 
 was arrayed more richly, or was a personage of greater 
 consequence than her buxom self. She carried more 
 weight upon her shapely feet than in her spinster-days, 
 and was not ill-pleased to sit still for awhile before the 
 next set. She knew herself to be a good dancer, and 
 that Mr. Francis would have no cause to regret the 
 exchange from Mrs. .Harrison, who was leading the 
 frolicksome troop down the floor in singleness and glad 
 ness of heart, feeling as young as the most youthful of 
 her guests, simply and unfeignedly happy because others 
 were. The Englishman chatted politely with her in 
 the pauses of the dance, but his devotion was less pro 
 nounced than when the older woman was his interlo 
 cutor. What subjects in common could he have with 
 Anne Harrison ? A worthy creature in her way, but 
 lacking the polish which only life in the old world could 
 impart. 
 
 Madam Byrd, overlooking the vari-colored waves of 
 revelry, her ears filled with the lively music of the
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. H7 
 
 fiddlers ordered up from Williamsburg, was in a frame 
 of most Christianly resignation to the providence that 
 had east her lot exactly there, and just then, and un- 
 dutifnlly reconciled to the dispensation of her lord s 
 absence. He was never so well-content as when fording 
 ice-cold creeks up to his saddle-cloth, or trudging through 
 canebrakes, with five chances out of ten of a moccasin- 
 bite, or the thrust of a wild boar s tusk. He would 
 rather, at this instant, be lying in the middle of an open 
 field, a blanket between him and the earth, and his head 
 pillowed upon his saddle, exchanging broad jokes with 
 his companions, or, while they snored about him like so 
 many swine, gazing up at the stars he knew so well by 
 sight and name, than to be the cynosure of this bril 
 liant assembly ; to warm himself in beauty s smile, and 
 presently, to help make away with the supper prepared 
 by the famous Berkeley cooks. Far be it from the 
 exemplary consort of the many-sided man to controvert 
 destiny, or run counter to her spouse s will ! 
 
 The pious submissiveness of temper and desire lasted 
 throughout the cotillon graced by her presence and 
 action. She wasted less thought upon the hireling she 
 had left leaning against the wall than if he had been a 
 caryatide. She recked as little of the trivial trip of the 
 tongue that had blanched her step-daughter s face, and 
 drew upon her the secretary s stare, as the tourist of the 
 pebble his foot displaces which may yet set an avalanche 
 in motion. 
 
 A minuet succeeded the second cotillon. Between 
 the two the young people had strayed out upon the 
 lawn and porches, and the room was the fresher for 
 comparative emptiness. Sconces, holding branching
 
 118 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 candlesticks, lined four sides of the ballroom ; between 
 them swung festoons of running cedar. Feathery 
 asparagus-boughs, speckled with red berries, filled the 
 fireplaces and wreathed the frames of mirrors and pic 
 tures. The oaken floor was waxed and rubbed until 
 it shone like glass. Portraits of Carters and Harrisons 
 looked down upon their multiplied descendants and the 
 friends of a later generation. Wall-benches were packed 
 with dowagers and matrons who had given over danc 
 ing; elderly men stood about in halls and doorways. 
 
 Colin Bass had pressed himself into the recessed 
 window deserted by Madam Byrd. Lieutenant May- 
 nard had sued in good and set ballroom phrase for 
 the honor of her hand in the stately dance, and in her 
 gracious assent there was no trace of the recoil she had 
 defined as inseparable from refined sensibilities. 
 
 Mr. Francis smiled as the " buccaneer-butcher" led 
 the willing dame down the long apartment to their 
 allotted places. Bending nearer his partner s ear, he 
 spoke low and laughingly. The secretary s furtive 
 glance had not left the pair since he saw that Evelyn 
 Byrd was to dance with her friend s lover. He noted 
 this motion as more familiar than the comparative 
 strangerhood of the parties authorized, then, the an 
 swering flash of meeting eyes bespeaking cordial 
 mutual understanding. As Francis raised his head, 
 the light from neighboring candelabra struck athwart 
 his face, and Bass saw what made his steady brain 
 totter. 
 
 The opportunity of inspecting the miniature in the 
 locket he had taken from Lady Bess had been brief, 
 but his habits of minute observation, and the tenacity
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 119 
 
 of memory he cultivated as part of his business capital, 
 had fixed every line of it in his mind. Upon more 
 than one occasion he had been puzzled by a flitting 
 fancy that he had seen this man before ; by an elusive 
 resemblance to person or picture that was gone ere he 
 could seize it. He recalled, now, how strong and per 
 plexing had been this impression one evening as he 
 watched Evelyn singing at the harpsichord, with 
 Francis hovering near her, the same night on which 
 the insolent patrician had slaved his promenade with 
 Miss Jaqueline to close the study-door with a mocking 
 allusion to " pestilent draughts." 
 
 He knew now the meaning of suspicions and the 
 vague boding that had ever attended them. His 
 shrewd wits forged, link by link, a chain of probabili 
 ties that sickened his soul. 
 
 The child had fallen asleep in Evelyn s arms. The 
 locket may have been lent to her as a plaything, and 
 forgotten by the owner. It was more likely that it 
 was abstracted by the thievish little fingers without 
 Evelyn s knowledge. It had, assuredly, not belonged 
 to Mrs. Carter, and this accounted for the circumstance 
 that no inquiry succeeded the loss. The opaque sal- 
 lowness of the reasoner s skin was cadaverous as he 
 admitted the almost certainty that the handsome face 
 he now scanned was identical with the original of the 
 picture he had seen surrounded by diamonds, and bear 
 ing the French legend, and that Evelyn Byrd had 
 worn the miniature above her heart. 
 
 Colonel William Evelyn Byrd was puissant in his 
 colonial principality, but he could not muzzle the 
 tattlers who had bruited through the region the rumor
 
 120 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 of his beautiful daughter s ill-omened betrothal. It 
 was merely a rumor, a faint sketch of a story, and 
 outline and detail were as varied as the mediums that 
 transmitted the romance. The secretary, who heard 
 everything and forgot nothing, had constructed a tale for 
 himself of harmonious excerpts. Miss Byrd accord 
 ing to this had been sought in marriage while in Eng 
 land, by a person of quality : her father had raised 
 objections to the union, and brought her home out of 
 the reach of danger. All this was six years ago. To 
 one who knew Colonel Byrd, it might as well have 
 been sixty. Having once decreed the dissolution of 
 the contract if contract there were no arguments 
 framed by man, and no tears wept by woman, could 
 stir his resolution. 
 
 Yet here was his daughter s lover still hers the 
 favorite of the Byrd household, in the master s absence 
 and under an assumed name making the most of the 
 privileges accorded him by the step- mother s partiality 
 for him above all other visitors, and the daughter s 
 complicity in the conspiracy devised by Martha Jaque- 
 line and her fellow-voyager ! Divers names and titles 
 had been fitted to the mysterious suitor for whose sake 
 some prophesied that the fair Evelyn would die un- 
 wedded, but " Francis" and plain " Mr." were not 
 among them. The one joint in the evidence which 
 Colin had difficulty hi adjusting was Madam Byrd s 
 connivance in the deception. Her awe of her husband 
 and dread of angering him would be potent dissuasives 
 from any course of conduct that opposed his will, and 
 joined to these was her notorious impatience with 
 Evelyn s affairs of the heart. She probably wished to
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 121 
 
 see her step-daughter settled in life before her own 
 girls came upon the carpet, but Colin had detected 
 too many tokens of intolerance with the adoration of 
 Miss Byrd s numerous admirers to credit her active 
 co-operation in a scheme so perilous us this. Under 
 the show of deference paid by Mr. Francis to his 
 hostess, there probably lurked the design of securing 
 her as an ally against the day of battle which was 
 inevitable, but Madam was not the woman to serve 
 wittingly as a stepping-stone or blind for sentimental 
 amours. 
 
 Still, his own ears had heard her call him, "Your 
 Lordship!" 
 
 It is within bounds to say that never, since the out 
 set of his ambitious career, had the rising man of his 
 tribe been more befogged, more utterly distraught, 
 dubious as to fact, and undecided as to action, than 
 while he continued to play caryatide against the 
 wreathed walls of the drawing-room to which he 
 knew he was admitted upon sufferance as the humble 
 protege of one who set and defied laws at his audacious 
 pleasure. 
 
 " M. Tartuffe appears to-night in a new part, as the 
 Knight of the Rueful Countenance," remarked Eve 
 lyn s partner, in the practised subtone that enables one 
 to say the most confidential things without exciting 
 suspicion of secret-service work in the minds of 
 lookers-on. "And sustains it passably well." 
 
 Evelyn s soft laughter was irrepressible. It was 
 
 easy to move her to merriment this evening, and a 
 
 glance at the dourness of a visage in ludicrous contrast 
 
 to the universal hilarity about him overcame the im- 
 
 F 11
 
 122 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 pulse to pity the lonely man. She recovered herself 
 in an instant, to say, remorsefully, 
 
 "Why will you name him Turtuffe ? He is no 
 hypocrite, nor yet especially religious. He lays no 
 schemes for working harm to others and profit to him- 1 
 self. He is a commonplace, respectable, faithful re 
 tainer of our family. But for him a token you wot of 
 would have miscarried the other day, and you would 
 not have been here to-night. I am ashamed to have 
 laughed. You ought to repent that you made me 
 laugh." 
 
 " I repent of nothing that blesses my eyes with the 
 music of lang syne. As to yonder knight, while I 
 must say of him, al \vays, what came to my mind the 
 first moment my eyes beheld him, 
 
 Non amo te, Zabidi, nee possum dicere quare ; 
 Hoc tantum possum dicere, non amo te, 
 
 I could be grateful to him for winning that laugh for 
 me. You look, this evening, as you looked in the 
 first months of our acquaintanceship, as on the day of 
 your first drawing-room, when you honored a trembling 
 adorer by accepting the fan won in a wager. Fairer 
 if that could be ! Not a day older, nor a degree more 
 sedate. Something has beguiled you out of partial 
 shadow into full sunshine, my lily among thorns!" 
 
 She raised a look to him it was lucky no one else 
 saw. Martha Jaqueline s simile of the unguarded 
 loop-holes was just. 
 
 " That is because I am strangely happy ! I cannot 
 tell you or myself why. Only that the burden and 
 the clouds have been rolled away after so long a
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 123 
 
 time, oh, how long ! They may return to-morrow ; 
 but to-night" with pretty defiance of Fate " I am 
 happy ! I will say it !" 
 
 " And hopeful at last ?" 
 
 She suffered the passionate gaze to read her soul ; 
 repeated the words with a smile like clear shining after 
 rain, 
 
 " And hopeful at last !" 
 
 The majestic measures of the minuet permitted the 
 by-play of earnest talk, but neither spoke again until 
 the foot of the room was reached. The admiring re 
 gards of one and another were attracted to them as 
 they passed along, hand-in-hand, until all were gazers, 
 and a babble of exclamations underran the rhythmic 
 beat of feet, the wail of the violins. The high-bred 
 air and striking beauty of the pair would have distin 
 guished them in any assembly, but to the dullest im 
 agination they seemed to carry with them an atmosphere 
 of their own. The world had fallen away from them ; 
 they were two freed, rejoicing spirits, guarded by grave- 
 eyed loves, each with finger on lip to warn back tres 
 passers from the hallowed ground trodden by maid and 
 man. 
 
 At the bottom of the room they turned in the order 
 prescribed by the dance, and stood, still silent, still 
 hand-in-hand, the same mystic glory of exaltation in 
 face and attitude. 
 
 A bustle about the door diverted the wondering 
 attention of the company. There had been arrivals 
 since the minuet began. A magnificent figure appeared 
 at the entrance of the drawing-room, bowing to his 
 companion to precede him.
 
 124 SIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Harrison, who were not dancing, 
 hastened to receive distinguished and belated guests. 
 An eager buzz went down the double ranks of the 
 dancers, arousing the two rapt dreamers to the very 
 present and actual : 
 
 " Colonel Byrd and Governor Spotswood !" 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 DECIDEDLY Madam Maria Byrd s fine spirits and 
 glib tongue were in league against her common sense 
 that night, and Mr. Francis was a circumspect confi 
 dant. 
 
 Martha Jaqueline would have shrieked in wicked glee, 
 Hannah Harrison been lost in mild astonishment, and 
 Lieutenant Maynard would have sworn in his beard, 
 had they known the purport of the voluble dame s 
 divulgations to the stranger within her ornate gates. 
 The listener, while he had a tolerably correct idea of 
 the facts in the alleged betrothal case, did not consider 
 himself called upon to betray familiarity with the 
 " warrior s" antecedents, or that he had divined his 
 identity at sight. 
 
 Martha Jaqueline met Lieutenant Maynard to-night 
 for the first time in a year and more, a meeting that 
 quieted whatever gossip connecting their names had 
 outlived the twelvemonth. It was not his place to tell 
 that ever since her return he had been cruising the 
 Carolina coast in quest of smugglers and pirates in 
 smugglers clothing, and in the intervals of duty,
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 125 
 
 cursing the luck that had sent him out of the James 
 and the Chesapeake when he most ardently longed to 
 be within hail of the big, square homestead, swathed in 
 ivy, flanked by "orchards fruited deep," and overlook 
 ing, as far as eye could reach, acres of low grounds fat 
 with alluvial deposit. He was, as has been intimated, 
 past the earlier prime of manhood, his hair was griz 
 zled upon the temples, and his close-cropped beard 
 streaked with like mementos of years past and pass 
 ing. Martha Jaqueline, his junior by over a dozen 
 years, had a lively sense of the ridiculous that made 
 her the terror of. stupidity and incompetency. Han 
 nah Harrison was little older by calendar-rendering, 
 ten years the elder in staid propriety of demeanor. 
 People had laughed until they were tired of the jest, at 
 the gallant officer s open devotion to the madcap girl in 
 her teens, and frowned at the naughty encouragement 
 it suited her humor to give him. Everybody winked 
 approvingly when he seemed to come to his senses, 
 after throwing away more time than a man of his age 
 could spare, and transferred his allegiance to Admiral 
 Harrison s well-endowed daughter. Hannah was his 
 firm friend, and in no danger of taking offence if, 
 while dancing with her, he looked at and talked of the 
 black-eyed girl in gold-colored taffeta selected in Paris 
 to match the amber ornaments he had given to her at 
 their parting, a year ago. 
 
 Nothing of which entered into Madam Byrd s com 
 placent imaginings. Her eyes saw far, but only along 
 the surface of the field, a not uncommon peculiarity 
 in people who pride themselves upon penetrative acute- 
 ness, and are diffuse in advertising the property. Foam 
 
 11*
 
 126 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 does not belong to deep-sea soundings, as the noted 
 pirate-hunter could have told her. 
 
 Martha was then, and ever afterward, grateful for his 
 chance proximity when, glancing toward the door at 
 the confused hum of announcement, she beheld the last 
 man upon earth she cared to see at that moment. 
 Instinctively raising her fan to the level of the mouth 
 she felt was working uncontrollably, and not daring to 
 look toward Evelyn, she said in incoherent haste, 
 
 " Say something, or do something quick ! No mat 
 ter what ! only make people look at you ! Don t look 
 to see who is at the door ! For heaven s sake 
 now !" 
 
 Accustomed to quarter-deck discipline, and ever 
 readier to act than to think, the sailor, thus adjured, 
 hung his left heel in Madam Byrd s satin train, in the 
 effort to extricate it, slid hopelessly with the right foot 
 upon the glassy boards, and measured six feet of robust 
 humanity directly across the dancers track, with a con 
 cussion that shook the solid beams. In a paroxysm of 
 thankfulness, Martha Jaqueline sprang forward and 
 offered both hands to assist him in rising. 
 
 " Well done ! well done!" she said, in accents strang 
 ling between laughter and crying. " But can you do 
 nothing in moderation ? Half the fall would have 
 served my purpose and bruised you less !" 
 
 The music stopped ; everybody crowded around to 
 inquire to sympathize and, when it was evident that 
 no harm was done, to join in the laugh led by the 
 unterrified warrior and Miss Jaqueline. 
 
 Her face was glowing, her voice shook hysterically, 
 as after quiet was restored she conducted Mr. Francis
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 127 
 
 up to the two most distinguished men in His Majesty s 
 Colony of Virginia. 
 
 " Will your Excellency allow me to present Mr. 
 Francis, my particular friend and Mrs. Byrd s guest, 
 who is visiting Virginia from England ? 
 
 " Colonel Byrd ! the only drawback to our sojourn 
 under your roof has been your absence. Your return 
 leaves nothing for us to ask of Fate." 
 
 The lie was dashingly enunciated. It was not a time 
 
 O V 
 
 for consultation with conscience. She might commend 
 half-way measures in the matter of the Lieutenant s 
 bones, but nothing stopped or stayed her when a leap 
 was to be taken. 
 
 The rugged features of the Colony s greatest Governor 
 relaxed ; the deep-set eyes twinkled at sight of the dark, 
 arch visage upraised to him with the confiding fearless 
 ness of a petted child who expects indulgent notice. 
 He bestowed a cordial handshake upon her " friend," 
 spoke a few words of welcome to Virginia, and laid his 
 brawny hand lightly upon the girl s smooth brown arm. 
 
 " My dear young lady ! if I were not fearful of 
 arousing the envy of every other man present, I would 
 claim a salute from your lips in token of the friendship I 
 bore your father, whose face I see repeated in your own." 
 
 "Is it quite fair in your Excellency to let the dread 
 of angering a few dozen men" disdainfully emphatic 
 "outweigh the honor such recognition would confer 
 upon me?" retorted the witch, with a tempting pout of 
 the ripe mouth. 
 
 The soldier-ruler, the Tubal Cain of Virginia, the 
 lately-appointed Postmaster-General of the American 
 Colonies stooped his grand head and kissed the fair
 
 128 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 pleader in heartiness of good-will that called forth a 
 chorus of applause. 
 
 " What can the man do that cometh after the king?" 
 said the rich, sonorous voice of the Master of West- 
 over. 
 
 He bo\ved so low in pressing Martha s hand to his 
 lips that the reverence was almost a genuflexion. " I 
 beg you to believe, sir," to Mr. Francis, " that, if 
 the Englishman and stranger needed other commenda 
 tion to my regard than these circumstances, he has it in 
 the friendship of this fair lady." 
 
 The two men looked squarely into one another s eyes 
 during the little speech, and while the stranger replied : 
 
 " I am proud to owe to her the consideration with 
 which you distinguish me!" 
 
 They took the time and pains to say such things in 
 that All-So-Long- Ago, and would have reckoned as 
 boorishly curt the address that disdained gracious cere 
 mony. For all that, blood and passion were no gentler 
 than in our realistic times. One heart, at least, quailed 
 at a certain settling of the urbane muscles about the 
 mouth, as Evelyn saw her father bestow a more search 
 ing look upon the face of his new acquaintance, as if 
 something in voice or feature impressed him and not 
 agreeably. 
 
 By tacit consent, Mr. Francis came near her no more 
 that evening, and supplied the gossips with no more 
 spice by apparent wavering from his fealty to his re 
 puted betrothed. He was Martha Jaqueline s shadow, 
 sparing never a look in the direction of the lily others 
 thought sweet and fair. The one other woman singled 
 out for his particular attention was the hostess whose
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 129 
 
 partner lie was in the Virginia reel that wound up the 
 festivities. 
 
 " Come to us to-morrow I" she said, ifnder a conven 
 tional smile. " The risk is too great to be taken need 
 lessly/ continuing, after he had " turned" her in the 
 figure, " my heart failed me for fear when I saw him. 
 His last letter home said he would be away a fortnight 
 longer." 
 
 "Since it must come, let it come !" Francis uttered 
 with lips whose curves told no more than hers. " The 
 masquerade is an excellent piece of work, Madam 
 Lady ! would it were done ! " 
 
 " Yet you come of a race of diplomatists !" 
 
 " Aye !" They were at the top of the set, and no 
 other two were, to all appearance, chatting more lightly. 
 "Since my ancestor, Henry Mordaunt, was proxy for 
 his liege, King James the Second, then Duke of York, 
 and brought home to England the beauteous Mary of 
 
 O O tf 
 
 Modena, who afterward followed his broken fortunes 
 into exile. But the part suits me ill. I favor finesse 
 less than fair fight. I am sorely tempted to risk all 
 upon one bold throw." 
 
 "You would lose all!" 
 
 "Not if I have read aright twin-stars that were 
 never brighter than to-night !" 
 
 " Sweet stars !" Mrs. Harrison s own eyes glistened. 
 "I marked them and so did many who read their 
 meaning less truly. But" returning to the charge 
 "come to us on the morrow ! Martha will, I am posi 
 tive, agree with me. The carriage will call for you at 
 noon." 
 
 "You could propose nothing, in the circumstances,
 
 130 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 that would better suit my humor. It is hardly honor 
 able to play sapper and miner to the house in which I eat 
 bread and salt! But Colonel Byrd has already, in my 
 hearing, invited Mr. Harrison and sundry other gentle 
 men to meet Governor Spotswood and my humble self 
 at his table to-morrow, and I fear that I could hardly 
 refuse to remain until evening without seeming uncivil. 
 After dinner, I shall be gratefully at your service, and 
 Mistress Martha s. When I have withdrawn to longer 
 range I shall conduct the siege vigorously. Within 
 two days I drop mask and domino, and claim mine 
 own in other things as well as name and title." 
 
 The great hall-clock struck twelve as the Westover 
 party entered the arched doorway on their return, a 
 deep-throated chime, mellowed and measured as a 
 cathedral-bell. 
 
 " Another day is dead !" said the Master. " To nest ! 
 to nest! my bonny birds ! if you would hop and chirp 
 at dawn ! Here comes the mother of the maids to 
 drive you up with her !" as Miss Lotsie rustled her stiff 
 black gown down the staircase. " And you, my lady- 
 \vife, albeit your roses are of a hardier sort than those 
 that faded in the lassies cheeks an hour agone, must 
 get rest, that you may shame them in the Governor s 
 eyes at dinner. Mistress Martha ! grant the humblest 
 of your votaries place in the background of your dreams. 
 Evelyn, child ! it is well I came home to save you from 
 the consequences of too much junketing. And so, good 
 night, and GOD be with us all !" 
 
 He said it airily, giving none opportunity for dissent 
 or other reply ; with hat under his arm, handed Madam 
 Byrd up the first flight; kissed his daughter s cheek
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 131 
 
 and Martha s hand, and ran lightly down to the group 
 of men left standing below. 
 
 A pull upon the bell-rope brought a sleepy footman 
 from the dining-room, and Caliban, agile as a cat, and 
 wide-awake as a night-hawk, from the direction of the 
 kitchen. 
 
 " Lights in the drawing-room !" ordered the Master. 
 
 o o 
 
 "Decanters, glasses, and pipes!" 
 
 In an amazingly short time the gleam of six wax 
 candles was thrown back from the mantel-mirror and 
 struck out keener glints from cut-glass and silver set 
 in array upon the central table. A chandelier depended 
 from the ceiling, and to this Colonel Byrd pointed, 
 without speaking. Caliban produced from behind the 
 green branches filling the chimney a slender wand of 
 pitch-pine, ignited the tip, and reached up" at the length 
 of his arm, to kindle the dozen wax candles overhead. 
 A wave of the Master s hand dismissed the elder ser 
 vant; Caliban took his station behind his owner s 
 chair, ready to fill glasses, and light the capacious bowls 
 soon filled with tobacco. 
 
 Colonel Byrd and his companion, ex-Governor Spots- 
 wood, had ridden forty miles that day over a rough 
 country, arriving at Westover half an hour after the 
 chariot had driven from the door bearing the revellers 
 to Berkeley. The two men had supped together, 
 dressed, and repaired to the gay scene, to ruffle it there 
 with the bravest for two hours. It was significant of 
 the social customs of the age that neither servants nor 
 guests saw anything strange in the preparations for 
 " making a night of it." The courtier-planter was 
 indefatigable alike in business and in pleasure, and
 
 132 SIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 complimented associates by assuming their physical 
 forces to be equal to his own. There was meaning in 
 the selection of the drawing-room as the theatre of 
 what could not be vulgar orgies while lie presided, and 
 Mr. Fontaine made one at the board. It was such fes 
 tivity as became the rich toilettes of the merry-makers. 
 Had they come in, spurred, booted, and muddy, from 
 chase or journey, pipes and liquors would have been 
 served in study or library. 
 
 Madam had her whisper to Miss Lotsie in the hall 
 above-stairs. Her sanguine complexion had paled ; 
 her eyes were startled ; her double chin was flabby. 
 
 " My holiday is over ! And it may be only the 
 vapors, after so much routing and racketing but I 
 feel as if there were thunder in the air, and the lightning 
 were going to strike not far from me!" 
 
 " You are out of sorts, now ! To-morrow you ll feel 
 better !" grated the friend of her neighbor. 
 
 Then she shut herself into the room where Evelyn 
 had sunk upon the floor, her silken robes crushed about 
 her, her head in Martha Jaqueline s lap. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 " PRAY be seated, gentlemen !" entreated the Master 
 of the house of Governor Spotswood, Mr. Fontaine, 
 Lieutenant Maynard, and Mr. Francis, and, affably, 
 to the sixth personage present, " sit down, Bass, and 
 have a glass with us !" 
 
 Too well-bred to patronize one who, by his invitation,
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 133 
 
 was to put his feet under the same table with himself, 
 he yet contrived a subtle difference between his manner 
 of bidding him and that directed to the rest, a differ 
 ence flattering or humiliating, as one chose to construe 
 it into favor or good-hurnored toleration. The secre 
 tary sat down a marked man to the apprehension of 
 his companions. It could not be surmised from the 
 smug stolidity of his visage whether or not he appre 
 ciated the fact. 
 
 "I abhor semi-ob.scurity !" continued the Colonel, 
 drawing a full breath through the stem of his gold- 
 mounted pipe. " When once a man s courting days 
 are done, he considers twilight a blunder. It, with 
 the moon and stars, would seem to have been continued 
 for the especial illumination of Fools Paradise. Saving 
 our good chaplain s presence, I might, reverently, sug 
 gest a doubt if the game be worth so many candles. I 
 mistrust that my excellent friend, Colonel Spotswood, 
 will challenge me on this head. Less, it may be, out 
 of jealousy for the honor of the Creator, who presuma 
 bly apportions means to ends, than for fear my Lady 
 Spotswood might hear of my heresy. You, Maynard, 
 who must have a sufficiently lively recollection of the 
 railing accusations he was wont to bring against matri 
 mony in the days of his unregenerate bachelorhood, 
 would be edified and confounded could you see what an 
 uxorious Benedick lie has become. In practice and in 
 precept, he is the exemplar to all husbands within a 
 dozen miles of Germanna. But, having the honor to 
 be tolerably well acquainted with her who has wrought 
 the revolution, I can testify that seldom has a man 
 had fairer cause for a change of creed and behavior." 
 
 12
 
 134 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 The Governor s visage was crimson in the seamed 
 cheeks, purple with a queer sort of shamefaced satis 
 faction, very comical to the beholders. Never adroit 
 at jovial repartee, lie twisted uneasily upon his seat and 
 diverted the conversation at a right angle. 
 
 "Is this Varina tobacco, Byrd?" he asked, in the 
 strident tones his enemies and they were many were 
 used to hear in philippic and mandate. 
 
 " It is a worthier brand than Varina. (By the way, 
 we say Henrico/ now !) It was grown and cured, 
 then ripened at Westover, and has a finer flavor than 
 ever belonged to the once famous Varina tobacco. 
 That lived upon its reputation for half a century, until 
 it the repute, I mean fell to pieces from sheer 
 rottenness. 
 
 " Varina, you will understand, Mr. Francis, is a 
 plantation near the head of navigation on James 
 River, and was once owned by Master John Rolfe, 
 who wedded Pocahontas, the daughter of King Pow- 
 hatan. The whey-faced son-in-law was a thrifty man 
 and a cunning. I do not affirm that he set on foot the 
 idle tale of certain valuable secrets connected with the 
 culture and curing of the bewitching vegetable, tobacco, 
 which had been confided to him by his royal relative. 
 But his crops brought larger prices for the tradition." 
 
 "Aspersion of John Rolfe would not come with a 
 good grace from you, Colonel," observed Fontaine, to 
 spare the stranger the trouble of reply upon a subject 
 of which he was probably ignorant. " He was brave 
 enough to put into successful operation your favorite 
 scheme of Christianizing the savages, to wit, inter 
 marriage with the English settlers."
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 135 
 
 Francis laughed. 
 
 " We believe what we like of that, Mr. Fontaine ! 
 The fame of Colonel Bynl s nice taste in such matters 
 is too well established to be easily shaken." 
 
 The Colonel fixed his brilliant dark eyes so like 
 his daughter s upon the Englishman s face, which 
 he seemed to study while he went on to vindicate iiis 
 position. His manner courteous, yet seldom free 
 from the dash of cynicism or banter one traces in his 
 diary and correspondence was, or so Fontaine and 
 Bass fancied, slightly abstracted during the harangue, 
 as if he sought for some forgotten clue. 
 
 " At the risk of endangering my reputation for 
 fastidiousness with you, Mr. Francis, conscience urges 
 me to full confession of my sentiments upon what you 
 and other Englishmen of fashion may consider as an 
 unsavory subject. It is my deliberate and unalterable 
 belief that, had the first English settlers in America 
 intended either to civilize or convert the savages, they 
 should have encouraged intermarriage with them upon 
 every conceivable occasion. The natives could by no 
 means persuade themselves that the pale-faces were 
 heartily their friends so long as the meanest of them 
 disdained to take an Indian maiden to wife. The 
 French have not been so squeamish in Canada, where, 
 upon trial, they find abundance of attraction in the 
 Indians. Their late Grand Monarch thought it not 
 below even the dignity of a Frenchman to become one 
 flesh with this people, and therefore ordered that a 
 bounty of one hundred livres be bestowed upon any 
 of his subjects, man or woman, that would intermarry 
 with a native.
 
 136 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 "By this piece of policy we find the French interest 
 much strengthened among the savages, and their re 
 ligion such as it is" unable, as a zealous Church of 
 England man, to withhold the fling "propagated just 
 as far as their love. And 1 heartily hope that this 
 well-concerted scheme may not hereafter give the 
 French an advantage over His Majesty s good subjects 
 on the Northern Continent of America." 
 
 " The thought of amalgamation is odious and vile to 
 my way of thinking!" Maynard struck in, bluntly. 
 "With Mr. Francis, I decline to credit your sincerity. 
 Zounds, man ! fancy yourself the husband of a copper- 
 colored wench, shining with fish-oil, and with no clothes 
 on to speak of except a blanket strapped about the 
 waist by a thong of deer s hide! Think of the filth 
 and vermin of her wigwam, as you and I have seen it ! 
 Ugh!- 
 
 Colonel Byrd put down his pipe, and produced his 
 snuff-box from the pocket of his embroidered waistcoat, 
 without change in the half-smile of friendly camara 
 derie he had worn all along; tapped the lid, opened it, 
 offered it to Francis, and took a pinch with dainty 
 thumb and finger. On the lid, laid right under his 
 eyes, Francis read, " In memoriam Johannes Cary & 
 Jacobi Dryden. January prim. 1679. 
 
 " Your imagination should go into the buck-basket, 
 Maynard, to be bleached and lavendered," resumed the 
 mellow accents. "/ was not an early settler ! Had I 
 made up my mind to other trials contingent upon my 
 duty to King and New Country, I would have brought 
 rny stomach to embrace an alliance manifestly so pru 
 dent as this. The Indians would have had less reason
 
 HIS G If EAT SELF. 137 
 
 to complain that the English took away their land 
 if the white men had received it by way of portion 
 with their daughters. Had such affinities been con 
 tracted in the beginning, how much bloodshed had been 
 prevented, and how populous would the country have 
 been, consequently, how considerable ! Nor would 
 the shade of the skin have been any reproach at this 
 day. If a Moor may be washed white in three gener- 
 rations, surely an Indian might be blanched in two." 
 
 He passed the snuff-box over to Maynard, who shook 
 his head impatiently. 
 
 " Gloze it over as you will, the idea is filthy, immoral, 
 and unchristian ! By your own showing, you put black 
 amoor and Indian upon the same footing, Let them 
 practise voudoo and pow-wow together and mingle 
 bloods. Don t degrade the finer race to which you 
 belong by such horrible unnaturalness of doctrine." 
 
 " It is rappee ripe and royal !" The Colonel con 
 tinued to hold out the snuff-box, insinuatingly, his 
 smile full of arch enjoyment. "No? You would feel 
 better if you took it ! To proceed with our argument. 
 The aboriginal Indian is many degrees higher in the 
 scale of being than the African negro. Our savages 
 are usually tall and well-proportioned, a circumstance 
 which ought to make amends for the darkness of their 
 complexions. Add to this, that they are healthy and 
 strong, with constitutions untainted by evil practices 
 and not enfeebled by luxury. Besides, morals and all 
 considered, I cannot think the Indians were much 
 greater heathens than the first settlers at Jamestown, 
 who built a church that cost fifty pounds, and a hostelry 
 that cost five hundred. Had they been truly pious and 
 
 12*
 
 138 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 wise in their generation, they would have had the charity 
 to take the only method of converting the red-skins to 
 Christianity." 
 
 The stalwart ex-Governor had hearkened up to this 
 point in silence that was plainly not acquiescent. 
 Knowing himself to be no match for his polished friend 
 in word-fencing, and looking, perhaps, for aid to the 
 clergyman whose reticence began to look ominous, he 
 had held in as with bit and bridle the energetic protest 
 that now burst forth by its own weight. 
 
 " /call such talk idle and ribald ! Were it not that 
 I believe you to be carrying out a jest which is in any 
 thing but good taste, I would not sit at the same table 
 with you. The Indian s soul is as white as yours or 
 mine, and must be saved by the same means. In our 
 school mission at Fort Christanna we taught them to 
 pray out of our Book of Common Prayer, to read their 
 Bibles and to live decent Christian lives. I am glad to 
 be able to state, as the result of these teachings, that the 
 women who were straight and well-limbed, of good 
 shape and extraordinary good features were very 
 modest and faithful to their husbands, and mighty shy 
 of Englishmen. They would not let one of us so much 
 as touch them !" 
 
 It was not in the man-nature of that liberal day to 
 refrain from a shout of laughter at the climax, espe 
 cially as the resentful intonation of the early portion of 
 the defence of his proteges swelled out with odd effect 
 in what he designed as a "clinching" fact. 
 
 The "Westover magnate lay back in his arm-chair, 
 his eyes shining with mischievous delight, and struck 
 his palms together.
 
 HIS ORE AT SELF. 139 
 
 " Bravo ! bravo ! Or would you rather we gave you 
 a vote of sympathy? We need only lend Maynard 
 rope enough to see him hang himself as cleverly. Even 
 now he dare not wag his tongue in denial of my dogma 
 that, after all that can be said, a sprightly lover is the 
 most prevailing missionary that can be sent among the 
 Indians at large, or any other infidels unless we except, 
 by courtesy" laughing musically "Governor Spots- 
 wood s Christanna lambkins !" 
 
 Mr. Fontaine interposed with characteristic tact and 
 delicacy. 
 
 " Our wise politicians settled the question for us in 
 Virginia, once and for all, at the beginning of our 
 settlement here. When they heard that Rolfe had 
 married Pocahontas, it was deliberated in Council 
 whether or not he had committed high treason in that 
 he had taken to wife an Indian princess, and had not 
 some troubles intervened which put a stop to the inquiry, 
 the luckless lover might have been hanged for doing 
 what other statesmen beside Colonel Byrd reckoned the 
 most just, natural, generous, and politic action that was 
 ever done on this side of the water. The action of the 
 Home government put an effectual stop to all inter 
 marriages of this sort that is, between whites and 
 Indians." 
 
 Caliban had moved out of the shadow of the tall 
 back of his master s chair to replenish Lieutenant 
 Maynard s glass, compounding the beverage with noise 
 less dexterity, and gliding back to his ambush as Mr. 
 Fontaine paused before the last section of his remark, 
 a pause that pointed his meaning. 
 
 " Pass the tobacco, my boy !" said the Colonel, kindly,
 
 140 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 and as the light streamed upon the lad s supple limbs 
 and golden-russet complexion, he added " Intermar 
 riages ! yes! When there is a choice of evils, the 
 wise man takes the lesser. We would not use a moral 
 method to convert the savage. The cross of races is 
 effected all the same. The Puritan fathers, the Bap 
 tists, and other New England dissenters, were of like 
 mind with the first adventurers to Virginia, anent 
 Indian alliances, false delicacy that created in the 
 natives a jealousy that the English were ill-affected 
 toward them. Many of the poor wretches paid for 
 their scruples with their lives, so we will not add our 
 censure to their miseries. The Quaker favorite of a 
 Popish prince William Penn managed to carry his 
 dish straighter. He purchased lands of the Indians, 
 and paid for them only a trifle, to be sure ; but that 
 they paid anything gained them the credit of being 
 more righteous than their neighbors. They had, like 
 wise, the prudence to treat them kindly, which saved 
 them from many of the wars and massacres wherein 
 the other colonies were indiscreetly involved. A people 
 whose principles forbid them to draw the carnal sword 
 have no right to give provocation. They vaunt some 
 what overmuch the harmlessness of their sect, and 
 having, like their founder, no vices but such as are 
 private, they have made Pennsylvania into a very fine 
 country." 
 
 It was at this stage of the discussion that Francis 
 chanced to look up at a portrait upon the wall directly 
 opposite his chair, and experienced a faint shock, as of 
 one who is covertly watched. The blaze of the wax- 
 lights met upon the face and figure of a man superb in the
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 141 
 
 costume of Queen Anne s court. His right hand rested 
 upon his hip; on a table at his side glittered a heap of 
 medals and chains. Conspicuous among his personal 
 adornments was a medallion-miniature of his royal 
 mistress, surrounded by brilliants, on the right breast. 
 His cravat and wrist-ruffles were of priceless lace; a 
 flowing perruque framed a haughty, handsome face. 
 There was a lurking, sardonic devil in the eyes that 
 seemed, to the young man, to survey him mockingly. 
 
 He had heard the story of the picture from Madam 
 Byrd. The original, General Daniel Parke, a Virginian 
 by birth, was the father of the first Mrs. Byrd. He 
 had served under Marlborough at Blenheim, and by 
 his splendid valor earned the right to bear news of 
 the victory to the Queen. The immediate reward of 
 Maryborough s messenger was the miniature so proudly 
 displayed. The more valuable gift was the governor 
 ship of the Leeward Islands, where, after four years of 
 a cruel and arrogant administration, he was killed in 
 an uprising of the people. Madam had, in Evelyn s 
 absence from the drawing-room, supplied graphic details 
 of the public and private misdoings of the girl s mater 
 nal grandfather. Francis had mentally discounted the 
 tales to his own satisfaction, but the sinister regard he 
 felt upon him now recalled the most unpleasant of 
 them. As a puff of wandering air swayed the candle- 
 flames, he could have fancied a sneer upon the full 
 lips. 
 
 He had known that he could not remain under 
 Colonel Byrd s roof after the master s return, and respect 
 himself. He had not expected discomfort and self- 
 contempt to begin so soon, or that they would be en-
 
 142 SIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 gendered by the steadfast gaze of a living man and 
 intensified by the furtive scrutiny of a portrait s eyes. 
 There was something uncanny in the chill that crept 
 upward to his heart while the talk, which seemed im 
 personal, proceeded, as if, once in a while, the coil of 
 an anaconda were cast about him. 
 
 Spotswood was speaking when he again lent an ear 
 to outward things. 
 
 " No other colony has thriven more steadily than 
 Pennsylvania. Had Penn lived until our times, he 
 might have said with Jacob, l With my staff passed I 
 over this Jordan, and I am now become five bands!" 1 
 
 "Six! my dear Governor ! six! His original grant 
 was for a slip of land lying between the Jerseys and 
 Maryland, containing three counties. He pushed his 
 interest still further with His Pope-loving Highness, 
 and obtained a fresh grant of New Castle, Kent, and 
 Sussex, which still remained within the New York 
 patent, and had been luckily left out of the grant of 
 New Jersey. All were incorporated, and dignified with 
 the name of Pennsylvania, a pretty pastoral title be 
 fitting the broad-brimmed hat that promised protection 
 to shoals of his peaceable sect. Verily, Friend William 
 had a long head for this world, if not for the next, 
 and doubtless he has had his reward." 
 
 " Don t sneer at a better Christian than yourself, 
 Byrd, because lie belonged to a sect instead of to the 
 Church. By their fruits ye shall know them. Penn 
 and his followers abide the divine test." 
 
 " By what fruits shall we know them ?" The Colonel 
 lounged indolently in his roomy chair, and with a silver 
 tobacco-stopper pressed down the contents of the pipe
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 143 
 
 Caliban had filled and lighted. " By the public record, 
 known and read of all men, or the secret history of 
 which few on this side of the Atlantic have heard ?" 
 
 " I am not advised of such a chapter," returned the 
 Governor, coldly. 
 
 " Nor 1 1" said Maynard, stoutly. " And when the 
 character of a dead man is involved, I dispute the 
 story in advance, unless it be supported by indubitable 
 authority." 
 
 Byrd s laugh and lounge were undisturbed by the 
 unflattering tone of the doughty couple. 
 
 " The tale was well known in England, where I first 
 heard it, long after the parties most nearly concerned 
 were in the dumb grave. It was surprising to Penn s 
 contemporaries who were not behind the scenes, how a 
 Quaker should be so much in the graces of a Popish 
 prince, but it was pretty well accounted for by those 
 versed in back-stair politics. This ingenious gentleman 
 was not born a Quaker, but in his earlier days had been 
 a man of pleasure about the town. He had a beautiful 
 form and very taking address which made him successful 
 with the ladies, and purchased for him the reversionary 
 right to a favorite of the Duke of Mon mouth. She 
 presented sweet William with a claugltter who had 
 beauty enough to raise her to be a Duchess and con 
 tinued to be a toast full thirty years. 
 
 " Don t be afraid of that brandy, Mr. Francis !" 
 seeing him put his hand over his glass as Caliban 
 would have filled it. " It was made from peaches 
 grown on the plantation in 1715, the year my daugh 
 ter, Mrs. Chamberlayne, was born, and has been twice 
 to the West Indies and back. That your right-hand
 
 144 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 neighbor is a water-bibber signifies nothing in the way 
 of example. It is our excellent chaplain s one weak 
 ness, to refuse the noblest form in which the kindly 
 fruits of the earth are offered to sinful man." 
 
 " I am no water-bibber," rejoined Francis, smiling. 
 " But British brains must be seasoned gradually to 
 American potations. Suffer me to commend the 
 brandy with no stint of word, however grudging you 
 may esteem my deeds. I have tasted nothing so fine 
 in any country. It has the gleam of the topaz, the 
 sweetness of honey, and the smoothness of oil." 
 
 The bland seignior bowed profoundly. 
 
 " Which right eloquent tribute to a princely drink 
 shall go on record in the archives of the Westover 
 Cellar. Mr. Bass will forget not one whit of it and 
 transcribe it in clerkly wise to-morrow. Our brace of 
 scandal-mongers are chafing with impatience at the 
 interruption in our chronicle scandaleuse," feigning 
 to frown at Spots wood and Maynard. " Life in the 
 provinces begets a taste for gossip as all dead things 
 fester into life. I grieve, gentlemen, that the most 
 corrupt part of the story has already been told. I 
 have but to add that the aforesaid amour had like to 
 have brought our fine gentleman in danger of a duel, 
 whereupon he discreetly sheltered himself under the 
 peaceable persuasion of Master George Fox. His 
 father had been a flag-officer in the navy while the 
 Duke of York was Lord High Admiral, and may have 
 recommended the son to his favor. I trust this piece 
 of secret history may wipe from the minds of my wor 
 shipful listeners any suspicions that our thrifty Penu 
 was popishly inclined."
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 145 
 
 "If half you hint he true,* he would better have 
 been a clean Papist," rejoined Spotswood, severely. 
 " A shaven monk who wrote the Ten Commandments 
 upon his bare back with a scourge were a better citi 
 zen. Not that I believe the tale to be worth contra 
 dicting. It is truly what you have named it, a 
 chronicle of the back-stairs. Thank GOD we have 
 none such in our newer and cleaner land !" 
 
 " We have aniono- us monuments in abundance of 
 
 o 
 
 the rule of this same papistical influence," Byrd re 
 torted, in unmoved calmness. "Virginia is scarred 
 from head to heel, behind and before, by the knife 
 forged and sharpened three thousand miles away. 
 Witness the excision of her goodliest arm, the Mary 
 land deeded one hundred years ago by King Charles 
 the First the Martyr, as we name him to his favor 
 ite (or the Queen s), George Calvert. It begat much 
 speculation, even then, how it came about that a good 
 Protestant King should bestow so bountiful a grant 
 upon a zealous Roman Catholic. Tis probable it was 
 one fatal instance among many others of His Majesty s 
 complaisance to the Queen. When to the influence of 
 lovely woman at home is joined that of the Scarlet 
 Woman at Rome, yon have a devil no man or nation 
 can lay." 
 
 His eyes, straying from the Englishman s non-com 
 mittal face to the hand resting upon the table, saw the 
 fingers contract spasmodically. The planter removed 
 
 * The author does not hold herself responsible for the " piece 
 of secret history" related in this chapter. It is taken for the 
 most part verbatim et literatim from Colonel Byrd s own MSS., 
 and is therefore curious, if not valuable. 
 G k 13
 
 146 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 his pipe from his mouth and leaned slightly forward. 
 His tone was gravely polite, with a sub-accent of 
 apology : 
 
 " I crave pardon on my own behalf, as on that of 
 my companions, if we are trenching upon debatable 
 ground, Mr. Francis. In our slip-shod talk over cups 
 and pipes we are losing sight of the possibility that 
 the rough gabble may displease you. I have, per 
 chance, taken too much for granted in supposing that 
 the favored guest of the Huguenot Jaquelines must, 
 perforce, be of their communion." 
 
 Francis looked up at the portrait opposite. Some 
 thing in the malicious scrutiny of the dark eyes com 
 pelled an answering glance. The anaconda coil was 
 tight upon his heart and lungs. He touched his dried 
 lips with his tongue before speaking, but his voice was 
 firm. 
 
 " If I hesitate to answer you directly, Colonel Byrd, 
 it is out of fear lest you should reproach yourself over 
 much for what was, at most, pardonable inadvertence. 
 To Madame Jaqueline s household I have made no 
 secret I wish to make none here of the truth that 
 my faith is that of my fathers. Ours is an old Catho 
 lic family. I may suffer in the esteem of those with 
 whom I would fain stand well" a swift glance and 
 almost imperceptible inclination of the head including 
 all present " by the confession, but to withhold it 
 would be cowardly and traitorous." 
 
 Simultaneously, Spotswood, from one side, and Fon 
 taine from the other, stretched out a hand of cordial 
 sympathy. 
 
 The Governor added to his vice-like grip :
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 147 
 
 " That s brave and right, sir ! Show your colors, 
 young gentleman, let what will follow ! This is a land 
 of liberty and toleration. You are more welcome to it 
 than before you spoke !" 
 
 The son of the Huguenot refugee said never a word, 
 but the mute pressure and expressive eyes left no need 
 for speech. 
 
 " Upon my soul !" blurted out Mayriard, " one would 
 suppose that the possibility of this sort of thing might 
 have come into some of our numskulls. For myself, 
 Mr. Francis, I can only beg a thousand pardons, and 
 congratulate myself upon the lucky fact that you are 
 more of a gentleman than I, or you would have cut our 
 talk in two an hour ago." 
 
 In the excitement of the moment, the humorous side 
 of the abject apology from one who had not opened his 
 lips upon the Roman Catholic question, was seen by no 
 one unless it were the self-possessed host. He arose, 
 and bowed regretfully to his foreign guest. 
 
 " Twould be but wasting words for me to reiterate 
 my friends apologies and assurances of deepest respect 
 for one who is not ashamed to avow his true character 
 and sentiments, whatever may be the consequences. 
 Fiat justitia, ruat GoelumT The sky-fall in this 
 instance should overwhelm us, not you, with con 
 fusion." 
 
 The young man had grown very pale. 
 
 " Let it pass, I implore you !" he said, huskily. " I 
 do not merit all or aught of the gracious things that 
 have been said. I am humbled by the hearing of 
 them." He reached out for a pipe of tobacco. " If 
 you will allow me, I will smoke the pipe of peace with
 
 148 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 all of you, and rejoice in so good an excuse to indulge 
 myself in another bowlful of what Colonel Byrd calls 
 f the bewitching vegetable. Westover tobacco is as 
 seductive, after a modest sort, as Westover brandy. I 
 never guessed until lately" his voice regaining firm 
 ness and lightness " what we owe to Sir Walter Raleigh 
 for introducing it into Christendom. If I have been 
 rightly informed, it was he who first brought it to 
 England ?" 
 
 The Colonel lifted his glass to his lips in a gesture of 
 indescribable grace. Amity, gratitude, renewed good- 
 fellowship, and oblivion all were pledged in the 
 action. 
 
 "It is a privilege to meet one who is correctly ad 
 vised upon a matter so interesting to Parent Country 
 and Colonies. I have heard learned Englishmen aye ! 
 and not unlearned colonists discourse seriously of the 
 probability that Christopher Columbus imported tobacco 
 into Spain. Had this been, is it likely that so accom 
 plished a gentleman as Walter Raleigh, and one who 
 had travelled so much and so far, should not have 
 known of the delightful narcotic, and adopted the use 
 thereof?" 
 
 Spotswood demurred : 
 
 "Yet the tobacco of Varina, Spain, was of so high 
 repute in 1622, that Rolfe s plantation was named 
 therefor. It was fancied that the tobacco raised there 
 had somewhat of the same flavor." 
 
 " So worthy a thing would have made good a claim 
 upon the consideration of mankind in forty years or 
 thereabouts. I have looked narrowly into the question, 
 and discovered no cause for doubt that Sir Walter s first
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 149 
 
 expedition to these shores took back the first tobacco 
 that ever touched European soil. I have heard my 
 father relate how the gallant Baronet, having fallen 
 in love with his new treasure, thought he could do no 
 less than make a present of some of the brightest of it 
 to his royal mistress for her own smoking. 
 
 "The Queen graciously accepted of it, but finding 
 her stomach sicken after two or three whiffs, it was 
 presently whispered by the Earl of Leicester s faction 
 that Sir Walter had certainly poisoned her. Her Majesty 
 soon recovering her disorder, obliged the Countess of 
 Nottingham and all her maids to smoke a whole pipe 
 out amongst them. There is no climate that produces 
 everything since the deluge wrenched the poles of the 
 earth out of place, nor is it fit that it should be so, 
 because it is the mutual supply one country receives 
 from another which creates a mutual traffic and inter 
 course among men. But I dare affirm that this same 
 colony of Virginia brings forth as many, as various, 
 and as valuable products as are to be found in any 
 quarter of the globe. I doubt me if the Land of Eden 
 were more prolific of the necessaries and the luxuries 
 of life." 
 
 " Peach brandy standing for one, and tobacco for the 
 other ?" queried the Englishman, again quite at his 
 ease. 
 
 The planter smiled genially. 
 
 "If you like. Or you may reverse the order. May- 
 nard ! you are nodding! Don t perjure yourself by 
 denying it ! The energy with which you prostrated 
 yourself at Mistress Martha s feet this evening has 
 wrought upon your strength, gamesome young buck 
 13*
 
 150 H IS GREAT SELF. 
 
 though you are. And there are the races to-morrow ! 
 We ll finish our pipes and toss off our heel-taps, and so 
 to bed." 
 
 A three-cornered note, with a few strands of hair 
 passed about it and caught together under the seal, was 
 stuck in the frame of the mirror above the toilette-table 
 in the room occupied by Francis that night. It was 
 without address or signature, but the hand was Martha 
 Jaqueliue s. Francis looked closely at the hair, detached 
 it from the wax, smiled, and winding the stray threads 
 into a coil upon his palm, kissed it before reading the 
 billet of a liue-and-a-half : 
 
 u / shall go through the garden at eight o clock to 
 morrow morning to the church-yard." 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE Berkeley race-course was laid out in an exact 
 circle upon the level stretch between the mansion-house 
 and the high-road beyond which lay the Westover 
 estate. 
 
 The perfect autumn day succeeding the ball brought 
 out the countryside in strength. Chariots, from which 
 the horses had been removed, surrounded, in close ranks, 
 the outer sweep of the course, and were filled with gay 
 parties of both sexes. The ladies and guests from the 
 two contiguous plantations had seats among the judges 
 on the grand stand, elevated by eight or ten easy steps 
 from the ground. 
 
 "Like and yet more unlike unto Jacob s ladder!"
 
 lUS GREAT SELF. 151 
 
 observed Martha Jaqueline, watching the ceaseless pas 
 sage up and down of neighborhood beaux. 
 
 It was Colonel Byrd who replied : 
 
 " Like because both lead to heaven. We need not 
 search long for the unlike. The angels came up hither 
 in one troop and remained. The wandering spirits 
 who ascend only to descend, should have your pity 
 not scorn if only because they are wanderers !" 
 
 " Oh !" sighed the girl, gazing up at him in genuine 
 admiration. " Why does no bachelor understand me 
 as readily and answer me as fitly as you? Yet there 
 are those stupid enough to marvel that I am still Martha 
 Jaqueline ! Why was not Evelyn your son, instead of 
 your daughter ?" 
 
 The courtier stooped lower to her ear. 
 
 "In that event, I should to-day have the misery 
 of seeing my son broken-hearted and his rival tri 
 umphant !" 
 
 " Colonel Byrd!" Reproachful look and accent were 
 inimitable. "Could your son have a successful rival? 
 You forget that other things would be altered by the 
 transformation of my dear Evelyn into her dearer 
 brother." 
 
 " Well done !" clapping his hands. " It is fortunate 
 that our English cavalier has tolerable skill in wordy 
 play, or he might look forward to many a defeat in the 
 combat-matrimonial. He has told you, I take it, of the 
 grievous faux-pas I executed last night and his mag 
 nanimous treatment of the same ?" 
 
 "Told me? I have hardly set eyes upon him since 
 you drove us poor women off to bed last night, like so 
 many hens at roosting-time."
 
 152 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 "You did not look at him then before breakfast? 
 Even your fearless eyes drooped under the ardor of as 
 eloquent a pair of blue ones as ever I beheld ? Aha ! 
 that pretty air of bewilderment is admirably feigned ! 
 You left out of account when you appointed a meeting 
 under the droppings of the sanctuary at bird-matins, 
 that one of mv few virtues is early rising. The black 
 
 *< O 
 
 silk domino befitted a church-yard tryst, but could not 
 disguise a figure and carriage that have not their like 
 in America if in the world. I was not near enough 
 to be an eavesdropper, but I saw, with respectful ad 
 miration, that you had taken my daughter along to play 
 dragon. She sat in the church-porch poor thing! 
 wrapped in a blue domino and despairing meditations 
 upon the injustice of Providence in not sending a du 
 plicate lover and a promenade upon the other side of 
 the sacred building to herself." 
 
 There was no mistaking the sincerity of her concern 
 as he began his raillery, or the relief she did not at 
 tempt to hide as he went on. Her black eyes sparkled 
 with appreciation of the cleverness that had outwitted 
 hers. 
 
 " You are ubiquitous ! You wear fern-seed in your 
 shoes ! I shall never feel safe again within a thousand 
 leagues of you ! Fortunately, there is, in the present 
 case, little to conceal from you. One day, and before 
 long, I hope, you will know all. Be assured that 
 nobody else shall know sooner, or more. Until then, 
 and even more afterward, may I ask your indulgence 
 with whatever may seem irregular or unjustifiable in 
 the affaire du cceur? I could never do anything 
 like other girls, you know. Promise me not to be
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 153 
 
 so angry with me that you will strike me out of your 
 books." 
 
 He pressed the little hand offered by the earnest 
 pleader, and dropped the tone of badinage in which he 
 habitually accosted her. 
 
 " Your father s daughter can ask me nothing in vain, 
 my dear young lady ! Some time before or after the 
 promised confession I would, as his deputy, question 
 you somewhat closely anent this good-looking gallant. 
 He comes of a Roman Catholic family, he tells me. 
 It is good if not noble?" 
 
 " Good and old ! I will give you the pedigree when 
 I tell the rest. But my friend needs no backing up 
 of dead and decayed ancestors to commend him to 
 the confidence of true men and women. I ask for him 
 but a fair field and no favor or d/sfavor ! May I 
 depend upon your impartial judgment?" 
 
 A keen look, sustained by her without flinching, 
 prefaced the answer. 
 
 " You may, unless it be that your preference must, 
 of itself, bias me. The Queen s seal carries weight." 
 
 " Thank you ! It is a bargain, then, that my signet 
 buys honest and fair consideration for the bearer?" 
 
 He promised with cordiality that surprised him in 
 the retrospect. The girl s known openness of speech 
 and deed, the high sense of honor he had seen her ex 
 hibit times without number since her childhood and, 
 perhaps more than the veteran courtier admitted to 
 himself, her fascination of glance and language, her 
 beauty and vivacity wrought upon his confidence. 
 They effected more. They allayed the undefined sen 
 sation of discomfort to which he had been subject at
 
 154 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 intervals since the moment of his introduction to the 
 stranger. The resemblance in person and voice that 
 had at first puzzled, then annoyed him, was clearly- 
 accidental and should not influence the behavior of a 
 rational man in association with an unoffending gentle 
 man who was to wed his old friend s daughter. He 
 brushed aside the cobweb of misgiving, and entered 
 zestfully into the business of the hour. 
 
 The scene was brilliant and imposing. The space 
 enclosed by the track had, some weeks in advance of 
 race-day, been seeded down with wheat, which, spring 
 ing up under favoring rains, now showed a carpet of 
 living green. The course, beaten and rolled into the 
 smoothness of a floor, was dotted with stray riders, 
 usually youths in light- or gayly-colored raiment, trot 
 ting or galloping from point to point to show off the 
 speed of their horses and their equestrian skill, while 
 paying court to the fair ones in barouche and chariot. 
 From the grand stand streamed the English flag; flut 
 tering pennons were tied to half- and quarter-mile 
 stakes ; the solid forest-line closed the view upon one 
 side ; upon the other rolled and glittered the river. 
 Beyond it were other plantations as fertile as the two 
 divided by the highway. The air, bland with October 
 mellowness, yet had a flavor of the sea. 
 
 The first race was to be run by negro jockeys, each 
 upon his master s horse. Caliban, in scarlet cap and 
 jacket, pipe-clayed breeches, and blue cockade, was 
 conspicuous in the group gathered at the starting-post. 
 
 "A cross between centaur and monkey !" declared 
 Martha Jaqueliue, whose spirits were at flood-tide after 
 the interlude above recorded. "It makes my heart
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 155 
 
 ache to think how many scoldings and cuffs will be 
 needed to bring him down to work-a-day life after 
 this." 
 
 The boy was mounted upon Matoax, a blood-bay 
 mare, and the finest racer of the Westover stud. Her 
 coverings had been drawn off so carefully that not a 
 hair of her burnished coat was roughened ; her slender 
 legs, shapely hoofs, small, nervous ears, and arched 
 neck bespoke distinguished sires and dams. Her com 
 petitors were of the best stock in the Colonies. From 
 Turkey Island, a Randolph had brought Lightning, a 
 white stallion renowned all over Virginia for speed 
 and symmetry. Rose well, the ancestral seat of the 
 Pages and the grandest mansion in the New World, 
 contributed a dappled gray, Hebe, backed by her 
 owner for a sum that made prudent men raise their 
 eyebrows even in that day and age of racing and 
 gaming. Mad Molly, notorious for having thrown 
 most of her riders, broken the arm of one, and kicked 
 another to death, was entered by John Dunbar, a neigh 
 boring squire. His son of the same name, in the next 
 generation, married a Byrd, and, obeying the trend of 
 hereditary tastes, divided his time so unequally between 
 horse-racing and the pulpit, that he was deposed from 
 the ministry, and subsequently fought a duel over a 
 betting-book in sight of Westover church, at the altar 
 of which he had once officiated. 
 
 From the Brandon stables came Clover-Top, a 
 sorrel, perfect in shape and gait, with mane and tail 
 like white silk. Far-off Corotoraan, in Lancaster 
 County, had sent Ajax, the pride of King Carter s 
 heart, black as midnight, sixteen hands high, with a
 
 156 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 stride phenomenal and traditional, a tail that brushed 
 the ground, a neck clothed with thunder, and the dis 
 position of a lamb. This prodigy of the celebrated 
 Corotoman stock-raising plantation had arrived by 
 easy stages at Shirley, several days before the races, 
 and, perfectly recovered from the fatigue of the journey, 
 was led past the stand by his jockey, a dwarfish negro, 
 as black as the horse, and dressed in white. 
 
 Caliban smiled superior down upon him from his seat 
 upon Matoax. 
 
 "How you gwine git up?" he jeered in an under 
 tone. "You orter fetched er lardder long wid you !" 
 
 Those occupants of the stand who were observant of 
 the episode guessed at the purport of the sneer from the 
 grin of one and the fell glance of the other, as reaching 
 a long arm up to the pommel, the dwarf vaulted into 
 the saddle like a tiger-cat, and snarled dumbly at his 
 tormentor. 
 
 " There isn t a jockey there who doesn t hate every 
 other rider with all his mind, soul, and strength," said 
 the Jamestown belle to her nearest companion. " Should 
 either of those two chance to win the race, the other 
 should be locked up, or there will be bloodshed." 
 
 The person addressed stepped forward to look over 
 the railing, and, attracted by the movement, Colonel 
 Byrd, and his secretary who sat at a small table to 
 record bets, and the results of the races looked at him. 
 The Englishman s remarkable comeliness was developed 
 to fullest advantage by his costume, which was that 
 of a gentleman-jockey of his country, a jerkin and 
 breeches of buckskin with high-topped boots. The 
 simple attire was made elegant by an elaborate pattern
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 157 
 
 embroidered in black silk upon sleeves and breast. His 
 cap was of black silk, worked with gold thread, and a 
 black silk scarf crossing the chest from right to left to 
 be knotted upon the thigh, and there kept in place by 
 a gold belt of chain-work, bore the legend, " J attends" 
 
 As Bass spelled out the letters, the pen slipped from 
 his fingers to the floor. The confirmation of his gravest 
 suspicions was like the death-sentence to his presump 
 tuous aspirations. Martha Jaqueline s chatter of hatred 
 and probable bloodshed would have taken on deeper 
 meaning to one who had happened to espy the red flame 
 smouldering in the deep-set eyes. By an inexplicable 
 impulse, Colonel Byrd s glance passed from the striking 
 figure leaning against the rail to the scribe, and before 
 either could raise guard, each saw what surprised him 
 with an intuition of intelligent sympathy. Bass re 
 covered his pen and returned to his book, revengeful 
 exultation beating along his veins in the premonition 
 of a coming crisis. Beyond the startled flash inter 
 cepted by the man who knew him best and at his 
 worst the Colonel gave no sign of emotion. His voice, 
 as he stooped again, in confidential wise, toward Martha 
 Jaqueline, was gay, sympathetic, even caressing: 
 
 " The scarf is, I suppose, a gage d amour ? 
 
 Wrought by nae hands as ye may guess 
 Save those of fairlie fair. 
 
 The day of chivalry is not over. Or is it the ances 
 tral motto ?" 
 
 " He is to ride my Pixie, you know," said Martha, 
 ingenuously. " It was but fair that I should supply 
 the colors. Dear Fairy ! you are trampling my toes 
 all out of shape !" 
 
 14
 
 158 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 The welcome trespasser was Lady Bess, who pushed 
 her way from her mother s side to Evelyn s knee. 
 
 " Tafe me yup !" demanded the tyrant of her thrall ; 
 "so s I tan see all the horses!" 
 
 As Francis lifted her to Miss Byrd s lap, she seized 
 his scarf. 
 
 " Mine Eva did that !" she announced in her piercing 
 treble. u I saw her making it one day an she hided 
 it. An I twied, tause she ouldn t yet me have it ! 
 Oo ll dive it to me, ont oo?" enticingly to the wearer. 
 
 Before the flooding scarlet burned to the roots of 
 Evelyn s hair, Martha s laugh pealed out like a mock 
 ing-bird s call. 
 
 "I never will tell another lie as long as I live!" 
 she cried in counterfeited confusion. " I wanted to pass 
 it off as my own handiwork every stitch of it. The 
 fact being that I should never have finished it in time 
 or eternity I am so prodigiously lazy had not tins 
 angel of mercy and diligence come to my help. You 
 don t prize it the less now that you know the truth, the 
 whole truth, and nothing but the truth do you ?" 
 
 For reply, Francis kissed her hand, and bowed grate 
 fully to her co-laborer. 
 
 "On the contrary, the pretty confession enhances the 
 value of the gift. I am this young lady s debtor, also, 
 Mrs. Carter, and congratulate her mother for having 
 trained her tongue to utter the words of wisdom and 
 of truth." 
 
 As the buzz of talk about them recommenced, he 
 muttered to Evelyn and her friend, 
 
 "O for one hour of Herod! Thank Heaven, this 
 will end soon !"
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 159 
 
 " Amen !" responded both girls, fervently, Martha 
 adding;, " I am aweary of Pyrrhian victories ! Even 
 a weasel has the right to sleep by day after waking all 
 night. Hair-breadth escapes are strewing gray hairs 
 among my raven tresses. But for the last thought of 
 exchanging cloaks this morning, not one of us three 
 would be alive upon the earth at this moment." 
 
 " I tant hear hat oo say !" whined Lady Bess, whose 
 best efforts to take in the rapid murmur were impeded 
 by Evelyn s dalliance with the curls hanging about the 
 sharp ears. 
 
 "Cannot you, my astute cherub? It is a burning 
 shame for anybody to so much as think of anything 
 you do not know ! Plark ! there is the drum-tap ! and 
 there go the horses !" cried Martha, forgetting all else. 
 
 The foremost was at the first quarter-mile stake when 
 Francis called over half-a-dozen heads to May nurd, 
 
 "A hundred to fifty upon Matoax!" 
 
 The pirate-killer nodded, and the Englishman signed 
 to Bass to write it down. 
 
 " An embroidered scarf against six pairs of French 
 gloves !" cried Martha Jaqueline, excitedly, as the bay 
 mare gained upon the leader, the Lancaster black. 
 "Mr. Harrison! will vou back Ai ax on that wager? 
 
 V ft O 
 
 He is your father-in-law s horse, you know !" 
 
 Maynard moved nearer, raising his voice above the 
 
 storm of cheers that marked the increasing interest of 
 
 the race. 
 
 " Two dozen pairs against your scarf! provided you 
 
 work it yourself!" 
 
 The brunette reddened darkly under the laugh raised 
 
 by the innuendo. A dozen voices contended for the
 
 160 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 right to take up the wager; Bass s stolid face looked at 
 the fair gamester for directions. 
 
 "Oh, put them all down!" she said, dauntlessly. 
 "I shall not be obliged to call in help to finish one of 
 the scarves, or to buy new gloves for ten years to come !" 
 
 Matoax came in two lengths ahead of her gigantic 
 competitor amid cheers that rent the sky. As Caliban 
 looked up, panting and exultant, cap in hand, to the 
 grand stand, he beheld a purse dangling from Francis s 
 forefinger; a gesture bade him hold up his cap, and the 
 prize fell into it, a glitter of gold and silver showing 
 between the meshes. 
 
 "By George !" quoth the ex-Governor, " the rueful 
 visage of the beaten negro wins more upon mv sym 
 pathy !" and he dropped a half-crown into the skinny 
 hand upheld at his signal. 
 
 " I, surely, can afford to be like-minded !" rejoined 
 Colonel Byrd, tossing a gold piece to the discomfited 
 dwarf. 
 
 All three actions were so quick that few beyond the 
 nearest bystanders saw what passed. Martha Jaqueline 
 noted the scowl of the half-breed as he rode the vic 
 torious mare to the rear. 
 
 " The Colonel has hurt the centaur s feelings or 
 pride," she said, aside to Evelyn. " He thinks that his 
 services are ill-repaid by what he construes into public 
 preference for his antagonist, and, upon my word, I 
 agree with the boy !" 
 
 " I will see to it that he comprehends how and why 
 the money was flung to the other," answered Miss 
 Byrd, and the incident slipped from both minds, 
 speedily supplied with more interesting matter.
 
 HIS GREAT 8 ELF. \Q\ 
 
 For the second and most important race of the day 
 was now to begin. By the time the track was cleared, 
 six gentlemen a Carter, a Page, a Randolph, a Harri 
 son, a Burwell, and the Englishman, Francis rode 
 from different points toward the grand stand. Three 
 were arrayed in huntsman s "pink" (scarlet to the un 
 initiated), one in blue with a profusion of gold lace and 
 brass buttons, one in sober gray. Buckskin of the finer 
 quality had found slight favor as gentleman s wear 
 with those who got the fashions once a year from Eng 
 land, and liked something brave in field and drawing- 
 room " toggery, " until Francis appeared in the arena. 
 The pliable material allowed every line of a faultless 
 figure to be seen, yet had not a wrinkle or crease. 
 The black embroidery brought out the rich tawniness 
 of the leather, and his fair hair shone golden by con 
 trast. After saluting the grand stand, he waved his 
 cap and bent to the saddle-bow in palpable homage to 
 the beauties collected there. His blue eyes brimmed 
 with happy light, his teeth gleamed in the smile of 
 sanguine youth ; he sat his curveting steed the imper 
 sonation of strength and health, refined by a patrician 
 grace that made the sprucest provincial gallant seem 
 burly of build and crude in polish. 
 
 "Mon Dieu ! qu il est beau /" uttered Martha Jaque- 
 line, under her breath. 
 
 She had cast her arm about Evelyn s waist, as the 
 two leaned over the rude balustrade, and pressed her 
 more closely for the tumultuous throbbing she felt 
 under her hand. She was hardly prepared for the im 
 pulsive movement with which her friend plucked a 
 rose she wore in her bodice, and flung it to the wait- 
 l 14*
 
 162 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 ing riders. Francis arose in his stirrups to catch it, 
 pressed it boldly to his lips, with a look that turned 
 Martha cold with apprehension, fastened it in his cap, 
 and backed his mare into position. 
 
 "Pixie" had been selected by Miss Jaqneline in 
 England, and was, she confidently affirmed, the choicest 
 bit of horse-flesh that ever crossed the seas. In color 
 a bright chestnut, with reddish reflections where the 
 sun played on her satin sides, stepping on tiptoe with 
 dainty hoofs that disdained the soil ; steely muscles 
 springing into relief under the thin skin, and the veins 
 showing red in the translucent ears as the rider s pat 
 upon her neck advised her that the waiting-time was 
 nearly over, her extreme beauty and spirited action 
 elicited a murmur of admiration from spectators who 
 were not sufficiently versed in turf-lore to recognize 
 signs of racing blood iu the firm barrel, broad chest, 
 clean limbs, and perfect joints. So radiant an appari 
 tion as Pixie and her rider had never before brightened 
 a Virginia race-course, and would have been notable 
 upon any. 
 
 Silence settled upon the field for twenty seconds 
 preceding the drum-tap. The former race had been 
 clear sailing, the result depending upon the speed of 
 the horses and address of the riders over a level 
 stretch of field. Before the second began, four hur 
 dles of varying heights had been set at irregular dis 
 tances in the track ; bagatelles to the fox-hunting 
 gentry of the neighborhood, yet imparting an element 
 of incertitude to the run in the estimation of timid 
 beholders. 
 
 The six horses took the first hurdle comfortably,
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 163 
 
 Pixie coming third, rising to the leap like a. swallow, 
 and alighting on her toes in a skimming flight. The 
 second was a foot higher, and the third, still taller, was 
 but two hundred yards away. The foremost rider 
 drove his heel into his horse s side, and lifted him at 
 the first higher rail; another dealt the flanks of his a 
 stinging lash, but all were over, and the hindmost was 
 fifty yards beyond the barrier when the leader arose to 
 the third hurdle. He was a big iron-gray, with a 
 strong strain of the racer in him, and went at the stiff 
 
 O 
 
 timber with a rush. It was said afterward, although 
 denied by his owner, that he just grazed a hind hoof in 
 clearing the top rail, and that the skittish animal im 
 mediately behind was startled by the click of the iron 
 against a screw that struck out a spark. It was certain 
 that the creature refused the leap, wheeling aside at so 
 sharp an angle that he crowded himself and master 
 broadside against the hurdle. Pixie, still third, was 
 upon his heels; the rider of the refractory beast in 
 stinctively lay flat upon the neck of his steed, and the 
 chestnut, without lessening her stride, arose in the air 
 in a mighty bound that cleared horse, rider, and fence, 
 landing her, still a-tiptoe, upon the further side. 
 
 A deafening roar went up from generous Virginian 
 hearts, renewed as the flying mare, now on her mettle, 
 sailed over the fourth hurdle, and made the finish a 
 dozen yards ahead of the big iron-gray, jockeyed by 
 his master, Page of Rosewell, the winner of a score 
 of harder races.
 
 164. HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE victor of the most exciting race of the day was 
 the hero of the dinner-table. The only ladies at the 
 feast were Madam Byrd, her step-daughter, and Miss 
 Jaqueline, and at their gracious request, their presence 
 imposed no restraint upon the natural tendency of con 
 versation to flow into sporting channels. Young Ran 
 dolph of Curies, to whom Evelyn was assigned by 
 the lady of the house when she herself went into the 
 dining-room upon Governor Spotswood s arm, and her 
 lord handed in the sparkling Jamestown belle, was, 
 however proud of the distinction that had fallen in his 
 way, extremely and unsenti mentally hungry, and Eve 
 lyn had abundant scraps of time in which to hearken 
 to the talk of others than her squire. 
 
 By accident, Francis sat directly opposite to her, and 
 to whatever cause others might ascribe the growing 
 brilliancy of her complexion and the kindling eyes 
 that seldom met his directly, he noted and prized these 
 tokens of her exultation in the honors paid to the now 
 distinguished guest. Compliments upon his dexterity, 
 his presence of mind, his riding, were lavished upon 
 him; everybody would take wine with him; military 
 men consulted him upon army affairs; civic officials 
 held grave discourse with him of home and colonial 
 politics, all presently drifting back to " horse talk." 
 He won upon the liking of all, although perhaps, 
 partly because he told no field-stories of his own and 
 hearkened attentively to those of others, while affably
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 165 
 
 ready to give intelligent and interesting information of 
 English stables and the English turf. 
 
 Madam Byrd made the signal for retiring from the 
 festal board at an unusually early hour. Her husband 
 magnificent in powdered curls, scarlet coat and lace 
 ruffles, every lineament, from wide brow to cleft chin, 
 bespeaking blandest hospitality found occasion to 
 telegraph to her beneath drooped lids that made the fine 
 eyes almond-shaped and languishing when he willed 
 to have them thus, and she was prompt to obey. The 
 day had been stimulating, and the best liquors of the 
 best cellar in the Old Dominion were in full gush. The 
 smiling host had seen lips close abruptly to hold in a 
 round oath or two, and anecdotes, unwisely commenced, 
 come to fatuous naught, with a furtive glance at one or 
 all of the ladies. The latter would be more comfort 
 able above-stairs : the most gallant of their admirers 
 
 t O 
 
 the happier for their absence. 
 
 Madam insisted upon bringing both girls to her 
 chamber, and summoning thither Miss Lotsie Johnson, 
 " talked over the day." 
 
 It was a tedious, and to the young women, a worry 
 ing process. Every detail of the elaborate repast, 
 concerning which Madam had endured untold mental 
 anguish pending the races she was persuaded to attend 
 by Miss Lotsie s promise to conduct, personally, every 
 operation ; the costumes of the women on the race- 
 ground ; two new chariots and one new livery; 
 the behavior of her guests, the praises of the ban 
 quet and of the hostess, each had place and dutiful 
 note, high station being awarded to the lion of the 
 occasion.
 
 166 IIIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " I protest, Martha Jaqueline, that, were I fifteen 
 years younger, I would break a lance with you for this 
 same English man, whom I am continually on the point 
 of calling my lord. There s a certain air of distinc 
 tion about him that means but one thing, and that is 
 noble birth. I said to him last week that I d like to 
 have a peep at his pedigree, and he said twas as old 
 as Adam, and not unreasonably honest/ and that, some 
 day, he would take pleasure in going over the familv- 
 tree with me, if I would join him in a flight through 
 the dusty branches. He has a mighty pretty way of 
 putting things. I had a lively argument with him 
 before he would consent to stay at Westover until to 
 night. He seemed positively uneasy lest the Harrisons 
 might take it amiss that he does not go to them, now 
 that Ben is well. I assured him that we rude Vir 
 ginians were not sucli sticklers for etiquette as court- 
 people, and that though he was invited there first, the 
 hand of Providence had, so to speak, turned him over 
 to us. He made reply that though, like a good Chris 
 tian, he had kissed the rod and might even be inclined 
 
 J O 
 
 to hug his chains, he must break away this evening. 
 We shall see much of him still, I hope, Martha, my 
 dear. It is my desire that the households shall be as 
 one while you are at Berkeley ; 
 
 " Which reminds me that Anne Harrison and I have 
 arranged for an out- door tea at the usual place to-mor 
 row afternoon. She has a large party of people with 
 her just now. I shall miss you, Lotsie, when I set 
 about making cake and pastry in the morning." 
 
 " You will not be strong enough for that, or the tea- 
 party, unless you rest now !" Miss Lotsie unpinned
 
 1I1S GREAT SELF. 167 
 
 the lace turban from the still-abundant hair. " I shall 
 send these girls away. They chatter too much. You 
 must lie down !" 
 
 She opened the door, motioned the worried pair to 
 be <rone with her grimmest air, and shut them out with 
 
 c> O 
 
 an impatient "slam." 
 
 "Her seat will be in the seventh heaven !" sighed 
 Martha, when they were safe in Evelyn s chamber. 
 " One sentence more, and I should have torn out ray 
 hair by hand fu Is, or gnawed the flesh from my arms, or 
 done some other of the pleasant tricks maniacs are 
 credited with. My child ! you were never so beautiful 
 before in your life as when the Colonel pledged the 
 health of our brave and honored guest, Mr. Francis. 
 What a grand old fellow the Colonel is ! If Heaven 
 
 O 
 
 had made me such a man, I should have died for joy on 
 the wedding-day !" 
 
 " Never so long as you could live to play guardian 
 angel to another woman !" said Evelyn, affectionately. 
 " How could I have lived through last night without 
 you? Can I live through the next week, even when 
 you are by to stand with me in the forefront of the 
 battle? I have sucked the sweetness out of each 
 minute of this day thirstily ! I would not look back 
 ward. I dared not look forward. Against my will, I 
 kept saying to myself or heard a whisper that said 
 "This may be your last day of perfect happiness on 
 earth !" 
 
 " It was a lying imp and an impertinent ! And 
 you are a goose to heed it. The skies are bright and 
 brightening. I could have married Dick Randolph on 
 the spot I m not sure I shall not do it, anyhow for
 
 168 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 affording our knight-errant the opportunity of vaulting 
 into the Colonel s favor. Backing Matoax was clever 
 play a palpable hit and the largess to Caliban. But 
 the hurdle-scene bowled him clean over. Nor have I 
 been idle. I have Monseigneur s word that he will 
 listen heed fully to whatsoever petitioner may present 
 my seal as his warrant. And when was a Byrd ever 
 known to retract his pledge ?" 
 
 " Provided it were given intelligently !" demurred 
 Evelyn. " If I could only see with your eyes !" 
 
 " You must, and shall ! Courage, ma mie ! He who 
 has waited so long is as brave as patient. As he told 
 you this morning in the church-yard, he removes him 
 self from this house that he may meet your father, as 
 man meets man, unembarrassed by obligation of host 
 and guest. To-morrow night not one day or one hour 
 later he will shed the disguise he detests, and demand 
 by word of mouth that which he asked by letter five 
 almost six years ago. 
 
 "So long, long time ago, dear heart!" taking the 
 yielding form into her strong young arms, and kissing 
 the wet eyes and trembling mouth. " And not a shadow 
 of change in that faithful soul ! Whenever opportunity 
 of eluding the vigilance that never sleeps, offered itself, 
 came the same message from beyond seas I am wait 
 ing ! Ah, man Dieu ! what constancy in the teeth of 
 temptation, of time, of cruel opposition and crueller 
 silence ! Evelyn Byrd !" tender cooing exchanged for 
 energy that was fierce, " if you let that man go home 
 without his wife! yes ! the word is spoken ! (I would 
 as lief as not shriek it in the ears of the wine-bibbers 
 down-stairs!) without the wife he has served for, as
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 169 
 
 Jacob for Rachel I am afraid I shall hate you ! I 
 know I shall despise you !" 
 
 She put Evelyn away from her, and walked up and 
 down the room fast like one pursued. Her face was 
 begloomed, her eyes flashed fire ; she bit her lips 
 angrily. 
 
 " When I think" she spat out, vehemently, to her 
 self not to the listener " of women who would sell 
 their souls everything except honor and loyalty for 
 what I have to beg this girl to take when it is thrust 
 upon her, I ask myself why I do it even for her" 
 and, inarticulately " for him f 
 
 Evelyn ran toward her and put both hands over the 
 changed face. 
 
 " Hush ! hush ! I cannot endure that you should look 
 like that ! You are not my Martha my precious, only 
 friend ! And" lifting her finger, waves of lovely color 
 breaking over a face that had been pallid under the 
 strange, wild upbraiding " you will be overheard ! 
 That is his voice !" 
 
 Martha drew her with her to the window and peeped 
 over the sill. 
 
 Through the drawing-room windows and hall-door 
 and front steps arose the babble of voices. The revel 
 lers were cooling heads and heels in the sunset air. 
 Two men had strayed from the rest along the rose- 
 alley and halted where the main building jutted beyond 
 the right wing. A rustic chair was in the nook thus 
 formed, and into this Governor Spotswood let himself 
 stiffly down as the girls looked out through the screen 
 of Virginia creeper curtaining the window recessed by 
 the chimney. His companion took an easy stand against 
 H 15
 
 170 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 a tree near by. With one arm thrown behind him, the 
 right leg lightly crossing the left, the sunbeams weaving 
 a crown of his hair, he stood in an attitude of uncon 
 scious and negligent grace, never suspecting what wor 
 shipping eyes were scanning him from above. 
 
 " The wear and tear of years and labors many, 
 begin to tell upon me !" said the raucous tones of the 
 older man. " And the bullet I got at Blenheim re 
 minds me somewhat more sharply of its presence than it 
 was wont to do a score of years back. You youngsters 
 are not like to have such souvenirs pressed upon your 
 attention." 
 
 "The less like because the men of an earlier gen 
 eration had so many," returned Francis, deferentially. 
 " We reap the harvest of your sowing, and, I trust, not 
 ungratefully. Men rail at war, but peace is the fruit 
 thereof." 
 
 "That man drew in diplomacy with his mother s 
 milk !" whispered Martha, in an agony of admiration. 
 
 The ex-Governor rapped his cane upon the gravel, 
 smartly and repeatedly. 
 
 " A just observation, sir, and fitly spoken ! It is 
 much the fashion, nowadays, to decry former times as 
 rude and violent. Your curled and laced jack-a-dandy 
 talks mincingly of needless and foolish bloodshed, 
 wiping away the ugly word from his mouth with his 
 scented cambric, and holding his nose at stories of 
 battle-fields, never reflecting, shallow-pate as he is ! 
 that, but for the carrion of those fields, he would be a 
 hind under the whip of a foreign master." 
 
 " Posterity will be more grateful. We are too near 
 the scene to paint it fairly. When the smoke of battle
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 171 
 
 shall have lifted, and such landmarks in the world s 
 history as Blenheim be set aright, their true prominence 
 will be seen to the eternal honor of those to whom our 
 national freedom and national glory are due." 
 
 " Hear ! hear !" motioned Martha s lips. 
 
 The cane scattered the gravel right and left. 
 
 "I would to heaven, sir, that a few of our young 
 fools could be put to school to you ! Why, sir, there s 
 not an acre of the tens of thousands that now blossom 
 like the rose in this new land of ours that was not paid 
 for with human lives, with heart s blood, sir ! The 
 very ground on which we now stand" tapping it 
 " was strewn with corpses in 1622. At Berkeley Hun 
 dred, seventeen men, women, and children were killed in 
 the Indian massacre of that date. At Westover, thirty- 
 three! Up and down the James River, three hundred 
 and forty-seven innocent victims to savage cruelty per 
 ished at one fell swoop. And of this the price of 
 lands, peace, and liberty our coxcomb quibbles and 
 prates ! A pest upon his tribe ! say I. I cannot 
 contain my tongue in thinking upon it !" 
 
 " I was told, some days ago, of a curious subterra 
 nean chamber, connected with this house, which, tradi 
 tion says, was constructed as a hiding-place from the 
 Indians, shortly after the massacre of which you speak. 
 Is it your belief that the tale is true ?" 
 
 " True as Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, sir ! 
 Had you descended the ladder into what is now the 
 Westover meat-cellar, you would have found the opening 
 to be a dry well, funnel-shaped and lined with mortar. 
 Fifteen feet below the surface, this branches into two 
 square chambers, also of brick, with smoothly-plastered
 
 172 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 sides. A round stone table is in the middle of each, 
 spread to-day, I dare say, with cold baked meats left 
 from the race-dinner, a rare good one, by the way, 
 even for Madam Byrd s kitchen. 
 
 " That cellar, sir, meant PERIL by day and by night ! 
 Peril of rapine and murder, and torture worse than 
 death ; and babies brains dashed out before mothers 
 eyes, and fair virgins carried into captivity and loath 
 some concubinage, and voung men roasted at the stake, 
 
 O / / O 
 
 and the Lord, who made mankind of one blood, alone 
 knows what other horrors of these then dark places of 
 earth ! To guard against these, the early settlers bur 
 rowed in the earth like moles, and plastered caves like 
 beavers, sir. From the Westover secret chamber was 
 laid a passage to the river by which the hunted ones 
 might escape to the boats. The mouth of that gallery 
 was bricked up long ago in the chamber wall and cov 
 ered with mortar. The river outlet has probably caved 
 in. In fact, I think nobody has troubled himself to 
 look up the precise locality of it." 
 
 " In subduing and settling a country, little attention 
 is paid to the preservation of historical relics," remarked 
 Francis. " In another hundred years, the very site of 
 Old Jamestown will be uncertain. As soon as a thing 
 becomes unprofitable, it would seem to be abandoned 
 without let or scruple." 
 
 The ex-Governor bored the ferrule of his cane slowly 
 into the ground, his chin sunk upon his breast. The 
 listeners above exchanged regretful glances Without 
 verbal consultation, they were one in the desire that the 
 young stranger should secure himself in the great man s 
 good graces. Spotswoocl s influence with Colonel Byrd
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 173 
 
 was more considerable than that of any other associate, 
 and in the coming struggle they reckoned upon every 
 possible ally. Francis had made his first false step. 
 Gerrnanna, the town founded by the Virginian Tubal 
 Cain in the immediate vicinity of his own home, had 
 been already treated of in Colonel Byrd s diary, after 
 one of his visits, in the following airy fashion : 
 
 " This famous town consists of Colo. Spotswood s 
 Enchanted Castle on one side of the street, and a baker s 
 dozen of ruinous tenements on the other, where as 
 many German families had dwelt some years ago, but 
 are now removed, ten miles higher in the Fork of 
 Rappahannock, to land of their own. There had also 
 been a chapel about a bow-shot from the Colonel s 
 house, at the end of an avenue of cherry-trees, but 
 some pions people had lately burned it down, with 
 intent to get another built nearer to their own homes." 
 
 The flippant lash at the man whom the people lie had 
 served never rightly esteemed when his popularity was 
 greatest, tells more forcibly than animadversion, of the 
 wane of influence and fortune. " The people of Vir 
 ginia," says a Scottish historian, " ought to have erected 
 a statue to the memory of a ruler who gave them the 
 manufacture of iron, and showed them by his active 
 example that it is diligence and attention which can 
 alone make a people great. . . . Had he attended more 
 to the courtly maxim of Charles the Second, ( to quarrel 
 with no man, however great might be the provocation, 
 since he knew not how soon he should be obliged to act 
 with him, that able officer might be recommended as 
 the model of a provincial governor." 
 
 Although few except his beautiful English wife knew 
 15*
 
 174: HIS ORE AT SELF. 
 
 it, he was even now revolving ways and means of 
 retreat with least loss and mortification from a position 
 that had become untenable. Exile from the beloved 
 land of his adoption was faced as courageously as the 
 foe upon the battle-field, but in genuine sadness. 
 
 One hand stole up to the jewelled horseshoe hung 
 upon his breast, the only ornament of apparel that was 
 studiously simple, as became his sturdy republicanism. 
 
 " Pardon me !" Francis ended the painful reverie 
 by saying in gentlest respect, " but having heard the 
 wondrous history of that badge, I have, naturally, the 
 wish to be allowed the privilege of inspecting it more 
 closely," 
 
 The facial barometers in the window overhead, had 
 he seen them, would have relieved his painful mis 
 givings. The misstep was retrieved. The veteran 
 reared his head proudly erect, as, detaching the trinket 
 from his vest, he placed it in the other s hands. 
 
 " You perceive that it bears the words, Sic juvat 
 iranscendere monies, and, as you have probably been 
 informed, only the brave men who with me planted the 
 standard of King George the First upon the summit 
 of the Appalachian Mountains, have the right to bear 
 it. No man who cannot prove that he drank His 
 Majesty s health upon Mount George dare claim mem 
 bership in the Tramontane Order." 
 
 " A mountain that will be your memorial rather than 
 that of His Majesty !" rejoined Francis, handling the 
 badge in sincere reverence. 
 
 " Run to earth !" cried jocund tones, and the Master 
 of Westover appeared around the projecting corner, 
 with half a dozen men at his heels. "Alexander
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 175 
 
 Spotswood ! have you no bowels of compassion, that 
 you drag this innocent stranger thorough bush and 
 thorough brier to the top of the Blue Ridge, cram him 
 with the constitution and by-laws of the Knights of the 
 Golden Shoe, and I dare swear, lest he should have 
 forgot the memorable battles of the Duke of Marl- 
 borough, have fought them over again for the nine- 
 and-fortieth time within the month." 
 
 The roar of vinous laughter from his followers 
 drowned Francis s eager protest. Spotswood, scorning 
 all attempt at self- vindication, purpled furiously, put 
 out an imperative hand for the precious memento, and 
 was stalking away in wrathful silence when a fresh 
 interruption occurred. 
 
 Beyond that wing of the house in which were the 
 kitchen and other offices, the front and back yards were 
 separated by a fence, a wicket-gate giving entrance from 
 one to the other. The hubbub of voices in hot dispute 
 preceded the bursting open of the wicket, and two 
 figures, locked in deadly embrace, rolled across a strip 
 of turf upon the gravel-walk, wrestling, scratching, and 
 biting like wolves, too mad to see where they were, or 
 in what presence, until the gentlemen hurried up in a 
 body to separate them. Torn violently apart, each 
 glanced at the other, panting and bloody, shaking with 
 rage, not terror. 
 
 The combatants were Caliban, in the smart livery in 
 which he had won the race and afterward waited at 
 table, and Selim, the dwarfish jockey who had brought 
 in the Corotoman horse second at the finish. The elfish 
 blackamoor looked the uglier for the disorder of his 
 white raiment, and the fiendish malignity contorting his
 
 176 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 features. His clawlike hands opened and shut con 
 vulsively, clutching the empty air as they might his 
 adversary s throat. Colin Bass pinioned Caliban s arms 
 with liis powerful hands. Colonel Carter, to whose 
 father Selim belonged, seized the dwarf, but could not 
 manage him until Mr. Harrison, his brother-in-law, 
 came to his help. 
 
 Colonel Byrd advanced a step in front of his guests, 
 and surveyed the pair in cool disgust that shortly 
 wrought upon them like a douche of icy water. 
 
 " A gentleman s door-yard is not the place for dog 
 fights," he observed when he had looked the trespassers 
 over for a minute of dreadful silence. " When the dogs 
 are mad as these would seem to be they are shot or 
 hanged. If there is any doubt as to their madness, 
 they are tied up for nine days, or until they foam at the 
 mouth." 
 
 All this with judicial deliberation, open snuff-box in 
 hand, thumb and finger delicately poised for a pinch, 
 which he now partook of leisurely, holding the culprits 
 with the glitter of his almond-shaped eyes. 
 
 " Harrison ! Colonel Carter ! I turn the Lancaster 
 varlet over to you. As for the other, I wish the black- 
 a-vised devil had strangled him outright for having 
 disgraced his bringing-up by fighting another gentle 
 man s servant upon my premises. Mr. Bass ! take him 
 off and give him nine-and-thirty, well laid on. If he 
 resists, send for me!" 
 
 Caliban broke from his captor with a quick wrench 
 and writhe of his supple body, and flung himself at the 
 judge s feet. 
 
 " Marster ! my dear marster ! you may beat me to
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 177 
 
 death ef you like, an I won say a word ! But don let 
 him tech me, for de Lord s sake. You may cut de 
 heart out o me ! Any o you gem men may tromple 
 on me ! My marster may shoot me dade, or string 
 me up ter er tree, dis minnit, an I won min it ! But, 
 my marster my good, sweet marster ! you won low 
 no po white folks ter lay er han pou one o you 
 servants !" 
 
 He begged like one at the door of death, tears, wash 
 ing the blood and dirt from his face, showed the ghastly 
 yellow of the skin beneath, He would have embraced 
 his master s feet and kissed them, had not the Colonel 
 drawn back as from a wet dog. The other side of the 
 paling was lined with negroes, great and small, cowering 
 with dread and terrified into dumbness, but the language 
 of the rolling eyeballs was "unmistakable. The secre 
 tary was the object of universal contempt that had sud 
 denly heated into enmity. 
 
 The master readjusted the lid of his snuff-box, and 
 filliped a few grains of the " Byrd mixture" from his 
 lace ruffles. 
 
 " Where is Mr. Booker, Osiris ?" he asked of the 
 butler, who had come out of the front door and taken 
 a stand in the rear of the group of gentlemen. The 
 Colonel s manner was unmoved from the nonchalance 
 with which he had pronounced sentence upon the evil 
 doer. " Ah ! here he is !" as the dusky ranks opened 
 to let the overseer pass through. "Mr. Booker! this 
 boy is to be flogged, and by Mr. Bass, if he will be so 
 good as to do me the favor. Will you see that all goes 
 well ?" 
 
 It did not sound merciful, but Evelyn, leaning in
 
 178 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 strained solicitude from the open window, thoughtless 
 of possible observation in her anxiety for the petted 
 page, clasped her hands, and fell to weeping so violently 
 that Martha pulled her back into the room. 
 
 " Thank GOD !" she cried. " Mr. Booker is never 
 cruel ! I could not have borne to have my poor boy 
 misused! Did you see that man s look when Caliban 
 was praying Papa that he should not touch him? It 
 was but a flash, but it scared me like a glimpse of hell ! 
 I never dreamed he could be like that!" 
 
 "He is a snake!" Martha pronounced, composedly. 
 " A cold, deadly, subtle, creeping snake that even the 
 bottomless pit could not warm. I saw all that and 
 more !" 
 
 CHAPTER XIY. 
 
 WESTOVER was dark and still at an early hour that 
 evening. Most of the guests had dispersed to their 
 several homes before dark. The chariot containing 
 Miss Jaqueline, her duenna, her maid and luggage, 
 was escorted to Berkeley by Messrs. Francis and Har 
 rison, Colonel Carter and Lieutenant Maynard. The 
 ball of the previous night, the race and the race-dinner 
 sufficiently excused Madam and Miss Byrd for non- 
 appearance in the drawing-room after supper. The 
 ex-Governor and his host had smoked an amicable pipe 
 together at bedtime. The lord of Germanna was iras 
 cible, but never sulky, and the raillery that had touched 
 him upon two tender points was soon forgiven. Since
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 179 
 
 lie must resume his journey upon the morrow, he 
 sought his couch betimes. 
 
 A dreary, reactionary lull settled down upon the 
 premises, as the autumn fog upon the river. Frogs 
 bellowed at the foot of the lawn ; tree-toads droned 
 their high, teasing notes in the tulip-poplars by the 
 front door, and a whippoorwill cried to the blind night 
 from the bnrying-ground. 
 
 Caliban had waited at table, as usual, although his 
 mistress kind of heart if quick of reproof would 
 fain have spared him the ordeal. Colonel Byrd was 
 not a harsh ruler, yet a martinet in the matter of 
 plantation discipline. The lad s absence would have 
 been construed into sullenness, and sharp account be 
 demanded therefor. He was at his post behind Eve 
 lyn s chair, in neat livery. Complexion and eyes were 
 dull, but he was not otherwise changed from his wonted 
 aspect. Only, the kitchen junta knew what the least 
 pickaninny there would not have revealed to a white 
 under the cowhide. When the house-work was done, 
 and the servants ready to partake of their nocturnal 
 meal, and Isis, the priestess of the high rites, called 
 the boy s attention to the liberal mess of delicacies 
 Madam Byrd had sent out for his use by the hand of 
 Osiris, he snatched it from the table, and tossed it 
 through the door to the dogs waiting without for their 
 pickings of the feast. 
 
 The general grunt that followed the act was suc 
 ceeded by a united groan, as the humbled favorite 
 dashed out into the darkness, and did not return. 
 
 " Marster done been gone too fur wid dat po chile !" 
 was the verdict of fat Isis, her turban nodding omi-
 
 180 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 nously. " He got Injun blood in im, an tain never 
 safe ter fool long Injun blood. We ain been see de 
 las o dis day s wuk, rnun !" 
 
 The bad mixture of savagery in the boy s soul and 
 body was in boiling ferment; heart and brain \vere 
 on fire, as he plunged down the garden-walk, leaped 
 the wall of the church-yard, and took his way up the 
 river. 
 
 The bank was, for the most part, a jungle of brush 
 wood and interlooping vines, grape, poison-oak, and 
 bamboo, but he threaded the labyrinth as if the time 
 were mid-day, and the way a beaten path. There 
 were black-snakes and moccasins in the thickets; he 
 believed in ghosts and bogies more firmly than in the 
 white man s GOD; now and then a thorny branch tore 
 his ankle or shoulder. He tramped on until clean out 
 of sight of lighted windows and the sound of human 
 
 O O 
 
 voices, threw himself down on the brow of a cliff, 
 cleft by a wooded ravine, and tried to put his trooping, 
 maddening ideas in order. 
 
 His arms under his head, his face to the sky, where, 
 between rising fogs, a pale star winked at him, now 
 and then, he let the turbid flood of thought and feeling 
 
 O O 
 
 rack itself into clearness of sight and purpose. 
 
 The wrong done him was irreparable, the insult 
 deadly. He had been exalted unto a heaven of favor 
 to be thrust down to a hell of infamy. He could never 
 again carry his head high and saucily in the sight of 
 friend and foe. He recollected the Caliban of yester 
 day, swaggering across the yard, admired and copied 
 by the pickaninnies, strutting past Osiris in the still- 
 room behind his mistress s back and sticking his tongue
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 into his cheek, his head on one side, to the holy horror 
 of the dignitary who durst not resent the insult in his 
 lady s presence. He recalled the harum-scarum as if 
 it were some one who had died and been buried since 
 then. 
 
 The whipping was nothing in itself. He had tasted 
 the overseer s lash more than once, and been no more 
 disgraced by it than by the thump of Isis s wooden 
 spoon upon his pate, or his mistress s box upon his ear. 
 It was a part of education and every-day experience in 
 his class. He despised poor whites upon caste and race 
 principles. If the flogging had been delegated to the 
 meanest field-hand, he would have been surprised, but 
 not degraded. The secretary sat at his employer s table ; 
 slept under his employer s roof, and mingled upon 
 terms of apparent equality with the most distinguished 
 guests who came to the house. None of these advan 
 tages raised him the fraction of a degree in the respect 
 of the born serfs whom he reckoned as less than the 
 dust he shook from Ins well-shod feet. They were 
 cognizant of his ignoble parentage; they could have 
 named over to a man or woman all the " no count 
 kinfolks" he tried to forget, who lived " way back in 
 New Kent County." That he had their master s con 
 fidence ; that he was a capital accountant, a skilful 
 penman, and a man of tolerable erudition in manv 
 branches of learning, weighed naught with them, and 
 less than naught. Any show of attainment and refine 
 ment was " puttin on a rs." 
 
 Over and beyond all this, Caliban, as we have seen, 
 bore a personal dislike to the smug official, and knew 
 it to be reciprocated. Every stripe from Bass s hand 
 
 16
 
 182 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 laid open his pride to the quickest core. He had not 
 struck hard. The surveillance of the overseer 
 pledged to his conscience to see that his employer s 
 property was never injured prevented absolute cru 
 elty. His master s cane would have drawn blood, 
 and left bruises for days, whereas, he was no worse an 
 hour after the punishment, for a single blow. What 
 had added to the ignominy of the sentence was Bass s 
 smile, as he brandished the whip before the victim s 
 eyes and the taunt with which he laid it by, the flagel 
 lation being over : 
 
 "I don t soil my hands with this sort of work, 
 generally, Booker. But the Colonel made a point of it, 
 and I couldn t refuse him a favor. Not but what I 
 rather enjoy cutting the comb of an impudent young 
 rooster when I get a chance." 
 
 The boy rolled over the biting words in his memory 
 until his fingers dug into the soil and tore up grass and 
 herbs by the roots. One thing, and one only, could 
 ever extract the shameful sting, or wash out the stain 
 from his honor; he would have that man s life, sooner 
 or later. Upon his smarting soul he stamped a black 
 cross against Bass s name. 
 
 When he left the house in which he was born, he 
 meant to return no more. There were runaways in 
 the depths of Virginia forests who had been "out" for 
 years. In the Dismal Swamp if the stories he had 
 heard on winter s nights by the kitchen fire were true 
 was a colony of this most pitiable class of outlaws, 
 who were free until caught by the militia patrol, and 
 always dangerous. In a hut, not much better than a 
 Westover dog-kennel, upon the edge of White Oak
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 183 
 
 Swamp, between the James and the Chickahominy, lived 
 the only known relative he had on his father s side, 
 the Indian grandmother whose reputation as a witch 
 made her to be both respected and feared by the negroes. 
 Caliban s visits to her had not been many. When he 
 was a little fellow, Miss Evelyn had prevailed upon her 
 step-mother to send him by the hand of an older ser 
 vant the ten miles and more that lay between his home 
 and that of the squaw, that his father s mother might see 
 into what a "likely" lad he was growing. Within the 
 past year he had twice helped himself to a horse from 
 the stables, and visited the crone by night, spending 
 some hours in her cabin, partaking of the hot supper 
 she hastened to cook for him, and returning before dawn 
 with the " love-powder" the head-hostler had commis 
 sioned him to procure as the bribe for the liberal wink 
 he would deal out next morning to the travel-worn 
 condition of the steed. 
 
 Caliban s hastily-formed design had been to make 
 her house a temporary asylum until he could open com 
 munication with the runaways. He had in his pocket 
 the purse flung to him by the English gentleman that 
 morning. He was counting the contents at the back of 
 the kitchen when Selim prowled around the corner and 
 made a grab for the coins, beginning the quarrel that 
 ended so miserably. There was enough money to make 
 him a great personage in the outlaw settlement. 
 
 But to go and leave unpunished the man who had 
 robbed him of a good name, good clothes, good friends, 
 a good home was this consistent, upon second thoughts, 
 with what he had been taught was his forefathers 
 highest law never to forgive, or to forget an injury?
 
 184 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 When he went, he ought to leave something behind him 
 for people to talk about, a warning to evil-doers for the 
 future. His "granny" had charged him to come to 
 her if he ever got into trouble. She had said something 
 else, her black eyes snapping, and skinny neck out 
 stretched like a snake s : 
 
 " If white man, or black oman git in you way, knife 
 an bullet no good. Too much blood. Blood tell tales. 
 I show yon better way. Come to me." 
 
 He was less shocked than if tales of poisoning and 
 " tricking" had not been rife among the negroes. He 
 knew what she meant. He would go back to the house ; 
 bribe the head-hostler with a coin from his hoard, and 
 consult the wise woman that very night. 
 
 The evil seed flowered and fruited fast. Others 
 beside the secretary must be reckoned with. He could 
 never forget how his master looked and spoke when he 
 begged him not to let Bass touch him. And after he 
 had won the race for him, he had given Selim money 
 and had never a word for Caliban. He could fancy, 
 too, how Colonel Byrd would hunt for him when his 
 flight was discovered. Even " the Dismal" would not 
 deter him, for he had headed the party that had laid 
 the dividing-line through it, when Caliban was a little 
 boy. Nothing else was talked of for weeks but that 
 Dividing-Line, and the horrors of the mighty morass. 
 Caliban had a fixed impression of how the mysterious 
 Line looked, and of catching his foot in it as he ran, 
 and being overtaken by his master before he could free 
 himself. 
 
 It would be best to put the poison into the coffee 
 some morning. The Colonel and his secretary took
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 185 
 
 two cups apiece, his mistress one, sometimes, generally 
 preferring tea. She must take her chance, he decided. 
 He owed her no good-will iu his present humor. She 
 had been tart with him, after supper, for dropping but 
 ter upon her gown, and had, in times past, made life 
 miserable to him in many ways. 
 
 " Thank GOD," thought the murderous little heathen, 
 "Mis Evelyn allers take choc lat !" 
 
 She had eyed him kindly as he passed the bread to 
 her to-night, and the gentle, " No, thank you, Caliban !" 
 when there was no need to do more than shake her 
 head, sounded in his ear now like music. Nobody in 
 the kitchen had dared speak to him directly of his 
 humiliation, but Isis had managed to have him over 
 hear her say to a scullion that " Viney says as how po 
 Mis Evelyn done mos cry her sweet eves out, sence she 
 see de carr in ons in de yard, dat ebenin !" 
 
 Thought of the one sweet drop in the nauseous cup 
 held to his lips at the close of the day he hoped to 
 reckon as the proudest of his life, broke the boy s heart 
 into a passionate rain of tears. He rolled on the ground 
 in the violence of his voiceless sobs. He was hardly 
 more than a child, and a petted child at that, and, 
 although he would have flouted the charge as derogatory 
 
 O O O / 
 
 to his manhood, as soft-hearted as a baby where the 
 affections came into play. 
 
 The plash of oars approaching the shore, and the soft 
 "swish" of water on the land checked the paroxysm. He 
 raised his head to listen. The bank on which he lay 
 overhung the narrow beach, and the fog was so dense 
 that his keen sight could discern nothing, although the 
 boat was already beached with a muffled, crushing sound. 
 
 16*
 
 186 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " Mighty funny dey should take all dat pains to come 
 in easy," reflected the boy, on the qui vive in an instant. 
 " Dem rowlocks done been wropped wid rags, else I d 
 a heern em sooner !" 
 
 He dragged himself by his elbows to the brink and 
 reached over, straining his eyes for other sign of the 
 intruders than the crunching footfalls upon the sandy 
 shingle, and an occasional whisper. There were two 
 men, he soon concluded, and they were bringing ashore 
 a heavy burden. He could hear their hard breathing, 
 once in a while a grunt, and that they staggered in the 
 yielding gravel. The load, whatever it was, was laid 
 down; there was the rattling of dried sticks or twigs, 
 and the rustle of green boughs, then the sound of let 
 ting a heavy stone down cautiously upon the earth, and 
 the men went back for what they had brought to land. 
 Then ensued the clatter of shoes upon a pavement, and 
 all noises became oddly subdued. 
 
 The boy s hair stiffened and stirred upon his head. 
 Stories of hobgoblins and spectres, of murders and ab 
 ductions, and devils carrying lost sonls into the side of 
 a hill that closed behind them after they entered this one 
 of the many ways to hell, rushed in upon his memory. 
 The cold sweat dripped, from his face upon the crum 
 bling verge that, every moment, threatened to cave in 
 and precipitate him into the clutches of the ghostly 
 visitants, yet he durst not budge an inch lest the fall 
 of a pebble, or the crackle of a stick should betray him. 
 
 They were coming out! He could detect the rub of 
 clothing against the sides of the aperture, and that they 
 straightened themselves in the open air with long 
 breaths, as after stooping in a low chamber.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 187 
 
 A rougli voice spoke : 
 
 " Tis a sultry night, an dark s a wolf s mouth, 
 
 with this fog !" 
 
 " All the better!" was the answer in a more cautious 
 key. " Here s the crowbar ! Up with her !" 
 
 Caliban fumbled wildly for the projecting roots fring 
 ing the bank, and clung to them desperately. His brain 
 toppled, and his breath almost stopped. For the last 
 speaker was the man whose death he was plotting, the 
 being in all creation whom he had most occasion to 
 dread and detest. 
 
 His wits cleared abruptly. Now that his superstitious 
 fears were allayed, he was no craven. Imagination 
 leaped eagerly to the belief that, by dogging the mid 
 night prowler, he might taste a more exquisite revenge, 
 than by robbing him of existence without letting him 
 know by whose hand he met his fate. Still hearkening 
 as for his soul s salvation, he heard the stone heaved 
 back into position, the rustling foliage, the heaping up 
 of what he now knew to be river-drift ; then, the men 
 seemed to kneel, and smooth the shingle with their 
 hands, no doubt to efface footprints. 
 
 Bass spoke again, so close beneath Caliban s head that 
 he feared that his breathing must be audible : 
 
 " You ll be off, then, Monday night ? Do you touch 
 below this ?" 
 
 " That s accordin ! I ve a promise o summat at 
 Maycox, an Wyanoake, an th Brandon overseer s cut 
 his eye-teeth, an s apt to take advantage of a good 
 captain goin down. Th other places is mos ly nigger- 
 work, an don count fer much. Tain every white man 
 who s got your long hade, let lone niggers."
 
 188 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " Why do you fool with them, at all ? You get 
 enough to do without them." 
 
 " Every little counts ! An a man doesn like to lose 
 any chance o turnin a hones penny !" 
 
 Nothing more was said. The men pushed the boat 
 off, clambered into her, and the muffled strokes were lost 
 in the distance. 
 
 Caliban worked himself back into his former position, 
 and lay still, his hands clasped behind his head, staring 
 up at the whitening sky. 
 
 " De moon risin !" he muttered. " Soon s she f arly 
 ober de top o de trees, I gwine see what dis yere 
 mean, my gentleman ! I ain been come out yere fur 
 iiuthin !" 
 
 Having changed his purpose of running away, ami 
 postponed his visit to his granddam, he was patient in 
 waiting. The silvery shimmer of the motionless mists 
 showed him how to descend from his perch to the 
 water s level. The shelving space below the cliff was 
 nearly filled with drift and dead branches that seemed 
 to have fallen from the trees overhead. He cleared 
 these away, breaking them as little as possible, patiently 
 and deftly scraping aside leaves and sticks, and holding 
 back living branches growing low on the bank, until 
 he touched a rough flat stone set perpendicularly in the 
 earth. Foreseeing the need of it, lie had cut a stout 
 hickory stick in the wood above and sharpened one 
 end. The improvised "jimmy" worked well. After 
 some preliminary probing about the edges of the stone, 
 he drove the sharp end of the stick into a crevice, bore 
 heavily downward, and then outward, and felt the ob 
 struction yield.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Stooping to the aperture yawning like a black mouth 
 iu the bank, he was met by a rush of cooler air, 
 freighted with an odor that let the truth in upon him 
 in a Hash. 
 
 Tobacco at that date was subject to a duty of a penny 
 per pound in English ports, and there was hardly an 
 inlet or bay or river on the Atlantic coast that was not 
 infested by smuggling-craft, hovering, like prey-seeking 
 birds, along the edge of the richest plantations. The 
 Westover overseer, Booker, bore an excellent reputation 
 for honesty, but to him had never been entrusted the 
 duty of making up the tale of bales and hogsheads of 
 tobacco for shipment. Mr. Bass, as major-domo and 
 confidential agent, inspected barn and warehouse, and 
 kept account of the contents of each. If the Colonel s 
 frequent and prolonged absences rendered peculation 
 easy, despite his astuteness, his brother-planters con 
 gratulated him upon the incorruptible integrity of the 
 manager that secured him against such losses. Bass s 
 opportunities were many and tempting, but the most 
 envious of his critics had never breathed upon his 
 honesty in business dealings. 
 
 Caliban would as soon have been without his trustv 
 clasp-knife as without tinder-box and steel. In the 
 box was, also, a bit of wax c;u:dle. Feeling his way 
 into the mouth of the cave, he struck a light. He was 
 
 / o 
 
 in an arched tunnel of brick masonry, paved with flag 
 stones, in which he could not stand upright. Bales, 
 boxes, and casks were piled against the sides. All, he 
 was certain, contained tobacco, until he shook a barrel, 
 and heard the wabble of liquid within. He brought 
 the candle nearer to examine the head.
 
 190 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 "Some nigger gwine ter be skin when dat brandy is 
 miss !" he grinned. 
 
 The humor of the situation touched him, serious as 
 he felt it to be. Just inside of the opening lay a cask, 
 the make of which he knew full well. The Byrd eoat- 
 of-arms was branded deep in the head of every hogs 
 head, barrel, keg, and box that left the plantation. 
 This one had evidently been brought ashore that night 
 by Bass and his confederate. 
 
 Caliban s tough muscles wrought toilfully at the 
 
 ~ V 
 
 prostrate stone before he could refit it into place. The 
 rest was more easily done ; but the moon was in the 
 zenith when he regained his perch. He was tired 
 almost to death, yet too excited to seek rest in sleep, 
 sat, elbows on knees and head in hands, doing the 
 severest thinking that had ever vexed his busy brains. 
 
 The triumphant impulse to denounce his enemy to 
 the master who trusted him died down under a wither 
 ing breeze of common sense. 
 
 The goods would be saved to their various owners, 
 for he at once connected the hidden store with com 
 plaints of mysterious thefts up and down the river he 
 had heard of in house and kitchen. But who would 
 believe his story of the midnight adventure and identi 
 fication of one of the criminals? He had not seen 
 Bass s face, and against the inevitable denial of the 
 latter what weight would the word of a slave have, 
 especially when his reasons for desiring to injure the 
 secretary were taken into account? He must wait for 
 more conclusive evidence ; must dog and pry and skulk 
 with the patient ferocity of his forebears, until the night 
 named as the time for removing the plunder. Even
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 191 
 
 then, Bass might not be among those caught in the act 
 by Colonel Byrd and such associates as he might sum 
 mon to his aid. The fellow had the cunning of the 
 devil. 
 
 The problem was still unsolved when the red sun 
 pierced the river-fog to his head frosted with rime, 
 bowed upon the knees where it had lain for four hours 
 in the dead sleep of utter exhaustion. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE great event of the month came to "Westover on 
 the morrow, the arrival of the foreign mail. There 
 was a package of books for Evelyn ; for Madam Byrd, 
 four or five gossipy missives from English corre 
 spondents, and two or three notes from tradespeople ; 
 and for the Colonel, a bulky parcel of letters and 
 papers. 
 
 He undid the seals in his study, seated in an arm 
 chair beside the escritoire in the chimney recess. The 
 light fell clearly over his left shoulder; his snuff-box 
 was open near his right hand ; his epistles were volu 
 minous, and, in the main, interesting ; replete with inci 
 dents of court and political and literary life, and seasoned 
 some of them with racy items and Equivoques. The 
 reader of to-day would peruse these last with less gusto 
 than was apparent in the handsome visage that lent 
 diligent heed to every line. lie laughed now and 
 then, low and musically, over some particularly highly- 
 flavored passage, or murmured inaudible comments.
 
 192 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 The secretary had hitched his chair to the other side 
 of the table as his superior established himself in his 
 corner. It was not respectful to sit with his back to 
 his employer, and Colin never abated one jot or one 
 tittle of the obsequiousness due to the potentate. Should 
 the examination of the mail leave the Colonel in a fair 
 humor, he would give a digest to his subordinate of 
 whatsoever it suited him to impart to other ears. It 
 was by such advantages that the man s education was 
 carried on in whatever pertained to Old World affairs, 
 social or public. The Colonel was a raconteur of rare 
 ability, and the auditor considered, with reason, mail- 
 day a genuine treat in his sober-hued life. After the 
 entertaining abstract of the world s news, the plantation 
 ledgers, of which a pile lay on the secretary s table, 
 would be overhauled, every entry of expenditure and 
 receipt inspected, account of stock taken, and balances 
 compared by one whom his tombstone avers to have 
 been "the splendid economist." 
 
 The book-keeper had nothing to dread from the 
 rehearsal of his stewardship during the month of the 
 master s absence. Not one figure would give the lie to 
 another; conscious rectitude, from her throne within 
 his bosom, courted inquiry and snapped clean fingers at 
 audits. Meanwhile he occupied himself with the Colo 
 nel s pet volume of MSS. The chronicle had grown 
 apace since the author s last review of it. The heap 
 of disorderly notes creased, blurred, and discolored 
 was diminished by the number of those impaled upon a 
 file at the back of the table, and many pages of vellum 
 were covered with the clerkly characters that, over a 
 century and a half later, command our admiration.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 193 
 
 By and by, when time and proof were ripe, and his 
 master s mood propitious, the scribe might have some 
 what of his own composition and collocation to submit 
 to the august judge. The anticipation was uppermost 
 in his mind as, having trimmed and nibbed a fresh 
 pen, he stole a glance at the seignior s complacent face, 
 and bethought himself, for the thousandth and first 
 time, of the iniquity of a so-called divine government 
 that dealt out to one man every advantage of person, 
 wealth, station, and intellect that the most extravagant 
 eighteenth century Alnaschar could covet, and left 
 millions of the same race to work for daily bread. As 
 mechanically as a modern calligraph, he wrote the next 
 paragraph : 
 
 " Thus, in what part of the Woods soever anything 
 mischievous or troublesome is found, kind Providence 
 is sure to provide a Remedy. And tis probably one 
 great reason why God was pleas d to create these, and 
 many other vexatious Animals, that Men should exer 
 cise their Arts and Industry to guard themselves " 
 
 The obedient pen gave a little astonished jump, and 
 hung above the page. 
 
 From the lips that were, just now, set in the smile 
 of sunniest content, flew forth an oath so gross in its 
 profanity, so sounding, so deep, and so fiery, that the 
 hearer doubted his own faithful ears. Colonel Byrd 
 swore upon occasion, devout churchman as he was. 
 The Father of his country sinned along the same line 
 forty-five years thereafter. But the companion of his 
 least guarded moments had never, until now, heard 
 from him ful mi nation like this that set a tray of glasses 
 upon the table to ringing, and made the moteful stream 
 in 17
 
 M* 
 
 194 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 of October sunshine flowing through the windows 
 vibrate. True to his phlegmatic custom, Bass neither 
 started nor looked up. After that one little leap, the 
 pen resumed its steady amble : 
 " against them. 
 
 " Bears Qyl is used by the Indians as a General 
 Defence against every Species of Vermin. Among 
 the rest, they say it keeps both Bugs and Musquetas 
 from assaulting their Persons which would otherwise 
 devour Such uncleanly People." 
 
 Between two sentences, the writer s eyes skirmished 
 under his scant eyelashes. 
 
 The Colonel sat as still as a stone, one palm pressed 
 flat upon the open sheet spread upon the desk, the other 
 hand a tight fist upon his knee, his eyes blazing into 
 vacancy. His lips were white, and the contracting 
 muscles about them had the singular effect of shallow 
 ing the cleft that lent a voluptuous cast to the lower 
 part of his face. 
 
 " Yet Bears Grease has no Strong Smell, as that 
 plant had which the Egyptians formerly used against 
 musquetas, resembling our pal ma Christi, the juice of 
 which smelled so disagreeably that the Remedy was 
 worse than the Disease." 
 
 " Mr. Bass !" 
 
 The summons was in the Colonel s gentlest voice, 
 
 " May I trouble you to order Pluto to be saddled 
 and brought around ?" 
 
 Pluto, the wickedest thing in the Westover stables, 
 was made ready by three grooms with celerity incon 
 ceivable by one familiar with his playful manoeuvres 
 of kicking, biting, and rearing. The plantation quaked
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 195 
 
 to a man when the Master expressed his intention of 
 taking the air upon the vicious black, and all who 
 could bear a hand in hurrying horse and rider off the 
 place, sprang frantically to the task. 
 
 Madam Byrd, up to her eyes in cake-making, espy 
 ing through the still-room window, her lord, booted 
 and spurred, striding down to the monogram gate, and 
 the caparisoned steed plunging until he lifted two 
 hostlers off their feet by the short hold they had of 
 his mouth, was of one mind with Isis and her attend 
 ants, pressing to the kitchen-door to peep at the same 
 actors : 
 
 " Lord -a-m ussy ! Dar s de mischief to pay when 
 Marster fling he laig ober dat Plutto ! I hope ter 
 gracious de pa r on em 11 shake de debbil offen de 
 crooper fo dey show dey faces hyur agin !" 
 
 The secretary sat between the open vellum leaves, 
 when Madam sailed in, her fair face clouded, her key- 
 basket jingling with trepidation. 
 
 " Had Colonel Byrd bad news in his letters ? Or, is 
 there somewhat wrong with the accounts, that he is so 
 upset !" 
 
 " Madam ?" The secretary had arisen ; his face was 
 an innocent blank. " Colonel Byrd said naught to 
 me of information received, whether good or ill." 
 
 "How excessively annoying! I shall be in a 
 tremble until ho gets back. If he ever does! I 
 never see him mount that imp of darkness whose 
 very name makes a Christian shudder that I don t 
 look to see him brought home with his brains knocked 
 out. I protest I shall have no nerves left if this sort 
 of thing goes on from day to day. After such a peace-
 
 196 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 ful four weeks as we have enjoyed, these scurries and 
 hurries and worries wear me clean out. Where is the 
 Colonel s mail ?" 
 
 " I presume that he put it away, Madam, before going 
 out. It was not to be seen when I returned from order 
 ing his horse." 
 
 " And locked it up, I declare !" trying the desk- 
 lid. " I must own that looks suspicious when the only 
 persons likely to come in here are his wife and his 
 secretary ! Had I but a key that would open this desk, I 
 should esteem it my duty, as a wife, to discover what has 
 put him in such disorder. A woman cannot sympathize 
 intelligently with her husband unless she has a clue to 
 his perplexities. But that is not what I am here to 
 discourse upon. We are to meet the Berkeley folk at 
 tea on the hill this afternoon. Will you grve orders to 
 the carpenters to take up boards and trestles for a new 
 table ? The old one is rickety, as I observed when we 
 last supped there, and tis but natural I should be 
 wishful to have things conformable for such a company 
 as we are to sup with to-day. Heigho! this house is 
 dull as Friday in Lent with all of them gone out 
 of it !" 
 
 Colin went as he was bidden, and willingly. Madam s 
 longing for intelligent sympathy in her lord s worries 
 did not exceed that of his faithful major-domo, but he 
 was the better content to wait for satisfaction of the 
 affectionate craving, since a key in his waistcoat pocket 
 exactly fitted the escritoire-lock, and he would have 
 ample opportunity for research while the al fresco 
 entertainment went forward under the trysting-tree. 
 
 The Colonel had not returned at dinner-time, and his
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. J(J7 
 
 wife s appetite was but indifferent in consequence. The 
 hall-clock was on the stroke of four when he drew rein 
 at the iron gate, and flung the bridle to a triad of grooms 
 who ran from the stable-yard at the sound of hoofs. 
 Pluto was drenched with sweat, his sooty sides criss 
 crossed by welts; his mien was as meek as that of a 
 twenty-year-old hack. The Master stayed to give 
 explicit directions as to the mash to be administered 
 when the animal was cool ; ordered that he should be 
 well rubbed down and covered without delay, and 
 sauntered up the walk, snapping his whip playfully at 
 a collie-pup that gambolled awkwardly about his feet. 
 Meeting his wife in the hall, ready dressed for the 
 sylvan gathering, he kissed her, held her at arms 
 length to survey the bravery of her apparel ; vowed 
 that she would eclipse the girls and bring a dozen duels 
 with raging admirers upon his hands, and ran up 
 stairs with the step of a boy, humming a popular ballad 
 in a round, resonant voice a young man might envy. 
 
 Evidently he and Pluto, between them, had dislodged 
 Satan from the crupper. The one had suffered loss in 
 the achievement, the other came out better than new. 
 
 At half-past four o clock, when the rural fete was in 
 full progress, the Master of \Yestover, arrayed with the 
 elegant precision for which he was distinguished, walked 
 up the long slope capped by the trysting-grove, and 
 halted in the covert of a clump of bushes to survey the 
 scene. 
 
 The table, draped in spotless damask, was encom 
 passed by a bevy of white-aproned servitors, Caliban, 
 in the dual role of Mercury and Ganymede, flying 
 between the board and the hampers collected under a 
 
 17*
 
 198 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 branchy oak. Fifteen yards away, upon the hill-brow 
 overlooking the river, the company for whom the feast 
 was preparing sat upon rustic benches and lounged on 
 carpets laid over the sun-warmed turf. The spectator 
 quickly singled out a group, withdrawn a little from 
 the larger assembly, consisting of Lieutenant Maynard, 
 Martha Jaqueline, Mrs. Carter, with Lady Bess playing 
 at her feet, Evelyn, and Mr. Francis. 
 
 "Madam Carter plays propriety prettily for a young 
 woman with charms of her own!" meditated the unseen 
 looker-on, drawing out his inseparable confidante, and 
 helping himself to a bountiful pinch. "Is she in the 
 plot, I wonder? The easier question to answer would 
 be, who is not except myself. Lover and friend 
 hast thou put far from me, and my acquaintance into 
 darkness ! " he repeated aloud, \vith a cynical laugh. 
 
 He had an eye for scenic effects, and tarried a de 
 liberate minute to possess himself of the best points. 
 
 The weather was delicious : the pure October sky was 
 flecked with a few pearly cloudlets sailing westward to 
 curtain the day-god s conch. The grove, dashed plen 
 tifully with autumnal gold, purple, and scarlet, was 
 merry with the voices of children playing hide-and- 
 seek in the outlying thickets ; about Mr. and Mrs. 
 Harrison was collected a body of guests, mostly young 
 people; Hannah Harrison and Mr. Fontaine talked 
 together, seated upon a fallen tree; the fair raiment of 
 the women and the more gayly-colored garb of their 
 beaux lent animation to the pastoral beauty of the 
 picture. 
 
 " I longed, in despair, for Watteau s pencil and a 
 blank fan !" Colonel Bvrd declared to Mrs. Harrison
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 199 
 
 after bowing his greetings to the company at large. 
 " I stood behind my leafy screen half an hour, lost in 
 admiration of the tableau. It was a human orrery, 
 with yourself as central orb, planets and satellites 
 ringed about you, and the children enacting comets and 
 asteroids." 
 
 He was never in blither rnood ; never more impartial 
 in the distribution of attentions that were subtlest flat 
 tery, but not until supper was handed by the servants 
 and the younger gentlemen to the sitting groups, did 
 he approach that of which Martha Jaqueline and his 
 daughter formed a part. The Berkeley host had joined 
 himself to them, also, and as the Colonel took a tall 
 stool before Mrs. Carter, a position in which he faced 
 the party, Mr. Harrison was anathematizing a grum 
 bling tooth that had kept him awake the night before, 
 and regretting that there was no dentist nearer than 
 Williamsburg. 
 
 " There should be one upon each plantation, as we 
 keep our carpenter and blacksmith and shoemaker," he 
 said. " He would be kept in practice if the teeth of the 
 white family and the negroes were properly looked 
 after." 
 
 " Allow me to show you a more excellent way," said 
 the Colonel, gravely, " and one which can be carried 
 out with infinitely less thought and expense. Upon 
 one of my journeys inland, I was greatly afflicted with 
 an impertinent tooth in my upper jaw that made me 
 chew with great caution. We had little else but bis 
 cuits to eat for days at a time, and I could not grind 
 a biscuit in these circumstances but with much deliber 
 ation and presence of mind. I got rid of this trouble-
 
 200 MS GREAT SELF. 
 
 some companion by cutting a caper. Fastening a twine, 
 about a fathom in length, to the root of my tooth, I tied 
 the other end to the snag of a log that lay upon the 
 ground in .-uch a manner that I could just stand upright. 
 Having adjusted my string, I bent my knees enough to 
 enable me to spring vigorously off the ground as per 
 pendicularly as I could. The force of the leap drew 
 out the tooth with so much ease that I felt nothing 
 of it." 
 
 "But mine is in the lower jaw!" Mr. Harrison 
 objected, laughing. 
 
 " In that case, you should stand on your head and 
 execute a somersault," said Martha Jaqueliue. 
 
 " Not at all !" the Colonel answered, with immovable 
 seriousness. " An under-tooth may be fetched out by 
 standing off the ground and fastening your string at 
 due distance above you. And, having so fixed your 
 gear, jump off your standing, and the weight of your 
 body, added to the force of the spring, will pry out 
 your tooth with less pain than any operator upon earth 
 could draw it." 
 
 He broke off upon perceiving that Lady Bess, lean 
 ing against her mother s knee, open-eyed and open- 
 mouthed, had inserted a thumb and forefinger between 
 her jaws and was working at one of her seed-pearls of 
 teeth. He stooped to take her on his knee. 
 
 " Don t borrow trouble, Fairy ! Never shake a tooth 
 
 to see if it be loose. Be sure you will find it out when 
 
 if i>j 
 it is I 
 
 " A good practical saw !" conceded Martha. " The 
 principle which is at the root of it is a tenet in my 
 religion."
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 201 
 
 " When mankind shall carry it into daily practice, 
 the millennium will be on the dawn," said Francis s 
 pleasant voice. 
 
 The gnarled root of a tree, cushioned with moss, 
 was his seat. Evelyn s chair was close by, and their 
 low-voiced chat was carried on under cover of the 
 general conversation until Colonel Byrd s approach. 
 
 " He who dreads death, dies twice," the Englishman 
 continued in the same easy, moralizing strain. " It 
 may be decreed that a man is to die by lightning, 
 though he knows it not. If he blench and cower at 
 every flash, he perishes not once, but a thousand times, 
 nine hundred and ninety-nine times by his own 
 appointment, once by GOD S." 
 
 Mr. Harrison s shiver was real, while he still 
 laughed. 
 
 " If you knew me better, Mr. Francis, I should 
 suspect that remark to be aimed at me. As my good 
 friends here know, the fear of lightning is a confirmed 
 weakness with me. I query, ofttimes, if the cowardice 
 be not premonition." * 
 
 " There is no such thing as human premonition," 
 Colonel Byrd replied, stroking the silken head resting 
 confidingly against his shoulder. " Auguries were the 
 lies of the pagans ; presentiment is the sentimental 
 fancy of the Christian whose vanity predisposes him 
 to imagine that the Almighty will do naught without 
 taking him into, at least, partial confidence. On the 
 contrary, the Deity would seem, generally, to treat us 
 
 * He, with two of his daughters, was killed by lightning at 
 Berkeley twenty years afterward.
 
 202 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 as do false friends and secret foes, beguile us with 
 fairest hopes when the judgment is closest at hand. 
 
 "Apropos to lightning," addressing himself to the 
 listening circle, " the most amazing instance that ever 
 I heard of happened at York, a little while ago. The 
 story came to my knowledge only last week. A sliip- 
 surgeon had come ashore to visit a patient, and was 
 walking about the sick-room when there came a dread 
 ful flash of lightning that struck him dead, but hurt not 
 the patient nor any other person, though several were 
 near him. At the same time it made a large hole 
 in the trunk of a pine-tree which grew about ten feet 
 from the window. But what was most surprising in 
 this disaster was, that on the breast of the unfortunate 
 man that was killed was the figure of a pine-tree, as 
 exactly delineated as any limner in the world could 
 draw it. Nay, the resemblance went so far as to rep 
 resent the color of the pine as well as the figure. The 
 lightning must probably have passed through the tree 
 first before it struck the man, and by that means have 
 printed the Icon of it on his breast." 
 
 Profound silence reigned in the group and among 
 others who were near enough to hear the anecdote. 
 Evelyn grew terribly pale, and her eyes, turning ap- 
 pealingly to her lover, saw him make the sign of the 
 cross. The hope that the rapid motion had escaped the 
 notice of any other than herself was dashed by hearing 
 her father say, in bland seriousness : 
 
 " You cross yourself, Mr. Francis, and I, from my 
 Protestant soul, respond, Amen ! From battle, mur 
 der, and sudden death, which I take to mean a violent 
 taking off, Good Lord, deliver us, one and all !
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 203 
 
 "Which brings to my mind that my distinguished 
 friend Colonel Spotswood and you held some converse 
 last evening relative to the Indian massacre of 1622. 
 He gave me to understand afterward that the dialogue 
 broken in upon by my irreverent jest pertained to that 
 bloody episode in the history of these colonies, and not 
 to the battle of Blenheim," laughing lightly. " I 
 only judged the present by the past in assuming that I 
 was your benefactor, not an interloper, and I crave 
 your pardon, as I entreated his." 
 
 " We had passed Blenheim and the massacre," re 
 plied Francis, catching the gayety of his tone. " I 
 had just made bold to ask the particulars of the ro 
 mantic expedition of the Knights of the Golden 
 Horseshoe." 
 
 " I withdraw my apology on the spot, and reclaim 
 the meed of gratitude !" rising, amid the shout that 
 greeted the sally. "In the certainty that Blenheim 
 and Mount George left no time in which to do justice 
 to the massacre, I shall take pleasure, if these fair 
 despots will parole us, of walking with you to a spot 
 whence I can designate to you the route taken by the 
 savages on that occasion. Mistress Martha ! I depute 
 you to recall us and come to the rescue of the cap 
 tive knight, should the sanguinary recital threaten to 
 equal in length the storied battles of the Duke of 
 Marlborou;h !" 
 
 o 
 
 Francis arose with alacrity and moved away with 
 him after a word to Evelyn, a bow and smile for the 
 others. All heard the beginning of the narrative as the 
 two strolled toward the river: 
 
 " Westover, at that time, was the property of Master
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 George Thorpe, the friend of Opechancanough, who 
 was the uncle of the Lady Pocahontas. I might add 
 that Thorpe was the friend of all Indians. He was 
 explicitly warned of his danger by an Indian squaw 
 employed in his family, but refused to credit her story 
 or distrust his Indian allies, 
 
 " No, Fairy !" to the child who escaped from her 
 mother and chased him with the petition that she might 
 go along, " we are talking of ugly things that would 
 frighten little ladies out of their small wits. Go ! tell 
 Caliban that Colonel Byrd sent you for a piece of 
 plum-cake as big as your two fists, and make the fists 
 as great as you can ! 
 
 "You do not take snuff, Mr. Francis?" producing 
 the box inscribed to the memory of John Gary and 
 Jacob Dryden. " But you will excuse the petty vice 
 in one who cannot tell a story aright without this 
 stimulus to memory and imagination." 
 
 " Twould argue monstrous arrogance in me to call 
 it a vice of any dimensions whatsoever, sir !" 
 
 The young man, accommodating his bounding step 
 to his companion s stately gait, looked happy and spoke 
 brightly. He felt that he gained ground hourly in 
 the esteem of the man whom he wished above al l 
 others to win. 
 
 " I thank you for a graceful and a gracious consent !" 
 He regaled a nose classic in outline with the aromatic 
 dust, while they sauntered forward. " We waste pity, 
 after all, upon those who met a speedy fate from the 
 tomahawk. The prisoners taken alive merited more 
 compassion. They were put to death nay ! they are 
 put to death at this day with all the tortures that in-
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 205 
 
 genious malice and cruelty can invent. And (what 
 shows the baseness of the Indian temper in perfection) 
 they never fail to treat those with the greatest inhu 
 manity that have distinguished themselves most by 
 their bravery. If he be a war-captain, they do him the 
 honor to roast him alive, and distribute a collop or 
 two to all that had a share in stealing the victory." 
 
 " Yet the parent government would legislate for the 
 protection of these fiends !" ejaculated Francis. " They 
 should the rather be extirpated like wolves and ser 
 pents !" 
 
 " There spake the intolerance of youth !" punctuating 
 the phrases by application to his " stimulus." " Dare 
 classical scholars reproach the poor Indians for this 
 when Homer makes Achilles drag the body of Hector 
 at the tail of his chariot for having fought gallantly in 
 defence of his country ? Was Alexander the Great, 
 with all his famed generosity, less inhuman to the brave 
 Tyrians, two thousand of whom he ordered to be cruci 
 fied in cold blood, for no other fault but for having 
 defended their city most courageously against him 
 during a siege of seven months? And I should add 
 that the braves on both sides perfectly comprehend what 
 seems to us monstrous cruelty. If the victim belong 
 to a hostile tribe, he makes it a point of honor all the 
 time to look as pleased as if he were in the actual 
 enjoyment of some delight, and if he never sang before 
 in his life he is sure to be melodious on this sad and 
 dismal occasion. 
 
 " We are now" halting unexpectedly and wheeling 
 full upon his companion, but with unaltered face and 
 accent " beyond the boundary-line of Westover, and 
 
 18
 
 206 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 standing \vithin the limits of Berkeley. Upon Mr. 
 Harrison s ground, I may demand of my Lord Peter 
 borough the motive and end of this scoundrelly mas 
 querade !" 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 THE one ill-advised word in the sentence that fell, a 
 blinding blow, upon the auditor, was the penultimate. 
 It stung like the whip of hail across the face, and 
 aroused all the patrician within him. The hurried 
 breath of utter astonishment had not passed his lips 
 when he was outwardly as self-possessed as his inter 
 locutor. 
 
 " We will not quarrel as to words, Colonel Byrd, 
 when so much weightier matters claim attention. Else 
 I should resent the epithet you have chosen to apply to 
 my presence here and thus. You have asked a ques 
 tion for which I had not intended to wait. It was my 
 declared purpose to seek you in your own house to 
 night, and to state boldly why I have crossed the 
 Atlantic, and why visited Virginia " 
 
 " Under an assumed name ! Excuse the interruption, 
 but I must, perforce, remind you that between gentle 
 men certain irregularities are difficult of explanation. 
 Sailino- under false colors is one of these." 
 
 o 
 
 " The name is mine V imperturbable as stone. 
 Native courage, race-tradition, the tenets and customs 
 of courts panoplied him in triple mail. He even 
 smiled faintly with a fine, cool disregard of the conse-
 
 HIS ORE AT SELF. 207 
 
 quences of action and word that compelled the other to 
 .a degree of respect. " My godfathers and godmothers 
 in baptism called me Charles Francis. The second 
 name, coining from my mother s family, was dropped 
 from daily use. The first was borne by my grandfather, 
 my father, and myself. I am an honest man, Colonel 
 Byrd, who wrote to you six years ago, expressing an 
 honest love for your daughter " 
 
 " If you please, we will leave her out of a discussion 
 that may grow warmer than should such debates as men 
 of honor and delicacy are willing to hold concerning 
 their wives and daughters. I may be willing to accept 
 the tale told by Lord Peterborough of the voyage to, 
 and travels incognito in a barbarous country. Young 
 men of quality and fortune have a right to their vaga 
 ries. I, as a humble householder and a parent, have a 
 right to defend home and child from the possible conse 
 quences of these vagaries." 
 
 A light flush wavered to the young nobleman s fore 
 head, but he evinced emotion in no other way. 
 
 " Yourself must know, Colonel Byrd no man better 
 how preposterous is the suspicion that aught I could 
 do or say could react unfavorably upon her whom I 
 honor most of created things. You forbade me to see 
 or write to her again in the letter which was the only 
 sign you vouchsafed that my passionate appeals had 
 reached you. You told me that you would not give 
 your daughter in marriage to a Catholic " 
 
 " Unless you object, I prefer, as more just, the term 
 Roman Catholic !" interjected the Colonel, in punctilious 
 parenthesis. 
 
 " As you like ! When I returned from the Continent
 
 208 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 in haste on hearing that you were in London, I found that 
 you had taken your daughter and departed, none knew 
 whither. I had said to her at our last interview that 
 naught in the power of man or fate should separate us 
 for aye. My grandfather admired Miss Byrd, as did 
 all who had the honor to meet and know her. Yet he 
 opposed my suit as strenuously as yourself, being bent 
 upon my union with an English lady of his selection. 
 I had but one answer for him and for you. I was not 
 my own master, but dependent upon my grandfather for 
 the bread I ate. I determined to carve out my fortune 
 with my sword, and declared my purpose to him. Had 
 Miss Byrd been willing to brave your displeasure, to 
 fly in the face of your prohibition, I had never let her 
 return to America. 
 
 "You know the rest. I haye, in all my life, loved 
 but one woman. Even after my grandfather s death 
 made me the possessor of his title and nominal heir to 
 his fortune, there were vexatious delays in the matter 
 of legal adjustments that seemed endless to me. I never 
 swerved, for one minute, from my intention to cross the 
 sea and throw myself at her feet, so soon as I was free 
 to do so. I have waited almost seven years for her. I 
 shall wait for her while we both live." 
 
 "And her reply to the paladin who chose postern and 
 pass-key instead of trumpet and drawbridge ?" 
 
 The cutting sarcasm fell blunted against the mailed 
 breast of the younger man. 
 
 "You have been, in your time, courtier and soldier, 
 Colonel Byrd. It should be needless to represent to 
 you the expediency of extraordinary measures when 
 Necessity holds the whip measures that would seem
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 209 
 
 unjustifiable in ordinary circumstances. Had I pre 
 sented myself at your door under my new title, I should 
 Lave been coldly received ; probably been denied speech 
 of Miss Byrd, or I should have owed more agreeable 
 treatment to the fact that Lord Peterborough, and not 
 Charles Mo rd aunt, sued for hospitality. I am still 
 young and romantic enough to wish to make my way 
 to your good graces and to those of Madam, your ad 
 mirable wife, as a man, a commoner, yet a gentleman, 
 who claimed no advantage from extraneous circum- 
 
 o 
 
 stance. I acknowledge that such design was not in 
 my mind when I left England. My one thought was 
 to seek, to win, and to wed the bride to whom I had 
 remained so long constant. That which commended 
 itself to me as the worthier scheme was conceived upon 
 the voyage. I said, ( I will not court favor for rank 
 and wealth, or risk disfavor on account of the past. " 
 
 " A scheme so clever betrays a shrewd wit and a deli 
 cate," observed the listener. " I should be at no loss 
 to detect the workmanship, even had I not known who 
 was your fellow-passenger. The woman tempted me ! 
 Your excuse is as old as Eden. One instant, if you 
 please !" as a gesture threatened interruption. " Had I 
 been conversant with none of these evidences of femi 
 nine complicity, my ingenious friend, Mistress Martha, 
 has put a clue into my hands by a winsome special plea 
 entered yesterday for the suitor who should present 
 himself to me, bearing her signet. She stipulated that 
 he should be heard for his suit s sake, and not be pre 
 judged by favor or disfavor, the very phrase you have 
 just employed. I engaged to give her hypothetical 
 wooer candid audience. Albeit not so nominated in 
 o 18*
 
 210 HI* GREAT SELF. 
 
 the bond in the present showing, I do not withhold it. 
 To a rude colonist who has tried to bring up his family 
 to fear GOD, to honor the king and to speak the truth, 
 that section of your romance that has to do with the 
 imposition upon a confiding household of another 
 woman s lover as her very own will require even more 
 than feminine casuistry to justify it." 
 
 The blue eyes kindled under the sneer; reply trode 
 hastily upon charge, yet mien and language were tem 
 perate. 
 
 " You leave out of sight the circumstance that my 
 original intention was to become the guest of Mr. and 
 Mrs. Harrison. That, not until we were abreast of 
 the Westover wharf on our way to Berkeley, were we 
 aware of the change in our plans consequent upon Mr. 
 Harrison s sudden seizure. As Mr. Francis, Mrs. 
 Jaqueline s guest and the invited guest of Berkeley, I 
 had been announced. As such I must accept the 
 generous hospitality tendered by Mrs. Byrd as the 
 representative of her afflicted friends, or return churl 
 ishly to Jamestown, foiled of my purpose. Miss Byrd 
 was upon the wharf when the sloop touched at West- 
 over. I could not go back !" 
 
 The brief last sentence escaped against his will. 
 Having uttered it, he turned half-avvay, looking, by 
 chance, toward Westover and the trysting-grove. Above 
 intervening trees towered the windowed roof and the 
 
 o 
 
 tall chimneys of the homestead ; between clumps of 
 shrubs he had glimpses of fluttering robes and lounging 
 figures. The children had been sent home after supper, 
 and only the low pulse of cheerful talk, and now and 
 then a happy laugh, stirred the sunset stillness.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 211 
 
 In this fateful moment, by a caprice of mental action, 
 recurred to him the tale of the Icon painted by the 
 death -flash upon the victim s breast. Would he carry 
 the fair picture he gazed upon always upon the inner 
 chamber of his imagery ? 
 
 For he knew already what was before him ; that not 
 one plea of his defence had availed against the deter 
 minate will of the man who feigned to balance the scales 
 of rightful judgment in untrembling hands ; the inex 
 orable will that had never wavered in six years obser 
 vation of his daughter s patient pain ; that had brought 
 to this interview a purpose as calm as the October 
 heavens, as resistless as the roll of the mighty river to 
 the ocean. 
 
 Colonel Byrd filliped from his finger-tips a half- 
 pinch of snuff with the smile of one self-remindful of 
 a matter overlooked in more important counsels : 
 
 " We are forgetting the probability that your charm 
 ing Portia, who has honored my daughter by standing 
 proxy for her comparatively- insignificant self, may use 
 the authority vested in her to end our talk should the 
 time of your absence I dare not say mine appear 
 tedious. 
 
 " Your fence is passably good, my lord. Had 
 Providence called you to the bar, you would have 
 established a reputation as special pleader. To save 
 time precious by reason of the probability I have 
 hinted at we will break the buttons from our foils and 
 make a sharp end of the bout. Your grandfather, the 
 late Lord Peterborough" lifting his hat in grave 
 respect " was the Adonis, the Crichton, the Rabelais 
 of his day, which was, by the ordinance of inscrutable
 
 212 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Heaven, a long one. My personal relations with his 
 lordship were cordial. He was a man of the world, 
 and we understood one another. 
 
 " Your father" this time he did not raise his hat 
 " was your father ! This circumstance, albeit one over 
 which you had no control, would seal my lips had the 
 plea that replied to your former suit of Miss Byrd 
 availed to abate your pretensions. I spoke truly in 
 alleging ray insurmountable objection to the union of 
 any member of my family with one belonging to your 
 communion. A distaste and a dread of Popery runs 
 with my blood through my veins. I am frank with 
 you in this, my lord, as I purpose to be in what 
 is to follow. Had my daughter trampled upon the 
 prohibition based on this ground, she would never 
 have seen niy face again, and thus I assured her in so 
 many words. A Protestant young woman who has 
 been properly nurtured, thinks not twice, but twice 
 two hundred times before she braves the paternal 
 curse." 
 
 " If causeless ? Surely in this day of general toler 
 ation of religious opinion and faith, one may come to 
 view such differences as of less importance than when 
 the safety of a nation was believed to depend upon the 
 precise shade of a sovereign s belief." 
 
 "You would add, in court parlance, Nous avons 
 chang& tout cela / I take leave to differ from you there ; 
 but concert or variance of sentiment on this point hap 
 pens to be of slight moment in the present instance. 
 Your father, the Honorable Charles Mordaunt recol 
 lect that I am driven to say it, Lord Peterborough ! 
 was my mortal enemy, and I, his ! I bear in my sword-
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 213 
 
 arm the scar of a thrust dealt in the desperation of what 
 his second and mine believed to be his death-agony. 
 He recovered, and the duel was kept from public 
 knowledge. We never met again, but I know that to 
 his death he remained my implacable foe. I am con 
 fident of this, if for no better reason, because I would 
 sooner slay my fair and well-beloved daughter with my 
 own hands than give her into the arms of his sou. You 
 resemble him so strongly in person that I might earlier 
 have penetrated the secret of your incognito but for the 
 dust cast into my eyes by ingenious Mistress Martha 
 Jaqueline. You may be as unlike him in heart and 
 soul as Ithuriel to Satan, but his blood, his name, and 
 his face are yours. This is my answer. I can have 
 none other to give in six years more, or in six-and- 
 twenty, should my disembodied spirit be then invoked. 
 Shall we rejoin our friends?" 
 
 " One moment !" said Lord Peterborough, his voice 
 no longer firm and full. " Your disclosure has shocked 
 me unspeakably. My father, as you know, died when 
 I was but a child, but I find it difficult to credit that 
 he carried to the grave the resentful memory of a youth 
 ful quarrel " 
 
 " And your hesitation would signify greater diffi 
 culty in comprehending how I, at my age, can hate a 
 dead man in his tomb" never a symptom of anger in 
 accent or visage. "Mutual comprehension upon this 
 topic being manifestly impracticable, we will receive 
 facts as they are and close the argument. Your pref 
 erence would be, I presume, that the unfortunate affair 
 be brought to a termination without more tittle-tattle 
 than is absolutely indispensable to the happiness of the
 
 214 HIS GEE AT SELF. 
 
 divine creatures who compound gossip for the polite 
 world. 
 
 " If, as I choose to take for granted in consideration 
 of the amicable relations that have long existed between 
 Berkeley and Westover, your present hosts are as pro 
 foundly ignorant of the lineage and title of the stranger 
 under their roof as were Mrs. Byrd and myself when 
 you were at Westover, the rest will follow easily. I 
 would, likewise, believe that the widow of my revered 
 friend, Edward Jaqueline, is not a conspirator with her 
 volatile daughter. The knowledge of the facts in the 
 case being thus confined to four people, your exit from 
 a neighborhood where, I regret to say, you can no longer 
 be comfortable or welcome" dwelling blandly upon 
 the emphatic words " can be easily effected. You may 
 rely upon me to use my best endeavors to accomplish an 
 end so eminently desirable for all concerned." 
 
 He had taken a dozen steps toward the trysting- 
 ground when he was overtaken by hastier feet. The 
 resemblance to the man he had tried to kill more than 
 a quarter-century before, was so marked in the son s 
 face that the Virginian grasped his cane with a darting 
 thrill. of the old murderous desire. 
 
 "No degree of insult, overt or covert, can hurry me 
 into forgetting that you are by many years my senior, 
 and the father of the woman I love and intend to 
 marry aye ! though she were hedged about by a 
 thousand devils !" said the young man, arresting him 
 authoritatively. 
 
 " Pla;iaristic of Martin Luther!" commented the 
 
 O 
 
 Colonel, regretfully. " But somewhat must be allowed 
 to youthful excitement !"
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 215 
 
 " I have had your ultimatum" continued the Eng 
 lishman, mastering his choler with a strong effort. 
 " Now, hear mine ! I do not consider myself bound 
 by so much as the strength of a hair by your refusal to 
 sanction my honorable addresses to your daughter. 
 Refusal based upon rancorous revenge that dishonors 
 humanity. If I can win her who is, already, in heart 
 my wife, by fair means, it shall be done. If not let 
 foul means be met by desperate measures !" 
 
 The Master of Westover stopped a foot short of the 
 line dividing the two plantations, and again had re 
 course to the heir-loom snuff-box. 
 
 " I know the Mordaunt blood, when hot, to be a 
 most pestilent fluid," he uttered, composedly. " Since 
 etiquette and expediency twin tyrants to whom all 
 Christendom does homage require that we return to 
 the revellers together and in seeming amity, we will 
 e en hoist a flag of truce figuratively, and declare an 
 armistice until good-nights are said. After that, the 
 black flag !" 
 
 " You stayed away for an eternity !" pouted Martha 
 Jaqueline, tripping forward to meet them. " I could 
 not half enjoy the sunset without you, Colonel, and 
 here is Madam Byrd descanting upon the danger of 
 river-fogs and night-damps, and all sorts of auguries 
 of speedy separation. You ve been long enough to 
 kill, capture, and torture every colonist who ever set 
 foot in Virginia. Marl borough s battles were nothing 
 by comparison." 
 
 "So Mr. Francis is thinking, although too civil to 
 repeat the words you put into his mouth !" retorted the 
 Colonel. " Strike, but hear ! of the surprise I have
 
 216 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 prepared for you, one that might buy forgiveness from 
 a sterner judge than your adorable self. Caliban ! run 
 down the hill to the persimmon-bushes yonder, and bid 
 the fiddlers who should be in hiding there, come up. 
 What say you to that, my dear Lady Disdain? "Will 
 not a dance upon the sward atone for our joint l&se 
 majestef What, ho! young sirs and merry lasses! 
 Foot it featly here and there ! " 
 
 To the secretary had been committed the duty of 
 stationing the fiddlers three in ambush, there to await 
 the master s orders. Not until this was done did he 
 consider it altogether safe to acquaint himself with the 
 details he must master if he would sympathize intel 
 ligently with his chief s annoyances. He locked the 
 study-door, unlocked the escritoire, and ran his eye 
 over every paper that had come in the morning mail, 
 until it alighted upon this paragraph in the letter of a 
 titled correspondent : 
 
 " The new Earl of Peterborough has at last suc 
 ceeded in possessing himself of all the property his 
 grandfather could not spend, or take away with him. 
 He would seem to be an improvement upon his father, 
 whose only exhibition of discretion and propriety was 
 in declining to outlive 7i/,9 father, the late lord. Take 
 him all in all, we shall ne er see Peterborough s like 
 again. He was as gallant as Amadis, and as brave, 
 albeit more expeditious in his journeyiugs. He had 
 seen more kings and more postilions than any other 
 man in Europe. It was the popular saying that he 
 would neither live nor die like any other mortal. But 
 die he did, and, as we may be sure, not of his free will. 
 Otherwise, it was in him to cheat his grandson, as he
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 217 
 
 cheated his son, out of a peerage. Tis said the young 
 fellow now rising thirty years of age has much of 
 his grandsire s wit and liking for adventures. If this 
 be so, you will, belike, hear of him, for he sailed t other 
 day for America." 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 " THERE is no such thing as human premonition !" 
 the Wcstover oracle had pronounced. 
 
 Mr. Fontaine smiled, in recalling the dictum on his 
 way to the Byrd homestead the morning after the sylvan 
 fete. Notwithstanding Madam s prognostications, the 
 fog had fallen late overnight. It had, also, been late 
 in rising on the morrow. At ten o clock the rime yet 
 sparkled, like hoar-frost upon brake and grass, and 
 silvered the webs spread over the stubble-fields. Evelyn 
 had called them once, in his hearing, " the fairies bleach- 
 ing-grounds." At thought of the graceful conceit, the 
 half-smile was more tender. 
 
 She was singularly gentle, even for her, to him, now 
 adays. Last evening, during the absence of her father 
 and the English guest, her talk with him was confi 
 dential. She had doubts and scruples on clivers points 
 on which she would consult him. She desired to be 
 upright and truthful, always, if she could. But if a 
 great and long-coveted good could be obtained only by 
 what strict moralists would account questionable meas 
 ures what was one to do ? Was not the maxim, 
 
 K 19
 
 218 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " Of two evils choose the less/ sound and safe in such 
 a case ? 
 
 " If one is absolutely shut up to the choice of an 
 evil," Fontaine answered. " The deceitful ness of human 
 nature often inclines us to the belief that there is no 
 alternative, because we have already decided to do one 
 of these two things, and we will see none other. There 
 is seldom scarce once in a thousand times a direct 
 conflict of duties. The fault is in our distorted views 
 of right and wrong." 
 
 " But where the welfare of more than one person is 
 concerned ?" Evelyn went on, her lovely eyes full of 
 vague trouble. " Where it is not possible to do what two 
 people or three or four would advise, and the claims 
 of both parties seem equally good, how can one decide 
 what is really and simply and altogether right to do?" 
 
 It was very sweet to be deferred to, and to be 
 allowed the privilege of ministering to the guileless 
 soul in its perplexity. He did not venture another 
 glance at her, lest she might divine how sweet he 
 found it. He picked up a rose that had fallen from 
 her hair before trusting himself to answer. She 
 seemed not to recognize the flower in his fingers, and, 
 by and by, he put it into his pocket. 
 
 When, full of years and honors, he returned a 
 blameless life to Him who gave it, the embrowned 
 petals were found in a sealed packet in a secret drawer, 
 were speculated over idly and wonderingly, and cast 
 aside with other rubbish. 
 
 They were rich in color and scent, and quivered 
 with the warm pulses of the hidden heart while the 
 rector made reply,
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 219 
 
 " A good rule for general adoption is, the greatest 
 good to the greatest number/ cseteris paribus. But 
 general rules are frequently a misfit in special cases. 
 An enlightened conscience is a pretty safe counsellor." 
 
 " Ah !" with what her step-mother reprobated as her 
 " Frenchy manner," " if one is satisfied that her con 
 science is enlightened ! Suppose we, Mr. Fontaine, 
 that you, as my spiritual guide, admonish me to do 
 one thing, and my father, my natural guardian, com 
 mand me to do another, and a diverse what course am 
 I to take ?" 
 
 " Who shall decide when doctors disagree if not 
 the patient?" returned Fontaine, playfully. And more 
 seriously: "There arise occasions in every human life 
 when the soul feels itself to be solitary save for the 
 Presence that ever attends it. It must act of, and in, 
 and for itself. The nearest and dearest of earthly 
 friends may not, then, intermeddle with its joy, or enter 
 into its bitterness. Do not ask why this is so. It is 
 GOD S will ; therefore, in some way for our good." 
 
 At that others had broken in upon the dialogue. 
 But for the interruption, he felt sure that she would 
 have spoken more frankly and specifically of that 
 which vexed and tried her. Whatever it might be, 
 and whensoever she might confide it unto him, the con 
 fidence must strengthen their cordial mutual under 
 standing, and lessen the distance between them. 
 
 Thus musing, and feeling the beauty of the day 
 rather as in sympathy with his tranquil happiness than 
 as an accessory, he rode through wood and plantation 
 until he met Colonel Byrd, again mounted upon Pluto, 
 at the outermost gate of his domain.
 
 220 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " A la bonne heure, Monsieur Fontaine!" cried the 
 genial seignior, cheeking his restive steed. " You are 
 bound for Westover, I hope? My Lady was wishing 
 for you but now. A nasty happening has troubled her 
 soul to the depths, and naught but the consolations of 
 the clergy can calm it. I commit what slight share I 
 have had in creating the commotion to your friendship 
 and sterling judgment. Meanwhile, I choose the 
 wiser part of valor. You are under the aegis of the 
 cloth, and therefore safe. The blessing of the fugitive 
 be with you !" 
 
 The chaplain was not alarmed. He knew too well 
 the bland autocracy of the ruler of the realm and his 
 spouse s wholesome awe of her polished lord to appre 
 hend trouble for himself in deciding between them. 
 Madam took life with her, almost a synonyme for 
 domestic worries hard. The worst the umpire had 
 to fear was some fresh act of contumacy on the part 
 of William the Third, whose instructor in Latin and 
 Greek Mr. Fontaine was in the interregnum separating 
 the regime of one English tutor from another, or she 
 suspected Caliban of pilfering, or Lsis, Osiris and 
 neophytes had failed in some cardinal culinary process. 
 
 Caliban flew out to the gate to hold his stirrup as he 
 alighted, a marvellous condescension in so distinguished 
 a member of the household staff. 
 
 " Mis Evelyn say s how she mus see you, suh, arter 
 Mistis done wid you !" said the lad, hurriedly, drop 
 ping upon one knee to brush the rector s shoes. " She 
 say, don go way, please, suh, tell she see you, ef 
 tain till plump night!" 
 
 The message was as unique as urgent, and rendered
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 221 
 
 more peculiar by the sight of Madam s august self 
 approaching the door through the hall. 
 
 " You are as welcome as an angel from heaven !" 
 she cried, offering both hands, and pulling, rather than 
 drawing him into the library. 
 
 When they were within, she shut both doors, and 
 waved him to a seat beside her on the sofa. 
 
 " Welcome as an angel of mercy to this afflicted 
 household!" she pursued, with real feeling that robbed 
 word and action of melodramatic effect. " Such a 
 terrible night and morning as we have had ! Evelyn 
 could escape after the awful scene with her father upon 
 our return from the tea-ground last night. She has been 
 locked in her room ever since, and only answers me 
 through the door that she wants for nothing save to be 
 left to herself." 
 
 " Yet she sent a message that she wished to see me !" 
 thought the listener, grieved to learn that she suffered, 
 yet inexpressibly moved that she turned to him for 
 comfort, when others were excluded. 
 
 "But I must keep up and about, and smother my 
 feelings, and pour out coffee and make talk at break 
 fast-table, on account of Colin Bass and the servants 
 (not that he would ever discover anything that wasn t 
 right under his nose!), and smile at the Colonel s jokes. 
 It is his way one of them to seem in extravagant 
 spirits when he is most dangerous. Heaven forgive 
 me for the word ! but I am sore bestead, Mr. Fontaine ! 
 For tis I who am blamed for the whole mischance. 
 Had / been blessed with ordinary prudence, the man 
 would never have been let into the house ! Tis I 
 who am so crazy after English gentry that I must, 
 
 19*
 
 222 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 forsooth, snap at this sprig of nobility and make him 
 and myself the talk of the county by toadying him 
 and giving the lovers all manner of opportunities of 
 billing and cooing/ when if lie had been at home, the 
 trick would have been exposed in forty-eight hours 
 after he and that arch-traitor Martha Jaqueline landed 
 at the Westover wharf. 
 
 " And this, though I plucked up spirit to tell him 
 last night in Evelyn s presence that, by his own show 
 ing, twas not until the letter from my Lord Orrery 
 arrived yester-morning saying that Lord Peterborough 
 had sailed for America, that he suspected anything ! 
 How, after reading that letter, he could disport himself 
 all the afternoon as if naught had happened ; telling 
 his funny and sad stories, and saying the gallantest 
 things to Martha Jaqueliue, who is, sooth to say, more 
 to blame than the poor young lord, for, says not the 
 poet that all s fair in love and war ? passes even my 
 understanding, and I ve known William Evelyn Byrd 
 for a dozen years. I m sure I went into hysterics 
 forthwith, when he marshalled me and Evelyn who 
 looked fit to faint at his first word into the study 
 when we got home from what I d been saying was a 
 mighty pleasant tea-drinking and dance, and says, 
 without a lisp of preface, 
 
 " ( My Lord of Peterborough and I had a right 
 merry crack auent massacre and masquerade, this after 
 noon. I was minded so he ran on, smiling all the 
 while to quote to him Samson s pleasantry about 
 ploughing with an honest man s heifer, but conceived 
 the figure, however apt, to be hardly respectful to 
 you, my Lady Byrd, he says. At any rate, until
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 223 
 
 I had assured myself how much, or how little you 
 know ! 
 
 "I must say that Evelyn proved herself her father s 
 child so soon as she gat back color and voice. 
 
 " My mother knew naught of the matter you speak 
 of/ she declared, never flinching one whit. Blame 
 me, if you like, for I knew all. Twas I sent the 
 token to Jamestown that lured him hither, said she, 
 head up and eyes a-light. But spare her. She is 
 innocqnt ! 
 
 " Upon hearing which, as I said, I fell into hysterics 
 that might well have lasted till now had not his deal 
 ings with Evelyn diverted my attention. She is not 
 my own daughter, Mr. Fontaine, but my heart bled 
 for her while hearing the cutting sneers and caustic re 
 proaches she had to endure, and she moving no more 
 than one of those stone posts out there, never trem 
 bling, nor letting fall a tear only when he asked, sar 
 castically, of the next act in the farce, saying, as a 
 statue might open its mouth and speak : I have 
 given my word to marry Charles Mordauut, papa, 
 whether you will or no, and I cannot go back ! " 
 
 The narrator was crying so heartily that she was 
 forced to muffle her face in her handkerchief and lose 
 volubility in sobs. 
 
 Fontaine sat like the statue to which she had likened 
 her step-daughter. From the wet tangle of the tale, 
 he drew one thread that seemed to wind about and cut 
 into his heart. 
 
 This Francis was Evelyn Byrd s early lover. She 
 loved him still. She had always loved him. She 
 would marry him. The beautiful dream that had
 
 224 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 glorified his own life the dream that, of late, he had 
 believed was shaping itself into reality that was divine 
 was more tenuous than the morning vapors, and left 
 arid blackness after it. 
 
 Madam Byrd s suspicions freely expressed to Mrs. 
 Carter and Miss Lotsie, of the rector s passion for her 
 step-child were swept away and forgotten in the 
 whirl wind of the new revelation. Perhaps the knowl 
 edge that the girl was adored by a nobleman put the 
 idea of an nntitled suitor with a moderate income so far 
 out of mind that she would not have admitted to her 
 self having indulged it. 
 
 For full five minutes her sobs were the only sound 
 in the room. It was hard for her to stop crying. Her 
 nerves had been racked, and the relief of pouring out 
 the story to the only person to whom she had a right to 
 speak of it brought a copious shower of natural tears. 
 In the absorption in her own emotions, she was deaf, 
 dumb, and blind to all else. 
 
 From where he sat, Fontaine looked through the 
 window at the iron gate with the interlaced initials and 
 curved tracery of the arch above; the clumsy eagles 
 balancing themselves upon the globes surmounting the 
 posts. He actually found himself dully numbering the 
 stone balls and pineapples alternating upon the iron 
 railing running to the right and left of the gate. Since 
 he had entered the house, the gossamer-nets robing the 
 stubble had dried into invisibility. The line of parti 
 colored forest defining the horizon cut keenly into the 
 sky ; he heard, in the same partial stupor, the whistle 
 of a partridge above the confused clamor of the poultry- 
 yard beyond the stables. Still further away, and heard
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 225 
 
 as in a swoon, a baud of negroes was " shucking" corn, 
 and chanting a mournful plantation-melody. His world 
 was under a spell. His life had sunk down dead at his 
 feet ; in the horrible suffocation of heart-constriction, he 
 could not lift a hand or stir a limb. Presently, when 
 the woman beside him ceased to sob, he must speak. 
 He would rather die. 
 
 The door behind him, opening into the drawing-room, 
 was softly unclosed. He divined by whose hand before 
 Evelyn Byrd glided around to the front of the sofa. 
 
 " Mamma !" she said, quietly, " I knew that Mr. Fon 
 taine was here, and I have come down to speak with 
 him." 
 
 " Thank you !" as he set a chair forward for her, him 
 self remaining standing, his eyes riveted upon the floor. 
 " Do not stir, dear mother ! I want you to hear what 
 I have to say to this good friend of us all. Mr. Fon 
 taine ! you gave me yesterday as a safe rule, The greatest 
 good to the greatest number. Shall I deceive the trust 
 reposed in me by him who has kept faith with me 
 through years of temptation and absence? Shall I 
 displease his friends and mine, violate my plighted word, 
 and break my own heart or obey my father s unreason 
 able command? This is the question I have been ask 
 ing myself all night long. You are a good man 
 upright, humane, and wise. Were my case that of your 
 sister, if the man to whom her heart had been true 
 for six years, offered her clean hands, a pure life, and 
 steadfast love; if her father had found no fault in him 
 other than his kinship to one who was his enemy a 
 generation agone how would you counsel her to act ?" 
 
 The appeal was made with studied composure to the 
 P
 
 226 SIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 last question let like a red-hot arrow into Fontaine s 
 heart. This was not the docile, sensitive woman whose 
 character he thought he had read from fly-leaf to 
 " Finis." In the throes of the past night she had 
 entered upon a new being. She was as remote from 
 him at every point of this as if the width of the globe 
 had divided them. In every tone and look he read 
 that her mind was definitively made up. The manner 
 of her reference to him was warning, not irresolution. 
 
 " Thus and thus stands the case !" it said. " GOD 
 and I have decided it in the awful solitude of soul of 
 which you spoke to me last night. As man and priest, 
 dare you controvert my resolution ?" 
 
 He raised his eyes and regarded her steadily when she 
 ceased to speak. She looked taller for the regal pose 
 challenging his dissent. Her eyes were large and 
 luminous ; her lips scarlet; the flush in her cheeks was 
 fixed. All the woman was up in arms. Yesterday, 
 she was as one who could die for her love. To-day, she 
 would fight for him to the death, and scorn the grant 
 of a life in which he had no part. 
 
 Obeying an impulse that proved him her peer, Fon 
 taine held out his hand as to a comrade, she rising to 
 take it. While he spoke he held it in a brotherly 
 clasp. 
 
 " Yourself must know that I can render but one 
 answer to your citation. At the tribunal of your con 
 science and of mine, in the hearing of the GOD whom 
 we both serve, I say that your allegiance is due to the 
 man you love, and who loves you !" 
 
 Before he could hinder her, Evelyn carried his hand, 
 first, to her forehead, then to her lips. Both were
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 227 
 
 burning, and the tear that fell with her kiss was hot. 
 Solemnly he led her to her step-mother. 
 
 "She will need all the comfort your affection can 
 bring !" he said to Madam Byrd. " She is in the right, 
 and we must stand by her." 
 
 As the two women fell weeping into each other s 
 arms, he walked to the window and looked forth with 
 eyes between which and the landscape had fallen a black 
 pall. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 THE race-ball was on Monday night; the race and 
 the race-dinner were on Tuesday ; the fttfrchamp&tre 
 was on Wednesday afternoon. 
 
 At sunset on Thursday, all the Westover house-ser 
 vants and field-hands were convened upon the lawn in 
 obedience to the Master s summons. He made short 
 work of the business in hand. Not one of them 
 man, woman, or child was to quit the plantation until 
 further notice upon any pretext whatsoever, unless by 
 his express command or permission. He had given 
 orders to the neighborhood patrol to arrest, tie up, and 
 whip within an inch of his life any servant of his found 
 out of bounds without a written pass signed by his own 
 hand. Lest some might count upon cheating the patrol, 
 he gave further warning that he meant to be his own 
 constable for some time to come. 
 
 "You know what that means!" While he talked, 
 he tapped the lid of his snuff-box with a shapely fore-
 
 228 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 finger, the nail of which was in form like a filbert, and 
 the color as delicate as the finest lady s in the land; his 
 smile was placid, his broad-lidded eyes were sleepy. 
 " I can do with less sleep than anybody else on this 
 plantation. For a fortnight to come, each one of you 
 may depend upon finding me in the very last place in 
 which he expected to see me, and at the exact minute 
 in which he didn t care to set eyes upon me. Those 
 who obey orders, stay at home, and mind their own 
 business, have nothing to be afraid of. If one of you 
 cross the Westover fence on either side, even to pick 
 up a chinquapin that has fallen from a Westover bush 
 upon Berkeley land, he will wish he had never been 
 born, so sure as my name is Byrd. If I never was 
 in earnest before, I am in earnest now. Now, be off, 
 all of you !" 
 
 Colin Bass heard the imperial ukase from his 
 writing-table, and smiled his pale, joyless smile to the 
 vellum quarto. He had been closeted for two hours 
 of the afternoon with his superior, and found an oppor 
 tunity to confide to one who, he felt, ought to know 
 whatever was going on upon the premises, certain ugly 
 surmises forced upon his own unwilling mind by inci 
 dents connected with the visit of the Englishman, call 
 ing himself Francis. He the respectful secretary 
 brought forward proofs in support of the theory that 
 this same gentleman was better known elsewhere under 
 another name. These proofs were mainly lapses in 
 discretion on the part of Mistress Martha Jaqueline in 
 speaking to and of Mr. Francis; in the Englishman s 
 inattention when accosted by the title he had given as 
 his; his familiarity with English high life; his reserve
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 229 
 
 as to his personal antecedents; lastly, and here the 
 ingenuous scribe made a pause that did honor to his 
 heart and taste, he had " chanced to overhear the 
 stranger addressed in private conversation as Your 
 
 Lordship by one who never styled him thus in 
 
 general conversation." 
 
 " Name him !" ordered the auditor, until now as im 
 passive as ice, and as uninviting to the communicative. 
 
 The secretary hesitated, painfully. 
 
 " I beg you will not insist upon that demand, sir. 
 Nothing but the certainty that your generous confidence 
 was abused would have impelled me to the extremity 
 of broaching a topic so disagreeable to myself, and, I 
 doubt not, to you. The lapsus linguce to which I refer 
 occurred at the ball of Monday night, and was proba 
 bly overheard by myself alone." 
 
 The Colonel smiled cynically. 
 
 "I should, then, have said, Name her! Was the 
 unwary fair one an unmarried lady?" 
 
 "If you will excuse me, sir " 
 
 "Most certainly not! 
 
 "Then, sir, the speaker was not a spinster." 
 
 " Was it Mrs. Harrison or Mrs. Carter ?" 
 
 Another obviously reluctant pause. 
 
 "Neither, sir!" 
 
 " I have no further inquiries to make, Mr. Bass !" 
 mildly courteous. "I thank you for your fidelity to 
 my interests and commend your discretion. What 
 you have said is safe with me. Heaven is my wit 
 ness," a dreary smile wringing the healthful color 
 put of the handsome face, " I was never in bitterer 
 need of faithful, incorruptible friendship. When a 
 
 20
 
 230 SIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 man s foes are those of his own household, and he is 
 betrayed with kisses, he may well be ignorant where 
 to turn." 
 
 The unprecedented evidence of natural feeling moved 
 even the phlegmatic secretary. He cleared his throat, 
 and fumbled with his papers before replying. 
 
 " I am a blunt man, sir, and slow of speech, as you 
 are well aware. But whatsoever lies within the power 
 of one so humble as myself would be thankfully done, 
 if it could be of service to you. You have befriended 
 me, sir, when I most needed a helping and guiding 
 hand. Mine are not showy talents, but such as they 
 are, they are at your disposal. It is the old fable of 
 the lion and the mouse. I cannot protest, sir, but I 
 never forget a benefit, and your benefactions to me are 
 beyond number." 
 
 The Colonel pushed his chair away, and took a few 
 turns in the small room. 
 
 " I believe you, Bass !" he halted to say. " I am 
 warring single-handed, and against odds. Time was 
 when I could have fought the world with one arm 
 lashed behind my back. But I am nearing the age at 
 which one is afraid of that which is high, and things 
 deal deep wounds that would once have scratched the 
 surface alone. I know you for an honest fellow and 
 a loyal. More than that, for a grateful. You cannot 
 eat my bread and drink of my cup, and yet watch for 
 opportunity to lift the heel against me. GOD help 
 me ! I am not sure, just now, that I can lay my hand 
 upon another among the many whom I have be 
 friended !" 
 
 It was in this hour of unprecedented weakness, when
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 231 
 
 his heart was smarting under what he esteemed as de 
 fection on the part of his closest of kin and nearest in 
 interest, that he unfolded to the wily factotum all the 
 latter had schemed to discover. The strongest and 
 most self-reliant are not proof against paroxysms of 
 self-distrust and morbid longing- for sympathy. The 
 sense of the awful loneliness of the human soul steals 
 past the defences of pride, the guards of experience, 
 the consciousness of native force, and compels the cry 
 for succor. This is the solution of many an enigma 
 involving the resort of the mighty to the weak, the 
 unbosoming of the reticent, and the hold of the bad 
 upon the good. 
 
 Bass hearkened with averted eyes and respectful 
 humility. His whole mien was assuasive to the 
 wounded spirit of one who faced failure as an un 
 familiar enemy; with whom success was habit not a 
 happening. To a naturally arbitrary temper he joined 
 belief in himself that was well-nigh sublime. Despotic 
 in his principality ; courted for wealth and personal 
 accomplishments; admired for dauntless energy and 
 infinite address, his mental attitude of haughty sur 
 prise at the resistance opposed to his will by the young 
 nobleman and the recalcitrant daughter who had so long 
 meekly submitted to his decree, was exchanged for 
 wrath none the less deep because concealed, when he 
 awoke to the humiliating truth of his own impotency. 
 Both parties were of age. His authority as parent, 
 magistrate, and freeholder could not, lawfully, hinder 
 the marriage of these two, should they maintain their 
 right and wish to be thus united. He had forbidden 
 his daughter to hold any communication with her lover,
 
 232 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 with Martha Jaqueline, and with Berkeley, while the 
 two remained there. He had threatened disinheritance, 
 severance from home and kindred, the objurgation of 
 neighbors and friends and looked vainly for tokens 
 of yielding. 
 
 O 
 
 She, who was erst the most amiable and docile of his 
 offspring, had become obdurate and unfeeling. Had he 
 struck her to the earth, he could fancy her rising to 
 confront him with the steady formula, 
 
 "My word is given. I must keep it!" 
 
 Dull red gathered under the thick skin of the sec 
 retary, and suffused his averted eyes in hearing of the 
 girl s contumacy. The knuckles in the hand clinched 
 upon his knee beneath the table stood up whitely, and 
 the narrow line of his mouth thinned to a thread. 
 Yet, under the knowledge of the fallacy of the auda 
 cious hope he had nursed ; the stinging consciousness 
 that to the high-bred woman he loved with passion 
 amazing to himself, he was little above her groom in 
 station by comparison with her titled lover, there was 
 ignoble triumph in the victory he had won over her 
 father s prideful prejudice. Tyrant and tool had re 
 versed positions. What he had listened to put the 
 master into the servant s power whether the- master 
 suspected it or not. 
 
 " Nothing, then, will move you from your purpose?" 
 he asked, deferentially, when his chief seemed to expect 
 him to speak. 
 
 "Nothing in heaven, on earth, or in hell !" 
 
 Bass bent his head submissively, as one who has no 
 opinion or volition apart from his superior s. 
 
 " Well ! what have you to suggest ?" said the Colo-
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 233 
 
 nel, impatiently, when submission and silence had 
 continued long enough to an angry man s apprehen 
 sion. 
 
 " You may blockade the plantation," yet more 
 deferentially, "and for a season hinder correspond 
 ence. But tis manifest that the only sure preventive 
 of an event you would deem disgraceful and deplorable, 
 is to remove, at once and for all, the cause of the dis 
 turbance." 
 
 " What the devil " 
 
 "Do not misunderstand my meaning, sir," undis 
 mayed by the flash of wrathful astonishment in the 
 dark eyes. "I intimate naught that would oifend 
 the law. Nor am I prepared to designate by what 
 means the offending party could be wrought upon to 
 depart from a region into which he has brought such 
 inconvenience. But right sure am I that circum 
 stance may be found that will bring about this end. 
 With your permission, I will think the case over for a 
 night. We must have time." 
 
 The Colonel eyed him with a mixture of new-born 
 respect and vexed amusement. The calm assurance 
 that a way would be found out of a complication that 
 had baffled the older and wiser man, carried weight 
 with it, little as the Master guessed of the subordinate s 
 inchoate designs. Bass had a cool head and a long one. 
 It was a prudent thing to call him into counsels the 
 proud man would have sworn, three hours before, that 
 he would share with none alive. 
 
 Least of all was he inclined to confer with him whom 
 he had jestingly commended to his wife s confidence. 
 Mr. Fontaine had not remained to dinner, nor had the 
 
 20*
 
 234 BIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Colonel received any report of his visit. Madam Byrd 
 and Evelyn had sat at table, apparently composed to 
 quiet cheerfulness. Little was said by either, but that 
 was without effort or constraint. Yet the change did not 
 look to the cynic like Christian resignation induced by 
 ghostly admonition. It lacked the limpness that goes 
 after chastening. It was more likely that Pierre Fon 
 taine, like the high-minded, sensible gentleman he was, 
 had declined to take sides in the family squabble. If 
 this were so, he, Colonel Byrd, would not drag him 
 into it. He could rule his household without priestly 
 interference. 
 
 Secretly, he cared not to tell to the rector a story he 
 had had no difficulty in relating to the secretary. With 
 all his gentleness, Fontaine was as fearless as his patron s 
 self, and no respecter of persons. He let pass the rail 
 lery directed at his profession by his powerful parish 
 ioner ; the enumeration of the hundreds of Christians 
 the chaplain made by baptizing the children of heathen 
 Indians and Gentile whites in the expeditions led by 
 Colonel Byrd into North Carolina and Virginia. He 
 smiled silently when held up to general notice as the 
 stubbornest of water-bibbers, and did not rebuke ver 
 bally coarser jokes, some of which the maker thereof 
 thought worthy of perpetuation in his diary. But 
 where the Right was imperilled by sophistry or by disso 
 lute living, Elijah was not braver, or John the Baptist 
 more outspoken, than the mild-mannered descendant of 
 a persecuted race. The Colonel had doubts as to his 
 own ability, clever reasoner though he was, to persuade 
 his reverend neighbor to regard Evelyn s recusancy 
 as heinous, or the parental opposition to the projected
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 235 
 
 union as entirely righteous. He had no doubts, more 
 over, as to how Fontaine would receive the declaration 
 of the autocrat s resolution to prevent the marriage by 
 stringent measures, should pacific fail. 
 
 Bass was the safer ally of the two for the enterprise 
 in hand. 
 
 Bass s own opinion was emphatically to this effect. 
 He could have assigned a hundred cogent reasons for 
 it, as he lounged down the rose-alley leading to the 
 church-yard that evening. He usually took his after- 
 supper smoke among the tombs, a privilege nobody dis 
 puted. 
 
 " Wonder ef he goter parss!" sneered Caliban to the 
 colored cabal, seeing him pass the kitchen-window. 
 
 The secretary s acute hearing caught the gibe and the 
 shrilly-derisive "ki-yi!" applauding it. He could let 
 the dogs yelp. lie owned their master. He put it 
 broadly to himself, with all that it conveyed. He had 
 been careful not to suffer the potentate to feel that he 
 had stooped lower than ever before in his honorable 
 life. To humble him would be to alarm arrogance and 
 prick pride into fury. The tongue the owner thereof 
 was pleased to stigmatize as " slow," had glozed over 
 the truth of debasement on one side, and vulgar victory 
 upon the other. He was never more obsequiously the 
 Master s instrument than when he sat down upon the 
 tomb of the first William Byrd of Westover, and 
 struck a light with flint and steel, holding the well-filled 
 pipe in his left hand. 
 
 The tobacco did not ignite at once. Three times the 
 blue spark snapped viciously at and caught the tinder, 
 revealing every sunken letter in the Latin inscription
 
 236 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 registering provincial offices filled by the sleeper under 
 brick and marble, and his demise "4th Die Decembris 
 170 Jf, post quam vicessit. 52 Annos" 
 
 Each time lie waited until one might count thirty 
 before making another attempt. The third essay was 
 successful, and he smoked tranquilly, his face river- 
 ward, his legs, disproportionately short for the trunk 
 they supported, swinging idly against the brick wall of 
 the ugly parallelogram. 
 
 It was a safe place for meditation. The negroes 
 feared to cross the church-yard after sunset, and the 
 whites were not nocturnal prowlers. There were bats 
 in the conical bell-tower set upon the chapel -roof, and, 
 annoyed by the light, one flapped Colin s hat with his 
 loathsome wings, in a downward swoop. He made a 
 futile pass at the thing with his hand, never withdraw 
 ing his gaze from the river. The ruddy flicker of the 
 pipe-bowl showed his heavily-moulded features, stolid, 
 but for the gleam of the deep-set eyes. The rest of 
 the figure was in obscurity. The moonless night was 
 the blackness of darkness under the trees. While he 
 stared at the water, something like a falling spark 
 illumined the filmy surface and was gone. Another 
 followed presently, and after an interval, a third. The 
 secretary smoked on placidly to the bottom of the pipe, 
 pocketed it, and lounged aimlessly down the declivity 
 to the beach. 
 
 The shadows stirred uneasily twentv yards behind 
 
 / * *> 
 
 him. Something only distinguishable as a darker shade 
 skulked over the supple, uncut grasses, lurking now 
 behind a tree, then wriggling, serpent-like, in the 
 open spaces, always in the lounger s track. When he
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 237 
 
 stopped at the water s edge, the shadows were still ; but 
 Caliban, barefoot, and stripped to his shirt and breeches, 
 lay flat among the willows within ten feet of him. 
 
 The muffled stroke of oars was already audible. 
 Before the keel could touch ground, the secretary landed, 
 with a spring, in the bows, and the craft, a dark oblong 
 among the mists, swept into the stream. 
 
 Caliban stood upright, gaping after it, foiled and 
 furious, for one despairing instant. The next, he had 
 cast off his garments twain, and slipped into the shal 
 lows like a water-snake. There was no time for think 
 ing, yet a glint of fun went through his mind with the 
 first stroke in deep water. 
 
 " Marster ain neber say northin"bout takin ter de 
 water ! He say, Don sot you fut on nobody else s Ian . 
 Reckon I done been got ahade o de partrollers, dis time !" 
 
 He could swim as fast and as soundlessly as an eel, 
 and float by the hour on his back, the water on a level 
 with his mouth. If his enemy thought to elude him 
 by quitting terra firma, he reckoned without account of 
 a riverside and " quarters" education. Some rays the 
 sun had forgotten to recall lingered in mid-stream, but 
 the kindly fog would soon blot them out. Should he 
 be perceived by the inmates of the boat, he had only to 
 dive and swim away under water. Rash as the expe 
 dient appeared, he was safer than on a land-hunt. The 
 oars were plied slowly ; he swam fast, almost too swiftly, 
 for he was brought up alongside of the boat by the 
 sudden slackening of the rower s stroke. 
 
 " Hold up !" said Bass, so close to the lad that he 
 ducked, dived under the keel and came up on the other 
 side, a little farther away. " Twas well you were on
 
 238 If IS GREAT SELF. 
 
 the look-out. I was afraid you mightn t be, and I 
 wanted particularly to see you to-night." 
 
 " Thar was two on us, then ! I was a-layin by 
 on a-purpus to see could I git sight or word o you," 
 chuckled the captain of the smuggling-vessel. 
 
 " What s the matter? Anything wrong?" 
 
 " Maybe you kin tell bettern me. I ve got the chance 
 of a passenger." 
 
 " To Norfolk ?" 
 
 " To Norfolk and clean across ?" 
 
 " Who is it ? and what ll he pay ?" 
 
 "I didn t ask his name, but he s a English gent by 
 the cut on him. Overhauled us this arternoon bout 
 a hour o sundown. A-rowin of hisself in a tight little 
 canoe. Had the pull o the devil s race-horse. Said s 
 how he was out on a breathin spell, jes to stretch his 
 arms. He was a-stretchin on em proper, too. He 
 slacked up an hove Alongside on seein mea-leanin over 
 the guards. We d dropped anchor for th night bout 
 a mile below Wyanoake, an the men was all ashore." 
 
 " After chicken-roosts, I ll be bound. If you don t 
 have a care, my man, one of your rascals will bring 
 back a spare bullet to you, one of these fine nights, or 
 you ll have to look up another hand." 
 
 "The niggers goes bail fur em gin rally. It s few 
 fat pullets gits jerked off the roosts by Jack. A string 
 o beads to a wench, and a taste o liquor to a buck, pays 
 honest for all the poultry. Let my lads alone for keep- 
 in whole skins ! But, bout my passenger ! We falls 
 inter talk, me bein lonesome an sociabel-inclined, an 
 pres ny I axes him aboard. He sez he don keer ef he 
 does, an I draps him a line to make fast his skiff, an
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 239 
 
 when tis done, he comes up on a rope, han over fist, 
 like a reg lar seaman, an sots down for a chat. An sez 
 he, pres ny, What s your cargo ? So I sez, Gin 
 seng an pelts an potatoes an a little tobaccy, when I 
 ken git hold on it honest an reasonable, sez I. For 
 bein as how I m marster o my schooner, sez I, I can t 
 take no heavy risks, sez I. 
 
 " So I mixed two horns o grog, stiff an sweet, an 
 he tossed off his like a man, an praised it too, an pretty 
 soon I was a-showin on him how I d things tolerable 
 ship-shape fur a sea-farm man, in cabin, an fo kiskle an 
 all. An when do you sail ? sez he, when he d sworn 
 he d never see a cleaner hole, an that he wouldn min 
 eatin off the decks. A-Monday night, sez I. 
 
 " Aha ! sez he, sort o struck-like, an goes off inter 
 a brown study. 
 
 " By V by he speaks up in a off-han , free-n-easy 
 way, Be hanged ! sez he, ef I m not in half a min 
 ter take passage with you, myself, ef you ken make room 
 fur me. Have you any other passengers engaged ? he sez. 
 I don hanker arter passengers in a gin ral way, sez I. 
 " But sposin you re well paid for it? sez he, kind 
 o jolly. "Thar s that tidy cabin o yourn, sez he. 
 * Would you think a hundred poun a fair price fur it, 
 all the way to Liverpool, for one maybe two pas 
 sengers, who d lay in their own vittels in Norfolk? sez 
 he. I m dog-tired o knockin roun the world ! sez he. 
 You look like a man as ken hole his tongue, sez he. 
 I m a-stayin with frien s on the river, an ken bring 
 ray mails aboard Sunday night, to be all stored away 
 snug, an come aboard myself, Monday midnight, with a 
 frien or two whar will see me down the river/ so/, he.
 
 240 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " Well ! I played off a little for the sake o business, 
 an knowin I dassent clinch the bargin thout ask in 
 you, seein you re the biggest owner o the schooner. 
 
 T las to belay this d d long tongue o mine, I 
 
 promised he should have a answer ter-morrer evenin , 
 bout sunset, an the men ter know nothin bout it, for 
 fear thar mought be fuss with frien s whar s expectin 
 
 to have him pay } em a visit What the devil s the 
 
 matter with you? You ll capsize her, if you thrash 
 roun that ar way !" 
 
 "A d d mosquito!" Bass slapped his hand 
 
 smartly. "Keep her moving a little, won t you? so 
 they won t settle so thickly. If I m not mistaken, 
 Providence, or luck, or the devil, have helped you to 
 the very business I wanted to see you about. What 
 was your Englishman like?" 
 
 " A d d personable chap ! Blue eyes, with a laugh 
 
 in em all the time. White teeth, an lightish, a most 
 sandy hair. He d a ring on his little finger with a big 
 stone in it that was jes the color o deep-sea-water. 
 Hands like a lady s, but they had the grip in em when 
 he laid holt on them oars o hisu !" 
 
 The information was received in silence so profound 
 that Caliban dared not strike out with hand or foot. 
 Turning slowly over, he floated like drift-wood in the 
 languid wake of the boat, his toes almost touching the 
 stern, the water displaced by the oars closing over his 
 face in alternate waves, so that he had to watch his 
 opportunity to take breath. 
 
 " Tell him you ll take him !" said Bass, finally, in 
 tones hoarsened by the fog, or other cause. " Don t 
 seem over-willing, you understand? but don t let him
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 241 
 
 slip for a thousand pounds ! The job may be worth 
 all of that to you What the deuce is that?" 
 
 Caliban s nostrils had shipped a sea, and a sneeze, 
 uncontrollable and stertorous, was the consequence. 
 The two men listened with suspended oars and breath. 
 
 The mists unfolded like rolls of cotton-wool upon 
 the surface of the water ; from the land came the hoarse 
 bay of a hound upon a night-chase over the low 
 grounds ; the wash of the river against the sides of the 
 boat was a dying whisper. All else was as still as 
 death. 
 
 " Sturgeon, or a porpus !" the seaman said, carelessly. 
 
 " They re the d dest creturs for outlandish noises at 
 
 night. A-chasin an a-nosin one another, an some 
 times a -squealin V a-gruntin like horgs. They call 
 sturgeons Charles City bacon, you know." 
 
 Caliban heard every word, still floating like a be 
 calmed log, returning unuttered thanks to the hoary 
 curtain settling between him and the speakers. 
 
 " Maybe so !" There was a dubious inflection in the 
 tardy accent. " But even so, there s no wit in talking 
 business so loudly that the fishes can hear." 
 
 They whispered after that so cautiously that only an 
 occasional word reached the half-breed. His limbs 
 were numbing with inaction in water colder than on 
 summer nights. Should the secretary take a notion to 
 go directly home and institute inquiry for him, trouble 
 might ensue. He would better get to land silently and 
 speedily. The conspirators did not hear the cautious 
 sweep with which he struck out straight for the haven. 
 His lithe, naked body slid through the water as an 
 arrow parts the air. Not until he shook himself, 
 L 7 21
 
 242 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 spaniel-fashion, on the beach, did he indulge in an 
 audible inspiration. 
 
 He got into his few clothes slowly and ruminatively. 
 The adventure had been unsatisfactory. Mistress 
 Martha Jaqtieline s sweetheart was, of course, the 
 Englishman who wanted to go home. But unless 
 which the boy could not believe he meant to run 
 away from her, there was no reason why he Caliban 
 should concern himself with his proceedings. The 
 Harrisons and maybe the Carters were teasing him 
 to stay longer in America, and he was homesick, that 
 was the upshot of the matter. Bass would probably 
 pocket two-thirds of the passage-money, and Caliban 
 would rather that he should not ; but that was nothing 
 when weighed against the delight of leading Colonel 
 Byrd to the cave on the very night set for removing the 
 smuggled goods, and seeing the entire party bagged. 
 Then, his master would be compelled to believe his tale 
 of how the plot was discovered. For a few minutes, 
 he meditated conference with Mr. Francis, but the 
 attempt would involve personal peril, and that gentle 
 man would laugh at the story. If the cargo were seized 
 and the captain arrested, no harm could befall the pas 
 senger except a delay in the time of embarking, and 
 Mistress Martha would not object to that. On the 
 whole, there seemed to be no reason for changing the 
 well-concerted policy of silence and vigilance. 
 
 He lay in the flags on the river-bank until Bass 
 returned, an hour later ; dogged him up the bank as he 
 had dogged him down ; saw him into the house; peeped 
 in at the window to behold him settle himself with 
 three long candles on the table, to writing in the pon-
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 243 
 
 derous book Caliban knew as well by sight as the scribe 
 did himself, then, the spy betook himself to his pallet, 
 assured that he might conscientiously dismiss the guard 
 for the remainder of the night. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 THROUGH the windows of the Berkeley manor-house, 
 lances of light fought with the fogs rolling up to the 
 house walls. The master s recent illness made him 
 suspicious of night damps, and a fire of " lightwood- 
 knots" and cedar logs crackled behind the brass fender. 
 Wax-candles in silver candelabra were upon a table 
 that had been rolled back from the middle of the floor 
 to make room for the circle of chairs about the hearth. 
 
 Genuine fire- worshippers then, as now, the Virginians 
 seized upon every excuse for adding this element of 
 comfort to living-rooms where cheer and home-iness 
 were the desiderata. They wished to see, rather than 
 to feel, the flame. The family-party, enlarged by unex 
 pected arrivals at supper-time, fell into form, naturally, 
 with the red hearth as centre and motive. Girls in 
 flowing muslins, and matrons in brocade, sheltered their 
 eyes from glare and heat behind screens that were 
 fashionable brio-a-brao in the drawing-rooms of that 
 time. Attendant beaux stood or sat behind them, glad 
 to be a degree further removed from the fiery heart of 
 the chimney. Yet all felt the scene to be the fairer, 
 and the spirit of the hour more glad, for the leaping, 
 writhing, dancing blaze.
 
 244 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Martha Jaqueline her dark, piquant beauty well 
 set off by her favorite yellow taffeta, a cluster of golden- 
 rod in belt and hair was directly opposite the windows 
 of the inland front of the house. Her cheeks were 
 like the sun-kissed side of a Georgian peach ; her eyes 
 glowed with what most of the spectators read as tender 
 ness that disdained concealment, in meeting the upward 
 regards of him who sat upon a cushion at her feet 
 tuning a guitar, while he talked with her. 
 
 The picture was perfect as a picture, but certain 
 lately-arrived spectators marvelled inly at the com 
 placency with which Lieutenant Maynard, albeit only 
 a former suitor, surveyed it as an episode in the love- 
 making of these two. The Englishman s profile, clean- 
 cut as a Grecian god s, was cast up strongly against the 
 oaken wainscot beyond him. The graceful abandon 
 of his attitude, the debonair archness with which he 
 looked up and replied to his mistress while his white 
 hands toyed with string and screw, and slipped along 
 the frets of the instrument, every detail of the gra 
 cious whole was noted at its fullest worth by a man 
 who, having left his horse at the gate, loitered upon the 
 porch, unseen and unheard. 
 
 While he looked and tarried, the drawing-room 
 troubadour began to sing, still looking into the warm 
 duskiness of the eyes above him, as if drawing melo 
 dious passion from their depths, 
 
 " When the willow-sap was flooding, 
 All the tender boughs a-budding, 
 When hoar-frost and sun were gilding 
 Twisted nests of thrushes building, - 
 It was then I saw my Norma, 
 Through the bare hedsje o er the lea.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 245 
 
 " When the murmuring leaves are sighing 
 O er the silent brook low-lying, 
 When the thrush s brood are sleeping 
 Mid the darkening shadows creeping, 
 There I wait and watch for Norma 
 By the thick hedge o er the lea. 
 
 " When the willow droops the greenest, 
 Sweeps the streamlet s rim the cleanest ; 
 When the young bird flies the strongest, 
 When the sky-glow shines the longest, 
 It is then I ll take my Norma 
 From the green hedge, o er the lea." * 
 
 As dreamy yearning arose into the full, rapid tide 
 of rapturous anticipation and the sighing of flute-like 
 tones was exchanged for the ringing peal of a clarion, 
 the unseen spectator wheeled abruptly away and walked 
 to the edge of the porch. His strong, slender hands 
 beat upon one another to bruising ; he looked up at the 
 heavens, inky beyond the shimmering bands of radi 
 ance outlined by the window-frames, and a cry broke 
 from him : 
 
 " Ah, Lord ! he has everything, and I since this 
 morning naught !" 
 
 The rich man with his exceeding many riches of 
 flocks and herds; the abundance engaged by express 
 blessing of the Christ to him who hath, he would not 
 have been human had not thoughts of these racked 
 him into arraignment of Divine justice and mercy. 
 This darling of fortune princely in beauty and in 
 wealth ; rich in all enslaving arts; audacious, yet gener 
 ous, in the buoyancy of youth, health, and happiness 
 
 * By Jesse Lynch Williams. 
 21*
 
 246 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 was a robber! For one black, blinding minute, he hated 
 him ! For a longer minute, he stood, balancing the 
 inclination to abandon the purpose that had brought 
 him hither, against the remembrance of what he had 
 decided, before leaving home, to be duty, based upon 
 the best thing a mortal creature can know as faith and 
 practice, self-sacrifice for another s weal. With head 
 bared to the dank darkness of the dumb night, he 
 prayed briefly and wordlessly, a cry out of the depths 
 beneath to the depths above, and walked quickly 
 to the door. 
 
 His knock was unheeded by the gay company within. 
 Francis was singing again a rollicking roundelay, 
 with an accompaniment all run and sparkle. Three or 
 four servants had stolen to the closed door of the draw 
 ing-room to listen to the music, and one answered Mr. 
 Fontaine s summons. 
 
 "Show me into Mr. Harrison s office!" he said. 
 "I see that they are getting cake and wine ready in 
 the dining-room. When you take it into the drawing- 
 
 O O 
 
 room, manage to let Mr. Francis know that some one 
 wishes to see him. Say some one/ and .let nobody 
 hear you excepting himself. Do not give my name." 
 
 The fellow was quick-witted. Mr. Fontaine had not 
 to wait many minutes in the host s " study" or " office," 
 environed by law-books, tobacco-boxes, pipes and stop 
 pers, guns, stirrups, walking-sticks, a fox s head, a 
 deer s antlers, pistols and holsters, a cavalry-sword 
 and spurs, when a light step rang upon the floor of 
 the passage, and the Englishman entered. 
 
 He brought in with him a breath of the presence he 
 had left. The faint incense of balsamic woods, the smell
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 247 
 
 of flowers, the bouquet of the rare old wine he had 
 quaffed, hung in his garments and bright hair. The 
 smile had not passed from his mouth, or the flush from 
 his face. 
 
 " Mr. Fontaine !" he cried, hurrying forward with 
 extended hand. " I did not look for this pleasure ! 
 The servant s speech of some one who would see me/ 
 misled me." 
 
 " He but discharged himself faithfully of the message 
 committed to him, my lord." 
 
 Fontaine had bowed respectfully, not seeming to 
 observe the offered hand. Still standing, one arm 
 cast behind his back, the hand of the other in his 
 breast, his soldierly figure erect, he sustained calmly 
 the piercing inquiry of the startled eyes, as the title 
 met the ears of the peer. 
 
 " You come from Westover, then !" the debonair air 
 giving way to serious anxiety. 
 
 " Not directly, my lord. But, as you have divined, 
 my errand has to do with that which nearly concerns 
 my friends there and yourself." 
 
 The young nobleman put his arm about the rector s 
 shoulders, with a frank and most engaging smile. 
 
 " Come, Mr. Fontaine ! let us sit down and talk 
 together as befits the good friends we have grown to 
 be in these last four weeks of daily companionship. 
 No my lording, and no diplomatic beating about the 
 bush. Until I leave this, I am Charles Francis, and 
 the nature of my business in this country is known to 
 none but the few who can be intrusted with the secret. 
 You will take my word for it that I am right glad to 
 reckon you in the number and second to none. I
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 confess that my impulse upon perceiving you here" 
 with a light-hearted laugh " was to ask, Come you 
 in peace or in war? But the second glance assured 
 me on that score. You were at Westover to-day noon. 
 Was word of any sort sent to me from thence ?" 
 
 "None there knew of my purpose of coming hither. 
 Nor was it a purpose until an hour ago. How knew 
 you of my visit to West over ?" 
 
 Francis laughed again. The excitement even the 
 suspense of this critical period of his life quickened his 
 blood pleasantly. Lord Orrery had written truly that 
 the fondness for adventure was transmitted with his 
 grandfather s blood and title. He would have headed 
 a hopeless charge with a cheer, ridden gallantly, his 
 blue eyes unclouded, upon a belching battery. 
 
 " As one of us, you should know that the incom 
 parable Mistress Lotsie walked boldly into the lion s 
 mouth or at least his den this morning; by a coup 
 d etat gained the heart of the citadel. Caliban was 
 here at sunrise with despatches apprising us that war 
 had been declared and that there was menace of a 
 blockade. Whereupon, that admirable friend of her 
 species departed straightway for the enemy s country. 
 She went by way of church-yard and river-road across 
 the lawn, right in at the front door, and hearing the 
 rattle of cups and sound of voices in the breakfast- 
 room, took her way up to Miss Byrd s chamber, where 
 she tarried, closeted with the occupant thereof for four 
 hours. For fear of implicating Mrs. Byrd, and thereby 
 causing trouble with her husband, that dear and worthy 
 lady was riot taken into confidence. Our valiant emis 
 sary escaped from the premises while you were in the
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 249 
 
 library with Madam. The puzzle is simple enoughj 
 you see. 
 
 " I wish to heaven" a shade falling upon his ani 
 mated countenance " that all others pertaining to this 
 affair were as easily solved. Or, that the brunt of the 
 battle fell upon me. I swear to you, Mr. Fontaine, 
 that when I think what is laid upon the delicate, sen 
 sitive being I would fain shield from every breeze of 
 adversity, I am driven past my patience and well-nigh 
 out of my wits. It is small matter for marvel that I 
 should gird at the needless delay of so much as a day 
 in releasing her from tyranny and captivity fitter for 
 the Middle Ages than this most Christian century. I 
 had a few lines from her by the hand of our faithful 
 Mistress Lotsie." 
 
 His hand moved toward his bosom never so slightly, 
 but Fontaine felt sure that the billet layover his heart. 
 As himself had but yesternight borne home the flower 
 that had fallen from her hair ! 
 
 " She is unconquered and unconquerable !" con 
 tinued the lover s softening tones, a beautiful light 
 flooding his eyes. " She does not even say to me that 
 she suffers, lest I should have the more to bear for the 
 knowledge. Mistress Lotsie tells me that she is as pale 
 as a lily, though heroic as Joan of Arc. I likened her 
 Monday night to a lily among thorns. If only I might 
 gather the thorns into one sheaf, as Arnold von Winkel- 
 ricd the foemen s spears, and sheathe the barbs in my 
 bosom, that she might go unscathed ! Show me a way 
 by which to do this, my dear friend," letting his hand 
 fall to his companion s knee, "and I am forever your 
 grateful debtor !"
 
 250 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " I would that I could !" in sincerity that was almost 
 vehement. " I fear me there lie yet severer trials before 
 her even a siege that would chafe to breaking a spirit 
 less finely tempered. Her father is inexorable." 
 
 " Therefore, we shall not adventure his displeasure 
 needlessly. He will be forced to hearken to no more 
 prayers from his child, to no further arguments from 
 me. Unless he bind her, hand and foot, she will come 
 to me before another week goes by, and, hand-in-hand, 
 we will voyage toward the rising sun." 
 
 In a few sentences he narrated the incident of the 
 afternoon, and how like the finger of fate had seemed 
 the rencounter with the captain of the schooner. 
 
 " A trig little craft, and not incommodious. I half- 
 suspect that my burly sea-dog would not rise superior 
 to the temptation of contraband tobacco and spirits, 
 were the chance offered him of running them safely 
 into an English port. I trust to make him accept other 
 freight better worth risk and trouble." 
 
 The end was then, so near ! Something hammered 
 
 / o 
 
 fast at the base of Fontaine s brain ; the hand he passed 
 across his mouth was chill, and strange prickles were 
 creeping over the back of it. 
 
 " I fancy that I know vessel and man," he said, 
 choosing his words with precision. " Is she not The 
 Mocking-Birdj and is not her master a thick-set man of 
 forty years, with a decided cast in the left eye ?" 
 
 " The very man and the name of the schooner ! Is 
 he, then, respectable, and not blackguard ?" 
 
 " Respectable enough, to the best of my knowledge. 
 He ran away to sea when a lad, and led a roving life 
 until he was past thirty, sometimes not revisiting his
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 251 
 
 home in Williamsburg for years at a time. Latterly, 
 he has settled down into the owner and master of a 
 trading-vessel. This is the story I have from his 
 mother, who is my parishioner it is now three years, 
 and a decent body, but stone-blind. The Blocking-Bird 
 was bought from Colonel Byrd two years ago, and, 
 having been built to his order, is stanch and sea 
 worthy." 
 
 " I could wish, of course," resumed the other, the 
 tender light lingering in his eyes, " that my bonny bird 
 had a daintier cage ; but, the voyage over, I can make 
 amends for discomfort and privation. We shall put in 
 at Norfolk for such matters as that small seaport can 
 supply toward softening prison-fare. The Mocking- 
 Bird weighs anchor Monday at midnight, the tide 
 serving then. Mr. Harrison will, on that afternoon, 
 privately procure a marriage license. The law re 
 quires this, does it not?" he interrupted himself to ask 
 at something he saw in the other s face. 
 
 " Before you say further, let me explain what brought 
 me hither." 
 
 Fontaine drew away, involuntarily, and the caressing 
 hand slipped from his knee. Powerful as was the 
 Englishman s personal magnetism, admit, though the 
 unavowed lover must and did, the sincerity of his 
 devotion to his intended bride, and the ingenuous man 
 liness of every utterance, the bruised heart flinched , 
 under the increasing pressure. It was not easy for the 
 self-contained master of himself to lend patient heed to 
 the details of that which would beggar him forever. 
 The effort to hide his hurt constrained his manner to 
 coldness.
 
 252 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " Among the arguments adduced by Colonel Byrd 
 why this union should not take place was the positive 
 assertion that, in your eyes, the solemnization of the 
 marriage by a Protestant clergyman would have no 
 binding force whatsoever. If I add, in what may seem 
 but bald parlance, that which her mother furthermore 
 confided to me, you will comprehend that sincerest 
 regard for her whom you seek to marry moves me to 
 plainness of speech. There is no clergyman of your 
 communion within one hundred miles of this. The 
 endeavor to procure one would be attended with incon 
 venience and loss of time that would be warning and 
 gain of time to Colonel Byrd. As a minister of GOD S 
 word, I must remind you, my lord, that should you 
 esteem the Church of England form of marriage 
 maimed rites, and the obligation thus imposed null and 
 void in conscience and in law, you have no right to 
 desecrate what is to you a sacrament, by an empty form 
 of words. To wed a woman here and thus for the 
 satisfaction of her conscience, and to voyage with her 
 to England, even with the intention of having the 
 marriage solemnized there in such fashion as accords 
 with your faith, would sully her fame in the eyes of 
 your compatriots and fellow-religionists. Miss Byrd 
 has no elder brother. I am here in the stead of one to 
 institute inquiry into what nearly affects her honor and 
 happiness." 
 
 Lord Peterborough was upon his feet, his face dark 
 ening haughtily. 
 
 " I am glad to know that the inquiry is of your and 
 Mrs. Byrd s institution. Had you intimated that her 
 daughter had part or lot in it, I should have flung a
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 253 
 
 denial into your teeth. She knows and" reproach 
 fully " I had hoped you, also, that I would go back 
 to England as I came alone sooner than have my 
 wife s fair fame overcast by the shadow of a shade. 
 Colonel Byrd is a citizen of the world and a man of 
 honor. That he has put forward this damnable insinu 
 ation is but one proof the more of the inveterate hatred 
 he bears my father s son. Miss Jaqueline may surely 
 be trusted to be jealous for her friend s reputation. 
 Before we left Jamestown, in hopeful anticipation of 
 this contingency, she had opened correspondence with a 
 venerable French abbe resident in Norfolk. She will, 
 herself, company down the river with us, and with her 
 duenna witness the second ceremony legalized by a 
 license taken out in that town. We shall, then, be 
 beyond Colonel Byrd s jurisdiction and such violent 
 measures as he might set on foot in a neighborhood 
 where his will is law." 
 
 "If this be your design, why risk discovery by the 
 license in this county and the Protestant ceremony ? 
 To the conscience of a Church of England communi 
 cant, the service uttered in GOD S name by the lips of 
 an ordained clergyman, of whatever creed, would be 
 sacredly binding." 
 
 The young peer came nearer, a smile of extreme 
 sweetness on his lips, his eyes soft and bright. Laying 
 one hand on the rector s shoulder, he brought him face- 
 to-face by grasping the hand hanging, cold and passive, 
 by Fontaine s side. 
 
 " Cannot you guess, dear friend ? Would I bear 
 away my bride and leave unsatisfied one desire that I 
 
 could fulfil ? She loves her church as I love mine. 
 
 22
 
 254 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Shall I cast dishonor upon that church by seeming to 
 scorn her ordinances? Have you known me so im 
 perfectly as not to divine that the first ceremony would 
 suffice for me, heart, soul, and mind ? The second 
 is for the world of carping scandal-mongers. The first 
 gives me my wife! for richer, for poorer, for better, for 
 worse, so long as we both shall live. And these words 
 I know, dear Mr. Fontaine, Evelyn would have you 
 utter above her head. Your benediction will best atone 
 to her for the loss of her father s blessing, the lack of 
 a mother s kiss. Are you satisfied?" 
 
 Pallor such as overspread the face he gazed upon 
 he had never seen except upon the cheek of the dead. 
 The form almost within his embrace swayed slightly ; 
 the eyes closed for a second under knotted brows. 
 When they opened, their misty agony was alarm and 
 mystery to him. The mouth moved twice before words 
 would come : 
 
 " You ask much ! But I will do it !" 
 
 " Am I selfish, then ?" queried the other, perplex 
 edly. " Would your action, were it discovered, bring 
 about a rupture with Colonel Byrd ? I would not 
 injure you with him " 
 
 A gesture, haughty to disdain, replied before Fon 
 taine spoke : 
 
 " I care naught for what he for what any man 
 may say or do! Since this is her wish, what else 
 should avail ?" 
 
 " I thank you in her name and in my own. I 
 ought, perhaps, to grieve somewhat" the moved smile 
 again touching lips and eyes " to rob Virginia of her 
 rarest jewel. And she has told me once and again of
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 255 
 
 the love and reverence she bears yourself. How your 
 brotherly sympathy and advice have been balm and 
 strength to her in the hours of need and they, pure 
 soul ! have been but too many ! Of the sweet counsel 
 you have held together " 
 
 " For GOD S sake, no more !" 
 
 The ejaculation tore like a bullet into the hearer s 
 brain as it had torn from the anguished soul -and he 
 was alone ! 
 
 When the rushing shock of amazement and com 
 passion suffered him to pursue Fontaine in the swift 
 retreat to the outer entrance, he was just in time to hear 
 the thud of a horse s hoofs down the avenue leading to 
 the highway. 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 " LOOKY hyur, Ann Isy ! I don wan ter be cross 
 long-a you, an I don keer fur to cuar no tales inter 
 de house, so you better lemrne off er holpin seed deni 
 ar grapes ter night !" 
 
 Caliban said it judicially, leaning half his length 
 upon one end of the kitchen-table, his face golden- 
 bronze in the flare of lightwood torches stuck into iron 
 sockets at the mouth of the chimney. At the other 
 end of the table loomed up the white turban of the 
 Egyptian deity, her fat arms bared to the shoulders. 
 Before her were bowls and pans ; beyond them was a 
 mountain of fox-grapes, filling the room with true 
 Falernian fragrance. Along each side of the board 
 were ranged five sad-eyed assistants, boy and girls,
 
 256 HM GREAT SELF. 
 
 furnished with small, keen knives, with which each 
 grape was to be halved, then seeded, with as little 
 waste of juice as might be. Caliban had, at the peti 
 tion of Isis, been excused from house-duties directly 
 after supper that he might bear a distinguished part in 
 the task. His deft fingers made him invaluable in the 
 finer offices of kitchen and pantry ; his saucy chatter 
 kept the young laborers awake and enlivened the spirits 
 of the elder. He lied as fast as he could talk, as every 
 body knew ; but the tales of which he was invariably 
 the hero, were none the less entertaining for that, while 
 his prankish humors were an increasing source of ex 
 citement to the mates who envied, while they had not 
 the hardihood to imitate the tricks that earned him 
 many a " lick" from clothes-stick or rolling-pin. 
 
 "An you looky hyur, you imp o Satan !" retorted 
 the mistress of ceremonies ; " I aint got no time fur to 
 steddy bout no sort o sassiuess you got in you hade. 
 Mistis done been give me my orders fur ter git all dese 
 yer grapes stone by bade-time so s she ken see de sugar 
 put wid em fo she go to sleep, an set bout her mar- 
 merled early in de mawnin . An I ain got more n 
 haff han s nuff fur ter git de \vuk done not ef ebcry 
 one o dese yer lazy niggers was to wuk ten thousan 
 time mo harder n dey eber did in all dey born libes. 
 Soon s Mistis done tole me what she wan done, I jes 
 step out dar in the grabe-yard n cut dis nice little 
 slip oifen a honey-locus tree whar growed pon a grabe. 
 Dar ain nothin like a stick whar s growed outen a 
 dade pusson fur to make folks wuk." 
 
 She exhibited a long wand, pleasingly adorned with 
 bark and stubs.
 
 JUS GREAT SELF. 257 
 
 " I k no wed who ould be de fus one ter ketch it, 
 too ! Take you lazy copper-colored karcuss off er dat 
 7 ar table, n set bout you wuk, or I ll limber it outer 
 you hide, you Ingin puppy, you !" 
 
 Caliban dragged himself up without indecent haste. 
 
 " Now, Ann Isy, you know I m better at dodgin 
 n you is at hittin , an you don wan ter w ar you self 
 out a-chasin roun arter grease lightnin . Ef you do, 
 good-by to de grapes !" 
 
 Infuriated by the snicker running down the table, 
 Isis started up, shillalah in hand, Caliban sidling 
 toward the door as she advanced upon him. He 
 eluded a well-directed blow by leaping backward down 
 the steps, and, keeping at a prudent distance, began a 
 low-toned parley with his foster-mother. 
 
 "I couldn say it in dar whar (ley is, Mam Isy," 
 wheedling and important; "but I dar fo gracious 
 dat I is jis obleege fur ter look arter sompin petickler 
 ter night. Dar s de debbil ter pay, an dis yer nigger 
 is wanted fur ter keep de pitch hot. Dat s a fac ! I ll 
 tell you all bout it Chuesday mornin . Ef I don git 
 off ter night, dar won be nothin ter tell." 
 
 The swart Eve loved scandal better than her own 
 ease. She raised her voice, backing toward the kitchen 
 steps, 
 
 "Well, go long! Ef Mis Evelyn wan you, I ain 
 got nothin fur ter say. I been hyur somebody callin 
 f om de up-sta rs winder, but you tell Mis Evelyn I 
 hadn no notion twas her, or I d a sont you right 
 straight off. Tell her I mighty sorry I been keep you 
 so long, an ef she please, ma am, fur ter sen you back 
 soon s she done wid you !" 
 
 r 22*
 
 258 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Caliban heard but four words of the sentence of 
 release, a matter of no consequence, since it was con 
 cocted and delivered for the sole benefit of the dis 
 appointed crew within doors. 
 
 Bass had gone out this evening, unperceived by him, 
 but he counted upon the time lounged away by the 
 secretary over his pipe in the church-yard, and was 
 not uneasy until, stealing down to the lower gate, he 
 missed the red spark under the trees, and creeping 
 nearer, saw that the tombstone whereupon Colin usually 
 enjoyed the " bewitching vegetable" was empty. Cali 
 ban made a cautious circuit of the little chapel, keeping 
 close against the wall, peered, in the starlight, behind 
 every tree, and was returning, baffled, upon his track, 
 when his name was called softly. 
 
 " Sh ! sh ! I thought it was you !" whispered Martha 
 Jaqueline, emerging from the denser shades of the 
 grove. She was attended by a lanker and taller shape 
 Caliban knew for Miss Lotsie. 
 
 " I can trust you to the world s end !" pursued 
 Martha. " Here is something for you !" pressing a 
 coin into his hand. " Run to the house as fast as you 
 can race, and tell your Mis Evelyn (let nobody hear 
 you !) that the course is clear. You understand ?" 
 
 " Ya as, ma am ! but Mis Marthy, ef you please, 
 ma am, Mr. Buss he smoke he pipe hyur mos ebery 
 night !" 
 
 She laughed. 
 
 " Good boy ! I saw him not ten minutes ago. He s 
 off on patrol-duty in another direction. Now, run !" 
 
 He was off like a kill-deer, and half-way up the 
 main alley of the garden almost ran against his young
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 259 
 
 mistress, hastening in the direction of the church-yard. 
 She said nothing in response to his breathless message, 
 but he ran ahead to open the gate at the end of the 
 walk for her, saw her pass through into the gloom that 
 swallowed up the cloaked and hooded form, and recol 
 lected how much time he had lost by the little adven 
 ture. 
 
 Bass had gone on patrol-duty, Miss Jaqueline had 
 said. Caliban knew better, and took a bee-line for the 
 spot where the boat was beached last night. The even 
 ing was fine and dry, and the water would be chilly, 
 but he would track the thieving traitor at the risk of 
 cold and cramp. As he ran down the bank, regardless 
 of the precautions he had observed when Bass was 
 certainly but a few feet before him, he grinned to 
 think how " Mis Marthy had fooled Marster." That 
 something had marred the cordial relations existing 
 heretofore between the Berkeley and Westover house 
 holds was an open secret in the kitchen council. That 
 it had to do with Miss Jaqueline, and, incidentally, 
 with her sweetheart, was almost certain. Miss Evelyn 
 was greatly afflicted by the separation from her dearest 
 friend, and the servants sympathy was entirely with 
 her. Every one of the house-servants was cognizant 
 of Miss Lotsie s stolen visits, and nobody would have 
 betrayed it, under the lash, to Colonel or Mrs. Byrd. 
 It was natural, to Caliban s understanding, that the 
 young ladies should meet by stealth, and simple loyalty 
 on his part to afford them every facility in his power. 
 
 Otherwise, he could have cursed the encounter that 
 had cost him the chagrin of finding the landing-place 
 deserted. He strained his ears for the beat of oars.
 
 2GO SIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 The lap of water running inshore before the fresh 
 breeze would have drowned the sound had the muffled 
 rowlocks been within a rod of land. Far down the 
 river he saw a spark like a star, a lantern hung to the 
 yard-arm of a vessel riding at anchor. This might be 
 the smuggling-craft awaiting laden boats from plan 
 tations on both sides of the stream. It would round 
 off his plot handsomely if he could have certain proof 
 that Bass was tampering with overseers and negroes 
 from other places as well as robbing his own employer. 
 
 Anyhow, he would have a nearer look at that 
 schooner. A tough river-rat like himself need not be 
 afraid of a cold "bath, however strongly his predilections 
 might set in favor of water with the chill taken off. 
 He stripped, and stepped into the lapping stream. 
 
 " What are you about, you rascal ?" 
 
 The speaker was Colonel Byrd. He sat at ease upon 
 a fallen tree, his figure undistinguishable in the dark 
 ness from the fringe of bushes at his back. 
 
 The lad leaped back to shore, shaking, as in a tertian 
 ague, but ready with a lie. 
 
 " I wor goin fur ter take a wash, suh. Dat s all !" 
 
 " Since when have you been so fond of cleanliness? 
 I have a great mind to make you scrub with soap-and- 
 sand, and then dry you off with a hickory-towel. 
 Don t you know better than to lie to me?" 
 
 " Ya as, Marster !" miserably penitent, rooted as mo 
 tionless in the sand as Cleopatra s Needle in the desert. 
 
 " Speak the truth, then, if you can ! Why are you 
 here? and whither were you going?" 
 
 The obelisk had an impulse that turned it as upon a 
 pivot.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 261 
 
 " I won tell you no lie, suli ! I wor a-goin fur ter 
 swim out ober yarnder" pointing up the stream " fur 
 ter look arter a net I see one o de fiel ban s a-settin* 
 ter-day fur ter catch catfish an eels." 
 
 He knew by his master s tone that he smiled. 
 
 " In other words, you were about to steal another 
 man s fish ! Don t you get enough to eat in my 
 kitchen ?" 
 
 " Ya as, Marster !" shamefacedly. 
 
 " So you steal for the love of stealing ? Come hither, 
 you young villain ! Take that ! and that ! and that ! 
 You are the fellow I heard boasting under my window, 
 last Sunday, that he knew the Ten Commandments by 
 heart !" 
 
 Whack! whack! whack! whack ! whack! WHACK ! 
 WHACK! WHACK! 
 
 " That is to teach you that * Thou shalt not steal is 
 Number Eight. You ll get thirty-one more the next 
 time you are caught in such a mean piece of deviltry 
 as thieving from afield-hand! I thought you had too 
 much pride for such a low trick !" 
 
 The cane was of lance-wood and well seasoned, and 
 the boy cried out sharply, but not loudly, at each cut 
 upon his naked body. He sobbed ostentatiously when 
 accorded permission to " get himself into his clothes, 
 and begone to the house." 
 
 " Hold that snivelling !" ordered the Master, whose 
 tone throughout the episode had not evinced the least 
 heat or discomposure. Indeed, Caliban suspected that 
 he was not sorry to kill some minutes of waste time in 
 what fell so opportunely in his way. 
 
 " Ya as, suh !" with a strangled sob.
 
 262 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 He gulped up another, and a third, mingled with 
 an artistic whimper, in climbing by the shortest route 
 to the upper grounds. Then perhaps because the 
 grass was cool and his back was hot he lay flat down at 
 a convenient distance from the path by which his master 
 must mount, and waited to see why the latter was 
 keeping watch on the river s brink, alone and by night. 
 
 He was as fast asleep as an " Indian puppy" ever 
 sleeps, when the jar of. feet vibrated upon his sensitive 
 tympanum. 
 
 Colonel Byrd spoke when opposite the prostrate 
 listener. 
 
 " He can answer for his crew?" 
 
 " To a man, sir. He has a tight hold upon every 
 one of them," replied Bass. " Most of them are never 
 quite easy when on shore for reasons best known to 
 themselves and the captain." 
 
 " It is settled that the mails are to be brought not 
 sent aboard ?" 
 
 " It was the passenger s own proposal. He will, at the 
 same time, make certain final arrangements of which he 
 could not talk this afternoon. If a friend or two 
 were to accompany him to Norfolk, he supposed there 
 would be no objection. And if he should take aboard 
 another passenger at Norfolk for the whole voyage? 
 The Captain said, There would be no objection so 
 long as the passenger was quiet and peaceable, and 
 willing to pay well for good accommodations. The 
 answer was that the respondent would be responsible 
 for all that. The Captain reports that the respondent 
 was mightily amused by the questions as to peaceable 
 disposition and so on."
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 263 
 
 " him !" muttered the Colonel, angrily. 
 
 " Yes, sir ! The matter would seem to have arranged 
 itself with little interference from us " 
 
 Caliban could wriggle through supple grasses like a 
 snake, but bushes would rustle, and these lined the 
 footpath from the top of the bank to the river-wall. 
 The safer course was to cut diagonally across the inter 
 vening ground, scale the wall and reach the house 
 before the Master and his secretary entered. 
 
 The pair, thus left behind, became taciturn when the 
 level was gained, perhaps from thought, perhaps from 
 prudence. Their route skirted the church-yard, and in 
 the brilliant starlight reflected from the river, they could 
 have threaded their way among trees and tombs but for 
 the forgotten circumstance that a grave had been filled 
 that day in the lower section of the cemetery devoted 
 to family servants. A superannuated seamstress had 
 died yesterday, and been buried this afternoon. Beside 
 the mound stood a wheelbarrow, with pick and spades 
 laid within it, and all were veiled by the shade of a 
 honey-locust. Colonel Byrd had passed them safely by 
 a step or two, when his companion s shins collided vio 
 lently with the front of the barrow, and he pitched 
 forward into it, upsetting it and the contents. In 
 attempting to regain his balance, he fell over the pile 
 of moist red clay, floundering there, head downward, 
 until the Colonel, hastening to extricate him, discovered 
 that the trestled bier on which the body had been trans 
 ported to its last home, was on the other side of the 
 grave, and oddly entangled with the legs of the strug 
 gling figure. 
 
 Colonel Byrd was courteous and humane to a proverb,
 
 264 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 but his sense of the humorous was too finely developed 
 to permit the maintenance of gravity in the situation. 
 His mellow, irresistibly-contagious laugh, first a ripple, 
 then a surge, lastly a billow of merriment swept over 
 the humbler graves to the marble-topped constructions 
 above the dead Byrds, and was heard by two people 
 sitting on the chancel-steps, their feet upon the slab 
 covering the remains of Theodorick Bland, the builder 
 of the family chapel. 
 
 There was enough light from the stars to show the 
 windows as glimmering oblongs set high in the walls, 
 not enough to reveal the movement with which Evelyn 
 Byrd cast herself into her lover s arms, and the defiant 
 air with which, holding her fast, he looked toward the 
 door. 
 
 "Hush !" whispered Martha Jaqueline from her seat 
 in the pew nearest the porch. " The door is locked 
 on the inside! We have but to remain perfectly 
 quiet !" 
 
 The Colonel s shout to the neighboring quarters fol 
 lowed his laugh : 
 
 " Halloo ! some of you fellows there ! fetch hither a 
 light !" 
 
 The flicker of lightwood flambeaux ruddied the 
 glass on the lower side of the church, illuminating 
 dimly the tableau in front of the altar : a woman 
 whose face was as pale as her gown, with her arms 
 about the neck of a man who had involuntarily 
 clapped his hand upon his sword-hip. They moved 
 not during the brief while in which the hubbub 
 of voices went on outside ; then the torch-light 
 moved along the opposite wall, and the Master was
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 265 
 
 heard, right under the windows, ordering the bearers 
 back. 
 
 "Let the fellow who left that wheelbarrow and bier 
 there report himself to Mr. Booker to-morrow ! I 
 wish he had tumbled over them, instead of Mr. Bass, 
 and broken his own neck to boot!" 
 
 The danger over, Evelyn trembled like a leaf in a 
 storm. 
 
 " The peril is too great !" she faltered, when her 
 betrothed would have rallied her in playful soothing. 
 " Indeed, Charles, we must not linger a moment longer. 
 We are never safe, whether he be in the house or out 
 of it !" 
 
 " Blessed be wheelbarrows !" called Martha, cau 
 tiously, in accents broken by laughter. " I owe half a 
 crown to the fellow who left it in the path ! I shall 
 leave it with you, Evelyn." 
 
 "And I a sovereign!" added Lord Peterborough, in 
 the same key. 
 
 In subdued tones, he went on to Evelyn : 
 
 " It shall be as you will, dear heart ! You need to 
 husband strength and nerve for three days longer, 
 thank heaven, for no more ! The continual strain 
 draws cruelly upon you. This little hand is slighter 
 than when I last kissed it. In a week s time you would 
 be resolved into thin air clear spirit ! If you love 
 me, sweet, have a care of what is most precious to me. 
 Keep yourself in health and spirits and hope. You 
 were ever wont to be despondent, and I to look at the 
 bright side of destiny. Until we meet again a meeting 
 that will, please GOD ! have no parting this side of the 
 grave take a leaf out of my book, and believe that 
 M 23
 
 266 SIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Fortune must favor those who obstinately refuse to 
 distrust her; that right makes might, and that naught 
 but death can separate you and me !" 
 
 In the eloquent pause that ensued, they could hear 
 the boisterous laughter about the doors of the quar 
 ters, evidently at the expense of the luckless nightly 
 prowler. 
 
 " Now, love !" resumed the tones fraught with fond 
 est feeling, " always and everywhere my love, and 
 mine alone ! on Monday night at ten o clock, Mr. 
 Fontaine will meet us here, and the hopes of years of 
 weary waiting be fulfilled. Until then, have a brave 
 heart. Trust our friends here and at Berkeley to 
 attend to the lesser concerns pertaining to our voyage. 
 Bring me but yourself at the appointed hour. What 
 is it, dear?" feeling her slip something into his hand. 
 
 " I have a desire a foolish fancy, you may think 
 it," whispered the girl. " I should like to have you 
 take the ring I have worn with your picture about my 
 neck, except after the door of my room was bolted at 
 night, and put it upon my finger now. Wish it on 
 if you will ! It may be superstition the belief that it 
 will make me the stronger to endure and to hope. Am 
 I silly?" 
 
 "With a sweet and holy folly, my darling!" He 
 kissed the ring when it was fitted upon the tremulous 
 hand, holding it to his lips, passionately and long. 
 "It is wished on, my lily, until I withdraw it to 
 make room for another that will mean liberty and love ! 
 
 " Mother Mary and all the blessed angels have you 
 in their gentlest keeping until we meet again, my 
 pearl of price !"
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 267 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 Or the Berkeley Harrisons, there were in church on 
 Sunday morning but the father and two children. 
 Miss Lotsie Johnson, gaunt and smileless, sat bolt up 
 right in the family pew, found the places for Charles 
 and Nat in Prayer-Book and Bible, and never turned 
 her eyes in the direction of the Westover seat until 
 service was over. 
 
 The clear face of the rector, olive-pale above his 
 surplice, was thin as from recent illness; his black eyes 
 were deep and solemn, as he arose from his knees and 
 faced the congregation : 
 
 " I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto 
 him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before 
 thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son !" 
 
 " Enter not into judgment with thy servant, Lord, 
 for in thy sight shall no flesh living be justified!" 
 
 His voice, ever full and sweet, had, to-day, an under 
 tone almost plaintive, yet manly. 
 
 Evelyn Byrd, kneeling in the end of the pew next 
 the wall, was choked by tears as she would have fol 
 lowed him in the General Confession. When the rest 
 arose, she remained kneeling, battling bravely with the 
 tide of softness unsealed by the opening words of the 
 service. 
 
 Some one, presently, reached past her step-mother 
 and the two little girls, to lay a vinaigrette upon the 
 wet leaves of her Prayer-Book. A thrill went through
 
 268 HI $ GREAT SELF. 
 
 her as she recognized the hand, which the various 
 labors and exposures in which he sustained the pio 
 neer s full part, could never make coarse, or other than 
 elegant. The wave of filial tenderness that responded 
 to the act, nearly broke down what poor remains of 
 self-command were left to her after four days of tor 
 turing anxiety and struggle. He had spoken kindly 
 to her at breakfast-time, drawing her into talk such as 
 he had not held with her since his return from his 
 journey, and, in other ways, had testified a disposition 
 to renew their former affectionate relations. She 
 thanked GOD for the gentler memories thus given her 
 of this, the last Sabbath she would ever spend in the 
 home of her infancy and childhood. It was such 
 mournful gratification as swells the heart when the dear 
 face, soon to be hidden by the coffin-lid, wears its loveliest 
 look. 
 
 She had no hope of recall in the years to come. The 
 strain of steadfastness that informed her fidelity to her 
 lover was drawn from her father s soul. In becoming 
 a wife, she would cease to be a daughter. The world 
 might be before her. The door of her father s house, 
 once closed behind her, would never be reopened while 
 he lived. 
 
 And he was so dear and noble in all else than his 
 opposition to her marriage with the man she loved ! so 
 indulgent to, and proud of her, his favorite child ! Mr. 
 Fontaine had said that she did well in keeping her 
 troth, -yet why had he selected that passage for this 
 day of all others ? Why had he not been near her 
 since the forenoon on which he had learned what was 
 the resolution, he might, for aught she knew to the
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 269 
 
 contrary, consider, upon calmer reflection, un maidenly 
 and undutiful? Lord Peterborough liad told her of 
 his interview with the rector, but with true delicacy, 
 withheld the description of the manner of their parting, 
 and the revelation it conveyed to him of the nobility of 
 the man who stood their friend at such terrible cost to 
 himself. He had promised to bind her in wedlock to 
 him for whom she would forswear parents and native 
 land. Was the text that sank into her soul the priestly 
 probe of a conscience he could not coerce, but must 
 warn ? 
 
 She heard not a word of litany, or gospel, and of 
 the sermon but one sentence : 
 
 " GOD is not like Jacob, who had only one blessing 
 in store. HE hath millions of millions to bestow upon 
 those who love and fear Him." 
 
 Had she limited Divine grace in all the years in the 
 which, refusing to*be comforted by other mercies, she 
 had cried, night and day, "Give me this desire of my 
 heart, or I die !" Had she submitted patiently to the 
 will of earthly and heavenly parent, would not comfort 
 and compensation from the exhaustless storehouse of 
 blessing have been added unto her ? 
 
 Rising, wan and weary, from her knees after the 
 benediction, and mingling with the retiring congrega 
 tion, she was jostled by Miss Lotsie, and descried the 
 swift motion that slipped a letter into the reticule that 
 hung at Evelyn s side. The ring she had worn, boldly 
 and unquestioned, since Friday night, seemed to tighten 
 upon her finger ; the sick heart lifted itself in a quick 
 throb. 
 
 "Right or wrong, I cannot and will not give him 
 23*
 
 270 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 up !" she said, inly. " The consequences be upon my 
 head, and mine alone !" 
 
 But she must have her word with Mr. Fontaine. 
 He stood just without the church-porch, exchanging 
 greetings with such parishioners as had come from a 
 distance, and whom he seldom met, except on Sunday. 
 A little apart, sweet-faced Mrs. Carter talked with 
 Madam Byrd. Lady Bess left her mother s hand to 
 scamper up to Evelyn the moment she saw her. 
 
 " I c?oin to dinner at ou house !" she proclaimed. 
 "Mamma says so; an on an Misser Fonten ill show 
 me ee pitters in ee bid boot ont ou ?" 
 
 " O, what a crooked tongue ! cried Evelyn, taking 
 her up in her arms, and hiding her face in the plum}) 
 white neck. " If you like, my pet! I shall be very 
 happy*to have you. Go, ask Mr. Fontaine about the 
 pictures !" 
 
 She watched the little witch fly up to him, saw him 
 bow his ear to what the embryo coquette preferred 
 as a confidential petition, and the grave-eyes light in 
 a smile, in glancing inquiringly at herself. At her 
 slight nod he carne toward her, Bess swinging upon his 
 hand. 
 
 "You would have me dine at Westover to-day? 
 Will it be a relief a help to you in any way? You 
 know how earnest is my will to serve you." 
 
 " I need you !" was the low reply. " I never needed 
 you more !" 
 
 They walked around by the lower slope of the lawn, 
 instead of following Colonel and Mrs. Byrd and their 
 guests by way of the garden. Lady Bess made a third 
 in the little party, and did so much of the talking that
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 271 
 
 they were half-way to the house before Evelyn could 
 put the question trembling upon her tongue. 
 
 "Did your selection of the opening sentence of the 
 service have to do with me!" 
 
 "With you? How?" 
 
 His unfeigned surprise lightened her heart. 
 
 " I fancied I feared I wondered if you had 
 changed your mind since Thursday/ she stammered, 
 vexed to find herself blushing painfully. " The thought 
 has given me a wretched morning !" 
 
 " Lady Bess !" said Mr. Fontaine, " run and see what 
 that is shining in the grass over there ! It looks like 
 a diamond ! You must believe me," he continued, 
 rapidly, to Evelyn, " when I declare that my own heart 
 dictated the selection to which you refer, and that the 
 application was to myself. Believe me, too, that I can 
 never cease to honor your constancy to your betrothed, 
 or to believe that, with respect to your father, patience 
 has had its perfect work. There is a love that outranks 
 filial duty. For this cause shall a man leave father 
 and mother and cleave unto his wife. You asked me 
 on Thursday what I would say to my sister were she in 
 your strait. I have said it! 
 
 " Only a dew-drop, Bess !" as she held up two rueful 
 wet fingers. " That happens, ofttimes, little one, and 
 to older people than you !" 
 
 He allowed himself not another syllable that might 
 be construed into complaint of his lot. At the table, 
 full of chance guests, he was ready and adroit in keep 
 ing the talk away from Evelyn and Madam Byrd 
 without seeming to shield them from notice. 
 
 Madam s sanguine complexion was lowered beyond
 
 272 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 its wont; her bright eyes were languid. By common 
 and tacit consent, she was not taken into the secret of 
 the projected elopement. In the hour of discovery and 
 investigation, she would be able to look her lord in the 
 face and say with truth, " I knew no more than you !" 
 
 Evelyn would see to it that suspicion should not light 
 upon the woman whose warm heart had opened to her 
 step-child in the hour of need, and dealt out love and 
 sympathy in unstinted measure. The letter to be left 
 for her father lay in a locked drawer upstairs. She 
 would leave nothing for the last day that could be done 
 beforehand. Under cover of the darkness, the faithful 
 Caliban had obeyed without question the direction to 
 carry and leave in the church-porch, the night before, 
 a hamper containing all that she would take away from 
 her father s house. She would go to her lover poor in 
 all but the treasure of love that had gathered and kept, 
 according to the rule of divine usury, the interest of 
 seven years. 
 
 " Husband your strength," her betrothed had en 
 joined. She strove to obey him to the letter. The 
 winds that had swayed resolution and hope during the 
 morning service, were a surprise of which she was 
 ashamed. 
 
 She appreciated, and gratefully, Mr. Fontaine s tact 
 in diverting attention from her, but felt strong enough 
 to meet whatever the occasion might demand. In the 
 seclusion of her room, she had read the missive dex 
 terously delivered by Miss Lotsie. It rustled softly in 
 her bosom now, as if trying to whisper to her the love- 
 words, sweet, pure, and solemn, penned by the beloved 
 hand.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 273 
 
 " <Tattends !" was set below the signature. And after 
 it " Heaven be praised ! I write it for the last time !" 
 
 Had Colonel Byrd divined the suspenseful pertur 
 bation of his spouse, the longing to know everything, 
 and the dread lest she should, accidentally, learn any 
 thing; the certainty that something eventful was in 
 near store, and crass ignorance as to time, place, and 
 circumstance of the event, and divining all, had he 
 pitied her from his heart for what she was undergoing 
 and must not show his deportment toward the har 
 assed matron could not have been more chivalric. 
 Without embarrassing her by downright compliment, 
 he contrived to show her and her doings in the most 
 favorable light ; quoted her and consulted her, and left 
 no possible wish ungranted. 
 
 At her right sat Mr. Randolph from Tuckahoe, and 
 between him and the host the ball of badinage bounded 
 gayly back and forth to the contemptuous bewilderment 
 of Lieutenant Maynard, who was Evelyn s vis-a-vis. 
 The naval officer made a strenuous effort, at length, 
 to introduce topics which would be, he fancied, more 
 interesting to the company at large. 
 
 "I was at Wakefield, Friday, Colonel, and had a 
 talk with Nat Harrison upon something that concerns 
 you nearly," he began, raising his voice to address 
 Colonel Carter, who sat at Evelyn s elbow. " He says, 
 unless measures be set on foot to suppress it, that smug 
 gling upon the James and York and Pamunkey will 
 subvert all honest trade. He is of opinion, likewise, 
 that the skippers of many of the so-called trading ves 
 sels, licensed to convey our exports to the other side, 
 are not averse to doing a tidy bit of running on the
 
 274 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 sly. As river-admiral, he is mightily exercised by 
 these suspicions, and would fain have the planters on 
 the James strengthen his hands in respect to patrols by 
 water and by land." 
 
 " One moment, if you please, Lieutenant !" said 
 Colonel Byrd, in suave apology. " Before organizing 
 our patrol, taste that liqueur! It is my Lady s latest 
 composition and her best. Which conveys a volume 
 of praise to those acquainted with her skill as a vint 
 ner. She put up, last spring, birch wine that has the 
 very spiciness and life-giving breath of the forest. 
 The receipt was obtained I forget from whom, my 
 dear?" 
 
 Madam supplied the name, and certain particulars 
 respecting the manufacture that excited lively interest 
 on the part of the housewives present, and silenced 
 ignorant men. 
 
 Her lord lent an indulgfent ear, and when the discus 
 sion flagged, applied another spur : 
 
 "My Lady s achievements throw Mrs. Bundle and 
 Mrs. Glasse so far into the shade that I am unwilling 
 to have her light smoulder under a bushel, albeit her 
 modesty inclines her to invert the measure over the 
 candle. You are confessedly an epicure, Mr. Ran 
 dolph, and must coax from her a small box of the 
 caviare which is like to hand down her reputation to 
 remote generations. She is exceeding stingy with it, 
 and jealous of adventuring it upon untutored palates." 
 
 " It is caviare to the general ! " quoted Mr. Ran 
 dolph. "I thank you for crediting me with taste 
 capable of valuing it aright." 
 
 "Harrison is, moreover, firmly convinced," resumed
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 275 
 
 the Lieutenant, "that smuggling is the high-road to 
 piracy. Pie has grievous suspicions touching a certain 
 ill-favored skipper " 
 
 " Pardon me again, my dear Mayuard, but I chanced 
 to hear Mrs. Carter name the Beggar s Opera just 
 now, and would ask her, lest I forget it later, if she 
 have ever read it ?" 
 
 As the lady accosted had never so much as heard 
 the name of the play before, her command of feature 
 and presence of mind were praiseworthy. 
 
 "I have never had that pleasure," she replied. 
 
 "Then, Madam, if you would enjoy a rare intel 
 lectual treat, allow me to lend the book to you. Then 
 capture Mr. Randolph, there, holding him in ward 
 until that he read it aloud to you. You have not 
 forgotten, Randolph, the time when I was storm 
 bound at your house, and Mrs. Fleming and yourself 
 triumphed over the bad weather by reading this same 
 work ?" 
 
 " I recollect how admirably Colonel Byrd read it," 
 corrected Mr. Randolph. 
 
 " Nay ! but you two finished it. Evelyn, daughter ! 
 you will kindly look up the book after dinner and 
 have it put into Mrs. Carter s carriage. Twas a droll 
 history this comedy had in London !" The servant? 
 were removing the cloth preparatory to bringing in the 
 dessert, and he addressed his discourse to the whole 
 party. " Not altogether in consequence of the wit 
 and humor that sparkled in it, but owing to some 
 political reflections that seemed to hit the ministry, it 
 ran for forty nights successively and gained four thou 
 sand pounds to the author. The Duchess of Queens-
 
 276 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 bury \vas his patroness, and no man with half an eye 
 in his head or half a guinea in his pocket could resist 
 her. Her Grace, like death, spared nobody, but even 
 took my Lord Selkirk the stingiest peer in England 
 in for two guineas, to repair which extravagance he 
 lived upon Scotch herrings and water for two months 
 afterward. But the best story was that she made a 
 very smart officer in His Majesty s Guards give her a 
 guinea. She plied him for five, but he swore one was 
 all he had in the world. "When her Grace came to 
 consider the matter, she was so touched with compas 
 sion that she sent the young liar fifty guineas out of 
 her own pocket the next day to reward his obedience. 
 I think this anecdote was my contribution to the enter 
 tainment on that soaking day a bagatelle by compari 
 son with the excellent reading with which Mr. Ilan- 
 dolph and accomplished Mistress Fleming favored 
 me." 
 
 The vein of court and literary gossip being opened, 
 smugglers and buccaneers had not a show of a hearing 
 before the ladies quitted the table. 
 
 "Lieutenant Maynard is positively absurd with his 
 sea-stories!" Mrs. Carter remarked to Madam Byrd, 
 seated in the wide front of the hall. " But for Colonel 
 Byrd s skill in parrying them, we should have had 
 naught else all dinner-time. His smugglers and 
 pirates exist nowhere save in his imagination, or 
 Nat Harrison s. One is as bad as the other." 
 
 When the hour of parting came, Lady Bess was 
 seized with the notion that she would stay all night 
 with her " Eva," passing from coaxing to storming, 
 from storming to such piteousuess of weeping and
 
 IIJS GREAT SELF. 277 
 
 brokenness of heart, that even the august host inter 
 ceded with her mother to grant her prayer. 
 
 " But the child s stubbornness must be conquered, 
 some time !" reasoned the parent, one of the many 
 whose theory as to the training of their young is per 
 fect, and whose intentions are above reproach. 
 
 "Grant her one day s grace!" pleaded the Colonel. 
 "My girl here will be the happier for one more night 
 with her pet bed-fellow before the breaking-in be 
 gins," passing his arm about Evelyn, fondly. "She 
 misses our sprightly Mistress Martha, whom she will, 
 I trust, have back again ere long. The house is dole- 
 
 / o o 
 
 fully quiet for the withdrawal of her winsome pres 
 ence." 
 
 Mrs. Carter did not note the slow mist of unshed 
 tears in the daughter s eyes, or the amazement in her 
 step-mother s at what sounded natural and characteristic 
 to herself. Colonel Byrd s faultless manner to other 
 women was perfected by domestic practice. The neigh 
 bor did not credit one of the whispers that would make 
 him out a despot when thwarted. She had been 
 heard to wish that her Colonel would go to school to 
 him. 
 
 Evelyn was not averse to the companionship thrust 
 upon her. She loved Bess, in spite of the minx s way 
 wardness, and was glad to purchase distraction from 
 haunting thoughts by showing her the " pitters" in the 
 big Dutch Bible, Mr. Fontaine turning the leaves with 
 her, and telling Scripture stories that kept away per 
 tinacious question from his ally. He was passing gentle, 
 this afternoon, and his seriousness had in it nothing 
 forbidding to the child. She sat in his lap, her head 
 
 24
 
 278 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 upon his shoulder, her eyes riveted upon the quaint 
 cuts. Once in awhile she sighed in excess of content. 
 Twice she lifted her hand to pat the olive-pale cheek 
 touching her curly pate. The second time, she cooed : 
 " I 7/0 ve ou dee ly, Misser Fonten !" 
 
 " Who does not? responded Evelyn, lowly. 
 
 " Thank yon !" 
 
 That was all. Neither by look nor accent did he 
 betray suffering past or present. She should have 
 nothing painful to remember in these last fleeting 
 hours. 
 
 At the picture of the Scourging, he looked across the 
 book to Evelyn. She answered as if he had spoken: 
 
 "So much has happened since! So much that has 
 proved you the truest friend woman ever had. If in 
 the years to come we can ever show our gratitude in 
 other ways than in words, you may be sure " 
 
 " Say e hard words !" said Bess, imperiously. 
 
 He repeated the Latin text. The harder words were 
 said afterward : 
 
 "I have done my duty nothing more. There can 
 be no question of gratitude." 
 
 The " we" and " our" were poisoned points that 
 brought the blood. So long as the surface visible to 
 her was unstained what matter? 
 
 The study-door had swung ajar, although there was 
 no wind. Through the crack, a pair of heavy gray 
 eyes surveyed the group, and the thin mouth that went 
 with them widened tigerishly. The spy feared this 
 rival no longer, but he gloated over the thought of 
 what impended above one lie believed to be ignorant of 
 nearins: events. The unruffled mien and the flawless
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 279 
 
 courtesy of the thoroughbred deceived the student of 
 human frailties; the lower nature expressed some assua- 
 sive ooze for its own hurt from anticipation of a better 
 man s sorrow. 
 
 The afternoon was as sultry as mid-August. All 
 day the river had lain like a sheet of pewter under a 
 sun that wilted the grass and curled the fallen leaves. 
 The sun-setting had the lurid glower of pit-fires. 
 Behind them, the sky showed coppery and sullen ; the 
 water was dusky crimson, shot with dull yellow; the 
 land had caught a baleful glow under which it seemed 
 to shrink and hold its breath. 
 
 Mr. Fontaine had said " Good-by" in the presence 
 of a dozen people, and gone home, and Evelyn, struck 
 with a sort of uneasy awe by the unearthly light and 
 breathless atmosphere, walked down the front steps 
 with Lady Bess, and so on to the eastern gate, partly 
 to seek coolness, partly to have a more extensive view 
 of the phenomenon. On the other side of the fence, 
 screened from the house- windows by a clump of caly- 
 canthus-bushes, was Lieutenant Maynard, steadying a 
 field-glass upon the top-rail, and gazing so intently at 
 some object up the river as not to see her until she 
 spoke. 
 
 " Are you on the lookout for your buccaneer, Mr. 
 Maynard ?" 
 
 He started violently, recovered himself upon seeing 
 who were the intruders, and answered with a half- 
 laugh : 
 
 " It may be nothing worse than a smuggler, but I 
 dare be sworn there s something wrong about that tight 
 little craft over there. I passed her on Friday, some
 
 280 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 miles below, and had a sight of her skipper, and if he s 
 an honest seaman, I ll eat my cutlass. I d wager the 
 same that I ve set eyes on him before, and in none too 
 respectable a place. I hailed him, and held a parley 
 over the side to see if I could fix the recollection, but 
 he was shy of showing too much of himself, and, after 
 all, I may be a fool to distrust a man because one eye 
 looks nor east and the other sou west." 
 
 " The evidence would hardly carry weight with a 
 jury," said Evelyn, demurely. " What is the name 
 of his vessel ?" 
 
 " The Mocldng-Bird. I talked to that sober-sides of 
 a Bass about it, awhile ago, and he says she was bought 
 of your father, and is run by reputable parties. If I 
 liked Bass better, I d, maybe, be less distrustful of his 
 schooner." 
 
 " His schooner !" catching at the word with terrified 
 eagerness. 
 
 " Of course not ! I meant that he spoke well of 
 her, and her owners whoever they may be." 
 
 Bess, who was amusing herself by swinging on the 
 gate, her toes wedged perilously between the pickets, 
 projected her quota into the conversation. 
 
 " Misser Bass is a velly wittet man ! Pie ioot mine 
 p itty bofe. I wiss on ould ti\l him dead /" 
 
 " Fie ! fie ! is this the little lady who was listening 
 to Bible stories just now ?" eluded Evelyn. " She has a 
 long memory for one of her years," smiling aside to 
 Maynard. " Poor Mr. Bass affronted her mortally and 
 mysteriously, it is now five weeks ago. She will none 
 of him since." 
 
 " She may not be far wrong. The fellow has a shifty
 
 1118 GREAT SELF. 281 
 
 eye, and children s instincts are oftener right than \ve 
 believe. I wish your schooner had another voucher." 
 
 Evelyn turned her head to hide a smile. Mrs. Car 
 ter s epithet, " positively absurd," recurred to her. The 
 gallant pirate-hunter was a man of one idea, and worked 
 it hard. 
 
 " You would hardly board her, cutlass in hand, on 
 that account, I suppose, any more than you would put 
 her skipper in irons for having a cast in his eye." 
 
 Maynard s eye was again glued to his spy-glass. 
 
 " They are confoundedly busy on board for a Sunday 
 afternoon, when Jack Tar likes to be drunk on shore 
 in hi.s best toggery. She s built for speed, too, and 
 could show a pair of clean heels did she choose. I 
 wonder where I have seen that skipper before! And 
 he skulked as if he knew me. I ll ask your father to 
 whom he sold the vessel, and if she s likely to have 
 changed hands since. To-morrow, I ll run down to 
 Wakefield, and stir up Harrison to send out a revenue- 
 cutter to demand her papers bill of lading included, 
 and see if her cargo corresponds with them. Bless my 
 soul !" 
 
 Lady Bess, in swinging the gate shut, had thrown 
 such weight and energy into the emprise as to jar her 
 hands from their grip upon the pales, and, her feet re 
 maining between them, she had fallen backward and 
 head foremost into the pit of the officer s stomach. 
 
 24*
 
 282 UIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 WHEN Lady Bess s shoes were removed that night, 
 a bruise, about the size of a sixpence, was perceptible 
 upon one instep, a novelty that lashed her imagination 
 into a gallop. The wounded member must be rubbed 
 with opodeldoc, then chafed by Evelyn s velvet palm ; 
 lastly, done up in linen cambric and laid upon a pillow 
 after she was put to bed, as she had seen " Mamma fits 
 Sharley s foot when it was b o&en." 
 
 The injured part of her frame disposed to her satis 
 faction, she informed her patient slave that she would 
 like to hear over again all the stories Mr. Fontaine had 
 told her in the afternoon. She never drooped an eyelid 
 until Cain and Abel, Noah and the Dove, Joseph and 
 his Brethren, Little Samuel, and the list of intermediate 
 biographies up to the New Jerusalem, were given in 
 detail. 
 
 It was half-past eight, and, at this season, pitchy 
 dark without, when Evelyn sat down to write a note, 
 the subject and wording of which had engaged her 
 
 tj O O <_? 
 
 thoughts throughout the automatic rehearsal of the 
 histories aforesaid. Bess had rebuked her, judicially, 
 for inaccuracies, and justly. No well-instructed damsel 
 of four years, less three months, would in that genera 
 tion, swallow, unconvulsed, the statement that the chief 
 butler saw in his dream a ladder upon which angels 
 were going up and down.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 283 
 
 Bess had doubts as to the ladder, even when it was 
 relegated to the right dreamer. 
 
 " What for did J ey fate a yadder when ey had wings? 
 / ould have f ewed up and down. So !" flapping her 
 night-gowned arras. 
 
 " We must ask Mr. Fontaine about that, some day," 
 said poor Evelyn, and was suffered to proceed. 
 
 She had treated Maynard s talk of smugglers and 
 river-patrol lightly in the hearing. Later, it returned 
 upon her memory, and begot solicitude. The Mocking- 
 Bird would drop down the river to-morrow midnight, 
 and while, with wind and tide in her favor, she would 
 pass Wakefield before dawn, it would be awkward 
 should the admiral s zeal for the integrity of revenue 
 laws incite him to challenge the outgoing schooner. 
 Moreover, and contrary to reason, the insinuations 
 touching the captain wrought upon her imagination. 
 She wrote frankly to her lover all she had heard, and 
 begged him to push, through Mr. Harrison of Berkeley, 
 inquiries into the skipper s character. They could not, 
 in the circumstances, afford to be over-nice in the selec 
 tion of instruments for furthering their flight, but 
 might it not be prudent to shift quarters at Norfolk, 
 should he be dissatisfied with what he learned of this 
 man s antecedents? 
 
 She implored the forgiveness of her al most-bride 
 groom if her over-wrought nerves made her foolishly 
 timid. Whatever might be his decision, she would 
 acquiesce in it cheerfully. Nothing and nobody could 
 work them serious harm when once they were together. 
 The letter written, she summoned her maid and sent 
 her privately for Caliban.
 
 284 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 The boy appeared promptly, but Evelyn remarked 
 immediately a certain disorder of mien unusual in the 
 spruce lackey. His fingers puckered plaits in the sides 
 of his breeches ; his lips were loose, and twitched oddly, 
 his eyes roved from right to left, up and down any 
 where rather than to rest upon her face. 
 
 " I sent for you, Caliban " she began. " What 
 
 ails you ? are you ill ?" 
 
 " Naw m ! Dar ain nothin ail me, ma am !" 
 
 " You behave so strangely !" pursued the young 
 lady. " I was fearful that you had gotten into trouble, 
 and thought I might help you. If you have, come to 
 me when you get back, and tell me the whole story. 
 Just now I am in great haste. Come close to me and 
 listen heed fully. 
 
 "About half-way between this and Berkeley a 
 schooner is anchored to-night. At ten o clock, Mr. 
 Francis will be on board of her for a little while. I 
 wish him to have this letter before he gets to the vessel, 
 if possible. If he is already on board, wait until he 
 leaves the schooner before you give it to him. My 
 skiff is chained to the Westover pier. Here is the key 
 of the padlock. Get into her, and pull toward the 
 vessel, and keep near her until you see Mr. Francis 
 going or returning from her. His boat will be rowed 
 by Roger from Berkeley. Follow this boat and give 
 the letter into Mr. Francis s own hands. Repeat to. me 
 now what I have told you, that I may be sure you 
 understand." 
 
 The grave simplicity of her address steadied the mes 
 senger s head, as her kindness nerved his sinking heart. 
 He recited the orders he had received without a blunder.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 285 
 
 Besides the honor of serving her, he had the stimulus 
 of the promised hearing when his mission should be 
 done. His eyes, wistful and honest, did not leave hers 
 while she subjoined : 
 
 " That is well done, Caliban ! I am putting a great 
 trust into your hands. It is very important that Mr. 
 Francis should have that to-night. I would send you 
 to Berkeley, but I will not tempt you to disobey your 
 master s orders. I know that I can depend upon you 
 to tell nobody where you are going. Be as swift as you 
 can, and when you get back, come at once to me. Viney 
 will be on the watch for you and bring you up-stairs." 
 
 There was not a touch of the saucy rascal in the sober 
 face the page carried down-stairs, and the resolute pace 
 the long lope he might have copied from his father 
 that took him down to the pier. 
 
 He had had a trying a disastrous day. While the 
 " white folks" were in church he had betaken himself, 
 leisurely, up the river s edge. Stopping here, to shy a 
 stone at a snipe or bull-frog, halting there, to stare at a 
 passing boat, scraping his bare toes in the wet sand, and 
 kicking the pebbles idly he readied the wooded mouth 
 of a ravine half a mile from the Westover dock. Into 
 this thicket, first looking up and down the stream, to 
 make sure he was not observed, he plunged, creeping 
 under the mat of vines and putting aside boughs, 
 without breaking a twig. Before he got to the stone 
 masking the mouth of the tunnel lie discerned tokens 
 of recent visitors. The shingle bore the prints of foot 
 steps, imperfectly covered ; withering leaves bestrewed 
 the ground, and bruised vines drooped in the sun. 
 Making no more noise in the undergrowth than a
 
 286 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 rabbit, Caliban, armed with a hickory-stick, cut in the 
 uplands, crawled to the cave-door, pried out the stone 
 with a few skilful thrusts, and the green light filtered 
 through the foliage into the paved interior. 
 
 The tunnel was empty as far as the eye could pene 
 trate the obscure depths ! With a low howl of rage, 
 the half-breed dashed in, and groped along until stopped 
 by a mass of fallen masonry and earth. There, he 
 struck a light. Not one bale or keg remained to cor 
 roborate the tale of his midnight adventure ! Without 
 them, he had no tale to tell. As the truth burst upon 
 him he flung himself upon the flags and cried piteously. 
 His schemes of revenge, renown, reward, were like 
 the " devil s snuff-box" into which he had dug his heel 
 wantonly on his way hither. There was nothing left 
 but choking black dust. 
 
 A thought drifted to him, by-and-by, that dried his 
 tears with sudden fire. 
 
 " I gwine tei % see Granny, now, shore ! Mis Evelyn, 
 she ken git me er parss. I ll git even wid dat po - 
 white-folks-Satan, shore s I born ! He ain fitten 
 ter libe, an he ain fitten ter die. De Lord, He don 
 wan him, an de debble, he won habe him, ef he ken 
 holp it. But he got fur ter start pon he trabbels fo 
 long. Ef I kent pay him out one way, I will in 
 anodder !" 
 
 He turned over, preparatory to rising, and his hand 
 struck something that rolled and rattled. It was a 
 silver pencil-case, and one that he knew. Colonel 
 Byrd had given it to his secretary last Christmas. The 
 initials " C. R. _Z>." were engraved upon one side. 
 
 Here was a scrap of proof! The plunder had, tin-
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 287 
 
 doubtedly, been removed on Saturday night. Bass had 
 gone early to his room, complaining of indisposition, 
 and Caliban, like a fool, believing in the excuse, had 
 treated himself to a long night s sleep. After the house 
 was still, the villain must have stolen out to the rendez 
 vous. Caliban recollected seeing him make numerous 
 memoranda in his note-book at supper-time from 
 Colonel JByrd s dictation, and that he used this pencil- 
 case. The lad gnashed his pointed, glittering teeth in 
 figuring to himself how securely the wretch had sat 
 here, perhaps upon a keg of stolen spirits, and made 
 inventory of the contraband cargo as it was taken out 
 and to the boats. 
 
 A grin checked the gnashing. 
 
 " Don I wisht I may see him when he misses dis? 
 He got ter arsk for it, some time. Den, I gwine ter 
 cuar it ter Marster, an tell whar I done fin it." 
 
 He pushed the stone into place, crawled through the 
 undergrowth, and went home, a sadder and a wickeder 
 boy for the disappointment. His spiritless performance 
 of the onerous duties of the Sunday waiting elicited 
 sundry reproofs from his mistress, whose own temper 
 was somewhat the worse for wear just now, and entailed 
 upon him the unforeseen result of detention in the 
 dining-room when the other servants were dismissed 
 for the night, while he set in order under Madam s 
 eyes a sideboard, into which she had detected him hur 
 rying plates and dishes, helter-skelter, without regard 
 to age, value, or pattern. 
 
 The work was just completed when Miss Evelyn 
 sent for him. Colonel Byrd, Lieutenant Maynard, Mr. 
 Randolph, and two or three others, had taken their
 
 288 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 chairs to the broad stone landing of the front steps, and 
 sat there smoking. Bass had gone away on horseback 
 that afternoon and not returned. It never occurred to 
 the lad that he might be upon his enemy s trail until, 
 when he got to the pier, he found the skiif gone. The 
 padlock had been opened with another key than the one 
 Miss Evelyn had given him, and the boat loosened, 
 after which the lock was again made fast upon the chain 
 and laid carefully beyond the reach of the waves. It 
 was a clean job, and with lightning instinct the boy 
 felt that but one man belonging to the plantation would 
 have dared commit the trespass. 
 
 His heart pumped boiling blood into his temples 
 while he stood, trying to bring together the various 
 threads of the plot he began to feel was weaving about 
 him. 
 
 That his courtly master could be interested in se 
 curing or preventing Mr. Francis s passage in a vessel 
 of which Bass was chief owner; that Miss Evelyn 
 corresponded secretly with the pleasant, generous Eng 
 lish gentleman whom Miss Martha was to marry ; that 
 so nice a gentleman was in such haste to get away from 
 people who thought the world and all of him that he 
 could not wait for a larger and geuteeler vessel, a 
 merchantman instead of a schooner, and a smuggler 
 at that, were, considered separatelv, incontrovertible 
 facts. They defied his cunning to dovetail them. 
 
 In the confusion, he got hold of two ideas : 
 
 1. Miss Evelyn s errand must be done. If not in 
 one way, then in another. 
 
 2. Bass must be followed. It was remotely possible 
 that he would be on the schooner to receive the passen-
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 289 
 
 ger. The two had never seemed fond of one another, 
 but there might be business ties, a realm in which 
 Caliban knew himself to be all at sea. 
 
 When he got home, he would make a clean breast to 
 Miss Evelyn sweet saint that she was ! of everything 
 he had discovered and suspected. She had promised 
 to listen, and she might be able to help him out of the 
 muddle. 
 
 The schooner was over a mile away, at the most. 
 He had swum three times as far on a warm night, and 
 this was almost as hot as the day hud been. While 
 taking off his Sunday clothes, folding and hiding them, 
 under a bush, he devised a scheme for carrying the 
 letter in safety. He wrapped it tightly in lily-leaves, 
 picked from the bank; bound oak-leaves about them, 
 and tied up all with a bit of twine. This he laid in 
 the centre of a silk bandanna handkerchief, his choicest 
 piece of finery, folded the latter in close bands, and, 
 passing it over the top of his head, tied the ends under 
 his chin. Tickled at the ingenious conceit, he walked 
 out until the water reached his neck, and swam leisurely 
 up-stream, pausing, every hundred yards or so, to listen 
 for paddles or voices. 
 
 A shimmering veil had shorn the sun of rays during 
 the day, without mitigating the heat. It now hid the 
 stars, but a strange glow, like that of red-hot metal, 
 lay upon the river. The west was inky, and the play 
 of heat-lightning showed the cause of this depth of 
 gloom to be a horizon-line of jagged cloud. Whispers 
 and puffs of sultry air crisped the breast of the w T ater. 
 The swimmer soon made out the outline of the schooner, 
 not at anchor, but lying becalmed in mid-stream. Be- 
 N t 25
 
 290 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 side the feeble rays of the binnacle-light, the deck was 
 dark, but two of the port-holes were faintly illumined. 
 Upon the weird glimmer of the water near the black 
 hulk was something like a blot with edges blurred by 
 the encompassing dusks. Caliban had floated and 
 swum at a safe distance from it for, perhaps, fifteen 
 minutes, when some one who appeared to lean over the 
 guards in the fore-part of the deck, just above the 
 moveless blot, called, rather cautiously than loudly, 
 
 "Halloo, there, Roger!" 
 
 " Ya as, suh !" responded a negro s drowsy voice. 
 
 " Cast off your rope there, and go home. The cap 
 tain has to send a boat up the river in an hour or so, 
 and Mr. Francis says he will wait and go back in 
 her." 
 
 " Ya as, suh !" 
 
 The oars rattled in the rowlocks, and the blot 
 spread into the blackness beyond. 
 
 Caliban flattened himself into the water. He could 
 not dive without wetting the top of his head. The 
 Berkeley boatman, a dull-witted and indolent giant, 
 only recognized the voice, disguised by falsetto inflec 
 tions, as that of one in authority, and obeyed, unques- 
 tioningly. The unseen listener s senses, naturally 
 acute and whetted by hatred, could not mistake it. 
 Bass was on the schooner, and with power. For the 
 first time in the bold expedition, an eerie dread crept 
 over the lad. If he waited the hour or so, and 
 swam after the schooner s boat, the chances were that 
 his enemy would be in it, and how could he deliver 
 Miss Evelyn s despatch with the secrecy she had 
 enjoined ?
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 291 
 
 A blaze of lightning split the horizon-cloud in two, 
 and showed the toothed edges rising into peaks. A 
 flaw of wind rocked the vessel uneasily, and brought 
 the angry mutter of thunder. By the flash, Caliban 
 saw, nestled close under the hull of the schooner and 
 fastened to it by a rope, the stolen skiff! To swim up 
 to it, cast off the line, clamber into the seat, and grasp 
 the oars, \yas the work of a minute, and he felt him 
 self master of the field, whether flight or strategy were 
 to be the order of the night. While uncertain on this 
 point, he would lie by and be vigilant. 
 
 The cloud, rocking before winds that as yet drove 
 but shallow furrows across the water, was seen by the 
 next flash, towering to the zenith. The river-rat looked 
 anxiously at it : 
 
 " I d make a run fur Ian ef I could git red o dat ar 
 letter!" he said, half-aloud. " Dar s gwine ter be a 
 harrykin, ef I m any jedge o signs. An dis boat ain 
 much better V er aigshell fur dat kin o wuk !" 
 
 He pulled the skiff entirely around the schooner, 
 from the deck of which he now heard the tramp of 
 hurrying feet and the hoarse call of the captain s voice. 
 The men were making ready for the gale. The boat 
 would not be lowered until it was over. He had just 
 made up his mind to turn his skiff shoreward, and to 
 revisit the schooner when the danger should have 
 passed, when the port-hole nearest him was dashed 
 open, and a voice like a trumpet-call pierced the dark 
 ness, 
 
 " Ho, there ! Roger ! where are you?" 
 
 " I se hyur, Mr. Francis, suh ! cried the boy, in 
 shrill excitement. "What mils I do, suh?"
 
 292 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " Go to Berkeley, and tell " 
 
 Caliban standing erect in the skiff, holding her 
 away from the hull of the schooner with an oar never 
 heard the rest. 
 
 At the sound of his voice, a head was thrust over 
 the taffrail, a face was seen distinctly by the blinding 
 pour of blue flame over heavens and earth ; there was 
 a flash of redder fire, a report was lost in the bursting 
 thunder, and the skiff was flying down the river before 
 the scud and roar of the gale. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 COLONEL BYKD and his guests watched the tornado 
 from the windows of the drawing-room after the vio 
 lence of the wind drove them in-doors. At the zenith, 
 the black cloud took the form of a huge funnel, the 
 conical end descending rapidly until it touched the 
 river. There it tore along, an awful besom of devasta 
 tion, a bellowing monster with outs \vooping arms, lust 
 ful for prey. The play of the lightning was incessant 
 and vivid, and from their outlook the gentlemen saw, 
 so near the Westover pier it seemed impossible that 
 she should not dash against it, a schooner racing before 
 the wind under bare poles. The livid glare showed 
 every taut rope and that her deck was empty. 
 
 A shuddering groan broke from the group ; then, 
 they waited in breathless silence for the next flash. 
 The flying craft was already almost out of sight. 
 
 " That was The Mocking-JBird !" said Lieutenant
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 293 
 
 May 11 a I d. " The gale has broken her loose from her 
 moorings. Her skipper keeps her nose well before the 
 wind, but unless he knows the channel better than he 
 knows his prayers, and she obeys the rudder uncom 
 monly well, I wouldn t give a pinch of rappee for the 
 chances of schooner or crew." 
 
 " The Lord have mercy upon their souls !" said Mr. 
 Randolph, fervently. 
 
 " Amen ! and upon those of honester men !" re 
 sponded Colonel Byrd. " Tis an ugly outlook, gen 
 tlemen ! We will have in lights and bar it out." 
 
 A footman, upon whose complexion yellow-gray 
 ashes had settled, answered the bell, and brought in 
 candles. About the flame of each hovered a sallow 
 halo which the negro regarded, awe-stricken, when he 
 had set them on the table. 
 
 " What are you about, blockhead ?" demanded the 
 Master. " Light the chandelier !" 
 
 The shaking hands did the work awkwardly, and, 
 as a terrific stream of blue fire filled the room, the 
 flambeau upheld to the wax candles dropped to the 
 floor, and the fellow to his knees. 
 
 His master laughed, good-humoredly. 
 
 " It is lucky that the fall extinguished the torch, or 
 we might have been roasted a worse fate, I judge, than 
 being frightened to death. The devil damn thee black, 
 thou cream-faced loon ! Get you gone and send Cali 
 ban hither. He has brains in his skull, and keeps his 
 head in the right place." 
 
 The negro picked himself up, and, knock-kneed and 
 with chattering teeth, tried to articulate. 
 
 " Please, suh, I was skeered ! Beg your pardon, 
 
 1 5*
 
 294 SIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 suh ! An Caliban, be O Lord !" crouching behind 
 a chair at another flood of flame and bursting report. 
 
 " Speak louder, my good fellow !" The Master was 
 amiably amused. "The thunder outbellows you. Cali 
 ban, he what?" 
 
 " He am hyur, marster, ef you please, suh !" 
 
 " We can see that for ourselves, and it does not please 
 me ! Shall I kick you out before you will go to look 
 for him?" 
 
 " Please, suh, he am nowhar !" 
 
 The Colonel took snuff patiently. 
 
 "My man ! you must know that, dead or alive, one 
 is always somewhere ! Go, fetch Caliban or his 
 corpse ! He would be livelier dead than you at your 
 living best !" 
 
 " Ya as, suh !" cowering before the almond-shaped 
 eyes more abjectly than at the lightning. "Caliban, 
 he ain been bout hyur nowhar fur right smart time 
 now, suh ! One de chillun say he reckon he been 
 gone to de riber fur er swim. He seed him go dat ar 
 way bout a hour ago, an he ain been sawed sence." 
 
 " Go, light your torch, and come back to finish what 
 you were doing. Tell Osiris to bring in pipes and 
 tobacco," said the Master, coolly. 
 
 " I hope no harm has come to the boy !" observed 
 Maynard, when the footman had departed. " He is a 
 likely young rascal." 
 
 " A good scare would be wholesome for one of his 
 kidney," returned the Colonel, in unruffled serenity. 
 " He has more brain than any other negro I have, but 
 he is too bumptious. A more daring, venturesome 
 young devil never danced upon bare toes. He will
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 295 
 
 fare better than likely if he do not dangle from a 
 hempen noose at the length." 
 
 " American hemp, I suppose ? said Mr. Randolph, 
 dryly. 
 
 " Nay that is one of Spotswood s hobbies, not mine. 
 He would insist that I should sow the seed of our 
 native hemp upon a fat acre of my low grounds, and 
 make fair essay of it. He has tried the experiment, 
 and it came up very thick. He sent about five hun 
 dred pounds of it to England, and the Commissioners 
 of the Navy, after a full trial of it, reported to the 
 Lords of the Admiralty that it was equal in goodness 
 to the best that comes from Riga. Set that tray here, 
 Osiris. What is it?" seeing the butler fall into an 
 attitude of respectful waiting. 
 
 " Please, suh, my mistis would like to know if you 
 think there is any danger?" 
 
 The chief butler, having stood for a score of years 
 behind the Colonel s chair at home and abroad, had 
 taken on by natural accretion a veneer of speech and 
 demeanor that suggested a ludicrous resemblance to his 
 model. In the thickest of meteorological phenomena 
 that had driven his compeers in service to their prayers 
 in the darkest corners they could find, he bore himself 
 like a man, and that man, Colonel Byrd. 
 
 "My compliments to your mistress, and say that, in 
 Lieutenant Maynard s opinion, the gale is expending 
 itself as rapidly as could be desired or expected, and, 
 therefore, is more nearly exhausted than it was a while 
 ago. Say, moreover, that Lieutenant Maynard is an 
 authority upon gales and that his word is of value." 
 
 " Yes, suh !"
 
 296 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Without the twitch of a muscle, Osiris bowed ami 
 backed himself out. In equal gravity, the Colonel 
 proceeded with the dissertation upon American hemp : 
 
 "I told the Governor if our hemp were never so 
 good, it would not be worth the making here, even 
 though they should continue the bounty. And my 
 reason was because labor is not more than twopence a 
 day in the East where they produce hemp, and here 
 we can t compute it at less than tenpence, and consid 
 ering besides, that our freight is three times as dear as 
 theirs, the price that will make them rich will ruin us, 
 as I have found by woful experience." 
 
 " You have the air and appurtenances of a pauper," 
 put in Mr. Randolph, glancing from the stately figure in 
 the tall-backed chair to the silver aud cut-arlass flushing 
 
 O O 
 
 back the fitful play of wax-lights and lightning. 
 
 " Moreover," went on the imperturbable lecturer, 
 "if the King, who must have the refusal, buys our 
 hemp, the Navy is so long in paying both the price and 
 the bounty that we, who live from hand to mouth, can t 
 afford to wait so long for it. Ah ! Mayuard is put 
 upon his mettle by the responsibility cast upon him by 
 my message to my Lady." 
 
 The Lieutenant was at the window, shielding his eyes 
 with his arched hands to obtain a better view of the 
 tempestuous outer world. He deigned no reply, and 
 the Colonel gave another pull at his hempen thread : 
 
 " And then, our good friends, the merchants, load it 
 with so many charges that they run away with great 
 part of the profit themselves. Just like the bald eagle 
 which, after the fishing-hawk has been at great pains to 
 natch a fish, pounces upon and takes it from him."
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 297 
 
 "I would give all the hemp in both hemispheres/ 
 M ay n a rcl wheeled about to interject, " to be assured that 
 naught human is abroad to-night !" 
 
 " Unless it be smuggler or buccaneer/ subjoined the 
 Colonel. " Tush, man ! take a stiff glass of braudy- 
 and-water, gird up the loins of your spirit, and forget 
 the hurt you cannot help !" 
 
 " Brandy ev r en such as your poetical English guest 
 likened to topaz, honey, and oil cannot stupefy a brave 
 man into forgetting that, while he has a tight roof 
 above his head, better and braver men than he may be 
 perishing beyond the reach of mortal aid." 
 
 The delicate curves of the host s mouth straightened ; 
 the cleft in the chin was shallow ; the broad lids drooped 
 over the eyes. He chose his words deliberately and 
 critically. 
 
 "I have ever discouraged in myself and others, my 
 dear Lieutenant, the disposition to sentimentalize over 
 seeming evils which are of our own deliberate brewing, 
 or the dispensation of an all-wise Creator. I have 
 somewhat that I wot of at stake in this storm, which 
 I would remember is none of my work, and per 
 chance more than I have knowledge of. GOD knows" 
 reverently " that the thought of the loss of human 
 life is unspeakably dreadful to me. Whatever of suf 
 fering, merited or undeserved, I may impose upon my 
 fellows, my skirts are clear of so much as the desire 
 of bloodshed. These things being so, is it not the 
 Christian s part, when Providence has put a snug roof 
 over his head and stanch walls about him, and good 
 brandy that maketh strong the heart of man before 
 him, to say for himself and for those exposed, by
 
 298 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 ordinance of the same wise Providence, to the horrors 
 of wreck by land and sea, The will of the Lord be 
 done ! " 
 
 The fury of the tempest was spent by midnight. Up 
 to that time the party in the drawing-room sat over 
 pipes and glasses, spell-bound by the rare personal 
 magnetism which was the pre-eminent gift of their 
 philosophical entertainer. 
 
 He bade them a cheery " Good-night, and only such 
 dreams as they would pray to have visit them !" a smile 
 upon lip and in eyes, and when all had gone drew back 
 the ponderous bolt of the front door, and stepped out 
 upon the stone platform. The moon was not up, but a 
 diffused brightness along the eastern horizon betokened 
 her approach. The rain had ceased ; the lower currents 
 of air were sobbing penitently in the wet trees, more 
 scantily clothed than at sunset ; the higher were tearing 
 crevices in the clouds through which tremulous stars 
 peeped down. The world was sweet with the smell of 
 the rain and the fallen, leaves. They were a sodden 
 carpet under the watcher s feet as he walked down the 
 rose-alley toward the calycanthus gate, bareheaded, his 
 hands clasped behind him. At the gate he halted to 
 gaze toward the quarter in which the madly-scudding 
 vessel had disappeared. 
 
 As the winds died down, the wash and roll of the 
 river, the wrath into which the gale had lashed it, still 
 unappeased, were audible ; the odor of bruised and 
 soaked roses was joined to the stronger breath from the 
 dying leaves ; in the clear fields of heaven a thousand 
 stars shone limpid ; a slim crest of silver showed itself 
 above the eastern line of forest. Nature was mar-
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 299 
 
 shall ing all gracious and soothing forces to atone for 
 the paroxysm of rage that had spared not her best- 
 beloved. 
 
 The Colonel looked and listened for long. Exqui 
 sitely susceptible to the influence of beauty and music, 
 he threw open the windows of his soul to admit the 
 white peace these inspired. 
 
 "I had no hand in this!" he said, aloud, at last. 
 11 Whatever I may have willed, the doing and the end 
 are GOD S !" 
 
 In passing along the upper hall to his own room, he 
 saw a line of liffht under his daughter s door. It 
 
 ~ o 
 
 burned all night, and the woman who watched beside 
 it never slept. Walking, kneeling, sometimes prostrate 
 upon the floor in abandonment of anguished suspense, 
 she dragged out the terrible, endless hours to the dawn 
 of what should be her marriage-day. 
 
 By sunrise she was on the road to Berkeley. Wan, 
 wild-eyed, her feet, drenched with wet, seeming to her 
 frenzied self to lag like lead, she sped down the garden- 
 path, past the church-yard that was to have echoed her 
 bridal vows, across the fields as the crow flies, with 
 never a glance at the river wallowing tawnily to her 
 left, yet seeing naught with the mind s eye but the 
 hungry torrent. A lorn, bedraggled ghost, she thus 
 burst into a group collected upon the lawn, all looking 
 at the river, all pallid with unsaid fears. 
 
 Martha Jaqueline was first to see her, and ran toward 
 her with a great cry of horror and surprise. 
 
 " My darling ! my darling ! how came you here?" 
 
 The women there were none but women there 
 gathered about her, tears contending with the deceitful
 
 300 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 cheer they would have brought. Evelyn caught hold 
 of Miss Lotsie. 
 
 " Where is he ?" whispered the parched lips de 
 manded the wide eyes. 
 
 The spinster lifted her in her powerful arms and 
 carried her with loving violence into the hall. As she 
 
 o 
 
 went, she said : " We haven t given up hope, yet. 
 Compose yourself. He may come !" 
 
 She got dry shoes and stockings for her ; wrapped 
 her in a blanket, and fed her with hot negus and toast. 
 Martha, seated upon the floor, Evelyn s hands in hers, 
 told her, as was merciful, all that was known as yet. 
 The gale had caught the Berkeley boat on its way back 
 from the schooner, as Evelyn s fears had divined. 
 When neither of the occupants returned, Mr. Harrison 
 had got ready a gang of men as soon as the storm 
 abated, and with boats had spent the remainder of the 
 night on the river. Five miles below the Berkeley 
 landing they came upon the missing boat, floating bot 
 tom upward. Upon the opposite shore, three miles 
 higher up, lodged against a tree, was the body of the 
 negro boatman. He had apparently clung to the lowest 
 boughs when exhausted by swimming, and been beaten 
 to death by the waves that had drifted his corpse inland. 
 His fists still clutched leaves and grasses. His com 
 panion had not been found, but the boats were still 
 out. 
 
 Evelyn heard it without tear or sound, and then lay 
 motionless, gazing at the ceiling with eyes set in awful- 
 ness of despair. Mrs. Harrison s caresses and Martha s 
 fondest exhortations to hope, did not win a look or sign. 
 Miss Lotsie sent, privately, a note to Mrs. Byrd, telling
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 301 
 
 what had happened, and sat down with the other women 
 to wait, with folded hands and sinking heart, for the 
 worst, if there were a worse woe to come. 
 
 Two hours went by, and there was no news from the 
 water. 
 
 "Ben will not come home until he has something to 
 tell," Mrs. Harrison said, once. " He blames himself 
 bitterly for allowing the boat to go without him. But 
 it was thought best that he should not appear openly in 
 the affair, lest it might breed trouble at Westover, or 
 some of the crew, recognizing him, might bruit the 
 news of his visit abroad. He regrets, now, that he 
 yielded to what was most thoughtful and generous in 
 our friend." 
 
 The colorless mouth stirred ever so little, but without 
 voice. Even praise of him she had lost could not gal 
 vanize the palsied nerves. Tears flowed silently down 
 Martha s cheeks, dropped upon her friend s hands, and 
 lay there until Martha wiped them off. 
 
 As she did it, she felt a thrill like an electric shock 
 run through Evelyn s frame ; her head was raised ; 
 into the dull despair of the fixed eyes shot a ray. 
 Before Martha could hinder her, she sprang from the 
 sofa, was at the door and upon the lawn, and was run 
 ning down to the pier like a mad thing. The others 
 followed, hurrying the faster as they caught sight of a 
 boat approaching with a smaller one in tow. 
 
 Mr. Harrison shouted to them from the foremost : 
 
 " Go back ! go back ! and send some men to me !" 
 
 Only his wife hesitated, and she but an instant. 
 Evelyn was at the landing before the larger boat touched 
 it. With a look he never forgot, she leaped into it, 
 
 2*5
 
 302 MS GREAT SELF. 
 
 passed Mr. Harrison and the oarsmen ere one could 
 raise a finger to stay her, seized the tow-line and pulled 
 the skiff within reach of her hand. Something in the 
 bottom was covered by a cloak. 
 
 " For GOD S sake !" ejaculated Mr. Harrison, darting 
 forward. 
 
 He was too late. Her swifter movement had torn 
 aside the cloak and revealed the ghastly features of poor 
 Caliban ! A bloody bandage was about his head ; his 
 eyes were closed; the displaced covering exposed his 
 naked shoulders and chest. 
 
 The girl staggered back into Mr. Harrison s arms ; 
 threw up her hands with a piercing shriek, and fainted. 
 They bore her to the house, and close after her the 
 senseless figure they had thought breathless when found. 
 The skiff had been driven into a small inlet, and, 
 wedged among the bulrushes, like the ark of the 
 Hebrew infant, had outlived the tempest that foundered 
 the larger craft. There, exposed to the rain and gale, 
 the insensible lad had lain for twelve hours, the flags, 
 beaten flat by wind and rain, masking the creek and 
 deluding the eyes of the search-party. His condition 
 was a dense mystery. The puzzle of his presence, 
 naked, in Evelyn s skiff, and how he received his 
 wound, was complicated by the surgeon s announcement 
 that he had been shot, the bullet fracturing the skull. 
 But for the banded handkerchief about his head, it 
 must have entered the brain and caused instant death. 
 
 "He may live a few hours," the surgeon was saying 
 as Mrs. Harrison, too anxious to wait longer without 
 the chamber, appeared to inquire if she could be of 
 service. " But the end is certain, and not distant."
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 303 
 
 Mrs. Harrison s eyes filled. 
 
 " Poor child !" she murmured. " Who could have 
 had the heart to hurt him ? I should have said he had 
 not an enemy in the world !" 
 
 " I fear me much that his own misdoing led to this 
 end, my dear lady !" said familiar tones, and Colonel 
 Byrd, of whose presence in the house she was not 
 aware, stepped from behind the bed-curtains. " I 
 caught him, three nights ago, in the act of stripping to 
 swim out to a net set by one of the field-hands. He is 
 a born poacher thanks to both of his parents. He 
 was pert with his fellows, too, and tricksome. But I 
 could better have spared a dozen better servants !" 
 
 The handkerchief taken from the wounded head, 
 soaked with blood and water, had been tossed into a 
 corner, and the folds falling apart showed green leaves, 
 pressed oddly together. Mrs. Harrison took it up, 
 gingerly, while the Colonel talked with the surgeon, 
 and there fell out a parcel bound flat with twine. 
 Taking it over to the window, she undid it and took 
 out a sealed letter stained and wet. The blurred 
 address was " To Mr. Francis" and the billet was 
 secured by strands of dark hair caught under the seal 
 Evelyn Byrd always used. 
 
 Mrs. Harrison escaped, unnoticed, from the chamber, 
 and ran with the fresh mystery to Martha Jaqueline. 
 
 Neither of the loyal friends would break the wax 
 while there was a probability that Evelyn might re 
 vive sufficiently to explain this turn in the enigma. 
 Nor was a hint given to Colonel Byrd that the supposed 
 poacher was the messenger, leal and ingenious, between 
 his daughter and her lover.
 
 304 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 But the discovery added tenderest assiduity to the 
 nursing bestowed upon the hapless boy whose days were 
 numbered. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIY. 
 
 MADAM BYKD and Miss Lotsie divided the duties 
 of chief nurse in the temporary hospital set up at 
 Berkeley. Evelvn rallied from her swoon only to 
 relapse into a stupor that lasted all day and far into the 
 night. Her step-mother and Martha Jaqueline, watch 
 ing beside her at midnight, saw the beautiful eyes 
 unclose suddenly in the glare of delirium. She plucked 
 at her ring, muttering rapidly under her breath : 
 
 "To make room for another that will mean liberty 
 and love ! liberty and love ! Mother Mary and the 
 holy angels ! Mother Mary ! Moth-er Ma-ry !" 
 
 The mutter became a drowsy whisper. 
 
 Madam Byrd s eyes dilated with horror. 
 
 " He has proselyted her !" she whispered to her com 
 panion. " Oh ! if this be so, it is better she should die ! 
 Her father would sooner see her in her coffin !" 
 
 " When she is there, it will be religious bigotry and 
 wicked hatred that have murdered her !" retorted 
 Martha, in righteous asperity. Then, melting into 
 tears, " O, my lamb ! my pretty ! that I should live to 
 see you thus ! He called you his lily among thorns ! 
 Thorns that have let your sweet life out!" 
 
 At the warm rain upon the restless hands the loving 
 hold could not confine, Evelyn opened her eyes again.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 305 
 
 Holy, chastened light flowed over her face ; her voice 
 was unearthly in musical speech, with a tender under 
 tone of solemnity. It was like a martyr s death-chant. 
 
 " 1, Evelyn, take thee, Charles, to my wedded hus 
 band, to have and to hold from t/iis day forward, for 
 better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in 
 
 health, to love, cherish, and to obey, till death do 
 
 us part /" 
 
 Martha Jaqueline looked upward, as the accents 
 trembled into an awful stillness. 
 
 "In the name of GOD, Amen!" she cried. "This 
 was to have been their bridal hour, and the wrath of 
 man cannot put them asunder. In the sight of heaven 
 and the holy angels, they are wedded, and you and I 
 are the earthly witnesses !" 
 
 Colonel Byrd carried a heavy heart homeward from 
 his visit on Tuesday morning. Caliban lay in a deathly 
 lethargy, only showing that he was alive by breathing. 
 Evelyn was raving with brain-fever. 
 
 " Talking herself to death !" was her step-mother s 
 report to the father. "She will have none near her 
 but Martha, and Lotsie Johnson, and Anne Harrison. 
 Me, she will not abide. She mistakes me for Sycorax, 
 the mother of Caliban in Shakespeare s Tempest. I 
 have always protested, Colonel, that no good could come 
 of your giving servants such heathenish names. The 
 poor child fainted at sight of the hole in Caliban s 
 head; and she and Mr. Francis I would say, Lord 
 Peterborough ! and Martha Jaqueline and Mr. Fon 
 taine made a play of reading The Tempest aloud the 
 day before the races, and all has got mixed up together 
 in her brain. 
 
 2G*
 
 306 U1S GREAT SELF. 
 
 " And no mortal will ever know what the poor dear 
 went through on Sunday night, knowing as she did 
 although I had no idea of it that he was on the water 
 just at that hour, and in that terrific storm. Do you 
 suppose, Colonel, there is the shadow of a hope that he 
 is alive ?" 
 
 " How the devil should / know, Madam ?" growled 
 her irate consort. 
 
 He said it over to himself many times, with many 
 variations, riding slowly along the road, head depressed 
 and eyes dreary. 
 
 It was uppermost in his mind when, entering his 
 study, he beheld his secretary bent over the vellum 
 MSS., his pen moving as sedately as if he had not taken 
 it from the page, except to dip it into the staudish, since 
 he had sat in the same place last Saturday afternoon. 
 He had, as has been stated, left Westover on horseback 
 Sunday, after dinner, with the expressed intention of 
 spending that night and Monday perhaps Monday 
 night with friends in Williamsburg. On horseback 
 he had returned while the Colonel was at Berkeley; 
 heard, without comment or visible emotion, the tragic 
 story of Roger s death, Caliban s wound, and Evelyn s 
 illness, and, after calling for a biscuit and a glass of 
 cool milk, settled into the oiled groove of his every- day 
 life. 
 
 The kitchen-cabinet, convened at an irregular hour, 
 and with safety, in the absence of master and mistress, 
 declared, with no ado of discussion, that " he hadn t no 
 mo heart n thar is in a bull tadpole." 
 
 Himself was better pleased with himself than usual. 
 Napoleon proclaimed Providence to be on the side that
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 307 
 
 had the heaviest artillery. Mr. Colin Bass, after inspec 
 tion of his muniments, greeted Providence as a redoubt 
 able and indubitable ally. 
 
 He arose to salute his superior in ceremonious defer 
 ence thrown away upon the anxious parent. 
 
 "Ah! Good-morrow, Bass!" he said, laying off his 
 hat and pushing back the hair from a forehead creased 
 by a faint line that was not there at their parting. 
 " When did you get back?" 
 
 " About an hour ago, sir." 
 
 " You had a prosperous visit, I hope ?" 
 
 " Reasonably pleasant, I thank you, sir. My friend s 
 wife was quite ill all of yesterday in consequence of 
 fright at the tornado of Sunday night. Otherwise, all 
 went well." 
 
 The Colonel had dropped heavily into his chair, and 
 sat, drumming upon the desk with his elegant finger 
 nails, staring at the opposite wall. 
 
 " You have heard, I suppose, what has happened 
 hereabouts since you went?" 
 
 " Of Miss Byrd s illness ; the drowning of one of 
 the Berkeley boatmen, and that Caliban was shot, by 
 accident, or of design, upon the river yesternight? 
 Yes, sir. I regret that I should have been absent at a 
 time when I might have been of service to you." 
 
 The drumming went on, and the Colonel had not 
 removed his gaze from a fixed point. 
 
 "The Mocking-Bird was driven out to sea by the 
 gale, and has not been heard from since." 
 
 " That is news, sir. Is it certainly known that she 
 did not weigh anchor and sail of her own accord, with 
 crew ajid passenger on board ?"
 
 308 SIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 The Colonel darted a look of fierce impatience at the 
 impassive visage. 
 
 " Not certainly known ! it, man ! How could 
 
 anything be certainly known in such a of a gale? 
 
 We saw her drive past at the rate of a knot a minute. 
 Whether or not anybody save the crew were on board ; 
 whether the Berkeley boat capsized before it reached 
 her, or after leaving her ; whether the schooner went 
 down out of soundings, and every soul on board found 
 a watery grave, or if she outrode the gale, and is now 
 on the high seas HE, alone, who sent the storm can 
 tell." 
 
 The secretary reflected a minute before replying : 
 " In any event, sir, the result to yourself will be 
 the same for awhile, at least. If the schooner were 
 wrecked and if her passenger have perished, you have 
 thrown away fifteen hundred pounds which, had you 
 been endued with the spirit of divination, might have 
 been saved." 
 
 " the money !" ejaculated the Colonel, with an 
 
 irritable motion of the foot, indicative of a frantic 
 inclination to kick somebody. 
 
 "Yes, sir. I was about to add, that, supposing the 
 vessel to be safe, the fifteen hundred pounds were well 
 expended in insuring for her a twelvemonth cruise, 
 with the guarantee that your name is never to be mixed 
 up in the affair. The involuntary voyager will be well 
 treated, and allowed the liberty of the schooner except 
 ing at such times as his confinement between-decks will 
 be a matter of necessity during the vessel s stay in for 
 eign ports. These periods being few and far between, 
 it can easily be seen that no hardship need befall the
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 309 
 
 noble passenger. He left England for an uncertain 
 period, in quest of adventure. He has gotten what he 
 sought/ a sardonic smile, pale and inclement, flitting 
 over his face. " It will be long before inquiry is made 
 for him. When he is allowed to escape from the vessel, 
 it will be in China. Before the story of his kidnapping 
 can be told in England, The Mocking-Blrd thanks to 
 your liberality will have a new coat of paint, a new 
 name, new colors, a new skipper, and a new career, or 
 should you prefer, she will be deserted and scuttled. 
 The hardy skipper can retire upon his gains or, what 
 is the more likely, can turn pirate in dead earnest. 
 You will have gained a year and more of time, with 
 the choice between the belief that the noble peer is 
 seeking his pleasure in other lands, or that he is feed 
 ing the fishes at the bottom of the sea. He took his 
 mails on board on the very night on which the schooner 
 was to sail ; he went with her, and has since made no 
 sign, although alive and well. Or he went on board, 
 intending to revisit his friends at Berkeley and West- 
 over ! She was broken from her moorings, and foun 
 dered, carrying him down with her. Or still again, 
 he was drowned in plebeian association with negro 
 Roger. Any one of these beliefs will suit your turn, 
 as I look at it." 
 
 " Oh ! it is a devilish fine plot, I grant you, and you 
 appear to be devilish proud of it, to judge from the 
 zest with which you rehearse the particulars, and weigh 
 the pros and cons of a living death, and bodily de 
 cease. Should you and I, between us, have killed that 
 poor girl " 
 
 He compressed his lips to stop their quivering.
 
 310 HJS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Almost unknown to himself, he was more irked by 
 something unnatural and unexpected in the secretary s 
 manner of stating the case with needless circumstan 
 tiality, than in the presentation of the particulars them 
 selves. Without trenching upon disrespect, the man s 
 tone was of conscious power ; of prideful assurance 
 that to him his patron was indebted for relief from an 
 intolerable weight, and that he meant to have credit 
 for the deed. While pretending to confer with his 
 chief at every step of the audacious undertaking, his 
 policy of partial confidences had been pursued through 
 out. His own hoard was the richer bv five hundred 
 pounds for the care of the Colonel s reputation that led 
 the emissary to conduct all negotiations in his own 
 name. Pie had prime reasons for believing that the 
 skipper would never give him up as a confederate, and 
 should he turn king s evidence, the Williamsburg visit 
 was in support of an alibi. 
 
 Roger, who might have known his voice under the 
 falsetto disguise, was dead ; Caliban, who had called 
 Francis by name, and looked straight at Bass as the 
 latter shot him, would soon be out of the way. Francis 
 had not seen him on the vessel, and she had touched at 
 Norfolk just long enough to put Bass ashore in the 
 early morning. Had not the diplomatist cause to be 
 content with the work of his own brain and the con 
 nivance of Him Who holds the waters in the hollow 
 of His hand, and the winds in His fist? 
 
 His intention not to mar the fair emprise by letting 
 the Colonel know now, or ever, that lie had been on 
 The Mockmg-Bird on Sunday night, and run a com 
 mon risk with the victim of the plot, in the headlong
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 311 
 
 race of the gallant little bark to the mouth of the 
 river was as firm as his design of making the impe 
 rious magnate feel, from time to time, the bit his hire 
 ling had clamped upon him. The scribe was guilty 
 of no accidental displays of feeling or temper. The, 
 for him, long speech to his employer was the first pull 
 upon the rein, and it had told! 
 
 "To say that I admire the scheme I have re 
 hearsed to relieve your apprehensions would describe 
 my feelings more fitly than to say that I am devilish 
 proud of it," he returned, provokingly cool. "If 
 strategy that quails not at possible consequences be 
 novel business for you, allow me to utter my admira 
 tion in yet fuller measure. If I, the humblest of Miss 
 Byrd s admirers, may express my regret at her illness, 
 I owe the privilege to her father s condescension." 
 
 His smirk pointed and aimed the sentence. The 
 Colonel started up and grasped his riding- whip. 
 
 " You hound !" 
 
 The scribe had arisen also, his lips thinner for their 
 sneer. 
 
 "A hound, if you will, Colonel Byrd ! and never 
 more entirely at his master s service than when noble 
 game is to be hunted down to the death /" 
 
 With not another word, the unhappy father de 
 based for the first time in his own eyes sank into his 
 chair and let his proud head fall upon the arms crossed 
 on the desk-lid. 
 
 Bass sat down and took up his pen : 
 
 " Two People were as indifferent company as a man 
 and his Wife, without a little Inspiration from the 
 Bottle, and then, we were forced to go as far as the
 
 312 If IS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Kingdom of Ireland to help out our Conversation. 
 There, it seems, "the Colo, had an Elder Brother, a 
 Physician, who threatens him with an Estate some 
 time or other. Tho possibly it might come to him 
 sooner, if the Succession depended on the death of one 
 of his Patients." 
 
 The pen was wiped and laid by, and the page sanded. 
 The secretary turned his chair about to face his nominal 
 master. 
 
 " I grieve, Colonel Byrd, that you take a plain truth 
 so heavily to heart. You desired a certain end, and 
 applied to me for means. A danger was imminent. 
 You appealed to me, by my loyalty to you, to avert it. 
 I laid hold of the only instrument available in the 
 urgency of the circumstances, the nearness of the 
 danger. You made but one stipulation. In scriptural 
 meaning, if not in phrase, you said, Touch not his 
 life! I sent your enemy away in safety and in com 
 fort, you supplying the expenses of his voyage. If he 
 be alive when the schooner arrives at the West Indies, 
 word will be sent to you through me, and the same from 
 other ports. It rests with you whether or not the young 
 gentleman s well-wishers in this neighborhood are left 
 in ignorance of his condition and whereabouts, after 
 this information is placed in your hands should it 
 come. Should inquiry from the other side be insti 
 tuted, Mr. Harrison, and not yourself, will be the one 
 to satisfy it. This is the frank statement of a condition 
 of affairs that should be solace not sorrow. Never 
 theless, I am prepared, should you desire it, to explain 
 the precise circumstances to your family, and the com 
 munity in general. I have naught to fear for myself.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 313 
 
 I am borrowing again from your Scriptures but clay 
 in the hands of the potter." 
 
 There was no response from the bowed figure at the 
 desk. 
 
 The secretary surveyed it in mute contempt. That 
 a man who had gained that for which he had sinned, 
 should have twinges of conscience as to the means by 
 which it was obtained, was beyond his comprehension. 
 His self-respect hinged upon other tilings than the pre 
 servation of a pure heart and clean hands. Failure was 
 crime; success, by whatsoever road, virtue. From 
 this stand-point lie made his next address : 
 
 " My respectful mention of Miss Byrd wrought so 
 unhappily upon you but just now, that I scarce dare 
 repeat the assurance of my sympathy in your natural 
 uneasiness at her present state. If I might, I would 
 fain couple with it the hope that her sickness is but a 
 passing attack such nervous disorder as is common 
 with her sex under like afflicting conditions. You said, 
 not a week ago, that you would the sooner bury her than 
 see her wed to him who, by the ordinance of Divine 
 Providence, and by reason of his felonious intent to rob 
 you of your fairest treasure, was placed in peril of his 
 life yesternight. I would, likewise, venture to remind 
 you that had you with violence seized him and hurried 
 him into the vessel wherein he met his fate, there might 
 be cause for repentance which does not now exist." 
 
 The Colonel raised himself, a tolerable assumption 
 of the old haughty grace clothing features and form. 
 
 " Enough of this for this once !" he said, waving his 
 hand. " What is done is done, and I am no craven 
 to shirk the consequences of mine own deed. I have 
 o 27
 
 314 SIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 acted, with the lights vouchsafed me, for the best good 
 of one whose happiness is as a sacred trust in my keep 
 ing. She may live to thank me for that which the 
 Searcher of hearts knows has cost me dear enough in 
 many ways. If not, I must look for justice to a Future 
 beyond the tomb !" 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 THE hurricane that cut a broad swath through acres 
 of forest as the scythe through grain, swept down the 
 river in mid-October. Christmas-snows had melted 
 from off the winter wheat, and the budding catalpas, 
 horse-chestnuts and maples were shaking off brown 
 water-proofs to show spring clothing, when Evelyn 
 Byrd was lifted into the "Westover chariot, and driven 
 carefully over the soft road to the gate of her home. 
 
 The same day, Caliban alighted from a spring-cart 
 at the kitchen-door; stared stupidly about him, and 
 slouched along into the familiar precincts without 
 acknowledging the storm of tearful welcomes poured 
 upon him. 
 
 Isis had set her own rocking-chair, lined with feather 
 cushions, in the hottest heart of the chimney-corner, 
 and, upon a table close by, were smothered chicken, 
 waffles and honey, and coffee. When she had ensconced 
 him in the midst of the puffiness, set a stool for his feet 
 and urged him to eat, she threw her apron over her head 
 and wailed aloud : 
 
 " He ain no mo de chile whar went way f om hyur,
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 315 
 
 dat tumble Sunday night, dan er serup is like er coal- 
 black Et op!" she bemoaned him in a fine flight of 
 fancy and feeling. " What (ley been do tcr you, boy? 
 Tell Main Isy, honey ! Who been strip you good 
 cloes off, an den shoot you dade, an den drownded 
 you?" 
 
 He looked at her with lack-lustre eyes, his jaw hang 
 ing in a foolish grin. He had grown fleshy, yet flabby ; 
 the golden brown of his skin was a dirty yellow. When 
 left to himself, he crossed his hands at the wrists, where 
 they dangled loosely, as if jointless. He shambled in 
 his walk, and stammered in his silly prattle. Many 
 words and people were altogether forgotten. Doctors 
 from near and from far agreed in pronouncing him 
 hopelessly idiotic, and his restoration to physical health 
 miraculous. The flattened bullet had been extracted 
 from under his scalp, but no attempt made to raise the 
 depressed skull from the brain. Since the inevitable 
 consequence of the accident must be death, the torture 
 of subjecting him to an operation was needless. To 
 the surprise of the local practitioner, the bone knitted 
 healthfully, and the scalp closed above it in a firm 
 cicatrice. His appetite was abnormally hearty ; he 
 could walk after a fashion, and regained strength 
 rapidly. Memory was so nearly gone that he recalled 
 nothing that had happened at or near the time of his 
 hurt, and every effort to stimulate his recollection, or 
 suggest incidents, was as futile as Mam Isis s exhorta 
 tion. 
 
 On Christmas evening, Mrs. Harrison, with tenderest 
 tact, told Evelyn how and where her last note to her 
 lover had been concealed. The boy s clothing, found
 
 316 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 under the bushes on the river- bank, made it certain that 
 he had undressed with the intention of swimming to 
 the schooner; yet the discovery of the bolted padlock 
 showed that he, or some one else, had unloosed the skiff. 
 Perhaps it had drifted away before he could get in, and 
 he had swum out to it. But why the ingenious dispo 
 sition of the billet in leaves and bandanna, when he 
 could have pulled the boat back to shore for the letter 
 and his clothing? 
 
 Mrs. Harrison related all to her guest conjecture 
 and baffling difficulties, and the total failure to piece 
 together a plausible theory of the casualty. Finally, 
 she produced the pacquet, discolored and creased, yet 
 unopened. 
 
 Until that day, not a tear had softened Evelyn s eyes ; 
 her lover s name had never passed her lips since the 
 return of the unsuccessful search-party. Except that 
 she would lie, hour after hour, slipping the ring he had 
 " wished on," up and down her wasted finger, and that 
 she always slept with his miniature clasped in her hand 
 memory of the tragedy might have been as extinct in 
 her as in Caliban. 
 
 She hearkened dumbly to the tale, truly a gruesome 
 one for Christmas-tide; held out her hand as dumbly 
 for the letter ; turned it over, half-bewildered, then 
 broke the seal. AVith the reading of the first line, the 
 spell was dissolved. 
 
 " O, my love ! my love ! my love !" 
 
 The cry reached Mr. Harrison in the room below. 
 He hurried up to find Evelyn weeping wildly in his 
 wife s arms, ever and anon ejaculating that the poor, 
 faithful boy had lost reason, and, perhaps, life for her.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 317 
 
 "Don t you see how it was?" she reasoned, when 
 calm enough to speak connectedly. " Somebody had 
 stolen the skiff. I gave him the key, and told him to 
 take the bout and lose no time. When he found it 
 gone, he recollected that I had charged him to deliver 
 the letter at, or near the schooner. He swam to the 
 vessel, I am sure of it, and the thief was there, too, 
 with the skiff, perhaps on board of the schooner. 
 Caliban got into the boat was discovered by that other, 
 and in the quarrel my poor lad was shot. O, I hope" 
 lifting her almost transparent hands to heaven " that 
 the murderer did not die in the same moment with my 
 darling! that his spirit did not take flight in such 
 companionship !" 
 
 After that, she spoke not freely, but without reserve 
 of her lover as beyond doubt dead. The Mocking- 
 Bird had been spoken by an incoming merchantman 
 off Cape Henry. A stiff breeze was blowing, and the 
 two skippers could make out little that was hallooed 
 through their trumpets ; but there was no doubt as to 
 the vessel, and that she was outward-bound. Mr. 
 Harrison brought the story to her, he having seen and 
 catechised the captain of the merchantman. She 
 thanked him, and said she had not hoped for better 
 news. Then a gentle melancholy settled upon her in 
 place of the apathetic despair that had excited fears for 
 her reason. 
 
 On New- Year s Day, she expressed a willingness to 
 see her father, whom, up to then, she would not admit 
 to her presence. There was no scene of formal recon 
 ciliation, but a calm, kindly meeting as of friends who 
 had been parted fora season. His visits after that were 
 
 27*
 
 318 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 daily, never prevented by weather, or delayed by other 
 engagements. There was a deprecatory shade in his 
 demeanor, an anxiety to please, and an effort to amuse 
 the invalid, that chance observers considered exquisite, 
 and at which the Harrisons chafed in secret. Evelyn 
 accepted it all without comment, or apparent emotion 
 of any kind. The spring of active feeling seemed 
 to be crushed. 
 
 When her step-mother could not speak for tears, in 
 receiving her upon the threshold of her home, she 
 smiled faintly. 
 
 "The journey has not tired me as you feared it 
 would," she said. " Belus drove with great care, never 
 touching a stone. Am I to go to my room, or do you 
 think it better for me to lie down down-stairs for a 
 while?" 
 
 Between her father and Mr. Fontaine, she was sup 
 ported to the drawing-room, but it was Colin Bass who 
 wheeled the sofa toward the fire, and when she was laid 
 upon it, took the tray containing wine and biscuits from 
 Osiris, and on one knee before her, offered it. 
 
 The action would formerly have surprised, perhaps 
 offended her. As it was, she accepted the attention 
 with the same languid smile, tasted the wine, set the 
 glass back with a murmur of acknowledgment, and 
 closed her eyes in utter weariness. Bass passed the 
 tray to the waiting Osiris, whose inaudible sniff and 
 toss of the head were infinitely eloquent. Then, in 
 stead of withdrawing from the room, as he would have 
 done a half-year ago, the secretary stood at the back of 
 the sofa as one whose right to minister to the invalid 
 was not to be questioned.
 
 JUS GREAT SELF. 319 
 
 Mr. Fontaine was at the foot of the lounge, and 
 glanced inquiringly from the trespasser to Colonel 
 Byrd, a flush of indignant amazement mantling his 
 forehead. The Colonel seemed ignorant that aught 
 unconventional had been done, and Madam Byrd had 
 followed Osiris to the door for a whispered consulta 
 tion. The eyes of the two men met in the mirror over 
 the mantel. Fontaine s were full of haughty sur 
 prise : Bass smiled, quietly confident in the strength 
 of his position. Between them, as they stood, was re 
 flected the recumbent figure, the lily-pale wraith of the 
 beautiful being they had seen framed by the marble 
 vine-leaves and fruit five months before. Both thought 
 of that other scene, one with a gush of generous sym 
 pathy that softened every lineament, the other with 
 arrogant hope and vulgar triumph. 
 
 This was the first overt assumption of the secretary s 
 new station in the household. He never lost the 
 vantage-ground it gave him. Men had commended 
 Colonel Byrd s selection of a factotum so clever, yet 
 who knew his place so well ; praised his modesty 
 almost as much as his ability and honesty. Before 
 the summer had passed, gossip was busy with rumors 
 of the evident mastery of the plebeian over the patri 
 cian. There was a change in the matchless autocrat 
 of the Westover principality. His forehead was be 
 ginning to show wrinkles, and a fine net-work of care- 
 lines was drawn about eyes, always brilliant, often 
 restless now. His grand air was a part of his person 
 ality as were the rolling periods of his speech, but the 
 rich resonance of his voice was fitful, and lie was sub 
 ject to seasons of reverie approximating moodiness.
 
 320 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Bass, by degrees alternately insidious and audacious, 
 possessed himself of the reins slipping from the mas 
 ter s fingers. The servants hated him more than ever, 
 but they had learned to dread him as well. It was 
 significant of their deep devotion to their young mis 
 tress that they endured without murmur the sight 
 of their master s neglect of their interests because of 
 the evident absorption of his every thought in his 
 daughter s condition. She did not rally in strength or 
 in heart with the spring weather that allowed her to 
 spend many hours of each day in the summer-house on 
 the outer verge of the lawn, to drive to Shirley, and 
 sail down the river to Brandon and Wakeiield. Her 
 father was her escort everywhere; his loving solicitude 
 more and more apparent as the leading motive of his 
 daily action. She turned to him, insensibly to herself, 
 more fondly and continually as her weakness made her 
 dependent upon the tender offices of those about her, 
 and never had suffering woman a stancher support. 
 All the resources of his magnificent intellect were 
 taxed to afford her entertainment; his versatile fancy 
 devised diversion and light occupations for her stronger 
 days, comforts for the hours of pain and weakness, 
 which, he fondly persuaded himself, were fewer as the 
 summer advanced to gorgeous prime. 
 
 In August, he fitted up a schooner we would non- 
 call a yacht, and took the whole family upon a cruise 
 as far north as Boston, spending some weeks in Massa 
 chusetts, and stopping at most of the chief towns in the 
 New England Colonies. Voyaging southward, they 
 visited the Bermudas, and sailed leisurely in summer 
 seas until earlv October.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 321 
 
 Evelyn had forgiven, long ago, and striven to forget 
 that, but for her father s refusal to sanction her be 
 trothal, her lover would not have been abroad on that 
 fatal night. She was very grateful that none interfered 
 with her mourning for the beautiful young life quenched 
 in the cruel river. She almost believed that, were the 
 last year to be lived over again, her father would have 
 learned to like and respect one all-worthy of esteem. 
 There was balm in the thought that wrought more 
 potently than sea-breezes and invigorating changes of 
 scene to coax back elasticity to her frame, color to her 
 cheek, and hopeful light to her eyes. 
 
 Still it was a faded image of herself that trod the 
 gangway laid from the yacht to the Westover pier, on 
 the afternoon of a golden autumnal day. Mr. Fon 
 taine s heart sank with dismay he would not name as 
 he grasped the hand he felt was smaller and thinner 
 than when it last lay in his. 
 
 " I am better ! much better !" she said, accepting his 
 arm for the climb up the winding steps, seeming not to 
 see that Bass pressed to her other side with offered 
 assistance. "And I have a world of things to tell you 
 when the time comes. That will not be until I have 
 heard everything that has happened at home while we 
 were gone. How lovely the dear old place is ! Seven 
 weeks is a long time to be away from it. But we have 
 seen and done so much that the days flew by." 
 
 Fontaine was not deceived by her forced vivacity, 
 but Bass, to whom it sounded like the gladsome over 
 flow of a heart at peace with itself and full of delight 
 in the reunion, could have torn his rival limb from 
 limb as he saw him check her upon the first lauding,
 
 322 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 and compel her to sit down upon the wall to rest. To 
 the apprehension of the slighted lover, it was a subter 
 fuge to gain a ttte-a-tete interview, Madam Byrd and 
 the children, with their retinue of servants, having 
 hastened up the hill. 
 
 The manager let the Master of Westover speak to 
 him twice before he appeared to hear him. The two 
 men were upon the wharf with no one else within ear 
 shot. 
 
 " I asked you if there were news of The MocJdng- 
 Birdf said Colonel Byrd, more peremptorily than 
 Bass was in the habit of hearing himself addressed of 
 late. 
 
 He answered senteutiously : 
 
 " None !" 
 
 " None since she was spoken off Cape Henrv, more 
 than eleven months ago! What make you of that?" 
 
 11 Nothing because nothing can be made of nothing. 
 It is a matter of little moment to either of us, so far 
 as I can see." 
 
 The bronzed visage of the Master gloomed while 
 Bass feigned to be occupied in pulling about the boxes 
 the crew were brino-ing; ashore, but he waited until the 
 
 o O 
 
 factotum deigned to approach him again with a look 
 that was more incisively interrogative than became 
 their relative positions. The look he received in re 
 turn staggered him. The king was upon his throne 
 again ; the man was master of himself, and resolved 
 upon mastering others. His voice rang out in the 
 remembered accents of command. 
 
 " Whatever may be your estimate of the importance 
 of the matter you wot of, I rank it as so nearly su-
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 323 
 
 preme that I shall set all agencies on foot, forthwith, 
 to discover the fate of the vessel, and to recall her 
 passenger if there were one. After conference with 
 Mrs. Byrd, who is thoroughly advised through Mr. 
 Harrison and his family of the hour at which the 
 boat left Berkeley on that Sunday night, the probable 
 time consumed in the row to the schooner, and in dis 
 posing the mails in her hold I judge that the unfor 
 tunate gentleman may have been on board when the 
 gale broke over her. Joining this to the fact that his 
 remains were never found while those of the negro 
 were, I deduce the likelihood that when The Mocldng- 
 Bird was driven out to sea, she carried him with her. 
 The first step is to discover, through English and 
 American ship-masters, what has become of the 
 schooner. To these you will address letters to-night 
 under my hand and seal, instructing them to spare no 
 expense in obtaining the needed information." 
 
 The man was grand even in error. In the enuncia 
 tion of the royal pleasure, he ignored the possibility 
 that his amanuensis might presume to question his 
 will. Serene and imperative he spoke, and looked to 
 have it done. 
 
 " And now" in a more colloquial tone " what of 
 plantation-affairs ?" 
 
 " This, first of all, sir." In emulating his chief s tone, 
 he achieved doggedness. " You will be so kind as to 
 suit yourself with another manager at your convenience. 
 I shall not retain the post more than a month longer." 
 
 " Very well, Bass. The yield of corn was good this 
 year, or promised to be, when we left home. And the 
 tobacco ?"
 
 324 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " My books are ready for your inspection, sir. At 
 the risk of angering you, Colonel Byrd. may I ask if 
 you are prepared to accept the consequences of this 
 remarkable reversal of sentiment and intention. They 
 may be grave." 
 
 " They must be grave. I am prepared to accept 
 them." 
 
 They were ascending the zigzag causeway ; a turning 
 made visible Evelyn and Mr. Fontaine, met at the top 
 of the Might by an uncouth figure that grovelled, dog- 
 like, upon the ground at his young mistress s feet. Buss 
 looked at his companion with a disagreeable smile. 
 
 "They wilt be serious. It might be well to weigh 
 them well before adopting measures that cannot be 
 recalled." 
 
 " I have had time and opportunity for mature de 
 liberation. We will not debate the business further. 
 It is mine and mine alone !" 
 
 Evelyn s hand closed convulsively upon her escort s 
 arm as Caliban shambled toward them, his tongue loll 
 ing like a dog s in the breathlessness of his haste, his 
 face broad with ecstasy a sickening spectacle. In 
 another second she stooped to pat his head, while he 
 kissed her feet with disjointed exclamations of rapture. 
 
 " My poor fellow ! are you so happy to see me again ! 
 Me who caused you such sorrow !" 
 
 Her eyes swam with tears, but she forced a smile. 
 The home-coming was a crucial test of strength and 
 courage, and this meeting not the least trying stage. 
 Her father s daughter would not blench. 
 
 " I must tell you," she continued to Fontaine, walk 
 ing slowly up the lawn, Caliban gambolling beside her,
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 325 
 
 "of something Papa has promised inc. We met an 
 eminent English surgeon in Boston, and became well 
 acquainted with him. I told him of this poor lad s 
 misfortune,, and since his intention is to see Virginia 
 before his return, Papa invited him to visit us. While 
 here, he is to examine Caliban, and perhaps perform an 
 operation trepanning, it is called. He says that such 
 things have been and wonderful cures effected. 
 
 " I must tell you, moreover," hurrying to say it 
 before they reached the house, " what he Papa has 
 been to me while we were away. No woman not mine 
 own sweet mother whom I shall ever remember as an 
 angel of love and mercy could have been more tender, 
 and Mamma was all goodness. When I remember 
 these things, I know it would be ungrateful not to be 
 glad to be at home again, and willing to take up what 
 of life is left to me. Help me, dear friend !" 
 
 He pressed her hand in releasing it from his arm, at 
 the door. 
 
 " Depend upon me to do my utmost !" 
 
 The latent heroism in the woman who had ceased to 
 be a girl, was developing nobly in the furnace that tried 
 her. The inner light shone white and clear, and none, 
 not even the parent who had grown to be the dearest 
 of earthly things to her, or he who loved her so entirely 
 that self had no part or lot in his hopes for her, sus 
 pected the fragility of the vase that held the lamp. 
 
 It was at Colonel Byrd s express and personal invi 
 tation that Martha Jaqueline and Miss Lotsie spent a 
 week at Westover soon after the return of the family 
 to the homestead. The visit included the anniversary 
 of the day that had widowed the bride who was never 
 
 28
 
 326 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 to be a \vife. Xo verbal notice was taken of the inci 
 dent in the household, but Colonel Byrd rode away 
 upon Pluto soon after breakfast, and was not seen again 
 until nightfall, and Martha and Mrs. Harrison sat for 
 a silent, sacred hour in the church-porch while Evelyn 
 prayed within, kneeling in the chancel, living over each 
 minute and hearkening in spirit to every love-word of 
 that farewell interview until memory became a present 
 and blessed reality. 
 
 The face she brought forth to the anxious waiters was 
 transfigured by peaceful radiance; she moved with the 
 grace of a wind-swayed flower; the beauty of her early 
 youth was renewed and sublimed. Upon the hand 
 clasped over her prayer-book gleamed the " wish-ring" 
 she would wear to her grave. 
 
 The yellow sunshine lay level across the burial- 
 mounds and burned like watch-fires in the windows; 
 the river was crystal and flame; the painted leaves of 
 the maples drifted as soundlessly as the sunrays ; the 
 tinkle of herd-bells was melodious in the distance. The 
 three women lingered under the trees, the fallen leaves 
 rustling and whispering after them as they walked. 
 
 " I am here every day/ said Evelyn at the upper 
 beud of the path. " For awhile, pain went before the 
 comfort I was sure to find at the last. Latterly, it has 
 been all rest and peace. When I have gone quite away, 
 I shall pray that I may be let to come back on such an 
 evening as this, and meet one, or both of you, just here, 
 where we three now stand. Charles and I parted on 
 this spot. You will not forget?" 
 
 There M r as no outcry against what must precede the 
 tryst. The simple earnestness of the pledge was met
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 327 
 
 by like simplicity of spirit. As they passed through 
 the west gate and along the rose-lined alleys, Evelyn 
 talked hopefully of the operation to be performed upon 
 her protege by the London surgeon, now at Brandon 
 and expected at Westover on the morrow. 
 
 " It is not wise to delay the attempt to save the boy 
 from what is worse than death," she said. " While 
 we were absent he was nearly uncontrollable at seasons. 
 Once he ran away and was gone three days. His 
 Indian grandmother brought him back. He had found 
 his way to her house alone. Occasionally he fell into 
 strange rages. In one of these he threw a hammer at 
 Mr. Bass. A fire was kindled under Mr. Bass s bed 
 one night, and my poor, witless Caliban was suspected 
 of the act. Papa is loath to put him under restraint. 
 What would I not give to have back my merry, game 
 some imp ! We were great friends Caliban and I." 
 
 They were under the study-window, and the secretary 
 was within, surrounded by the plantation-books. His 
 short, thick fingers opened and shut spasmodically, as 
 he listened, and a muscle in the right side of his face 
 contracted suddenly, drawing down one corner of the 
 eye and mouth. 
 
 For a wonder he was idle. The vellum MSS. were 
 completed, and stored in a library-closet. There were 
 the weekly accounts to be gone over, and letters to write, 
 but he was disinclined to touch them. For a week he 
 had not been well. Doughty as was his tone in offer 
 ing his resignation, the blow of his confederate s defec 
 tion had fallen heavily. For six months he had lorded 
 it as virtual ruler of the plantation, saying in his pros 
 perity, "I shall never be moved!" security founded
 
 328 H IS GREAT SELF. 
 
 upon the belief that his clutch upon the Master was as 
 inexorable as death. In his presumption, his ambition 
 meditated further humiliation for his dupe and triumphs 
 for himself, a final coup that was to make the daugh 
 ter s hand the price of his continued discretion. In his 
 opinion, the submission of the chastened spirit to the 
 inevitable, and the affectionate duty rendered her parent, 
 were abundant proof of the supremacy of the latter, 
 and his ability to coerce her into whatsoever course he 
 might decree. Bass had heard twice from the skipper 
 of The Mocking-Bird. In curt, rough fashion he had 
 been told that " him you wot of keeps well, but aint so 
 mighty easy in his mind." And again, " Somebody 
 makes friens with the men, moren I could like. I m 
 glad time s most up." 
 
 Bass had intended to use this last intimation as a 
 lever in the execution of his daring scheme. Gauging 
 his employer by his own standard, he reckoned con 
 fidently upon the effect that would be produced upon 
 Colonel Byrd by the suggested prospect of Lord Peter 
 borough s escape and return, and the accompanying 
 threat upon his Bass s part, that, in such an event, 
 it might be obligatory upon him to save himself by 
 giving up the real criminal. The obvious expediency 
 of guarding against the worst consequences of the 
 Englishman s reappearance by giving his daughter in 
 marriage to an honest man whose influence in her father s 
 behalf would thus be secured, would finally be brought 
 forward to calm the fears of the principal party in the 
 outrage perpetrated upon a peer of England. Safety 
 was to be found alone in unity of sentiment and 
 interests.
 
 UIS GREAT SELF. 329 
 
 That the well-digested plan could be foiled by a 
 single act of moral courage would have seemed pre 
 posterous, yet through this short, straight avenue had 
 ruin entered. The lion had rent the net with one 
 stroke of his paw. Intimidation and cajolery would 
 be alike ineffectual in dealing with one who faced the 
 consequences of an evil deed as brave men face an 
 honorable death. 
 
 Defeat and discomfiture are not synonyms to stead 
 fast souls, and such Bass held his to be. He could still 
 have wrestled with destiny and escaped a stunning fall 
 had not physical force failed him. He, who had boasted 
 himself to be made up without nerves, and his phlegm 
 to be invulnerable ; to whom sleep came at call, yet 
 could be dispensed with when need arose for vigil con 
 tinued for nights together, was a prey to nocturnal 
 horrors, sleeplessness that was anguish, childish dreads 
 of formless ills. His appetite was capricious ; he started 
 like a woman, if a door were slammed, or one spoke 
 abruptly at his ear, and involuntary facial twitchings 
 threatened to make his pitiable state known to others. 
 His habits had always been temperate. He smoked 
 with others because it was the custom of gentlemen, 
 and the act symbolized his equality with such, and 
 drank for no better, and no worse reason. In his 
 solitary occupation of the great house, he had kept 
 a demijohn of the finest Westover brandy in a closet 
 opening out of the study, and compounded a mint- 
 julep or a glass of brandy-and-water for his private 
 delectation when work pressed him hard. Lately, the 
 potation cleared a brain that never used to be foggv, 
 and braced up spirits that fluctuated irrationally. 
 
 28*
 
 330 IIIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 This afternoon, as I have said, he was not working. 
 Dull pain behind the eyes, slight nausea, and what felt 
 like a sinking of the material heart, robbed him of the 
 disposition to be industrious. He had sat for nearly 
 an hour in his chair, elbow on table and head on hand, 
 thinking of nothing in particular, yet oppressed with a 
 sense of general misery of body and soul. Evelyn s 
 voice aroused him to steal on tiptoe to the window and 
 peer out. The trio of friends had paused where, by 
 leaning forward, he could touch Evelyn s head. In 
 the flush of her glorious early womanhood she was 
 never lovelier than now when bloom and contour were 
 refined by time and suffering. He contemplated with 
 devouring eyes the blue tracery of the veins on temples 
 and hands, the shell-shaped ears, dainty, fine, and 
 clear; the arch of the dark hair at the back of the 
 neck, the classic profile; the scarlet of lips that was 
 vivid by contrast with the waxen skin. His passion 
 was as fierce as it was useless. He could have beaten 
 his eyes blind because he could not withdraw them 
 from her; he stretched out his arms to empty air and 
 drew them iu closely upon his breast as one might 
 crush a human form against his heart. 
 
 And, in accents that w r ould have wooed him back to 
 earth were his foot over the threshold of heaven, she 
 lamented the lost wits of the chattering ape who got 
 only a modicum of his deserts in the bullet that cracked 
 his skull ! 
 
 He got out the demijohn when the ladies moved away, 
 and mixed a potent draught. It made up to other men 
 for thwarted ambition and unrequited passion, and, after 
 all, he and other men were of one common clay.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 331 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 THE hush of intense excitement pervaded house, 
 kitchen, and quarters upon the day in which the great 
 London surgeon was to quote Isis " ter breck inter 
 dat po boy s hade an let in his senses." 
 
 By ten o clock in the forenoon all knew what was in 
 progress, and hundreds of hearts beat in one suspense- 
 ful throb while the hours lagged on. At noon, Osiris, 
 the only servant who had been retained in the closed 
 chamber, next to Miss Evelyn s own, appeared in the 
 kitchen. His face was of a curious dun-color, his lips 
 were a faded purple, otherwise, his deportment was, 
 if possible, more consequential than in ordinary. Sink 
 ing into a seat, he waved back the inquisitive crowd, 
 and said, sepulchrally "Cider!" 
 
 Isis s own hands brought it in a lordly beaker. He 
 swallowed it to the last drop and wiped his mouth : 
 
 " In all my travels, the xperience of this day is the 
 most wonderful lest xperience I ve ever xperienced. 
 Thank GOD it is over an done with ! I could not 
 have borne myself up with credit ten minutes longer. 
 An the subjec is alive an probable to do well. 
 Stop !" as a hum of pious rejoicing threatened to swell 
 into the wordless surge of thanksgiving peculiar to 
 the negro fanatic. " I wish it understood distinct 
 that the battle is not one but, as I might say, two!" 
 Pleased with the daring epigram, he elaborated it. 
 " Yes, two ! that is, two chances. This ban , life,"
 
 332 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 sprawling a flat palm, dirty-pink in hue, "this han , 
 death!" jerking out the left. "Moreover, when a 
 nisher" (issue) " is not certain, it is more than ap 
 to be uncertain, even when a famous Lunnon chirog- 
 rapher weaves what may be called the axe of fate." 
 
 The room was full by now, the outermost and latest 
 comers crowding to get sight of the oracle. A buzz 
 ran swift from the circumference to the oratorical hub. 
 He got himself to his feet with alacrity incompatible 
 with the exhaustion under which he had collapsed, a 
 minute ago, and tugged at his pepper-and-salt forelock 
 to his young mistress just entering the kitchen. She 
 stopped near the door, looking around upon the dusky 
 sea of faces, her own colorless, her eyes like stars for 
 prayerful gladness. 
 
 "I came, forthwith, to tell you what I knew you 
 would be most thankful to hear," she said. " We may 
 hope that Caliban will soon be well again. I ask in 
 my own name that you keep the house and grounds 
 very quiet for a day or two, until the danger of fever 
 has passed. You shall be told, every few hours, how 
 he is getting on. I ask you, too, to join your prayers 
 with mine that our dear Heavenly Father will carry 
 on the good work begun in the poor lad." 
 
 Is is pressed nearer : 
 
 " Please, my Miss Evelyn, ma am, is he got all his 
 sense back? He done been los a heap!" 
 
 Evelyn smiled. 
 
 " That will not be known until he awakens. They 
 had to give him large quantities of opium to dull the 
 pain of the operation, and he is sleeping from the effects 
 of it."
 
 HIS GEE AT SELF. 333 
 
 The head-cook was still revolving with brain and 
 tongue the possibilities formulated by her query, when 
 a shadow fell athwart the bowl in which she was shred 
 ding vegetables for soup, sitting in the noon-sun on the 
 kitchen steps. 
 
 Bass was sauntering by, tracing listless patterns in 
 the fine gravel with his stick, his eyes fixed on the 
 ground. 
 
 " Mr. Bass ! suh !" challenged Isis. 
 
 Usually she would have scorned to apply to him for 
 information upon any subject, but her heart was full 
 and soft. 
 
 He stopped and eyed her sullenly. 
 
 " Ef so be dat po boy up yarnder" nodding her 
 turban sideways at the house "gits back his senses 
 whar was spilt out in de riber dat night, ken he tell, 
 right, straight, smack, stnoove off, who been hu t him, 
 an how it all happen ?" 
 
 Bass s eyes were bloodshot and stupid while he 
 seemed to ponder the query. His face twitched so 
 fast and violently that he put up his hand to hide the 
 tremor or to keep it still. 
 
 " I don t know !" he said, at last. 
 
 His tongue was clumsy ; his lips hardly moved. 
 He made as though he would say more, but moved on, 
 leaving it unspoken. 
 
 Jsis shook her head many times and portentously. 
 
 " Dat ar gittin silly, or he drinkin mighty hard !" 
 she said to her corps of helpers. " Thank de Lord t 
 don make much diff ence to we-all, now Marster done 
 got on de box agin an tuk up de lines, an bless n 
 praise His holy Name fur dese n all udder marcies !"
 
 334 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Bass sauntered on, trailing his cane behind him, to 
 the church-yard and his accustomed seat upon the tomb 
 of William Byrd the First. It was not easy to rally 
 and mass his mental forces nowadays, but Isis s ques 
 tion had shocked them into temporary activity. The 
 horror of the idea broached by the illiterate woman 
 grew apace upon him. He tried to recollect an old 
 ^etory he had heard of the return of memory to a man 
 who lay for six weeks, senseless, after a fall that pro 
 duced concussion of the brain. He had caught a sen 
 tence spoken by the surgeon last night to Evelyn, as 
 she parted from him near the study-door. 
 
 " I will not flatter you with false hopes, my dear 
 Miss Byrd, but surgery has before now given speech to 
 the dumb, eyes to the blind, and wisdom to the fool." 
 
 Icy, viscid drops oozed out upon the thinker s fore 
 head ; a horrible sickness possessed every square inch 
 of his body. The persuasion that paralyzes the boldest 
 energies, let it be superstition or deduction from unde 
 niable circumstance, that the wheel of fate has begun 
 to turn backward fur him, changed his heart to water. 
 Tilings had gone wrong until neither he, nor the Provi 
 dence that had so lately seemed all on his side, could 
 stein the current. A month ago he would have defied 
 a thousand negroes, all telling the same tale, word for 
 word, to win Colonel Byrd s credence in opposition to 
 his unsupported statement. In that unfortunate cruise, 
 when father and daughter were thrown into closest 
 intimacy, and long voyaging over trackless seas and 
 between the stars and the deep had brought season 
 for honest introspection and just weight of men and 
 measures, his work of years had been undone. His
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 335 
 
 whilom dupe had arisen in pristine strength, clothed 
 with native integrity and in his right mind the more 
 resolute for good for shame that he had listened for a 
 while to evil counsel. 
 
 Caliban was Evelyn s protege. She would lend eager 
 heed to every incoherent phrase that embalmed her 
 lover s name. Her woman s wit would knit stitch to 
 stitch, and the clue once given to his own presence 
 upon the schooner when Francis was trapped, like a 
 partridge, in the cabin, would be followed, until 
 
 He could not frame it, even in thought. Shaking, 
 as in palsy, he struck a spark into his pipe, and smoked 
 by fits and starts; his limbs aching, yet numb. He 
 might go away to England, for instance. He had a 
 tidy sum in foreign securities of which his employer 
 did not dream. Or there was the river or the holster 
 hanging in his room with a pair of pistols he always 
 kept clean and loaded. An odor of burning arose to 
 his nostrils, and he looked down to see a thread of red 
 flame creeping along the earth. A spark had fallen 
 from his tinder, or a fiery ash from his pipe, upon the 
 carpet of dead leaves. Being a thread, although flame, 
 it was extinguished by one stamp of his foot. Action 
 and occasion awoke a thought that warmed his languid 
 veins, infused courage into his heart. A touch would 
 strike out. the life wavering in the breath of fate, in the 
 
 O / 
 
 stilled chamber over there. If the touch were dealt 
 before reason awoke in the drugged brain, all was 
 safe. 
 
 From that moment of hopeful inspiration, opposing 
 forces kept watch, the one without, the other within 
 the darkened chamber wherein the injured boy was
 
 336 -H/S GREAT SELF. 
 
 swimming for his life. If the watchers beside his 
 pillow counted every respiration and hung above the 
 immobile visage with hope that strengthened every 
 hour, the prowler skulking up the stairs, lying in wait 
 in dark corners of the upper corridor, listening with 
 ear laid to the panel for sound or silence that might 
 indicate whether the helpless boy were guarded or alone, 
 was on the fiercer alert. 
 
 " That secretary of yours is in danger of delirium 
 tremens or something worse," remarked the surgeon to 
 Colonel Byrd, as they smoked together in the drawing- 
 room the third night after the operation. 
 
 " O, I think you mistake there. He is a temperate 
 fellow steady as a clock, albeit somewhat upset just 
 now by the prospect of leaving my service. The ques 
 tion of drunkenness being disposed of, in my mind, 
 at least, what is the worse peril ?" 
 
 " Paralysis or some cognate seizure. His hand is 
 tremulous, uncontrollable muscles draw his face awry, 
 he drags the right leg slightly in walking. If he do 
 not look out, he will not, as the vulgar say, make old 
 bones." 
 
 While they talked, the doomed man was feeling his 
 way through the familiar gloom of the upper hall. He 
 had peeped into the still-room window, and seen Madam 
 Byrd. with two colored women, busy scraping opium 
 from poppy-pods that had been scarified in their green 
 prime that it might exude. The milky sap turned dark 
 in stiffening, and when hard was taken off and treasured 
 as a valuable addition to the domestic pharmacopoeia. 
 Madam had an acre of poppies sowed yearly, and her 
 self visited them in the season, daily, armed with a
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 337 
 
 needle for scoring the seed-vessels, and shears for clip 
 ping the ripe ones. Removal of the precious deposit 
 was a nice process, and she deputed the superintendence 
 of it to no one. The pile upon the table insured her 
 occupation for an hour to come. 
 
 Colonel Byrd, the surgeon, and Mr. Fontaine were 
 in the library, and Miss Byrd s maid had come down 
 stairs a half-hour ago, announcing to Osiris in the hall 
 that " Mis Evelyn had a mighty bad headache, an was 
 goin ter bade right off." 
 
 The patient was undoubtedly left in the care of a 
 negro woman renowned for her skill in nursing. It 
 would be an easy matter to offer to take her place for a 
 couple of hours. A thumb and finger upon the thorax, 
 a displacement of the bandages, would suffice after 
 that, and nobody would tell tales. He had but to 
 aver that the patient was as he had found him. Negro 
 evidence went for nothing. Such a conjunction of cir 
 cumstances might not occur again. It came none too 
 soon. The evening bulletin from the sick-room re 
 ported the continued absence of febrile symptoms, also 
 that the patient had spoken rationally only to ask for 
 a drink, but in a natural tone. Then, he had dropped 
 off into what the surgeon said was healthful sleep, not 
 stupor. The morrow, it was believed, would see yet 
 more decided improvement. 
 
 The door of the hospital-chamber was ajar a few 
 inches, and by the glimmer of the night-taper Bass 
 beheld, with a shock that left him weak and quivering, 
 Evelyn Byrd seated by the lad s pillow. Perfectly 
 motionless, her head laid against the back of her chair, 
 she looked, with her waxen-white face, closed lids, and 
 p w 29
 
 338 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 folded hands, more deathlike in the low light than the 
 form upon the bed. As if disturbed by the viewless 
 proximity of hi.s enemy, Caliban stirred with an inar 
 ticulate murmur. His young mistress bent toward him, 
 took in her slender fingers the tawny hand tossed out 
 upon the coverlet, and spoke soothingly: 
 
 " What is it, Caliban ?" 
 
 He opened his black eyes to their fullest width, his 
 teeth showed in a pleased smile : 
 
 "Mis Evelyn, ma am is that you?" 
 
 " Yes, my boy. You must be very quiet. You have 
 been ill, but you will be well soon very soon !" 
 
 The rush of blood to her heart almost suffocated her, 
 but she compelled herself to outward composure. 
 
 " Ya as, ma am. De skiff war gone, Mis Evelyn, 
 when I got to de lundin . I was jes"bleeged fur ter 
 swim, you know, ma am." 
 
 Agonizing as she was with anxiety to hear his story, 
 the listener tried to cheek him. One hand went up to 
 her throat ; her words were divided by short, broken 
 breaths. 
 
 " Yes, my good, faithful lad ! We know that you 
 did your best. But you must sleep now. To-morrow 
 you shall tell me all." 
 
 " Ya as, ma am !" his features working piteously. 
 " I jes wan ter say s how de letter is wropped up, safe 
 V soun , up liyur /" raising his hand to his bandaged 
 head. " I ain los it ! I can t member what come 
 nex ! Who fotch me in dis room?" 
 
 Heroically, Evelyn endeavored to calm him, drawing 
 down the wandering hand and patting it playfully. 
 
 " Now, Caliban ! you always mind me, you know.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 339 
 
 Don t try to think, to-night. Shut your eyes and sleep, 
 or I must go away. You have been ill, as I told you. 
 And because we all like you so much, we brought you 
 up here that we might take care of you. Won t you 
 obey me, and talk no more?" 
 
 He lay still so long with closed eyes that the secre 
 tary began to breathe freely again. A gentle rain was 
 falling outside; through closed doors he heard Colonel 
 Byrd laugh guardedly, lest even at that distance he 
 might disturb the copper-colored devil laid in state 
 among linen and down. 
 
 The boy started convulsively ; his eyes flew open ; 
 his accents were strained and piercing ; his words poured 
 forth in a torrent that could not be forced back. 
 
 " I member it all now, Mis Evelyn, ma am ! You 
 better sen right straight off ttr dat ar schooner ! Mr. 
 Frarncis he dar ! Mr. Bass, he been call ter Roger 
 kinder high-up like, but he couldn fool me an he 
 say, Go home, Roger! we gwine ter sen boat up de 
 riber pres n y, an Mr. Frarncis, he ll go in her. An* 
 Iloger, he pull up de riber. Twas arter dat, right 
 smart while, an de storm was comin up fas , dat I 
 see de skiff. Close by de schooner, she war, an I jomp 
 into her, an bymby Mr. Frarncis, he knock open de 
 pote-hole, an halloo out loud an fierce-like, Iloger! 
 whar are you? An I say, Here me, Mr. Frarncis, 
 suh! What mus I do? An he call out, Go ter 
 
 Berkeley, an tell Den, Mis Evelyn!" his voice 
 
 rising into a scream, " he ttik an shoot me /" 
 
 " Who /" cried the horrified woman, throwing her 
 arms about the form that struggled to sit up. " Not 
 he ! Never ! never !"
 
 340 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 " Dat low-live Bass look ober de side o de schooner, 
 Mis Evelyn ! Den, he shoot me !" 
 
 "You LIE!" thundered a terrible voice. 
 
 A frantic figure with livid face and starting eves 
 
 O ~ 
 
 dashed at the bed. More quickly, Mr. Fontaine, just 
 entering by another door, threw himself in the mad 
 man s way. They were locked together, one swaying, 
 wrestling shape, the resolute purpose of the taller and 
 slighter man bearing the other toward the doorway and 
 further from the woman whose utmost strength was 
 required to hold the lad upon the pillow when Colonel 
 Byrd and the surgeon rushed up. 
 
 Before a separating hand could be laid upon the 
 combatants, there was a gurgle and a lurch, the thud 
 of a lifeless body upon the floor. 
 
 The three men took up the secretary and bore him 
 to his own chamber. His face was distorted grotesquely 
 when he revived and tried to speak. But half of his 
 body was alive and sentient. 
 
 The " worse peril" was upon him. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 HAD Caliban lied in a tale so graphic that the least 
 important feature of it haunted Evelyn s imagination 
 as if the experience detailed had been her very own ? 
 
 The question was not to be settled for days, each of 
 which was a draught upon the reserves of her life. A 
 slow fever consumed her by night, and the dregs were
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 341 
 
 the daily lassitude it was no longer practicable to con 
 ceal. She had no pain, so she protested, and, there 
 fore, must rally with time. Instead, she wasted like an 
 untimely snow-fall, hidden fires licked up her strength 
 as the sun the dew. In after-days those who were con 
 tinually about her soothed remorseful regrets by recol 
 lection of distracting interests that inclined notice and 
 solicitude from her unmurmuring self. Caliban s re- 
 
 o 
 
 lapse, incident upon the frightful scene in his room, 
 brought him nearer the edge of the grave than had the 
 original wound. Even the London surgeon gave up 
 hope after twenty-four hours of delirium. Then, the 
 marvellous vitality inherited from a savage ancestry re 
 asserted itself; the fevered brain cooled, and reason re- 
 entered, as it were, a house swept and garnished. Con 
 versation was strictly prohibited, and he throve apace, 
 enjoying with childlike glee the delicacies sent up by 
 Isis, and content to pass most of his time in sleep. 
 
 He was in the second week of his convalescence when 
 a startling discovery was made. In the bottom of the 
 demijohn of brandy kept by the secretary in the study- 
 eupboard, and from which no one else was ever known 
 to drink, was a deposit of pounded roots which Colonel 
 By rd identified as the most deadly poison known to the 
 gatherer of simples in Virginian forests. The specific 
 action of it was upon brain and nerve, and it was but 
 too probable that the luckless man s frequent potations 
 of the noxious decoction had undermined an iron con 
 stitution, and indicated the direction in which the arrow 
 of incurable disease should be sped. 
 
 Cross-examination of every negro who could have 
 had access to the room and closet failed to elicit any
 
 342 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 testimony bearing upon the mystery. If Isis recol 
 lected, sh udder ingly, the visit of the Indian doctress, 
 she held her tongue, and when the incident was referred 
 to by a younger and less discreet witness, she was ready 
 to risk her soul s safety upon the asseveration that the 
 squaw stayed but three hours on the plantation, and did 
 not set foot in the mansion. Caliban s rooted hatred of 
 Bass was likewise descanted upon, but the preparation 
 of the poison, and the introduction of it into the demi 
 john usually kept under lock-and-key, argued a degree 
 of intelligence the quarter-witted boy had displayed in 
 nothing else since he received his hurt. 
 
 ~ 
 
 To save the family credit, Osiris set on foot the story 
 that the secretary had malignantly contrived his own 
 poisoning by slow degrees and ingenious processes of 
 torture. It was, in the chief butler s opinion, " a low- 
 down trick, but only what might be expected from a 
 man o no fam ly and no bringing-up to speak of. 
 Twas pity he hadn t done the thing in genteeler style, 
 and made a respectable corp of himself, instead of a 
 half-rotten lorg like that stretched out up-sta rs." 
 
 And so October St. John the golden-mouthed 
 amonw the twelve fathers of the vear went, and in 
 
 O * 
 
 the second week of November, on a day when dis 
 heartened drizzle, gray as lead and chill as snow, alter 
 nated with angry showers that pitted the river with the 
 force of bullets a sloop was lashed up the stream by 
 east winds, and moored at the Westover dock. 
 
 Two well-known figures came ashore, and mounted 
 the winding flight of stone steps that were as slippery 
 as glass. They were Martha Jaqueline and Miss Lotsie 
 Johnson.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 343 
 
 "Does Evelyn know that I am here?" queried the 
 former of Madam Byrd, who met her in the hall. 
 
 " !N"o. She has not been down-stairs to-day. She is 
 not so well fora week past, and her father counselled her 
 to remain in her chamber until the weather changes." 
 
 " Let nobody boar the news to her until I have seen 
 Colonel Byrd. My first errand is with him. He is in 
 the library do yon say ?" 
 
 Madam watched her to the library-door and ventured 
 not to follow her. The serious directness of the visitor s 
 address, the grave dignity of her bearing, rebuked 
 curiosity. Something had happened, or was to happen, 
 and the experiences of the past year made the good 
 woman timorous of getting herself " mixed up" with 
 new adventures. 
 
 The sun, whose existence was that day received as a 
 fact by faith alone, was an hour nearer his setting when 
 Colonel Byrd handed Miss Jaqueline up the stairs and 
 to his daughter s chamber. His wife, meeting them on 
 the way, after one glance at him, passed on without 
 speaking. His face was haggard, the down-drawn 
 lines cut deeply as if never to be erased. It was the 
 first look of age she had ever seen there, and it terrified 
 her to tears. 
 
 He pushed back Evelyn s door softly. A faint voice, 
 like a tuneful whisper, was singing : 
 
 " "When the willow droops the greenest, 
 Sweeps the streamlet s rim the cleanest; 
 When the young bird flies the strongest, 
 When the sky-glow shines the longest 
 It is then I ll take my Norma 
 
 From the green hedge o er the lea 1" 
 
 A lon, trembling sigh followed.
 
 344 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 Evelyn sat before the fire in an easy-chair, propped 
 by pillows, her feet upon a cushioned stool. Upon the 
 chill, neutral-tinted light if that be light which can 
 only be said not to be darkness falling sluggishly 
 through the windows, the flaming logs tossed rosy 
 waves that ran up the still folds of the dim-blue gown 
 enwrapping the invalid ; kissed and flecked and dallied 
 with the folded hands ; struck prismatic sparkles from 
 the " wish-ring," but kept back from the white face with 
 its deep, shining eyes and nameless look of serene ex 
 pectation which those who have once seen it upon a 
 beloved visage, know ever afterward as the light that 
 comes at eventide. 
 
 Martha brought her hands together in an impulsive 
 gesture, and laid her brow upon them for an instant; 
 her features worked as she signed to her companion to 
 precede her. 
 
 " It is I, my daughter !" There was a palpable 
 and successful effort to bear himself as she was used 
 to see him. "And I have brought a visitor whom 
 you will be more glad to see Mistress Martha Jaque- 
 line!" 
 
 Evelyn settled her eyes searchingly upon her friend s 
 face, as the latter arose from her embrace : 
 
 "You bring me news!" she said, confidently. "Sit 
 you there, and tell me all." 
 
 " You are right, dear ! Martha sat down upon the 
 foot-cushion, leaned her arms upon the elbows of the 
 chair, and returned the gaze by one full of love and 
 meaning. " I have tidings. I came hither for no 
 other purpose than to bring them to you. It is your 
 father s wish that all shall be said in his presence."
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 345 
 
 Evelyn reached up her hand to touch his cheek, and 
 motioned to him to sit beside her. 
 
 " Papa and I have no secrets from one another. Say 
 what you will !" 
 
 " Dear heart !" While Martha talked, she never 
 withdrew her meaningful eyes from the lily- face 
 drooped toward her ; her fingers were interlaced to 
 torture, but her tone did not falter. " All that Caliban 
 said was true. The hearing of it should have prepared 
 you for what is coming. When the gale drove the 
 schooner out to sea, she carried Charles Mordaunt with 
 her. She was heard from, you know, within a few 
 weeks afterward. We did not dream then how closely 
 the news concerned us. We have heard again of her 
 and of him. He is living, and well !" 
 
 For reply there were the closer clasping of one 
 wasted hand upon the other, the upraising of eyes 
 glorious in devout gladness, the fluttering breath be 
 tween the parted lips. The spirit, like a captive dove, 
 strained at the cord withholding it from the sun-bright 
 fields of ether. 
 
 Martha s intent gaze stirred not from the rapt face. 
 
 " He is well and faithful, dearest !" 
 
 A beautiful smile, proud and sweet, prefaced the 
 response : 
 
 " Living or dying, he would be that!" 
 
 " Yes living or dying, every beat of that true 
 heart is yours. He was at the other side of the world 
 when he wrote to me on his way to England whither 
 imperative business called him. He will be here ere 
 long. Are you hearkening, my dearling? He did 
 not go so far away of his own will. Xor did the
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 storm beat the vessel out of her course. It was in 
 tended that he should be borne off, and you were to 
 suppose that he had deserted you " 
 
 A motion of fine disdain checked her. 
 
 " But I should have known better ! He did not fear 
 that! Goon!" 
 
 " He boarded the schooner of his own motion, and 
 went below to see his boxes disposed in cabin and hold. 
 Poor Roger was sent home without his knowledge. 
 When he would have quitted the cabin, the door was 
 fast. He struck open a port-hole and shouted to 
 Roger. Caliban answered. Then the hurricane came 
 upon them. 
 
 "Sweetheart! my part of the tale is told. The 
 residue you will have from other lips. Before I quit 
 you for a little space, I pray you hold to your heart 
 the honey and wine I have brought. Say, while you 
 listen to the rest, He lives ! he loves me ! He is 
 coming! coming! coming! and put from you what 
 would else be as bitter as gall. My snow-drop! mine 
 bonnie, bonnie bird ! kiss me once, and let me be gone, 
 that what is to follow be done quickly !" 
 
 Evelyn looked after her in bewilderment, then in 
 quiringly at her father. He had arisen to open the 
 door for Martha to pass out. He now came around 
 before his daughter, and bent one knee to the floor. At 
 the sunken cheeks, the dreary eyes raised to her, Evelyn 
 cried out, dismayed, 
 
 " Papa ! oh, what is it ?" 
 
 " You have heard that your lover was spirited 
 away and why. Against his will, he was a wanderer 
 upon the face of the deep for six months. It was
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 347 
 
 meant that a full year should pass before you could 
 hear from him. That he whose sentence this was, was 
 himself kept in ignorance by the interposition of a 
 providential agency, of the fate of this most unfortu 
 nate gentleman, is no excuse for the crime that cost 
 him his liberty and happiness that has broken your 
 heart ! Can you forgive him V 
 
 She stroked his hair; stooped over to kiss him be 
 tween the eyes ; the serenity of countenance and attitude 
 told that she was feeding upon the honey and wine left 
 to her in such bounteous measure. 
 
 "It was that unhappy man that lies speechless and 
 nigh unto death, I suppose. Martha warned me, once 
 and again, to beware of him, and I believed her not. 
 Poor wretch !" 
 
 "Child! child! no! He was the tool mine was 
 the hand! It is your father who, on bended knee, 
 confesses that he has sinned against heaven and against 
 you, and begs you to forgive him !" 
 
 She recoiled sharply, made as though she would 
 spurn him as he clung to her knees, a horror of 
 loathing, a terror of him as of something base and 
 noxious and abhorrent, was instinct in every feature. 
 She tore her gown from his hold, struggling to her 
 feet as if to escape from his touch and presence, 
 
 "My GOD!" she cried, frantically. " And this man 
 is my father ! Why was I not let to die before hearing 
 it?" 
 
 In another second, she had fallen upon his neck. 
 
 " Papa ! Papa ! May the Saviour of sinners for 
 give me as I forgive you !" 
 
 When Martha Jaqueline again looked into the room,
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 the father sat with his child in his arms, her head 
 cradled on his shoulder, her wasted hands clasped be 
 hind his neck. The fire-waves had washed the gray 
 light so little removed from shadow, back to the win 
 dows and out into the stormy gloaming. Upon the 
 daughter s uplifted face was the radiance of an infinite 
 blessedness, but the friend beheld, with a failing heart, 
 in eye and upon cheek, the shadow of a mightier 
 Coming, even that of the Guest that knocks but once 
 at the door of every human heart, and will not be turned 
 away. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 IT all was so long ago, dear reader, that many echoes 
 of that eventful Past dispersed into naught before you 
 and I or our parents were born. 
 
 Hence we have no further word, traditional or doc 
 umentary, of the stricken secretary after we leave him 
 lying, a bit of worthless drift-wood, in his upper cham 
 ber dependent for daily tendance upon menials who 
 despised him, the scheming brain benumbed, the facile 
 tongue and fingers alike palsied. From obscurity he 
 came, into obscurity lie returned. 
 
 Caliban, we are told, lived to a dignified old age, not 
 scrupling to derive a liberal percentage of the respect 
 awarded him by old and young, from the ever-growing 
 narrative of the deed done upon his cranium. In 
 time, when tljose who could have established or refuted 
 the tale had passed away, it came to be believed that a
 
 IUS GREAT SELF. 349 
 
 silver plate had been inserted in place of bits of bone 
 shattered by the bullet. The scalp, taking kindly to 
 the substitute, had healed over it, leaving a ridge about 
 the metal edges. Capillary growth was more scrupu 
 lous, and the bare space upon the butler s pate was 
 regarded with reverential curiosity by his- juniors. 
 
 A story that does him more honor is that, in dying, 
 he asked and obtained the promise from his "young 
 master," then a middle-aged man and Colonel of a 
 Colonial regiment of Virginia troops, that he might 
 be buried at " Mis Evelyn s" feet. Whether or not 
 this be authentic, no trace of the grave remains. 
 
 The little chapel was, by order of the second wife 
 and widow of William, the Third Byrd of Westover, 
 removed, brick by brick, and reconstructed at Evelyn- 
 ton, about three miles farther inland, and is still used 
 as a house of worship. The flat stone covering the 
 mortal relics of Theodorick Bland marks the place once 
 enclosed as a chancel. 
 
 This is Christmas-week, and wassail, like unto the 
 times that are no more, and can never be again, pre 
 vails at Westover. A cold rain set in at nightfall, 
 but "curtained, and closed, and warm," I sit before 
 the glowing grate in the drawing-room, in converse 
 with the sunny-faced, sound-hearted chatelaine of the 
 ancient homestead, and let the storm drive and the hours 
 fleet by. From the billiard-room, in the third story, 
 ripples of merry talk and leaping rills of laughter fall 
 down the stairs that once echoed the firm tread of the 
 courtly Master of the realm ; the curiously-twisted 
 balustrades of which were swept by Madam s brocades 
 and Evelyn s muslins and taffetas. 
 
 30
 
 350 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 It was at supper-time, and in gay chat with her young 
 guests, that our hostess introduced the topic that has 
 engaged her tongue and mine since the boys and girls 
 went off to their balls and cues. 
 
 " You must go on a rainy midnight, such as this will 
 be, each of you alone," she said, in mock solemnity, 
 " to Colonel Byrd s tomb out there in the middle of 
 the garden, and, putting your lips close to the ground, 
 say, Colonel Byrd ! do you know any reason why you 
 should lie here, in unconsecrated ground and alone, 
 while the rest of your family are buried together over 
 yonder in the grave-yard? Say it distinctly and re 
 spectfully each by himself or herself, out there in 
 the rainy midnight and he will answer, Nothing 
 nothing / " 
 
 The tall monument, defaced by the storms of one 
 hundred and fifty years, says enough to justify his 
 silence. He was the elh e of Sir Robert Southwell, 
 " the bosom-friend of the learned and illustrious Charles 
 Boyle, Earl of Orrery. . . . To all this were added a 
 great elegancy of taste and life, the well-bred gentleman 
 and polite companion, the splendid economist, the con 
 stant enemy of exorbitant power, and hearty friend to 
 the liberties of his country." 
 
 In his diary he sets down, with no flourish of self- 
 glorification : 
 
 " We laid the Foundation of Two large Cities, one 
 at Shoccoe s, to be called Richmond, and the other at 
 the Point of Appomattox, to be called Petersburg." 
 
 The ambitions structure in the middle of the garden, 
 and Westover, lifting high in air the peak of its win 
 dowed roof, are but two of his many monuments.
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 351 
 
 The Colony owed him ranch; the State owes him no 
 less. 
 
 Our hostess is the direct descendant of sweet Anne 
 Harrison, and while in the four-feet-on-a-fender inti 
 macy of the wintry night, our thoughts mingle spon 
 taneously in one deepening channel, she tells me how 
 her ancestress and Evelyn Byrd loved and sought one 
 another; of the promise made, a month before the death 
 of the younger woman, to show herself to her friend 
 even after she should have " gone quite away." 
 
 "The story runs," says my companion, " that, on 
 the anniversary of that mid-October day, Mrs. Harrison 
 visited the church-yard, and, while sitting there and 
 thinking sadly of her lost friend, she saw Evelyn glide 
 toward her from the church-porch, between the graves. 
 She was robed all in white : she moved lightly and 
 
 J O ^ 
 
 swiftly ; her face was bright with ecstasy, and more 
 beautiful, with an elevated, ethereal beauty, than ever 
 in life. She paused beside her own grave-stone. You 
 know she is buried on the spot where her last parting 
 with her lover took place ? There she stopped, threw 
 a kiss to her friend, with a smile of unutterable love 
 and happiness and vanished !" 
 
 A less pleasing legend, and less credible, is that the 
 pale shade of " The Fair Evelyn" as she is named in 
 family tradition walks by night in the corridors of 
 Westover and along the rose-alleys, wan and woful, 
 forever plucking at the ring placed upon her finger by 
 her titled lover. 
 
 We have seen, to-day, her portrait, transferred from 
 Westover to Brandon, when her grand-niece married a 
 Harrison of Martin s Brandon. Near it hangs that of
 
 352 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 her father in court-dress. The resemblance between 
 them is marvellous, especially in the brows, the bril 
 liant, broad-lidded eyes, and the delicately-symmetrical 
 hands. Evelyn s gown is blue, faint and dim in shade, 
 and modestly decollete in cut. Her abundant hair is 
 rich brown ; her perfect hands are binding flowers about 
 a shepherdess-hat ; a rose is over her left temple. By a 
 conceit characteristic of the artist of the period, said in 
 this instance to have been Sir Godfrey Kneller, a red 
 bird is perched in the tree at her right ; over her left 
 shoulder is a lane with sheep. 
 
 There is nothing in the picture, with its conventional 
 affectation of pastoral life mocked by court-costume, 
 to hint at the constancy that made her life romantic, or 
 the sorrow that lent it tragedy, unless a certain pen- 
 siveness of the dark eyes be premonition of coming 
 shadows. It was painted in England, before the 
 shadows gathered. 
 
 " She was beloved by and betrothed to Lord Peter 
 borough, a Roman Catholic nobleman, but her father 
 prevented the marriage on account of the noble suitor s 
 religion. Refusing all offers from other gentlemen, she 
 died of a broken heart." 
 
 I have copied the few, pregnant, pathetic lines from 
 a time-spotted family MS., as an abstract of what parent 
 and child chose to have the world know. 
 
 "Of Mr. Fontaine, who spent his whole ministry of 
 about forty years in the county of Charles City" (in 
 which Westover is situated), "with the exception of a 
 short time at Jamestown and Wallingford parish, it 
 becomes us to add something more," is the preamble 
 penned by a distinguished Bishop of his Church to a
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 353 
 
 glowing recital of the virtues and works of this one of 
 the Church s servants. 
 
 The same pen copies a letter which includes affec 
 tionate mention of " my highly- respected aunt, Martha 
 Jaqueline, who died at the age of ninety-three. . . . Our 
 dear aunt, Martha Jaqueline, chose to take upon her 
 the title of Mrs. at the age of fifty, this being the 
 custom with spinsters in that day." 
 
 We saw at Shirley yesterday the portrait of Lady 
 Bess, the " good-humored little Fairy" of Colonel 
 Byrd s diary. The picture was painted when she was 
 seventeen, just prior to her marriage to William the 
 Third of Westover, the match agreed upon between 
 the parents of the contracting parties. The midnight 
 hour strikes while I listen to the tale of a union made 
 unhappy by strifes of temper between two spoiled 
 children, of her mother-in-law s intolerance with 
 " Betty s" frivolous tastes and extravagances ; lastly, 
 of her death by the fall upon her of a heavy oaken 
 press, or armoire. 
 
 Hapless little Fairy ! We give her more than one 
 sigh in returning to her whose petted darling she 
 was. 
 
 "And Evelyn died without seeing Lord Peter 
 borough again ?" I lament. 
 
 The door uncloses to admit a man who catches the 
 name. He repeats it, in drawing a chair up to the 
 fire. 
 
 " Lord Peterborough won the cup at the Inter 
 national Steeple Chase at Baden-Baden in 18 7-," says 
 the President of the Gentleman s Riding Club, whose 
 own prizes for similar victories are notable. 
 x 30*
 
 354 HIS GREAT SELF. 
 
 We look at him in amazed interest that moves him 
 to add particulars. 
 
 " The Major and I were abroad together that year, 
 and went to Baden-Baden to attend the races. The 
 young English lord rode magnificently !" warming with 
 his theme. " A noble-looking fellow he was, too, with 
 fair hair, blue eyes, and as fine a pair of shoulders as 
 you ever saw !" 
 
 This true " happening" is but one of many proofs 
 we term idly " coincidences," that the world is round, 
 and generations are but so many circles intersecting 
 each other, most often at the most unlikely points. 
 
 In at the opening door, like the bound of a brook in 
 June, all sparkle and laughter, troop the young people. 
 A girl flutters to the piano and begins to sing. A sad 
 ballad, of course, such as only happy women dare to 
 sing. As with full heart and eyes I steal away up the 
 stairs, I hear the burden : 
 
 " My eyes are filled with tears 
 
 And my heart is numb with woe 
 It seems as if twere yesterday, 
 And it all was Long Ago !" 
 
 In my chamber once Evelyn Byrd s the little 
 incident of the Baden-Baden steeple-chase banishes 
 sleep from my eyelids. With only the soft coal fire for 
 confidante, as I hearken to the heavy east wind, the 
 plash and drip of the rain against my panes, I paint 
 to myself the picture of the Berkeley race-day, and 
 the hero of the course, the knightly youth with the 
 broidered scarf crossing a heart bounding high with 
 love, and hope, and courage, and the grand stand,
 
 HIS GREAT SELF. 355 
 
 with that other superb figure in the front rank of 
 spectators. 
 
 With the scene before me, "as if twere yesterday," 
 I marvel anew at the chance word that, a century-and- 
 a-half later, has dashed upon the canvas the sketch of 
 the fair-haired, blue-eyed " crack" rider of that other 
 course across the sea, winning the cup under the eyes 
 of the present Master of Westover. 
 
 THE END.
 
 NOVELS BY 
 CAPT. CHARLES KING, U.S.A. 
 
 CAPTAIN BLAKE. 
 
 \VithIllustrations. I2mo. Cloth, $1.25. 
 
 " It is like a long draught of clear, cool spring water after a 
 hot and dusty desert ride to read this fresh, breezy, wholesome 
 story, peopled by manly men and womanly women, and full of 
 the bold, free life of the soldier on the frontier, with enough of 
 the schemes of scamps to give it lively interest, and abounding 
 in brilliant and charming pictures of the life of the soldier in 
 the quiet of peace at the remote frontier posts and the thrilling 
 excitement of battle with wily, savage, and desperate foes. . . . 
 Captain King has done much to give the people at large, who 
 have known next to nothing of the dangers and privations and 
 priceless services of our small military force, a better idea of 
 what the country owes to its meagre but gallant force of de 
 fenders. He writes of the life, the dangers, the joys, the sor 
 rows, of which he has personal knowledge, and there is no 
 more lagging or dulness in this tale than in many of the won 
 derful marches made by the force of which he is a worthy 
 member. This story is one of his best." Chicago Times. 
 
 THE COLONEL S DAUGHTER. With Illustrations 
 MARION S FAITH. With Illustrations , 
 
 STARLIGHT RANCH, and Other Stories 
 KITTY S CONQUEST 
 
 LARAMIE ; OR, THE QUEEN OF BEDLAM 
 THE DESERTER, and FROM THE RANKS 
 Two SOLDIERS, and DUNRAVEN RANCH 
 
 .00 
 
 .00 
 
 .00 
 
 .00 
 
 .00 
 
 " He is a graceful and vigorous writer. His novels are sure 
 to be out of the common run : he depicts military life on the 
 frontier with a fidelity that has won much praise; his romance 
 is always pure and sweet; and while he is sometimes severe 
 with his women characters, he has the art of setting forth the 
 better qualities of the sex with enticing realism. In a word, he 
 is simple and natural in all that he writes. To take up a book 
 from his pen is to be sure of an hour of harmless pleasure." 
 Boston Beacon. 
 
 For sale by all Booksellers. Sent by the Publishers, 
 post-paid, on receipt of the price. J. B. Lippincott 
 Company, 715 and 717 Market Street, Philadelphia.
 
 ENTERTAINING STORIES 
 
 BY THE MISSES WARNER. 
 
 PATIENCE. 
 
 By ANNA B. WARNER. I2mo. Cloth, $1.25. 
 
 " There are some few books making no pretence to plot, yet so mag 
 netic that one is held entranced, and such a one is Patience. The hero 
 ine is not one of those too-good-to-live creatures found only in story-books, 
 but just such a sweet, impulsive girl that we all cannot but love." Balti 
 more American. 
 
 "Told so well and withal so natural character, scenes, incidents, all 
 that any reader with the least spark of sentiment will come to love and 
 respect the sweet girl heroine, and close the book with a sigh that Patience 
 Hathaway, after all, lost the lover she sweetly worshipped and failed to 
 receive in maturer years the reward that ought to have been bestowed upon 
 such a heroine and perhaps would have been were the writer not retailing 
 a story of long ago as it was told her. By all means read Anna B. Warner s 
 latest and best romance." Detroit Commercial-Advertiser. 
 
 DAISY. A Sequel to Melbourne House. 
 DOLLARS AND CENTS SAY AND SEAL. 
 MY BROTHER S KEEPER. THE HILLS OF THE SHATEMUC. 
 QUEECHY. THE WIDE, WIDE WORLD. 
 
 I2mo. Cloth, $1.50 per volume. Sets of eight volumes, 
 uniform binding, in neat box, $11.75. 
 
 " The Misses Warner are among the best friends a young girl can 
 have as chaperones into the delightful kingdom of romance." Philadel 
 phia Public Ledger. 
 
 THE WIDE, WIDE WORLD. 
 
 By ELIZABETH WETHERELL. With Etchings by FRED 
 ERICK DIELMAN. Complete in one Volume. Small 8vo. 
 Printed on laid paper. Cloth extra, $2.50. 
 
 With the possible exception of " Uncle Tom s Cabin," no story has 
 had such a sale as " The Wide, Wide World." In one year something like 
 125,000 copies were sold, and up to the present time the sales have reached 
 nearly 450,000 copies. The story will be always read by succeeding gen 
 erations, and ever find a welcome in American homes. The additional 
 attraction of Dielman s etchings will create a new demand for the book. 
 
 For sale by all Booksellers. Sent by the Publishers, 
 post-paid, on receipt of the price. J. B. Lippincott 
 Company, 715 and 717 Market Street, Philadelphia.
 
 .JAKEN BY SIEGE. 
 
 A Novel. Handsomely issued in I2mo form. Extra cloth 
 binding, $1.25. 
 
 " A graphic and very interesting anonymous story of a young journal 
 ist s experiences in New York. Who the hero may be is enveloped in 
 mystery, hut that the heroine is Miss Clara Louise Kellogg there is little 
 doubt. The other characters will be readily recognized as conspicuous in 
 New York society. The story reveals the inside workings of some of the 
 metropolitan newspapers, and shows how, by pluck, brains, and luck, a 
 new man may sometimes ri^e rapidly to the highest rank in journalism, 
 distancing the veterans. The author has unusual ability as a writer of 
 fiction." Albany Journal. 
 
 BY MARY AGNES TINCKER. 
 
 AURORA. 
 
 Illustrated. 121110. Cloth, $1.25. 
 
 " It is a story so delicately wrought, so artistically perfect, that one 
 reads it with a delight that deepens into fervor and enthusiasm. It is a 
 story of Italian life, of love, of intrigue, of despair, of aspiration. It is 
 full of dramatic situations, and ot subtle, pervasive power." Boston 
 Evening Traveller. 
 
 " Everything which Miss Tincker writes bears the stamp of a refined 
 mind, a poetic temperament, and unmistakable genius. The story glows 
 with Southern warmth and sparkles with good things, and is very complete 
 in every way." London Whitehall Review. 
 
 THE JEWEL IN THE LOTOS. 
 
 Illustrated. I2mo. Extra cloth, $1.25. 
 
 " There is not a dull page in it. Every one in this novel, from Glen- 
 lyon to the servants in the kitchen, has his separate and rounded individu 
 ality. It is full of beautiful pictures, and has certain passages we should 
 be glad to quote, but we must be content to leave these to the reader to 
 discover." The Literary World. 
 
 " An Italian tale of the highest order of literary merit. The pictures 
 of life in the land of bright skies and dark deeds are powerfully drawn, as 
 with a masculine hand, while the emotions are played upon with a touch 
 delicately feminine. The language is as fluent as the discernment is keen, i 
 and the reader is carried along by an easy progress through the details of 
 a rather sad plot as smoothly as the glide of a gondola on a Venetian 
 canal, constantly enjoying sensations as grateful as the balmy air that 
 soothes the feelings in the land of history and of romance. It is a valuable 
 addition to the literature of the day." Pittsburg Commercial-Gazette. 
 
 For sale by all Booksellers. Sent by the Publishers, 
 post-paid, on receipt of the price. J. B. Lippincott 
 Company, 715 and 717 Market Street, Philadelphia.
 
 s 
 
 TORIES BY 
 
 FRANCES COURTENAY BAYLOR. 
 
 ON BOTH SIDES. 
 
 I2mo. Cloth, $1.25. 
 
 " A novel, entertaining from beginning to end, with brightness that 
 never falls flat, that always suggests something beyond the mere amuse 
 ment, that will be most enjoyed by those of most cultivation, that is clever, 
 keen, and intellectual enough to be recognized as genuine wit, and yet 
 good-natured and amiable enough to be accepted as the most delightful 
 humor. It is not fun, but intelligent wit; it is not mere comicality, but 
 charming humor; it is not a collection of bright sayings of clever people, 
 but a reproduction of ways of thought and types of manner infinitely en 
 tertaining to the reader, while not in the least funny to the actor, or 
 intended by him to appear funny. It is inimitably good as a rendering of 
 the peculiarities of British and of American nature and training, while it 
 is so perfectly free from anything like ridicule, that the victims would be the 
 first to smile." The Critic. 
 
 BEHIND THE BLUE RIDGE. 
 
 A SHOCKING EXAMPLE, 
 
 AND OTHER SKETCHES. I2mo. Cloth, $1.2$. 
 
 " Rarely have we enjoyed a more delightful series of literary enter 
 tainments than have been afforded by the handsome volume containing 
 fourteen stories and sketches from the bright pen of Frances Courtenay 
 Baylor, whose On Both Sides has won for her so enviable a reputation 
 on both sides of the Atlantic." Boston Home Journal. 
 
 Miss Baylor s complete works (" A Shocking Example," " On 
 Both Sides," and " Behind the Blue Ridge"), three volumes, in 
 box, $3.75. 
 
 For sale by all Booksellers. Sent by the Publishers, 
 post-paid, on receipt of the price. J. B. Lippincott 
 Company, 715 and 717 Market Street, Philadelphia.
 
 UC SOUT 
 
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