|K 
 
 * 
 
 r 
 
 TO 
 
 BY 
 
 WflRQUlS OF LORN

 
 Jfrom Sbabow to 
 Sunlight 
 
 BY THE 
 MARQUIS OF LORNE, G.C.M.G. 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 LOVE AND PERIL, A STORY OF THE FAR NORTHWEST, ETC. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 
 1891
 
 Authorized Edition.
 
 FROM SHADOW TO SUNLIGHT. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 " OH, let me see the cavern. Do take 
 me if the weather be fine enough," said 
 a beautiful American girl, who with her 
 father was visiting Europe, and had 
 found her way to a Scotch country house, 
 after tasting of the joys of the London 
 season. Her father was a gentleman 
 who had been in office in New York 
 State, but had given up public life for 
 the leisure which he loved to use for 
 travel and reading. As in the case of 
 most Americans who love literature, he 
 had at his fingers' ends most of our great 
 authors. Scott's novels had of course 
 made him wish to see Scotland, and he 
 had gladly accepted for himself and 
 daughter an invitation given to him by
 
 4 from Shaboro ta Stmlight. 
 
 the proprietor of some wild coast and 
 moorland on the West of Ross. 
 
 "Well," he said, after his daughter had 
 spoken, " I am of Dr. Johnson's opinion 
 in the matter of caves. There is hardly 
 one that repays the trouble of a scramble 
 down into their gloomy passages. Even 
 in the Kentucky Mammoth Cave or those 
 of Virginia I have been very glad to es- 
 cape from the underground corridors and 
 holes, although they are filled with ex- 
 quisite and elegant stalactitic forms, and 
 to leave them all behind, again to emerge 
 and breathe the free air of heaven." 
 
 "Yes, sir, you are right with dear old 
 Sam Johnson," said the old laird who 
 venerated the great Sam, his dictionary 
 and everything that he had ever written, 
 with the reverence often shown by a sim- 
 ple-minded gentleman for a literary bear ; 
 " but Sam Johnson himself was much 
 pleased with a cave on a neighboring 
 coast not unlike that one which I desire
 
 from Qhaboro 10 Sunlight. 5 
 
 to show to you to-day. You will here ex- 
 perience none of the unpleasant sensa- 
 tions of being in a hole underground, for 
 you will be able to see the ocean from a 
 great part of the interior, and light com- 
 ing from the sea even in its largest hall, 
 though not beyond that." 
 
 " If you and my daughter unite your 
 forces, I yield with the best grace," and 
 so the matter was settled to the young 
 lady's great delight. She had much en- 
 joyed her " good time " in England, and 
 was prepared to be as enthusiastic about 
 Highland scenery as she had been about 
 Westminster Abbey. She liked the free- 
 dom of life in the country house, where 
 two or three of the bachelors were already 
 devoted to her, and willing even to forego 
 a day's grouse shooting or stalking to 
 take part in any expedition she might in- 
 dicate as agreeable to her somewhat way- 
 ward fancy. She had charmed the old 
 laird by insisting on playing chess of an
 
 6 from 0ha&onj to Stmligljt. 
 
 evening with him. He was a venerable 
 ancient who looked antique enough to 
 have drawn a sword for Prince Charles, 
 and whose memory was well stored with 
 the legends of the neighborhood where he 
 now spent his last years, after a long serv- 
 ice in the army. It was a very pretty 
 sight to see the tournaments in which he 
 engaged at chess with Mary Wincott. His 
 strategy was by no means so good as we 
 may hope it had been in the days of his 
 military youth. Perhaps he thought more 
 of his opponent than was quite compati- 
 ble with the confidence in his own powers, 
 which is so necessary an element of vic- 
 tory. It was certainly wonderful to see 
 how much surprised he appeared to be 
 when the flashing eyes and pearly teeth 
 shone for a moment between the lovely 
 lips opposite to him, laughed in his face, 
 and " Check Queen ! " rang from the 
 round throat of " little Miss Mary," as he 
 called her. His tall frame, bowed with
 
 from Seaborn to Sunlight. 7 
 
 years, and clothed in a handsome dress- 
 ing-gown, below which he wore a long 
 crimson velvet waistcoat, would stretch 
 forward, and then the fine old head, with 
 the white locks brushed carefully forward 
 in the old style, the fine curve of the 
 prominent nose, and white mustache and 
 beard, would bend over the board, and 
 then look gravely up into Mary Wincott's 
 face, and he would say : 
 
 "By George, I believe you've got me 
 this time ! " and she, with a wealth of 
 darkened, cloudy locks, shaken back from 
 her straight and splendid brows, would 
 let the starlight of her great blue eyes 
 illume her perfectly molded and happy 
 countenance, and then she would sweetly 
 say: 
 
 " Never mind, Colonel McLain, you 
 will win next time." 
 
 Yes, indeed, it was a sight well worth 
 seeing when the head of the old man and 
 the head of the girl were bent toward
 
 8 from Shaboro to Sunlight. 
 
 each other in that joyous antagonism, 
 which made both, first so serious and then 
 so merry, as they exchanged gracious lit- 
 tle courtesies on the result of the game. 
 To be sure, the combat generally ended 
 one way only, and Beauty prevailed as 
 usual over Valor; but Valor's chivalry 
 made glorious his defeat, and Beauty's 
 gracious, smiles and condolence made 
 beautiful her victory. An artist who was 
 one of the party staying at the house 
 made sketches of the pair so engaged; 
 but he never produced anything worthy 
 of his theme, and the subject remains one 
 which, if well rendered, would make the 
 fortune of a painter equal to the task. 
 
 " Miss Mary, you don't mean to say 
 you wish to scramble over all those rocks 
 that guard the cave's mouth ? " 
 
 " Yes, indeed, I do, Colonel, if your son 
 will allow me : for although we don't 
 walk so much in America as English girls 
 do here, yet it seems to me that your cli-
 
 from Shabmn to Stmlight. 9 
 
 mate makes walking pleasant, for it is 
 never either too hot or too cold." 
 
 " Well, I hope they will take good care 
 of you," said the old man ; and one of the 
 young guests forthwith exclaimed that if 
 Miss Mary let him, he would answer for 
 it that she would " not come to grief." 
 
 " You see I shall have plenty of guides 
 and guards," she answered, laughing. 
 " But is the way there so very difficult ? " 
 
 "Yes," said Mr. McLain, "this cave, 
 and others near it, have been used by 
 smugglers even in quite recent times, be- 
 cause it is difficult to get at them. I be- 
 lieve that very many gallons of excellent 
 whisky have, even within the last twenty- 
 five years, been brought out of that place. 
 During the winter gales, when a strong 
 wind is beating the surf in from the west, 
 and the great swelling rollers of the At- 
 lantic are hurled against the cliffs, no 
 Revenue vessel can approach ; and from 
 the landward side it is always easy for
 
 io from 0hab0u) to Sunlight. 
 
 the smugglers, or rather the lawless whis- 
 ky brewers, to watch the few paths over 
 the moorlands, so as to give notice of any 
 person's approach. If strangers are in the 
 district it is soon known, and when there 
 are none to landward these robbers of 
 Her Majesty's Excise chest can be quite 
 sure that ' the coast is clear,' for no vessel 
 could at such time approach the shore. 
 Then descending the cliff and skirting the 
 boiling surf, which at flood-tide, or even 
 half-tide, effectually shuts out all prying 
 eyes even in fine weather, the smugglers 
 can go securely to work and get a lot of 
 work done before morning, when the tide 
 having turned to ebb they can carry out 
 their stuff, concealing it among the rocks 
 until it be safe for one of their boats to 
 take it away by water, or until it can be 
 carried inland." 
 
 " Why, how romantic ! " cried Miss 
 Mary. 
 
 "Yes," said McLain. "You can't im-
 
 .from Shaboto 10 Sunlight, n 
 
 agine a sight more weird than a high tide 
 on such a night, a moon silvering the 
 mighty surge as it lifts itself to break in 
 foam and send its hollow roar far along 
 the rocks and into the great caves. A 
 baffled Government vessel may be stand- 
 ing perhaps off and on outside as a phan- 
 tom in the gray of the further ocean. 
 And within the arched vaults of the cav- 
 ern you may fancy the busy figures of 
 the smugglers crossing and recrossing the 
 sandy floor of the immense grotto, their 
 fires rapidly distilling the ' dew,' knowing 
 that for many hours their retreat is sealed 
 from any human eye, for no sign of their 
 work by light or sound can be seen or 
 heard from without. They make the best 
 of the time, and labor hard through all 
 the night hours, so that by the morning 
 there may be something ' well worth the 
 drinking.' As the firelight flickers on the 
 rough and curving walls and the sea winds 
 move the ferns that hang in plume-like
 
 12 from Shaboto ta Sunlight. 
 
 groups from the ledges, and the smoke 
 from the secret stills floats over the half- 
 illuminated scene, one might imagine that 
 preparations were being made for deeds 
 far more evil and mysterious than the 
 making of a few wholesome 'nightcaps' 
 for old men like my father there. It al- 
 ways seems to me that the punishment 
 for such work is even now far too heavy, 
 though it is nothing to what it was in the 
 old days when to see a smuggler was to 
 fire at him ' straightaway.' " 
 
 " If you go, mind you, bring me back 
 some whisky for a nightcap," said old 
 Colonel McLain, " but you'll have to start 
 early. Had we not better be thinking 
 about our beds now ? " 
 
 Thus the happy party began to break 
 up, as the ladies wished good-night to the 
 gentlemen ; but to these a cigar with 
 more talk seemed indispensable, and they 
 begged the aged Colonel not to retire so 
 soon, but to give them for a little while
 
 .from &hub0to 10 Stmlight. 13 
 
 longer the benefit of his presence and con- 
 versation. 
 
 " Ah," he said, " I am too old. I will 
 leave you now, gentlemen." But his good 
 nature was not proof to their entreaties, 
 and he was wheeled near the fire, where 
 he declared it was a shameful dissipation 
 on his part to remain up so late, saying 
 he was nearly eighty years of age. They 
 declared that this could not be, and that 
 he was younger in mind than any of 
 them. 
 
 " I began to get old when most of you 
 were not born, and my hair was gray 
 when you were babes, although there is 
 none now." 
 
 " I wish I had as much still on my 
 head," said a very bald young man of 
 forty. " I've tried to prevent it going, 
 and concealed the alarming deficiency 
 by putting it over the bare places, but it 
 was all of no use." He quoted the epi- 
 gram:
 
 14 from QhabotD to Sunlight. 
 
 " Our hair, when youth's before us, see 
 
 Brushed back. Life's ours, we laugh ! 
 When forward brushed, be certain we 
 Look back on more than half ! " 
 
 "You are too kind to an old man," 
 smiled the Colonel. " But it is not long 
 since that an excursion like that you will 
 make to-morrow would have delighted 
 me. Long as my days have been, how- 
 ever, I have never seen reason to believe 
 in any of the bogies said to haunt men in 
 caverns or elsewhere." He declared that 
 although he had heard of such in the 
 underground places near this, he had not 
 thought of this matter at all, so lightly 
 did he regard the legends and supersti- 
 tions of the people. Who did not know 
 that in every big hole in the ground 
 throughout all Celtic Scotland and all 
 Celtic Ireland there was either a mysteri- 
 ous piper or a strange harper ? Who has 
 not heard of the piping or harping in the 
 dimmest corners, of musicians who retired
 
 from Shabcto la Stmlight. 15 
 
 as mortals entered their haunts, and 
 marched away playing their melodies 
 until they went too far away into the 
 roots of the mountains to be heard any 
 more ? " Nobody but a fool would repeat 
 such blethers," and he would be ashamed 
 of any one who did so. 
 
 Miss Mary certainly would not have 
 her pleasant dreams of her excursion on 
 the morrow dashed with any subterranean 
 nightmares and she fell to sleep think- 
 ing, like a fanciful child, as in truth she 
 was, of the enchantment of entering the 
 nether world, which was one not of awe 
 and darkness to her mind, but an illu- 
 mined and endless procession of fairies, 
 who carried miniature torches in such 
 numbers that the place wherein they 
 moved sparkled like a huge diamond cor- 
 uscation. Each pendent form and mossy 
 ledge near the entrance of such abodes 
 were but resting-places for the pygmies 
 that must come, bearing deeply interest-
 
 16 from Sljaboro to Stmligljt. 
 
 ing messages to the little inhabitants from 
 others in like fortunate dwellings in far- 
 off lands. It seemed probable that such 
 messages took the love and state missives 
 with greater speed, and by the shorter 
 routes of the upper air, than could the 
 sprites, who might communicate with dis- 
 tant places through the earth passages, 
 which surely must exist. The rock-dove's 
 wing traveled faster than could the little 
 legs of the mountain elves, however strong 
 these last might be, who acted no doubt 
 as carriers for the little fairies, whose dig- 
 nity could not allow them to do more than 
 bear lights and hold councils. 
 
 With such delicious dreams Mary fell 
 asleep, all eagerness for the excursion of 
 the morrow. But the younger McLain, 
 although he said nothing of the things he 
 had heard in regard to the spot they were 
 to visit, would not have laughed at the 
 report that had reached his ears. It 
 might be true that it had been the inter-
 
 from Shadow to Sunlight. 17 
 
 est of smugglers to make the superstitious 
 people about them believe the place to 
 be haunted. That they did so there could 
 be no doubt. But he had once himself 
 seen something there which he could not 
 explain, except upon the general supposi- 
 tion that things were visible to him which 
 were not visible to others. Yet he did 
 not like to think himself gifted in any 
 unusual way. Every circumstance that 
 had made him suspect himself to be so 
 had been most unwelcome to him, and he 
 tried to drive away the very thought. 
 The curious thing was that the smugglers 
 themselves were said to be so suspicious 
 of what they called their workshop that 
 they did not like to go there except in 
 bands of some strength, and not one of 
 them would have ventured, at least so it 
 was said, to sleep there alone. He said 
 nothing, knowing that the result of say- 
 ing something would be either that he 
 would be " chaffed " by others or that he
 
 1 8 .from Shabouj to Sunlight. 
 
 would make them uncomfortable. As it 
 was, one of his friends had already told 
 him that he considered him to be uncanny. 
 There was little wonder at the friend's 
 opinion. This is what had happened. 
 The friend and McLain were sitting to- 
 gether, one windy day in the summer, in 
 the house where the present party had 
 assembled. McLain had been half doz- 
 ing, for the weather was hot, and his com- 
 panion was reading a newspaper, when 
 suddenly, " without rhyme or reason," as 
 the phrase goes, McLain started up, rushed 
 in great agitation to the window, and 
 shouted, as though to an imaginary crew : 
 " Down with the sails, down with them, 
 down d'ye hear? down, down with 
 them ! " and then, after a breathless 
 pause, with the utmost distress of voice, 
 
 " By ! she's gone ! " and then, when 
 
 his companion looked at him in amaze- 
 ment, he was still all trembling. I could 
 only say that he thought he must have
 
 from Shabou) ta Sunlight. 19 
 
 been dreaming, but he had seen a ship go 
 down in a squall. And sure enough, not 
 so far from where they were, but far out 
 of sight of any mortal eyes looking from 
 that house, a ship had thus sunk. Yet 
 McLain knew naught of this vessel. It 
 was nothing to him. He knew none on 
 board, and only saw the vision.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 " O MY, I wish you were coming also, 
 Colonel," said Miss Mary on the follow- 
 ing morning, when after breakfast she 
 went to see the old man in his room. 
 
 "Well, I wish I were, by Mary," he 
 said, and continued, " You see that I can 
 use an old oath or affirmation, Miss Mary, 
 as you do, and I like to use it with your 
 pretty name." 
 
 " How ? I use an oath ! My ! Colonel, 
 what are you saying now ? " 
 
 "It is as I say," replied the old man 
 with a smile, " when you say ' O my,' you 
 use the old oath or form of invocation 
 'O Mary,' shortened into 'O M'y.' It 
 used to be considered enough in these 
 parts in the old Catholic days, but now it
 
 .from Sha&ow to Stmlight. 21 
 
 is a pretty exclamation, more honored in 
 America than here." 
 
 "Well, I never knew that," laughed the 
 girl. " Fancy that I should have to come 
 all this way to know the meaning of an 
 expression I have heard used all my life. 
 O my ! How odd ! " 
 
 " Well, if you check my Queen, I didn't 
 want to check your ' O Mary,' Miss 
 Mary," and away she went to complete 
 her preparations for the expedition. 
 
 It was a long drive, but greatly to be 
 enjoyed. The house in which they had 
 met was situated near the sea and at the 
 mouth of a wide glen flanked by towering 
 hills, various in form and covered on their 
 lower slopes with oak and hazel copse, 
 and above the natural wood with heath 
 that shone purple as the bloom on the 
 serried ranks of the plants caught the 
 eye. The color of the hills was also re- 
 markable, for red rocks made the morn- 
 ing and evening sunlight seem almost un-
 
 22 .from 51) afc DUO to Sunlight. 
 
 naturally ardent in hue, while on the 
 scarred and broken crests above a white 
 rock gleamed snowlike on the summits of 
 the highest hills. Mary, an artist by na- 
 ture and by practice, was enchanted with 
 the beauty of this coloring, and asked : 
 
 " How is it that the rocks up there look 
 almost like snow, they are so white, while 
 all around are the brown and purple or 
 darker tints, and it is only white there 
 against the sky ? It looks as if a little of 
 that foam that fringes the blue of the sea 
 where it breaks quietly on the rocks of 
 the shore had been by some mysterious 
 agency floated away up to the tops of the 
 mountains." 
 
 " Yes," answered young McLain, " that 
 is one of the curiosities of this part of the 
 world, and it is the result of the work 
 both of the sea and of fire or great earth 
 upheavals. All that white stuff that you 
 see two or three thousand feet above our 
 heads lay once on the ocean sands, and,
 
 .from Shabow to Sunlight. 23 
 
 with the wonderful alchemy of the salt 
 depths, or it may be after the water had 
 been drained away and the surface raised, 
 the earth and sand became like flint, hard- 
 ened and whitened by the quartz so that 
 each little grain of sand looked twice his 
 age because blanched and fixed to the 
 next grain. And among these grains the 
 sea-worms had worked, and one can see 
 the channel each creature made. There 
 they are in millions, filled in with quartz- 
 ite stuff, but plainly apparent. The old 
 sea floor with all its teeming life pilloried 
 for ever and lifted high into heaven's 
 face." 
 
 "Well, that's a very grand but very ter- 
 rible idea, to have had such upturnings of 
 the earth," said Mary, thoughtfully, " and 
 .you have nothing now in the way of vol- 
 canoes nearer than Iceland, have you ? " 
 
 " No," McLain answered, " but all the 
 neighboring country to the south of us is 
 covered with traps and basalt and every
 
 24 .from Shaboto la Smtiight. 
 
 evidence of fearful volcanic eruption. 
 Underneath their crust of lava you some- 
 times find the leaves and stems of the 
 plants that were buried by the fiery fluid 
 or shower of hot ash. There must have 
 been beautiful lakes surrounded by trees 
 like those now growing in Japan, for we 
 find them imbedded in mud, now turned to 
 sandstone and hardened clay preserved 
 so that you can trace each tendril and 
 leaf nerve, each delicate edge and vein 
 network, saved from the crushing of the 
 superincumbent mass of lava, by the 
 friendly silt of the quiet pool into which 
 they had fluttered down from the trees 
 they had once covered." 
 
 Mary looked up with deep respect in 
 her fresh blue eyes to the cliffs and abrupt 
 rocks along the shore, the lovely lines of 
 her eyebrows rising in a gentle curve of 
 wonder at what she heard, and the dusky 
 rose tints of her cheek deepening with the 
 interest of the revelation of an age far
 
 from ShabotD io Btmlight. 25 
 
 older than the dimmest and darkest, and 
 most distant she had ventured to imagine. 
 The road as they traveled on became 
 wilder and wilder, now skirting some deep 
 bay on a ledge so immediately overhang- 
 ing the sea, that from the carriage they 
 could look down into the depths of green 
 gray crystal, where often a lobster trap 
 set floating on the tide, could be seen ; or 
 the more graceful forms of cormorant, 
 seamew, and even Sheldrake and Eider 
 Duck be for a moment discovered around 
 some rocky promontory, before the birds 
 took wing or dived to avoid the dangers 
 of Mary's eyes. How often she had pitied 
 the poor eider duck, when as a child she 
 had been told that men took their feathers 
 and soft down to make into pillows and 
 quilts ! And here were the actual birds, 
 as she fancied ! No, they could not be the 
 same, for they had evidently plenty of 
 feathers remaining, and there were the 
 horrid young men of the party, one in her
 
 26 from 0habow ta Sunlight. 
 
 carriage, and others in the next, " dying " 
 as they said "to have a shot at those 
 fellows," and she devoutly hoped they 
 would have nothing of the kind. When 
 the carriage way ran along these terraces 
 she would look with awe at the precipi- 
 tous masses that arose wall-like on the 
 land side, leaving often but just room for 
 the wheels to find safety on the narrow 
 space left at their foot, and then she 
 would breathe more freely when the rock 
 walls retired a little inland, so that a 
 steep turf slope intervened between her- 
 self and them, and it was not so evident 
 as it seemed a minute or two before, that 
 a piece of the cliff, loosened by winter 
 frosts or summer rains, would, if it broke 
 off and descended, crush them all to 
 atoms. 
 
 The driver had delighted to point 
 out places where huge masses had come 
 off the cliff face, and, thundering down, 
 had demolished a portion of the road be-
 
 -from SI)abotD to gmtligljt. 27 
 
 neath. He had had a narrow escape him- 
 self once, he declared, and his horse could 
 afterward hardly be persuaded to traverse 
 the dangerous passage, and even now was 
 all of a shake when he approached it. 
 The driver evidently wanted to make a 
 hero of himself and his horse, but still it 
 was a relief not to be obliged to keep an 
 eye in the air and one on the water, and 
 to feel free to keep both for the view of 
 the sparkling Atlantic, as it came flowing 
 in between islet after islet to caress the 
 shore, which had for countless years bid- 
 den it at once a welcome and a defiance. 
 And there where the beach was more 
 shelving, great beds of the magnificent 
 Laminaria could be observed, making 
 purple the blue of the water, where the 
 waving fronds of sea tangle remained 
 covered, or where the tide had left them, 
 the broad brown banners lying piled to- 
 gether, with their array of colored folds 
 glistening in the sunlight. There, next to
 
 28 ,rom Shaboro to Sunlight. 
 
 the green of the grass, made more vivid by 
 contrast with the gray and lichen-grown 
 bowlders, was the bright yellow band of 
 the shoreweed sometimes showing also a 
 tawny red to set off the laughing azure of 
 the calm deep beyond. Where the group of 
 flat topped rocks showed above the flood, 
 what round heads were there which kept 
 swimming about, as if a boat's crew had 
 been shipwrecked, and had rather enjoyed 
 the sensation, determining to make the 
 most of their luck in being cast away on 
 such a charming coast, and still desirous 
 of contemplating its charms from a little 
 distance, and so seemed to be amusing 
 themselves for some time longer in the 
 water before coming to shore ? No, they 
 could not be men, for they went down too 
 often, and reappeared at places a diver 
 could not reach. No, they were seals; 
 and presently one came up close to the 
 shore, looked with round black eyes 
 solemnly at the carriage, and then shut
 
 from Sha&oto ta Sunlight. 29 
 
 its nostrils and sank slowly down, the pug 
 nose disappearing the very last, and then 
 his native curiosity being unsatisfied he 
 came up again, and not content with giv- 
 ing a wink with one of his eyes, he raised 
 himself breast high, to have a long stare. 
 
 One of the party said " I killed two of 
 them the other day, and have ordered 
 several specimens of their skins." 
 
 Mary gave the speaker such a look of 
 horror and disgust that he wished he had 
 bitten his lips through before he had 
 made such an avowal, and heard her in- 
 dignant 
 
 " Well, I think the man that can shoot 
 those harmless and beautiful things de- 
 serves to have the fire returned by the 
 friends of outraged innocence." 
 
 " Oh, but, Miss Mary," pleaded the pec- 
 cant sportsman, " indeed, indeed, they 
 aren't such guileless things as you imag- 
 ine. They play the devil with the salmon, 
 and I myself have seen one of them pass
 
 30 from Seaborn to Snnligfjt. 
 
 under my boat in hot pursuit of a poor 
 salmon, who deserved your pity, when I 
 lay on my oars floating in shallow water." 
 
 Miss Mary did not look convinced, and 
 would only vouchsafe, " Well, they are 
 worth any number of salmon ; of that I 
 am sure." 
 
 Turning a headland which sheltered a 
 long fiord, or loch, from the outer ocean, 
 they came in sight of the rocky islands 
 of the Hebrides, which with great variety 
 of form lay out to sea at distances vary- 
 ing as much as did the shapes they pre- 
 sented to the eye. The largest had hills 
 of considerable height and of picturesque 
 ruggedness of outline, which here seemed 
 as though terraced by the hand of man, 
 so regular were the flats which terminated 
 in abrupt precipices, like huge steps set 
 in the silver sea. Mary had seen the 
 fairy isles of Capri and Ischia that lie off 
 Naples, but she did not miss the won- 
 drous rose tints which so often mantle
 
 .from Shaooro to Sunlight. 31 
 
 them, as she gazed at these northern isles. 
 They had a beauty of coloring all their 
 own, and she did not feel tempted to 
 make comparisons. She had seen (for 
 what does a young American not see now- 
 adays ?) those last and largest of the isles 
 of the Archipelago of the Adriatic, the 
 little ocean realms of Corfu and Zante, 
 the " flowers of the Levant," lift their 
 sloping sides and olive-crowned heights 
 over the straits which are guarded on the 
 Turkish shore by the long line of the Al- 
 banian Highlands. If she had compared 
 what she now looked upon with those 
 scenes of the East, she might perhaps 
 have regretted that here the softness and 
 charm that comes alone with wavy woods 
 was absent, and she did indeed say to 
 young McLain : 
 
 "I hear of deer forests in the island, 
 but these must be away inland ? " 
 
 He told her that the use of the word 
 " forest " dates from a long way back in
 
 32 from Shaboro to Sunlight. 
 
 the history of this country, when a natural 
 growth of oak and fir and smaller trees 
 covered the land. 
 
 " There are bits," he said, " of the old 
 Scots fir forests left, but they are chiefly 
 in rather inaccessible places where the 
 wants of the needy and scanty population 
 of old Scotland did not tempt their de- 
 struction. Wherever there were people 
 crowded in their poverty and cold in the 
 valleys, there the woods disappeared, 
 gradually cut down for the fires in the 
 huts of the natives or burned by careless- 
 ness. It is astonishing how a fire will 
 run during a hot summer. You would 
 imagine that the trees would have been 
 too green and wet here. But this is not 
 the case, and in a dry season I have 
 known a whole hill-side of nice wood 
 burned up by the careless leaving of a 
 fire lit to amuse a picnic party. ' Wooded 
 Caledon ' the Romans called Scotland, 
 and wherever you cut a peat from the
 
 from ShabotD to Sunlight. 33 
 
 mosses, or drain these, you will see the 
 roots of trees, sometimes of large oaks. 
 I have got excellent pieces of bog oak 
 cut from large trunks found deeply im- 
 bedded in the peat. They are very 
 heavy, these fallen and sunken trees, to 
 drag out, for they are quite water-logged. 
 One must cut trenches round them, and 
 let the wood dry slowly before it is used, 
 otherwise it all goes into splinters, and is 
 useless for ornament or furniture making. 
 The color is a capital blue-black, and if 
 you want to be sure of a bit keeping quite 
 sound for carving purposes, the best plan 
 is to keep it for a month or more in warm 
 water, so that the cold water gets driven 
 out of it, and then to keep it for some 
 weeks in a mixture of glue and warm 
 water, when the glue is carried into the 
 heart of the wood and solidifies it, making 
 it quite firm enough for any delicate chis- 
 eling." 
 
 Miss Mary told him she had once seen 
 3
 
 34 .from Shabonj to Sunlight. 
 
 a spring in America that was so full of 
 flinty stuff that any wood put into it be- 
 came like agate in a short time. 
 
 "Ah, we can't match America in any- 
 thing, Miss Wincott." 
 
 " Oh, yes, but you do," she replied 
 warmly. " In the old memories you have 
 delights for the mind we have not got, 
 and then the color here of the sun, 
 glimpses seen among white mists, and 
 the purple and dark blue shadows, and 
 the exquisitely soft and tender greens are 
 things we find new to us." 
 
 Now before them, as they drove along, 
 the great cliff receded inland, and on the 
 slanting ledges, a mile or so wide, was 
 luxuriant pasture, so that they looked 
 over the sward to where it fell to the 
 water, that flashed in little lines and spots 
 and points of light. These verdant slopes, 
 wherever they were steepest, had marks 
 of old dikes or rough walls intersecting 
 them in every direction. They were the
 
 from Shaboro 10 Snnligljt. 35 
 
 marks of the ancient divisions, and very 
 minute divisions many of them seemed, 
 between the old croft lands, and they 
 extended from the cliff of the sea to the 
 foot of a high wall of mountain, which 
 must have sheltered their owners from 
 the eastern blasts of winter. There were 
 half-a-dozen nicely-built new cottages 
 along the road, and a large, white farm- 
 house among the green patches of the 
 old crofter cultivation. Large numbers 
 of sheep could be seen on the hill-sides, 
 and a fine herd of cattle below wandered 
 at will, feeding on the rich grasses. 
 
 " Oh, what a place to live in ! " ex- 
 claimed Mary. " Rather lonely, perhaps ; 
 but with a friend or two, and the sea to 
 cheer one, that wouldn't matter for a 
 time," she added, as if doubtful how far 
 her exclamation might be taken as a real 
 wish, and she might be left to enjoy the 
 solitude. 
 
 " Well," said McLain, " the people must
 
 36 .from Shaoouj to Sunlight. 
 
 have been cheerful enough here at one 
 time, and those that live in the houses 
 you see get enough to eat, and are for- 
 tunate. But in the old days it was not 
 so, and the sheep were poor and small. 
 No drainage system was known, so that 
 it was only where the rains fell off the 
 land by reason of its steepness that culti- 
 vation was possible. The land was tilled 
 by a hand plow. A century ago there 
 were about forty to fifty souls living here. 
 Then the potato was introduced from the 
 south, where it had long been known. 
 It was got, as you know, from your coun- 
 try. Well, the potato acted, 'strangely 
 enough, as an ambassador to ask the peo- 
 ple to go to America. But it did not do 
 so at once. On the contrary, it said to 
 them, Here I am come to remain with 
 you a fat, jolly bulb, and you can fatten 
 on me and stay where you are.' So they 
 feasted on him, and he seemed to thrive 
 with them, and the people multiplied fast.
 
 .from Shaooto to Sunlight. 37 
 
 Why, in fifty years they had increased so 
 much that there were three times the 
 number living in the place. And then 
 the American envoy, the potato, sud- 
 denly found out that the climate was not 
 quite to his liking, and gave only black- 
 ened bulbs where before there had been 
 wholesome, -creamy roots. The people 
 sickened and starved, and some were 
 helped to go to America, and they wrote 
 home that there was plenty and no potato 
 disease. Then came a mania for a resi- 
 dence on your big continent, and the 
 owners ' of the land got frightened that 
 all their people would leave them; and 
 many tried to make them stay, but in 
 vain. They would go. Their children 
 are rich enough now, and the owners of 
 the land have found out that they could 
 manage also with fewer tenants." 
 
 " It seems sad that they could not have 
 remained in their own country, although, 
 to be sure, I should not have been a free
 
 38 from SbaootB to 
 
 American myself if my ancestors had not 
 been progressive and left the old country," 
 said Mary, her eyes becoming cloudy and 
 thoughtful, and continued : " I have heard 
 it said that the rights of the people were 
 taken from them, and that the land that 
 was theirs became the laird's." 
 
 McLain would not for one moment al- 
 low this. 
 
 "That is a piece of agitator's lying," 
 he said warmly, " got up by them for pur- 
 poses of a little cheap election popularity. 
 But I think they have found themselves 
 mistaken. The people are in the long run 
 too honest and sensible to believe that 
 they can take at will other men's goods. 
 Of old the laird was a terrible autocrat. 
 It is quite true that unless he wanted what 
 he called ' loyal ' tenants, he did not dis- 
 place those on the soil, because they were 
 his own people to some extent, and it was 
 not natural that he should do so. But if 
 in troubled times they went against the
 
 from Shubow to Sunlight. 39 
 
 side he espoused, they were moved and 
 others put in their places. This happened 
 in our mixed and vexed history often 
 enough. The obedience they had to ren- 
 der to their chief and chieftains was abso- 
 lute, and the continuance in their lands, 
 and the enjoyment of them, according to 
 their rude fashion, was theirs because they 
 gave their chief warlike service. He had 
 only to hold up his little finger, or more 
 practically and literally go to a kirk and 
 blow a horn, and his men had to go with 
 him, the next moment, if he so willed it, 
 to cut the throat of the nearest neighbor- 
 ing chief and his folk in the next glen. 
 That is fact. And yet with the fiction 
 that the lands were not the property of 
 the chiefs, who have always exercised 
 the rights of property over them, our 
 sapient legislators have given to the 
 occupiers the houses built by myself and 
 others. The result of course is that we 
 can build no longer for our friends,
 
 40 .from Shabouj to Qnnlicjht. 
 
 and must leave them to shift for them- 
 selves." 
 
 " O, Mr. McLain ! I am sure you are 
 glad that the poor people have their share 
 of houses and lands," said Mary. 
 
 " Yes, indeed I am, Miss Mary ; but I 
 fear the general effect of such laws trans- 
 ferring what has been one man's to an- 
 other's possession, will be that most peo- 
 ple will take care to put no houses on land 
 that may be thus taken from them. They 
 will say to the poor : ' Now you have been 
 put in possession as owner of that I gave 
 you to make you comfortable, and you 
 must look to the Government and not to 
 me for further help.' The Government 
 will say : ' No, we have done it for a few, 
 but we can't do it for all, nor can we con- 
 tinue to help the person to whom we have 
 given the land, ta live upon it.' The 
 wisest plan would have been to have made 
 laws against wrongful use of legal powers 
 in the case of the poor, instead of putting
 
 from Shafcoto to Sunlight. 41 
 
 the poor in a position of temporary and 
 false independence that can last for a 
 short time only, and then leave him in a 
 position worse off than before, when he 
 could look to the landlord as a friend as 
 well as a neighbor." 
 
 " I should help them at all times," said 
 sweet Miss Mary ; " but I have known 
 many, like your Scotchmen, who would 
 not do so certainly if the gentlemen who 
 had left the people on their land were to 
 be so fined for their goodness. It is easy 
 to exercise charity at other people's ex- 
 pense. Those talkers would act meanly 
 if they themselves had to lose anything 
 by their talk. Perhaps that is so. Any- 
 how you would not wish to fight your 
 neighbors over those hills now, Mr. Mc- 
 Lain, so you don't want the war service 
 of the crofters." 
 
 " We should like some of them to serve 
 in the army against a national enemy, but 
 they won't serve either their chiefs or the
 
 42 from Shaboro ta Sunlight. 
 
 Queen in her army now, and even in the 
 old days it was difficult enough to per- 
 suade them to come forward, for instance, 
 for the French war." 
 
 " Why, that's the time of our war with 
 you, the war of Independence,'' said Miss 
 Mary, mischievously, " and if they had 
 been all persuaded to serve, we should 
 have a good many more bad potatoes 
 planted among us, I guess." 
 
 " Ours are not bad potatoes," laughed 
 Mr. McLain, " but all peasants, if they 
 have a hearth, don't like to leave it. In 
 France you have to have forced service, 
 or conscription, on this ground, that the 
 men who dislike most the military service 
 are the men who can call some land their 
 own. We found it too difficult, as I say, 
 in the old days to get them to turn out, 
 great as our power over them was, and I 
 doubt if you planted these hills and val- 
 leys thickly with people, first, whether 
 many would stay, because the demands
 
 ,fr0m 0hab0tn to Sunlight. 43 
 
 for comfort are far higher now, and they 
 would not be satisfied ; secondly, whether 
 those who did stay and were content to 
 live in places where none but the least 
 enterprising would remain, could be per- 
 suaded to contribute a contingent to the 
 army. Some of the crowding of the croft- 
 ing population that took place after the 
 war was in consequence of the cutting up 
 of good farms into small bits to accommo- 
 date men who would serve only on the 
 promise of the possession of such land 
 after the campaign." 
 
 " Well, now, tell me something of their 
 belief, besides their faith in the virtues of 
 doing nothing," she said. " Are they very 
 superstitious?" 
 
 " Not more so than most uneducated 
 people, and perhaps less so than many 
 who are highly educated. The things 
 that are told of saints and others were 
 taught them by the most educated men of 
 old time, whose nonsense can be heard
 
 44 .from BhobotD to Sunlight. 
 
 any day at the present, if one takes up a 
 church book. Of course, there's the Evil 
 Eye. I have never been in any country 
 where that was not more or less firmly 
 believed in. In Ireland they put a piece 
 of bent stick over the lock of a door when 
 they leave their cabin to prevent the Evil 
 Eye or hobgoblin from entering. A friend 
 of mine used to put up at the house of a 
 lady who had a farm situated near a road 
 he often had to take. She used hospi- 
 tably to give him a night's lodging as he 
 passed. One day to his surprise as he 
 left her door she said goodby, and that 
 she must request him not to call again, 
 as each time he had come she had lost a 
 cow, a horse, a pig, a hen, or some creat- 
 ure she had owned, through death. It 
 must be my friend's evil eye that did the 
 mischief. She was very sorry, but she 
 must thank my friend not to call again. 
 It is always considered unlucky to start 
 on a voyage, however short, in a boat un-
 
 from Shabow ta fitanligfyt. 45 
 
 less you turn the boat three times round 
 with the sun. This has no doubt nothing 
 to do with the evil eye, but it is a remnant 
 of the ancient sun worship. But ill luck 
 attaches itself in their minds to any boat 
 from which a man has fallen overboard 
 and been lost. Would you believe it, I 
 once told some men that they might pur- 
 chase a boat at my expense. They went 
 and chose a very good one. Some ma- 
 licious agitators did not like them to ac- 
 cept a boat from me, and they started a 
 cock and bull story that a man had been 
 lost from the vessel. From the moment 
 this lie was spread among them not a man 
 of the crew which had been got together 
 would touch the boat. They actually left 
 it to lie and rot on the beach, and some 
 more sensible person offered a few pounds 
 for it, bought it, as none of the people of 
 the place would do anything with her; and 
 she is now in his hands giving an excel- 
 lent return in the fish that her lowland
 
 46 .from 0habcm) 10 Sunlight. 
 
 crew take. It is amazing that our people 
 should thus listen to strange men and 
 still stranger women. But there are other 
 bees in other people's bonnets, and we 
 must hope that they who have known us 
 from childhood will return in affection to 
 us, who have for generations been their 
 real friends. But it is not their supersti- 
 tion, but their old predatory habits that 
 the tempters play upon in speaking to 
 them against us now. If they could only 
 be got to believe that the evil eye and 
 bad luck would follow them if they broke 
 up the friendship their fathers had with 
 ours, they would never think of turning 
 against us. Even if gold were at the end 
 of the cave we are about to visit, no 
 human persuasion would tempt them to 
 enter it after dark alone."
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 LEAVING the carriages at the large, 
 white farmhouse, wraps and luncheon- 
 baskets were consigned to the ghillies, 
 and a delightful walk undertaken over the 
 pastures that topped the sea-cliffs. Or- 
 chises and little pansies flecked the grass, 
 and where any natural knoll, too rough 
 for the herbage, had broken the surface, 
 there the heather seeds had dropped and 
 flourished, and the hum of bees in the 
 deep red bells and minute purple flow- 
 erets told of the grateful gathering of 
 unenvied wealth. Now the path skirted 
 the very edge of the abrupt wall, which 
 rose close to the line of refluent sea- 
 water, and although there was no wind 
 and no lashing wave, yet the heart-beat
 
 48 from Seaborn ta Sunlight. 
 
 of the mighty deep, sent, in measured 
 undulations, shining masses that almost 
 insensibly swelled and laved with an am- 
 pler flood the jagged stones and sandy 
 coves, while a low murmur, as though of 
 pleasure, rose upon the air ; only every 
 now and then a little flush of darker blue 
 mantled, for an instant, the surface, where 
 a breath of wind had wandered from the 
 mountains inland, and had fallen over the 
 cliff, and struck with a light " flurry " 
 upon the waters. 
 
 Mary would have liked to lie down on 
 the perfumed bank to gaze for hours on 
 the grandeur of the coast which dipped, 
 headland beyond headland, into those 
 turbulent depths. She had seated her- 
 self, but rose, saying, " Man is always in 
 a hurry when he should rest, and gener- 
 ally thinking when he should be acting," 
 for she was told that the tide would soon 
 be too high for their purpose if they de- 
 layed. She left, with a sigh, the place
 
 .from Sha&oto ta Sunlight. 49 
 
 made to look yet more restful by her re- 
 pose, and found that they had been led 
 to a break in the rock wall, and that close 
 to where they stood, a very steep, but 
 still quite practicable slope of turf, made 
 a descent tolerably easy. The only one 
 of the party who would not venture it 
 was an elderly Italian, who looked down 
 the steep green stairs of turf, shook his 
 head over the abyss, and murmured re- 
 peatedly, " Imposs ! imposs ! " Nothing 
 could persuade him to attempt the task, 
 even although the ladies offered him their 
 fair shoulders as a support for his hands. 
 " Imposs," as they then called him, was 
 left at the top of the bank, looking over 
 the path, " like an old mare over a gate," 
 as one of the others remarked, with more 
 truth than politeness. 
 
 A scramble brought them all safely to 
 the bottom, and then began a more diffi- 
 cult part of the road, for the little space 
 left between rock and sea was strewed 
 4
 
 50 from 0hab0tD to Btmlight. 
 
 with huge bowlders rolled up by the ice 
 in past ages, and fragments of rock de- 
 tached and tumbled from above. These 
 lay in confusion, piled one above the 
 other, strewed in wondrous disorder, lit- 
 tle pools left by the tide scattered among 
 them, where their lower surfaces were 
 decked with the little pyramids of the 
 limpet, and scarred white with the crusts 
 of barnacle and serpula. The men had 
 plenty to do to get the women over the 
 rough obstructions of the shore, and they 
 all paused, breathless with their climbing, 
 where a rough table of stone gave them 
 a comparatively flat platform whereon to 
 take breath. Above them, over the preci- 
 pice, streamed a little burn, coming from 
 what seemed a great height, and grad- 
 ually getting thinner and thinner in its 
 volume until it reached the broken rocks 
 below, a mere streak of foam-white spray, 
 showing through its veil the red and gray 
 of the stone beyond, and the green tufts
 
 Shaboto to Sunlight. 5 
 
 of fern and ivy which clung to that over- 
 hanging wall. And now, beyond a last 
 giant buttress, they were told that the 
 object of their journey lay. They had, 
 however, been so careful to arrive as the 
 tide was retiring that they had come too 
 soon, and were obliged to wait, because 
 the road around the foot of the angle of 
 rock was still flowing knee-deep. A wild 
 pigeon or two flew in before them into 
 the recess they desired to reach, and they 
 envied the birds their wings. A little pa- 
 tience was, however, easily learned ' on 
 that glorious spot, and soon the white 
 and green and muddy pebbles showed 
 shining wet, for they were still kissed by 
 the lips of the sea, but the sun disputed 
 their possession, and the travelers could 
 tread on them. Just round the corner 
 the whole of the immense opening of the 
 cave showed itself to their astonished 
 eyes. Far away overhead the cliff broke 
 into a vast portal, whose rugged and ir-
 
 52 .from Seaborn to Snnlight. 
 
 regular arch grew gradually lower and 
 lower as the aperture deepened inward. 
 This covered approach to the actual en- 
 trance of the cave was paved with many- 
 colored pebbles, while the rock in ter- 
 raced ledges rose grandly on each side 
 as they stood within. The roof above 
 was more beautiful than could have been 
 any closed vault; for, open to the sun 
 and sea air through its wide and lofty 
 entrance, it appeared like the avenue to 
 some mystic Egyptian temple, where the 
 perspective makes the walls close in and 
 in, until the opening to the cave itself 
 leads in the distance to the narrow en- 
 trance which guards the sacred halls of 
 the secret and inner fane. 
 
 Mary, with the impetuosity of her girl- 
 ish character, sped on over the pavement 
 of small stones that made walking labori- 
 ous, and, followed by her companions, 
 stood for a while beneath the ragged 
 lintel of the door of the cave vault ; there
 
 ,fr0m Shobou) to Sunlight. 53 
 
 the archway was only about thirty feet 
 in height. Looking behind, she saw the 
 blue line of the sea's horizon, formed by 
 the rocks, and inclosing on its farthest 
 verge an island, which seemed a mere 
 mote in that intense light which shone 
 on the outer world. Before her loomed 
 a great space of darkness, where the 
 rocky ceiling rose into impenetrable 
 gloom. The floor still rose slightly, but 
 not with so decided an incline, and it was 
 now sand and not a confused collection 
 of rounded stones on which she stood. 
 Her eyes gradually became more accus- 
 tomed to the gloom, and she saw how ex- 
 tensive was the natural hall into which 
 she had ventured. 
 
 " Oh, look what nice soft sand ; and 
 there are flat stones to make tables for 
 our lunch," she said, and pointed to some 
 blocks that gleamed shadowy white some 
 forty yards away. 
 
 She moved on to them, and when nearer
 
 54 -from Shaoow to Bmtlight. 
 
 she saw, or thought she saw, seated on 
 them a man. The figure, if she could 
 trust her eyes in the obscurity, was that 
 of an old man. He was clad in a brown 
 or dark-looking long coat, and had a 
 white beard, and his hat was on his head, 
 a battered wide-brimmed cloth hat that 
 concealed a good deal of the face. She 
 was startled for a moment, and looked 
 toward her companions as if asking if 
 they should camp there, as others seemed 
 to be there before them. But when she 
 looked again the figure had moved, and, 
 thinking that it must only be some tour- 
 ist visiting the cavern as she and her 
 friends were, she sat down on the sand, 
 and soon the baskets were emptied of 
 the luncheon, and a laughing group made 
 the corks fly, and jokes and merriment 
 reigned. They sat with their backs to 
 the darkness, and fronting the entrance, 
 so that the cheerful day made a deep 
 shaft of light strike along the floor al-
 
 from Sljaboto to Stmhght. 55 
 
 most to their feet. The glare was so 
 rarefied by the space it had to pass that 
 they could look forth undazzled through 
 that little arch, to where the island 
 floated, far away. If any person had 
 attempted to pass out they must there- 
 fore, of course, have seen him, and toward 
 the end of their repast, Mary said in a 
 low voice to her neighbor, that she won- 
 dered what had become of the old gentle- 
 man who had been sitting so near where 
 they then were when they first entered. 
 
 " Old gentleman ! there is nobody here 
 surely but ourselves," said she, and this 
 statement was echoed by those who were 
 sure that there could be nobody, and that 
 there had been nobody there, or they 
 would have seen them. Only young Mc- 
 Lain backed Mary's remarks, and said 
 that he, too, had positively seen a man 
 move away into the darker parts of the 
 cave. He added, laughing : 
 
 " If it isn't a tourist, it must be some
 
 56 from Shafcow to 
 
 belated smuggler." He, too, had noticed 
 the white beard and the long brown coat. 
 " Well," he said, in the undertone in which 
 their conversation had been carried on, 
 for they knew not if they might not be 
 overheard, " if it's a smuggler we'll soon 
 find him, for this great vault is as round 
 as a kettle, and the main corridor that 
 leads out of it farther on into the hill, 
 ending in another smaller hall, has no 
 side passages that I have ever seen or 
 heard of. Light the candles and lanterns, 
 and we'll soon show you the end of any 
 mystery there may be here." 
 
 All started to their feet, and a number 
 of lights, little glow-worms, searched the 
 moist walls, and peered into any crannies 
 that appeared. The sandy floor rose 
 higher and higher, until it ended in a 
 ridge under the place where the rock 
 ceiling again descended from its height 
 to within thirty feet of the floor. Beyond 
 this ridge a wide passage led and past
 
 from Shafcoto to Stmlight. 57 
 
 more big stones, until a slight descent a 
 hundred yards farther brought them to 
 the room described by McLain. The 
 farther end of this was blocked by pieces 
 of rock detached from the roof. 
 
 They had come across no person, and 
 now that they could speak without fear 
 of being overheard, Mary was often mer- 
 rily told that she had been long enough 
 in Scotland, for she had begun to share 
 the second sight McLain was reported to 
 possess. She was certainly much puzzled, 
 and so was he, at the absence of any proof 
 of their statement, and they answered lit- 
 tle, and seemed to regard the matter more 
 seriously than did the others. So much 
 was this the case that the attempt at 
 badinage on the subject died away, and 
 they left the cave far more silent than 
 when they entered it. But their spirits 
 revived with the renewed exercise of the 
 exertion of the scramble over the fear- 
 fully rough shore ; the young men were
 
 58 from ShabotD ta Sunlight. 
 
 happy enough in helping Mary over the 
 rugged obstacles, and they would encour- 
 age her to rest and stand on some big 
 stone, where they could admire her as 
 she stood above them, her young figure 
 appearing to their gaze more beautiful 
 than that of any Grecian goddess, as she 
 remained awhile looking to seaward, her 
 hand, as it leaned on a long staff of hazel, 
 raised above her head, the masses of her 
 dark hair showing in abundance under a 
 blue flat "boori," or basque cap, her 
 rounded and firm chin, clear cut lips, and 
 nostrils taking in the salt breath of the 
 ocean, with a delight that her great and 
 happy eyes made glorious to behold. 
 
 But all good things must come to an 
 end, including the chance of seeing a 
 beautiful girl motionless, and having the 
 luck to be allowed to stare at her without 
 being rude ; for now the top of the cliff 
 had to be gained. There they found their 
 sedentary friend, " Old Imposs," as they
 
 .from Shafcow to Sunlight. 59 
 
 called him, waiting for their return, de- 
 claring that he had had a much better 
 time of it than they, but, by the by, had 
 they any lunch left, for he had quite for- 
 gotten that he had none in his pockets 
 when they went down to the shore, and 
 he had begun to envy the cormorants 
 below him, for he had seen a lot of them 
 on a rock taking a wash in the water, en- 
 joying a most substantial meal on fish, 
 that he had begun to feel hungry enough 
 to eat raw. 
 
 The ladies rather unkindly declared 
 he deserved nothing until he got back to 
 the farm-house, but one of the ghillies 
 was seen to keep back alone with him, 
 and it was feared he had obtained a sur- 
 reptitious supply of whisky and biscuit, 
 for he did not mention the cormorants 
 again. Young McLain soon made a pre- 
 text for telling him and the rest to pro- 
 ceed, as he decided to fetch something he 
 had accidently left on the shore, and wan-
 
 60 from Shabotn to Sunlight. 
 
 dered back the way they had come. But 
 no sooner were they out of sight than he 
 reascended the grassy bank, and crept 
 onward along the cliff brink where heath- 
 er screened the abyss, until he knew by 
 the lie of the land he stood immediately 
 over the cave. Here he lay down and 
 crept cautiously, as though stalking a 
 deer, and determined to remain unseen, 
 to the very brink. Parting the heather, 
 he looked cautiously down. 
 
 Nearly an hour had now elapsed since 
 they had left the cave, and looking down 
 upon the shore where the big bowlders 
 they had crossed with so much difficulty, 
 appeared no larger than a boy's toy mar- 
 ble, this is what he saw. It was nothing 
 very startling, but it was something that 
 puzzled him considerably. 
 
 A boat, with a small sail lying along 
 the thwarts, was being unfastened from a 
 tiny creek in the rocks below. This mini- 
 ature cove must have been entirely con-
 
 .from Shaboto io Sunlight. 61 
 
 cealed from any one climbing along the 
 rough shore, unless it was accidentally 
 stumbled upon. Besides, it lay beyond 
 the approach to the cave. 
 
 Engaged in unfastening the boat, and 
 working with evident energy to get it 
 away before the tide yet receded farther, 
 was a man. Unlike the person McLain 
 and Mary thought they had seen in the 
 darkness of the cavern, this person was 
 evidently young and vigorous. McLain 
 pulled out his field glass, and saw him as 
 though he could have touched him. He 
 had fair and fine hair, which had grown 
 long over the forehead and back, and 
 was bright and curly. On the crown of 
 the head it seemed to have been cut 
 shorter, as though for the sake of some 
 wound. The youth was bareheaded. A 
 new growth of young hair covered his 
 chin and lip. He seemed nervous and hur- 
 ried ; his eyes were expressive enough, but 
 the expression was one of some anxiety
 
 62 ,from ShabotD to Sunlight. 
 
 and tension of mind, enforced by a knit- 
 ting of his brows and the quick motion 
 of his hands, with which he often threw 
 back the hair and dried his brow. Soon 
 the painter was free, the little mast stepped, 
 although the sail was not yet hoisted. 
 
 The young man jumped into the little 
 craft, and soon shoved himself into the 
 deep. Then he took the oars as he stood, 
 and rowed for a while standing between 
 the thwarts, in order to see ahead, for he 
 seemed fearful of some rock or shallow. 
 He did this slowly, but evidently quite at 
 ease now that he was afloat and had 
 caught the ebbing water. And as he 
 slowly bent and swung forward, leaning 
 on the oars, he paused at intervals, and 
 his heart seemed to fill with joy, as, with 
 head erect, he sang these strange words :- 
 
 " Out from the darkness, forth into light, 
 
 From the vault of earth I go ; 
 The Rock-dove's neck but needs her flight 
 From the cave, in the sun to glow,
 
 from Seaborn ta Snnligfyt. 63 
 
 So my soul, athirst for the open day, 
 Moves aflame with the love Divine ; 
 
 O shelter me, shine on my ocean way, 
 God ! with the angels nine. 
 
 " The devious tracks are passed at last, 
 
 I see the heavens blue, 
 Thy love's great tide swings free and vast, 
 
 And thrills the whole world through, 
 Unchanging, in its change, to fill 
 
 With health the noisome mine ; 
 So come, Thou all-compelling Will, 
 
 With Thy great angels nine. 
 
 " I sought to know Thy way through those 
 
 Who make themselves as God ; 
 The worm that on his belly goes, 
 
 Their sign not Thy green sod 
 Thy sunlight was not in their heart, 
 
 Nor Thy great ways Divine ; 
 Thy breakers shatter their dull art, 
 
 Thou need'st not angels nine ! 
 
 " Priests spin their cobwebs, hiding truth, 
 
 And weave their nets for power ; 
 One honest pulse of healthy youth 
 
 Is worth their creed's long hour ; 
 Then forth to follow to the West, 
 
 Thy great Sun's golden sign ; 
 Away with any man-made test, 
 
 My soul's whole worship Thine ! "
 
 64 .from 0haooto to Bmnligljt. 
 
 The voice ascended clear and strong in 
 the calm evening air, and still the young 
 rower stood and propelled his craft in 
 the leisurely fashion with which he had 
 started. But soon a little breeze touched 
 the surface around him, and he stooped 
 to raise his sail. And McLain marveled 
 more and more who on earth he could be, 
 but refrained from hailing him, much as 
 he felt inclined to shout out a happy 
 journey to him " merely for the fun," as 
 he said afterward, " of startling him." 
 But there fell no voice from the height to 
 surprise the youth. The quiet beauty of 
 this Western night would soon be around 
 him. A few cries from gulls, a few 
 splashes as a diver threw up his tail and 
 disappeared, or the sound of the watery 
 shock of the plunge after his prey of the 
 solan bird ; the feathery " whisk " heard 
 at intervals from the place where the 
 little brook fell down the precipice, and 
 the more constant hollow whisper of the
 
 .from Shaooto to Sunlight. 65 
 
 tide along the shore, a sound that never * 
 allows an absolute silence, even on the 
 calmest day these, and these alone, could 
 be heard when the song ceased. The 
 dusky cobalt of the upper heavens be- 
 came yet deeper, as the golden glory in 
 the west brightened, and ever brightened. 
 A few pennon-like streaks of cloud 
 glowed with an ethereal crimson, and in 
 varied lights of palest green, and saffron, 
 and blue, the sea shone responsive to the 
 light above. The isles and islets afar 
 upon its breast assumed a deep sapphire 
 tint, and McLain's thoughts turned to the 
 Celtic legends of the Isles of the Blessed, 
 the Avilion whither the spirit of Arthur 
 passed at his death. Where were they, 
 those " fortunate isles ?" Where never 
 wind blew loudly, nor mortal grief could 
 come ? Would he or any man ever find 
 them ? or could they ever be seen for, in 
 the end, there would be " no more sea." 
 How then could there be any happy 
 5
 
 66 from Shnfcotn to Smtlight. 
 
 ' shores in the West, he asked himself, half- 
 smiling at the futility of his own thoughts. 
 And as he so checked himself in his 
 dreaming, he took another look through 
 his glass at the voyager in the little boat. 
 The sail was drawing the light air and he 
 was fast leaving the land behind, and 
 gliding quietly toward the blaze in the 
 west; and McLain gazed again toward 
 the sunset, and saw far down on the 
 burning horizon what seemed to be the 
 very isle of his desire. There it stood 
 from out the opal-tinted deep, refulgent 
 with more than mortal brightness. There 
 rose a glittering shore with sudden peak 
 and deep ravine, with splintered mountain 
 ridge and glens glowing with the sheen of 
 molten precious metals. Distinct and un- 
 mistakable, the strange land lay along 
 the water, an Eldorado so clearly defined 
 that the most skeptical eye could not 
 doubt of its existence. The youth in the 
 now distant boat appeared to see it, for he
 
 front Shocoro to Sunlight. 67 
 
 stood up and gazed westward, as though 
 beholding the vision of wonder beyond 
 the rough basaltic masses that broke 
 through the ocean surface nearer to him. 
 But now the night came on apace; the 
 boat grew smaller and smaller. It was 
 only the nearer and familiar and certainly 
 material forms of the Hebrides that could 
 be dimly distinguished in the gathering 
 gloom, and McLain left his watch, puz- 
 zled and feeling decidedly superstitious, 
 with a prevalent feeling that the mysteri- 
 ous young man had got a clew to a scent 
 that had long escaped the most searching 
 Celt, and had shipped himself off " for 
 good," to the happy land, which none 
 really deserved until they had grown to 
 be at least four times as old as the young 
 voyager, or three times as old as McLain 
 himself.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THAT inland sea, ringed with its round- 
 headed hills of yellow sand, called the 
 Harbor of San Francisco, shone steel blue, 
 as the usual cold wind blew upon it 
 through the " golden gate " the opening 
 to the Pacific. In the carved court of 
 the immense Palace Hotel, which in that 
 city engulfs most of the travelers who 
 arrive as fleeting birds of passage, the 
 band made the white, wooden-columned 
 colonnades of each of its many stories 
 resound with a brazen din. There was 
 an incessant banquet proceeding in the 
 lower halls, where a never-ending table 
 tThdte attracted and surfeited people, who 
 seemed to come from most of the civil- 
 ized countries under the sun. In the
 
 front Seaborn la Sunlight. 69 
 
 luxurious upper rooms, little supper and 
 dinner parties were being given ; and 
 sometimes the purchases that had been 
 made of curiosities in the city discussed, 
 and the articles displayed. 
 
 There were many handsome shops in 
 the straight streets which ran up and 
 down the monstrous sand-hills, but the 
 monotony of the things set out for the 
 benefit of tourists was usually even great- 
 er than that of the streets and hills. 
 Specimens of gold in dust ; specimens of 
 gold in crystals of pure yellow metal ; 
 specimens of gold in quartz, cut and pol- 
 ished; specimens of gold in nuggets, 
 small and big. These were the forms 
 that the San Francisco commercial enter- 
 prise exhibited as the chief novelties and 
 peculiarities of the place, and some of 
 the visitors had had enough of them. 
 This was the case with a party which had 
 just arrived from the Eastern States, and 
 although tired with the long time spent
 
 70 from 0habou) to Sunlight. 
 
 in the cars, had already seen most of the 
 sights of the city, including some of the 
 magnificent wooden-built houses of the 
 principal merchant princes, the park where 
 the sea-lions are shown, reposing their 
 ungainly carcasses on the stack of rocks 
 that jut out into the long rolling surge of 
 the Pacific. They were talking of an ex- 
 pedition to Montalto, where the Govern- 
 or's splendid herd of horses might be seen 
 by those who could present introductions 
 to him ; but it was resolved that they had 
 not yet thoroughly " done " San Fran- 
 cisco, and a visit to the Chinese theatre, 
 in the Chinese quarter, would be some- 
 thing new at all events, and would show 
 them something unlike what they had 
 seen before. So the opera or academy 
 of music, as many towns in America love 
 to call that institution, was left for an- 
 other day, and the carriages were ordered 
 to set the party down in the " Celestial's " 
 part of the city.
 
 irom Shadow 10 Gunliglit. 71 
 
 A very ill -formed part it was, with 
 many wooden houses, little better than 
 shanties, a contrast to the vast blocks of 
 handsome buildings of which most of this 
 city was built. To be sure, the preva- 
 lence of earthquakes, mild in character 
 as these generally are, might make many 
 a nervous person prefer a single storied 
 building to one containing many floors, 
 as escape would be easier ; but there are 
 too many brick and stone buildings to 
 allow one to imagine that the occasional 
 danger exercises much influence on the 
 minds of the inhabitants. Along the 
 sides of the streets into which the party 
 now penetrated there were many low 
 shops and dingy counters, protected from 
 sun and rain by a roof of projecting 
 boards, supported from the floor of the 
 side-walk by posts, against which Chinese 
 loungers leaned, wearing the familiar pig- 
 tail, and clad in long, loose dresses of 
 black or dark blue. Usually there were
 
 72 .front Shaboro lo Sunlight. 
 
 no shoes on their feet, but every now and 
 then a richer man passed, his drapery of 
 finer stuff, and white shoes on his feet, 
 turned up at the toes like the prow of an 
 old-fashioned boat. 
 
 The theatre itself was a long dark par- 
 allelogram, with a gallery, the ends of 
 which nearest the stage were divided off 
 into small partitions. Lamps of the most 
 ordinary kind gave just enough light to 
 enable persons entering to see their way 
 to rough benches, which were always well 
 filled with a crowd of Chinese working- 
 men. They sat very silently awaiting the 
 commencement of the piece which had 
 always been proceeding to develop its 
 story during three or four of the preced- 
 ing evenings. One peculiarity of the act- 
 ing struck a stranger as curious when the 
 acting began. 
 
 There was no attempt to keep the 
 " wings " or sides of the stage free of 
 those who were not acting, although they
 
 Jrom Shabmn to Sunlight. 73 
 
 might have been friends of the actors. 
 They indulged their curiosity as much as 
 they chose, by standing in deep rows, 
 and laughing or cheering the action of 
 the drama. 
 
 Another peculiarity consisted in a band 
 of musicians, if this term of flattery for a 
 knot of men making hideous noises be 
 permissible, being stationed in the very 
 center of the stage. In front of them the 
 actors who conducted the story recited 
 their parts in a loose fashion, that sug- 
 gested they were improvising as they went 
 on. The applause from the audience was 
 occasionally loud and hearty, especially 
 was a droll fellow, who often came for- 
 ward to make jokes, rewarded with plenti- 
 ful laughter. There seemed to be only 
 one woman in the cast, and all the other 
 characters made love to her, a method of 
 insuring " the unities " which allowed the 
 play to be indefinitely protracted, and yet 
 kept the interest circling round the lovely
 
 74 from Shaboto to 
 
 female, who, as far as the assemblage in 
 the house was concerned, seemed to be 
 the only Chinese woman in 'Frisco. There 
 must have been others somewhere, but 
 they were apparently not so clamorous 
 for boxes and stalls as are their paler sis- 
 ters of our race. There was no attempt 
 at scenic decoration, although in more 
 luxurious theatres it is said that this is 
 being introduced. Like the plays of the 
 classical day of Italy and Greece, and 
 like those of our own Shakespeare, the 
 diction was supposed to be entrancing 
 enough without such meretricious attrac- 
 tions. And then, as the Chinese clown 
 in shrill tones and with ludicrous gestures 
 straddled on the stage front, and was 
 every now and again succeeded by this 
 single and singular woman, who had all 
 the Chinese world at her feet, a light 
 which did not come from the stage but 
 from overhead made the audience look 
 up, a shower of sparks fell among them,
 
 ,from 6hab0to to Sunlight. 75 
 
 making them start to their feet, then 
 came more sparks and a bright outflush 
 of flame overhead. There was a quitting 
 of the stage by those upon it, and men 
 were soon heard tearing at the roof, 
 which blazed up ever brighter and bright- 
 er. Then a babel of tongues that had 
 begun as soon as the fire was seen was 
 lost in loud cries of terror, and the panic- 
 stricken Chinamen rushed to the entrance 
 doorway below, while those in the gal- 
 leries, who from their position were nearer 
 the fire, and had at first observed it, were 
 screaming at the top of their voices, dash- 
 ing over each other, struggling to be first 
 to reach the creaky stairway. 
 
 It was an appalling scene, for it was 
 evident that the men above had done 
 nothing to stop the misfortune, which 
 now threatened irredeemable disaster. 
 The party from the hotel had risen from 
 where they sat, the chief figure among 
 them being a father and daughter, who
 
 76 from Shaooto to Sunlight. 
 
 stood holding each other's hands, pale 
 and silent amid the tumult, but really 
 terrified like the rest, for imminent death 
 appeared to stare them in the face. It 
 was evident that no egress was possible 
 by the door crammed with frantic strug- 
 gling Chinamen. 
 
 Then suddenly a thoroughly Californian 
 figure, a man spare, and agile, and of 
 good stature, with a sombrero-like hat 
 on his head, and long fair hair showing 
 on his neck, sprang toward them, climbed 
 the railing that divided their portion of 
 the gallery from the pit below, and in a 
 moment had taken the old man's arm, 
 and hurried him and his daughter toward 
 the side wall. There at one corner was 
 a low door closed and fastened a door 
 that none had looked for or observed. 
 This yielded at once to the weight of his 
 shoulder, and in another minute they 
 were all outside the burning building, 
 and on a roof whence they could reach
 
 from Bhabora ta Sunlight. 77 
 
 one of the veranda-like boardings over 
 the street side-walk. Letting himself 
 down first, he bade them one after the 
 other leap down to him, and, receiving 
 them safely in his wiry arms, they found 
 themselves breathless, but unhurt, in the 
 roadway. 
 
 Mary Wincott, for it was she and her 
 father who had so narrowly escaped, was 
 pale enough still and trembled a good 
 deal, nor could she at first summon voice 
 to thank their guide, who now asked them 
 if they were at the Palace Hotel, in a 
 manner happy enough, but as though 
 trying to suppress the intense excitement 
 under which his voice labored. 
 
 " Well, I'll show you the way," he said, 
 in reply to their answer, and striding by 
 their side, with his wide hat framing a 
 handsome face, he said not another word 
 until they reached the hotel door, when 
 he saluted them, and would have left had 
 not Mr. Wincott pressed his hand, and
 
 78 from ShabcrtD 10 Snnligljt. 
 
 told him that he must ask him to come 
 again as soon as possible to receive their 
 thanks for his most opportune appearance 
 and assistance. A more impetuous mem- 
 ber of the group broke in. 
 
 "Why, yes, sir. If you hadn't come 
 we should all have been crisps by this 
 time." 
 
 The Californian smiled and said he 
 would have the pleasure of again call- 
 ing, and, with a low bow to Miss Wincott, 
 departed. They met very soon again, 
 for the next morning brought a number 
 of callers to congratulate them on their 
 escape, and among them was the man 
 who had saved their lives. When he en- 
 tered and found others in the room he 
 seemed disconcerted and annoyed, but 
 Miss Mary soon put him more at ease, 
 for nothing could be more graceful and 
 charming than the tact and cordiality 
 with which she made her acknowledg- 
 ments.
 
 .from Shob0io to Smtlight. 79 
 
 How was it, she asked, that when so 
 few white men were in the theatre he 
 should have been there just at the right 
 time ? And how was it that he had at 
 once thought of the closed door by which 
 escape had become possible ? 
 
 "Oh," he answered, in a voice that, to 
 their Eastern ears, seemed very Califor- 
 nian or European, for it came from the 
 chest, and the enunciation was different 
 than it often is in the older States, " I 
 have always taken a deep interest in all 
 Old World matters, and the oldest of Old 
 World things can be found among the 
 Chinese; thus I often go to see their 
 plays, and have even learned something 
 of their language. I knew the building 
 intimately, having been there night after 
 night. You probably did not think of 
 this when listening for a time to their 
 somewhat cumbrous play, but it is a fact 
 that, of all spectacles presented to living 
 eyes, a Chinese play is probably the most
 
 8o .from ShafootD to Sunlight. 
 
 unchanged from the earliest times. Of 
 course, there may have been minor modi- 
 fications in the art, but essentially the 
 stage as they have it now is what they 
 had when Greece and Rome were not, 
 and we have to go back to Egyptian or 
 even Assyrian times for anything like it. 
 Indeed, when the dim dynasties of these 
 ancient realms were not, China was. The 
 music you heard at that theatre, the main 
 features of the representation, were the 
 earliest growth of civilization." 
 
 " Well, certainly, I never thought of 
 that," said Mary, " except that the funny 
 man who made the people laugh was 
 much like an ordinary clown, in the by 
 play and jokes he was perpetually mak- 
 ing." 
 
 " Yes, we must have got our clown 
 from the far East, but I do not think that 
 he existed on the classic stage of North- 
 ern Europe." 
 
 " I did not think that you in California
 
 from Qhaboro to Sunlight. 81 
 
 interested yourselves so much in such 
 things," said Mary, in some wonder, as 
 she looked up at the refined and eager 
 face of this man, who seemed an odd 
 mixture of ranchman and reader, "but 
 perhaps you have stayed for some years 
 abroad ? " 
 
 " Oh, nobody stays very long in San 
 Francisco, for pleasant as the coast is, it 
 becomes monotonous, and one longs after 
 a time for some real winter again," he 
 answered evasively. 
 
 " I, too, am very fond of reading, and I 
 hope you will be able to come to see us 
 and talk over our experiences of foreign 
 travel," she replied frankly, " for you are 
 resident here now ? " 
 
 She could not conceal her curiosity. 
 
 " Yes," he answered, " I have come up 
 just in time as it turned out, from some 
 way down the coast, where the old mis- 
 sions of Los Angeles, and Santa Barbara, 
 and Monterey interested me so much that
 
 82 from Shabott) to 0mtiight. 
 
 I remained long at those places, which 
 were before unknown to me. If you wish 
 to see the most enchanting portion of 
 this coast you should visit Monterey, 
 where a perpetual sunshine illuminates 
 beautiful woods of sycamore, and, above 
 all, a great grove of cedar, like those of 
 Lebanon. The pines clothe the hillside 
 for some miles, and grow close to the 
 water's edge, so that the breakers of the 
 Pacific fling their spray among the ter- 
 raced boughs. I wish I could have lived 
 in the days of the old Spanish rule, when 
 first the Christian evangel was brought 
 by the fathers to the Indians who dwelt 
 in numbers on the coast, living on fish 
 and the flesh of the Haleotis shell. They 
 were brave men who first landed in those 
 sunlit bays, and one of them probably in 
 gratitude for safety after some adventure 
 by sea, made his Indians build his church 
 so that the interior of it looks like the 
 inside of a ship, the buttressed ribs curv-
 
 .from Shflfooto to Stmlijjht. 83 
 
 ing from floor to roof. I liked to stand 
 there in that early church, now ruined, 
 and to fancy the work of the raising of 
 God's Temple by the natives with their 
 feather ornaments on their heads, their 
 copper-colored skins glowing with the ex- 
 ertions as they placed the stones or hard- 
 ened clay bricks, the priest encouraging 
 them, and near at hand a group of Span- 
 ish soldiery with the front and back 
 curved steel morion on their heads, their 
 rich doublets, and trunk hose, with pikes 
 and arquebuses over their shoulders. 
 For there had been hostile natives to en- 
 counter, men who had come from the 
 great woods in the mountains of the in- 
 terior, and the Spaniards had experience 
 enough in the heavy fighting which they 
 had to face in the South, in Peru and 
 Mexico, to know that the arm of the flesh 
 must protect the saints." 
 
 He spoke all this with what seemed to 
 Mary a strange enthusiasm, but it inter-
 
 84 .from Shadow to Stmlight. 
 
 ested her, and made her still more curious 
 in regard to the speaker, whose face, fig- 
 ure, and manner, she admired. She liked 
 to listen to his talk, and was yet struck 
 with the embarrassment that occasionally 
 overtook him, as though he feared to be- 
 tray himself by the very eagerness with 
 which he pursued a subject that engrossed 
 his mind for a time. Betray what ? That 
 was the question that arose in her mind. 
 What was there to conceal ? Why for 
 instance should he suddenly have ceased 
 to pursue in speech the thoughts that had 
 once led him after the meetings had be- 
 come frequent, to talk to her on the 
 teaching he thought best for a younger 
 brother of her own, who had just entered 
 the military academy of the States at 
 West Point ? He had delivered with ardor 
 a long discourse on the best manner of 
 preparing a youth to encounter the bat- 
 tles of life, and then some doubt or hesita- 
 tion seemed to seize him, and he stopped,
 
 from Shabmn ta Sunlight. 85 
 
 giving some lame apology, obviously not 
 felt as real by the speaker. 
 
 " Ah, but my views on such things can't 
 interest you, Miss Wincott, and I should 
 not have ventured to bore you with 
 them ! " 
 
 She felt he knew she was not bored 
 with them, and yet in one so young as 
 himself it seemed to her so odd that he 
 should have cared to think so much 
 either about missions to ancient heathen 
 or of the training to be given to boys in 
 the United States. What on earth could 
 have made this eccentric young Califor- 
 nian keen on such points ? And why again 
 did he seem not to care to discuss them 
 with others in whom it might naturally 
 be expected he would find congenial 
 companions and controversialists ? For 
 he had on one or two occasions when she 
 had offered to introduce him to men of 
 culture and distinction, said he would far 
 rather talk with her on such things, than
 
 86 from Bhafcow la Snnlighi. 
 
 with them. Yet he had not pressed these 
 subjects, for the talk had naturally led to 
 them, and he was quite as much at home 
 and seemed more at ease, although less 
 engrossed with the cause of talk, when 
 conversation fell on horses, sport, botany, 
 or the natural beauties of the wonderful 
 land in which they then found themselves. 
 He had given his name as Chisholm 
 Walter Chisholm and was obviously a 
 man of education, and one who had en- 
 joyed opportunities of travel and of life 
 generally, which are not often given to 
 men less wealthy, and that he had made 
 the best of his chances to enrich his 
 mind. 
 
 They made an excursion together to 
 the Yosemite Valley to see the " Welling- 
 tonias," as he accidentally called the gi- 
 gantic Sequoias. " Washingtonias," you 
 mean, she had said, and the incident led 
 to an explanation. They had sat to- 
 gether on the stage, as it swung at a
 
 from ShafcutD to Snnlight. 87 
 
 canter round the buffs, where the road has 
 a mountain on one side and a precipice on 
 the other, and she had recounted some of 
 her European adventures of travel to 
 him, and he on his part had shown that 
 the scenes she described were familiar to 
 him. 
 
 " Do you know, Mr. Chisholm, I don't 
 believe you are a Californian at all, but 
 an old countryman," she exclaimed, " and 
 you're saying * Wellingtonia ' in naming 
 our big trees is most outlandish. Now 
 tell me, when did you come to Cali- 
 fornia?" 
 
 " Well, not so very long ago," he an- 
 swered, and on the following day Mary's 
 father had taken occasion to rally him 
 gravely on his British nomenclature. 
 
 "Ah, Mr. Wincott," he said, lightly, 
 " we get back into old habits sometimes, 
 and I have not escaped the failing. Who 
 would have thought it possible that the 
 Britishers would have had the effrontery
 
 88 from 01) O&CHD to Snnligljt. 
 
 to call the biggest plants in America 
 after Wellington, especially when they 
 had been appropriated by native bota- 
 nists to the glory of the great Virginian ?" 
 
 " But are you not a Britisher your- 
 self?" Mr. Wincott said, and Chisholm 
 replied: 
 
 " Since you ask me the question, I am, 
 although I am not sure that I shall not 
 settle altogether in some one of these 
 beautiful valleys, for I like the freedom 
 of the life, and the scenery is most fasci- 
 nating. I fear, however, that duties will 
 call me back to Britain, where my home 
 used to be, and may have to be again." 
 
 He spoke with a certain regret not un- 
 noticed by the shrewd American, who 
 had for some time past wished to know 
 more of the young man to whom they 
 owed so much, who had now been so 
 much thrown with his daughter. He sus- 
 pected that he did not belong to the 
 " Pacific Slope," and the cast of mind he
 
 from Shafcmn to Sunlight. 89 
 
 had observed in him did not suit the wav- 
 ing locks, and what one of his temporary 
 companions was pleased to call " that lan- 
 guage in his hat." Now that he confessed 
 himself to be only a sojourner in the 
 land, although knowing it better than 
 many who had been born there, he showed 
 the adaptability of his character by join- 
 ing in any joke, even though it went 
 against himself. Thus his enthusiasm for 
 many things was sometimes a cause of 
 fun among his new acquaintances, and 
 in especial his apparent love of authority, 
 and reverence for those he conceived to 
 
 be above him* in station was the cause of 
 
 * 
 
 much good-humored merriment among 
 the young Republicans. He was not at 
 all hurt at their want of comprehension 
 of his temperament in this respect, and 
 laughingly told them that he did not be- 
 lieve they would look up even at the big 
 trees when they were among them, or 
 acknowledge them to be one whit taller
 
 90 ,from ShafcoiD to Stmlight. 
 
 than the travelers themselves. He used 
 to declare that the subservience shown 
 to dignitaries, whether of the church or 
 state, was not personal service, but the 
 outward form of regard paid to a belief 
 or a cause. One or two of the others 
 professed to admire this, but could not 
 understand it, although, to be sure, the 
 eldest said, " It is the case in the Roman 
 Catholic Church, and I have seen a little 
 feeling expressed in Canada in regard to 
 the monarchy." 
 
 " Yes," said Chisholm, with a proud 
 look in his eyes, "there are many who 
 would sacrifice themselves for their faith 
 or their prince." 
 
 "Well, for my part, I understand doing 
 anything for a principle, but nothing for 
 a prince." 
 
 " I think I could die for my sovereign," 
 said Chisholm, in a low voice, and the 
 other, eying him with a painstaking as- 
 tonishment, could only reply, slowly :
 
 from Shalom to Stmlight. 91 
 
 " Indeed you don't say so that must 
 be an interesting sensation," and added, 
 with partial assent, "I've known men 
 ready to die for a dollar, which I take to 
 be less than a sovereign." 
 
 But he became a great favorite with 
 his new friends, who were only five in 
 number, nay, her father, a young brother, 
 and another couple, who had all come 
 from New England. He had never vol- 
 unteered to speak to them of himself, 
 nor had he ever by anything that he had 
 said assumed any front position, although 
 his bearing and manner gave the impres- 
 sion that he was a gentleman by birth. 
 He appeared, indeed, at first too much 
 occupied with intellectual pursuits to 
 heed much in what light others regarded 
 him. It was only after a time, when he 
 had obviously felt the attraction of 
 Mary's society, and had yielded to the 
 magic of her presence, that he had seemed 
 anxious to conceal that which puzzled
 
 92 from Shaboio to Sunlight. 
 
 Mr. Wincott, namely, the undoubted aver- 
 sion he manifested against meeting any 
 of his own countrymen, that is, any Eng- 
 lish or Scotch, whom he might happen to 
 hear were likely to recognize him. This 
 peculiarity became a source of curiosity 
 to Mr. Wincott when they returned to 
 the city, and he could not avoid feeling 
 some degree of prejudice against the 
 young man in consequence of it. There 
 had been so many English adventurers 
 calling themselves by all the good names 
 known in England, who had presumed on 
 the ignorance of Americans, and who had 
 admitted without question into their so- 
 ciety, had, in several cases known to Mr. 
 Wincott, grossly abused the courtesy and 
 hospitality accorded to them. 
 
 But with Chisholm the case was re- 
 versed. He had never even mentioned 
 his own name until pressed to do so, nor 
 had he seemed at first especially desirous 
 of making the most of the opportunity
 
 from ShafcoiD to Sunlight. 93 
 
 he had to continue an acquaintance begun 
 under circumstances so terrible, and plac- 
 ing his new - found friends under such 
 great obligations to him. Now, indeed, 
 it was different, and he made the most 
 of his time, and was evidently anxious to 
 see as much as he could of Mary. She, 
 on her side, was as evidently interested 
 and charmed by him, and would listen 
 with most unwonted attention and pa- 
 tience while he talked. Another matter 
 which Mr. Wincott had observed was 
 that Mr. Chisholm was exceedingly well 
 lodged, and was therefore evidently a 
 man of some means. He thought, also, 
 that he must be a man of some distinc- 
 tion, for he had let fall observations with 
 regard to men and things that induced 
 his listener to believe that he had seen 
 "many men and cities," in a way not 
 open to those who had not good creden- 
 tials. It seemed, also, that it was rather 
 in regard to a wish, felt for change of
 
 94 -from Shadow to Sunlight. 
 
 society, than to any other feeling that 
 the avoidance of old countrymen was 
 adopted. Chisholm seemed to be tired 
 of his former life, and to be seeking in 
 the new world variety and difference, 
 rather than any associations with his pre- 
 vious career, whatever that may have 
 been. The exception to this existed in 
 his liking all forms of religious observ- 
 ance, and in his great curiosity in refer- 
 ence to languages and customs. For 
 these things he showed the zeal of a 
 scholar combined with the enthusiasm of 
 a priest. He rather surprised Mr. Win- 
 cott by telling him that he, too, wished 
 to go again eastward, and, as he knew 
 that the party he had rescued meant soon 
 to be going homeward, he proposed that 
 they should take steamer to the mouth 
 of the magnificent Columbia River, ascend 
 that stream, and then from some point on 
 Washington State cross over to Vancou- 
 ver's Island, and finally take the Canadian
 
 from Sha&crw to Stmlight. 95 
 
 Pacific route back to the Atlantic States. 
 Wincott liked the idea, and the proposal 
 removed from his mind one last doubt 
 in regard to his friend, for if there were 
 anything personally unpleasant to Chis- 
 holm in his intercourse with Englishmen 
 on account of any remembrances of the 
 past, why should this project be started, 
 a plan that would inevitably throw him 
 among many who would recognize and 
 know all about him if he were a person 
 who had been known in English society. 
 Miss Wincott did not give enough credit 
 to the ignorance of Canadians on such 
 matters, an ignorance as great as that 
 prevailing among Americans. It was, 
 however, likely that Chisholm might find 
 quite as many Englishmen likely to know 
 him in Canada as in Italy, now that the 
 world-famous railway line of Canada had 
 attracted so many tourists on account of 
 the comfort it gave its passengers, and 
 the wonderful scenery it allowed them to
 
 96 .front BhaootD to Sunlight. 
 
 witness in such perfect comfort and se- 
 curity. Mary took up the idea of an 
 alternative route for their return with 
 enthusiasm. She said she had had quite 
 enough of those horrid alkali plains 
 through which the line from Omaha to 
 'Frisco had taken them. The brief 
 glimpse of the fine woods after they had 
 crossed the Rockies was but a poor com- 
 pensation for the dullness of the desert, 
 which the Mormon communities at Ogden 
 and Salt Lake had, to her mind, alto- 
 gether failed to enliven. They were 
 then all of one purpose, and although a 
 sea-voyage was a thing which was not so 
 acceptable as the rest of the programme, 
 a fine morning in the early autumn found 
 them embarked on a good steamer, and 
 quitting the golden gates of the wind- 
 vexed harbor of 'Frisco for the mouth of 
 the alp-girdled torrents of the Columbia.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE vessel leaped into the joyous 
 waters, past the fort-guarded bluffs, and 
 Mary, her young brother, and Chisholm 
 found that for a day or more they would 
 practically have the deck entirely to 
 themselves. The future cadet of West 
 Point, young Wincott, found also that 
 the company of the officers of the ship 
 was quite as lively as was that of his 
 sister and her friend, engaged in conver- 
 sation which was far too learned for any 
 participation. He didn't a bit mind 
 listening for a time, when Chisholm 
 spoke of his travels, and narrated what 
 he had seen in many strange lands, but 
 when he began to talk at length of what 
 all these good folks believed in the way 
 7
 
 98 ,fr0m Seaborn ta Sunlight. 
 
 of religion, and when he sat for a long 
 time quite silent and only looking at his 
 sister, who again became, if possible, 
 more contemplative, and when both 
 finally not only silently agreed not to 
 talk, but would not answer him when he 
 began to hold forth on the most interest- 
 ing subjects; then, indeed, he thought 
 that the sooner the rest recovered from 
 their sea-sickness the more pleasant and 
 sociable it would be for all concerned. 
 To do him justice, he did not interrupt 
 either their silence or their conversation, 
 the only exception taking place on the 
 second day of the voyage, when he rushed 
 #ft to tell them of a " splendid sight," 
 namely, a whole army of porpoises which 
 were breaking the water just ahead of 
 them. Mary went to the side of the ves- 
 sel, and with her two companions gazed 
 in astonishment at the curious spectacle. 
 Almost as far as the eye could reach, 
 along the slowly heaving waters, a long
 
 .from 0l)aoott) to Bmtlight. 99 
 
 line of porpoises appeared, flinging them- 
 selves out of the rolling swell, and ad- 
 vancing northward in an orderly array. 
 She had seen single individuals, or groups 
 of a few together follow a ship in the 
 Atlantic, but here the creatures took no 
 heed of the steamer, but in their immense 
 numbers kept an even front for miles 
 along the ocean, plunging forward as 
 they follow some mysterious instinct of 
 migration. The ship soon passed through 
 them and left them far behind, and now 
 the voyagers were close to the entrance 
 of the river, but a strong gale arose, and 
 made the captain shake his head when he 
 looked to windward. 
 
 " I'll try it anyhow," he said, " for I 
 have often got over the bar in worse 
 weather." 
 
 Then before the evening had made 
 navigation more difficult, the vessel 
 headed in toward the long line of break- 
 ers which marked the dreaded bar of the
 
 ioo .from Sljaboto la Stmligfjt. 
 
 Columbia. To landsmen the passage of 
 this place in stormy weather always ap- 
 pears a miracle. Nothing is visible of 
 the comparatively smooth channel, which 
 if hit off cleverly gives a safe entrance 
 among the white tossing waves, whose 
 angry moan of thunder fills the mind 
 with terror. The ship seems to be go- 
 ing to certain destruction. The land, 
 mountainous as it is, appears far off, be- 
 cause the shore is flat for some distance, 
 and the eye rests only on the white com- 
 motion of the surge. The passengers 
 from San Francisco were all on deck, for 
 the moment was too interesting and ex- 
 citing to allow any to remain below, and 
 from where they stood the waves rose 
 high above them as they rushed past. 
 The steamer swayed one way and then 
 another, rolled and was carried bodily 
 forward, as the great creamy hillocks 
 dashed under her, and bore her along. 
 They were soon in the very thick of the
 
 .from SI] aboro to Gunligljt. 101 
 
 turmoil, and they gazed at the toppling 
 crests as each hurried on, apparently de- 
 sirous to choke and fill the watery lane 
 that yawned between it and its immediate 
 predecessor in the awful race for the 
 sand-bar ; and they looked amidships 
 where, quietly and calmly the officers and 
 men at the wheel were gathered, watch- 
 ing the conduct of their vessel as they 
 did what they could to guide her. This 
 was most difficult, for the vast hollows 
 made under her stern when a wave had 
 passed, and the next had not yet come, 
 made the propeller revolve with a whir- 
 ling jar which shook the ship from stem 
 to stern, while the billows that threw her 
 forward with the set of the wind appeared 
 to laugh at the attempts made to direct 
 the toy of wood and iron which they 
 tossed about in derision. There was 
 soon an instant of dreadful suspense, 
 when a heavy shock told them that they 
 had struck the sand, and the momentary
 
 102 ^from 0hafo0tn to Sunlight. 
 
 pause on the way of the steamer caused 
 a wave to fall in hissing masses over the 
 stern, and to sweep forward in a volume 
 that would have carried all before it if 
 the precaution of having everything well 
 lashed had not been taken. The passen- 
 gers were behind deck-houses that broke 
 the force of the water, and saved them 
 from being swept away. The next mo- 
 ment another mountainous breaker roared 
 at them, as though to engulf them, but it 
 lifted the vessel, and she floated free 
 again, swept on with the speed of wave 
 and wind. 
 
 " Now we are probably safe," said 
 Chisholm ; and so it proved. Each 
 minute made it apparent that the deeper 
 channel they had entered lay behind the 
 ridge of sand which had so nearly wrecked 
 them. The screw revolved more regu- 
 larly, catching the surface no more with 
 only brief snatches; the billows no longer 
 mounted high alongside and roared them-
 
 .from SfyaibotD to Smtlight. 103 
 
 selves hoarse as they raced forward. It 
 was evident that the dire commotion was 
 being left astern, and that the ship was 
 not any longer being overtaken by it. 
 Yes, the bar of the Columbia lay behind 
 them. The near peril that had threat- 
 ened their lives so short a while ago, was 
 over. They hardly realized as yet that 
 they were saved. But as soon as they 
 did so, and smooth water was really 
 reached, an audible " Thank God ! " was 
 breathed from every lip. It was, indeed, 
 a signal mercy that had rescued them 
 from the terrible bar, and in spite of 
 some mistake as to the exact spot of the 
 true channel, had carried them unharmed 
 over a place where many a vessel had 
 been destroyed. The captain had cer- 
 tainly been foolhardy in attempting the 
 passage at all, when he might have pro- 
 ceeded up the coast to the secure en- 
 trance to the wide straits of San Juan de 
 Fuca, and he himself was by no means
 
 104 .from Shadow to Snnlight. 
 
 anxious to hide the relief he felt, for now 
 that the tension was over, he became 
 talkative and " smokative," if such an ex- 
 pression may be used, and consumed 
 about thirty cigars during the next few 
 hours, burning half and then chewing the 
 remainder of each. The others, in whom 
 we are more immediately interested, were 
 inclined to say very little, but were de- 
 voutly thankful that what had seemed 
 imminent death was passed. 
 
 Mary and Chisholm went below, for 
 darkness had now come on, and the cheer- 
 ful lights below were more attractive 
 than the deck, with the monstrous gloom 
 spread around it. 
 
 " How strange," said Chisholm, " that 
 in so short a space of time your journey 
 should have brought you into peril by 
 fire and by flood ! I fear that you must 
 consider me a man to bring ill luck, for 
 you had no such dangers except when I 
 was present."
 
 .from Shabow la Sunlight. 105 
 
 " If the luck always turns out so for- 
 tunately, I don't think I shall mind your 
 presence much," was the answer, with a 
 quick glance of gratitude. " Have you 
 had any such terrible adventure before ?" 
 
 " In some ways, perhaps, more trying," 
 said Chisholm, " although as far as actual 
 bodily danger is concerned, I do not think 
 that any one could ever have passed 
 through worse than those of the fire and 
 the threatening shipwreck. But I have 
 felt more tried, and have escaped over an 
 even worse bar than that of the Colum- 
 bia," he added, with emotion. Mary's 
 curiosity was again aroused, and he con- 
 tinued. " Yes, there are trials of the 
 mind and character, which age men more 
 than these things would it indeed, in- 
 terest you to know more of me, Miss 
 Mary ? Sometimes I think you doubt 
 me, and I feel that I should like to speak 
 to you as a friend, and know that you 
 have a friendly interest in me. Is it so,
 
 106 .from Shaoom to Sunlight. 
 
 and can I hope for some such senti- 
 ment ? " 
 
 Mary knew by instinct, what might be 
 another peril to her self-possession was 
 close at hand but felt too unnerved to 
 encourage at that moment avowals that 
 she desired secretly to hear, and yet 
 feared because she was aware she would 
 be helpless if he demanded a surrender of 
 her independence. She was not quite 
 prepared to go through more experiences 
 of an agitating nature at that hour, and 
 so she postponed the matter, by asking 
 what could be more dreadful than the 
 storm they had escaped, and saying she 
 only knew of one thing that might be so, 
 and that was, perhaps, the breaking of 
 some affection the estrangement of some 
 dear friend ? 
 
 " Yes," he said, to her surprise, " the 
 linking of all ties that bind one to those 
 we love, the rejection of all communion, 
 the bitterness of exile from that we have
 
 from. 0hab0t to Sunlight. 107 
 
 most adored and reverenced, the find- 
 ing that false we have believed to be 
 true." 
 
 " Had he then loved some woman," she 
 asked herself, "and been rejected? Did 
 he still," she wondered, " cling to the 
 memory of one who spurned him ? What 
 could this mean, and if it meant what the 
 words implied, why was he here, giving 
 perhaps too much of his regard, winning 
 much," she almost whispered to herself, 
 "of her affection?" She said nothing, un- 
 less a scarcely audible " yes " indicated 
 inquiry and regret. 
 
 " Yes, I have suffered more than ship- 
 wreck in life," he went on, "and the sym- 
 pathy of a friend is inexpressibly precious 
 to me. I have touched on a bar in the 
 great river of life, which has shut me out 
 from the flow of the mighty river of hu- 
 man kindness." 
 
 " Nay," thought Mary, " what an atro- 
 cious woman it must have been to have
 
 io8 from Shabotn to Sunlight. 
 
 given him so much pain ! I should like 
 to see her thrown overboard." 
 
 It was quite certain that if Miss Mary 
 had been an autocrat, such as Cleopatra 
 may be supposed to have been when she 
 navigated the Nile in her ancient " Dia 
 Byah," any lady who had offended Walter 
 Chisholm if he had been on board, would 
 have instantly have found himself explor- 
 ing the bottom of that historic river.. 
 This idea made her look rather fierce 
 and intractable. Her admirer, who was 
 himself " getting into deeper water " every 
 moment in speaking to her of his woes, 
 observed the expression, and, being of a 
 very sensitive nature, said : 
 
 " But I am a fool to trouble you with 
 my feelings, for what right have I to in- 
 trude my insignificant and cheerless talk 
 upon you especially now when you 
 ought to be having the conversation of 
 some cheerful and amusing companion 
 after the fright you have had to-day ? "
 
 from Shafcoto to Sunlight. 109 
 
 " No, pray, Mr. Chisholm, do not say 
 so ; but I do not see in what I can help 
 you in mending what the person who 
 has vexed you has done. Perhaps you 
 still look to that person for restitution 
 of something that has been taken from 
 you. But if you lost your heart," she 
 said, with at attempt at gayety, "it is 
 always a difficult matter, as I am told." 
 
 "All lights out please, m'm," at this 
 junction said one of the boat's officials, 
 as a hint that the retirement of the pas- 
 sengers to their cabins was now expected, 
 and further explanations, and disclosures, 
 confidences, and condolences were some- 
 what abruptly cut short. The morrow 
 was to witness another complication, for 
 at a place where they left the steamer 
 and took to the train they saw on the 
 platform a gentleman who scrutinized 
 Chisholm with much attention, and was 
 soon occupied in earnest conversation 
 with a companion, who also looked in
 
 no from Sfyafccrn) to Stmlight. 
 
 the same direction, when both, with a 
 gesture of aversion, entered another car. 
 Chisholm had seen these two men also, 
 and turned his back upon them, as he 
 helped Miss Mary and her father into 
 the other car. A reference to his ac- 
 quaintances on the platform soon came 
 from Miss Mary, who perceived that the 
 gentlemen she had observed looking at 
 them and speaking eagerly were known 
 to him. 
 
 " Oh, yes, they are known to me, but I 
 do not think they will care to speak to 
 me," he answered, somewhat sadly. 
 
 " I suppose they are reporters for some 
 of the newspapers," she remarked, a lit- 
 tle maliciously, " for it is evident that 
 they take much interest in your move- 
 ments." 
 
 "Ah," he said, with a forced smile, 
 "perhaps it was you, Miss Mary, who 
 engaged their attention and any admira- 
 tion their looks may have conveyed, was,
 
 - from Shadow to Snnlight. m 
 
 I am certain, not excited by my appear- 
 ance." 
 
 It was evident that he did not care to 
 pursue this subject, and no further allu- 
 sion was made to it. But their journey 
 was to carry them past the flourishing 
 American cities now rising on the United 
 States coast, and they took ship again to 
 cross over to Vancouver's Island, where 
 they designed to pass a few days at Vic- 
 toria, there to rest awhile before again 
 undertaking the transcontinental journey. 
 It was while crossing over the straits, 
 and while Wincott was admiring the 
 splendid view of the Olympian Range 
 that walled to the south the calm waters, 
 that he was accosted by one of the men 
 who had watched so closely himself and 
 Chisholm as they took the cars a day or 
 two before. The stranger began by lift- 
 ing his hat and making some ordinary 
 observations about the scenery and the 
 weather. He was well clad in a dark
 
 n2 from Shafcoto to Snnlight. 
 
 suit of clothes, with a hat having a sug- 
 gestion in " its language " of clericalism, 
 an idea further strengthened by the cut 
 of his collar, which also " spoke " of a 
 subtle eloquence having occasionally 
 been delivered from under its narrow but 
 immaculate and close-fitting edge. His 
 address was good, and the accents decid- 
 edly British. Mr. Wincott was naturally 
 polite, but, unlike some Americans, he 
 had almost a British antipathy to being 
 interrupted in his thoughts by any un- 
 looked-for intrusion. He therefore an- 
 swered somewhat briefly, and did not 
 offer to continue the conversation. But 
 the darkly-clad gentleman soon again, in 
 the gentlest of voices, expressed the 
 pleasure it gave him (for he was, he said, 
 an Englishman) to find that an eminent 
 citizen of the Eastern States intended to 
 visit an English colony such as Vancou- 
 ver, and said that he had been there 
 long enough to know the value of inter-
 
 .from Shadow to Smnlight. 113 
 
 national good understanding, a result 
 that could best be arrived at by mutual 
 knowledge, and how could such knowl- 
 edge be better obtained than by the per- 
 sonal visits of influential men on both 
 sides ! 
 
 Mr. Wincott did not care for this 
 style of flattery, and merely bowed. His 
 coldness was remarked by his agreeable 
 besieger, and the attack was changed, 
 and the tone altered to one calculated to 
 awake a more responsive spirit. 
 
 " I hope I may be permitted to present 
 to your daughter a brief account of the 
 history of this part of the world. I have 
 seen how she admires the country, and 
 its natural history has only been touched 
 by poor Lord's pen, while there is much 
 that would interest her in its early dis- 
 covery from the time of the Dutch Van- 
 couver to the days commemorated by 
 Washington Irving in ' Astoria.' " 
 
 " I thank you, sir," replied Wincott. 
 8
 
 ii4 -from Shabow to Snnlight. 
 
 " I presume I have the pleasure of ad- 
 dressing a resident of the West Coast." 
 
 " No, I have but lately come here, but, 
 as I have had a good training, that makes 
 me a good hand at learning languages. 
 I have been much among the Indians, 
 and have taken a deep interest in them, 
 and my work has laid chiefly among them 
 and the Chinese. I should like to be of 
 service to you, and perhaps you will not 
 take it amiss if I ask one question of 
 you, for you have among your party one 
 I know well. May I inquire if my old 
 acquaintance Chisholm has been long 
 with you." 
 
 " No, sir; but, if you know him, how is 
 it that you do not put the question to 
 him, instead of to me ? " 
 
 " It is because I have a special reason 
 for the inquiry, and if he is not a friend 
 of yours, and you have but known him 
 recently, I can do so." 
 
 " Sir, he is, I believe, a countryman of
 
 from BhaootD to Btmlight. 115 
 
 your own, but I have not been so curious 
 about him as you appear to be, and I 
 have not questioned him." 
 
 " Perhaps it is as well that you did 
 not," was the reply, "for I fear you 
 would not get the truth from him." 
 
 Wincott looked at his questioner in 
 great surprise. 
 
 "Sir, I do not think we need discuss 
 such matters." 
 
 " It is because I wished to give you a 
 solemn warning against him that I have 
 ventured to say so much," replied the 
 man, with imperturbable suavity, as 
 though he was saying the pleasantest 
 thing in the world. " I have known 
 Walter Chisholm, for such is his name, 
 for some years, and believe me that he 
 is here for no good. He has betrayed 
 those who trusted him in Europe, and he 
 will betray again any man or woman who 
 confides in him." 
 
 " Sir, you have said enough," was Win-
 
 n6 from Shafccrto to Sunlight. 
 
 cott's answer, and he bowed to the com- 
 municative gentleman a low bow, that 
 clearly indicated an end to the conversa- 
 tion. 
 
 Such confidences, however, do not leave 
 an agreeable impression behind them, and 
 Wincott found himself eying with in- 
 creased attention, and with an easiness 
 he could not control, the good under- 
 standing that had evidently sprung up 
 between Mary and Walter. He went so 
 far as to take occasion to say a word to 
 his daughter, in the nature of a reminder 
 that people were not always to be at 
 once implicitly to be trusted, however 
 great an obligation might be owing to 
 them, and urged that a long acquaintance 
 should always precede the forming of any 
 irretrievable decisions. Mary listened pa- 
 tiently, but only said when he concluded : 
 
 " Papa, is it not true that these men 
 who came on board with us have been 
 speaking to you of Mr. Chisholm ?"
 
 from 0l)ab0tD \o Sunlight. 117 
 
 Wincott had eluded giving any positive 
 reply, which, of course, made Mary cer- 
 tain that the fact was as she and Chis- 
 holm had surmised. 
 
 "But why, then, does he not," she 
 thought, as she meditated on this, "why 
 does not Mr. Chisholm challenge these 
 eavesdroppers and slanderers ? " 
 
 Before long they arrived at Victoria, 
 and pushed their way along the quay, 
 which was crowded with people who had 
 come down to meet the boat. There 
 were many Chinese indeed, most of the 
 men there wore the pig-tail and blue 
 loose tunic of that nationality. But 
 there were many whites, who directed 
 the operations of the yellow men in clear- 
 ing the boat. There were a few Tartar- 
 faced Indians " ugly creatures," as Mary 
 thought with big cheek bones, and eyes 
 set at an angle only a little less than 
 the Chinese. There were also ruddy Eng- 
 lishmen, who heartily greeted the pas-
 
 n8 .from Sljoooto to Stmlight. 
 
 sengers they expected to meet. Among 
 these was a man of good countenance, 
 who, as soon as he saw Chisholm, shouted 
 out: 
 
 " Hullo, Walter, old fellow, what on 
 earth brings you here ? By Jove, I am 
 glad to see you ! Come to turn over a 
 new leaf altogether in the new world, 
 eh ? Are you alone ? Come to my house. 
 Goodness gracious, what a surprise to 
 see you, old man, and what a pleasure ! " 
 and then ran on in the same strain, ask- 
 ing so many questions that it was impos- 
 sible to answer them. Chisholm's face 
 glowed with delight at the meeting with 
 his friend, and Mary shared in his joy, 
 on seeing him so warmly welcomed. 
 
 " No, I am not alone, in one sense, for 
 I have been in the company of these 
 friends," said Chisholm. " Let me intro- 
 duce you to them," and then he made 
 known his name as the Honorable Charles 
 Churston, an old English public school-
 
 ,fr0m Shaboto to Stmlight. 119 
 
 mate of his own. Nothing would satisfy 
 Churston until Chisholm had promised to 
 go to his house instead of going to the 
 Russell House Hotel, where they had all 
 ordered rooms. 
 
 " Will you follow on after you have got 
 the luggage," said Churston, " and, in the 
 mean time, if Mr. Wincott allows me, I 
 will show himself and Miss Wincott the 
 way to the hotel, and see they get all 
 they need." He made them mount a 
 nicely appointed buggy, and, as he drove 
 them away, said to Mr. Wincott : 
 
 " Well, I consider myself to be in great 
 luck to have met you, especially with 
 such a dear old friend as Chisholm the 
 best fellow I know." 
 
 Wincott told him that he esteemed Mr. 
 Chisholm, and that he had saved them 
 from a great danger at San Francisco. 
 
 " Well, I am glad to hear he has fallen 
 in with you, for I am sure he could not 
 be in better hands. I have good reason
 
 izo from Shaboro to Sunlight. 
 
 to respect and love him, and no man in 
 my estimation has shown a finer charac- 
 ter than his and well tried it has been, 
 too," he added in a lower tone. 
 
 They drove on through the clean and 
 bright streets of the delightful capital of 
 the great Province of British Columbia. 
 There was plenty of life in the highways 
 and by-ways. Cheerful buildings of red 
 brick bespoke a comfort unalloyed by 
 extravagant attempts at display, good 
 shops with ample fronts of glass were 
 sheltered from the sun by the verandaed 
 sidewalks, which the travelers had no- 
 ticed in use in the big city that they had 
 left a few days before. From many 
 points the joyous waters of the bay and 
 of the calm straits could be seen, the 
 shadowy mountains on the farther Ameri- 
 can continent shining with the dim snows 
 upon their summits. Hills on the island 
 around them rose green with the forests 
 of the handsome Douglas fir. Over all
 
 from Sljab0tD to Smtligfjt. 121 
 
 breathed an air of peaceful prosperity, 
 not achieved without effort, but main- 
 tained without the fever manifest in more 
 ambitious places. A perfect climate, a 
 contented people, a free and happy life, 
 occupied but not distracted by its daily 
 business, these seemed the characteristics 
 of a country whose motto might be given 
 in the words " Loyal and Laborious." 
 By loyalty and labor they had won a po- 
 sition to be envied. They had enough for 
 their wants ; there were none very rich to 
 make them envious. There were only 
 enough poor to remind them of the vir- 
 tue of charity. Their land was beautiful 
 and their lives were happy.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 IT may readily be imagined that Mary 
 Wincott had by this time made a confi- 
 dante of the only other lady of her party, 
 and this lady took a most lively interest in 
 all she heard, fully sympathized with Mary 
 in her admiration for Chisholm, and was 
 ready, as most good women are, to clear 
 up any misunderstandings and difficulties 
 which might have prevented a marriage. 
 
 " You may think how badly I felt," said 
 Mary, " when my father spoke to me on 
 the subject of Mr. Chisholm's attentions. 
 He seemed to think that those bilious- 
 looking men on the steamer, had truth on 
 their side when they spoke against my 
 friend. I consider them both as frauds, 
 and although they should be intelligent,
 
 from Shaootu 10 Stmlight. 123 
 
 judging from the number of bumps and 
 lumps on their heads, I think Mr. Chis- 
 holm's calm fair brow is decidedly worth 
 a thousand such mean intellects." 
 
 This was pretty strongly expressed, but 
 Miss Wincott's mind had been much exer- 
 cised on the subject; and where the heart 
 feels the mouth speaks. Her anxiety was 
 heightened next morning when her friend 
 did not appear, and when a letter was 
 handed to her father, which she could see 
 bore Mr. Chisholm's handwriting on the 
 cover. We may as well give the contents 
 of this letter. What it conveyed could 
 hardly influence the young lady's mind 
 for or against the writer, because her 
 opinions were already so firmly estab- 
 lished that it is safe to say that nothing 
 short of a miracle would have changed 
 them. Her father had been most favora- 
 bly impressed by all he had heard from 
 Mr. Churston, but he had not cleared up 
 any doubts that might arise in conse-
 
 124 from Shafccm) ta Snnlight. 
 
 quence of the peculiarities he had noticed 
 in Chisholm the dislike of meeting those 
 he might have been supposed to be likely 
 to be willing to meet, and the somewhat 
 mysterious references he had to let fall as 
 to the vexations of his past life. Mr. 
 Wincott said nothing when he received 
 the letter, but retired to his room. Thith- 
 er we may follow him, and read the letter 
 over his shoulder.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 Letter from Mr. Chisholm to Mr. Wincott. 
 
 " DEAR SIR : I hope you will not be 
 angry with me if I ask your kind atten- 
 tion to a very long letter. I might, per- 
 haps, not have addressed it to you, had I 
 not heard before we left San Francisco, 
 that family circumstances, which would 
 have deterred me from writing it, had 
 been changed by a judicial decision given 
 on a pending suit in the Scottish Courts. 
 This decision leaves me the master of a 
 fortune that renders me quite independ- 
 ent. Owing to events which I shall take 
 the liberty of explaining to you, this mat- 
 ter rested in doubt for some time. 
 
 " I have been assured by your consid- 
 erate conduct toward me, that events
 
 126 from Shaboto la Sunlight. 
 
 which concern me may not be wholly in- 
 different to you. If they be of no inter- 
 est to you, I do not request you to pro- 
 ceed in the perusal of this communication. 
 I feel, however, that unless I make you 
 the offer of an explanation, I may remain 
 in a false position, and I have had too 
 evil an experience of a false position to 
 allow me not to make the attempt, at all 
 events, to save myself from again becom- 
 ing the victim of another such misfortune. 
 The death of my father occurred a few 
 months ago, and it has added to the dis- 
 tress I have felt on other accounts that I 
 was not able to receive his blessing on his 
 deathbed, nor to remove from his mind 
 prejudices which he had conceived against 
 me. These prejudices were founded on 
 conduct on my part of which you your- 
 self shall be the judge, if you read this 
 letter to the end. Suffice it to say now, 
 that they were sufficiently strong to pre- 
 vent his contributing in any form to my
 
 .from Shaooto to Stmiight. 127 
 
 support when I had occasion to apply to 
 him. 
 
 " He told me when I was still quite 
 young, and had taken the first step that 
 led to his displeasure, that if I persisted 
 in the course I had felt it my duty to take, 
 he could not give me the aid he had given 
 to others of his family. As I was the 
 eldest, and had a natural right to expect 
 favor at his hands, this announcement 
 did not tend to soften my feelings, but 
 rather hardened me to shape an independ- 
 ent course, believing that injustice had 
 followed misrepresentation. That my 
 path was not his, that my opinion led me 
 on a different way, was, I knew, a grief 
 to him, but I did not expect that he would 
 have taken the side of my enemies. 
 
 " My persistence soon led to his sending 
 to me an intimation that he had disinher- 
 ited me. But this also had no effect on 
 me. Indeed, from the manner of life I 
 had chosen to lead when this new meas-
 
 128 from Shaboto to Sunlight. 
 
 ure of his displeasure fell upon me, I had 
 expected little else. I was not* surprised, 
 although I was pained by the manner in 
 which the decision was conveyed to me, 
 and by the additional words of reproof 
 with which it was accompanied. I could, 
 however, not have used the property, as I 
 then conceived, for my own good, and re- 
 gretted its loss only because I fancied that 
 therewith I might have done good to 
 others. Now since his death all is changed. 
 It was found by my legal representatives 
 that the old Scots entail through which in 
 his phrase he could ' drive a coach and 
 six,' still held good. The wish of my 
 parent to devise the land otherwise than 
 it has been devised from father to son 
 through a very long array of ancestors is 
 therefore rendered a nugatory and I am 
 in possession of that he owned. Although 
 by no means a rich heritage, it is far more 
 than sufficient. I have been accustomed 
 to live as though I should literally have
 
 .from Shaboro to Sunlight. 129 
 
 to take no care for the morrow as to what 
 I should eat or what I should drink. I 
 find myself still wondering whether it is 
 right to spend what is mine, still waking 
 with surprise to find that I am to wear 
 good clothes, still inclined to grudge my- 
 self that which all those of my station in 
 life enjoy without thought, and use with- 
 out examination or gratitude. The old 
 poverty and faith that made me not care 
 for the morrow, is replaced by a conscious- 
 ness that what has become mine without 
 labor should be shared by those who can 
 hardly attain by any effort the comfort I 
 have. The vow of charity I hold to be 
 a holier vow than that of poverty. The 
 acceptance of the will of Providence in 
 bestowing that which is good is best 
 shown by the filling of the burden of the 
 responsibility of its distribution. We 
 should not, I believe, fly from this pen- 
 ance of life, and leave to others that which 
 we should do ourselves. To hide our in- 
 9
 
 130 <from Styabotn la Stmlight. 
 
 dividuality for an association of mortals 
 like ourselves, and to vow obedience to 
 one of these in matters in which the giv- 
 ing of that which is ours, not as seems 
 best to the intellect planted in ourselves, 
 but as seems best only to a fellow-man 
 chosen as our superior, seems to me a 
 sacrifice to man rather than to God. I 
 have interpreted the phrase used by my 
 former friends of the abdication of the 
 empire over self-will, and have found it to 
 mean the enthronement of a will more to 
 be distrusted than our own. 
 
 " Let each man use the intellect given 
 to him ; let no man surrender it to others 
 in the lesson I have learned. I have not 
 found peace in the suppression of my own 
 thoughts, nor have I found rest in forsak- 
 ing the place appointed me by Providence 
 in the line of life's battle. You will won- 
 der at this apparently irrelevant rhap- 
 sody, but the explanation is briefly this 
 my father disapproved of my becoming a
 
 ,rom Shaboio to Sunlight. I3 1 
 
 Roman Catholic, and of the further steps 
 taken by me in that most holy faith. It 
 was the after consequences of my action 
 that he detested, with the unreasoning 
 dislike of a man who has never had the 
 patience to look into questions, even 
 though he had heard them superficially 
 criticised. It was not so much my recep- 
 tion into that Church that he dreaded, 
 but the acceptance by me of priests' 
 orders, which I was privileged to bear 
 some time afterward. He declared that 
 a priest must give all he had to the 
 church, and that as I could have no family 
 or affection outside of its pale, he must 
 pass me over, and give my inheritance to 
 another. I am no priest now ; I have 
 left the communion I embraced. I am a 
 double-dyed traitor in the eyes both of 
 my family and my old brethren of the 
 priesthood. Can you wonder that I feel 
 a terror of meeting those who believe me 
 forsworn ? Can you not at this same time
 
 i3 2 from Bhaboto 10 Stmlight. 
 
 understand how it is that I entered that 
 church in my youth for conscience' sake, 
 embraced the religion by which I was 
 attracted, and have also done right in re- 
 turning to that in which I was christened, 
 when the priestly vocation did not satisfy 
 me and when my conscience no longer 
 allowed me to wear the uniform denoting 
 obedience to its officers, and belief in its 
 trusts ? Thus much I say at the outset, 
 that you may not misunderstand me, for I 
 can not bear that I should long delay in 
 placing before you my reason for the 
 doubt you must have seen in my bearing, 
 and that I should not at once declare 
 that I am not ashamed of what I have 
 done, however much I may shrink from 
 the constant assertion of my integrity be- 
 fore those who would dispute it. 
 
 " But I have not told you all. More 
 must yet be said. Let me ask your pa- 
 tience. 
 
 " I was an impressionable youth, and
 
 .from Shafcoto la Stmlight. 133 
 
 had from a' very early age liked to pore 
 over books, containing what I may call 
 the heraldry of religion, for the forms of 
 the churches are but the blazon of belief. 
 The pageantry that is always attractive 
 to the wondering child-nature within us, a 
 nature that is impressed by ceremonies 
 and costumes, and scenic effect, especially 
 if they be made to have mysterious mean- 
 ings ; the love of beauty in music, in 
 lights, in colors, which the boy or girl 
 shares in common with the elder child, 
 the savage, or the uneducated all this 
 had a double fascination for me. But as 
 a youth I was by no means untouched by 
 the simple forms of worship. I used to 
 attend the services of the Orthodox or 
 Greek Church, and loved to listen to the 
 deep-toned chanting of their priests, and 
 delighted in the mysterious secrecy of the 
 painted screen, rich with the hues of all 
 metals and jewelry surrounding the fig- 
 ures of the saints. My curiosity in eccle-
 
 134 from Shobauj to 
 
 siastical matters went so far that I sat 
 observing with the greatest attention not 
 only the services but even the debates in 
 the assemblies of Protestant churches. 
 Perhaps it was the constant strain on the 
 mind, caused by watching how much all 
 these doctors differed in the prescriptions 
 they offered for its weal, that aggravated 
 a temperament which in youth was too 
 sensitive, as is the case with many boys. 
 The delicacy of constitution which marked 
 my early years gave way with manhood, 
 but the doubts and questionings of heart 
 and soul that a more healthy tone would 
 have preserved me from, left its impress 
 upon me. I became, when still a child, 
 what the French call a dfvot. I believed 
 that I could assist in the regeneration of 
 mankind. Among my studies had, of 
 course, been the writings of the Fathers 
 of the Catholic Church, and I had taken 
 opportunities of conversing upon these 
 with members of that church. An excel-
 
 irom Sho&oro to Sunlight. 135 
 
 lent man, who belonged to that faith, 
 soon saw the aptitude I possessed for in- 
 struction and took me in hand with a zeal 
 worthy of a better cause. He was de- 
 sirous not only to secure me, but the 
 property that he believed would be mine, 
 and, without telling any of my family, I 
 was admitted by him to the church. I do 
 not blame him, for I know that he acted 
 as he thought for my good. It was some 
 time before the truth of my conversion 
 was known to my father, and his anger 
 made me, as I say, a yet firmer adherent 
 of the doctrines I had embraced. I con- 
 ceived myself to be already in some meas- 
 ure a martyr, and that the punishment I 
 suffered in this world would be more than 
 rewarded in the next. But my health was 
 none the better for the anxiety I endured, 
 and the weaker I became in body the 
 more was I shut out by my new pastors 
 from any influences but their own. Soon 
 my highest ambition was the priesthood.
 
 136 from 0hab0to to Sunlight. 
 
 " I begged to be allowed to study at 
 Rome. Then from exposure to the sun, 
 and the consequence of a cold caught 
 when sleeping in a little room hidden 
 away from the light, and therefore damp 
 and chilly, I fell very ill. Again, in spite 
 of all the kindness of those who minis- 
 tered to me, a renewed state of uncer- 
 tainty as to my future, a dependent frame 
 of mind took possession of me and tor- 
 tured me with misgivings, and doubts, so 
 that I often even longed for death. The 
 reminiscences of childhood, the desire 
 again to experience the love of my kin- 
 dred, were mingled with intensely vivid 
 pictures of the place I loved in my 
 youth ; the woods, and hills, and glens, 
 and streams, along which my way used 
 to take me. 
 
 " In my ravings I panted for the cool 
 rush of the Highland burns, the soothing 
 babble of the quieter reaches in the 
 meadows so full of primroses in the
 
 from Shabouj to Stmlight. 137 
 
 spring, and starred even in the autumn 
 with the ox-eye daisies. I raved against 
 all that had induced me to leave such 
 happiness, the joys shared with parents 
 and brothers and sisters at home. It was 
 raving, I suppose, for I had been told 
 that I had been delirious, and surely such 
 weaknesses were wholly unworthy of one 
 who had put his hand to the plow and 
 durst not turn back. * 
 
 " Certainly as I grew stronger the fear- 
 ful homesickness and yearning for the 
 old days and the old ways, left me to a 
 great extent, and I looked forward again 
 to fulfilling my vows as a soldier of 
 Christ. It was when I was recovering 
 that I read the lives of the saints, and the 
 fortune and career of the founder of the 
 Jesuit fraternity, deeply interested me. 
 I could not help in some measure com- 
 paring his fate with my own, for he also 
 had been born to competence, and a 
 position honorable in his own country.
 
 138 from 0l)aaoio to Sunlight. 
 
 He had had greater fortune than I, for 
 he had distinguished himself in battle, 
 and when wounded had first turned his 
 thoughts to piety and God. It was a 
 fanciful and conceited thought on my 
 part, to think of my own case in connec- 
 tion with his glorious success and marvel- 
 ous self-confidence. But I was still weak, 
 and conceit is one of the courtiers of a 
 feeble brain. An ambition was at all 
 events aroused to do what he had done, 
 to make his knightly breeding and bear- 
 ing the stepping-stone to a place wherein 
 to wield authority greater than that even 
 of the most successful warrior. My 
 studies were renewed, and in the intervals 
 of my work I wandered to some massive 
 ruin of Pagan times, in Rome, and felt 
 how great the creed must be that van- 
 quished the building of these leviathan 
 baths, and theatres, and temples, and 
 palaces, and felt how the spirit of Peter 
 and of Paul had lived again in such men
 
 ,from Bhaboto ta 0mtligl)t. 139 
 
 as Loyola, although in different guise, 
 and perhaps sullied with more natural 
 aspiration. The soldier and cavalier had 
 not the advantage which the fishermen 
 possessed, of following so close upon the 
 Master. He had not been able to see 
 Him, and hear from His lips the words 
 that made death seem as nothing, and 
 even pain if it 'must come, welcome as a 
 seal of their covenant with Him, and an 
 ensign for the guidance of all men in the 
 ways they had walked with Him. But 
 although the type of the conquering 
 spirit was wholly different, yet the Span- 
 iard and the Galileans had both fought 
 the good fight, and if mistakes had been 
 committed by the successors of Loyola, 
 had not equally grievous mistakes been 
 committed by the successors of St. Peter? 
 " I used to go to the churches when 
 worn out with pacing the streets and 
 country, and would sit down or kneel 
 before some altar, heart and limb wearied,
 
 i4 .from Shabota to Sunlight. 
 
 and feeling the coolness and the darkness 
 of the place more soothing than I can 
 express. On one of these days I had 
 felt disturbed by some chanting which 
 had broken forth in the chancel, and had 
 wandered forth again, only to enter be- 
 neath another great front, whose doors 
 were receiving many persons. It was 
 near evening. The church was great and 
 solemn in the gloom, but there was noth- 
 ing visible in it which especially distin- 
 guished it from many another beautiful 
 edifice. The lofty roof, the round arches 
 which divided the chapels in the aisles 
 from the nave, the semicircular vault 
 above the high altar, were like those of 
 other places of Roman worship. They, 
 too, were built as were the old temples 
 with that perfect curve of round vaulting 
 which was bequeathed to their descend- 
 ants by the masters of the ancient world. 
 But it was too dark to criticise the archi- 
 tecture or to be conscious of more than
 
 from Shaftou) to Stmlight. 141 
 
 the vastness or solemnity of this Chris- 
 tian temple. Wandering on into the 
 church, with a vague desire to kneel 
 nearer to the great altar, upon which 
 were numerous lights burning like the 
 shore of a harbor of refuge seen across 
 a waste of black waters, I found several 
 worshipers there before me, and turned 
 into the transept and kneeled before a 
 marble balustrade which guarded a shrine 
 on which were set no candles. I com- 
 pleted my prayer and rose, and then saw 
 that apparently coming from the steps 
 before me shone a glow of light, which 
 made the inner part of the shrine bright 
 with the sheen of gold. This upward 
 gleaming of light from the steps before 
 me led me to gaze more nearly at it, and 
 I saw on the worked metal the figure of 
 a man who was giving an open volume 
 to others who pressed around him to re- 
 ceive it. The dress of this figure was 
 unmistakable. It was the Jesuit dress,
 
 142 from Shafcoto to Sunlight. 
 
 and this was the figure of Loyola, and I 
 was standing at his tomb. I was pro- 
 foundly impressed with the circumstance 
 that had led me to this sepulchre, for I 
 knew not, so short had been my sojourn 
 in Rome while in health, where the 
 Church of the Jesu stood. I had entered 
 it unwittingly, I had been conducted, as 
 I thought, by an unseen but directly 
 guiding power to this holy place, the 
 grave of one of whom I had lately read 
 so much, and with whose spirit I had 
 felt a sympathy that had drawn mine to 
 his. And now, on a platform near the 
 pulpit, I saw a Jesuit priest ascend in 
 order to address the crowd who were 
 filling the center part of the building. 
 He waited until most of them had seated 
 themselves, and I saw his dark robes 
 and -dark square cap becoming gradually 
 less and less distinct in the dusk. There 
 was a little lamp hanging from the cen- 
 ter of the arch which vaulted each aisle
 
 .from 6l)aZ>0tt) to Sunlight. 143 
 
 chapel, and near one of these he stood, 
 and then began to preach in a voice so 
 full of earnestness, so silently, with an 
 intense consciousness of the transcend- 
 ent importance and the truth of the mes- 
 sage .he was commissioned to give, that 
 I listened spell-bound. His white face 
 could be seen moving a little from side 
 to side, his arms as they were raised 
 lifted the long sleeves that rose and fell 
 at his sides like black wings. The peo- 
 ple were very silent, and bent forward 
 to hear, as his full voice boldly explained 
 his dogma, and then pleads with them 
 most touchingly to hear and to follow 
 where the saintly founder of their so- 
 ciety, the servant of God, had led. He 
 did not plead in vain with me. I became 
 not only a priest, but also a Jesuit. 
 
 " The severe discipline to which all 
 those who desire to enlist in the Com- 
 pany of Jesus are subjected fell heavily 
 upon me, and when at last I was admitted
 
 144 from Seaborn to Sunlight. 
 
 to exercise my new functions I was an 
 austere ascetic. Some disappointment 
 and chagrin was, I am ashamed to say, 
 allowed to rankle in my breast, for an 
 eager novice naturally expects to be re- 
 ceived with open arms, when once he has 
 given up his whole life, and desires to 
 embrace the new duty. He is apt to be- 
 lieve that the severity of the wrench his 
 own feelings have undergone, should be 
 the measure of the warmth of the greet- 
 ing accorded to him when he enters the 
 new fold. When on the contrary, except 
 for the congratulations of his own inti- 
 mates, he finds the order he joins is, at 
 all events as far as regards its official or 
 public conduct toward him, apparently 
 suspicious and distrustful, he resents the 
 coldness of his reception. He thinks he 
 has already in all he has suffered proved 
 his sincerity, and that further tests are 
 unnecessary a worry nay, almost an 
 insult. The meekness and obedience he
 
 from Shaboro ta Sunlight. 145 
 
 should feel have not yet fully entered 
 into the fiber of his thought, and he is 
 inclined to think that his sacrifice has 
 not been accepted, and that he is worthy 
 of greater trust. He knows that it is 
 
 useless to ask for responsibility where 
 
 
 the authority to which he has yielded, 
 
 has not yet decreed that such shall be 
 given to him. He undergoes his disci- 
 pline, but he often repines. It was so 
 with me, and my tendencies were not un- 
 discovered, nor was it thought good that 
 I should be tried beyond what I could 
 bear. It is not the policy of the society 
 to do anything to a man which might 
 lose him to its cause, or even render his 
 enthusiasm less fervent. It was desired 
 that I should be retained among them 
 and employed to win others over. Each 
 of my utterances had been repeated, and 
 although I was not in the habit of saying 
 much, yet all that had escaped me to- 
 gether with the evidence of the moods
 
 146 -from Shabcrw to Sunlight. 
 
 that had possessed me, was sufficient for 
 the superiors of the Order to deem that 
 my health was to be strengthened, my 
 mind braced, and a very generous course 
 of treatment accorded to me, so that I 
 might again take my place among men, 
 and work for the greater glory of God in 
 the world. I was to be an instructor of 
 youths, and boys do not like a severe 
 ascetic as their playmate and companion. 
 My director therefore encouraged me to 
 eat good food, and lead my life as much as 
 possible in the open air, and to live much 
 as I would have lived had I remained in 
 the house of a country gentleman. This 
 ultimately restored to me my former 
 strength, and was perhaps also the cause 
 of my future release from the bonds and 
 meshes they had cast and woven around 
 me. For a long while I worked diligent- 
 ly, I endeavored to the very best of my 
 power to subdue any rebellious thoughts 
 that arose in me. My own inclinations
 
 from ShaboiD ta Sunlight. 147 
 
 had always pointed to missionary work, 
 and I had conceived a great desire to 
 have China allotted as the field of my 
 labors. But I was told such was not my 
 destination, and that I could be of more 
 use at home. During the time I remained 
 under instruction there was much in the 
 teaching I received that was repulsive 
 to me, and was, I thought, against the 
 spirit of the Founder of the Order, for 
 whose pure and gallant life I retained the 
 greatest veneration. How could I, for 
 instance, agree that the maxim of one of 
 their most renowned writers was consist- 
 ent with truth, when he wrote : ' If a man 
 commit a crime, reflecting indeed, but 
 still very imperfectly and superficially, 
 upon the wickedness and great willfulness 
 of those crimes, however heinous may be 
 the matter, he still sins but lightly. The 
 reason is that as a knowledge of the 
 wickedness is necessary to constitute the 
 sin, so it is a full clear knowledge and
 
 148 from Shoboro to Sunlight. 
 
 reflection necessary to constitute a hein- 
 ous sin. And thus, as Vasquez says, in 
 order that a man may freely sin, it is 
 necessary to deliberate whether he sins 
 or not. But he fails to deliberate upon 
 the moral wickedness of it, if he does not 
 reflect, at least by doubting upon it, dur- 
 ing the act. Therefore he does not sin 
 until he reflects upon the wickedness of 
 it. It is certain that a full knowledge is 
 requisite to constitute mortal sin.' 
 
 " Was not this maxim, and others like 
 it, which I still found in favor, worthily 
 denounced by that pope who was un- 
 doubtedly poisoned by the Jesuits be- 
 cause he suppressed their order in Rome ? 
 What said this pope Ganganelli as late 
 as the last century : ' Further concerning 
 the use of certain maxims which the Holy 
 See has with reason prescribed as scanda- 
 lous and manifestly contrary to good 
 morals.' Yet it was by these lights that 
 I was commanded to walk, for in course
 
 from BhofcoBj to Sunlight. 149 
 
 of time I became under this recommen- 
 dation tutor to the heir of another family, 
 situated somewhat like my own, that is 
 having a good estate, which was to de- 
 volve upon the boy placed under my in- 
 struction. I was here gradually pressed 
 more and more by my immediate superior 
 to do things against which my whole soul 
 revolted. I do not blame the general of 
 the order or the higher authorities, for I 
 believe that they were misled by false re- 
 ports coming from the priest whose orders 
 I was obliged more immediately to obey. 
 But I perceived after a time that this man 
 had persuaded himself that it would be 
 within the bounds of possibility for his 
 conscience to prevent the lad from marry- 
 ing, and knowing that he would have ab- 
 solute control over the lad and goods, for 
 the boy had been born after the date of 
 the act which forbade the entail of land 
 on children born after its passage through 
 Parliament. He would therefore be free
 
 iso -from 0I)afo0to to Sunlight. 
 
 to do what he chose with the property, 
 and if he did not marry, might dispose of 
 it ' to the greater glory of God.' It may 
 be that I wronged my superior in fancy- 
 ing that to be his object. Whether this 
 be so or not I suspected that it was, and 
 wrote to him a violent letter, for my in- 
 dignation was aroused by the base sus- 
 picion a suspicion I must own which 
 was based on very slight grounds. The 
 idea was indignantly disowned and a re- 
 port sent against me to headquarters. 
 
 " My old headstrong impulse had re- 
 turned to me with my recovery of health, 
 and I swore aloud that I would no longer 
 submit. The very terms to the reply of 
 my letter, the subtle lies as I thought 
 them to be, impressed on each page made 
 my passion greater. I wrote again saying 
 that I should never wear again ' the livery 
 of my moral disgrace,' as I called my 
 clerical dress. Without a word to the 
 family with whom I was living I left, and
 
 from SIjafcotD la Sunlight. 151 
 
 changing my name resided for some time 
 in a town where I could not be easily 
 tracked, even if any one had cared to take 
 the trouble to follow me, which was by no 
 means likely. After I had left, a reaction 
 set in, and I half regretted my passion 
 and the course it had led me to take. 
 
 "Loneliness is bad for man, and soli- 
 tariness in a great city makes loneliness 
 feel doubly miserable. I could not ap- 
 proach my family. They had given me 
 up as a blacksheep long ago, and did not 
 wish to rearrange the partition they 
 fancied they could make of our estate. 
 I could not venture near any of the 
 brethren I had left, for I should be re- 
 ceived by them either too kindly as 
 willing to return, or not at all, and 
 treated as a renegade and traitor. Shame 
 seemed to darken round me on every 
 side, and yet gradually I knew that I had 
 on the whole been right in what I had 
 done, although I may have done what
 
 152 from Shabotn to Sunlight. 
 
 was right too passionately and too im- 
 pulsively. A longing came over me to 
 see again the country of my birth and 
 boyhood. I found friends among the 
 tenants of the estate, and lived among 
 them for a month. Then I escaped from 
 my own thoughts, and from the idleness 
 that made them get more bitter, and took 
 passage for America. There, after a 
 year, I had the happiness of meeting you 
 and your daughter, in the Chinese theatre. 
 Should you condemn me, I shall ask you 
 not to let your daughter see this letter. 
 Should you, on the whole, approve of my 
 conduct, I request you to allow her to 
 read it, for her good opinion has become 
 to me that which I most value and regard 
 in life." 
 
 Mr. Wincott was not a man to delib- 
 erate too long on any question. His 
 opinion was gradually formed and reso- 
 lutely adhered to, and the opinion he had
 
 from Shafcoto to Snniigljt. 153 
 
 on the case laid before him in the letter 
 was accurately expressed when he closed 
 its perusal and said : 
 
 " Quite right. Better late than never. 
 He might have imagined the set of that 
 current before he embarked on it. I'll 
 give Mary the letter." 
 
 That young lady also retired to her 
 room to read it, and her prevalent feeling 
 was expressed when she concluded in the 
 words "What a horrid shame!" by 
 which she doubtless meant that Chisholm 
 had been all along in the right, and 
 everybody he had disagreed with had 
 been in the wrong. He pame to receive 
 his sentence next morning, and was 
 unanimously acquitted by the judge and 
 jury. He certainly would never have 
 feared another earthly tribunal so much 
 as he did that of the Wincott party, 
 and I doubt if even the General of the 
 Jesuits could have infused into him a 
 tithe of the fear that secretly possessed
 
 i54 -from Sljaooio to Sunlight. 
 
 him as he approached the door. To 
 judge from his face, when he left the 
 door, the grand inquisition within had 
 not put him to the torture. He walked 
 quite straight, and was firm on his legs. 
 A smile on his lips and a light in his eyes 
 spoke of what his former friends would 
 have pronounced, in their language 
 "justification and peace." Not many 
 days elapsed before he had declared that 
 he could not face the criticism of the 
 East unless he had Mary to exorcise any 
 evil spirits that might linger around him 
 or meet him in the world he had left, and 
 she had vowed to defend him against 
 devil or saint. 
 
 " Who would have thought that I 
 should meet my fate in 'Frisco," she 
 laughingly said, " and at the hands of a 
 man, too, who had never seen me in po- 
 lite society, and appeared for the first 
 time like a 1 Chinese dragon to carry me 
 off in the midst of flames and smoke ?"
 
 jTrom 0hab0a to Btmlight. 155 
 
 " Ah, but I saw you in polite society 
 long before our 'Frisco meeting," he said. 
 
 " No how was that ? Where ? " was 
 the natural inquiry. 
 
 " Don't you remember a certain visit 
 paid by you to a smuggler's cave in Scot- 
 land ? " he asked. 
 
 " Why, yes ; you don't mean to say that 
 you were the ghost we saw in the cave ? " 
 
 " Yes ; I had been staying in the farm- 
 house, you remember, near the cave, and 
 had asked the good people to keep quiet 
 about my return for a time to my old 
 haunts, and was reading one day in that 
 cavern, which I dearly loved to visit, 
 when you and your party entered, and I 
 had an opportunity to see you sitting, 
 and eating, and talking, and never forgot 
 you from that moment." 
 
 " No, impossible ; there was only an 
 old man, who disappeared an old man 
 with a white beard." 
 
 He laughed and said :
 
 156 from Sl)ob0u) to Sunlight. 
 
 "What, my poor old book, the volume 
 I had with me ? There was no white 
 beard, but the book I held near my face 
 may have seemed like one in the dark, 
 and the ledge to which I ascended was 
 hidden from your candles, so that you 
 nevet saw me, but I saw you well. I 
 was at one moment almost tempted to, 
 join you, but my foolish fear of being 
 again seen by people who might talk 
 about me, and tell many who would 
 recognize me, prevented me. Besides, I 
 am not sorry, for I was perhaps able to 
 make a better impression at the theatre 
 than I could have hoped to do even in 
 that romantic place." 
 
 " Well, I consider you took a base ad- 
 vantage of us," said Miss Mary, "but 
 you must have been known to that farm- 
 er and his neighbors." 
 
 "Yes, but they kept my secret in all 
 my trouble. I never disguised myself, 
 nor did I ever change my name."
 
 from 01) abort) ta Sunlight. 157 
 
 " Then you have behaved better than 
 I, for I have promised you to change my 
 name," said Mary. 
 
 And she has kept her promise, and now 
 speaks with a very British accent, and 
 has a property that she and her husband 
 sometimes call the Smuggler's Cave. To 
 this the reader may some day be invited, 
 and if he makes the expedition he will 
 see the ghost, and Mary Chisholm, who 
 has never since the day we quoted her 
 as using the expression ever again said 
 that she felt badly." 
 
 THE END.
 
 T 
 
 D. APPLETON ft CO.'S PUBLICATIONS. 
 
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 commended." Notes and Queries. 
 
 LOWERS AND THEIR PEDIGREES. By 
 * GRANT ALLEN, author of "Vignettes of Nature," etc. 
 Illustrated. 121110. Cloth, $1.50. 
 
 No writer treats scientific subjects with so much ease and charm of style 
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 gestive writer. 
 
 '"Flowers and their Pedigrees,' by Grant Allen, with many illustra- 
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 and the book is fascinating to any one who has either love for flowers ot 
 curiosity about them." Hartford Courant. 
 
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 FLAG TO FLAG. A Woman's Adventures 
 and Experiences in the South during the War, in Mexico, 
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 almost to point to a Yankee strain in her blood." The Nation. 
 
 J^ffE HISTORY OF A SLAVE. By H. H. JOHN- 
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 With 47 full-page Illustrations, engraved fac-simile from the 
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 IE MEMOIRS OF AN ARABIAN PRINCESS. 
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 The author of this amusing autobiography is half-sister to the late Sultan 
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 at Hamburg. 
 
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 SKETCHES FROM MY LIFE. By the late Admiral 
 ^ HOBART PASHA. With a Portrait. i2mo. Paper, 50 cents ; 
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 are described with much spirit. . . . The sketches abound in interesting 
 details of the American war." London Athentfum. 
 
 New York : D. APPLETON & CO., i, 3, & 5 Bond Street.
 
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